by Josh Pachter
“I still don’t understand,” said Roelof Smit. “What about the water?”
Chaudri ticked the points off on his fingers. “The Qatar Causeway is made of concrete. Concrete is mixed with water, pure water—in Bahrain, with sweet water. Nicolaas Sjollema needed money—or wanted money—and he saw a way to amass quite a bit of it. He ordered sweet water for the project, ordered it frequently and in large quantities—I have the dates and amounts right here.” He patted the pocket of his uniform shirt. “But he built the Umm as Hawwak section of the bridge with ordinary tap water, and kept the money he was to have paid out for the sweet water for himself.”
Sjollema sat there, impassive, motionless, silent.
“Then things began to go wrong. A few weeks ago, a Korean laborer named Kim Lee Kwan stole a jug of Mr. Sjollema’s tap water from the site, but Mr. Sjollema caught him in the act. Perhaps Kim tasted the water, and realized that there was a swindle going on. Perhaps he never had the chance: Mr. Sjollema had him on a flight out of Bahrain that very same day. For a while, he must have felt safe again. Then Ebezer Kwaja became suspicious. The Indian was not under Mr. Sjollema’s supervision, so Mr. Sjollema could not get rid of him directly, but he went to you, Mr. Hofstra, with some vague, trumped-up story—”
“He said he’d heard the man was working out a method of siphoning money away from the company.” Hofstra filled in the details dully. “He had no evidence, so I couldn’t come out and make a direct accusation. But since it was Nick, I—I believed him. And I had Personnel let him—Kwaja—go.”
Chaudri drew a breath and went on. “Mr. Sjollema expected that the Indian would be deported, as was Kim Lee Kwan. He hadn’t counted on Kwaja’s having a cousin here who would take over sponsorship of his visa. And, meanwhile, he realized that the Umm as Hawwak section of the bridge would have to be destroyed. Made of concrete mixed with brackish tap water, he knew that it would last only a few years, perhaps half a decade. Then it would collapse—there would probably be loss of life, there would certainly be an investigation, and the truth would be discovered. No, it was better to sneak back out to the islet late at night on the 4th of December, after work, and to set the charges that would rip the structure apart on Sinterklaas, while Sjollema himself was in full view of dozens of impeccable witnesses.”
At last the accused man stirred. “You have no proof,” he said. His voice was flat, emotionless.
“I have your signatures on the purchase orders,” Chaudri replied, “requesting the purchase of thousands of liters of sweet water. And I have Ebezer Kwaja’s signatures, authorizing the monies to be paid to you, rather than directly to a supplier. Which, of course, is why you finally decided that you had to kill him: so he would never reveal what he suspected about your bridge—your ‘baby’—and about your phony purchases of sweet water. Then I have your signatures again, confirming that the sweet water Nederbild paid for was in fact delivered.”
“It was delivered,” Sjollema snarled. “I ordered sweet water, I paid for sweet water, I got sweet water, and I built that roadbed with nothing but pure sweet water. And you can’t prove otherwise, Mr. Chaudri: after the explosion, I had my crew dump every last bit of rubble so far out to sea that you’ll never be able to find it.”
“A clever move,” Chaudri admitted. “But what you do not know, my clever Mr. Sjollema, is that I happened to pick up a small piece of concrete debris when I was out at Umm as Hawwak that day, after you and Lieutenant Smit went back to the fishing dhow. I had it analyzed this morning. And according to that analysis—”
But there was no need for Chaudri to continue. Nicolaas Sjollema put his head in his hands and began to sob.
* * * *
At Roelof Smit’s insistence, they had dinner that night at Mansouri Mansions, where it was possible to eat a Western meal and drink large mugs of foaming Dutch beer.
“So the analysis showed that the concrete had been mixed with tap water,” Smit said, wiping suds from his bushy walrus mustache contentedly, “which was enough to prove Sjollema a crook even without his confession. But there’s one thing I still don’t understand. Right after the explosion, when we rushed out of the mess hall to the beach, I saw him standing there crying, and he was crying real tears. Was he so upset about the destruction of his bridge, even though he’d blown it up himself?”
Chaudri shook his head. “Mr. Sjollema stopped caring about the causeway the day he began building it with worthless concrete. It was not his baby when he killed it, not any more.”
“Then why the tears?” Smit frowned.
Chaudri picked up his hamburger and bit into it hungrily. “You know quite a lot about police work, Lieutenant,” he said, “but you must learn to pay more attention to human beings. Mr. Sjollema planned the blast for a day when no one would be working out at Umm as Hawwak, a day when he could devastate the bridge without hurting any people. Yet he needed to ensure that the contaminated section of the structure would be completely destroyed, so he used a very large amount of explosive. Much more, as it turned out, than was needed.”
“You mean—?” Smit’s face cleared.
“The children,” Mahboob Chaudri nodded. “Sinterklaas cried because he hadn’t meant to hurt the children.”
Afterword
Having lived in Holland from 1979 through 1982, I decided to give Mahboob a case that would take him into Bahrain’s Dutch community. At the time, a Dutch construction company was nearing completion of the most expensive stretch of roadway anywhere in the world, a seven-mile causeway connecting Bahrain to Saudi Arabia, and I decided to blow the bridge up and have Mahboob investigate the crime.
So the story’s original title was “The Saudi Causeway,” and that was the way I sent it to Eleanor Sullivan at Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Eleanor —who’d bought and published all three of my previous Chaudri stories—liked this one, too, but she told me it was far too long for EQMM and asked me to cut it down to about half of its original length.
I suppose I could have done that, but I really didn’t want to, so I asked Eleanor how she’d feel about my submitting it as is to Cathleen Jordan at Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, which had been under independent ownership until 1975, when Davis Publications bought it and made it EQMM’s kid sister. Eleanor graciously agreed, and Cathleen also liked the story—but she was uncomfortable with the idea of my destroying an actual bridge that really existed in the real world, so she asked me to shift the causeway project to another Bahraini location. There’s only one other place where a bridge connecting Bahrain to the mainland could go, though, and that’s why the published version of the story is called “The Qatar Causeway.” (My fictitious construction project is referred to in the story as “the second most expensive stretch of highway in the world,” which was a tip of the hat to the actual Saudi Causeway.)
Often in my fiction, I name my characters after people I know. Here, Emad Rezk, who is named after my ex brother-in-law, makes his second appearance in the series, having first shown up in “The Tree of Life.” Similarly, I knew people in Holland named Merkelijn and Stutje, and I borrowed both of their names for minor characters. I even gave myself my second-ever Hitchcockian cameo. When Mahboob and Dutch policeman Roelof Smit have dinner together at the Star of Paradise, the Dutchman orders a bowl of a well-known Kashmiri dish: beef rogan josh.
When I first started selling my short stories, the sale itself was an incredibly exciting honor for me. As I placed more and more stories in more and more magazines and anthologies, though, the sale itself became—I’m not going to say unexciting, that never happened—but certainly less exciting, and the bigger excitement came at those rare times that my name appeared on the publication’s cover. The first time that ever happened to me was in 1972, when mine was the ninth of ten names listed on the front cover of the September issue of EQMM. I made the cover of EQMM several more times over the next couple of years, but in those days AHMM d
idn’t feature author’s names on its covers. They started to do so when they were bought by Davis, and I was listed second of four names on the cover of the issue containing this story.
Also something of a rarity for me is to see my stories illustrated, but I just love the drawing Jim Odbert did for the first page of “The Qatar Causeway,” and I’m delighted to share it with you here:
One criticism I’ve had regarding this story is that, in its final scene, Roelof Smit is drinking a mug of beer in a restaurant—while “everyone” knows that the serving of alcohol is prohibited in Arabic countries. That prohibition is not, however, absolute. In fact, a running joke when I lived in Bahrain is that the country got its name—which is pronounced Bar-rain—because of all the bars in and around the suq. Mansouri Mansions was in 1982 one of my favorite Manama restaurants, and they did indeed serve big mugs of foamy beer. (According to booking.com, the place still exists, although it’s now called Mansouri Mansions Hotel, and it has “a wine bar and an Irish pub, with billiards and darts.”)
A word about cursing. In English, we sometimes euphemize swear words to tone down their impoliteness, so that “fucking” becomes “fricking” or “frigging” and “Goddammit” becomes “goshdarnit” or “goldangit.” The Dutch do the exact same thing: “Godverdomme” is a very very nasty thing to say, but “getverdemme” and “potverdorie” are socially acceptable variants.
In his Honor Roll at the end of The Year’s Best Mystery and Suspense Stories (Walker and Company, 1987), Ed Hoch acknowledged the work of 66 crime writers. Only nine of those writers had multiple stories on the list, and I was proud to be one of that select group, with both “The Qatar Causeway” and “The Night of Power”—another Chaudri story, which appears later in this collection—singled out for inclusion.
ASU
“And one more thing,” Captain Craft told them. “You’re not in San Diego or Norfolk any more. You’re going to find out right quick that the folks out here have got some different values from the folks back home. When you were stationed stateside, going off base on liberty meant you could loosen up and relax for a while. But when you go out on the economy here, you’ve got to be twice as careful as you are on post. The locals are fine people as a rule, but there are things that might be second nature to you and me which are downright offensive to them. That means no drunkenness, no fights, no wisecracks, and no uniforms.
“You men: I don’t care how hot it gets out there, you wear long pants and a shirt at all times unless you’re on the beach. And you, Miller: no sleeveless tops or low-cut necklines, nothing tight or see-through, and you either wear slacks off base or keep your hemlines at the knee or lower. These people are more modest than you ever thought was possible, and they don’t want to have to look at your uncovered skin.” The captain paused to check his watch. “Well, that about wraps it up,” he said, “unless there are any questions?”
The four new men—one of them, Miller, a woman—exchanged tentative glances. It had been a huge amount of information to absorb at one shot: the briefing had lasted a little more than an hour. The one black sailor in the group half raised his hand.
“Sanders?” the captain recognized him. “Let’s go, mister, sing it out.”
“Well, sir,” the youngster began, “I’m kinda proud to be serving here in the US Navy and all that, you know? So I don’t understand how come we’re not supposed to wear our uniforms when we go off post.”
“Your pride is noted and appreciated, mister. But nobody’s asking you to understand the policy. I am ordering you to remember it, that’s all. Do you understand that?”
Sanders looked stricken, and Craft realized that perhaps he’d been a bit too hard on him. After all, it was the kid’s first day at a brand-new duty station. Maybe he’d better unbend a little, not come across the complete ogre right off the bat. What was the boy’s first name again? Bill? No, that was Garripy, the new postal clerk. Tom, that was it.
“Listen, Tom,” he said more gently, “the local government wants us to keep our military presence here in the emirate as low-key as possible. I’m not sure I understand it, either. Hell, I’m not sure the admiral does, or even the ambassador. But part of the agreement that entitles us to maintain an Administrative Support Unit here in Bahrain, and to dock and fuel our ships out at the Mina Sulman harbor, is that we’re not supposed to flaunt the fact that we’ve got 70-some naval personnel stationed at ASU. And that’s why, any time you go out that gate and into town, the requirement is that you wear your civvies. You with me, son?”
Sanders managed a weak smile. “Yes, sir.”
“Very well.”
The Miller woman shot up a hand.
This one was going to be trouble, Craft thought. He’d felt sure of it the moment he saw her march down the C-130’s boarding ladder out at the airport on Muharraq this morning, strutting her stuff like she owned the damn plane. He was all in favor of equal opportunity and all the rest of it—hell, if a lady service member was willing to go into combat with the men, he didn’t see any reason to stop her—but Miller was going to have to learn that the Middle East was a far cry from the Midwest she’d grown up in, and she was going to have to modify her aggressive behavior a tad if she wanted to make it through her tour of duty here without some serious problems. He nodded at her, and she jumped into her question just as brash as can be.
“Sir,” she said, “I’m a little worried about the possibility of sexual harassment while I’m here. What am I supposed to do if I’m downtown and one of these ragheads starts—”
“Young lady!” the captain roared, and whatever Miller had intended to say died stillborn in her throat. “The piece of cloth our hosts wear on their heads is a ghutra, not a rag, and the men who wear ghutras are known as Arabs. If I hear the word ‘raghead’ out of your mouth again, I can assure you you’ll be much too busy peeling potatoes for the rest of your stay on this island to have to worry about sexual harassment.”
The woman gaped at him, speechless.
“Have I made myself clear?” Craft barked.
“Aye aye, sir!”
“Very well. And in answer to your question, Ensign, in the unlikely event you should ever find yourself in a situation where you feel you are being harassed, you get yourself out of that situation and report the circumstances either to me or to the XO and let us take care of it. But I’ll tell you what, Miller: with your attitude, I don’t think you’ve got much to worry about. Any other questions?”
There were no other questions.
“Very well,” said Captain Craft. “I wish you all an enjoyable year in Bahrain. Dismissed.”
* * * *
“Hey, Sanders, wait up,” a voice behind him called, and when he turned he saw Miller jogging toward him, a bulky canvas carryall banging her hip with every step. She came up to him breathing hard and put a hand on his shoulder to steady herself as she caught her breath. “You heading into town?”
“Name’s Tom,” he said, shifting his leather camera bag out of her way. “Yeah, I figured I’d take me a little look around. Captain really chewed you out back there.”
“You, too. I guess he doesn’t much care for women or blacks, huh?”
“He’s not so bad, I guess. Just runs a tight ship, that’s all. I seen worse. What’s your name?”
She brushed the question aside. “Miller’s fine. You mind if I come along with you?”
“Suit yourself. But I can’t go calling you Miller. My stepdaddy’s name’s Miller. What’s your first name?”
“Oh, hell.” She shrugged. “It’s Dolly. My damn name’s Dolly.”
The boy smiled. “Dolly. That’s a fine name. Pleased to meet you, Dolly.”
She smiled back at him, and they shook hands solemnly.
As they approached the thin wooden railing that separated the base from the outside world, a small man in an unfamiliar olive-green uniform stepped
out of the guard shack next to the barrier.
“Good afternoon,” he greeted them pleasantly. His English was lightly accented, and his lively chocolate eyes regarded them with friendly interest.
“Hello, yourself.” Sanders returned the smile. “How come they got a Bahraini soldier here on the gate instead of a US Marine or somethin’?” He pronounced the word “BAH-rainy,” putting the emphasis on the wrong syllable and missing out on the gutteral hr most Westerners had so much trouble with.
“I am Pakistani,” the man explained, “not Bahraini—and a police officer, not a soldier. The Bahraini government’s Public Security Force supplies the guards for this gate, and most of us on the force come from Pakistan. In other countries, your own men stand the watch?”
“Men and women,” Dolly Miller corrected him. “Aren’t there any women on your security team?”
“No, I’m afraid we have no women—not in uniform, at any rate. This is an Islamic country, and such positions are held only by men.”
Miller seemed about to express her opinion of a system that excluded half its population from any type of position, but her companion cleared his throat.
“We were gonna stroll into town for a while,” said Sanders, “look around a bit. Can we go on through?”
“You are new here,” the Pakistani deduced. “Welcome to Bahrain. You will find it’s rather longer than a stroll from here to Manama, especially in this heat.” He nodded at the line of a half dozen red-and-white cabs parked beyond the wooden railing, their drivers—all in flowing thobes and checkered ghutras—lounging in a circle on the cracked sidewalk, conversing lazily in liquid Arabic. “You will enjoy yourselves much more if you take a taxi. And most certainly you may pass through—today and tomorrow, at any rate. But I will have to ask you to open up your camera bag and your purse for a moment before you go.”
“Why’s that?” asked Miller. “And what happens after tomorrow?”