#23. OLD CITY, DAMASCUS, SYRIA
Sunday July 12, 14:34
IT WAS bright and hot in the courtyard. The sun had warmed the bricks and the paving slabs radiated heat into the soles of Ali's bare feet. The fountain gurgled peacefully. Al Masbak 2 Cul-de-Sac 306102.
''You know who the next delivery is?'' Ali said. ''It's you.''
''Shut up.'' Hisham jabbed him again with the pistol.
''You heard him,'' Ali responded. ''He's breaking for the desert this afternoon. He said 'I', not 'we'. He's closing down the operation. What use are you? You're his recruiting agent and he ain't recruiting any more.''
They passed narrow, winding streets, stray, squalling cats, old men snoozing in plastic chairs, small half-naked boys playing football in the dust, passed through the city and the life of the city, death walking with them.
''You're off to Amman in a crate,'' Ali continued, ''And you're coming back in a box. Several boxes. Several small boxes, 'cos I've seen a suicide-bombing. They scrape whatever bits of charred, bloody meat they can find off the walls and bag it up. The guy who did my parents, they found enough to fit into a shoebox. Maybe they could fit you into your glue-sniffing bag.''
''Shut up,'' Hisham repeated.
''Well, if that's the way you want to go,'' said Ali, ''I won't try to stop you but I thought you were smart. Seems you're just a dumb-ass like Tamer after all.''
Al-Amin Market was massed with afternoon shoppers. Hisham and Ali went to a stall where produce was laid on the pavement under a shady canvas awning and purchased some cabbages, carrots, peppers and cucumbers and piled them into a wooden box.
''Carry it,'' Hisham commanded.
''It's difficult,'' Ali said, ''With this vest on.''
Hisham scowled angrily. ''Give it to me then,'' he said, putting the gun in his pocket.
The walls and minarets of the Umayyad Mosque loomed over the huddled, crowded rooftops. The restaurant was very near. It looked out at the mosque. Ali knew it had two floors, wooden stairs, wooden walls. It would catch fire in seconds.
He could jump Hisham now but he still had the detonator and the bomb might be triggered anyway if they ended up rolling round in the street. In addition, Firas was trailing them and Talal was no doubt somewhere close by, probably with a back-up detonator. He had to disarm the bomb somehow.
He heard the music from Leila's minutes before he saw the wedding party, the women ululating, the men rhythmically clapping. Dressed in a dark grey suit and red tie, the bridegroom was dancing slowly round his bride who was clad in a shimmering white gown, a tiara woven into her glossy black hair. They seemed so young, so carefree, so joyful, and so much in love. Four men in traditional Syrian costumes were dancing with swords, skipping through glinting blades lying crossed on the cobbles. The guests included a sprinkling of men in olive-green uniforms. Medals and epaulettes winked in the sunshine. Everyone looked happy.
''You want to destroy all this?'' Ali gestured. ''Why? For what?''
''They are enemies of Islam,'' Hisham replied, ''Takfir, excommunicate. They deny their faith. They are worse than unbelievers.''
''How are they takfir?''
''They dance,'' said Hisham, ''They drink. Their women are uncovered. They have betrayed everything. They have betrayed themselves.'' He gestured to a narrow, paved path that led through a herb garden to the restaurant. ''Here.''
''I need the toilet,'' said Ali.
''What?'' Hisham jammed the gun into his ribs.
''I need the toilet. I'm not going to die on a full bladder.''
Hisham hesitated.
''If I don't go,'' said Ali, ''I'll have to do it here right in front of the wedding guests. That'll put a stop to you. In fact,'' He fumbled at his shorts, ''I'm not sure I can hold it any longer.''
''All right,'' snapped Hisham. ''Up the road.''
They entered the toilet next to the Umayyad Mosque. One or two men and a couple of kids were there. It stank of urine. Ali hated being barefoot. God knew what he was treading in. He headed for the same cubicle he had occupied yesterday.
''Keep the door open,'' Hisham directed.
''You're going to watch me have a shit?''
''Sure.'' Hisham leant against the wall, the box of vegetables cradled in his arms.
Shaking his head, Ali tugged down his shorts and sat on the cold toilet-seat.
''Can you get me a cigarette?'' he called. ''Let's have a last one together. Old time's sake.''
Hisham looked irritated. ''We'll go to the kiosk outside,'' he said.
Grunting, Ali pulled fistfuls of paper from the wall-dispenser and wiped himself. Then he pulled his shorts up again and flushed the toilet. In the pan with the paper was a plastic wrapper.
Hisham bought two cigarettes. They stood in the corner of the square facing the big Roman arches that strode, stark and white, from the darkness of Hameediya Souk and the steps that led towards the Umayyad gate. Some kids were playing hopscotch. Others were riding skateboards down a ramp. Some pigeons were pecking at the sand on the pavement. In just ten minutes, bloody chaos would explode here because some people were insane.
''What did you expect from life?'' Ali said conversationally. ''Not this, I guess.''
''No,'' said Hisham, ''I wanted to be a basketball player.''
Ali grunted. ''I wanted to be a tennis player.''
''You know what I want most?'' said Hisham. ''A hot bath. And my dad to come back.''
Ali drew on the cigarette, felt the smoke creeping insidiously into his system. ''Why do you do this, Hisham? Take boys to them?''
'' 'Cos I hate them.'' Hisham spat on the pavement. ''These boys, these Tamers and Anases, they're pathetic, they make me sick, living on the street, selling themselves, selling their dignity, bleating on about how unlucky they are and how the Syrians don't give them a chance because they're just immigrants. They might as well serve some purpose and die for jihad.''
''You believe in Holy War?'' Ali said carefully, flicking ash from the Marlboro.
''You bet,'' said Hisham. ''I wanna exterminate every stinking traitor we can. They're a disgrace to Allah.'' He tossed his cigarette on the floor and poked Ali with the gun. ''Come on,'' he said. ''It's time.''
''Give me the box,'' Ali said. ''You carried it far enough.''
Hefting the vegetable box up against his chest with his knee, he led the return to Leila's back door. The guests had gone in. The antiseptic smell of thyme wafted from the herb garden.
''Kitchen delivery!'' he called. ''Vegetables from the market.''
A white-coated, white-hatted cook appeared. ''Great. Pop 'em on the work-top, will you?''
''Tips?'' asked Ali.
''Cheeky brat,'' said the cook.
''If we peel them and chop them?''
''That's fair enough,'' agreed the cook. ''Dice the cucumbers, peel the carrots, slice the peppers and I'll give you five hundred pounds.''
Hisham seemed shocked. This was not part of the plan.
Ali grinned and picked up a sharp knife. ''You heard the man, brother. Let's get to work.''
''What the hell are you doing?'' Hisham hissed.
''By the time we finish, the guests will be seated for lunch,'' Ali explained. ''We can probably help serve this food and get really close to them.'' He slammed the knife-blade through a cucumber. ''If I'm going to die, I might as well do it properly and hope you and Talal are right.''
While he worked, singing along to the kitchen radio and Fairouz' 'Nassam Alayna El-Hawa', he identified the door to the dining room, the door to the toilets and the doorway that led, through a beaded curtain, to the well-advertised roof-terrace with spectacular views over Old Damascus. That, he supposed, was where the bride and groom were being photographed.
''Nassam alayna el-hawa, men mafra el-wadi, ya hawa dakhl el-hawa, khedny hala blady'' he warbled, ''Ya hawa ya hawa, yally tayer bel-hawa…''
''I wonder you can sing,'' Hisham hissed. ''Let's do it.''
''Fe mantoura ta'a w soura
, khedny la 3endon ya hawa,'' he finished. ''You're sweating, Hisham. It isn't hygienic for a kitchen-worker to sweat so much.''
''Enough pissing about.'' Hisham jabbed the gun into Ali's ribs. ''Get moving.'' Turning his head, he called in a loud voice ''We're just off to see the wedding party, tamam?''
Then he uttered an ear-piercing scream as Ali skewered his left hand to the bench with the kitchen knife, the blade boring through the back of his hand to drive deeply into the wood. Ali smashed him round the head with a cabbage, kneed him sharply in the guts and crashed the wooden box down on his skull. Hisham slumped sideways. Ali kicked the gun out of his limpening hand and searched for the mobile.
''I think he got the point,'' Ali remarked to the open-mouthed cook.
Crouching under a lemon tree among the beds of rosemary, thyme and lavender, he took the Nokia 1100 he had retrieved in the toilet, dialled the double hash jamming signal, tore off his T-shirt, reached behind his back and yanked the blue and red wires away from their terminals to make the device safe. He could not help breathing a relieved sigh.
Drawn to the kitchen by Hisham's wild, hysterical screaming, wedding guests were now swarming from the dining room. The cook appeared in the doorway with the bridegroom and his father, a middle-aged, thick-set man in an army uniform.
''That kid stabbed him in the hand,'' he yelled.
''Oh my God!'' cried the groom's father. ''He's wearing a bomb!''
A dozen people screamed. A dozen security men drew their weapons. A dozen muzzles aimed at Ali's head. A dozen hammers clicked. Time to go.
Rolling on his shoulder through the bushes as a dozen bullets shredded the shrubs and ripped up the earth, he burst into the street, acutely conscious that he only had one bullet left in the recovered Sig-Sauer. Three men were coming, and he could hear the howl of police sirens approaching up Al-Amin Street. He ran across the square towards the kids playing on the steps by the remains of the Roman Temple of Jupiter.
''Sorry guys,'' he said, grabbing a black and red skateboard and jumping aboard just as one of the men drew his gun and fired. Pilgrims and tourists cried in alarm as one bullet ripped into the stonework above Ali's shoulder and another smashed through a silk-seller's window tucked just inside the souk's gloomy entrance.
Gripping the edges of the skateboard with his toes and crouching low at the knees, partly to avoid being shot and partly to lower his centre of gravity, Ali clattered down the stone steps and scooted fast past Saladin's tomb. His left hand extended for balance, he dialled 1-1-1-1 on the Nokia 1100 with his right. Another bullet whizzed past. He dug down with his right heel and, lifting the board, changed direction. He had to lose these guys and get back to Talal Hafez before he disappeared into the mazy Old City. Weaving through ancient streets where upper storeys met high-above to blot out the sky, he swayed fluently through knotted clumps of children and cats.
''Wadi Insurance,'' said the voice on the phone. ''How can we help you?''
''This is Salawa,'' he said. ''The target is on the move. Al-Masbak 2. Cul-de-sac 306102. He's got about eight men but most of them are walking wounded. Understand?''
Another bullet tore into the road.
''Understood.'' It sounded like Hala Ghaboury. ''Are they shooting at you, Salawa?''
''Just a bit,'' said Ali. Another bullet clanged into a bin. ''I'm heading back now.''
And then what? Ali sped down another ramp, accelerated round a bend and into Al Masbak Alley. Glancing over his shoulder he could see that the men had dropped too far behind to catch him. He whooped, wobbled, then, arriving abruptly outside the yard, turned the skateboard sideways to screech to a stop.
There he was, Talal Hafez, in the courtyard, waiting by the fountain for Firas or Hisham to come running in with news of the bombing. He seemed puzzled. He would have heard the explosion by now. He was fiddling with his phone, presumably either calling Hisham or sending his over-riding detonation signal.
Ali kicked down hard on the skateboard, making it spring up into his hand and, as Talal, raising his eyes, registered shock, flung it at the preacher with all his might. Talal managed to ward the heavy skateboard away with his hook but Ali had a split second to get through the defence with a jumping back-kick into the chest which knocked the imam backwards into the trough of the fountain. Ali piled on top, punching him savagely in the side of the head with his right fist, hoping to stun him, or even kill him, whilst choking him violently with his left hand.
Talal gurgled and kicked, the hook thrashing close to Ali's face. Sirens shrieked in the distance. Ali heard shouting, Osama, Firas, others.
Talal's hook slashed down Ali's right cheek, slicing the skin. Ali cried aloud, then all the rage and hurt he had pent up since May erupted in a volcanic red mist consuming every fibre with a hatred, a sheer, naked hatred of an intensity he had never before experienced. He punched Talal hard in the kidneys and kneed him brutally in the right thigh, to deaden it. Talal, shouting, rolled over in the water-trough.
Jumping on his back, Ali dug his knees into Talal's sides and forced his face into the fountain. The man roared again, confused, distressed, frustrated, wounded, trying desperately to shake him off, like a dog trying to rid itself of a troublesome tick, got an elbow up, jarred Ali's jaw, then lurched sideways again, threatening to tumble them both. Ali scrabbled for the Timex on his wrist and yanked out the garrotte. Looping it over the imam's head, he tugged at the wire with all his strength. Gargling, Talal kicked violently as the wire bit savagely into his throat.
''You killed my parents,'' Ali hissed fiercely, ''You killed my brothers. You crippled my sister. You tried to kill me.''
Shoving his knee into the small of Talal's back, he pulled harder as the wire cut more deeply into the now-bleeding flesh around the man's Adam's apple. The man lurched again, choking, shaking like an epileptic rat, and almost threw Ali off.
''You go to Hell,'' Ali hissed in his ear, pushing the face into the fountain again. ''Even those who kill with suicide-bombing shall meet the flames of Hell. It is written, you bastard.''
Talal's blood-stained fingers clutched desperately at the wire, trying to loosen it. Ali wrenched it tighter. Something deep inside the imam's chest rattled, like trapped air knocking in a boiler. There was blood in the water, blood matting that great black beard. The hook beat a wild tattoo on the marble lip of the fountain. Sirens ululated like women at a wedding. Somewhere he heard gunfire. He heaved at the wire again and cursed Talal to Hell. Talal uttered a dreadful gargling sound as his windpipe was crushed. His feet kicked on the ancient stones. The hook rattled again. His entire body heaved for breath. Blood seeped from his mouth then, suddenly limp, he collapsed face-down in the fountain with Ali still on his back.
The wire had bitten into Ali's fingers, drawing blood.
Someone was shaking him. He may have been crying.
''Ali,'' said Hamza Madani, ''Ali. He's dead. Let him go. He's dead.''
Gently he levered Ali's fingers from the wire and, even more gently, folded the boy protectively into his chest.
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