The trucks trailed out of town in a dusty convoy. By now the moon was high in the sky, providing just enough light to see the faint outline of the hills. Since they had crossed the border into Afghanistan two days earlier, their journey had traced a crude upward crescent, which was now bending northeast, a route that brought them to the lower reaches of the wide, fertile valley spilling westward from the Khyber Pass. Jalalabad, Kudrat’s reputed base of operations, sat in the middle of that valley, some thirty miles east-northeast of Heserak. If that was their destination, the roads from here on out should be relatively straight and flat.
They weren’t smooth, however, and as the trucks bounced forward Najeeb noticed a dark liquid pooling at the base of the closed tailgate. It seemed to be coming from the wounded man, whose face was no longer visible in the night. A mile or so later Najeeb noticed someone next to the man leaning closer. Then, over the noise of the engine, a voice announced, “He’s dead.” Najeeb translated the news for Skelly, who dutifully recorded it after consulting his watch. The five survivors shifted and realigned, giving the dead man more room now that he no longer needed it.
“Do you know his name?” Skelly asked.
Najeeb relayed the question to the others. One grunted in reply.
“No one knew him.”
Skelly scribbled a few moments more, then put down his pencil. Najeeb wondered if the dead man had a family, any children. If he was like most fighters, he had probably been at war for years, since his teens, carrying a gun for one warlord or another since before he was old enough to shave, forgetting not only his age but any skills he might have learned for earning a living. Other than fighting, of course. If peace came anytime soon, as everyone hoped, what would these men do, other than return home to fields of dust and drought? And now Najeeb and Skelly had been washed into this stream of the aimless warrior class, bumping from one forlorn destination to the next. He could get angry over that, too, he supposed wearily. If not for Skelly’s headstrong pursuit of a story they would be making their way back across the border by now, toward Tariq and the ISI. So keep moving forward, wherever that led. And keep trying to conserve energy for the first chance of escape. He would be drawing upon reserves he hadn’t needed in years.
The night was cold and getting colder, and once or twice he heard Skelly’s teeth chattering. The notebook was back in his pocket. A half hour later they saw the twinkling lights of Jalalabad. The town’s electricity was the strongest testimony yet to Kudrat’s prestige. The fealty of various gangs and factions meant little for very long unless you controlled the ones who kept the water and power flowing.
But when they reached the town the convoy drove through the outskirts, passing quickly into orange groves that sheltered the road, speeding past low, darkened homes and a lonely checkpoint or two where campfires were burning, then another mile or so into the countryside before turning left, bouncing across a dirt track alongside a bare field. The route continued in a jostling series of turns across more farmland, beneath long promenades of drooping eucalyptus, the menthol smell heavy in the night air. When the trucks finally stopped, no one spoke a word. There was only the sound of doors slamming and tailgates dropping. During one lull he heard Skelly’s pencil scratching anew, an insistent mouse gnawing at the baseboard. Then a deep voice came up from behind as their tailgate bounced open.
“Everyone out.”
“Where are we?” a captive asked.
“Rishkoor.”
It was a small military base just outside Jalalabad, and for the moment it appeared to have no lights. Either that or it was operating under blackout orders. The silhouettes of a few low buildings were barely visible. Beyond them was a moonlit field littered with hulking dark shapes. Trucks? Tanks? He couldn’t be sure.
Someone switched on a flashlight, and the beam lit Skelly’s face. Then one of Bashir’s men grabbed Skelly by the arm. Najeeb stepped quickly to keep pace, passing a huddle of men muttering to themselves in a foreign tongue. Najeeb thought it was Arabic but couldn’t tell for sure.
“Wait here,” the man told Skelly, then departed.
Someone nearby pull-started a generator, the engine beating noisily to life, and a short time later a string of dim lights flared overhead. Najeeb stole a glance at the knot of strange men, squinting into the glare. They were sullen, a tough-looking bunch, and definitely not locals. Each of them was armed to the teeth.
Skelly nudged him, as if trying not to attract too much attention, then nodded toward the men.
“Taliban?” Skelly said under his breath.
“Guests of the Taliban.”
“Guests,” Skelly repeated, sounding exhausted. “You mean some of the retreating forces from the north? Or is this a way station for visitors?”
He said it almost dreamily, as if he might be half expecting a cameo appearance by his friend Sam Hartley, the wheeler-dealer, blowing in on the next breeze to set things right with assurances of commerce for all.
“Arab guests,” Najeeb clarified. “From Syria, Saudi, Yemen. Or countries like that. They’re the ones your government calls al-Qaeda, although I doubt that’s what they’d call themselves.”
Skelly reached for his notebook, then seemed to think better of it and let his hands fall to his sides.
“I guess we’ll either have one hell of a story, or we’ll soon be very unwelcome.”
Najeeb supposed he was right.
A few minutes later one of Kudrat’s guards tugged them toward a line of captives walking single file toward a long cinder-block building. Then Bashir seemed to materialize out of nowhere, remonstrating with the guard.
“They’re arguing,” Najeeb translated for Skelly. “Bashir’s saying we belong to him. He’s trying to separate us from the others.”
Bashir eventually got his way, which Najeeb took as a good sign. At least he was a known quantity, and for all his deceit the man seemed to have a vested interest in keeping them alive. But he’d had to raise his voice to win the argument, and that had attracted the attention of the Arabs, who didn’t seem to approve. The farther they got from Azro, the more the man’s authority seemed to diminish.
Bashir led them toward another low building and ushered them into a small room at one end. He turned on his flashlight to help them get their bearings. It looked like their room in Azro, dirty plaster walls and a few thin mattresses on the floor.
“Where’s the rest of my stuff?” Skelly asked.
Najeeb thought he looked a little better, but perhaps it was wishful thinking.
“Tomorrow,” Bashir said.
“And my phone?”
“Tomorrow. Patience.”
Then he flicked off the light and departed, shutting the door and leaving them in darkness. Najeeb groped his way toward one of the mattresses, supposing they wouldn’t be getting any food tonight. I can do this, he told himself again. I can live this way for as long as I have to. Now if only Skelly can do the same.
“He didn’t lock the door,” Skelly said.
“They don’t have to. I heard one of the guards saying the Americans had dropped cluster bombs. There are apparently hundreds still in the fields, unexploded. Try to sneak away and you’ll probably set one off.”
“Not that we’d know where to go anyway.”
“We should sleep while we can. Who knows what they’ll want out of us tomorrow.”
“Do you know where they took Razaq? Him and his sons?”
“I couldn’t tell. They were in the first truck. It was empty by the time the lights came on.”
“But I guess they won’t harm him, right?”
“Unless they give him to the Arabs.”
“Or whoever’s with the Arabs. Or leading them.”
“Yes.” Najeeb didn’t want to say the man’s name. “That could change everything. For us, too.”
Skelly said nothing more on the subject, as if he, too, feared it might jinx them.
NAJEEB FELLASLEEP quickly. There were no prayers calling through t
he night here, no sound except the shuffle and mutter of a few men outside the door. At some point in the night a few of the trucks drove away, but it was impossible to say how many.
Hours later he was awakened by a flash and an explosion, the ground shaking, and for a terrifying moment the oxygen seemed to be sucked from the air. A rain of dirt and stones showered the roof. Then a jet shrieked overhead, leaving in a hurry. He heard Skelly moving in the darkness, throwing back his blankets.
“What the . . . ?”
“Stay here,” Najeeb cautioned.
“Just getting my bearings,” Skelly said, sounding shaken. “Wonder how much more of that is coming.”
There were three more explosions, but each was progressively distant, like a cloudburst moving down the valley. Someone was moaning outside, then there was a flurry of footsteps followed by silence. Najeeb must have fallen back asleep shortly afterward, because the next thing he knew Bashir was standing over him, his face lit by flashlight, jostling his shoulder.
“What is it?” Skelly said groggily from the other side of the room. “Who’s there?”
“Come,” Bashir said. “You must both see this.”
His tone was urgent, and he must have been excited because he wasn’t bothering to speak English for his scribe. Najeeb translated Bashir’s orders, but Skelly barely mumbled in reply, and when Bashir turned his beam toward the reporter Najeeb saw that Skelly’s brow was bathed in sweat, his hair matted and askew. He reached across. The man’s forehead was steaming.
“I need another pill,” Skelly mumbled. “And I need another shit.”
“He’s sick,” Najeeb said.
“You must come anyway. Now.”
Najeeb translated quickly, and Skelly, for all his troubles, reached first for his notebook, then began pulling on his pants. He, too, had untapped reserves, Najeeb observed, grateful for the knowledge.
“What is it he wants us to see?” Skelly asked, and this time Bashir answered in English.
“Justice,” he said. “Justice for Mahmood Razaq. He is to be tried for treason, with his brother and son. Then they will be hanged.”
Skelly looked over at Najeeb, then muttered a short sentence, barely audible.
“What?” Bashir asked. “What is he saying?”
Najeeb recognized the words well enough, having heard an American professor use them long ago in response to some legal outrage or another. It was a line that had intrigued him enough to go and look it up, finding to his surprise that it came from a children’s book, an imaginary world where animals and playing cards had walked and talked, a place where logic and order were turned upside down.
“What he said was, ‘First the sentence, then the trial.’ ”
Bashir nodded. He seemed to find the concept to his liking.
“Come,” he said again, eyes blazing. “You must see it.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
THE TRIAL WAS unlike anything Skelly had ever seen, made all the more surreal by the recurring waves of fever.
Bashir had chivvied them into a low plaster building where at least fifty men squatted on a concrete floor beneath a dangling forty-watt bulb, barely brighter than a candle. Razaq stood defiantly at the front along with his son, Haji din Razaq, his brother, Salim, and two other men from his caravan, one of whom was wrapped around the middle with bloody bandages, hunching forward with his face in a permanent grimace. Every time he sagged farther, or tried to sit, a man with a long switch would rise from the front row to swat at his ankles, to the delight of the crowd, which didn’t so much laugh or cheer as huzzah, heads nodding, as if he’d had it coming.
Opposite the defendants—that was the word Skelly put in his notebook, unable to come up with anything better—was a tall elderly man with a graying beard and a soiled white turban, clutching a brown blanket around his chest like a shawl. Kudrat stood nearby with a watchful eye, seeming firmly in control of the proceedings.
When the older man began to speak the crowd went silent, Skelly scribbled a description of the place while trying not to notice how bad he felt. He’d swallowed another pill with the last of his water just before leaving their room.
“What time is it, anyway?” Skelly whispered, causing a few heads to turn toward him with scowls of disapproval.
The floor was stone cold, like sitting on an ice rink, and there wasn’t a rug or cushion in sight. The whitewashed walls—or what you could see of them—were scuffed and pocked. A chill breeze wafted through an open window, the remnants of the panes swept into a pile of broken glass.
“Almost four in the morning,” Najeeb said, leaning closer, again placing a palm on Skelly’s forehead, a look of concern creasing his brow. “We have to find you some food and water.”
“Just tell me what they’re saying.”
“Blather mostly.”
More heads turned, the scowls deepening, and Najeeb lowered his voice to a whisper, causing Skelly to cup a hand to his ear. “He is calling them traitors. Spies for America. He asked them what they had to say for themselves but he kept on talking. He is preaching a sermon, really.”
“Some sort of imam?”
“No. Just a blowhard. A political.”
Skelly looked at Razaq, the only one of the defendants who seemed to have held on to his pride. The others were downcast, looking at the floor, but Razaq glared at anyone who caught his eye, first at the speaker and then at the crowd. For a moment his gaze seemed to settle on Skelly at the back, although it was doubtful the man could have picked him out of the crowd in the dimness. The overhead bulb flickered once, then twice, making it seem even more like candlelight, but the crowd took it in stride as the speaker droned on, now raising his right arm and shouting.
“He is saying that the penalty for treason is death. That they must pay with their lives as a lesson to others.”
Razaq suddenly spoke up in a booming voice. Skelly remembered the big sword and saw that it was gone. He wondered who had taken it as a trophy. Kudrat, perhaps. He tugged at Najeeb, wanting words, but Najeeb shook him off, attentive to the unfolding scene. The judge, if the man indeed called himself that, was now shouting back at Razaq, and for a moment their voices canceled each other out in a blur of noise, the foreign words buzzing past Skelly’s head like bad music. He felt dreamy, weakened, and he stopped writing for a moment to steady his posture, placing a palm on the chilly floor. He wished he had a blanket to pull around himself, and he didn’t like the concerned look on Najeeb’s face whenever he looked Skelly’s way. The man’s quiet and careful translations seemed as much in deference to his fragile condition as to keep from offending Kudrat, who had flinched and frowned at the first of Najeeb’s interludes, but now seemed to tolerate them as one would the buzzing of a fly.
The man with the stick, sitting in the front row, rose again, this time to lash Razaq across the side, the big man fending the blows off with his left hand. He didn’t look proud anymore.
“Razaq said he is a Pashtun, a Durrani of the Lokhali tribe, and that all of them should be ashamed, taking orders from an Arab slave. You saw what happened next.”
Skelly told himself he would write it down later. It was good stuff, but he was suddenly too weary to move. Then the crowd began to stand, bursting into excited chatter. Before Skelly could even get to his feet, men were pushing past him, the smell of sweat and onions and tobacco everywhere. His knees felt creaky, and Najeeb took his arm, pulling him along, the young man’s grip strong.
The voice in his ear said, “Come on. Try to keep moving.”
Skelly’s head swam, then he steadied. He panicked for a moment, thinking he’d dropped his notebook, then realized it was still clutched in his left hand, the pages sweaty.
“I feel awful. Where are we going? Is it over?”
“They are going to be hanged now. All of them. Everyone is going to watch.”
Skelly shuddered, whether from his fever or from the thought of witnessing an execution he wasn’t sure, but he suddenly felt more attun
ed to the proceedings, and horrified at what he was about to witness.
They were among the last ones out the door, the crowd shoving ahead at an eager pace. In Skelly’s clouded state of mind he couldn’t help but think of store openings and giveaways he’d had to cover in the United States. Free gift to first fifty customers. Free hanging to first fifty Pashtuns. He experienced a wavery déjà vu from the grand opening of a Warren County Wal-Mart, overweight women pushing past him through a bank of doors toward a counter beneath a sign with a yellow smiley face. He stopped, if only to shake the weirdness of the image, Najeeb still trying to tug him along.
“Just give me a second. I’m about to pass out.” Then a rush of panic seized him. “Have you seen the Arabs again?”
“No. Come on.”
Skelly checked again for his notebook. Still there. Still in his left hand, which clutched it like a claw. He thought again of the Wal-Mart, a woman in flowered capri pants nearly knocking him to the ground by the drink machines out front. Cokes for thirty-five cents. He would do some damage for one of those right now, a cold and fizzy swallow of sugar. The thought seemed to clear his head, and he was moving again, out the door into the night, following the crowd by its smell and shuffle.
The gallows was as crude as the courtroom, and the process just as peremptory and raucous. Someone had taken a twenty-foot pole—the kind often used as a checkpoint barrier—and lashed it between two eucalyptus trees, about twelve feet high. A camp lantern hung from one of the trees, and the mob swarmed toward the light like a mating frenzy of night bugs, shouting and raising their arms, sharp cries to Allah and deep, throaty rasps. Razaq and the other four had disappeared into this maelstrom, and Skelly was struggling at the rear, grasping at Najeeb’s sleeve but feeling steadier now that he was back in fresh air. He looked upward. The stars were out, no hint of dawn yet visible in the east. A rope soared into the air up front, tossed as crisply as a lasso, but it struck the pole, then fell to the ground. A second attempt put it across. Then four more ropes followed in succession, spaced evenly down the pole. This was their gallows, then, a crude make-do affair, but it certainly seemed up to the task at hand. The ropes jiggled for a second, charmed snakes all in a row, and Skelly raised on his toes just high enough to see men below fashioning nooses.
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