Amsterdam 2020 (Amsterdam Series Book 2)

by Ruth Francisco

  “Why are you taking such a risk for me?”

  “You took me out of the tomb and gave me life. I owe you everything.”

  “You would've done the same for me.”

  “Maybe. I don't know if I would've had the courage to try to trick my father. I have always loved you, Katrien. Hell, one of the reasons I was so wild is I wanted to be noticed by you.”

  “You were noticed.” I smile, then hug her for all I'm worth. “Promise me to get Jana to Copenhagen. When they can't find me, they'll arrest her. You know that's how it works.”

  “You can count on me.”

  “Now find me a nice Turkish man to be my husband. I can't go on hajj by myself.”

  “I can think of more pleasant tasks.”

  Twenty-Three, July 2021

  Hajj

  A young kid points an AK-47 at me at a checkpoint. “Your papers.” I give him my birth certificate, passport, travel documents, and religion certificate. He glances at them, before handing them back. He clearly can't read.

  Just following orders.

  A dozen other border guards stand impassively, wearing gray IRH uniforms and red turbans, AK-47s across their chests, expressions surly and bored.

  It is the middle of the night in a wretched thunderstorm. Rain-laden winds whip the train. We halt at a former outpost of the iron curtain. High wire fences surround the station, lights glowing dimly across the railway, a green crescent flag, and a black-and-white UNI flag droop from forbidding, communist-era buildings, bristling with antennas.

  It is like this at every station.

  Several hours later, the train gets going again.

  #

  Erol Burakgazi sits opposite me, a huge sullen man. Together his names mean brave warrior for the faithful. A false name, of course, but lovely regardless. Someone in the documents department is getting downright poetic. He certainly acts the part, glaring at any male that glances my way. Who knows where Draak found him. You do not see many Turks with a zabiba—a raisin-shaped callus on the forehead that develops after a lifetime of touching one's forehead to the ground during prayer. I wonder if he lost his faith. Obviously, if he works for the Resistance his views have changed. With his zabiba, no one questions our stated mission—to circle the Kaaba in Mecca.

  After boarding the pilgrim train in Amsterdam, we will switch in Bonn, travel through Germany, Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Bulgaria, and eventually arrive in Istanbul. There are no sleeper cars, just six-berth foldout shelves, unassigned. The women's berths are separate from the men's car.

  Every Muslim must make the pilgrimage once in his life, if they are able to do so. Before the war, two million people made hajj each year. Despite the risk, the train bulges with pilgrims. After all, anyone who dies during hajj is a martyr, and will go immediately to paradise. To many it is a vacation from war.

  We arrive in Ljubljana, Slovenia around dinner time, and the schedule allows us to wander the town for a few hours. It is delightful, unmarred by war, a cross between the charm of Italian villages, and the cleanliness of Swiss towns, with terrific food all it's own. We find a place to eat cevapcici, a grilled, spiced beef sausage, ubiquitous to the Balkans, served with oily charred onions, crispy hot peppers, and soft pita. It's the best thing I've eaten in years.

  Erol, who has barely said a word to me, compliments me on my appetite. I think he is being sarcastic.

  After dinner, I head to the women's car, find a shelf, and fall asleep.

  When I wake in the morning, I dress and look for Erol in the passenger car. He tells me we are leaving Serbia. The train crosses a broad, brown river on an iron bridge into an industrial morass of docks, cranes, and chimney stacks rising gloomily into low clouds. The charm of Ljubljana quickly turns bleak and forbidding. In Belgrade the architecture becomes monotonous—Soviet-era gray apartments in utilitarian blocks, with an occasional Ottoman remnant. Thick forests and steep mountains turn into scrubby flatlands, with low treeless hills in the distance.

  Across from me, I watch a baby chew on a plastic gun on his mother's lap.

  At various checkpoints, IRH soldiers go through the train asking for documents. They carry out this routine rapidly, barely looking at our faces.

  Five times a day, the train stops so the men can pour out onto the train platform, line up facing Mecca, and perform salat. The women fold their hands in their seats and pray.

  A friendly Turkish guard brews tea and coffee on a camping stove in his compartment, and refuses payment from any of the passengers, wishing us safe passage. “It is an honor to serve pilgrims on hajj,” he says. I drink a cup of his tea hoping it will bring me luck.

  In the late afternoon, someone begins singing Islamic prayers. Others join in—like a camp song. That is generally the feeling on the train, festive and relaxed. It is amazing to me how all of these pilgrims seem completely oblivious to the war and what's going on around them—completely wrapped up in a spiritual delirium. Some travel with families, so the children ground the women, but the men are off in a world of their own.

  Erol plays his part, and spends most of his time with the other men discussing theology, and the minutiae of Islamic law: Is Viagra halal? (Yes.) Can a Muslim talk while peeing? (Only if asking for water to clean himself.) Is a sex change allowed? (No.) Can women watch football? (No. They should not stare at men's thighs.) Can married couples see each other naked? (Yes. But they should cover themselves with a sheet while having sex.) Is it permissible to read fiction? (No. Fiction is full of lies.) May men have sex with their dead wives. (Yes. No holy book prohibits it.) I surmise that at one time Erol was some kind of Islamic scholar. The other men bow and give him a great deal of respect. They even bow to me, his wife. Crazy.

  The train stops at the Turkish border town of Kapikule for two hours. Everyone climbs off and gets their passport stamped at a dreary two story building. While Erol prays, I make my way through the food vendors, and begin to understand why Kazan raves about Turkish food. I don't know if it is the pregnancy, or the food is really that good, but when my lips wrap around a börek, a buttery pastry filled with feta, wash it down with a thick yogurt drink call Jogurt, then crunch on a crisp salad of cucumber and tomato, I think I've died and gone to heaven. Erol gives me a disapproving scowl that says I am making a spectacle of myself, but I can't keep from moaning. It's that delicious.

  We clamber back onto the train for a short ride to Çerkezköy, where everyone has to get off and onto a bus, headed for Istanbul.

  #

  Just after daybreak, we step out of the Sirkeci station in Istanbul to a mob of commuters and shoppers, and fishmongers crowding the Eminönü piers. The air reeks of the oily smell of frying fish and cigarettes. Homicidal Vespa riders tear up and down the sidewalks, cadaverous black smoke belching from their tailpipes, gleefully scattering everyone. Slim men, dressed in white, stagger with trays piled with simits balanced on their heads.

  I shuffle behind Erol like a good Muslim wife, trying to keep up, grateful for his wide girth plowing ahead like an icebreaker. I'm completely distracted by the screeching jumble of colors, sounds, and smells, tripping on the rough cobblestones, trying to see as much as I can out of the slit in my niqab. It feels magical after the oppressive rain, the drab Soviet-era train stations, and the drone of mumbling pilgrims.

  So lively, percolating like a coffee pot.

  As we walk across Galata Bridge, graceful minarets prick the sky, and the dome of Yeni Mosque glints in the sunlight. The crumbly old wooden houses with square bays tipping over the street, the moss-covered fountains, the Camondo Stairs, twisting down Galata Hill, the Byzantine mosaics near the old city walls, the plane trees shading Aya Pasa—if I could paint, I would spend my life here.

  Erol deposits me at an inexpensive hotel to go check out which prison Kazan is in. “Do not leave under any circumstance. Do not open the door for anyone but me.”

  I do not particularly like being told what to do, and everything in me resists. “I want to go
with you.” My pride makes me unwilling to tell him that I am nervous being away from him.

  “It'll be easier by myself. I have to meet with the local Resistance, then probably have to bribe a few officials and one or two prison guards. You'll only slow me down.”

  He may be a Resistant, but he still glares at me with the impervious superiority of the Turkish male, humorless, intractable. I sputter with resentment, but I see his point. “What do I do if you don't come back?”

  “I'll be back. Lock up behind me.”

  At least he leaves me his gun on the dresser.

  The room is decrepit in a charming sort of way. The walls show various paint jobs, with floral wallpaper peeking beneath where paint has chipped off. Faded mismatched curtains and bedding. A Turkish toilet and a shower, no tub. Dim hallways with old-fashioned timer switches. But it is relatively clean, and a hot plate sits in a corner, with a tea kettle, tea pot, and a can of loose tea.

  I make myself some tea, mentally fuming, but gradually growing calmer. I open the shutters, sip my tea, and gaze out the window into the busy street.

  The view is fascinating—spires and glistening gold-leaf domes, a jumbled of red-tile rooftops, and crooked streets. The sun blazes out of a bleached muslin sky, and beyond, the gray Bosporus and the Asian side of Istanbul. Barges on the river blare deep frog-like horns. In a courtyard across the way, two women hang clothes outside their balconies; in another courtyard, old men in vests huddle around small tables playing chess; a band of Turkish gypsies push a colorful cart down the street, ringing small bells, selling flowers and scraps of junk.

  I suddenly miss Rafik and Jana so much.

  I tear myself away from the window. Instead of feeling useless and resentful, I should come up with a plan.

  If Kazan is in jail, he will need clean clothes, clean underwear, a toothbrush, toothpaste, deodorant, food that doesn't need refrigeration, and things he can trade for favors: soap, cigarettes, bug spray, bandages, aspirin. There must be more. Maybe one of those motorized hand-held fans.

  I need to be prepared to go to Kazan as soon as Erol returns.

  Which means I need to go shopping. I am dying to explore the city. I could go now and be back before him. How dangerous could it be? Turkish women go out shopping every day. I'll be in a burka. No one can recognize me. What's the worst that could happen?

  I decide to wait a few hours.

  Before I left Amsterdam, I sent word to Jean-Luc to meet us in Canakkale, Turkey, where the Dardanelles meets the Adriatic. It's about 3,600 nautical miles from Rotterdam. Going an average of 7 knots per hour, he should make it in 21 days. Unless he decides to go down the Rhine to the Danube to the Black Sea, which would be much shorter, but he'd have to deal with all the locks and barges and inspection points. He can handle Allegro by himself, but I sent along a good chunk of cash from Kazan's safe, enough for bribes, and to hire extra hands.

  I have a little less than three weeks to get Kazan out of jail.

  The Resistance here is working with a number of lawyers, but lawyers take forever. As far as I know, all they have on him is a false documents charge, which isn't particularly serious. He is Turkish—that's in his favor—and they don't know his real name. And he is Muslim. For a misdemeanor, bribes should be enough. He might be able to convince them he is a smuggler rather than a Resistant, or come up with some other plausible reason for carrying a fake ID. He'll have to come up with another ID to prove his real identity, which will have to be a very good fake, and witnesses to vouch for him. If they suspect he is a Resistant, we might be able to work some kind of prisoner exchange. Maybe. If they discover he is Kazan Basturk, a high level operative for the Islamic State, he might be able to convince them that he is carrying out orders at the highest level. Or they might hand him over to the Turkish Special Operations Police. That wouldn't be good.

  The question is, once free will Kazan leave the Resistance? Can I convince him to sail away? To find a little happiness for ourselves?

  Part of it will depend on how he is treated in jail, if he is tortured or starved or gets one of a dozen diseases that spawn in jails. He may be too weak, too dispirited to continue fighting.

  How can I wish illness on my own husband?

  I am ashamed that I've become so selfish since I've become pregnant, but I can't help it. I want a home for our baby, in a world without war. I want to sail to the ends of the earth.

  Suddenly I am so tired I can barely stand, my head swimming. I shuffle over to the bed, lie down, and instantly fall asleep.

  #

  Smells of dill and roasting chicken rise up from below, waking me. I am crazy hungry.

  I look at the clock. Erol has been gone for eight hours. Does he mean to leave me to starve to death? I can't wait any more. I'll dip out for twenty minutes, just to get something to eat and pick up a few things for Kazan. I'll be back before Erol, I am sure of it.

  I slip on my burka and open the door. In a sudden impulse, I take the gun.

  #

  The heat of the day has passed and everyone is out in the streets, headed home from work, shopping, stopping for tea at little tables under arcades. Women with huge bags of groceries, gangs of boys strutting through the streets in lines of five or six, young women tittering in clusters.

  Little shops spew merchandise into the streets: tables filled with water pipes, kilim carpets piled high, cloth purses, pashmina scarves, amber prayer beads, cobalt blue ceramic plates, copper lanterns, guitars, mountain ranges of Iranian saffron, rainbow racks of Turkish clothes. Smells of chickpeas and barbecued lamb waft in at me from all sides.

  Cats swarm everywhere, leaping from window sills, darting down alleys, glowering from fire escapes, rolling and scratching their backs, feeding, six to a bowl, their mating yowls echoing through the impossibly narrow streets.

  I buy a börek to satisfy my immediate cravings, and then begin to shop for Kazan, using gestures when English doesn't suffice: lavender-scented soap and lice shampoo, roach spray and cigarettes, cans of fruit juice and dolma—stuffed grape leaves. I enjoy the vendors, their greedy humor, their extravagant flattery. How do they manage to compliment a woman when they can't even see her? On her eyes, her hands, her smart choices, her clever bargaining. “Your husband is a lucky man. If he doesn't treat you well, I will beat him to a pulp.” Actually, I'm not sure that's what he's saying—but it's something like that.

  I enjoy knocking shoulders with people; this anonymous brush with humanity feels good, the laughter, the softness of hips, the padded thump of shoulders. I get turned around a few times, but I recognize landmarks, and know pretty much where I am. In an odd way it feels comforting and safe—an otter tumbling in the water with other otters.

  I am fascinated by a taffy magician, who stands over a kettle divided into a palette of bubbling sugar and twirls multi-colored strings of sugar on spits, tossing them into the air, chattering all the time like a carnival barker. Five minutes pass, and I'm still mesmerized.

  There is a rumble in the crowd, and people begin moving fast in another direction. I try to step aside, not wanting to be crushed in a river of people, but it's useless. I am carried out into a large plaza of Ottoman era buildings, where people spill out and gather in clusters.

  Seconds later, a dozen police cars screech into the plaza, lights flashing, forming a large circle in the center.

  People push back as they see an executioner get out of one of the cars, giving him room. He wears a red fez and a crisp black robe, and carries a glinting scimitar at his side.

  The man they drag from the car is HaZinE, a popular Turkish singer, who, apart from his criminal use of capitalization, has had various skirmishes with the mutaween for his lyrics and casual life-style. Until now, his popularity has protected him.

  Like geese, the crowd follows the executioner to a platform in the center of the plaza. Young men, women in burkas, old men, push each other aside, vying for a good view, hungry for entertainment.

  A sheet of black p
lastic covers the platform: sitting in the middle, a block of black granite, scooped out on one side for resting one's forehead.

  A stranger pulls my hand. “Here! This is a good spot. You can see everything from here.” Touching a woman in public is haram, but the middle-aged man is caught up in the excitement and forgets. He pushes me in front of him and looks over my head.

  The police drag HaZinE to the center of the plaza. Everyone cheers, and pushes in closer. UNI soldiers push them back, using their AK-47s like staffs.

  HaZinE stumbles, his hands tied in back, blindfolded, his long glamorous hair hanging in dirty clumps. His whole body is rubbery, probably drugged to keep him from bolting or making a scene.

  The crowd jostles in excitement, pushing me back against the man behind me, who puts his hands on my shoulders to steady me. I panic, trying to push out of there. I don't want to see an execution. A woman digs her handbag into my side, trying to get me to move. They begin to chant the singer's name—HaZinE! HaZinE!

  Prickles shoot up the back of my scalp, and I think I am going to be sick. There's nowhere to go. I realize just how stupid I am for being here. This is exactly what Erol was afraid of.

  The crowd stills as a mutawa with a flowing black beard lists HaZinE's crimes. It is a long list of sumptuary violations, finishing with “enemy to the United Nations of Islam.” I wonder what he did for the Resistance, or if the charge is bogus. Perhaps they merely want to get rid of him, even if he hasn't been allowed to perform publicly for years.

  HaZinE kneels on the ground, his head over the block, his white shirt patterned with large circles of sweat. The mutawa commands him to recite the Shahad—“There is no god but God, and Muhammad is His messenger.”

  Then HaZinE bends forward, placing his forehead to the stone. The crowd grows silent. The executioner, in one graceful sweep, raises the scimitar over his head, the evening sun reflecting on the blade, shooting sparks of light over the crowd.