by Abi Silver
Ahmad gulped. He opened his hands wide, dropped his mop which fell with a clatter and picked it up hurriedly. ‘I don’t have time.’
‘No, of course you don’t. How silly of me. It’s just that I so miss a garden. When I was married we had a lovely garden. Now, I do have a little terrace, so that keeps me happy pottering around. But it is so very time-consuming. Have you read anything interesting recently?’
‘I…I read to my daughter when I get home sometimes.’ Ahmad felt the need to say something to show that he was not entirely ignorant.
‘That’s nice. How old is she?’
‘She’s nine.’
‘Have you read “Aladdin”?’ Barbara had suddenly asked.
Ahmad looked straight at the jury.
‘She, Mrs Hennessy. She asked me if I knew the story “Aladdin”,’ he said. ‘And she said she wanted the book with the story of Aladdin and the other stories. The one thousand nights and one night.’
‘She asked you to buy it for her, the book?’
‘Yes, I told you, Miss Burton. I went in my lunch break. She paid me £12.99.’
‘So it wasn’t your book, that you gave to her?’
‘No.’ Ahmad was confused. ‘Who said it was?’
Judith allowed Ahmad’s comments to sink in.
‘We’ll come back to the book soon. I want to get an overview first, if possible, of your relationship with Mrs Hennessy.’
‘Yes.’
‘So, you first met on Tuesday the 9th of May, the day she was admitted to the hospital?’
‘Yes.’
‘And on that day, you had a chat?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did you clean her room the next day, Wednesday?’
‘No. Maia, the other cleaner, she cleaned, but I did in the corridor. They called me up because someone spilled on the floor.’
‘And the Thursday?’
‘Yes. She had her operation that day. I cleaned on Thursday.’
‘What time of day was it?’
‘I saw Mrs Hennessy in the morning, before her operation.’
‘Did you speak then?’
It was such a silly question, given Mrs Hennessy’s garrulous nature. Mrs Hennessy had knocked on the window pane as he cleaned in the corridor.
‘I hope you are not thinking of just passing me by without wishing me luck,’ she had said as he opened the door. ‘I saw you yesterday and you never came in.’ And then she had stumbled and grabbed the door handle.
‘Are you all right, Mrs Hennessy?’ he had asked with concern.
‘Oh yes. I just didn’t eat. Third day in a row. And call me Barbara, I told you. Let’s hope they do my operation this time or I’ll fade away.’
She had hobbled back into her room and got back into bed. Ahmad had followed her.
‘Were you planning to clean my room this morning or when I was out?’
‘I was going to finish in the corridor, but I can clean now if you like.’
‘I do like. You can cheer me up. My daughter came yesterday but that wasn’t much fun. She has money trouble. She thinks I don’t know it. And the girl came to clean yesterday, from Romania. Terrible place. Remember Ceausescu. All those orphans.’
Ahmad had shaken his head. ‘Maia?’
‘Yes. That was her name. You must say goodbye to her for me if I don’t see her again.’
‘When you go, remember to take all your things with you,’ Ahmad had advised her. ‘Don’t leave anything behind.’
‘No, you’re so right. And Tracy says I am getting forgetful. Now where did I leave my rings? Oh you know what. I left them in the bathroom again. Can you bring them for me please? It saves me hoisting myself in and out of this wretched bed.’
Ahmad had rested his mop against the wall and entered the bathroom. As Barbara had remembered, two large, gaudy rings had been left lying on the edge of the wash basin. One was gold in colour with a large green stone, the size of an olive. The other was also gold, made up of many strands wound into a gigantic knot, with tiny glittering chips. She accepted the rings with a nostalgic grin and held the green one up to the light.
‘It’s real you know,’ Barbara had declared knowledgeably. ‘My husband, my ex-husband I should say, bought it for me for our engagement, from Zimbabwe. I didn’t wear it much then. You can’t when you’re busy with children, can you? But now I rather like to; it shines so gloriously and I didn’t want to leave it at home, you see. In case I got burgled.’
Ahmad remembered now how he had cautioned her.
‘You should give it to your daughter when she comes. It could become lost in here.’
‘Tracy? Yes, she said that too. But I’m not letting her have my ring. She’d have it down the pawn shop before I was even halfway home. But anyway, she’s not coming till I go home now so I don’t have any choice.’
Ahmad hadn’t understood the term ‘pawn shop’ but he had a fair idea what Mrs Hennessy meant.
‘And this one was from my mother.’ She surveyed the second ring with pride, turning it over and over on the palm of her hand. ‘She told me that my father bought it for her when I was born. But I’m not sure that’s true. I think she told me that because she thought I would like the story. It’s funny, isn’t it? When you’re very young and when you’re very old, people tell you things they think you want to hear.’
Ahmad had nodded non-committally. He liked Mrs Hennessy but he couldn’t contribute much to this sentimental conversation.
‘No. I should put them away, though where I’m not sure. I can’t remember where I had them before. Perhaps in my wash bag. Oh yes. I could try my purse, I suppose. It’s as good a place as any. Just pass it to me, Ahmad. It’s down in that cabinet.’
Ahmad had walked around the bed and fished around among Mrs Hennessy’s things in the bedside cabinet before locating a sparkling, beaded wallet.
‘Yes, that’s it. Fabulous isn’t it? Nothing boring or black or leather for me, eh? Although I’ll let you into a secret, it’s completely worthless. It’s a trick a very attractive actress friend of mine taught me years ago. If you have style you can carry anything off, even the cheapest accessories. Are you married, Ahmad?’
‘Yes I am.’
‘Oh yes. I know I’ve asked you that before. And you told me. Your wife is called Aisha. Did I remember right?’
‘Yes. That’s correct.’
‘But, damn. You told me what her name meant and I’ve forgotten. Don’t tell me. Just give me a second. No. It’s gone.’
Ahmad had crouched down and picked up a discarded tissue in his gloved hand.
‘Where was I, before I started rambling about names? Oh yes. So, make sure if you do nothing else that you buy your wife one really special piece of jewellery, like Miles did for me. You see, he left me almost forty years ago and I still have the ring. I’m not saying it has to be something quite as elaborate as this,’ she waved the green ring around in the air, ‘but something stylish, something really dazzling. Everyone likes to be dazzled once in a while.’
And she beamed so broadly at Ahmad he thought her face would crack in two. He thought for a moment of Aisha sitting quietly at home staring into nothing, her hands devoid of rings, folded neatly on her lap. They had sold everything in order to fund their journey to England, and when they had reached the streets paved with gold, there had been far higher priorities for their limited income than jewellery, however special it might make Aisha feel.
But as he gritted his teeth and entered the bathroom, grabbing the toilet brush and moving it in a clockwise motion around the toilet bowl, he decided Mrs Hennessy had a point, even though she had made it in a thoughtless way. Everyone, however impoverished, needed something bright and shiny to gaze at and treasure. It would be Aisha’s birthday next week. He always remembered but it had been impossible to take pleasure in
anything for so long. Perhaps now it was time to have a celebration, just a small one. And to treat his wife to something special, as Mrs Hennessy had said.
‘Yes, we spoke. She asked me to bring her rings from the bathroom where she had left them,’ Ahmad told Judith in the voice of someone recounting a distant memory.
‘Those are the rings which you are accused of stealing?’ Judith asked.
‘Yes.’
‘What did you do with the rings?’
‘She had a purse with all bright colours. I put the rings away for her in the purse.’
‘Why did you do that?’
‘So she wouldn’t lose them.’
Chambers snorted under his breath.
‘Your honour. We have those two rings here today. Can they be shown to the members of the jury?’
‘Yes, thank you Miss Burton.’
‘Did you steal Mrs Hennessy’s rings?’
‘No. Of course not. It would be a terrible thing to steal from anyone, but to steal from someone in a hospital when they are old and sick…’ Ahmad’s eyes were wide and Judith marvelled at his indignation. He was on trial for murder and he was offended that people thought him guilty of theft.
‘Did you see Mrs Hennessy again that day?’ Judith asked.
‘Listen. Will you drop in and see me later?’ Mrs Hennessy had said, as he was packing up to leave. My daughter’s not coming today, you see. It’ll be nice for me to think of a friendly face for when I wake up.’
Ahmad remembered how confused and bemused he had been. Mrs Hennessy had only met him once two days before and now she was relying on him for support.
‘She asked me to return later. She said it would be nice to have someone to talk to, after her operation. But I was busy all day and when I came back in the evening her door was closed.’
‘Did you enter her room?’
‘No. I thought she was sleeping. And I thought I see her on Friday before she goes home.’
‘Let’s return, just for a moment, to the book you bought at Mrs Hennessy’s direction. The Arabian Nights, or as you called it, The Thousand and One Nights, the tales which Scheherazade recounted to King Shahryar night after night to prevent herself from being killed.’
‘Yes.’
‘Are you familiar with the stories in the book?’
‘Well they are magical stories, folk stories, very old. More than a thousand years.’
‘Mr Chambers, standing next to me, talked about them being violent stories, with crimes against women in them. Can you comment on that?’
‘I didn’t read the book, this book. But I know the stories like Aladdin and Ali Baba from when I was a child. They make them into Disney films.’
Judith was momentarily stumped by the answer Ahmad had given. She could not have provided a better illustration of the monstrous nature of this line of attack if she had planned it for a week.
‘Your honour, members of the jury, I will accept that some aspects of some of the stories in this version (and there are many different versions) are unpleasant if they are rationalised and scrutinised with a twenty-first century lens. It’s certainly not politically correct to take a virgin to your bed every night, deflower her and behead her at dawn. But we gloss over those parts, don’t we, and focus instead on magic carpets and genies? We adopt that technique with all great but outdated literature.
‘As Ahmad has kindly reminded me, Disney, the paragon of virtue and the purveyor of the ‘U’ certificate, tells these stories from this book with their drama and colour and noise, tales of bazaars and spices and sea monsters, but without the disembowelling or beheading, so how can we criticise my client for buying a copy for a lady who asked him to do so?
‘Moving on, can you tell me any reason why a strand of your hair might have been on Mrs Hennessy’s clothes? You heard testimony from Dr Lewis before the break.’
‘I am not sure. Maybe when I cleaned in her room.’
Judith paused. Ahmad had just sat through her triumphant and resourceful dismantling of the expert DNA evidence, and this was his response? She tried a new approach to encourage him to expand his answer.
‘Was there any time that you touched Mrs Hennessy when you were in her room?’
Ahmad hesitated for a moment before answering. ‘On the Thursday morning when I went in to clean.’
‘Yes?’
Ahmad remembered Mrs Hennessy perfectly in that moment, the slant of her head, the tremble in her sweet voice. He had finished cleaning in the bathroom after he had put her rings away for her and she was still sitting in bed but her eyes were closed. As he tiptoed towards the door she had woken with a start.
‘Hello Ahmad,’ she said. And then ‘Oh damn. I need the bathroom.’
Ahmad had stood nonplussed. ‘I will call the nurse for you.’
‘I don’t think there’s time. They take so long. You can help me. I feel so giddy.’
He had remained still, knees slightly bent, undecided about his next move.
‘Oh come along, Ahmad. Can’t you help an old lady to the bathroom? Otherwise there’s going to be an awful mess. I won’t tell if you don’t.’
And before he could make any decision she had placed her foot on the ground and let out a sharp gasp of pain.
‘I won’t tell if you don’t,’ Ahmad mumbled the words to the packed courtroom. Judith coughed to bring him back to the present.
‘She asked me to help her to the bathroom,’ Ahmad said. ‘She said she couldn’t wait for the nurse.’
‘Did Mrs Hennessy put her arms around your neck when you helped her to the bathroom?’
Ahmad thought hard. He could see Mrs Hennessy trying to put weight on her foot and falling forwards. He had caught her and propped her up and her hands had been around his neck.
‘Yes. She fell and I catched her,’ he said. ‘Then I helped her walk to the bathroom.’
‘And what happened then?’
‘She said not to wait. So I went back to my work.’
‘Did you say goodbye?’
‘No.’
‘Why not?’
‘She was in the bathroom. It was not polite. And I thought I would see her the next day.’
‘Did you ever touch Mrs Hennessy’s medical notes?’
‘Yes. They were in a book by the wash basin. I would clean there.’
‘Do you remember moving the notes?’
‘Yes. But I often move them – not just for Mrs Hennessy – so I can clean. I put them back afterwards.’
‘Do you accept that your fingerprints were found on more than one page of her notes?’
‘Yes. She was in the hospital three days. I cleaned two times.’
‘Mr Qabbani. What did you do in Syria?’
Silence.
‘You weren’t a cleaner in Syria?’
‘No.’
‘Can you tell the court please?’
‘It’s not important.’
Mr Chambers sprang to his feet.
‘For once, your honour, I am agreeing with the defendant. This is completely irrelevant.’
Judith studied Chambers, the angle of his head, the colour of his cheek, the slight breathlessness on delivery. Did he know? she wondered.
‘Your honour, some latitude for a moment, please. Ahmad. What was your job in Syria?’
Ahmad’s face crumpled and his shoulders sagged. He shook his head from side to side and clamped his mouth shut.
Constance very deliberately tapped Judith on the shoulder and handed her some papers. Judith read through them, raising her eyebrows and held one out at arm’s length.
‘Your honour, I have a letter before me from a Dr Faisal Al-azma from Damascus University Hospital. It was sent to my instructing solicitor Miss Lamb late last night. Ahmad, tell us all what you did when you lived in Syria.’
Ahmad drew himself up tall, rolled back his shoulders and spoke in a half whisper.
‘I was a doctor,’ he said.
For the second time in the trial, a loud muttering filled the court, gradually petering out as Judith began to speak again.
‘What kind of doctor?’
‘I specialised in spinal injuries, paralysis, paraplegics, quadraplegics. I treated a lot of soldiers and others, victims of the war.’
‘Your honour, I will need an opportunity to review the letter Ms Burton is waving around,’ Chambers said quietly.
‘You’ll have one, my learned friend. Miss Lamb will provide you with a copy. Your honour, if I may continue, where did you train?’
‘I trained in USA for two years, then returned to Damascus where I practised from 2007 to 2014, when I left Syria.’
‘Why did you leave?’
‘Our house was destroyed. We were lucky to survive. Our quarter was just piles of bricks. Then two of my colleagues were killed at the hospital. I decided I was better use to people if I could stay alive.’
‘Did you try to obtain work as a doctor in the UK?’
‘Yes.’
‘But you couldn’t?’
‘There were problems. First, they wouldn’t accept my qualifications. They said I had to take some tests. Then they said they needed the original certificates. I received them from Damascus after some months. I sent them and they were lost.’
Judge Seymour took note and cleared his throat.
‘Mr Qabbani, the government office to which you sent your certificates lost them?’
‘Yes, your honour. They had a fire. I was not the only one to lose important documents.’
‘So, are they lost for ever?’
‘Before they lost the documents I kept saying “I am a doctor. I don’t need to do more exams.” Then, after they lost them I said “Just let me do the exams”. About three months ago I had a letter. They said that because they “could not locate” the documents they were “prepared to accept” that I was a doctor in Syria and they offered me the chance to enrol on a course in London to take the exams. The exams cost £1,100. We don’t have £1,100.’
‘Would you like to practise as a doctor again?’ Judith asked.
