Amsterdam 2020 (Amsterdam Series Book 2)

by Ruth Francisco

  At best, he will be imprisoned or sent to a work camp. He will be hard to replace.

  How did Shirzad find out?

  Nine, January 2018

  Postbode

  After a year of distributing fliers and documents for Uncle Sander, Salima receives her first assignment as a postbode—mailman—a transporter of refugees. She gets very good at it.

  In the evenings, a shopper, usually a burka clad woman, stops by Freyja Natuur Winkel, and, while watching Salima weigh out a kilo of golden pears, tells her where to meet her contact the next morning and what code words to use. Salima meets her contact, who tells her where to make the pickup. A different assignment and a different contact each day. She finds her charges and delivers them into the hands of another contact. She travels on trains and boats, bicycles across the countryside to farms and old pig factories. The refugees fade into the landscape, hidden and absorbed into farm life, or get transported to Denmark or Scotland.

  As soon as Salima finishes a “delivery,” she forgets everything she has said and done. Immediately. It is not a hard task. Alcohol is usually involved, aboard the barge, with Pim and Nasira and the rest of the Watergeuzen.

  But nothing ever goes as smoothly as all that. Her charges are often far more desperate than expected. They need coats and shoes just to survive the day, and certainly before they are moved to Denmark. They are often sick or injured. Sometimes they are so frightened and paranoid they cannot follow instructions. Sometimes a contact is late. Or a Landweer officer wanders into the neighborhood. Or, at the last minute, she gets word IRH soldiers are making a roundup. Or the Bloed van God militia are cruising the streets.

  Failures are common.

  One day she arrives to deliver food and medicine to a safe house in de Pijp, a neighborhood below the canal belt. Eight Christians she met in Aachen, smuggled up the Varken Weg and hid in Amsterdam until another Postbode can whisk them out of the country. A family with four children.

  In WWII the practice was to separate the children and parents because the children were easier to hide, added to other families in plain sight. But it caused a lot of trauma after the war. The children who survived wondered what happened to their parents, who often had died. Sometimes parents tried but couldn't find their children, returning home in despair, blaming themselves, loathing their own survival. Sometimes the children didn't want to leave their adoptive families.

  The Resistance tries to keep families together when they can.

  As Salima bikes by the safe house, she sees one curtain is half open, the signal something is amiss. She pedals past.

  Each safe house has a hiding spot where refugees abscond whenever someone comes to the door, or if they hear neighborhood raids. In this house, the hiding spot is a crawl space beneath the floorboards, not more than eighteen inches high.

  When Salima returns to Freyja's, Sander tells her IRH soldiers have temporarily moved into the house. It is not unusual. Housing for soldiers is limited in the city. If a place appears deserted, they take it and use it.

  The Christians under the floor will have to be totally silent until they leave.

  “What if we start a fire in back?” Salima suggests. “The Kroots will run out the front, and we can sneak them out. Or what if we create a disturbance outside, a fight or something?” All options seem too dangerous, a fire too precarious. There are others hidden in the neighborhood.

  Usually during her deliveries, Salima tries not to look too hard at the faces of her clients—better not to be able to describe them. Better not to get attached. But an adorable bright-eyed girl in this group makes that hard. A little Heidi. Ten-years old, with blond braids and a gap between her front teeth, she is sweetly maternal to a younger brother, rocking him, singing a lilting Slavic tune; the boy will let no one else hold him.

  That night Salima thinks of the girl and her family, thirsty and hungry, hiding under the feet of Islamists, who are stuffing their faces, making jokes about dirty pork-eating kafir and what they plan to do to the next Christian girl they find. It makes Salima crazy. If they are very brave, they might sneak out while the soldiers sleep upstairs and find food. She can only hope they were quick enough to have grabbed some food before hiding under the floorboards.

  When the IRH soldiers finally leave and Salima makes a food delivery, only seven come out of hiding, thin, white, and weak. Six days without food or water. One of the children has died.

  Salima takes Heidi's body from her father's arms and buries her in the courtyard.

  She bikes home to celebrate her eighteenth birthday.

  Secretary

  “We need someone to work undercover in the Landweer.”

  Gerda shifts in her seat, grimacing. Hansen, who stands behind her, pours a glass of water, taps out a few white pills from an amber bottle, and places them in front of her. She wrinkles her nose, takes the pills, and continues. “Because of the personnel shortage, the Islamic Council has decided young, unmarried Muslim women from good families may hold secretarial and low-level administrative jobs in the government.”

  Salima stares at her, a hard lump in her throat, gnawing excitement in her stomach. The Islamic Council goes through cycles of tolerance, followed by crackdowns. They loosen up only when they have to—like when they started to let women go to university to become nurses and doctors. They had passed laws that women could not work only to realize there was no way to staff women's hospitals. Cornered, they opened up the university to women medical students. They do a lot of this kind of thing.

  It's not so easy turning the clock back to Medieval Europe.

  “I want you to seek employment with the Landweer. Perhaps your father could put in a good word for you. If not, I am sure you will find another way to position yourself. Appear helpful, positive, decisive, and rigorously religious. Never hesitate. Shirzad Sahar is brilliant at spotting any sign of hesitation. A flicker of indecision in your eyes, and you're on your way to Bijlmerbajes Prison.”

  “Shirzad Sahar?” Salima gives an involuntary shiver. She recalls the man strolling imperiously in the farmer's market, tapping his black baton on each vendor's table, his sadistic game of Duck-Duck-Goose.

  “We want you to get close to him.”

  “You mean work in his office?”

  “Yes, if possible. You must convince yourself you are one of them. You believe the United Nations of Islam is the will of Allah. You believe the End of Days is coming. You believe there will be only twelve legitimate caliphs, and Talaat Saleh is the eighth. You believe that after the armies of Islam defeat the armies of Rome, Islam will reign the world in peace until the anti-Messiah appears in Jerusalem. Your lies must become real to you.”

  “What will I do there?”

  “Pim will be your contact. Every day he will meet you on your way home from work—at a fruit stand or newspaper kiosk. You will pass on your information and arrange for the next day's meeting in a different place. You will have access to rubber stamps, official IRH documents, and travel papers. Steal as many as you think will go unnoticed, and give them to Pim.”

  As she must, Salima asks permission from Rafik to seek employment. He is cool to the request.

  “I thought you enjoyed working for Uncle Sander.”

  “I do. But I need to do something more challenging than deliver vegetables,” Salima pleads. “I am taking the job of someone who isn't capable of anything more. Besides, I might find a suitable husband if I am in an environment where I can meet men.”

  Rafik blinks slowly. She sees his disbelief. Not for a second does he think she is interested in finding a husband.

  “I would prefer that you do not go this route,” he says, pressing his lips together in concern. “If you are sure this is what you want, I will not stand in your way. Are you sure you know what you are doing? You put your family at great risk.”

  “I will be careful,” she says meekly. That is all that is said about the matter.

  She does not ask for his help in getting the job
. She decides to go through the women at the mosque, befriending some of the older women, and finally Shirzad Sahar's wife, Sanne, who often leads Quran Tajweed. With the help of Nasira, who brings up the question about women in the workplace, she listens closely without participating. Shirzad's wife is surprisingly adamant. “It is a waste of human resources to keep women at home. The Islamic State would be far stronger if it allowed women to take a more active role.”

  Clapping fills the room. Salima can hardly believe her good luck. Such liberalism from the wife of a Landweer officer!

  Later, she approaches Sanne. “I was moved about what you said about women at the forefront of Allah's army.” Salima continues along these lines, flattering her, saying she has paved the way for younger women, and could she help her find a job. “I know I am young, but I am efficient and organized. I want to serve the Caliphate.”

  Sanne agrees to talk to her husband, and a few days later tells Salima to report to Landweer headquarters in the Rijksmuseum. “The Minister of Documents needs an assistant. He's a bit of a fool, and you'll end up doing his job and getting no credit. But he is a nice man.”

  The next day Salima presents her ID card to two armed, gray-uniformed IRH soldiers at the entrance of the Rijksmuseum.

  The last time Salima walked these hallways, she was madly packing away 17th century Flemish paintings. Soon after the Jenever Theater Murders, the museums had cried out for help. The Van Gogh Museum, the Rijksmuseum, The Royal Palace, the Stedlijik Museum, Museum Van Loon, Museum het Rembrandhuis. She, Jana, and hundreds of volunteers spent weeks knee deep in straw, newspaper, and twine, crating sculptures and canvasses. The curators, certain the Islamists would destroy everything, became generals, leaning over maps, planning evacuation routes, ordering packers and movers and crate builders, arguing about humidity. Much was sent to the Hadron Collider, the rest shipped to Reykjavik. They worked around the clock.

  The walls are barren now, empty dark squares where paintings once hung, with hooks and frayed wires for the alarm system. A few Islamic propaganda posters hang along the major hallways. But the ceilings are too high, the posters look lost, the effect, cheap and futile.

  She enters a large salon that looks out over the Museumplein. The Minister of Documents, Bora Burakgazi, turns out to be an amiable family man, with a pink face, big belly, and short beard. He is secretly fond of Scotch whiskey, and, by the look of his eyes, indulges heavily at every opportunity. Salima is glad to discover that he is always an hour late to work.

  In the guise of preparing for his arrival—starting coffee, sorting mail, straightening his desk, printing out his daily schedule—she rifles through the metal filing cabinet, where hundreds of names of suspects and other important information are collected in alphabetical order. She takes a few cards at random, hides them in her burka, then tears them up and flushes them down the toilet during her break.

  Few women work in the Landweer offices, and the men try to ignore them, which suits her fine.

  They have a few computers, but eschew any kind of network or sharing. They think, rightly so, that a network makes them vulnerable to sabotage and infiltration. She is not allowed on a computer and uses an old electric typewriter. She types out forms in the corner, unnoticed.

  Often, before a raid, Shirzad bursts into Bora's office, his orders clipped and excited. Bora has her type up the arrest warrants, which she takes to various offices to be stamped and processed. She asks Bora if she may take her break early—she needs to run to the drug store for “female necessities.” Bora flicks his hands as if beating off flies, and tells her to hurry back.

  She scampers to the nearest public phone and calls Pim about the raid.

  Shirzad returns hours later, kicking desks and tables, utterly furious. The Resistants had cleared out in the middle of a meal. He seems most upset that they had been eating Genoa salami and pork cracklings, the seats “still warm from their traitorous asses.” He goes on to say that, “smuggling will be the ruin of the country.”

  Smuggling is the only thing keeping us alive. Salima tries to clear her head of such thoughts. Shirzad can read minds, the clerks say. She sits quietly at her desk. Because she is veiled, he has never seen her face. She doesn't think Shirzad has ever noticed her. She would like to keep it that way.

  The more competently she performs, the more Bora trusts her, and eventually, as Sanne Sahar predicted, she does most of his work for him. After two months she is allowed to work on the computer to fill out forms. No information is stored on the memory. It must all be copied onto disks, and stored in a locked drawer. They use the computers only as slightly updated typewriters. It's like driving a tank to do your grocery shopping. They store only blank forms on the computer.

  Shirzad tells Bora that he plans a raid on the town of Den Helder, the most northern town in western Holland—an important rendezvous point for getting refugees on boats and out of Holland. He has finally figured out who the leader of the Resistance is there, and decides to strike. “I hear he is gay. He won't last long under interrogation. He'll spill the names of the rest of his group.” He says this with a cheerful smack of his lips. It is 2 PM when he storms into Bora's office. The raiding party is to set out at five.

  “Do you have any proof this man is a member of the Resistance?” asks Bora.

  “We do not need proof. It is better to arrest a hundred innocent men than to let one traitor escape.”

  “That doesn't seem particularly efficient.”

  Salima is almost proud of her boss, even if his mild opposition is out of laziness rather than ideology.

  “You will come to our view in the end, Bora,” says Shirzad. “The Caliphate is more important than the individual. You will come to see that, too.”

  Shirzad brushes past Salima's desk, and for the first time appears to notice her. She pretends to be oblivious, pressing a command on the computer keyboard. The noisy printer begins rattling out a form. Yes, she's efficient. She can smell his cologne and wonders for a moment why, if women cannot wear nail polish, men can wear cologne. She can hear him exhale through his nostrils. “Why don't you bring your assistant?” Shirzad suggests.

  Bora bristles, casting a protective glance at her, but says nothing. Prisoner of rank.

  Shirzad continues. “If we arrest women, she can do the searches and verify their identities. We leave in one hour.” Shirzad spins and marches out.

  Salima asks to go to the pharmacy, to pick up a few things. A guilty Bora nods. “Be quick about it,” he grumbles. She dashes to the pharmacy and calls Pim.

  Eight cars filled with Landweer agents and IRH soldiers gather outside. She is not allowed to ride in a car with the other men, so she gets her own black Touran with her own driver.

  The ride takes ninety minutes, the solitude wildly luxurious. She opens a tray, and half expects to find little bottles of booze, but there is nothing. Not even water.

  She closes the screen between herself and the driver, takes off her veil, and leans her cheek against the cool window.

  Driving north through the farmland, there is no war, no mosques fingering the sky. They pass Edam and drive along the dikes. Windmills spin slowly. Sheep munch beside the road.

  She tries to come up with a plan for what to do when she gets to Den Helder. How she can hinder the Landweer? She hopes Pim got word to everyone in town, but knows inevitably someone will not have gotten the message. She considers faking a seizure when they arrive, but realizes most likely they would ignore her, or order a local woman to tend to her. She considers grabbing an AK-47 and shooting it into the air. She can't think of anything that won't blow her cover.

  Halfway to their destination, the convoy of Tourans stops at the center square in Alkmaar. Salima puts on her veil and rolls down the window.

  Friday is the cheese market at Alkmaar. Sixty thousand pounds of Gouda, Edam, and Leiden are spread across the brick plaza like great yellow checkers on a game board. Gone are the girls in white-winged cotton hats and wooden clogs
. But some traditions stand. Men in red-ribboned straw hats carry cheese wheels on red bowed pallets, eight wheels of cheese at a time. Hundreds of buyers mill around, bidding on cheeses. Men in white cotton coats plunge instruments into the cheese, and pull out plugs to taste and judge the quality.

  Shirzad is already out of the lead car. He orders the soldiers to round up everyone and check IDs. The shoppers scatter; those who aren't quick enough are instructed to form a line. Shirzad walks up the line, demanding their papers. He does nothing but take their documents walk behind their backs, and slowly hand them back.

  Although Alkmaar is a Christian town, the women are veiled according to sharia law. Shirzad orders Salima to verify the women's IDs. As gently as she can, she asks each woman to drop her niqab and compares her face to her photo ID. “Hide your cross,” she whispers to one woman, who tucks her pedant under her clothes.

  “Are any wearing makeup?” Shirzad asks Salima.

  “These are wholesome Dutch women. They don't need makeup.”

  He regards her, thoughtfully. She is terrified he detected something in her voice. A sarcasm she didn't intend. A rock sinks to the bottom of her stomach. “Very well, then,” he says, flipping his hand in dismissal.

  After an hour of fun, the Landweer and IRH soldiers get back in the cars and head north.

  As soon as they arrive in Den Helder, silver threads of sleet plink against the car windows, and hit the pavement and bounce. Yet dozens of people are scurrying around on their bicycles. Salima sighs in relief. They must have gotten word.

  The lead car stops at the ferry depot, a modern one-story building of glass and steel that sits on the water across the channel from the white beaches of Texel. Apparently the harbor master is the contact. Shirzad and the others get out and walk inside.

  Glass crashes. Salima turns and sees a grenade fly through the window and explode.

  For a moment the depot becomes almost weightless, lifted, defying gravity, before it rains down in pieces back to the earth. Doors fling away from their frames. Glass windows burst into stalactites. Bricks tumble, clumps of mortar and powder. A flame starts in a corner, flicking up a wall. Outside an automobile catches fire.