Grave Island

by Andrew Smyth

  ‘Doesn’t she hold us responsible for Shamir’s death?’

  ‘I think she would but she’s probably beyond that now.’

  ‘Ask her again. Ask her why she’s telling us this.’

  The interpreter repeated what she said in flat tones. ‘Until now he’d managed to keep out of the fighting but Jafar always brought trouble with him. If it hadn’t been for him, her son would have been left alone. He would have still been alive. People here are dead even as they’re born which is why she’s so happy her eldest son got out. At least he should be safe. She says she’s given up taking sides – there’s so little to choose between any of them. She wants it all to end so they can bring up their families in peace.’

  I looked again at the photograph. They were good-looking boys – the older one particularly so and he was out there somewhere. I clicked on “share” and sent the photo to my own email address. I’d leave the boy’s phone inside for her to find later.

  I looked down at her. Her sobs were getting quieter. ‘She’s giving us the name of this Jafar Nazim in return for our help in finding her boy somewhere in Europe possibly even in a refugee camp.’ I turned to Ali. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘This is your call. This is your responsibility.’ He turned and walked off.

  I watched him go with surprise. My responsibility? I was responsible for this?

  ‘Find her boy,’ the interpreter repeated. ‘You’re from England – you can find him if he’s there.’ That was a very big “if” but I didn’t say anything. ‘She says if you find Jafar Nazim then try to get him to stop. He can’t come back to the village, but he has to be shown that killing isn’t the way.’

  ‘Ask her how I can find him.’

  ‘He has family in the next village. Ask for Amina – she’s his aunt. She says she’ll know where you can find him.’ He waited for her to finish. ‘But she says that’s for you, she’s not interested in Jafar. It’s her son she wants you to find. Her son Sayed. Find him, she says.’

  I looked at her plaintive, tear-streaked face. In a few months I’d be back in England. I could leave, but she never could. Perhaps after all I could trace her son. Records were kept of refugees – after a fashion – and it wasn’t impossible that I’d be able to find out something. ‘How long ago did Sayed leave?’

  ‘She says it must have been about two years ago. He left the village as soon as he could. The local schoolteacher taught him some English and he worked at it whenever he could. He wanted to act as an interpreter and went off to see your army. He came back a couple of times but after that she didn’t hear anything until a few months ago when someone told her he’d gone to Europe as a refugee. She thinks with his English it must have been to Britain.’

  We left them and headed back to base, but the depth of her grief stayed with me. Ali was particularly subdued. I tried to get him talking but he ignored me and concentrated on the bleak landscape around us.

  1

  I managed to track down Jafar Nazim before the end of my tour of duty in Afghanistan. I’d visited his aunt and asked for her help, but she was extremely doubtful that there was anything she could do but agreed to contact me if he turned up in the village. When he did, I took my interpreter and drove to meet him but by that time, it was clear that he was a hardened fighter and nothing I could say dissuaded him from thinking of me as an infidel and a sworn enemy of Islam. I even showed him the photograph of him with his dead friend but nothing would move him. In retrospect I think it was only because he felt safe in his aunt’s house that he didn’t have a gun trained on me when I met him. Killing had become an automatic reflex for him and I was probably lucky to get out of there alive. But now that I was back in the UK with time on my hands, I started to honour my promise to his mother and look for Sayed.

  Despite the huge number of refugees finding their way to Europe, records of varying quality had been kept and since Sayed had at least some English, I thought his mother was probably right in thinking that he’d been sent to the UK. The majority of Afghan refugees live in London and through the local refugee community organisation I finally located him living with another Afghan family. He’d enrolled at a local college and by all accounts he was assimilating well. I tracked him down on the phone but first I wanted him to contact his mother. After that we could meet. I managed to set up a Skype connection with the Chorjah village headman and sent on the message that Sayed was safe and well. It wasn’t much but at least I’d made a small contribution to one family in that beleaguered country.

  Most of the 10,000 Afghan refugees in England live in introverted communities in north and west London – in contrast to those from the Indian subcontinent who make their way to the east of London. But their communities are as close, and many are built around the local mosque and they were sometimes a very useful source of intelligence. I therefore had mixed motives when I visited Sayed in Harrow a few weeks later.

  Walking through the streets, the pungent smells of eastern Asia enveloped me and I almost felt myself back in Afghanistan. I’d arranged to meet in the local park and when I got there I could see that someone was already sitting at the end of one of the benches. I stopped a while and brought out the old photograph his mother had given me – he was clearly recognisable. A young man in a public park – what could be more harmless? Sayed wasn’t physically imposing, he was quite slight and normally no one would have looked at him twice – no one, that is, who hadn’t spent time with him.

  After a few minutes in his company it was as though he’d cast a spell over you and not for the first time I was thankful that he was on our side – or least so I hoped. I sat at the other end of the bench and pulled out the photograph his mother had given me, hoping that he would recognise it. ‘She wants to hear from you,’ I told him. ‘She knows you’re alive and well here in London, but she wants to speak to you.’ I held out a piece of paper. ‘I have the number of the village headman here. He has a mobile so you can arrange it through him.’ The phone with his brother’s photograph on it would have long-since expired.

  He took the paper and glanced at it before putting it in his pocket. He said something I didn’t catch. ‘Was she well?’ he repeated.

  ‘It’s been very difficult for her. Your village was badly damaged.’ I needed to decide whether to tell him about his brother, because I didn’t want him to associate me with bad news. His mother would tell him soon enough. ‘How is life treating you here?’

  He said nothing for a while.

  ‘I thought I could train as a doctor,’ he said eventually. ‘Allah knows how many doctors are needed back home, but I didn’t have the basic qualifications, so they suggested I take a degree in Pharmacy and I’ve been enjoying it – I only have a year to go now and then perhaps I can return and help. I want to try to put something back.’

  I told him how the Taliban had targeted the clinic in Chorjah and he snorted. ‘Yes – they call it “Western Medicine” as though it was the work of the devil. The truth is they want people to be kept in poverty and illness to make them easier to control.’

  I was taken aback by his fierceness but also encouraged by it. ‘And how are things otherwise? What about the family you’re staying with?’

  ‘It’s okay. They’re very religious and don’t really approve of my attitude, but they don’t force themselves upon me. I spend the evenings on my studies and in the mornings I work in a café to pay the rent. I suppose I should say that things are okay.’

  ‘Your English is very good.’ This wasn’t flattery.

  ‘Thank you. I was already quite fluent before I got here.’

  ‘And your mosque?’ I had to ask this. ‘Have they made you welcome?’

  Another pause. ‘I suppose they have.’ He finally turned to look at me and I saw that his photographs didn’t do him justice. He had the most piercing brown eyes and held my gaze with an air of steady self-confidence. ‘So tell me why you’re really here?’

  I was taken aback for a moment. Was I really th
at easy to read? ‘I told you. I promised your mother that I would contact you and hand over that phone number.’

  ‘There’s always something more,’ he said, looking at me steadily. ‘With you people there’s always something more.’

  ‘It’s up to you,’ I said guardedly. ‘If you feel you can help us then we’d appreciate it, but it really is up to you. You’ve been around the army in Afghanistan. You must have some idea how things work. We can’t afford to miss any opportunity to get intelligence.’

  ‘You want me to spy for you.’ He didn’t say it as a question and he didn’t seem to be in the least embarrassed.

  ‘If you want to put it that way.’ There was no point in dressing this up. He obviously knew his mind. ‘You’re part of the community here, you could keep your ear to the ground and let us know if there’s anything suspicious.’

  ‘When you say “community” you mean Muslim community. Why don’t you just say so?’

  I sighed inwardly. ‘Yes. You know I do and you know why.’ Despite my reservations, I thought I’d take a chance by telling him about his brother, hoping that it might help me get his confidence. ‘There’s something I didn’t tell you. It’s about your brother.’ Immediately I could see his face cloud over as though he knew what I was going to say. ‘In the attack on your village, he was shot. I’m afraid he was killed.’

  I waited to see the reaction, but Sayed just stared at me. I pulled out my phone and scrolled through the photographs until I found the one I had copied. I held the phone out to him and he took it and looked at it for a long time. I could see his eyes water, but he still said nothing.

  ‘He looks happy here,’ he said finally. ‘You say this was taken just before he was killed?’ I nodded. ‘That’s something, I suppose. The other boy is Jafar. He was only a few years older than me, but he couldn’t wait to join the fighters. Do you know what happened to him?’

  ‘I traced him through his aunt.’ At least I could show that I was involved. ‘She arranged a meeting, but it was a waste of time. He would have killed me if he could.’

  ‘That was Jafar. Always destined for a martyr’s death. Another wasted life. I should have realised that the war would catch up with my brother eventually.’

  ‘If you feel that way, why don’t you try to help us?’ I said. ‘You don’t have to decide anything now.’ I took a card out of my pocket. ‘My office and my mobile numbers.’ I held it out to him and he hesitated before putting it in his pocket. ‘Young men your age are being indoctrinated here in London and are being sent out to kill. Is it so unreasonable to try to stop them?’

  Sayed looked around him. In the corner was a playground and the screams of the children carried across the park. ‘As you say, I don’t have to decide anything now.’ He stood up and held out his hand. ‘Thank you for the message from my mother. I haven’t spoken to her for a long time. She’s already lost one son so I must try and make up for it.’

  I watched as he left the park. There was something about him that struck a chord with me. He’d had to learn independence at an early age – as I had. There was an inner strength there, someone who’d worked out for himself what he thought was important. Someone who lived by his own values and was little affected by outside pressures. It was an independence that I recognised but it meant I couldn’t tell whether I would ever hear from him again.

  I’d been spending most of my time up in London where I’d been given a grace-and-favour apartment while I was on secondment to Whitehall. I’d enjoyed rubbing shoulders with the other agencies I was supposed to be working with and, while it beat my last tour in Afghanistan, the trouble was that I wasn’t so sure about the pinstriped role. After a while though, I thought I was starting to get the hang of it and was beginning to understand the nuances of mandarin-speak.

  I was back in my flat later that evening, struggling with a new recipe on the flat’s tiny electric hob. At the critical moment when I had to stir hard to stop the sauce from curdling, there was a hammering on the door. I was very tempted to ignore it – I wasn’t expecting anyone, so it was probably a neighbour wanting to borrow some milk. Except I didn’t have any neighbours.

  Reluctantly, I turned off the stove and went over and opened the door. As I did so, two men pushed past me, while a third grabbed my arm and bent it up high behind my back. Instinctively I turned with the force of his attack and pulled him towards me until he lost his balance and I was able to get my other arm around his neck and pull down. The man grunted before loosening his grip and I kicked him hard on his shin and managed to grab him and ram his head into the doorframe until he fell unconscious. I turned to face the other two, my vision distorted by the familiar rush of blood to my head. I looked around for something I could use – taking out one of them might be possible without a weapon, but not all three.

  ‘Okay, you’ve had your fun,’ one of the men said, pulling out his wallet and showing me his identification. ‘Damian Webster, Military Police Investigation Department. Let’s all cool it, shall we?’ He turned to his partner. ‘See if he’s okay. We might need an ambulance.’

  I stepped to one side to let him through. The man on the floor was starting to come around, so I guessed he’d be okay. ‘Let’s see that identification again.’ I took it with a shaking hand, the adrenaline still coursing through my veins. I inspected it carefully but it seemed to be genuine. ‘So what’s all this about? Why couldn’t you make an appointment like any normal person?’

  ‘What? And give you time to hide the evidence?’

  ‘Evidence? What are you talking about?’

  ‘We need to search the flat.’ He turned to his partner. ‘How is he?’

  The other man was struggling to his feet.

  ‘I think he’ll survive. Though he’ll have a hell of a headache.’ He looked across at me. ‘That’s a nasty temper, you’ve got. You could have killed him.’

  I shrugged. ‘Then don’t barge in like that. Have you got a warrant?’

  ‘Don’t need one. It’s government property so you have no rights over it. Now are you going to co-operate or is it going to get even nastier?’

  ‘What are you looking for?’ As I said it I realised how feeble it sounded – I would find out soon enough what this was all about. ‘Help yourself. If you find anything valuable I’ll let you have a share of it.’ I glanced across at the man I’d attacked and could see that he wasn’t going to be needing an ambulance. Perhaps I was slipping – they don’t usually get up so fast.

  My dinner was ruined so I sat at the table and waited for them to finish, and it didn’t take long. Webster had gone straight into the bedroom and now came back out with a handful of files. He didn’t need to tell me that they were exactly where he’d been told they would be. I’d been around long enough to recognise when evidence had been planted.

  Webster brought the files over to the table and spread them out in front of me. ‘These belong to you?’ he asked. ‘All marked Top Secret – Not to be Taken Out.’ Of course he’d added that last bit. Top Secret files are never to be taken out which is why they’re secret. I said nothing and tried desperately to think how they might have got there. They’d obviously been planted by someone, but I couldn’t think who. This was a Court Martial offence staring me in the face. Someone wanted me out and I had no idea who.

  Webster picked up the files and put them in his briefcase. ‘Anything to say?’ he asked and I shook my head. ‘Thought not.’ He turned to the others – the man I’d attacked was still looking very unsteady, but he was at least walking. ‘Are we all set? We’ve got what we came for.’ He turned back to me. ‘I think this is a matter for Headquarters.’

  The Old Priory at Chicksands in Bedfordshire has been there since the Doomsday Book recorded it nearly 900 years ago. It was appropriated at the start of the Second World War when it was used as a decoding centre for the Enigma transmissions and these days it’s the headquarters of DISC – the Defence Intelligence and Security Services, otherwise known as the Brit
ish Army Intelligence Corps, of which I was an officer, and about to find out for how much longer I would remain one.

  The parklands, stretching down to the banks of the River Flit, are magnificent and trees were in full leaf as Ali and I wandered down to the riverbank, but this time we barely noticed them. Idly, Ali picked up a stone and attempted to skim it across the water, but it tripped over itself and sank with barely a ripple.‘Don’t give up the day job,’ I said and chose my own stone more carefully. ‘One, two, three, four,’ I counted before it stalled. ‘You know there are world championships at skimming?’ I said inconsequentially. ‘Held at some disused slate quarry up in Scotland. Think about it. What sort of person takes leave from their work and goes all the way up to some remote island in Scotland to see if they can skim stones further than anyone else? D’you think skimming along the surface is a sort of metaphor for life?’ I thought about that. ‘Can’t see how.’ I tried again but this time it only managed three jumps before joining the others on the riverbed. ‘Why do you think they’re doing this?’ I asked, not for the first time.Ali shrugged and tried another stone, this time with more success. ‘See that? Six!’‘Perhaps you should go up to Scotland for training,’ I said. ‘It’d look good on your résumé – qualified stone-skimmer.’Ali ignored me and said, also not for the first time, ‘I’m not surprised they didn’t believe you.’‘It’s a pretty easy way of getting rid of someone, isn’t it? Everyone takes files home – you just have to wait ’til you know someone’s taken some files and call out the guard. Now, watch this.’ I’d found a stone that looked perfect and flicked it across the water. ‘Note the wrist action coupled with the follow-through,’ I said as I counted. ‘Ten! There you are. Try beating that.’ But there was no time. Ali’s phone rang and we were called back.

  Hence the tribunal. There wasn’t much I could do to prevent it. I could have told them that I had no idea how the files had found their way into my flat, but Ali told me not to. He was representing me as my “officer friend” and said that they’d find this so far-fetched that there was no chance they’d believe me. ‘Tell them it was an oversight,’ he said, adding that no less than a former Sea Lord and security minister had once been caught taking out classified papers. They only found out when he saw them plastered over the pages of The Mail on Sunday – apparently he’d dropped them while walking a friend’s dog. So I told them what Ali had suggested and it turned out that he was right. I had to admit that he’d done a good job and had shown a commanding presence in the court. He was classically tall, dark and handsome and this had obviously impressed the judges. There was something about Ali that seemed to show an inner certainty, though where it came from I had no idea.