by James Barney
“I guess there’s no easy escape route when you live in a plain between two rivers,” said Kathleen, pointing to the map.
“That’s exactly right. So you might say this was a calamity of biblical proportions.”
Kathleen considered that comment for a moment, shifting in her seat. “I assume you’re referring to The flood? As in the Bible and Noah’s ark and all that?”
“Yes, indeed.”
Kathleen pressed her lips together but said nothing.
“Most scholars agree that the flood of the Old Testament and the historical flood that took place at the beginning of the third millennium BC in Mesopotamia are one and the same event. After all, what is the Old Testament but a history of Mesopotamia and Egypt that begins around the time of that great flood?”
Kathleen nodded obligingly but was unable to suppress her doubtful expression.
“I’m sorry, you look puzzled,” said Dr. Sargon.
“Sorry . . . it’s just that I don’t really subscribe to the Bible at all, Old Testament, New Testament, or otherwise. I’m a scientist. I seek truth through observation and experimentation, not through divine scripture.” She waved her hand at the map. “But, please, continue.”
An awkward silence ensued. “Interesting,” muttered Sargon after several seconds.
“What is?”
“It’s just that . . . Well, your parents, they were also committed to seeking the truth. And they, too, believed in the power of observation—archeological evidence, anthropological evidence, pottery fragments, carbon dating, sediment samples. You see, they, too, were scientists. Like you.”
Kathleen squirmed uncomfortably in her seat. She didn’t like where this was going at all.
“But your parents also studied the Bible,” Sargon continued. “They studied the Quran. They studied the Torah. They knew and understood those texts well. Because, you see, there is truth in those books that goes beyond carbon dating and sediment samples.”
Kathleen felt uneasy and desperately wanted to change the topic. The fact was, she hadn’t believed in God or the Bible since she was a teenager. It had marked a major turning point in her life, and one she firmly believed had been for the better. Biology was her religion now.
“So where’s Tell-Fara?” she asked, changing the subject.
“Tell-Fara is here, near Babylon.” Sargon pointed to the map with his index finger. “In ancient Mesopotamia, before the flood, Tell-Fara was known as Shuruppak, a Sumerian city that was then on the Euphrates River. Many believe it was the birthplace of Noah.”
Kathleen ignored the last comment. “What happened to my parents there?”
Sargon drew a deep breath, obviously bracing himself for an unpleasant task. Then, with great delicacy and respect for the memory of the Talbots, he explained the events that he observed at Tell-Fara on a September morning thirty years earlier, just a day after his own family had been ruthlessly murdered on the outskirts of Baghdad.
Chapter Nine
September 4, 1979. Baghdad, Iraq.
Dr. Hakeem Abdul Sargon stepped on the brakes of his black Mercedes. Why such traffic at midday? he wondered. He honked impatiently at the rusty Peugeot mini in front of him, but to no avail. Traffic on Bagdad’s main artery had slowed to a glacial pace.
Sargon had woken up this morning with a bad feeling about today. The ominous sensation had intensified when he arrived at work. There was a buzz amongst those in his office that a coup d’état was imminent. Not that a coup would have come as a great surprise to anyone. Politically speaking, President Al-Bakr had been growing progressively weaker in the past six months, his political power seeming to slip away with his health. In Iraq, physical weakness invited challenge, and there was no mystery as to who would soon step up to challenge Al-Bakr’s authority. Saddam Hussein, Al-Bakr’s young cousin from Tikrit, had been amassing power as quickly as Al-Bakr had been losing it. Though just a cabinet official by title, Hussein had, in recent months, been acting more like president-elect. The unspoken transfer of power between the two was palpable in the governmental corridors of Baghdad.
Change was afoot, Sargon was sure of that. It was only a question of when . . . and how bad things would get.
This morning, he’d decided things were going get very bad. There was talk of imprisonment, or worse, for anyone who dared challenge Hussein’s accession to power. And that made Sargon particularly uneasy. Years ago, he’d had a run-in with Hussein. Not a big deal at the time, but in hindsight perhaps enough to earn him a spot on Hussein’s infamous “enemies list.”
The run-in was silly, a mere trifle in the larger scheme of things. As Director of Antiquities, Dr. Sargon had begun an aggressive repatriation program, searching the world over for Iraqi relics that had been spirited away by adventurers and so-called archeologists over the past century. Using the oil revenues that had swelled the governmental coffers thanks to Al-Bakr’s nationalization of the oil industry, Sargon had arranged to buy back precious Iraqi artifacts from foreign collectors and museums and repatriate them to the Iraqi National Museum. Occasionally, museums—and more rarely private collectors—were kind enough to return the antiquities without charge. On most occasions, however, the Iraqi government had to pay dearly for the privilege of owning its own historical artifacts. Sargon knew this well, because he was the one who wrote the checks.
The trouble began when Hussein—then just a lowly bureaucrat in the defense ministry—decided he wanted to “repatriate” a precious fifteenth-century mosaic from a private collection in London for his own personal summer residence in Tikrit. It was a beautiful mosaic; there was no doubt about that. It depicted a heroic Persian cavalry officer in full battle regalia. Surely, it would have enhanced the décor of Hussein’s summer home. But, as Sargon explained to a fuming Hussein, the National Museum simply could not use government funds to purchase artwork for a private residence. Thus began an unspoken feud between the two that had simmered on low boil for more than five years. The situation intensified when, two years later, Sargon purchased that very mosaic for the National Museum and displayed it prominently in the museum’s front gallery.
Things got even worse when Hussein got wind that Sargon had authorized foreign archeologists to excavate a temple in southern Iraq. “Treasonous!” Hussein had famously declared in a meeting of interior defense officials.
Sargon was sure he was on Hussein’s dreaded “enemies list.” Moreover, he was sure Hussein would soon be treating the Iraqi National Museum as his own private art gallery, taking anything that struck his fancy. Undoubtedly, that beautiful fifteenth-century mosaic would be among the first pieces appropriated.
The buzz around Sargon’s office this morning made him think that today might be the day. When he tried to call home at 10:00 A.M. and found the phone line dead, that confirmed it beyond all doubt. Cutting off government communications was the first step of any successful coup.
For months, Dr. Sargon had been planning for this exact moment. But now that it was actually here, he suddenly feared his plans were inadequate. He’d planned to drive his family south to Az Zubayr and then into Kuwait. His political credentials would facilitate their safe passage. If not, he had plenty of cash to make it happen. For months, he’d been exchanging modest amounts of Iraqi dinars for British pounds, using his official position as curator of the National Museum so as not to raise any suspicions. He now had nearly £20,000 in British currency in his personal possession—enough to exit Iraq safely, if not comfortably. Hard currency went a long way in this part of the world.
On the other hand, it could also get you killed.
Sargon honked his horn again, which had no effect other than to prompt an obscene gesture from the driver in front of him. Curse this traffic!
If he could have called his wife from the office, she would have been packed and ready to go by now. What if she wasn’t even home? What if she’d taken Farhana to the market? Unthinkable, Sargon concluded. His wife would never go out without checking wit
h him first, and she’d said nothing about going to the market this morning.
His street was now just a block away. Losing patience, he punched the accelerator and veered the Mercedes halfway onto the sidewalk. Vendors and pedestrians yelled at him as he zoomed past the backed-up mess on the Qadisiya Expressway, the main highway that bisected downtown Baghdad. He didn’t care. His official tags made him practically invisible to the local police.
He banked right onto Rasheed Street. Now liberated from the traffic-clogged main artery of the city, he pushed the Mercedes hard, reaching fifty miles per hour as he roared down the wide, palm-tree-lined avenue toward his house.
At 110 Rasheed Street, he pulled the car over and jumped out. He rushed through the front door of his luxury apartment and bounded up the stairs to the living quarters on the second floor. “Nisreen!” he called, barely suppressing his panic.
“What is it?” his wife responded from the kitchen. Her fearful tone mirrored Sargon’s own anxiety.
“Where’s Farhana?”
“Upstairs, sleeping. What’s the matter?”
Sargon grabbed his wife firmly by the shoulders and said sternly, “We have to go.”
“Allah have mercy!” Nisreen whispered. She knew exactly what her husband meant and what they had to do. She ran immediately upstairs to pack her bags.
Thirty minutes later, Sargon, Nisreen, and a sleepy six-year-old Farhana were belted into the Mercedes, Sargon in the front, the girls in the back. The trunk of the car sagged noticeably beneath the weight of clothes, cash, and valuables they intended to take with them. Sargon was careful to drive the speed limit in the city, not wanting to draw any extra attention to the vehicle. When they cleared the Baghdad city limits without incident, however, he breathed an audible sigh of relief and eased the Mercedes up to a more comfortable cruising speed.
With Baghdad safely behind them, Sargon relaxed and tried to engage his nervous wife in conversation. “Is Farhana still sleeping back there?” he asked without taking his eyes off the road.
“Yes, sound asleep.”
“Nisreen,” said Sargon reassuringly, “everything will be fine. I promise.” He swiveled his head around and flashed a quick, confident smile.
And that’s when he noticed the military van advancing rapidly from behind.
Sargon’s heart skipped a beat as he straightened in the driver’s seat. He clutched the wheel tightly. “Don’t look at them,” he warned as he gently slowed the Mercedes to allow the van to pass.
But the van did not pass. Instead, it pulled alongside and slowed to the same speed as the Mercedes. The two vehicles were now driving side by side along the deserted, two-lane highway that led south out of Baghdad. Sargon squeezed the steering wheel tightly with both hands and held his breath. He risked a quick glance at the van and saw a soldier glaring back at him from the driver’s side window. He also saw a black object moving inside the van, which he recognized immediately as a weapon.
Dr. Sargon gunned the accelerator, and the Mercedes responded obediently with a roar. Farhana woke up and began to whimper. The Mercedes was now several car lengths ahead of the van and pulling away quickly.
Suddenly, a burst of automatic gunfire erupted from behind them. The Mercedes’s back window shattered instantly in a deafening explosion of glass and bullets. Farhana and Nisreen shrieked in horror as shards of glass flew everywhere. Sargon felt tiny bits of glass slam into the back of his head like birdshot. He pushed the accelerator harder, but it was already on the floor. The Mercedes was screaming down the highway at nearly one hundred miles per hour.
More gunfire was now coming from behind them in short, emphatic bursts. Suddenly, there was a loud pop, and the steering wheel jerked sharply to the left, nearly escaping Sargon’s grasp. He struggled with all his strength to keep the car pointing south, but it was no use. The left rear tire had been blown out, and the car was now skidding into an uncontrollable spin. Nisreen let out a long, sustained shriek as the Mercedes spun around several times and finally came to rest on the soft, sandy shoulder of the desolate highway, facing north toward Baghdad, toward the home they loved but were desperately trying to escape.
“Get down!” Sargon bellowed as the military van skidded to a halt beside them on the road. He pulled his Tariq 9 mm pistol from under his seat.
Seconds later, the driver’s side windows exploded in a barrage of bullets from the soldier’s automatic weapon.
Sargon felt a stinging pain in his left shoulder and slumped far down into his seat. The onslaught lasted for only a few seconds, though it seemed like forever to Sargon. Then it ceased abruptly.
Sargon was wounded but conscious. He sat motionless and watched, using his peripheral vision, as a soldier approached the Mercedes cautiously. The man wore an Iraqi infantry uniform and had a military-issued AK–47 drawn to his shoulder. He was coming to finish them off!
Sargon gripped his pistol tightly and, with his thumb, gently clicked the safety off.
As the soldier neared the driver’s side window, Sargon lifted the Tariq and fired twice in rapid succession. The soldier lurched backward and fired a short burst of bullets over the top of the Mercedes as he fell to the ground. Sargon wasn’t sure if the soldier was dead but had no time to find out. For, at that exact moment, the driver of the van was getting out of the vehicle. Sargon aimed and fired twice in the man’s direction. The first shot missed, but the second landed squarely between the man’s eyes, bringing him down instantly. The soldier fell out of the van’s open door, his feet catching on the seat belt as he did, so that he ended up dangling awkwardly, upside down over the road.
Frantically, Sargon looked in the backseat, where Farhana and Nisreen were huddled on the floor. Beneath a blanket of broken glass and tattered upholstery, he saw movement. Then he heard Farhana crying softly and Nisreen hushing her. Thank Allah, they were alive! He was just about to speak to them when he saw movement out of the corner of his eye.
Time seemed to stand still as Sargon turned to see the first soldier staggering to his feet beside the driver’s side window, his torso bloody from the two gunshot wounds Sargon had inflicted. The wounded soldier hoisted his automatic weapon to his hip and, for a split second, locked eyes with Sargon. Reflexively, Sargon lifted the door handle and pushed the door open as hard as he could with his wounded shoulder. He yelped as an excruciating pain surged through his upper body.
The car door connected squarely with the gunman’s weapon just as the AK–47 erupted in a burst of fire and bullets. The lethal barrage, meant for Sargon, instead slammed into the vehicle’s rear door and quarter panel. Simultaneously, Sargon lifted his pistol and fired through the open door. His first shot caught the soldier in the right shoulder, the second in the neck. The soldier fell to the ground and dropped his weapon.
Fueled with rage, Sargon exited the vehicle and stood over the soldier’s prone body, his pistol aimed directly at the man’s head. But the soldier was already dead.
There was now only silence, and the acrid smell of gunpowder and burned rubber.
Sargon stepped over the soldier’s bloody body and stuck his head through the Mercedes’s shattered rear window. One glance confirmed his deepest horror—Nisreen and Farhana lay in a bloody, lifeless heap, their bodies riddled with bullet holes.
He opened his mouth to scream, but nothing came out.
He couldn’t breathe. His knees buckled.
For several seconds, he braced himself awkwardly on the car, desperately gasping for air, until, finally, he lost consciousness and collapsed.
Chapter Ten
September 4, 1979. Mishkhab, Iraq.
Sargon couldn’t stay long in Mishkhab. By now, Hussein and his cronies almost certainly knew what had happened on the highway south of Baghdad. At the very least, someone had surely reported the abandoned Mercedes and two dead soldiers to the authorities. They were after him, and they knew he was heading south.
He had driven four hours in a panic-induced haze, with the bodie
s of Nisreen and Farhana in the back of the military van, wrapped in green blankets. He’d driven and shifted gears with one hand because his left shoulder was stiff from the gunshot wound. The bullet had nicked the soft, fleshy portion of his upper arm. Whenever he tried to move his injured arm, the searing pain made him feel lightheaded. But, in an odd way, that pain was the only thing that kept him grounded as he drove. Everything else around him seemed like a horrible dream.
He was dressed like an army corporal now, having removed the military uniform from the body of the van driver. The olive green fatigues were snug at the waist but otherwise fit surprisingly well.
Just after 4:00 P.M., Sargon arrived at the modest house in Mishkhab where Nisreen’s sister, Aaliya, lived with her husband, Lutfi. They were not expecting him, so his appearance—in military fatigues and driving a military vehicle no less—caused a tremendous commotion.
Mishkhab was a small farming village about 150 miles southwest of Baghdad. The villagers there were blissfully unaware, of course, of the political upheaval taking place at that very moment in the Iraqi capital. Although Sargon explained as best he could to Aaliya and her husband, he could tell they did not fully grasp the gravity of the situation.
That changed, however, when they saw the bullet-riddled bodies of Nisreen and six-year-old Farhana in the back of the van.
Pandemonium erupted almost immediately. Aaliya howled uncontrollably and was soon joined by other relatives, including Nisreen’s aunt and uncle, cousins, second cousins, and dozens of people vaguely related by blood and marriage. The whole village, it seemed, poured out of their houses to share in the family’s grief.
