The Jealous

by Laury Silvers

  Looking down the road again, he abruptly craned his head. He smiled more broadly, and called out, “Khalil, Khalil!”

  She looked to where he was calling, stung that this broad smile had not been for her. There was a tall Arab, almost as tall as Tein and as solidly built and muscular, leaning against a wall with a thin miswak in his mouth. He wore his dark blue turban wound under his chin in such a way that it fell across his face, just slightly. As they drew closer, Tein leading her through the crowd to him, she saw that his brown eyes were lined with kohl, and his thick linen robe hung off him as if he would shed it in a moment. Recognizing Tein, the man smiled in return; his perfect small, white teeth shone, ready to bite. He pushed himself off the wall and stood, his shoulders back, his legs apart. She drew a sharp intake of breath. He did not have a sword, but there was a dagger on his waist strap under the short robe, its hilt worn from use. It was like Tein’s, a knife meant for violence. Khalil came to them, unworried whether or not he was in anyone’s way and people in the road parted for him. Saliha drew her wrap around her body more carefully, covering all but her eyes, and standing somewhat behind Tein, but did not look away.

  Khalil tipped his chin at Tein, indicating his turban. “I heard you’d joined the police. Bad pay. Why didn’t you come to work with me? You’d have a purse full of coin and wouldn’t be wearing such a shabby coat!” He looked down. “And sandals in this cold.”

  Tein laughed at him. “You must have tapped some big debtors with talk like that, Ghazi. Last time I saw you, your clothes were not as fine, and you didn’t make such a strong case.” He slapped the man on the shoulder. “Had I known where it was going, I’d be with you now.”

  Looking past him and seeing Saliha, he said, “But you seem to be paid well enough for a woman like this.”

  Tein’s smile collapsed and he took a step forward against Khalil, when Saliha came out from behind him, saying with sharpened eyes, “You couldn’t afford me, brother. I choose my men, and I would not choose you.”

  Tein looked down at her in shock, but she could see that the shock was mixed with pleasure, and she smiled.

  “Ah! A sharp-tongued one!” He slapped Tein. “Worth every fals.”

  “As it happens,” Tein said, “I’ve been looking for you.”

  Khalil held up his hands. “Whatever it is, I did it!”

  Laughing, Tein said, “I’m looking into the death of a man who may have had some debts that required persuasion for repayment.”

  Khalil raised his eyebrows, taking the miswak out of his mouth. “Imam Hashim? Word is out on him. Everyone agrees. It was a well-deserved death. God protect us all from what we deserve.”

  Saliha said under her breath, “Amin.”

  “What did you hear?” Tein asked.

  “He was late with his payments. He wasn’t one of mine. But if you are asking whether or not he was beaten to death, no matter how late a man is with his payments, beating him to death is not going to get the money back.”

  “It could have been a mistake,” Tein offered, “a beating might have gone too far.”

  Khalil said, looking directly at Saliha, “True. More than one of us takes pleasure from our work.”

  Tein stiffened. Saliha touched him to let him know she was alright, but she didn’t feel him relax.

  Khalil frowned in thought. “But if the Amir wanted him dead…”

  Tein relaxed his stance at the mention of the Amir. “Give me his real name.”

  “As if I know the name of the man who runs the best brothels and gambling houses in Baghdad.”

  Tein huffed, but did not press him, asking instead, “But why would the Amir kill a client like that?”

  “If the Imam offended him?” Khalil shrugged.

  “A well-known religious scholar?”

  “Ibn Rashid at-Taymi! You remember that? The Amir ordered it. A servant in the household was paid to smother him. You police said he died in his sleep.”

  “How do you know this?” Tein was defensive. “The family doctor reported it was a natural death.”

  “It’s not a secret. It was meant to be a warning to others. You police are the last to know! Anyway, I heard an ifrit killed Imam Hashim.”

  “Maybe not.”

  Khalil looked down the street, scanning the people of the marketplace. “Whatever the case. He’s well-dead. These scholars, such hypocrites. Do the people deserve them?”

  Tein called him back to the conversation, “Imam Hashim. His debts. Where did he gamble?”

  “You’ll go there?” Khalil looked surprised.

  Tein nodded. “I’ll need to.”

  “The Pomegranate Nahariyya. It’s in a dead-end square just after the last of the wool sellers and before the furniture makers. You can’t miss it. You’ll need to say to the guard that your mother raised you to be an honourable man.”

  “What?”

  “It’s the password. They’ll know you’re coming with a reference.”

  Tein laughed.

  “I heard he had a regular woman there,” Khalil added, looking at Saliha.

  Saliha gestured as if she were flicking a piece of filth from her fingers. “These scholars, such hypocrites. I don’t take their money.”

  Khalil smiled at her but asked Tein, “Where did you find this one?”

  Tein looked at her. “Friend of my sister, actually.”

  “The sister who prays all night and refuses to eat?”

  “And I pray with her,” Saliha snapped. Then she turned slightly, tugging her wrap, so the curve of her ample bottom was outlined. “But I eat.”

  Khalil tipped his head to her in appreciation, then said to Tein, “Listen. I haven’t heard that any of us killed him. I have to go, but I’ll keep an ear out. Remember that I was good to you once if any trouble comes my way.”

  Tein touched his turban, and said, “I will.”

  Khalil then bowed his head to Saliha, offering her a wink and a hungry smile, and left them.

  Once Khalil was out of earshot, Tein said, “You were convincing!”

  “You should take me with you to the nahariyya! If you aren’t getting anything from the marketplace, what makes you think you’ll get anything out of a brothel?”

  Tein turned serious, “It wouldn’t be safe, Saliha. I can’t do that.”

  She looked at him under her lashes, eyes wide. “But with you, how could I be in any danger?”

  “No. That’s final.”

  “Fine then, I’ve got work to do anyway. I cannot leave Shatha empty-handed, and,” she lifted one shoulder to him, “maybe I’ll run into Doctor Judah after work.”

  “That’s not going to work with me.”

  She scolded, laughing lightly, “You are not immune to my charms.”

  Tein did not return her humour. “No, I am not, but I won’t let you put yourself in danger.”

  “I can help.”

  “No.”

  “And if I don’t come and I could have been of use, will you wonder if you did everything you could to prove that girl innocent?”

  “Saliha, that’s not fair.”

  “All the same, it’s true.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “And not a moment ago you were worried about being seen with me and losing your job.”

  “I am wearing the wrap I come to work in everyday! Ibn Ali might have remembered. If I go with you, I’ll wear my old wrap instead and my face will be covered. No one will recognize me.”

  He looked down the marketplace road at the lines of shops, then back at her. “Will you do exactly as I say?”

  She replied quickly, “Yes, Ghazi, sir!”

  He shook his head at her, exasperated. “Tomorrow morning?”

  “I will go by the hospital first to let Shatha know I can’t work. I’ll make something up. Blame it on Zaytuna. One day of missed work, I won’t be in any trouble.”

  “I’ll meet you there?”

  She looked concerned. “Better not.”

  “Where then?” />
  “There is a line of places that sell juice and snacks just before the Wool Seller’s Market.”

  “Around duha time? I’ll be coming from my place by the Basra Gate.”

  She nodded.

  “Would you mind if I don’t walk you home, after all? I need to head to another marketplace before it closes and keep interviewing the herbalists and pharmacists.”

  “Not at all.” She smiled. Then just as she was about to leave, she said, “It might be the black turban causing the trouble getting people to talk. You need a disguise.”

  He reflexively touched his turban, then handed her the bag of lotus and camphor. “Good point.”

  “Head back to the Fabric Seller’s Market, then. If you’re lucky, you can snatch the purse of some unwary rich woman to pay for it!”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Ammar woke up angry from a dream. He stood alone on the plain of Karbala. He was too late. The surviving women and children of the Prophet’s noble family had already been captured and driven from the field of battle by men glorying in death and victory. The heads of the martyrs had long been carried away on pikes or slung to the sides of camels in sacks that slapped against the animals’ bellies with every rolling step. Ammar stared at the blood that had dripped from the pikes and camels’ sides onto the hard desert ground. Each drop glittered with eternal light marking the path to Ibn Ziyad’s court in Kufa. Tracking the trail of blood back from the horizon to where he was standing, he realized his feet were bare and he could feel the warm thickness of blood between his toes. White ash began to blow on a biting wind, first around his feet, then rose, swirling around him, binding him in place. He opened his mouth to scream. An atom’s weight of ash alighted on his tongue, and he tasted the burnt remains of the women’s tents.

  He had twisted himself up in his blankets such that they had bound his ankles, leaving him uncovered on his bedroll, yet sweating despite the cold. Sitting up in the dark of night, he unwound the blankets, freeing his legs and feeling the soles of his feet for blood. Then he got up on his knees, pulled off his nightshirt and used it to rub the sweat off of him, then threw it to the corner of his room.

  Standing, bare-chested, in only short sirwal, he went out into the shared courtyard. His neighbour Jamila was outside, tending a fire, for God knows what reason at this hour. But the light meant that she saw him, half-naked, walking to the barrel where they kept their shared store of water. She let out a small scream. Ammar snapped at her, “Go inside, woman, if the sight of a man scandalizes you.”

  Her drunk husband came lolling out of his room ready to fight, but stumbled, and fell back to sleep where his body had dropped not far from their door. Ammar ignored them and poured cup after cup of icy water over his head until his hair and beard were soaked through. He wiped his face down with one hand, pulling at the end of his beard, then shook the water from his hand and went back into his room.

  Ammar leaned against the wall in the darkness, finally feeling the cold as the water dried on his body. He pulled off his soaked sirwal and felt along the wall for his sword, hanging in its scabbard by a belt. Putting it on, he felt the scabbard slap against his bare thigh. Ammar reached around and pulled out the sword, noiselessly, and held it up to God, his knees shaking under the weight of it, and he finally fell to the ground, closing his eyes. When he woke again, it was to the sound of the call to the dawn prayer, naked and cold, his sword unsheathed in his hand, and still angry.

  He dressed angry. He ate a loaf of bread on his way to the police offices angry. He waited for Ibn Salah and Mustafa angry. He greeted them angry. And now he walked angry ahead of them out of the Khurasan Gate.

  The Police Chief’s Palace and offices on the Tigris were soon in view. They were late, and the lines would be long. People would be already crowding the secretaries’ desks and waiting in hopes of being seen that day or the next, or maybe the day after that. They had to stand in line with everyone else. A dedicated administrator for the police would not play well. This Police Chief wanted to make it seem as if they served the people and not the Caliph and his cronies, but it made going to these offices feel like an administrative swamp. More trouble for nothing but play-acting.

  Ibn Salah and Mustafa chatted behind him, Ibn Salah holding court. Ammar knew the type. He’d only met the man this morning, but he talked like one of those scholars who cover an intellect and will as hard as stone with a gentle voice and carefully measured gestures of propriety. Mustafa was evidently stunned by it. Tein was going to have to wise him up.

  Ibn Marwan was more than happy to have the case transferred to the religious court in Rusafa. It was an embarrassment, and he wanted it off his hands. He had the report written up in such a way that it carefully left out the details of Ammar’s botched investigation so there’d be a clean transfer with no administrative recriminations. Ammar had burned when he saw it. His weak interrogation ending in a faulty confession sent up to the Chief of Police’s court and his refusal to investigate thoroughly had set all this in motion. Hiding it didn’t make him a man. He wanted to hear that voice again, the voice calling him to martyrdom with Husayn, “Ya Ammar! I have glad tidings of paradise for you!” But there was only silence and a dream that left him on the plain of Karbala too late for the battle.

  He could half-hear Mustafa arguing some point. It didn’t have anything to do with the case, he knew that much. They still needed someone to petition Ibn al-Zayzafuni’s court, and Mustafa hadn’t found one. His little friends weren’t going to risk the possibility of future positions teaching children in grand homes by petitioning the court on behalf of the family of a controversial dead Imam.

  The outer gate of the Palace was open, three guards standing along either side. The gates were as high as the walls, too tall for any man to scale, and held open from dawn until dusk every day to give the impression that the Police Chief was available to an audience at any time. The guards stood still, looking ahead. He wanted to yell at them, Keep your eyes open! You’re the first line of defence, you fools! But what could six of them do anyway if the people decided to riot? Better for them to step aside and let the people make their demands by ripping the Palace down. Curse the enemies of the Prophet’s family! Every bit of the caliphate and its justice was a lie! Ammar called out with all his heart, Sayyidi Husayn! I am your servant! I will fight in your cause!

  He felt a hand on his shoulder. He stepped forward and pivoted, his sword clearing its scabbard before he saw Ibn Salah’s face tight with terror.

  “Ghazi, Ghazi, please!” Ibn Salah stepped back, his hands up.

  Mustafa yelled, scrambling back away from Ammar, “Ghazi!”

  Ammar pulled himself back and stood firm, his heart pounding in his chest. He turned his wrist and raised the hilt of his sword, returning it smoothly into his fleece-lined scabbard. He put up his hands, but conceded nothing, “Don’t touch a ghazi from behind.”

  Ibn Salah recovered himself and put his hand over his heart, bowing his head. “You have my apologies, Ghazi.”

  Mustafa stood still. Ammar could see he was still afraid.

  Let them be afraid.

  He walked straight through the gardens and its pomegranate trees, picked clean of its fruit, and the long pools of water fed by the Tigris. There had been multi-coloured fish in the pools once, but the poor would come when the gates were open and catch them with nets to cook for their dinner. Now the pools were empty, their surfaces like glass in the cold sun of morning.

  They reached the palace gates, here there were more guards at least, six by each side of the door. The men were better armed with short staves, useful for fighting and controlling crowds.

  As they walked through the doors, two wealthy men rushed past them to get ahead in line. Ammar wanted to stick his foot out to trip one of the men. Others came in at a resigned pace, knowing they’d be there all day. The vast room was carpeted, there must have been a hundred great rugs laid out end-to-end, in every colour and pattern, all thickly woven. Low
couches lined the walls broken only by guards standing at attention at regular intervals. The secretary’s desk was at the far end of the room, raised on a carpeted pallet, and a snaking line of people were already there waiting.

  Ibn Salah said with some irritation, “We’ll be here all day.”

  “This moves quickly,” Ammar said. “We’re just registering our names and cases here. He’ll refer us to the secretary in the Police Chief’s office who can get us a hearing.”

  “Don’t they have a different process for the police?” Mustafa asked.

  “No.”

  Ammar got in line right behind the man he wanted to trip. The fool smelled liked he had doused himself in rose water and Ammar wanted to slap his excessively wrapped turban off of his head. He noticed the edging on the man’s outer robe and laughed aloud. His taraz was the height of vanity; the banding of calligraphy said his full name, over and over and over again. But this ass could not afford to have it embroidered, it was merely inked. The fool turned around, looking him up and down. Ammar goaded, “You should check with your taraz-man, it seems he’s written your name in one spot here on the back as ‘Abu Abdallah Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Ghalib al-Bahil’ rather than al-Bahili. But perhaps he saw you were nothing better than a she-camel on the loose and made the change accordingly?”

  The man opened his mouth to object, but he saw the black turban, sword, and Ammar’s demeanour, and settled for a huff.

  Ibn Salah asked over his shoulder, “Is this necessary?”

  Ammar didn’t answer. He watched the fool ahead move bit by bit as they snaked forward until at last they were standing before the secretary themselves. “I am Ghazi Ammar at-Tabbani from Grave Crimes for Karkh. Ibn Marwan has sent me with a request to have a case moved from the Police Chief’s court to the religious court in Rusafa.”

  The secretary said, “The request, please?”

  He handed over the document. The secretary read it, rolled it back up, and returned it to him. “First, I need all your names.” The man wrote down their names, their purpose, and made a mark on the document, then pointed toward an arched doorway leading into another great room. “Proceed directly to the administrator through there. He will take this further.”