The Intern Affair (11 page)

Ghali
had an arm around her shoulders. Again, Talya felt secure.
She thought of how different she had felt with
Alhassan
.
It had been all passion with him.
They fought so much, they argued about everything, it seemed, and yet Talya loved him, or so she thought.

She was deep in thought when
Ghali
stopped her in front of a
jewellery
store.
The glittering jewels in the window, the bracelets, the rings, all those stones—she saw the little
jeweller
at the Artisan’s Market in
Dakar
….

Ghali
was saying, “Which one do you prefer?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, there is a blue ring I rather like, what about you, which one would tickle your fancy?”

“I don’t know about ‘tickling my fancy’.” Talya smiled at her
precious
friend—much more precious to her than all of the stones she was seeing in the window. “I rather like the amethyst … it’s pretty.”

“Yes, and what about that bracelet?
Do you like that?” He
pointed to
a gold heavy chain-like piece set apart from the others.

“Sure, it’s beautiful, but I wouldn’t buy it for me. I don’t particularly like bracelets. I don’t know why; I never did.”

“Why?”

“Oh, I don’t know,
Ghali
. I don’t like to see them on my wrist I guess.” Suddenly an image flashed before Talya’s eyes—manacles!
Why would I think of manacles?

Ghali
saw the odd look on her face. “What’s the matter?
What did you see?”

“Nothing, nothing… Let’s go back, it’s getting cold.” She was pleading for
Ghali
to take her away from the
jeweller’s
window.

“Sure, let’s go and have coffee at the hotel, do you want to?”

“Good idea, maybe they have some of their after-dinner biscuits.”

“Oh, I see my friend is still hungry is she?”

“No, not really, I just love their biscuits.”

“Okay then, let’s find you some biscuits.”

“And a Turkish coffee.” She smiled.
I love Turkish coffee.

“And where would we find a Turkish coffee in
Victoria
, pray tell?”

“I don’t know, but the espresso from the hotel’s lounge will do perfectly well, thank you.”

“Okay, let’s get going then. You’re right, it’s getting cold.”

As they arrived at the hotel, an old brownstone house, Talya had a glimpse at the one stone block, which was slightly protruding
from
beside
the doorframe, and she saw the image of a manacle, encircling a wrist, clamped into a stonewall.
She was terrified.
The picture had been more precise, more vivid.
She put a hand to her mouth to prevent a scream escaping from it.

“Talya, what’s the matter?”
Ghali
saw her face turn as white as a sheet.

She hadn’t seen
Kareef
, or a ghost even, but an image of something Talya knew horribly well.

13

“
Mansur
!
How are you?”
Alhassan
said when he and Samir entered their friend’s office.

Mansur
stood up to welcome the two men.

Samir salaamed to their host saying, “
Mr. Dillon
, it is a real pleasure for this servant to seeing you again.”

“The pleasure is all mine, Samir.
Alhassan
, how are you?”

“I’m fine, thank you.”

“Please sit down.”
Mansur
indicated the chairs opposite his desk and sat down again.
His attitude was cold and almost dismissive.
Alhassan
wondered why.

“As I’ve mentioned on the phone,”
Alhassan
began, “we are interested in knowing what was in the background report you’ve got on Talya,” rapidly getting to the purpose of their visit.

“Wait for a moment.” Samir held up a hand. “Don’t you think we should tell
Mr. Dillon
why
we’re asking him to do this first?” He glanced reprovingly at
Alhassan
.

“Yes, I’m sorry, but time—”

“Save it,
Alhassan
! I got a call from
Sir Reginald
last night and I know a little of what may be behind your questions.
Talya isn’t coming back soon if we can’t get at the bottom of her illness, right?”

“In short, yes.
But why would
Sir Reginald
call you about it?”
Alhassan
was surprised to learn that the Canadian Ambassador in
Senegal
was involved with their problem once again.

“That’s another story.
But let’s see what we can do about getting you the answers you seek. However, in order to answer your questions, I had to look at the report myself.
I have it here.” He put a hand on a folder in front of him.

“Can we see it?”

“No,
Alhassan
. The less people read this the better it will be.”
Mansur
wasn’t ready for
Alhassan
to become unduly worried (or worse) about the content of the report.

“Okay, okay.
Then I’ll ask the first question. When and where did she go to school?”

“Let’s see…”
Mansur
opened the folder and read from what appeared to be the second page of a sheaf of tightly typed foolscap sheets of papers. “We’re talking
many
years ago, for some four years, at the Lycée de Conakry.”

“Was it a Muslim school?”
Samir inquired.

“Very much so … but I should tell you that a note has been added to it only recently.”
Mansur
went back to look at the report—presumably to read the notation. “It says here that she only attended half a term during her third year of attendance—no reason given.”

“Anything else?”
Samir seemed anxious to prod for answers.

“No, apart from the fact that the school was a boys’ only school and that her father obtained a dispensation from the minister for her to attend the courses given at that particular establishment.”

“That’s interesting,”
Alhassan
remarked. “There should be a record of that dispensation in the archives and maybe there is something about her absence from school.”

“Under normal circumstances, I would agree,”
Mansur
said. “But we’re talking Guinée under the reign of Sékou Touré, and since his assassination, most of the archives have been destroyed.
People wanted to erase all memories of this alleged tyrant from their records.”

“Do you mean there is no way of finding out what happened to her at that time?”

“I’m afraid so.”
Mansur
closed the folder.

“I have another question, M
r. Dillon
; did she complete her education at that school, or did she leave beforehand for some other reason?” Samir asked.

“I don’t have to look at the report for that, we know for a fact that she received a high school diploma from that school which was subsequently ratified by the Belgian government a year after her return to
Brussels
. More than that I can’t tell you.”

Samir rose. “We’re very grateful for your time, and I think we should leave you to your duties now.”

“But—”
Alhassan
wanted more.

“No,
Alhassan
, we have what we came for; an approximate time and a place.
Now it’s up to us to find out the rest.”

“All right,”
Alhassan
said resentfully, getting up.
“
Mansur
, will you be at home tonight?”

“Inshallah,
Alhassan
.”

Driving back toward town
Alhassan
could no longer contain his curiosity.

“Why did you want to leave so quickly?
Mansur
could have given us a name or an address perhaps and—”

“You haven’t listened have you? You’re still taking everyone’s words at face value, don’t you?”

“Yes, from
Mansur
, I would anytime, why?”

“It’s the way
Mansur
talked, or what he couldn’t say, which made me leave.”

“But he read everything from the report—”

“No, he didn’t—”

“But we saw him—”

“No,
Alhassan
!
You see but you don’t observe.
Let’s go to the Paillotte again and I’ll tell you what I think happened.”

“
Mansur
is my best friend; he wouldn’t fabricate any stories for anyone’s benefit, even for mine.”

Samir made no comment.
His jaw was clenched.
Something bothered him.

As they did the previous Saturday, both men went to sit on the lounge chairs in one of the little grassy nooks, where the waiter soon brought them some tea.

“All right, Samir, what is it that I didn’t observe?”

Alhassan
’s abruptness surprised Samir a little. “It’s not that simple.
P
eople have a way of saying one thing in a very different manner, depending on who’s asking the questions or who’s answering them. You obviously know about that.
As an attorney, you must have heard the difference hundreds of times.”

“Yes I have.
But when it comes to
Mansur
he is an open book, and I would trust anything he says, in what ever way it would come out of his mouth.”

“I understand that, and I can assure you I lay no blame on him.
He is a respectable man but he couldn’t tell us what we needed to know.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just this; when he read the notation about Talya missing a whole term at school, he said and I quote: “no reason given.”
I don’t believe that to be the case.”

“I’m sure if there had been a reason he would have told us.”

“Not necessarily. There might not have been anything written down, but I’m sure there was some sort of indication, in the margin maybe, that would have told him not to divulge any more than what he told us.”

“If that’s the way you felt, why didn’t you ask him about it?”

“But I did,
Alhassan
, and if you recall he brushed me off…, and because you did.”

“I did? How?”

“You asked him about the archives in
Conakry
, and he was very quick in deterring you from looking into the matter any further.”

“Don’t you think you’re stretching his words a little too far?”

“No, I don’t, but all of that is not important.
The fact is that I’m sure we are not supposed to open that book.
The story behind the missing term at school could only be told by one person.”

“You mean Talya?”

“Yes.
Her father is no longer alive to tell us, and I’ve never heard Talya utter a word about her mother.
That’s another thing that troubled me, when I was with her in
Dakar
.
Almost every child on this earth will speak of its mother, but not Talya.
It is as if she had never existed.”

“Yes, I noticed that, but I never paid much attention to the fact.
The only time I heard her speak of someone other than her father was when she told me that she was divorced.”

“Ha-ha! That’s another interesting factor in the equation.
Did she ever say why she was divorced?”

“No.
She only said that the last time she had loved someone it ended up in divorce.”

“Did you hear what you’ve just said?”

“No, what?
I just quoted you what she told me.”

“Yes you did, but you had not listened to the words. She said,
“The last time I loved someone it ended up in divorce”.
”

“So what?”

“
Alhassan
, open your ears will you?
It means she has never loved or dared to love since the
last time
it happened
.
To me it means that Talya is afraid of loving you.
She doesn’t want your relationship or marriage—if there is marriage to happen between you two—to end up in divorce.”