Mirage

by Soheir Khashoggi

  “Yes. As soon as possible.” He reached for the phone.

  Enemies

  Barely a kilometer away, in the converted ancient regime hotel de ville that served as his Paris office, Malik stared at the Le Monde article. He knew it by heart now but still couldn’t make sense of it. Before, he at least had been able to make assumptions about his sister’s disappearance, to envision a pattern. Now he felt like a man stumbling in the dark who suddenly finds his foot hanging over empty space.

  For the dozenth time, he went over it all from the beginning. His spies in Ali’s entourage had informed him of his sister Amira’s escape almost as soon as it occurred. He probably learned of it, he reflected with some satisfaction, before Ali himself did. He had learned about the search, as well, the dead end in Teheran. Then, yesterday afternoon, word had come that Philippe was involved, and the trail led to Turkey. But even then, he had expected something, a dash to Ankara or Istanbul, a private jet to—where? Rio?

  Nonsense. Philippe might be a romantic, but he was no idiot. He would bring Amira to France, fight—if he had to—on home ground, where he had friends and power. Resources. Besides, this was no mere affair of the heart, of that Malik was sure. Amira was running not to someone, but from someone. Malik had long had his suspicions, his spies’ reports of Ali’s idiosyncrasies. What had happened only confirmed his thoughts—and fueled his anger.

  All in all, he had assumed that Amira and Philippe would be in France at any moment, and that sooner or later, she would contact him. He was her brother; he was powerful; he could protect her.

  But now this. Death in some godforsaken mountain gorge in Turkey. It made no sense at all.

  “Amira,” he said aloud, “Little Sister”—and in that moment, felt again the odd reassurance he had experienced when the news article was first brought to him an hour ago. He couldn’t explain it: it was mystical, religious perhaps, or maybe genetic—blood thicker than water. It was the certainty that Amira was alive. He knew it. If she weren’t, he would know that, too.

  He summoned an aide and gave orders.

  Twelve hours later, he stood on a bare mountainside in Anatolia. With him were two bodyguards, a translator, a colonel in the Turkish army, and the local headman of the remote area where the car—and Philippe—had been found. Two hundred yards below, by the fast waters of a narrow river, a pair of soldiers stood desultory guard over the smashed remains of the Land Rover.

  The leathery headman, who might be any age from forty to seventy, looked like a cross between a goatherd and a bandit. Probably, thought Malik, that was exactly what he was. The man’s counsel was simple: Malik’s request was a waste of time. If Amira and her son had been in the car, they might have been killed and swept downriver; no one could have survived such a crash. Even if, through some miracle, they survived, they could not have gone far in these mountains; his men or the army would have found them, or their remains, by now—unless, of course, wolves or a bear had done so first. Either way, Malik was looking for something that was not there.

  “Where, then, should I look?”

  The man gazed diplomatically into the distance. “I do not speak of your woman, of course, but when ours stray from the path, it is in the cities that we find them.”

  Malik already had agents in Van, where Mr. and Mrs. Rochon had stayed briefly in a hotel, but the man’s wording confirmed a fear he had harbored from the first: Ali was hunting Amira, too, and his operatives were painting her as a runaway wife. Even if Malik could match the royal billions bribe for bribe, no good Muslim would help him in the face of a husband’s rightful demands. And if Ali were to find her first …

  But no one found her. Malik’s and Ali’s men crisscrossed eastern Anatolia—Kars, Van, Agri, every town of any size—bribing, cajoling, intimidating airport personnel, bus drivers, cabbies, private citizens who owned automobiles, anyone who might have helped a woman and child leave the area. There were countless false trails, but even with the full cooperation of the police and the army, who were being bountifully paid by both sides, nothing concrete led beyond the hotel in Van or the wrecked Land Rover.

  It was as if Amira had disappeared from the face of the earth.

  Eventually, even Malik had to give up. On the plane back to Paris, he remembered the icy chill of the snow-fed river. Was that where Amira and Karim slept? If not for his inexplicable certainty that his sister was alive, he would have despaired. But surely, that feeling was true, he told himself. Surely, he would see her again.

  O

  Ali had no parapsychological intuition concerning his wife. His feelings were simple: rage and fear. Rage at her betrayal—if she turned up alive, he would certainly kill her. Fear that if she were dead, so must be his son.

  It had been nearly noon on the day following her escape when he awoke, half-poisoned, to learn of it. His first instinct had been the same as Malik’s: the local airport. Much time was wasted in trying to find a woman of Arab descent and child who left Tabriz on an early-morning flight to Teheran. Nothing came of the effort, and when a steward from the flight was found and questioned in Basra, he swore that the woman had had no child with her. More time was spent investigating a European-looking man and his Arab wife and child who had flown from Teheran to Istanbul. They turned out to be a Belgian businessman and his family on vacation.

  Late on the second day, the body of a SAVAK agent who had been watching Amira was found on a dung heap south of the city. The search took on a new seriousness. The next morning, someone discovered that a Mr. and Mrs. Rochon had crossed the Turkish border at Bazargan. Philippe Rochon! Ali reflected bitterly that the trap he had tried to set in al-Remal had, in a perverse way, sprung on his own hand.

  Rochon’s involvement made Paris the most likely destination for the trip. SAVAK agreed, but with the death of their colleague, the secret police had grown decidedly cool toward Ali. He wanted his own men in Paris. The Remali intelligence service was practically an arm of the royal family—one of Ali’s uncles was its director—and its best agents in Europe were rushed to the French capital to wait and watch. Ali had no way of knowing that the two who were assigned to Orly arrived just as Paul and Amira were driving away. The more Ali thought about it, the more he was convinced that his brother-in-law was behind it all. He had never liked Malik. The man was a commoner, after all, like his bitch of a sister, no matter how rich he was making himself, and he apparently fancied himself a European, enlightened, superior—the same delusions that afflicted Amira. Undoubtedly, the gigolo doctor—who was finished, Ali would make sure of that—was just a dupe, a pawn, an excuse.

  Then came the news from the wilds of eastern Anatolia. At first, Ali believed that Amira and Karim must indeed have died with Rochon in the wreck, and his hatred of the woman alternated with grief for his son. But at heart, he had never trusted anyone, and there were many things to doubt in the accounts coming out of Turkey. He sent men to investigate, and soon they told him that Malik was there.

  To Ali, there were only two possibilities. The first was that something had gone terribly wrong with Malik’s plan and that he was in Turkey to find out what had happened. The second was that the plan had come off perfectly, right down to some treachery that had left the French doctor’s corpse as a smoke screen, and that Malik’s presence on the scene was merely added smoke.

  If the first, Amira and Karim were probably dead. If the second, they were certainly alive. In either case, Malik was to blame for everything—and for that, Ali would take vengeance, in his own way, in his own good time.

  He swore it to himself and to God.

  A New Woman

  Amira followed it all in the newspapers and on television. It had taken the press only a few days to connect her with the woman missing in Philippe’s accident.

  There had followed a field day of speculation about the mystery of her disappearance. There were quotations from Malik and from Ali, from her father, even from Farid. The event commanded the same kind of attention that, a few ye
ars earlier, the disappearance of one of the Rockefellers in New Guinea had occasioned.

  She was glad, for once, that she came from a culture that officially frowned on photography. The news stories carried over and over again the same wedding portrait, partly in profile and not a very good likeness. Of Karim, there was only a baby photo. Not that it mattered: she was in a place where no reporter could have reached her; moreover, any reporter who did, could never have recognized her.

  The place was a château in Senlis. It was a recovery house for women who had had cosmetic surgery and could afford absolute secrecy, and during the first week of her stay there—the time when her wedding picture was on every news- cast—Amira looked worse than she had after Ali’s beating.

  The surgeon had explained that what was needed was not a complete change of her looks, even if that were possible. For one thing, she was presumed to be dead. For another—and more important—recognition depended on only two or three key features.

  Her nose needed repair anyway, after Ali had flattened it. The surgeon would also rearrange the cast of her eyes slightly, and she would wear contact lenses that changed the color from light brown to a deep green. He would also remove the scar from her forehead.

  It sounded simple and rather delicate; it left her looking temporarily like the victim of an airplane crash. After a week, though, as the swelling sub- sided and the bruises cleared, she could see the face of a new woman emerging, familiar yet different.

  Two weeks later, the surgeon himself took photographs. Two days after that, she had a French passport bearing her new likeness and her new name: Jenna Sorrel. Karim kept his first name—it was Jenna’s wish, against the surgeon’s advice. That was the only part of the matter that was overtly discussed. Philippe was mentioned only indirectly, as a fine man and a wonderful friend. One month from the day she entered France, Amira—Jenna—left from Le Havre as a passenger on a freighter bound for New Orleans. The mode of transportation represented a last bit of caution: someone—probably Philippe—had decided that it offered the least likelihood of scrutiny.

  The crossing was difficult. The only woman aboard, she felt exposed— naked—to the gazes of the crew. The captain, a fatherly Greek, apparently understood the situation and gave orders. After that, there was no more overt leering, although the men’s sidelong glances could not be misinterpreted. Yet, all that was hardly more than an embarrassment. Far worse was her growing sense of guilt over Philippe’s sacrifice. And there was Malik. By now, he must have accepted her death, must be grieving for her. Should she let him know that she was alive? Just a note?

  No. Better for now that he know nothing at all.

  In New Orleans, she filled out papers for status as a foreign student. She found a hotel that had child-care facilities, then went out to find a jeweler. The town did not match her picture of America—certainly not the America of Dallas. It was more Mediterranean, rather like Marseilles.

  She passed the shop on Royal Street three times before going in. The name on the window was Jewish, raising prejudices with which she had been instilled since birth, but she liked the look of the place. The jeweler rose from a table to greet her, his loupe perched above his right eye.

  “I want to sell some jewels,” she said simply, and emptied her case on the counter.

  The old man looked for a moment, then said, “This is quality. This is beauty. May I ask your name, ma’am?”

  “Sorrel.”

  “Sorrel. Harvey Rothstein. A pleasure. Your name is French?” “Yes. I’m French by marriage.”

  “I see. Well, Mme. Sorrel.” He lowered the loupe and inspected the jewels. Now and then, he sighed with pleasure. At length, he said, “I will buy these, even though I’ll have to borrow to do it.”

  He named a figure. It seemed terribly low to Amira. She bargained. He raised the price, but not greatly. “You won’t get more,” he told her.

  Something about the man, his open admiration of her jewels, made her trust him. “Very well. I’ll take it.”

  “Come back tomorrow morning. I’ll have a cashier’s check.” He looked at the jewels for a moment more. “Mme … Sorrel, you must know that I’m offering only a fraction of what these pieces are worth. That’s only fair— first, because I must make a profit; second, because there are certain … risks involved. But this one, no.” He pushed the pigeon-blood ruby toward her. “That’s not part of the price. I recognize it, and so would any other fine jeweler in the world. Keep it. Forgive me if I predict that there will be better times for you, and you will have it then.”

  The next afternoon, she caught a plane for New York with a connecting flight to Boston, where, on the recommendation of M. Maurice Cheverny, and after an interview and a special placement test, she was assured of a place at Harvard for the fall term. She would major in psychology.

  Part

  Six

  An All American Boy

  “What happened?” Jenna Sorrel demanded.

  “Nothing,” said Karim unconvincingly. His left eye was blackened. A streak of blood had dried under his nose.

  “The truth, young man.” “I had a fight, okay?”

  Jenna heard shame and pride mixed in her son’s reply. He was nine years old, she reminded herself.

  “No, it most certainly isn’t okay. What happened?” “Josh was calling me names.”

  “Josh Chandler?” Half of Karim’s fourth-grade classmates seemed to be named Josh, but Jenna recalled the Chandler boy as one with whom her son did not get along well.

  “Yes.”

  “What kind of names?” “Just … names.”

  Jenna remembered the insults thrown at Middle Eastern students during her second year at Harvard, when the hostage crisis had broken out in Iran. Now and then, Karim’s first name and his cafe-au-lait complexion had sub- jected him to similar cruelty from his schoolmates.

  “Names are no reason for fighting. You know that, don’t you?” Karim nodded, close to tears.

  “Your father always said that most fights happen because someone is afraid not to fight. He said that what takes real courage is to walk away. And he was a brave man.”

  Karim nodded again. The father he had never known was his greatest hero. Unfortunately, that father was a lie: Jenna had created him, worrying all the while about the psychological implications of the act and cautioning herself not to build a role model too perfect to emulate. Physically, the man she invented was smaller than average, as Ali was and Karim himself promised to be. In most other ways, he resembled Philippe. He was not a physician, though: Jenna had feared that someone someday might link “French doctor” with “vanished princess.” So Jacques Sorrel was a ship’s captain who had died bringing medical supplies to an epidemic-stricken port in Africa.

  “Come on,” she said briskly. “Let’s go solve this problem.”

  She knew the Chandlers slightly from school functions. They lived in elegant Beacon Hill, a brisk walk from Marlborough Street.

  A maid answered the door and ushered Jenna and Karim in. Carolyn Chandler appeared, tall, blond, tennis-fit, and smiling graciously, if a bit nervously. Behind her, big Cameron Chandler loomed up like a cordial but concerned bear. The Chandlers appeared to be in their mid-thirties.

  “I understand there was some trouble,” said Cameron. An indulgent smile indicated that he didn’t think the trouble very serious.

  “There was. And I’ve come to get your assurance that there won’t be more.” Jenna did not smile.

  “But,” interjected Carolyn, “I think your son hit ours first.”

  “If that is so, he was wrong and will apologize. But from what I hear, Josh was attacking Karim’s heritage—his ethnic heritage. And that must stop. I’m sure you agree with that.”

  Cameron Chandler nodded. “Of course, we do. Unfortunately, boys will be boys. Josh, come in here.”

  Josh was inches taller and twenty pounds heavier than Karim. He had a badly split lip.

  Cameron took charge. After a few blun
t questions elicited what was prob- ably very close to the truth of the episode, he ordered the boys to shake hands and forget the whole thing. Jenna wasn’t sure she agreed with his method, but it seemed to work.

  “Want to shoot some baskets?” Josh asked Karim. “Sure. Can I, Mom?”

  “Just for a little while.”

  The two scurried away from the council of adults. Feeling at loose ends, Jenna gratefully accepted Carolyn’s offer of coffee. Cameron joined them with a drink in hand.

  The Chandlers didn’t exactly pry, but Jenna soon found herself reciting the fiction of her past, so well rehearsed now that it seemed almost like the truth. About her hosts, there seemed to be little to learn. They were what everything about them proclaimed them to be: old Boston society. Cameron was an investment banker; Carolyn devoted her spare time to tennis and charities. He was aggressively friendly, she cool and diffident.

  Jenna intuited a certain distance between them, something in their body language. Perhaps they had argued over Josh’s behavior.

  “So, you’re a psychologist,” said Cameron. “Yes.”

  “Of course!” said Carolyn, suddenly animated. “That’s who you are! Why didn’t I make the connection?”

  “Who?” said Jenna, almost afraid to ask.

  “You have a book out, don’t you?” Carolyn bubbled on. “I’ve been meaning to buy it. I saw a very nice review of it somewhere. Ancient …”

  “Ancient Chains Jenna said with relief. “I’ll bring you a copy if you’d like.” The book had been a sweet surprise. A reworking of her doctoral dissertation, it had been published in a print run of a thousand by a small university press in the Midwest. There it might have died like countless other scholarly monographs except for a brief but very positive notice in the New York Times Book Review. Now it had sold thirty thousand copies, and there was talk of a paperback.