Among the Ruins

by Ausma Zehanat Khan

  “Touka Swan. The Green Birds. Someone’s bound to know. And if not, they’re better equipped to find out.”

  Rachel shifted the photographs again.

  “Do you see that, sir?” She handed him the photo from Evin. “Do you see what he’s doing?” Rachel tilted the photograph so she could see it.

  “Look at his eyes, the angle of his head. He’s looking for someone in the crowd.”

  Khattak did a double take. As usual, Rachel was right.

  “Do you have all the photos from Zahra’s camera?”

  Khattak paused. “Yes, I think so.”

  “Take another look. Maybe we can figure out who he’s looking for.”

  “You don’t think it was Zahra?”

  “I think if he knew Zahra would be at Evin with her camera, he wouldn’t have been there that day.”

  53

  Rachel slept well on the train. She woke to a hearty breakfast and the unrestrained chatter of her tour guide. Samira’s words floated into the ether. Rachel was thinking about the photographs, wondering if she’d guessed correctly at Zahra’s intentions.

  Zahra knew about the Darya-e Nur. She informed the representative of the Supreme Leader. She showed up at Evin prison a few days later. She was arrested at Evin and never seen again. Her body was buried without ceremony.

  Why? Why had she gone to Evin? What had convinced her to do so?

  Rachel’s questions remained.

  * * *

  Their first early morning stop was the Nasir al-Mulk mosque, a construction lovingly described by Samira as the Pink Mosque of Shiraz.

  “You can choose between the Shah-e Cheragh and this. Many favor the ruins of Persepolis, but to me, these two sights are the greatest Shiraz has to offer. The more discerning will favor the mosque above the glamor of the Shah-e Cheragh, but I’ll leave you to decide for yourselves.”

  Samira treated them to a quick history of a region described as the heartland of Persian culture. Shiraz was the city of wine and beauty, of nightingales and poets, where Hafiz and Sadi were buried, their grave sites places of pilgrimage—the city of courtesy and courtliness, of gardens, mosques, and architectural treasures, the crowning jewel of which was the late-nineteenth-century Nasir al-Mulk mosque.

  “This will be our first stop,” Samira said with an air of maternal indulgence. “So the photographers among you may catch the light. Then we’re off to Shah-e Cheragh, and you can tell me your conclusions: Which of the two is better?”

  Rachel found this a bit demanding given their by-the-numbers tour of Tehran, but she was to change her mind in the prayer hall of the Nasir al-Mulk. Stained-glass windows paraphrased the light, their forms minutely articulate across a row of carpets. Patterns danced over tulip-shaped columns, a bridge to the concave arches of the panj-e kasih composition.

  A rippling sea of turquoise, swimming in sun-warmed blues, formed the main floor of the gallery. Quietly aglow in the sea of blue were the reflections of pink-and-gold tiles. Columns floated above the floor, illusory and immemorial. Light, color, form, pattern, soundlessness, and space—though Rachel had no decided form of worship, she’d never seen a space as hallowed.

  She was dwarfed by it, undone.

  Simon stood quiet and thoughtful at her elbow.

  “I don’t see how the Shah-e Cheragh can top this,” he said. “Maybe we should have begun the other way around.”

  The Danish couple had found a place on the carpets, the other Briton set up a tripod to capture a panoramic view. Rachel had never seen anything like it. She’d imagined Iran as a place of violence and turmoil. Even the treasury hadn’t prepared her for the sublimity of the mosque.

  “A perfect cohesion of light,” Simon said.

  Rachel nodded. She wandered off to a corner, struggling with a puzzle. Her thoughts of Iran had been limited to a scowling Ayatollah, to a region in turmoil, and lately to the nuclear negotiations. What she hadn’t imagined was this ample tranquility, this amphitheater of joy.

  The dignity of the mosque tore at Rachel’s heart. Her lens was correcting itself. There was something to be learned from the cosmic radiance of her surroundings. Her mind was seized by a painful imagining: What must it be like to know your civilization possessed of such celestial beauty, and to find yourself the object of diminishment?

  She was roaming the deep places of the soul. And she wondered if this soaring elevation of spirit was the essence of Esa Khattak, or if it was an epiphany personal to her. She felt quickened by it, lighter for it, something she would keep to herself, to be examined later on her own.

  She passed the rest of the tour in a daze. The glittering turrets of the Shah-e Cheragh, the succession of colleges and mosques and robust bazaars, the gently unfurling plane trees that encircled a square of teahouses, the families about their business like any family in any other part of the world.

  She met Khattak in the jewelers’ district with something like relief. To investigate a death was her safe and comforting reality. When Khattak asked about the Pink Mosque, she couldn’t speak, embarrassed by the way her thoughts had leapt about, evanescent in their conclusions. She hadn’t snapped a single picture. The experience had been too intimate for that.

  Gruffly, she turned the subject to the jeweler at Mehran Najafi’s workshop.

  “You think he’ll cooperate, sir?”

  “It depends on what he knows—how deeply involved he may be.”

  The address Touka Swan had given Khattak was of a tucked-away shop in a corner of the jewelers’ arcade. Windows gleamed with jewelry in turquoise and silver and gold. A sprinkling of rough carnelians occupied a glass counter. Behind the counter, an elderly man stooped over a cash register, concluding a transaction with a woman in a chador. His hands trembled as he passed the woman her change, his face had the pallor of someone who spent long periods of time under fluorescent lighting.

  “Rachel.” Khattak indicated one of the showcases that lined the small shop. It featured several intricate pieces: three-tiered necklaces, engraved collars and cuffs in gold, a plume of ornamental brooches thick with blue and green gemstones.

  “No rubies,” he murmured to Rachel. “Indicative of a shortage?”

  His business concluded, the jeweler turned a face of welcome to them. One side of his face dragged down, leaving his mouth with a permanent twitch. He exchanged courtesies with Khattak, identifying himself as Sharif Syed. A ripple of laughter drifted through the arcade, followed by the shrieks of birds that swooped through the bazaar.

  To Rachel’s surprise, Syed switched over to a precise and formal English.

  “I was hoping to purchase something unique to Iran,” Khattak began. “Something with the weight of history behind it. A friend of mine suggested your name as a specialist in reproductions.”

  Syed looked uneasy. From his pocket, he unearthed a pair of spectacles with enormously thick lenses. These he perched on the tip of a nose that had once been broken. A tang of smoke drifted into his shop from the arcade, carrying the scent of burning cloves.

  “Does your friend have a name, Mr. Khattak?”

  “Mehran Najafi.”

  The jeweler went even paler.

  “I don’t think I know that name.”

  Khattak nodded at Rachel. She handed him the catalog from the Jewelry Museum.

  “Come,” Khattak said politely. “I’m not interested in Mr. Najafi’s role in your business. I only wish to inquire whether you fashioned a replica of the Darya-e Nur for him.”

  There was a stool behind the counter. Sharif Syed collapsed his weight on it, sweat breaking out on his forehead.

  “It wasn’t a crime,” he said faintly.

  He expressed no curiosity as to how Khattak had come by his information. A blind terror had seized his thoughts. He pushed the catalog away as if warding off an unknown evil.

  “I know it wasn’t,” Khattak agreed. “I want to know if you completed the work.”

  Syed fumbled with the scarf he had tied at his thr
oat.

  “I’m not—feeling well. You must go.”

  Khattak reached over the counter for Syed’s wrist.

  “Rachel,” he said. “See if you can find some water.”

  When Rachel had brought a bottle of water, Khattak helped Syed to sip it. He held Syed’s wrist until his pulse stopped racing.

  “Please don’t be alarmed. We won’t be reporting this conversation.” He shot a quick glance at Rachel, who was supporting Syed. “We’re detectives from Canada, we’re trying to find out what happened to Zahra Sobhani. She came to see you, didn’t she?”

  Syed nodded weakly. He slumped back into Rachel’s arms.

  “Not here,” he wheezed. “Take me to the back room.”

  A feeble gesture indicated a narrow door in the corner.

  “Shall I shut down your shop?” Khattak asked.

  Syed nodded. He fumbled the keys from his pants pocket, extending his hand to Khattak. Moving quickly, Khattak secured the outer door of the shop as Rachel helped Syed to a sofa in the room behind the shop front.

  Rachel glanced around, making note of the jeweler’s tools and his ready supply of rough. Though cramped, the space was well-organized, with a natural flow from a jeweler’s bench to the melting surface and polishing area, to a sink at the back near a roller stand. An assortment of tools was arranged on the jeweler’s workbench. Small hammers and welders, tweezers and magnifiers, jeweler’s loupes, a group of gemological pliers. There were also microscopes and grading instruments.

  This was clearly where Syed performed his work. A finely tooled necklace worked in sapphire and gold rested on his desk, a pair of binoculars beside it. A security camera above the door was aimed at the shop, Rachel didn’t see a safe.

  Khattak sat beside Syed, offering reassurance. After a time, the jeweler regained his poise. He sat up on his own, brushing Khattak’s hands away with a testy gesture.

  “I shouldn’t be speaking to you.”

  “No one is following us,” Khattak assured him, though he couldn’t be sure of his words. Since his departure for Tehran, he’d been watching for a tail and hadn’t spied one. That didn’t mean it wasn’t there. “No one knows of our interest in Zahra. Tell us what we want to know, and we’ll leave you alone. Did Mehran and Zahra come to you?”

  Like Rachel, Syed kept an eye on his security camera. His shop was deserted, Rachel had dimmed the lights.

  “Yes, he came. He asked me to do the impossible—to imitate the Darya-e Nur. I don’t know how familiar you are with the stone. I told him it would be impossible to replicate such a rare pink diamond of its size. There’s nothing similar in existence. And if there was, Najafi could not afford it. He said that wouldn’t be a problem.”

  “Why not?”

  The jeweler sighed, his chin quivering with the movement.

  “He brought me a replica of the diamond. He said my job was to duplicate the setting—the sun, the lions, the ornamental brooch. He told me to use the cheapest stones—crystals, zirconium, whatever I liked. He was willing to pay anything I asked.”

  From the corner of the room, Rachel asked, “How long did it take you?”

  “Too long.” The left side of his face dragged down. He held up his shaking hands. “It wasn’t worth it. It was the only thing I worked on for six months, it ruined my health.”

  His voice roughened with tears. “If Mehran is displeased with it, I don’t have the money to return, I used it for my children’s education.” Only one side of his face moved as he winced. “Nothing in Iran comes easily these days. Sanctions have made our lives impossible.”

  “I’m not after the money, and I don’t represent Mr. Najafi. Why did Zahra come to you?”

  Immediately, the jeweler looked grave.

  “Such terrible things happen in this country. How do I know they won’t happen to me?”

  “You’ve done nothing wrong,” Khattak said firmly. “And even if you had, it would be impossible for me to report you—we’re in the same position. Neither of us wishes to draw attention to our actions.”

  Understanding that this was true, Syed relented. He told them Zahra had come to him in pursuit of her ex-husband. She’d wanted to know where Mehran was, and when Syed had last seen him. She’d asked the same questions Khattak was asking now. Had Syed undertaken a special commission? Had he duplicated the setting of the Darya-e Nur?

  Rachel flicked Khattak a glance. Their theory had been wrong. Zahra and Mehran weren’t in on the plot together. If Syed was to be believed, Zahra had been chasing her husband’s trail for reasons they didn’t know. Khattak’s voice became animated.

  “Agha Syed, do you know why Mehran wanted the replica?”

  Rachel watched the jeweler’s rheumy old eyes. He blinked several times. His trembling hands removed the thick-lensed glasses from his nose in order to wipe his eyes.

  “He said it was a gift for his daughter, Roxana.”

  He hummed an eerie tune under his breath.

  With a sense of shock, Rachel recognized the song Max Najafi had played at the studio.

  “Everyone in this country knows of Roxana Najafi.” His lips shook. “It was a fitting gift for a daughter of Iran. It was my privilege to do anything for her.”

  Rachel and Khattak exchanged a glance. The jeweler was a tacit supporter of the Green Movement. His role had been to reproduce the ornament, he’d played no part in its theft. Preparing to leave, they thanked him. He looked small and frail in the harsh light of his shop.

  “Will the other man be back again? Will he want his money back?”

  Rachel and Khattak turned at the door.

  “What other man?”

  “The man who paid for the materials. I was able to duplicate everything except for one of the lion’s eyes. I had purchased another ruby from my supplier, but this man was in a hurry. He demanded I finish the brooch early, he didn’t notice the ruby was missing.” Syed’s voice quavered. “Has he noticed it now?”

  “Do you know who this man was?” Khattak returned.

  Syed shook his head. “Mehran sent him. He didn’t give his name.”

  “But you’d recognize his face?”

  Khattak reached for the photograph of the exhibit from the inside pocket of his jacket. He grabbed a stool from the workshop and placed the photograph before the jeweler, smoothing it out. Rachel brought Syed his jeweler’s loupe.

  “No,” he said. “Bring me those glasses.”

  Rachel found the binoculars and handed them over. Syed examined the picture.

  “Well?” Khattak asked. “Is it one of those men?”

  The jeweler shook his head. But when Khattak disclosed the second photograph, Syed gave an involuntary cry. He jabbed his thumb down on the photograph.

  “This man,” he said. “In his countryman’s clothes and boots. This is him. This is what he looked like. You see his hands?”

  Khattak nodded.

  “I always remember the hands, they’re the hands of his profession.”

  Rachel looked up, her heart beating fast.

  “What profession is that, sir?”

  The jeweler made a clean breast of things, a burden slipping from his shoulders.

  “This man is a captain at Anzali Harbor. He sails on the Caspian Sea.”

  54

  The Suite

  Joojeh is back. He takes me for a shower and a shave. My legs are weak, I haven’t walked in so long. He puts an arm under my shoulders and drags me down the hallway. There’s a bit of tinfoil in his pocket, it’s shaped like a triangle. He passes it to me, and I see that it’s the corner of a Toblerone. “The Swiss?” I gasp. “The Swiss are here?” Joojeh speaks under his breath. “Not for you, for a foreigner. I got to keep a piece of the chocolate, so I saved it.” I thank him copiously. To be a foreigner in an Iranian jail! And then I realize. Joojeh has accepted me. I’m not foreign, not peshmerga, not just a Kurd—I’m a son of Iran. I lick the tinfoil, wretched in my gratitude. “What’s happening?” I ask him. “W
hy such kindness?” Joojeh looks me dead in the eye. “Kindness costs nothing, rewards everything,” he says. I slip out of his arms, sobbing. I’m shuddering with grief, with joy. I look up at Joojeh. “My sister,” I say. “You’ve seen my sister?” He jerks a hand across his mouth, telling me to shut up. He pulls me up from the floor, shoulders my weight again. “She’s safe,” he whispers. “She’s working to get you home.” Home, I think, sobbing like a child. My mother died in childbirth, my father in prison. Nasreen is my only home.

  55

  The sun broke across the sky, divesting the land of its cover of snow, the earth below emerging in patches. They’d left Shiraz behind, trading Tehran for a train to the harbor in the north, the Caspian Sea sounding like something from a fairy tale, magical and remote, undiscoverable by ordinary means.

  “We’ll need to split up,” Khattak said to Rachel. “Slip away from your group and take this side of the harbor, I’ll try my luck at the other. We’ll meet at your group’s restaurant for dinner.”

  “Did you have any luck with Touka? Or your group of students?”

  The journey had tired them both. Khattak’s clothes were rumpled, his face unshaven, a dark shadow upon his jaw. The sky beyond their window was flecked with streaks of red, a herald of the dawn.

  Khattak showed her a message on his phone.

  “Nothing from the Green Birds. Touka identified the man at Evin as Barid Rud. That’s who you should be asking for.”

  “I’m not sure I can ditch the tour all day,” Rachel said. “I think Simon is getting suspicious.”

  “You’re not worried about your tour leader?”

  Rachel tried to reassure him.

  “Nate paid her well. It isn’t worth her while to ask questions about me.”

  “What if she reports your absence? That’s something you need to think about.”

  “Don’t worry, sir. Nate’s promised her a bonus if my impression of Iran is favorable. I think it will get me back onto my plane.”