The Prisoner's Wife

by Gerard Macdonald

  “I am Muslim.”

  “Okay. You are a Muslim. Okay, right. Like I say, we have religion in common, you and me. We both believe in a transcendent God. A force for good. I understand your anger. I feel your pain. You believe that we—I mean, people like me, Americans—we’re killing Muslims. You think we’re doing it in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in Lebanon, Palestine—we’re helping do it in Chechnya—we did it in Iran, a little help-out from our friends in Iraq, and you think, what can I, Darius, what can I do to stop it? Of course you do. I understand. Hell, if I was a Muslim, I might feel that way. You have no tanks, you have no bombers, you have no fighter planes. You think all you can do is kill Americans. You turn our airplanes into weapons.”

  The prisoner said, “No, sir. Not me. No. I condemn that.”

  “It’s okay, Darius,” Calvin said. “Don’t be defensive. I mean, what choice do you have?”

  “But that is not how I feel,” the prisoner said. The wounds to his face made speaking difficult. “I have—I had, before you took me—I had many choices. I am an academic. I spoke out. I never wished to kill.”

  “Don’t get me wrong,” Calvin said. Again, he touched the prisoner’s arm, lightly, confidingly. “Not all Muslims are terrorists. I appreciate that. You have children?”

  The prisoner was having trouble breathing. “You know the answer, sir. I do not.”

  “But you have a girlfriend—”

  “—a wife.”

  “Ah,” said Calvin, “no. Not a wife. You see, we check on things like this, Darius. Let’s call her a girlfriend. I met her in England. And Morocco, come to think of it. Damn, I thought, this puss looks good enough to eat with a spoon. I’ll bet ten bucks she comes on like the Easter bunny. Sooner or later, what do you know, she’s forgotten to take her pill—bang, you got a pickaninny in the oven. Now, Darius, believe me, when you guys have this rugrat—”

  The prisoner nursed his damaged cheek. He said, “Rugrat?”

  “Kiddie. Small person. You have this kid, you’re going to see things differently. Happened to me. I get to be a father, all of sudden I think, hey, I love this boy. Makes you value human life, Darius, having family. You won’t want crazy hajjis wandering around with nukes.” His voice changed. “Who were those guys, going to pick up the warheads?”

  “I told you,” the prisoner said, “I told you, sir, I do not know. And let me say, sir, I don’t have to wait for children to value human life. Sir, I have always valued human life.”

  Calvin’s tone was reproachful now. “Don’t do this to me, Darius. We know you found those papers in Kandahar. In Abbasi’s office.” He paused. “You do know he’s dead, right?”

  Darius shook his head.

  “Killed himself. Jumped off of a roof, poor bastard. Now, what I’m saying, I know how you felt, you found those Abbasi papers. You read them, all of a sudden, you know where the nukes are—you think, thank God, thank Allah, here’s a chance for the perfect storm. Revenge on those infidel Christians killing my fellow Muslims. Of course you’d think that. You’d use the knowledge you had. You were the only one who could read those papers. You could understand them. Here’s your big break. Chance to grab a nuke. Small device, sure, but big enough for what you wanted. Big enough for New York, say. You took the chance. I understand that. I see where you’re coming from. In your place, maybe—maybe I would’ve done the same.”

  He stood close beside the prisoner. Sensing his presence, Darius cringed. Calvin removed the man’s blindfold. Sighted, the prisoner seemed more acutely aware of his nakedness.

  “How do you know what I found in Kandahar?”

  “We know most things about you,” said Calvin. “We know what makes you tick. What we don’t know is what you told Dr. Khan. We don’t know where the nukes went. We don’t know how they got to where they went. That’s how you can help us.”

  The prisoner’s hands tightened over his scrotum. He shook his head no.

  “Now, Darius,” Calvin said, “do yourself a favor. You talk to me—a man with sympathy for Muslim folk—or you go back to the bad boys downstairs. Knuckledraggers, we call them. Unkind, but true. I tell you this, my friend. They’re likely to get grouchy, those boys, when they hear you’re being difficult. When they get grouchy, you know, they’re likely to smack you around—and they shouldn’t do it, but you likely got that old electric wire up your ass, plus one of those pit bull dogs with all the teeth—dog’s just waiting to get his mouth around that big old dick you got there. I tell you this, Darius—once they get a good bite, those dogs, damn hard to make ’em let go. Might have to put off those kids.” Calvin shuddered. “Myself, I’d hate that. I’m truly allergic to dogs. Always have been. Specially anyplace close to my cock.” He sighed. “It’s a real question, my friend. Are you going to do yourself a favor and talk to me? Or do you want to go back there—talk to the boys downstairs?”

  The prisoner wept. Calvin saw that he was shaking now, and urinating in small spasmodic spurts. The urine smelled rank. For some reason, Calvin found, it often did, after a long interrogation. He’d need to have the whole damn place disinfected. Just as well the floor was tiled. In itself, though, pissing was a good sign. If Calvin was any judge of character, the wretched business was nearly done. This sorry-ass hajji needed no more pressure. He was about to talk.

  “I know,” Calvin told the prisoner. “It’s a bitch. If I could stop those thugs doing what they do, believe me, I would, but I don’t run this place. I’m just a cog in the wheel. They’re out of control, those guys downstairs. They think up things—they do things—I truly do not wish to know about.”

  “Tell me what you want,” the prisoner said. “Just tell me. Whatever it is, I will do it.”

  “Well, my friend,” Calvin said, “first thing I want you to do is read this bit of paper. Read it out loud. Here’s what it says. ‘My name is Darius Osmani. I am thirty-nine years old and a Muslim fundamentalist, working with al Qaeda. During the months of April through June of 2004, I was well treated in the jails where I was held. I was not questioned by Americans. I was not subject to any kind of ill treatment.’”

  “You want me to read that?”

  “You bet your life,” Calvin said. “We have your voiceprint. If we keep you a little longer, another year or so, say, you’ll maybe need to read it again.” He was setting up a tape recorder. “Give me a minute, get this damn thing running. After that, you read the boilerplate, nice loud voice. You identify yourself. Then we help each other, you and me. Starting with you telling me everything, and I mean everything, I want to know about Dr. Khan and the nukes.”

  33

  PESHAWAR, PAKISTAN, 3 JUNE 2004

  In the lobby of the Grand Comfort Hotel, Shawn searched his pockets for his satellite phone, wondering if it could be packed with his still-missing baggage. Then he recalled the porter who had, for a moment, grabbed him at the airport, a hand inside his jacket. Thinking back, that must have been when the damn thing went south. What use was training, if you fell for a move like that?

  He wasted time speaking to the plump receptionist, reporting the phone missing, then fought his way into the street, through moving crowds of robed and bearded men. He was searching for a back-alley gun shop he’d used a few years ago, at a time when he wanted an untraceable weapon to kill the man who murdered Rafe Ramirez.

  Wading through this human sea took Shawn back to childhood outings to the coast of Alabama, struggling neck-deep through the sea-wrack of an incoming tide. Here, in the back streets of Peshawar, he made slow progress, turning eventually down a narrow half-remembered passage, where the crowd thinned. Toward the end of the alley, two Pakistani men perched on three-legged stools, close to a wall hung with patterned rugs. They watched him. These men were ageless: They could have been in their dotage, but Shawn knew, from earlier dealings, they were shrewd in business and perhaps no older than he. Though for them, he thought, in this town, and this trade, reaching the age of fifty might be a real achievement.

&nbs
p; It was, Martha would have said, no country for old men.

  Above the businessmen hung a weathered sign, painted in green and purple. It read PESHAWAR ARMY SUPPLIES (PVT). Shawn made a pistol gesture with thumb and forefinger. One of the old men rose stiffly from his stool. He held aside a beaded curtain hung over an open doorway, then followed Shawn down two steps and into a shadowed and suddenly cool weapon store. The walls were hung with weapons. A single blowfly circled the room.

  Shawn’s notion of these places was formed by the gun shops of Alabama: little roadside stores selling handguns and hunting rifles, bait worms, and NRA decals (KEEP HONKING, I’M RELOADING), along with eye-catching jackets, so your buddies don’t take you for deer.

  Peshawar Army Supplies was different. It offered rocket-propelled grenades, missiles, land mines, machine guns, cannon, fragmentation bombs, rocket launchers, Kalashnikovs, and artillery shells. A young man in a skullcap brought Shawn a cup of cardamom-spiced tea. A notice on a wall announced the availability, to order, of American-made Stingers—maybe the same heat-seeking missiles Shawn once shipped across the border into Afghanistan. He pointed at a short-barreled, nine-mil double-action Russian-made Makarov in a dusty glass case. He was giving up on Glocks. Disappointed that this was all his customer needed, the old man briefly checked the weapon, found a brick of shells, and passed the pistol over the counter. Calculating what money remained, Shawn paid cash.

  The storekeeper indicated a battered RPG launcher. “You are wanting nothing else?”

  “The minute I need missiles,” Shawn said, “I will let you know.”

  The old man laughed politely and ushered his customer from the shop. “Sir,” he said, “go carefully. This is not a safe town for American spies.”

  “I’m not a spy,” Shawn said. He turned right out of the store. “If I was, I’m not now.”

  * * *

  Walking toward Khyber Bazaar, Shawn had the feeling, the sense, that he was being followed. He stopped suddenly, backed into a café doorway, put a hand on his new purchase—he hoped to hell the pistol worked—and faced the way he’d come. Avoiding a group of young Pashtuns, along came a thickset man last seen in Fes: the lethal handyman, Alfred Burke.

  His right hand in his windbreaker pocket, Shawn leveled the Makarov. “Alfred,” he said.

  Without changing pace, Alfred came toward him.

  “Not too close,” Shawn said.

  Alfred pulled out one of the café’s plastic chairs, seated himself, and waved Shawn to another. “Don’t be that way, matey,” said Alfred. “I want to talk with you. Take your hand out your damn pocket. If I was on a hit, you think you would’ve seen me?”

  Shawn, seating himself, shook his head.

  “Well, then,” Alfred said. He sat a while in silence, staring into space. “You know I been working for Mr. Abbasi,” he said finally. “You remember that.”

  “You told me in Fes. When you took me to the cellar.”

  “Jesus,” said Alfred, “don’t you hate them underground places? Give me the creeps, personally speaking. Mr. Abbasi used to say they make him feel safe. Not me, they don’t. Make me feel like I been buried. Before I was dead, know what I mean?”

  “Which reminds me,” Shawn said. “Something I want to ask you.”

  Alfred waited.

  “A man in Fes tried to kill me.”

  Alfred clicked his tongue. “Weren’t me, squire. Principle I work on, someone’s trying to take you out, they don’t appreciate what you’re doing. Which, in your case, it’s chasing that schwartzer they keep shifting around.” He paused, then said, “Same with Mr. Abbasi, Lord love him.”

  “Are you telling me,” Shawn said, “Abbasi’s dead?”

  “Dead as they get,” Alfred said. “Garroted. Pity. He was Paki, okay, but I liked him.”

  “Me, too.”

  “They banged him up in jail, some bullshit charge.” Alfred pointed northward. “One of them hajjis had a wire, got to him. Or, another story, hajjis blow up the jail wall, they go in, find our guy”—Alfred made a pistol gesture with his right hand—“they whack him.” He put a calloused hand around his throat. “Then, this.”

  Shawn thought back to his meeting with Abbasi in the peace of his Sussex garden. He thought of shots at a pear tree, a woman in a Lexus, a kitten on a lawn. He shook his head. “Not true.”

  “Which bit?” asked Alfred.

  “Both. Either.”

  Alfred shook his head. “Ye of little faith. You don’t believe this, because why?”

  “Because it never happened,” Shawn said. “If Abbasi’s dead—”

  “—which, trust me, mate, he is—”

  “—he wasn’t killed by his own people.”

  “Well,” Alfred said, “I don’t know. It’s what I heard. These days, who d’you believe? The stories you hear.” He considered Shawn. “Heard one or two about you, come to that.”

  “Tell me,” Shawn said. “I like stories.”

  “Might not like this one,” Alfred said. “Mr. McCord’s planning to pick up your girlfriend.”

  “You’re working for him?”

  “Am now,” Alfred said. “Something I noticed, people stop paying you, once they’re dead.”

  Shawn swung his chair so that he was fully facing the thickset man. “So. McCord’s paying. Walking-around money, that’s called. What do you do for him?”

  “Now, now,” Alfred said. “I don’t ask you what you’re doing with Miss Baptist.”

  “Baptiste.”

  “Whatever,” Alfred said. “I don’t ask. But when I say pick up, apropos Mr. McCord and Miss Baptist, I mean not in the sense he’s asking the lady out on a date.”

  “I know what you mean,” Shawn said. “Hasn’t happened yet.”

  Alfred pressed large hands together: an isometric exercise. “You know why that is? I’ll tell you. Because Mr. McCord has a little job for you, which he wants it done first.” He turned away, then paused. “You know something?” he asked. “If I was you, which I’m glad I’m not, I wouldn’t stay around this town.”

  “You said you hadn’t been hired for a hit.”

  “I haven’t,” Alfred said. “Don’t know if I’d do it, even if I was. We’re getting too old for this game, you and me. You specially. Comes a time, right, when you say, okay, enough of this shit. Or your body says so. If I was you, though, and like I say, I’m glad I’m not, there’s other bodies I’d be watching.”

  “Anyone in particular?”

  Alfred bent to toss coins to an orange-robed and legless beggar scooting past them on a skateboard.

  “What about the one you’re living with? The bird? The one the boss wants a chat with.”

  Hands clasped in blessing, the beggar scooted off.

  Shawn said, “You’ve been listening to McCord.”

  Alfred shrugged. “At this moment, it’s my job.” He reached beneath his jacket. Shawn stood and stepped back, his hand going to his own pocket.

  “Relax,” Alfred said. He produced an envelope and passed it over. “Last payment from Mr. Abbasi.” He watched Shawn open the packet. “It’s not what you settled for. Man was running short of cash. Plus, I took myself a little commission.”

  “You could have taken it all,” Shawn said.

  Alfred bared tombstone teeth. “You know what he says, whatsisface. Live outside the law, you best be honest.”

  Listening to the handyman, Shawn reflected on honesty, on lives cut short, on the people he knew who’d died violent deaths, at his own hand or others’. One of those others, he believed, was Alfred—who lifted one liver-spotted finger in farewell, then paused.

  “Last word,” he said. “I got myself a armpit of a place”—he pointed to where a gold-leafed onion dome reared above the rooftops—“right next that mosque thing there. Bitch, trying to sleep. Five in the morning, what do they do, the bastards?” He held his hands apart. “Prayer call over speakers, this near my fucking head.” He yawned. “Anyway, son. You want to find me, t
hat’s where I’ll be.”

  Shawn told him thanks for the heads-up. “No offense,” he said, “but why the hell would I want to find you?”

  The handyman was walking away, rolling his head to ease the muscles of his neck. “Who knows?” he asked. “This place. Fulla surprises.”

  34

  PESHAWAR, PAKISTAN, 3 JUNE 2004

  When Shawn arrived back at the Grand Comfort Hotel, Bobby Walters was there, waiting in a veranda in a pool of shade, escaping the crowd and heat of the afternoon. Putting an arm around Shawn’s shoulders, he said, “Good to see you, boy. Been a while.”

  “In an army chopper,” Shawn said, “did you not drop into my village, two weeks back?”

  “Lot goes down in two weeks,” Bobby said. “Stuff happens. I came here. You came here. I want a word where no one’s listening. Get your ass in the jeep.”

  Given orders, Shawn’s instinct was to do otherwise. He’d been that way since schooldays in Turkey Forge.

  Seeing this, Bobby said, “You don’t do it, be a mistake. Trust me. Got a job for you.”

  Two buses edged past, flying the campaign flags of both political parties, together with a hundred small mirrors, hand-colored posters of Nashida Noon, and, for some reason, an image of a young and fully dressed Madonna Ciccone. Bearded men hung on the running boards and stood waving, semaphore-style, on roofs. Someone in a bus played what sounded like an off-key trumpet.

  “Do I get to know where we’re going?”

  “The hills. Observation.” Bobby—in charge of what Shawn guessed to be a hired vehicle of a certain age—peered underneath, for bombs, then sat a while adjusting the driver’s seat, putting the jeep in gear; checking gas, oil, and temperature levels. He was thorough about these things. “Plus, I want a chat, where no one’s listening.”