“And Feisal doesn’t. Nor does Halib. Don’t look so surprised, I know what that house is like. Anyway, thanks for trusting her.”
“She’s very persistent.”
“She knew what I wanted, you see. Getting me what I want matters so much to her. Did she tell you she was my housekeeper? She’s my oldest friend: a friend who happens to keep my house.”
Now he turned to look her full in the face. “We’d have come even if Azizza had been a dragon.”
“Because you wanted to know if anyone could really be as horrible as they described me?”
When he laughed she found herself liking him more.
“Well, I’m worse,” she said.
“So I see.”
Now it was her turn to laugh. Robbie plucked her arm. “Would you like to see a drawing?” he asked.
“Your drawing?”
He nodded solemnly.
“I’d love to.”
“I have to draw it first.”
Azizza was hovering in the doorway. Now Celestine beckoned her over. “Robbie needs paper and some crayons. Do you think we have any?”
Azizza did not refer to the assortment of paints, toys, games, puzzles, and books that the two women had been accumulating ever since they first got wind of the Raleighs’ visit. Instead, she pretended to consider it.
“I think so,” she said, after a pregnant pause, during which Robbie gazed at her in anguish. “Let’s go see.”
Celestine gave the boy a little push, and he ran off to join Azizza, who took his hand and led him inside. A moment later, however, she reappeared, carrying two glasses and a frosted green bottle.
“He’s happy,” Azizza said. “I left him on the floor of Leila’s old bedroom. There’s a lot of space there.”
“Good. Thank you, Izza. Do you know this wine, Colin? It’s called Ksara.”
He accepted a glass, raising it in a toast to both Celestine and Azizza before he drank.
“Yes, I know it. A wonderful wine. We must take some back with us.”
“Are you looking forward to going home?”
His hesitation was somehow expressive. “We’ve been well looked after,” he said diplomatically. “Well protected.”
“Ah. Colin, I hope you can understand about Beirut. It’s like one big party. Do what you like, spend what you can, use any language, we all speak everything. The only price we pay is to beat war the whole time.”
“Rather an expensive price.”
“Oh, there’s hardly any killing at the moment. We’ve almost united against the outsider, you see.” Celestine made a wonderful face. “The Palestinians.”
“You’re not fond of them, I take it?”
“I’m sorry for them. How not? But I don’t want them here. They don’t pay for the telephone or the electricity they use—did you know that?”
Colin sipped his wine, saying nothing.
“If they stay, they’ll cause a real war. With Israel. Then we’re finished.” She waited for his reaction. “You don’t agree?”
He was obviously weighing his words. When they came, they were not what she’d expected.
“I don’t agree with anybody, actually: Palestinians, Jews.”
“Israelis.”
He stared at her.
“You said Jews when you meant Israelis. Go on.”
“Sorry.” But she could see he didn’t begin to understand. “Anyway … I’ve read up the politics, a little. Kind of complicated.”
“No, simple. But depending which side you’re on, totally different.”
“Doesn’t that worry you? The polarity, I mean.”
She shrugged. “We, this family, are nominally Shia Muslims. I say ‘nominally,’ because our ID cards say we’re Shiites so that’s what we are. And yes, to forestall your question—of course we resent the way the Maronite Christians lord it over us. The ‘polarity,’ as you call it. But there are ways of coping.”
“Such as?”
“Such as making sure that we take our two percent from every deal the Christians make. And keeping the Levantine spirit alive.” Celestine folded her hands in her lap. “Colin, we have our friends, people we feel we can do business with, often the same people. Greek Catholic, Jew, Maronite, Druze—what does it matter? The politicians say it matters.” Another of her fancy shrugs. “Bully boys, assassins, men who couldn’t get a decent job if forced to it…. Isn’t it the same in England? Do you listen to your politicians? Anyway, enough: I didn’t invite you to this house to be tiresome on the subject of your wife’s politics.”
He didn’t feel the sting of her last remark at once. When it dawned, his face flushed an even deeper shade of red. “You think I’m just parroting Leila?”
But before she could tell him what she thought, Robbie ran out of the house, trailing a sheet of paper behind him and calling, “Daddy … Celestine!”
“What is it, sweetie?” she cried. “Come show the queen of Yarze what you’ve done.”
Robbie hauled himself up onto the sofa swing and smoothed the paper into her lap.
“Gracious!”
The exclamation was forced out of Celestine, substituted in the nick of time for something less polite. He had used dramatic blocks of color to create a representation of a sprightly lady in a kaftan recognizable as the one she was wearing today. Her cheeks had, for some reason, turned blue, and she wondered if her hands could ever really be that peculiar mauve color, but the striking thing about this portrait was the way the lines coalesced to make an identifiable human face—through all the childish muddle, it was so clearly her.
“May I keep this?” she asked softly. “Please.”
He sat hunched forward, elbows on knees and his chin cupped in his hands. “If you want.”
She folded it into four, then tucked it between one of the cushions and the side of the swing. Later she was to transfer it to her handbag, wherein it would travel the world until, years afterward, it fell apart, its folds creased and recreased by so many inspections whenever Celestine needed reassurance that she had blue cheeks and mauve hands and so, to one young person in the world at least, was real.
Azizza brought tea and cakes for the boy. While he munched away, Celestine continued to study him, sometimes looking shrewdly at his father.
“He’s like you above the nose, and Leila below.”
“That’s what everyone says. I can’t see it, myself.” “
Who do you think he takes after, then? Someone on your side?”
Colin shook his head. He seemed reluctant to answer. At last he said, quietly enough to be sure Robbie wouldn’t overhear, “I thought I could see a touch of Halib in him. The eyes.”
Celestine sucked in her lower lip. “Oh.”
“Listen, it’s not my wife’s politics that I spout. Or rather—”
“She speaks the words, but they start with someone else.” “
Halib.”
“And their father. Yes, Colin, I know.” She raised a hand from her lap and shook it at him. “Be careful.”
“You think they’re dangerous?”
“I do. Remember, Beirut crackles with danger! Feisal works on the hottest part of the grid and Halib worships him. How do they treat you?”
“Okay.” Colin wasn’t looking at her. His eyes followed Robbie as the little boy trotted away to inspect some flowerbeds, with Azizza in tow. Celestine saw the anguish in his gaze and felt her guts clench.
“You’re worried for the boy, aren’t you?”
“Not exactly worried …”
“What then?”
“It’s just … Feisal’s rages. When he loses his temper … one minute all smiles, the next … look, I really shouldn’t be talking to you like this.” He managed a smile. “Excuse me.”
“Because I’m his mother? Forget it! Has he threatened you?”
“No.”
He stood up and turned his back on her, seeking the child. Celestine stared down at her hands, wretchedly wondering how to retrieve the situat
ion. Hearing raised voices, she looked up to see Colin over by the grove of fig trees, grasping Robbie’s arm while Azizza looked on in disapproval. Father and son were arguing.
“I don’t want to go home,” Robbie cried.
Celestine rose and approached them as quietly as she knew how.
“Mummy’s at home,” Colin said. His voice was low but taut; she could tell that he was focusing all his patience on the boy, determined at any cost to avoid that most British of all diseases: embarrassment.
“I don’t want Mummy, I want Celestine.”
Don’t rush in, she warned herself; it’s not your business.
“We can’t stay here forever, Robbie.” The first hint of petulance crept into Colin’s tone. “Be reasonable.”
“Please, Daddy.” Robbie rubbed his eyes. “Don’t make me go back. Mummy can come up here.”
“She can’t.”
“She can, she can, she can!”
Robbie burst into a fit of sobbing. Celestine clenched her hands underneath her thighs, ground her teeth, and remained silent. Colin squatted down beside the boy, grasping his shoulders.
“It’s all right, darling. Don’t cry. Here, Daddy’s got a handkerchief.”
He wiped Robbie’s eyes before sweeping him up into a tight hug. Celestine felt a little of the tension drain out of her. He was a good father, after all.
“Don’t leave me alone with that horrible man again. Promise!”
“What horrible man?” Celestine had not meant to intervene, although now the words were out she didn’t regret them. “Robbie—who’s been horrible to you?” She took the boy into her arms. “Tell me,” she murmured.
“Halib.” He was sleepy now, after so much emotional effort; when he rubbed his eyes this time it wasn’t to wipe away tears but to keep them open. He leaned back onto her shoulder and whispered in her ear, “I don’t like him.”
“Why, dearest?”
“He’d hit me if Mummy wasn’t there. Or Daddy.”
“There, there, precious. No one’s going to hit you.”
She pivoted slightly, the better to see Colin, and indicated with a look that he should wait for her inside the house. When she joined him a moment later she took him by the arm and half led, half dragged him into her study. She strode to the desk that once had been her husband’s and fiddled inside one of the drawers until the hidden lock snapped back, revealing a cavity.
“Here,” she said, with brusque insistence. “Take this. Go on, take it!”
Colin was staring at her in stupefaction. As if in a slow-motion movie, his hand stretched out, fell back.
“It’s a gun,” he said, and she could see how stupid he felt at having stated something so obvious.
“Yes. It’s loaded; the safety catch is on.”
He shook his head. “Not my scene.”
She reached for his hand and pressed the gun into it. “If not for your sake, then for Robbie’s. Don’t tell them where you’ve been today; make sure the boy doesn’t say anything. Promise me that, promise me. And take the gun.”
“I can’t.” He tried to force it back on Celestine but she resisted with greater strength than he’d have given her credit for. “I mean … suppose they found it, the police—”
“You fool, everyone in Beirut has a gun, everyone! Don’t you know where you’re living yet?”
The door opened, to reveal Robbie in the foreground and Azizza hovering uneasily behind him. “Daddy, what are you and Celestine doing?”
Colin had his back to the door, concealing the gun from the boy’s gaze. Now Celestine took advantage of his confusion to push his hand, the one holding the gun, into the pocket of his jacket. “I was just explaining the quickest route back into town,” she said slyly. “The road’s a bit hard to find if you don’t know it.”
“Oh.” He advanced into the room. “Do we really have to go?” His voice was doleful.
“Yes, darling. But there’ll be other times.” She picked him up. They had their routine, now; he settled into the crook of her shoulder as if he’d been doing it for years instead of minutes. Celestine carried him out to the Fiat and slid him onto the back seat, where he would be safer in the event of an accident—how the very thought made her shake with rage and trepidation—before turning to Colin.
“Wise up,” she all but snapped. “Look about you, stay alive.”
“I will. We will.”
“Give my love to Leila. Don’t forget what I told you.”
Colin got into the driver’s seat and started the engine. “Thank you,” he said awkwardly. “For everything, I mean.”
“I know what you mean. Come back one day. Both of you.”
As she turned to enter the house, some macabre conviction assured Celestine that Colin would need the gun, and soon.
DAY
TWO
21 JULY: DAWN:
AL MAHRA, SOUTH YEMEN
LEILA had ordered two of the doors to be opened. She sat alone in first class, enjoying a cool flutter of air through the plane. Behind her, the passengers were being allowed to use the toilets after a night spent strapped in their seats; they too would be glad of some ventilation. Captain Morgan had consulted her about the air-conditioning, which would not last long. She agreed with him: better to switch if off during the night and save fuel for the heat of the day. Not that the nights here were cool. At 3 a.m., the ambient temperature had registered 80 degrees Fahrenheit.
Morgan was good. He had begun, hesitantly, to talk to her. She knew this was what the anti-hijack manuals instructed him to do but did not care; he was an interesting person. He’d mentioned his “souls” and, when she queried it, explained that a plane’s full complement of people, crew plus passengers, was always referred to as so many “souls.” He was a fine pilot and a decent man too, because he understood that people had souls. Killing him would give her no pleasure, even though he was—he had to be—at the top of her death list. Fouad could do it, when necessary.
She remembered the first time she had taken life. Before then, she had never thought to do such a thing. It was like sex: as a girl, the notion of being mauled by a man was disgusting. Then, slowly, you came around to the idea that one day you might love a man enough to marry him and let him touch you. Later still, love became more important in that equation than marriage, so perhaps you could bring yourself to take a lover without marrying him. Finally, you went to bed with somebody, and after that it was all downhill. So with murder: the sin became first conceivable, then tolerable, and at last habitual. You scarcely noticed. If you did notice, you looked back at your young self, that other person who’d once expressed abhorrence at what was now your practice, and you laughed, ashamed to think you could ever have been so naïve.
As long as you knew the killing was in aid of a purpose, a cause that you yourself were prepared to die for, you got used to it.
Behind her, they were waiting. Passengers, crew, even the hijack team itself: all waiting. She could feel their impatience like a lethal wave overbearing her hunched shoulders, poised to come crashing down. Back there were loaded guns, grenades with their pins pulled, explosives wired to emergency hatches and doors. These objects seemed to her less dangerous than the human volatility that, for the time being, controlled them. She could make a pistol do her will, but people were not like that.
Her men ruled the passengers, and her job was to dominate her men. She could not use objects to do it. What she needed lay inside herself and had roots that went down deep into the past.
She sat in seat number 3B, on the aisle, where the movement of air through the nearby door was most perceptible. The sun had already risen over the horizon. It was light inside the cabin. She stared down at the passport in her hands, every so often turning the blue booklet over or opening it to scan a few pages before letting it fall into her lap.
Robbie had traveled a bit since 1982 and New York: the year, the place, when Leila had last seen her child. She’d held him in her arms and kissed him above th
e ear,there … how often had she relived those magic seconds? She could still smell the apple scent of his hair, his spine still curled inward under the pressure of her hands, his smooth skin nuzzling her own: all hostages of memory, intact, immaculate.
Leila jumped up and turned around, her gaze locking onto the curtain that separated the first class cabin from the plane’s business section. He sat just beyond it. Seat 13K. If she tore that curtain aside, his face would be the first thing she’d see. She took a step forward without willing it and grabbed the nearest seat, like a woman trying to save herself from being swept away by a flood tide.He was there!
Her nails dug into the cloth until her fingers turned white. Now was not the time. She could pass through that curtain and ruin everything, or she could wait. So she would sit down. She would take the rest she so badly needed.
She fell to studying Robbie’s passport again. He had traveled to Russia. A school trip; she knew about that and had wanted to snatch him back then, but Halib had said no, because in Russia he could do nothing. Greece. Yugoslavia, in the same year as Greece … motoring holiday? Halib hadn’t said anything about it. Perhaps he hadn’t known. Taking Robbie back would have been so easy in Greece.
Robbie might have traveled, but it hadn’t been possible to find out about his trips at the time. Not like now. This journey to Malaysia and Australia had mysteriously found its way into the newspapers. Why? Law tutors went abroad all the time, without necessarily being profiled in the press.
There was something about this operation that made Leila’s flesh creep. A man had tried to keep her from entering the cockpit: a sky marshal employed by the airline, perhaps. But there was something almost familiar about him, something she couldn’t put a name to. Perhaps she had seen him before and couldn’t remember where. She would give details taken from the man’s passport to Halib. Halib would find out.
She glanced at her watch, glad of the way her thoughts focused and assumed new direction, with Halib suddenly much in her mind. Without him, what would have become of her? Death, madness?
She might have been happy, but for him. No, don’t think that….
Y’Allah, let her brother be fit and well this day. There were things they must do together. He had radioed twice, during the night: the first time to tell her that, as expected, the Iraqis were disclaiming all knowledge of the six prisoners, the second time to find out how she was coping and to say he loved her.
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