The Children Return

by Martin Walker

  Cooking familiar dishes came almost automatically to Bruno, so he began talking about Sami as Gilles sat on the high stool by the kitchen counter, taking notes and sipping at his beer. As Bruno mixed an egg, some soft butter and two chopped shallots into the ground pork that would be the stuffing, he described Sami’s life in St. Denis and why Momu had turned to the mosque in Toulouse. He added some nutmeg, salt and pepper, mixed the stuffing together and inserted it into the pigeons. Pamela always maintained the stuffing was the best part whenever she ate roast fowl. Then he reached for the big ham that hung from the beam in the kitchen and carved off four slices, as thin as he could make them. He carved an extra slice, a little thicker, for the expectant Balzac, who wolfed it down and sat back, looking especially appealing as he hoped for more.

  “Whether people at the mosque helped him go to Afghanistan, we don’t yet know,” Bruno said. “But they were responsible for Sami, and they let him down. The schools inspector who gave them a rating of ‘acceptable’ has some explaining to do. Maybe that’s another angle for your story.”

  Bruno began mixing spices and sugar into half a liter of Bergerac red wine as he described Sami’s voyage to Pakistan, and then his brutal treatment at the Peshawar madrassa. He grated lemon zest and ginger into the wine, added a splash of cognac, poured it all back into the wine bottle and replaced the cork. In his head he calculated the timing: thirty minutes for the tarte aux tomates and then another forty minutes when he’d turned down the heat to mark two on the gas stove. The pigeons would need about forty minutes at mark six. Pamela and Fabiola were due in about thirty minutes. Allowing time for drinks and chat, he could make it all work, but he’d cheat a little by using a tin of petits pois.

  He spread the thickened cream and Cantal mixture over the pastry. Then he layered the sliced tomatoes, each one fitting over the next in a long spiral that ended in the center of the pastry. He filled the final hole with some more slices, sprinkled walnut oil and ground some fresh pepper over it all and put it in the oven, setting his timer.

  “Given Sami’s limitations, he’s been enormously helpful,” Bruno told Gilles as he washed his hands. “He’s identified people from photographs at the Toulouse mosque, in Germany and in Abu Dhabi, in Pakistan and in Afghanistan. He remembers every place and date and the names of the terrorists who starved him and whipped him to make him work. The intelligence guys are very happy.”

  “Should you be telling me this?”

  “I’m authorized to say he’s being very helpful and cooperative. And if the Taliban know Sami, they know he’s got an extraordinary memory. That’s why they want to kill him.”

  “Has he told you yet how he escaped?” Gilles asked.

  “Not all the details, but we know when he repaired a radio in a village south of Herat, he heard a news bulletin that said the French were at the Nijrab base in Kapisa, and that’s when he began to think he might escape and get home. Then he says he just slipped out of the village, walked all night, hitched a couple of rides but walked most of the way. One of the soldiers here who served in Afghanistan says autistic people like Sami are seen as holy fools, said to be touched by Allah.”

  “When can I see him?”

  “Tomorrow morning. Will that work for your deadline?”

  Gilles nodded. “That’s great. Given his autism, how well does he express himself?”

  “His speech gets better every day, and he looks better. He’s putting on a bit of weight and seems very glad to be home. But expect very short and simple sentences. I don’t think it will be your usual kind of interview.”

  “Can I quote you by name?”

  “Anything about his life in St. Denis before he went to the mosque, certainly. Anything after that, just call me a French official involved in Sami’s debriefing. You can also meet the American colleague who’s been sitting in on the debriefings, but you’ll have to check with her about sourcing. It might help if you took along a tape of Mozart when you interview him. He loves Mozart, don’t ask me why.”

  “What about this gas explosion they were talking about on the car radio? There were reports of gunfire.”

  “I’ve been tied up with Sami,” Bruno said, shrugging as he loaded plates, cutlery and wineglasses onto a tray. He took them out to the table in the garden, Balzac following hopefully at his heels. Gilles brought his notebook and a bottle of the Bergerac white.

  “What’s going to happen to Sami?” he asked. “Do you know?”

  “Nobody knows. It may depend on the way you write this story,” Bruno replied, opening the bottle. “You’ve got the exclusive, you’ll set the tone. Right now the world knows Sami as the Engineer, the ruthless bomb maker with dozens of dead to his name. You now know it’s a lot more complex than that, but you have to make your own judgment. This may be the most important story you ever write.”

  Gilles was silent, looking away over Bruno’s land and over the woods and ridges into the far distance.

  “Jesus, this is a time when I wish I still smoked cigarettes,” he said, and fell silent. Bruno poured him a glass of wine, but Gilles left it untouched.

  “You probably know that a lot of publications aren’t doing well, but you don’t know that they’re offering buyouts at Paris Match. If too few of us take the money and leave, there will be layoffs. We don’t know how many—ten percent, twenty, maybe more. Advertising is down with the financial crisis, sales aren’t great. That means, I suppose, that I need this story. It could save my job. God knows there aren’t many alternative jobs in journalism these days.”

  “It can’t hurt to have one of the world’s great scoops,” Bruno said, hearing the familiar sound of an underpowered car laboring its way up the steep road to his house.

  Fabiola’s battered Renault Twingo lurched around the final bend and into Bruno’s driveway. Balzac galloped to meet it with his ears flapping almost as if he hoped they would turn into wings and let him take to the air. And once the door on the driver’s side opened, the dog seemed to soar onto the driver’s lap, and Bruno heard Gilles chuckle as they watched Balzac smother Fabiola with affection. He was glad to hear it. So focused had Bruno been on Sami’s story and Gilles’s reaction, he’d forgotten that for Gilles the deeper meaning of this evening was his meeting with Fabiola. Gilles’s fingers were plucking nervously at his shirt collar as if trying to adjust the tie he wasn’t wearing.

  Fabiola walked briskly from the car, a warm smile on her face. She thrust Balzac into Bruno’s arms as she strode straight past him to take Gilles in a strong embrace, her arms locked around his back, her face tucked against his chest.

  “I miss the beard,” she said, a catch in her voice. “And you’re getting too slim. I like you a bit more cuddly.”

  Balzac still in his arms, Bruno leaned forward to kiss Pamela, when she took his face in her hands and kissed him soundly on the lips. “I find all this affection rather catching,” she said, and kissed him again.

  At last, all four of them were sitting in the evening sun with glasses of wine, Balzac scampering from one to the other and squeaking in pleasure. Bruno pointed to the sweaters he’d put out in case the evening turned cool, raised his glass to his friends and rose to head for the kitchen, where his timer had just gone off.

  Bruno turned down the gas, laid a slice of ham over each of the pigeons and slipped the roasting dish onto the bottom shelf of his oven. He took a very dry cabécou goat cheese from his pantry and crumbled it over the top of the tomatoes. He tasted the spiced wine for the pears and decided to add a touch more cognac and ginger before heading back to the table on the terrace, where his friends were talking about Sami.

  “… even if he stays out of prison, Sami is still likely to go into a psychiatric hospital, not because it will do him any good but because that’s the least the politicians and public opinion will accept,” Fabiola was saying, shaking her head in frustration. “He’s Sami, he’s not this monster we call the Engineer.”

  “The point is that Sami is two people,�
� said Gilles. “He’s both Sami, this autistic kid who can’t really be blamed for what he was forced to do, but he’s also the instrument of mass murder. Even if we drop this emotive name he’s still a bomb maker. But from what you’ve been saying, Bruno, Sami is also a third person, an extraordinarily valuable source of intelligence.”

  “Are you saying that compensates for the bombs he made?” asked Pamela.

  Gilles shrugged. “Probably not, but it’s got to be considered.”

  Bruno headed for the kitchen, with a quick detour to the herb garden to pluck some more leaves of basil and one of his lettuces. He washed the lettuce and rinsed it for the salad he’d serve after the pigeons, took the tarte from the oven and shredded some fresh basil on top. He turned up the heat on the pigeons and took the first course out to his friends, where Pamela was lighting the candles and Gilles was opening the bottle of Sincérité.

  “I was just telling Gilles that if he wants Sami to open up you ought to be there,” Fabiola said to Bruno as he joined them. “Maybe you should take Balzac. He loves that little dog.”

  “He’s fond of you as well,” Bruno told her, slicing the tarte. Pamela handed him the plates, each in turn. “At some point the tribunal will need to talk to you as his doctor. Maybe we should both introduce Gilles so Sami knows he’s a friend.”

  Bruno described the two new members of the tribunal. Fabiola perked up at the name of Amira Chadoub, saying she had read a book of hers on psychological issues for immigrants and had been impressed by it.

  “I’ll have the photographer with me as well,” Gilles said.

  Bruno nodded. “I’ll pick you all up at the medical center at ten in the morning. But now let’s enjoy our dinner.”

  “Pastry, cheese and tomatoes, it looks like a French version of pizza, and I smell goat cheese under all this basil,” said Pamela, picking it up like a slice of pizza to eat with her hands and taking a healthy bite. “Mmm, good.”

  “Seemed like a good way to use up some of my tomatoes, since I had so many this year,” said Bruno, and then added thoughtfully, “Maybe next time I should add some onions and a little ham.”

  “Don’t,” said Pamela firmly. “Learn to leave well enough alone. This is perfect just as it is.”

  “I agree,” said Fabiola cheerfully, as if she didn’t have a care in the world. “And you can start cutting me another slice, Bruno.”

  18

  Bruno had ensured that the names of Fabiola, Gilles and his photographer had been put on the approved list to get through the security checks at the château. Even so, they had to show their ID cards, and Freddy’s camera case was thoroughly searched, as was Fabiola’s medical bag. They rolled their eyes when Bruno showed them the sports bag containing broken laptops and junked cell phones that he’d picked up from Florence. Balzac was well enough known that the guards relaxed their stern expressions and grinned at the sight of him. One bent down to pat him and fondle his ears. With a chill, Bruno remembered that one of the special tricks of the Engineer had been to hide bombs inside the roadside corpses of stray dogs.

  Nancy and the brigadier came down the steps together to greet them. Despite the warm September day the brigadier wore one of his usual dark suits and a forced smile, as though not happy to welcome the press but determined to make an effort. Nancy was in the casual pants and sweatshirt that she usually wore around Sami. Perhaps she suspected that more formal dress might change his response to her. Her eyes met Bruno’s, and he felt that frisson again. She gave him a quick smile and then braced herself as Balzac greeted her as an old friend, jumping happily into her arms as she bent to stroke him. Fabiola observed this with interest and then gave Bruno a quizzical look.

  Introductions were made, and the brigadier handed Gilles a bland summary of the facts surrounding Sami, the basis for a planned press release. He gave a copy to Bruno, who read it quickly. There was something mind-numbing about official prose that could turn a profound human drama into lifeless bureaucratic verbiage, thought Bruno, but perhaps that was the point.

  “How long do we have with Sami?” Gilles asked. Freddy already had one camera in hand and another slung around his neck.

  “About an hour,” the brigadier replied. “We don’t want to take too much time from the tribunal. He’s in the garden with his parents, so please follow me.”

  “Here, take the dog,” said Nancy, handing Balzac to Gilles. “Now Sami will know you’re a friend.”

  “Doubly so,” said Fabiola, slipping her hand under Gilles’s arm as they went through a stone archway. It led into a walled garden with a stretch of lawn, fruit trees espaliered against the stone, a long wooden bench and some chairs around a large table of sun-bleached wood laden with coffee and bottles of mineral water. Momu and Dillah were seated and looked up when Sami bounded toward the new arrivals, beaming and calling out, “Fabiola.”

  Balzac squirmed from Gilles’s arms, made the perilous leap to the ground and sprang up to meet Sami’s outstretched arms and start lapping at his neck. Bruno heard the mechanical clicking as Freddy fired off photo after photo. Suddenly Bruno saw Nancy and the brigadier moving quickly toward the flight of stone steps that led up to the balcony, where Bruno saw Deutz standing, his arms crossed, glaring at them all. Nancy reached him first and put a hand on his arm, and the brigadier tried to steer him back inside the building, but Deutz shook them off and Bruno heard angry voices.

  “Who in hell are all these people?” he heard Deutz ask angrily, before the brigadier’s voice cut him off. By now others had noticed the confrontation and Bruno heard Fabiola’s sharp intake of breath, as if bracing herself for something. Sami, intent on Balzac, was oblivious to it all, but Bruno moved at once to block Freddy’s camera, which was now turning toward the balcony scene.

  “That’s not what you’re here to photograph,” he said, keeping his voice low and friendly but taking a firm grip on Freddy’s arm. “The deal is you photograph Sami and his family. The American woman and the brigadier are off limits or I’ll confiscate your camera gear.”

  Gilles, putting his small tape recorder on the table while trying to talk to Sami, seemed not to have noticed this byplay, but Fabiola looked stunned. She stood a moment with her hand to her face, watching the scene on the balcony. The brigadier led Deutz back inside.

  “Are you all right?” Bruno asked her quietly.

  “Fine,” she said harshly, turning away to open her medical bag. She took out a stethoscope and asked Dillah if Sami had been taking the pills she’d given him. Briskly, she donned some surgical gloves and took his pulse, blood pressure and a small sample of blood. Then she asked him to slip off the tracksuit top and used her stethoscope on his chest and back, the occasion for Freddy to photograph the scars on Sami’s back. When Freddy nodded that he was done, Fabiola patted Sami’s shoulder, helped him dress again and sat down again close to Gilles.

  Sami seemed more settled and more open to conversation than when Bruno had last seen him. He responded to Gilles’s questions with whole phrases, even a few complete sentences, rather than in the monosyllables he had used when he first returned. Perhaps the questions, about the whippings and how he had managed his escape and his motives for leaving Toulouse, had become familiar.

  Some of the answers Bruno had not heard before. Sami said he had been woken at night in the Toulouse mosque by his friends, Hamid and Khaled, and taken by car to a bus station. He gave the registration number of the bus and the towns it passed on the way to Germany. Gilles asked if he knew where he was going. Sami said no, but he was happy to be with his friends and he’d been excited to hear that he would be going on a plane.

  What happened to his friends? He had not seen Hamid since Pakistan. Khaled had died after being wounded in Helmand, when an ambush had been prepared using one of Sami’s roadside bombs but the British troops had some kind of radio beam that exploded the bomb before their convoy reached it. Sami said he’d been starved until he devised something that could neutralize the antibomb device.
He took Gilles’s notepad and made a quick but careful sketch of an electrical circuit to show what he had developed. Then he drew another sketch to show how he used a cell phone to detonate a bomb.

  No, he had not lived in a cave, Sami said. He only slept in a cave a few times, when crossing from Pakistan. Usually he and the men he was with stayed in villages, never more than a few days at a time. Once he went to Kabul, and he described the mobile phone shop where he’d stayed while adapting cell phones to become detonators and going through catalogs of electrical goods, marking the ones he would need. Sami gave the shop’s address, the manager’s name and the catalog numbers of the items he’d ordered. Gilles whistled softly as he began to realize just how much intelligence Sami’s extraordinary memory could provide.

  “Don’t use that,” Bruno said. “It’s operational intelligence.”

  Gilles nodded and asked, “What do you want to do now, Sami?”

  “Play with Balzac and Fabiola, swim with Bruno and run with Nancy,” Sami said, and opened his arms as if to embrace them all. “Live with Momu and Dillah and Karim, fix things and hear Mozart.”

  “Tell me about Mozart,” said Gilles. “Where did you first hear his music?”

  “In Pakistan, always Mozart on the playlists. Mozart like math, only liquid, flows like stream in mountains. You know what’s coming, until you get surprised.” He laughed happily. “And always messages on playlists.”

  “Messages?” Bruno asked, suddenly alert.

  “On playlists they send by Internet, iTunes, Spotify, it doesn’t matter,” Sami replied innocently. “Just run acoustics program, see the thick bar, copy it, slow it down, decompress and there’s the message. All encrypted, very secure.”

  Bruno nodded reassuringly and realized Gilles was looking at him fixedly. He must have picked up on the revelation that the jihadists were using playlists to hide their communications. Bruno shook his head at Gilles. This could be too important to be shared with the readers of Paris Match.