“Remember, my dear, you must think of a question while you drink.” Huda offered another counterfeit smile. “You can ask yourself, will I take a journey soon? Are there any adventures coming up in my life?”
“Adventure?” Ally frowned. “Not likely.”
“It sounds like you need a holiday. You should take a trip to Jordan.”
“I’ve got to admit, I’ve been thinking about taking a little break from Baghdad.” Ally paused and lowered her voice. “The problem is, with all this tension with Washington, some of the other embassies are starting to withdraw nonessential staff. If I go, the bureaucrats in Canberra could decide to keep me out too. After all, I’m the poster child for nonessential.”
“Don’t say that,” said Huda quickly. “You deserve a little holiday. You like scuba diving, yes? You should go to the Red Sea. You can see a whale shark there.”
“I don’t know.”
“They have some lovely spas too. You could really relax.”
“I’m worried if I go, I won’t be able to come back. Maybe in a few months, when things calm down . . .” She raised her coffee, gulped the last few mouthfuls, then slid her cup across the desk.
“Okay, my dear,” said Huda. “First, you must take your cup and saucer back in your hand. Do you remember? Follow what I do.”
Ally copied Huda’s motions, slipping the saucer on top of the cup and swirling the pieces at her chest.
“Careful now,” said Huda.
She flipped the china upside down. Ally held her breath and did the same. Her cup slipped sideways, squealed like a tiny mouse. Ally caught it with her fingertips and slid it back into place.
“Now,” said Huda, “close your eyes. Forget about everything but the question you want answered. Put that at the center of your mind.”
After waiting a few minutes, Huda broke the seal between Ally’s cup and saucer, and turned the cup upright. In places, the congealed grounds rippled like tides. In others they were pockmarked with craters. Huda’s pupils widened: three signs stood out, clear as day.
“What’s that?” Ally sat forward and pointed at a grainy squiggle. “Is that a snake?”
Huda ransacked her mind for the most convincing lie.
“You won’t believe this.” She faked a chuckle. “But there is clearly a sea or an ocean in your future.” She pointed at two grainy puddles. “See, it is parted down the middle, like the Red Sea before the Prophet Moses.”
Huda flicked her finger toward a blob of grinds.
“Look here,” she said. “This is a sign for your home, your family life.” She made a show of scanning the grounds, taking her sweet time, like her grandmother taught her. She clucked a couple of times, then shook her head. “I don’t think you need worry about anyone keeping you apart from Mr. Tom. I see no sign of that here. You can see for yourself: the grounds have formed a small mound; they are rounded. That means contentment.”
From under her lashes, she watched Ally lean a little closer. Huda pointed at the saucer.
“And look here—this line is a road. It’s the sign of a journey. I’m not kidding, my dear, this is what your cup says.” She leaned back in her chair, like she was reclining on a sandy beach. “Even the coffee grounds say you deserve a nice holiday at the Red Sea. After that, you will come home refreshed to your husband.”
Ally smiled half-heartedly.
“You said while I drank my coffee, I should focus on the questions I wanted answered. But I wasn’t thinking about a vacation.” She pushed the cup away and stood up to leave. “I was thinking about my mother.”
As soon as Ally said goodbye and disappeared down the hall, Huda snatched up the cup. The three signs were still there. At the base, a tower. On the side, a snake. By the handle, the sword. Huda looked away, took a deep breath, and then eyed the cup again. Tower. Snake. Sword. Loud as a scream at midnight.
* * *
Huda left the old nurseryman at the top of the riverbank on Eighty-Second Street, staring morosely at the currents braiding midstream. She ducked under the shade cloth and hurried past a row of potted fruit trees, back toward her car. Huda’s chest felt tight, and when she put her hand to her heart, she saw that the shade cloth had patterned her skin like a henna talisman painted by her grandmother’s hand.
Huda wished she could hide herself in the soft folds of her grandmother’s robe and listen to the old woman divine a way forward, chart a path through the dangers ahead. Her grandmother would have understood straightaway the signs in Ally’s coffee cup. The tower: a secret leaked to an enemy. The snake: betrayal by a friend. The sword: death, of course.
At first Huda thought the message in the grounds was sickeningly clear—if she and Rania betrayed Ally and traded her secrets for their children’s safety, the girl would end up dead. But Ally had said she was thinking of her mother while she sipped her coffee, and Huda suddenly remembered the faded photo of Yusra, the nurse whose home had been bulldozed. The young woman’s face kept coming back, and Huda had wondered, Was this the message of the tower, the snake, and the sword?
Huda’s grandmother would have been wise enough to understand the symbols. In any case, she wouldn’t have done what Huda just did: force the truth from the nurseryman’s wrinkled lips with a combination of threats and bribery. Stick and carrot. It had worked for Abu Issa, why not for her? Huda trudged from under the shade cloth, trading the humid shadows for sunlight, clear and sharp as diamonds.
She glanced over her shoulder. The nurseryman still hadn’t moved from the riverbank. Huda wondered, was he eyeing the money she’d given him the same way she did when Abu Issa slipped cash into her palm, like it was a scorpion that might turn and bite? The venom was still in her veins, because a moment later she found herself wondering, how much would the mukhabarat pay for news of a traitorous nurse and her connection to Ally? Enough to afford Khalid freedom?
The nurseryman told her that Ally had been back here too, just yesterday. When he spotted her pulling up in a taxi—no doubt driven by Hatim—the old man hid inside a lean-to of corrugated tin where he stored his tools, fertilizer, and pesticide. He stayed there until she gave up and slouched away, clutching that faded photograph in her hand.
“Why does she want to stir up trouble?” he’d asked Huda. “And why the hell do you?”
Huda pulled her head scarf over her hair and hurried away from the nursery. She didn’t want anyone on Eighty-Second Street noting down her number plate, so she’d parked on the rise overlooking the masgouf restaurant and its bobbing pontoon. She’d even stopped by the kitchen and told the cook she was thinking of bringing a friend for lunch of roasted fish, building the lie she’d use if the mukhabarat came calling, demanding explanations.
She hurried to the Corolla and slid into the driver’s seat. A long, low sedan sailed past. Huda’s heart stopped mid-beat. The driver had the Bolt Cutter’s blocky profile. He turned toward her. Huda saw blue eyes, not brown. His lips were thin, unlike the Bolt Cutter’s fleshy red mouth. But he had the same carp-eyed stare. Huda trembled as she pulled the belt over her shoulder and turned the key in the ignition.
* * *
Huda’s heels clacked rapidly across the sidewalk outside Rania’s house. She rang the bell at the copper gate, then huddled by the wall, folding in on herself like a card player closing a bad hand. When Rania finally opened the locks, Huda squeezed past her without waiting for an invitation and hurried toward the garden.
“What’s going on?” Rania scurried after her.
“I think I was followed.”
“Here? Now?”
“I saw a brown Cadillac behind me an hour ago over near the river. I spotted it again on the expressway.” Huda’s pulse throbbed at her wrist. “I think I saw the same car just a few minutes ago on al-Kindi Boulevard, so I parked and went into the souk. I snuck out the alley behind the market and came here on foot.”
“What if they saw you?” Rania’s gaze flicked toward Hanan’s bedroom on the second floor. “What if they
come here? What do we tell them?”
“We say we’re old friends.” A blush crept across Huda’s cheeks. “Friends from childhood.”
“Why have you come, anyway?” said Rania. “Did you convince Ally to leave? Has she applied for an exit visa?”
Huda shook her head.
“She’s not interested. So I lodged an application for her.”
“You what?”
“I filled out the form for an exit visa and forged her husband’s signature. Apparently you’re not the only artist here.”
Huda checked the path to the gate. Her ears strained for the rumble of an approaching car or the flat buzz of the bell.
“I’m supposed to meet with Kareem tomorrow,” said Rania.
“I don’t like this plan.” Huda’s nerves fizzed like a length of burning fuse. “If Ally hasn’t left by the time the regime finds out she’s American, they might—”
“I told you already.” Rania cut her off. “In that case, we call the embassy with an anonymous tip. She’ll have enough time to make a run for the border, or she can take refuge inside the embassy. She’ll be safe enough.”
“I can’t have her blood on my hands.”
“Don’t be dramatic. That’s not going to happen,” said Rania. “If you want to back out, that’s your choice. But I’ll do whatever I need to do to keep Hanan safe.”
Huda straightened her shoulders.
“I’ve got a new plan,” she said. “And if it works, we won’t have to sell our souls to the mukhabarat or to Kareem and the cleric.”
Rania eyed her skeptically.
“So what is it?”
“It came to me at the river, after I talked with a nurseryman.” In her mind’s eye, Huda saw dregs of coffee stretching out like the dark side of the moon. “It turns out, Ally has more secrets than she even dreamed.”
CHAPTER 23
While Huda locked her car, Ally waited at the top of the riverbank and inhaled the aroma of roasting fish drifting from the kitchen of the masgouf restaurant. Below, the Tigris rippled south, the crests of its milky-tea waters waving at the sun. Ally shaded her eyes and watched the shadow of a cloud sail across the river, climb the opposite bank, and vanish from view.
“We’re not the only ones at the restaurant this time.” Ally turned to Huda and pointed out the silhouette of a lone diner seated on the bobbing pontoon.
Huda smiled tightly and started down the zigzagging steps.
“Tom told me you took a day off,” Ally called after her. “But I didn’t realize you had organized another masgouf lunch. How long have you been planning this?”
“It was a last-minute idea, my dear.”
Ally scanned the quiet riverside, then followed Huda down the pebbled bank. Nimble even in heels, Huda made it to the water’s edge first and disappeared under the awning. Ally hurried across the ramp.
“Wait up. I’m not as fast—” She paused as the pontoon swayed, feeling the river rush beneath her feet. The diner she’d glimpsed earlier swiveled toward her.
“Welcome, dear.” Rania adjusted a pale scarf over her hair. “Please, sit and join us. I ordered a round of Pepsi.”
“Rania, this is a surprise. . . .” Ally’s eyes flicked from Rania to Huda and back again. The two women were blank as freshly painted walls. “What are you doing here?”
“Don’t worry,” said Rania.
“Join us,” said Huda.
Ally hesitated. She felt like an addict who’d just walked into an intervention.
“Please, sit.” Rania patted the bench beside her. “We have a favor to ask you.”
“A favor?” said Ally.
Huda and Rania traded glances. Ally slid warily onto the picnic bench.
“I guess this favor involves more than a cup of sugar?”
Rania and Huda laughed sharply. The sound reminded Ally of breaking glass.
“It’s about Khalid,” said Huda.
“Is he skipping school again?” Ally shook her head ruefully. “I’m sorry, I opened a can of worms with that one.”
“I’m glad you told me, but that is not it. I mean, it’s not . . .” Huda trailed off.
“This involves Hanan too,” said Rania.
“A favor for your kids?” The tension in Ally’s shoulders eased a little. “Sure, I’d be happy to help. What would you like me to do?”
Huda leaned across the table.
“Khalid and Hanan need to leave Iraq. And we need you to get them out.”
Ally sat very still as shock flooded her system.
“You’re kidding, right?”
Huda stared at her. Her pupils were so wide Ally feared she might fall in.
“The secret police are going to put Khalid in the fedayeen.”
“The fedayeen?” Ally gasped. “Uday’s militia?”
“They’ll turn Khalid into a monster, a murderer. I can’t let that happen.”
Rania inched toward Ally.
“And Uday’s friends want to take Hanan to his palace.” She leaned closer and put her mouth near Ally’s ear. “Did you know, Uday keeps a pack of wild dogs in a cage? And when he’s done with a girl, sometimes he lets the dogs tear her to pieces.”
A pebble rolled down the slope. The waiter trudged down the steps toward the pontoon. The women’s huddle dissolved. Huda and Rania pasted on smiles. Ally busied herself with her handbag, needlessly rifling through pockets and unzipping zips, while the blood drained from her face.
The waiter clattered across the ramp, balancing a tray with three small bottles of Pepsi and a bucket of ice. He set three glasses on the picnic table and ladled out ice cubes with a small set of tongs. The river surged for a moment. The waiter paused, cube halfway to glass, and softened his knees like he was surfing. Ally faked a smile.
After the waiter left, Huda and Rania explained their plan and what would happen if she didn’t save their children. Each new horror crashed on Ally like a wave, one on top of the other, so fast she didn’t have time to catch her breath. The women swayed on their benches, while the Tigris pulsed below, moving relentlessly south, immune to the desperation of those struggling on its surface.
“I’d like to help, I really would,” stuttered Ally. “But it’s too dangerous. Tom will never agree. I can’t do it.”
“Yes, you can.” Rania gripped her hand. “You tell Tom you are going to Jordan for a holiday. Huda already has the exit permit for you. She will use the embassy Land Cruiser to drive you out of the city. I will meet you at Lake Habbaniyah with the children. They will get in the vehicle with you, and then you drive straight to the border.”
“What about the embassy? They’ll notice a missing vehicle.”
“I will change some travel orders,” said Huda. “And I know where the keys for the vehicles are kept. You don’t need to worry about that.”
“Please, listen,” said Rania. “After Lake Habbaniyah, you simply keep going until you near the Jordanian border. Then you turn off the road and drive due north. Five miles later turn east and keep on going until you cross the border. ”
Ally glanced up the riverbank, at the waiter sitting near the firepit, puffing on a cigarette like it was just another ordinary day. How was that possible? she asked herself. Couldn’t he feel the earth shifting beneath them?
“Let me get this straight,” she said. “You want the kids to go with me, while you and Huda return to Baghdad?”
“I can’t leave until Allah decides to gather my mother to his side.” Rania took a shaky breath. “And if anyone asks about Hanan, I’ll say I’ve sent her to Basra. Uday is summering at his northern palace, so with luck, it’ll be a month or more before he bothers trying to hunt her down. By then, God willing, I’ll have the money to join her in Jordan.”
Huda cleared her throat. “I would take the children myself, but my absence would be noticed immediately by the mukhabarat.”
“I don’t understand why the mukhabarat are targeting you, Huda.”
“I work for the embassy
.” She sighed. “Also, I am friends with you, a foreigner.”
Bile rose in Ally’s throat. She’d always suspected their friendship put Huda at risk, but Khalid and Hanan were only children, innocent in all of this. A voice inside her whispered, What would the regime do to an American journalist who lied her way into the country and tried to smuggle Iraqis out? She thought back to the reporter arrested in Baghdad and branded a spy. She could see his battered body, like it was right in front of her, dangling from a rope.
“If you can’t deliver the children to Amman,” said Rania, “then take the detour near the border and let the kids cross on foot by themselves. They will have some money, water, and food. Then you can return to the highway and exit at the official border checkpoint. You will cross the border legally. And the side trip will cost you an hour or two at most.”
“An hour or two,” said Huda. “That’s all it will take to save our children. Surely that’s not too much to ask?”
Ally fumbled for a reply. She felt strangely numb, as if she were outside her own body, watching herself at the picnic table, pale as sand, fingernails digging into her palms.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry.”
Huda and Rania traded glances. Huda trained her eyes on Ally, like she was reading the fine print on her soul.
“I have something to show you,” she said.
* * *
Ally trailed Huda past a row of potted geraniums into the mottled shade of the nursery on Eighty-Second Street.
“What are we doing here?” Ally glanced over her shoulder. The nurseryman was back by the gate, nervously plucking at his dishdasha, head swiveling left and right. “Did you pay him to keep lookout? Is that what the money was for? Don’t tell me he knows about this too?”
Huda shook her head, then beckoned Ally on.
“It’s not far away.”
Ally hesitated.
“I don’t like this.”
“You want to know about your mother, right? And her friend?”
When the Apricots Bloom Page 24