Blood Wine

by John Moss

  “Philip Carter was another Albanian. His name was Mohammet Jousef. He was an Islamic extremist. Many Albanians are Muslim. He worked for a group called al-Qaeda, and they paid for his education in the United States.”

  “Al-Qaeda? The terrorists behind the American embassy bombings in Africa? You’re telling me he was one of them? Come on.”

  “Yes.”

  “He was utterly convincing as a corporate lawyer from Oakville.”

  “Is that a judgement on lawyers?”

  “Possibly.”

  “Why shouldn’t he be convincing? They have the advantage. We are a society built on rules and mutual trust, which makes us vulnerable. Even people in our business, we are not suspicious enough.”

  “Philip Carter was a terrorist.” Miranda had trouble getting used to the idea.

  “Mohammet Jousef was a terrorist, Philip Carter was an illusion.”

  “But why kill him if he was one of theirs?”

  “They wanted Vittorio out of the action. The wine, the heroin, Vittorio wanted to close them down. When they found out — Carlo Sebastiani, my Vittorio, whether you like it or not, they died as patriots.”

  “It would have been neater for the terrorists to have Vittorio in jail — but I was in the way.”

  “Yes. Your friend Mr. Carter, he was your watcher. When it seemed your testimony was going to set Vittorio free, it was time to dispose of you.”

  “Why not Vittorio?”

  “Too risky. It might draw too much attention. Ultimately, they took the chance.”

  “The man with the ring, the man in the vat with the hand chopped off, he was sent to kill me.”

  “He was sent to instruct Mohammet Jousef to kill you. Mohammet refused, in spite of the ring-man’s assistance — it was the ring-man who drugged you.”

  “That was him, not Philip? And Philip refused to kill me?”

  “Exactly, Miranda. For what it’s worth, that cost him his life. And he took the man with the ring down with him. The ring-man reported back to Savage. Savage was not pleased. He drove to Toronto and took care of business himself.”

  “Took care of business!”

  “And when he returned to Bonnydoon Winery the next day in time to meet Ms. Sturmberg, he executed the man with the ring. First he cut off his hand. He wanted it known that the ring-man betrayed their cause by backing down when your Mr. Carter tried to protect you. There is no room for disobedience with such people.”

  “But amputation is the punishment for thievery.”

  “The ring man, he insulted al-Qaeda, he dishonoured their merciless God,” said Frankie, rising and going to the sink, where she picked up a lethal-looking knife and resumed preparing vegetables. “We’ll take along a snack when we make our escape. Carrot sticks and celery. The failure of his mission, Miranda, that was the theft of honour. We too have a code, I understand that. Chopping off the man’s hand was symbolic.”

  “Not for him.”

  “His execution, that was real. He will not go to heaven and be cosseted by sixty-six virgins. He will simply spin through eternity with only one hand.”

  “Sixty-six? I thought it was seventy-seven. I wonder what heaven Philip is in?”

  20

  Rubik’s Cube

  “Tony wants to blow them away,” said Frankie, looking out the kitchen window as dusk settled over the slate rooftops and silvery trees of Rosedale. “I told him, ‘No, not in this neighbourhood.’ He’s not so sure, so I told him, ‘You think about it, we have quarrels, we take out a few on each side, there is a truce, and we get on with business.’ That’s how it is with us. But I told him, ‘Tony, with these people, it’s never over.’”

  “I walked out and looked through the hedge,” said Miranda. “There are half a dozen cars parked along the street. They’re empty. I think we can relax.”

  “That’s when they get you,” said Frankie. “Trust me, they’re watching. They know you are here and they’re coming. They’re waiting, and they’re coming. Getting rid of you will be a bonus.”

  “Have you packed enough food for a week?”

  “Tony did that already. The car’s loaded. We’ve got clothes. We’ve got DVDs. Your TV is working, right? I mean, what’s to do in a village?”

  “Read. Take a few books. There are books there. And walk. I phoned Mrs. DeBrusk at the general store, the whole village knows by now I’m having guests. You can get basics from her.”

  “But you’re not staying.”

  “No. You’ll like Waldron.”

  After Tony climbed in behind the wheel and Miranda slid in beside him with Frankie in the back, he started the car and eased out of the garage, letting it roll into the light of the street, then he gently accelerated, turning west. Half a block along they passed a side street and a car started, catching them briefly in its headlights. It pulled out behind them, making no effort at stealth.

  Tony drove nonchalantly. He turned a number of corners, and then for a moment the following lights were gone and he gunned the car and spun around another succession of corners.

  “Careful,” Frankie shouted from the back. “Don’t hit anybody. These are my neighbours.”

  “Rosedale hasn’t seen anything like this before,” exclaimed Miranda. Tony swung the car in and out and around the labyrinthine roadways of Toronto’s most prestigious location. Then suddenly he was on Yonge Street, heading south, their car indistinguishable among the carnivalesque traffic in the late evening rush of gawkers cruising Toronto’s most garish and inelegant strip.

  By the time they got settled into the house in Waterloo County, Miranda was tired. She decided to stay the night. They all went to bed early.

  Miranda lay awake in the room that was her sanctuary and refuge through childhood, when her father was her ally and her mother and sister were allied against her. Staring into the darkness, she realized how absurd it was to have drawn lines like she had, but after her father died, it seemed she was alone.

  She heard a stirring and got up to see if her guests were all right. Frankie was coming out of the bathroom.

  “Frankie, the kid who was killed under the bridge, was he one of yours?” Miranda was not sure where the question came from. Her mind was working on several levels; on one, trying to sort out the details of crime, on another, reliving her childhood as she did every time she came into this house. She had not slept here since her mother died several years ago.

  “Gianni, yes, he did jobs for us. He was not a regular. I think he went over. He wanted to belong, and I guess we didn’t let him in. He wanted to devote himself to something, to anything. In another life, he might have been a monk.”

  “Some people are born zealots, aren’t they,” said Miranda. “See you in the morning.”

  “And some lives are so empty, only unreasoning belief fills the vacuum.”

  “Amen,” said Miranda.

  During the night three messages were left on Miranda’s answering machine in her Isabella Street condo, waiting for her to access them in the morning.

  Miranda, it’s Seymour Clancy. Listen, I have to get back to New York. Thanks for everything. I’ll never think of Thoreau the same way … not that I spend a lot of time thinking about Thoreau. But Walden was memorable. The drive was memorable. You’re a good person, Miranda. Let’s keep in touch. And thank you for showing me a bit of your Canada. It’s the same and yet different from what I expected … like being at home but you’re not who you thought you were. I’d love to spend more time there, some time. Call me if you’re coming to Gotham. You take good care. Click.

  Miranda, it’s Ellen Ravenscroft. Thank you, thank you very much. Your Captain Clancy is a dreamboat, love. We had a wonderful time together. Of course, you did not mention he was gay, but then why should you have mentioned he was gay? More interesting, let Ellen Ravenscroft find out Captain Clancy is gay all on her own. Did I make a fool of myself? You will never know, my love. I’m sure Captain Clancy won’t tell. He’s much too discreet. Maybe he decided to tr
y out the alternative, wink wink, nudge nudge, you’ll never know. I hate you, love. Call me some time. Click.

  Miranda. Where the hell are you? If I can’t count on you being at home in the middle of the night, then what’s the point … You’re okay, I hope. Listen, I should be back later today. Nothing’s resolved but I’ve got a lot to tell you. Elke and I are staying the night in Cambridge. Twin beds — not that I’m explaining myself. We’re going to see an old professor of hers in the morning. Very important, apparently. She’s got an agenda, Miranda. She’s not the enemy. I’m not sure she’s a friend, either. I called Alex Rufalo earlier. He said Clancy drove you back from New York. You be wary, now. No new very, very close friends without me checking them out. Bye now. Click.

  After a breakfast of kippers, fried tomatoes, stringy bacon, and cold toast Morgan and Elke strolled along King’s Parade, down past Magdalene College and across the River Cam — nothing more than a stream, Morgan thought, or a creek or a brook, he wasn’t sure which. Growing up in the heart of Toronto meant his experience of moving water was mostly in ditches during rainstorms or thaws, or in historical references, rivers as geographical boundaries. Elke’s college was beside a stream of its own, beyond the inner city but surrounded by ancient houses, belying its medieval origins when it was cloistered away from the intellectual thrum at the centre.

  As they walked, Morgan asked her, “How did you know I was coming to England? Where I was staying?”

  “How did you know I was here?”

  “Intelligence, I assume. The superintendent must have been on the phone to MI5 or New Scotland Yard. Perhaps it was our friend, Alistair Ross.”

  “Or else we let him know.”

  “Did you?”

  “Yes. And, Morgan, you were tracked from Heathrow. It wasn’t difficult.”

  “You have agents everywhere.”

  “Not everywhere.”

  “And meanwhile, the bad guys are tracking you.”

  “And you. You led them to me.”

  “And they are exactly who?”

  “In due course, Morgan. I have to give you a context for it all to make sense.”

  “I feel like an actor who’s wandered into the wrong movie.”

  “Brought in, not wandered. You were brought in, you and your partner.”

  Morgan looked up. The sky was a brilliant blue and it had started to drizzle. Anything is possible, he thought.

  When they reached the college, the porter rang ahead. They clambered up an impossibly narrow set of stairs to find Elke’s professor waiting at the open door of his study. He and Elke shook hands vigorously then he ushered them into a room with leaded casement windows opening onto a quadrangle of intensely green lawn. A gesture was made for Morgan to sit down. He looked around appreciatively. The walls were books and the floor was carpets layered in haphazard profusion.

  The professor was old, with a luxuriant white beard and piercing black eyes. He wore a skullcap, possibly to keep long wisps of the little hair remaining on his head under control. He should have been a mullah, not a professor, Morgan thought. And immediately he countered himself by wondering why these were mutually exclusive. On the other hand, how many mullahs were wine connoisseurs?

  When the effusive greetings between student and mentor subsided, Elke introduced Morgan, who again rose to his feet and the two men shook hands.

  “Professor Ali Rashid Izzadine Al Sayyed,” said the professor, repeating his name several times, bowing graciously as if to acknowledge the worth of someone outside the academic profession.

  “David Morgan,” said Morgan, repeating his own name and returning the gesture.

  “To what do I owe this very great pleasure?” said the professor, turning to Elke after motioning to Morgan to resume his seat.

  Elke responded with casual banter about being in the area, not wanting to pass up the opportunity, honouring her mentor, sharing wine reminiscences, having a chat about life in Cambridge, ever changing and always the same.

  Professor Sayyed exchanged pleasantries with his young protégé, but Morgan could see he was waiting. He expressed neither patience nor urgency, but it was clear to all three that this casual informality was a prelude — to what, Morgan wondered? When Morgan asked Elke their purpose, she had been coy. He would have to wait and see.

  My goodness, he suddenly thought, she’s here to kill him!

  No, the professor did not look like a man about to die. But with her you never know. Morgan surveyed the room, his eyes falling again and again on the rugs, his mind getting caught up in the details of colour and design.

  Professor Sayyed interrupted his conversation to address Morgan. “I see you admire my carpets, Mr. Morgan.”

  “I do.”

  “They are mostly from Persia — I am an expatriate, you see, in time as well as space. I belong to an Iran of an earlier era, when it was still a remnant of the great Persian Empire.”

  “Iran?”

  “Yes.”

  “I would have guessed you are from Kurdistan.”

  “You would?”

  “Aren’t most of these carpets Kurdish? I imagine they are a reminder of home. Perhaps Iran, but definitely, I would have said, from the Kurdish north.”

  “You would have said, would you? Excellent, Mr. Morgan, you are very observant. Mostly these rugs are made by Kurds, yes. They come from Turkish Anatolia and Iran and Iraq and Afghanistan. My people cannot be contained by national borders.”

  “I was right, then, you’re Kurdish?”

  “My family is originally from the mountain country of northern Iraq.”

  “Where Saddam Hussein used chemicals on his own people in ’88?”

  “His own people! Tens of thousands of my people have died, not just in 1988, not just from Saddam — so many Kurds have died under the rule of outsiders.” He smiled, as if to acknowledge that his vehemence showed a lack of social grace. “These rugs are from the villages of my childhood. That one is from Duze, my father’s village.” He pointed to a small prayer rug with stylized handprints.

  “You brought them with you?”

  “No, when I departed from Tehran I travelled lightly — I was on the faculty of the American University. I was no friend of the Shah’s, but even less of the Ayatollah Khomeini — I carried only what was inside my own head … and several degrees, of course, from the Sorbonne, Yale, and Oxford.”

  “One could argue you were carrying a good deal.”

  “Some might argue that knowledge in this world weighs heavily upon us, so we cannot look up and see God. And therefore we place carpets beneath our feet as reflections of his presence above.”

  “You have much to reflect upon.”

  “Yes, yes, but these carpets, they were all purchased here. Such is the legacy of empire, my dear Mr. Morgan. These poor remnants of our tribal life, they fetch astonishing prices at auction in London. There is not, perhaps, such a market for Kurdish carpets as for those from the Qashqa’i and Loris of the south.”

  “Of Iran! And you represent yourself as Iranian.”

  “It is easier at this brief point in our history. Iraq is a pariah, Iran is merely a renegade.”

  “But you are neither, you are from Kurdistan.”

  “Which does not presently exist. It is as easy to be from one as the other, and more convenient right now to be from Iran. And how do you know about carpets?”

  “I have read a little. That one,” said Morgan, pointing to a carpet of finer weave and more formal design partially covered by others, “that is an Akstafa. It is Caucasian.”

  “Indeed it is. A gift from some wealthy friends, and it is beautiful, is it not? The peacocks, they are splendid, the blue as deep as the night.”

  Elke shifted in her chair and both men looked in her direction. “I’m sorry about Gianni,” she said to Professor Sayyed, making it clear she wished the conversation to swing to more serious matters. Morgan suspected there was nothing more serious for the old man than a discussion of his ancest
ral roots and the ways they had been pruned back and stifled. But Sayyed turned to Elke with focused attention.

  “You have to understand,” she continued, as if they were in the middle of a debate, “it was either him or me.”

  “Yes, I am sorry too,” said Professor Sayyed. “And I’m sorry it had to be you.”

  “Gianni?” said Morgan. “The kid under the Humber Bridge.”

  “He wasn’t a kid, but, yes, he was working for Professor Sayyed.”

  “Not for me, my dear Elke, not for me.”

  “For your people.”

  “What are you talking about?” Morgan asked almost peevishly.

  “His father was an Italian, his mother was a Kurd,” said the old man in a way that suggested no further explanation was necessary.

  Morgan rose to his feet and motioned to the others to remain where they were. He was an old hand at informal interrogation, and it was his turn to be in charge. Or so he thought. In fact, it became immediately evident that Elke had not relinquished control, and Professor Sayyed himself was more than a venerable tutor from an out-of-the-way corner of the world.

  “I really would appreciate an explanation of your relationship,” Morgan began.

  “You would?” said Elke.

  “Yes.”

  “Ho, ho,” said the professor. “I am an old man. We do not have a relationship.”

  “I think you know what I mean.”

  “What do you mean?” said Elke.

  “A wise old Muslim, a beautiful Israeli, it is not the most likely combination.”

  “This is a very cosmopolitan university,” said the professor with a glint in his eye.

  “Okay,” said Morgan. “Let’s try — an agent from Mossad and a militant mullah.”

  “A-ha,” said the old man. “Such assumptions! I am merely a professor of mid-eastern cultural studies. Hardly a militant.”

  Morgan looked around and thought how wonderful it must be to sit in these gloomy and exhilarating chambers day after day, surrounded by books and carpets, with inquiring minds dropping in for conversation and a glass or two of port or Madeira. It would be easy to forget the world of conspiracies and oppression.