Amsterdam 2020 (Amsterdam Series Book 2)

by Ruth Francisco

  “Don't wory, Lina,” he says. “We'll find you.”

  Courier

  “Haven't you figured it out by now, Salima?” Uncle Sander claps his hands over his considerable girth, and roars. “You are such a bright girl. Haven't you ever looked inside the brown paper bags? Haven't you wondered why I insist you burn the delivery list every day? I guess you didn't think your uncle was capable of such mischief, eh?”

  Salima feels dumb. As soon as the giant woman gave her fliers to pass out, she realized she had the perfect cover for delivering them. But she couldn't do it without her uncle's knowledge. It was too dangerous. Tentatively, she feels him out, asking if he'd ever heard of anyone getting a flier that spoke against the Islamic State. He strings her along, getting more and more amused, until he finally hands her a brown paper bag.

  “Open it.”

  Salima opens it and pulls out several pieces of fruit, each carefully wrapped in a copy of the same flier she passed around the night before. She opens a second bag and finds ID papers, a travel permit, and a passport. “I was passing these out and didn't even know about it?”

  “Not the documents. I usually have someone deliver these in the morning. But he is needed for other things. That's why I wanted you to ask Jana if you could work in the mornings.”

  “She knows what you do?”

  “Of course. Who do you think prints up this stuff? If she said yes, I was going to put you to work this very morning.”

  “Why didn't she tell me?”

  “There is much for you to learn, Salima. For now, only ask questions in the courtyard by the fountain. Understood? Now get on your bike and make deliveries. The bags on the bottom are very important. Burn your list when you are done.”

  “What about Jana? I didn't ask her yet.”

  “I'll speak with her. Don't worry. Now get going.”

  #

  Salima learns the city like the back of her hand. Every alley, every block, every bridge, every canal. She knows of alleys that lead to courtyards, that lead to basement tunnels. As soon as she sees sign of mutaween or IRH soldiers, she sprints into the maze. She doesn't wait to see if they are following. She knows a million places to hide her bike. Where to stash her parcels when she's in a hurry. She wears a big black poncho when it rains, but always in her shalwar kameez and niqab, covered head-to-toe in black.

  She learns to be invisible.

  Not all of her tasks are clandestine and frightening. She and Pim travel to small towns around Holland to establish safe houses, posing as a young married couple. They get a wink and a nod from many of the landlords, most who assume they are an unmarried couple who want a cheap place to have sex. A few give them long slow looks before renting to them. These are the ones who guess they are part of the Resistance. They hesitate getting involved, but Salima and Pim agree to whatever outrageous price they are demanding. Few say no to cash, despite their misgivings.

  Salima enjoys these trips and Pim's company. She enjoys pretending to be married, taking liberties like holding Pim's hand on the train. Or laying her head on his shoulder to nap.

  It feels completely natural.

  She learns how to spot others in the Resistance, and is amazed at how many are involved. Those tracking movements. Collecting intelligence. Watching. Passing on information. Hiding and moving people. And how many people, not in the movement, who are willing to lend a car or a gallon of gas. Or hide a refugee for a night or two.

  Bit by bit she learns all about the structure of the underground. It reminds her of a film she once saw in science class about ants, where the scientists poured resin into the top of an ant hill, and later dug up a gigantic candelabra of tunnels and branches. That's the Resistance. A colony of hardworking ants.

  She learns there are nine different Resistance organizations in Holland, many with overlapping responsibilities, each with dozens of cells.

  The National Relief Organization, the Nationale Hulporganisatie finances many of the other organizations, giving financial assistance to citizens who are hiding people, providing food coupons, funding sabotage and arms for resistance fighters.

  The Onderduikers Redding, an organization revived from WWII, runs the underground railroad and administers the illegal social services, which pays a dole to people in hiding.

  Another group takes care of communications with Copenhagen through radio transmissions and couriers, who ride bicycles throughout Holland.

  One group has a network of saboteurs in the newspapers. They're the ones who deliver vital information hidden in crossword puzzles or in advice columns. They also print and distribute several illegal newspapers, including Vrijheid (Freedom), and Realiteit (Reality). Once they invaded the offices of Al Jazeera, and replaced the next day's entire printed edition with an edition of the Vrijheid. The altered paper included articles about the real state of the country, the poverty, the political prisoners, the cruelty of sharia law, other Islamic atrocities, and the truth about the victories of the Coalition Forces. Nobody suspected a thing, and Al Jazeera was delivered as usual.

  More than a few cups of coffee were spilled that morning.

  Another group trains and networks decoders in Copenhagen, who parachute out of airplanes all over Holland. They bring radio transmitters with them. Two such men live on the third floor above Pim. Couriers, mostly women in burkas, stop by during their shopping and disseminate the information.

  She learns the names of the people she met that first night on the barge. Gerda is the Amazon. Garret, the nervous Moroccan. Hansen, the tall square-faced blond, who never speaks. She has never seen Gerda without him.

  Pebbles

  Every day Salima bikes past Joury's house on the way to work. If no one is around, she throws pebbles at the plywood over her window. If Joury is still inside and hasn't yet gone mad, she'll know it's her. She'll know that someone is thinking about her. Someone cares.

  She asks Uncle Sander if there isn't some way they can get her out.

  “We have to pick our fights, Salima.”

  “But she's my best friend.”

  He looks at her silently for a long moment, then goes back to stacking Honey Crisp apples. “Go do your job.”

  Two weeks later, Salima passes Joury's house and sees the plywood is gone. Terrified they have killed her, she bikes recklessly to Freyja Natuur Winkel. She begs Sander to find out what happened. He tells her to come out into the courtyard by the fountain, and to sit.

  “I had someone start a rumor at the local mosque that Joury's father was starving his daughter to death. Sharia law allows her father to kill her, or keep her locked up until she dies. But he may not starve or torture her. The local imam sent over two women to make sure she was healthy. Of course her father was furious, but he couldn't deny them entry. The women determined Joury was severely malnourished and dehydrated.”

  “Is it true?”

  “To an extent. Joury was always skinny. The women insisted she go to the hospital to get checked out. Her father could not refuse without disobeying the imam.”

  “The women . . . they're with us?”

  “Of course.”

  “Where is she now?”

  “In Medisch Centrum Jan van Goyen.”

  Salima knows where that is, just south of Vondelpark. “Do we have people there?”

  “Yes. Her father first took her to DC Klinieken. Fortunately we have a nurse there who said they were full, and sent him on to the Medisch Centrum. We have much better contacts there.”

  “Can we get her out?”

  Sander smiles. “Her father has her under armed guard. We have several nurses and a doctor on our side. A nurse will call her father and tell him that Joury's vital signs are very weak, and if he wants to see her before she dies, he must come in. Honor demands that he visit her. Just before he enters her room, the nurse will give her a dose of propranolol in her IV drip, which will drop her heart rate to less than ten times a minute. He'll see that on the EKG monitor. While he is still there, the nurse wil
l covertly disconnect the EKG and it will flatline. An alarm will go off. Nurses and doctors will rush in and push him out of the room. After a few moments, the doctor will tell him she is dead.”

  Salima gasps.

  Sander smiles, and continues. “Because she is disgraced, her father will not give her a proper burial. He will leave her for the hospital to cremate. He will not linger. As soon as he leaves, the nurse will give her epinephrine, and bring her back. When the guards leave, we will take her to the Onderduikers Redding.”

  “Can I see her before?”

  “Her father won't allow visitors, but I think we can manage something. Do you know how to change a bed pan?”

  “I'll learn.”

  “I think it is important she sees you. She's probably half crazy with fear. She needs a face she can trust to tell her not to panic and that we plan to get her out.”

  Salima does her part, dressing as a nurse's aide. The two guards are bored, mildly entertained by the fact that in an all women's ward the nurses are allowed to go without the veil. A particularly pretty nurse talks to them while Salima pushes by a cart with a bedpan.

  She can hardly believe how awful Joury looks, twig-like arms wrapped around her pillow, sunken cheeks, eyes dull and despondent. Even her hair looks listless. Salima picks up her wrist as if checking vital signs. “Joury. It's me. Don't react. Just blink if you know who I am.”

  Joury slowly turns her head to look at her. Her eyes blank, not recognizing her. Then her irises seem to darken, and her breath hitches. Her skin suddenly goes from pasty white to something resembling normal skin. She blinks slowly.

  “We are getting you out in the next few days. You don't have to do anything. Just be ready. Your father will come to visit. He will think you are dying. Blink if you understand.”

  Joury blinks, her eyes shifting to the guards at the door, who are preoccupied with the pretty nurse.

  Salima takes off her silver sailboat necklace, carefully lifts Joury's head, and loops it round her neck, hiding the pendant under her clothes. “We'll be back.” She squeezes her hand.

  Joury squeezes back, refusing to let go. Salima has to release herself by pulling on Joury's wrist with her other hand. “Stay brave,” she says, “and eat something.” She turns and leaves.

  The rest of the plan goes without a hitch.

  Only later does Salima find out they only had a few minutes in which Joury could be under propranolol without brain damage. If her father had decided to pray over her dead body, it would've been a disaster. Luckily, Joury's father is a heartless bastard. He wouldn't allow Joury's mother to visit her in the hospital. Not even when he was told that Joury was going to die.

  “Where is she now?” Salima asks Sander, a few days later. She is disappointed she didn't get to see Joury before she went underground.

  “I don't know. If I did, I couldn't tell you. My guess is she is out of the country.”

  “In Copenhagen?”

  “As I said, I don't know.”

  Joury's rescue changes something in Salima. One of Jana's friends notices first, an ambiable older woman, who remarks at mosque, “Salima is becoming such a young lady.” She doesn't mean that Salima's body has developed or that she is becoming pretty, both which are true, but that her deameanor has become calm, deliberate, and poised.

  Her true self, her spontanteous and cheerful self, is carefully hidden away. She feels as if the core of her body has turned into something cold and rigid—like steel.

  She becomes fearless.

  Boerenmarkt

  On Saturdays, Salima goes to the Farmer's Market on Noordermarkt off of Prinsengracht, not far from where she lives.

  She meets Uncle Sander with his small vegetable truck, helps him set up a table and stand, then serves customers. They do not pass out fliers or any subversive material. It would be far too dangerous. IRH soldiers mill around, just waiting to catch someone doing something illegal. But hard as they try, they cannot keep people from speaking with one another.

  During her break, Salima goes from one food vendor to another. Many are friends, members of the Resistance, passing on information. Someone needs a travel pass to get out of the country. A safe house needs a plumber. New refugees are coming up the Varken Weg.

  Salima buys herself a small plate of poffertjes, then ambles through the tables, which are covered in white canvas canopies to keep off the drizzle. Rows and rows of tables overflowing with handmade cheeses, eggs, fresh fish, bread, honey, herbs, spices, nuts, homemade cakes, fruits, and flowers. One table offers mushrooms in all shapes and colors, collected in Dutch forests or brought in from France or Belgium.

  The Islamists don't quite get the Dutch obsession with mushrooms, but they do understand that the produce is highly perishable and quite valuable. They allow mushroom farmers and merchants wide-ranging travel passes. Which makes them excellent liaison officers. An important link in the Resistance.

  Salima sways over the boxes of mushrooms, breathing in their heady aroma. They smell of damp earth and underground tunnels—the old mines used for mushroom farming, which also provide havens for refugees.

  As her fingertips dust the tops of the cèpes, morilles, and chanterelles, she shows her ring. A simple silver ring with a pig's tail design. She wears it on her wedding ring finger. If an IRH soldier nears, she turns the design inside toward her palm. She points to the orange ear-shaped griolles, and asks for a quarter kilo. A farmer named Ton, recognizes her ring and her voice. “Don't turn around,” he says softly. “Shirzad Sahar just walked in from Boomstraat.”

  Salima groans with dread. “What's he doing here?”

  “Just looking around right now. You'd better come back behind the table.”

  Salima slips around the booth and sits in a corner under the awning against the van. The cooling engine warms her back and smells faintly of gasoline. She can just see Shirzad over the mushroom boxes.

  Five Landweer officers and two IRH soldiers stand behind him. He wouldn't bring so many unless he planned on making an arrest. He walks slowly into the middle of the bazaar, looking over the tables, as if a famous chef composing the day's menu based on the freshness of the vegetables. He smiles, his hand passing over a crate of ginger crisp apples. He speaks to no one. Just looking. Taking it all in.

  Customers drift away, giving him wide berth. His reputation precedes him.

  Fascism attracts sadists, but Shirzad is worse than a sadist. Eventually sadists become uncontrollable megalomaniacs, and their bosses have to curb or eliminate them. But Shirzad is beyond anything so human as sexual perversion. He is a cool efficient machine, without an ounce of compassion, carrying out sharia law to the letter.

  Torture is part of his job, and he does it well. He takes his prisoners to Rijksmuseum, which the Islamic Council has commandeered for government offices, down to the basement vaults, airless and climate controlled, where watercolors and delicate oil paintings were once stored. People say he was trained in torture by the American CIA in Iraq. It must be true. He approaches torture as a science. People do survive it, but they are never the same.

  He is not driven by ambition or power. He is an effective bureaucrat. Salima suspects after work he returns home and eats a pleasant dinner with his family. They say he is a loving husband, and that during Eid al-Fitr, he gives 10 percent of his income to the poor, rather than the 2.5 percent zakat required of every Muslim. She stares at him hard. How do two men live in one body? A well-known philanthropist, a family man who dotes on his daughters, an amateur historian of ancient Assyrian culture, and a torturer.

  She has seen Shirzad Sahar before. Twice at Chop-Chop Square on Friday afternoons after the midday prayer, and once when Grand Mufti Fawaz Jneid spoke before a crowd at Stationplein in front of the train station. He presides at executions and floggings without a trace of emotion. Some call him “The Terminator.”

  Shirzad claims to have a sixth sense for hunting down rebels. He walks into the center of the bazaar, turning slowly severa
l times, pausing as if receiving radio signals. He watches the customers. He watches the vendors. He sees who is scurrying away, who pretends he isn't there. He smells their sweat, hears their thumping hearts, senses the change in their breathing, their tensing muscles.

  Everyone knows what is coming.

  Salima inhales nervously, sucking her veil into her mouth. She yanks it out so she can get air, telling herself not to be frightened. Not to draw him to her.

  He raises his hand, turns one step to the right, and brings it down.

  Three Landweer spring out behind him and upend a table, arresting a potato vendor, accusing him of smuggling in pork sausage. Salima hitches a breath. Not a member of the Resistance, as far as she knows.

  But Shirzad is not done.

  As the Landweer drag off the vendor, two more smash up his stand. Shirzad steps away nonchalantly as if he'd merely purchased a snack of organic purple potato chips, continuing on between the tables as before.

  He pauses, as if catching a pleasant aroma, then starts his spin, more slowly this time. He raises his arm . . . and points at her.

  “Run,” hisses Ton, bracing his hips against the table.

  As Landweer officers charge the mushroom stand, Salima slips unnoticed behind Ton's van and zigzags through the market. She takes the arm of a burka clad woman who always stands by the flower vendor, a lookout for the Resistance. “Razzia,” she whispers hotly. “Tell Sander and the others.” The woman nods and disappears.

  Salima is pretty sure she was not Shirzad's target. Still, it wouldn't do to lead them back to Sander or anyone else. She must leave.

  As she weaves her way through the streets, she reviews in her mind what Ton knows. Information he knows goes one way. He knows the troop movements of the IRH, but nothing of the Resistance in Amsterdam. Ton names his contacts after mushrooms. He knows her as Truffel, but to be safe, she might need new ID papers.