The Burning Gates

by Parker Bilal

  ‘Sir . . .’

  ‘Yes, yes. I can see.’ With a sigh Bostan finally turned to Makana. ‘I am not blind, I would just prefer not to see you in my hotel.’

  ‘I haven’t come to cause you any trouble.’

  ‘That would make a change.’ Bostan abruptly turned away from the counter and began walking. Makana fell in beside him.

  ‘Would it surprise you to know that I am actually working for one of your guests?’

  ‘Nothing about you would surprise me.’ Bostan paused to reprimand a bellhop whose uniform needed straightening. It seemed to cheer him up. ‘Who is this fortunate individual?’

  ‘Mr Charles Barkley.’

  The name brought the hotel manager to an abrupt halt. As it happened, right beside the life-size photograph of his superior. The contrast between the confident Swiss smile and the harried, nervous Egyptian could not have been stronger. He resembled a lean, underfed greyhound. He couldn’t have done a better job if his tongue had been hanging out.

  ‘Barkley?’ Bostan echoed, steering Makana by the elbow to one side. ‘I should have guessed it. Are you really working for this man?’ He dropped Makana’s arm and stepped back for a moment, before drawing closer. ‘I should have you arrested.’

  ‘Any particular reason?’

  ‘Mr Barkley and his associates have gone. They left the hotel overnight without checking out. Do you know what that means?’ Without waiting for a reply, he tugged Makana back to the reception desk and began issuing orders. Behind the counter people tripped over one another in their haste. Finally, a sheet of paper was set on the counter. Bostan scrutinised it for a moment and smiled, as if in disbelief. ‘The bar bill alone comes to almost three thousand dollars.’

  ‘What associates?’ Makana asked. Bostan stared as if facing an idiot. ‘You said he had associates?’

  ‘Five of them.’ Bostan slid another sheet of paper forwards. ‘Four Americans, Raul Santos, Randy Hagen, Cody Jansen, Eddie Clearwater, and one Iraqi, Faisal Abdallah.’ He tapped the names on the list as he read them out. Makana took the sheet.

  ‘Don’t you take photocopies of guests’ passports when they check in?’

  ‘Naturally. Standard procedure. You can’t just allow anyone to walk in.’

  ‘Heaven forbid.’

  Bostan snapped his fingers a couple of times. ‘Show me this Barkley’s papers.’ There was more agitation behind the counter. The receptionists seemed to be drawing lots as to which one of them would break the bad news. He looked from one to the other. ‘Well, what is it?’

  ‘Sir, we have photocopies of four of the Americans but not Mr Barkley.’

  ‘I see, and how do you explain that?’

  ‘I can’t.’ The girl twisted her fingers into a knot. ‘There was some confusion when they checked in.’

  ‘Really? Well, believe me there will be no confusion when I find out who is responsible. Who was on duty?’

  ‘I was, effendim. I remember that Mr Barkley said his passport was at the bottom of his suitcase and he would bring it down later.’ She gave a shrug. ‘He was very convincing. Since we had all of the others . . . I was trying to be accommodating.’

  ‘We’ll see how accommodating you find it without a job.’

  ‘Yes, effendim.’ She lowered her eyes. ‘And . . . there’s something else.’

  ‘What? Don’t keep me waiting, girl!’

  ‘There’s a problem with Mr Barkley’s credit card,’ she said. ‘We tried getting in touch with American Express but they were very slow.’

  ‘What about the others?’

  ‘It all went on Mr Barkley’s Gold card.’

  ‘All of it?’

  ‘Oh, yes. It was meant to be a temporary measure. Mr Barkley assured me personally that he would rectify the situation.’

  ‘Who authorised that?’ Bostan glared from one to the other of his receptionists. ‘Who was the idiot who gave permission for this to happen?’

  ‘Well . . . actually, sir, it was . . . you.’

  ‘Me?’ Bostan began to massage his temples. ‘Check again with American Express.’

  ‘We already did that. They say that the card was not issued by them.’

  ‘You hear that?’ Bostan turned to Makana. His eye caught that of his superior hanging on the wall. He sighed. ‘Get me the manager of American Express on the line. If it was one of their cards they have to honour it.’

  ‘They believe it to be false, a counterfeit card.’

  ‘I want to speak to him. Get me the director on the telephone immediately,’ Bostan raged. The receptionists collided with one another in their haste to reach the telephone.

  ‘Can I have copies of these papers?’ Makana interjected.

  Bostan’s face was livid. ‘You can have whatever you want if you think you can recover our money. You find that man Barkley and you have my personal permission to wring it out of his neck.’

  ‘I have American Express.’ The receptionist held up a telephone like a trophy.

  ‘I’ll take it in my office.’

  ‘He’s upset,’ Makana said as Bostan stalked away.

  ‘I don’t understand it,’ fretted the woman receptionist. ‘Every­thing seemed to be in order.’

  ‘How was the reservation made?’

  ‘By fax from the Grand Hyatt in Amman.’

  ‘Did you check with them?’

  ‘I called them myself,’ the receptionist sighed. ‘They have no record of a Charles Barkley staying with them.’

  Chapter Twenty-one

  Makana faxed all the papers through to Sami’s office and then called him several times but couldn’t get through. He rang off to find Dalia Habashi had been trying to call him. An icon that was new to him told him he had a message. After several failed attempts he managed to enter the correct combination of keys and suddenly found Dalia’s voice speaking to him.

  ‘I need to see you. Please call me back, I’m scared.’

  Makana tried to call but was rewarded only with an engaged tone. After that he tried Sami again, still without luck. He managed to reach Rania, who told him that the faxes had come through but that Ubay was not around.

  ‘Do you have any way of reaching him?’

  ‘He’s a bit unpredictable, our boy genius, I’m afraid. I’ll let him know you called.’

  ‘Any idea where Sami is?’

  ‘Sorry, that’s even harder to say. He went out on one of his strange errands.’

  ‘Rania, are you and Sami okay?’

  Makana heard her sigh. ‘I told you we’ve been talking about having children. The problem is that Sami doesn’t think he’s ready.’

  ‘Maybe he just needs time to get used to the idea.’

  ‘How much time can he need?’ Rania asked. ‘I’m not getting any younger. Sometimes I just don’t understand him. He’s so negative about the future, and I know what he’s thinking: what’s the point of bringing children into the world when you know they will never have a chance of making something of themselves?’

  ‘You and Sami didn’t do too badly.’

  ‘Things were different then. It’s getting more difficult every year. So many people work hard to give their kids an education. They go to school, study hard for ten years and get into university, another five years maybe and then what, join the eighty per cent of graduates who are out of work? We don’t have the contacts to find our children a job.’

  ‘Things can change.’

  ‘On good days that’s what I’d like to believe too,’ she said. ‘On bad days, I just think that nothing is ever going to change. Look, I’m sorry to unload all of this on you. You know what he’s like. As soon as he grows up and accepts that this is his life, and that there is no perfect moment to start a family, then we’ll be fine.’

  Rania rang off and Makana lit a cigarette. He wandered down the hotel ramp to the river’s edge and stared out at the sun gleaming on the water. It was a welcome moment of tranquillity. No sooner had the thought passed through his head
than the telephone in his pocket began to buzz. He reached for it with a sigh. There were advantages to not being available all the time. It was Dalia Habashi.

  ‘I’ve been trying to reach you for hours. Where have you been?’

  ‘I got your message. What’s happened?’ Makana asked.

  ‘I don’t know. I don’t know,’ she repeated the words over and over.

  ‘Listen, Dalia, I need to speak to Na’il. Have you any idea where he is?’

  ‘No, that’s the thing. I’ve heard nothing. Before I was worried. Now I’m scared.’

  ‘Scared of what?’

  ‘I know something is wrong. I can feel it. He never disappears like this.’

  ‘When we talked the other day, there was something you didn’t tell me.’

  She gave a loud sniff. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘About Na’il and Kasabian. You knew about that, didn’t you?’

  ‘Look, he didn’t kill him, if that’s what you’re thinking.’

  ‘I didn’t say that he did. But he was blackmailing him wasn’t he?’

  There was silence at the other end.

  ‘Where are you now?’

  ‘I’m at home. I can’t go out, I daren’t leave, I’m afraid,’ she whimpered.

  ‘What are you afraid of?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she moaned. ‘What if he’s dead?’

  ‘Who would want to hurt him?’

  ‘I don’t know. I don’t know!’ She sobbed for a while and then it came. ‘Those gangsters.’

  ‘The Zafranis?’

  ‘I warned him. I told him not to get mixed up with them. But that’s the thing about Na’il, he always thinks he can find a way where nobody else can. He’s like a big kid, with that motorcycle of his.’ She fell silent. ‘I can’t bear it any longer.’

  ‘If you’re afraid then perhaps you should go away for a while.’

  ‘I can’t. I couldn’t just abandon him. He needs me.’

  ‘Just until this blows over. Na’il can take care of himself. Wherever he is, you can’t help him.’ Makana listened to the sound of her breathing. ‘He’d want you to think about yourself, wouldn’t he?’

  ‘I suppose so.’ A sob escaped her. ‘I could go away, just for a bit. Now. Tonight.’

  ‘The sooner the better.’

  ‘I’ll go to the Hilton. They’re always kind to me there. I’ll get a room and catch the first plane out tomorrow morning.’

  ‘Sounds like an idea. And Dalia?’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘You need to tell me everything you know.’

  ‘Yes, yes, I will. I promise. But not now, not over the phone. At the hotel. We can talk there.’ Another long pause followed. Then she gave another sniff and was gone.

  The offices in Bab al-Luq were deserted when he arrived. In the far corner sat Ubay, chewing what looked like a stick of wood and turned out to be sugar cane. The big eyes blinked slowly when they lifted to find Makana standing in front of him.

  ‘Where is everybody?’

  Ubay spat out a wad of pulp into a waste bin by his side and bit off another chunk to resume chewing in that slow, deliberate manner that Makana had come to realise was characteristic of him.

  ‘Some kind of meeting. I don’t know. Politics. They’re trying to start a movement or something.’ He gazed around him as if he had only just noticed that everyone had gone.

  ‘How are you getting on with what I sent you?’

  He sat up. ‘I ran a general search for Charles Barkley and came up with a total blank, apart from the references to basketball, of course.’

  ‘Basketball?’

  ‘Sure. Charles Barkley is a famous basketball player. Didn’t you know?’

  ‘How would I know something like that?’

  ‘Everyone knows.’ Ubay shrugged as if these things were obvious. ‘Anyway, I started with the other names, thinking, you know, that it was probably the same story, and then I hit something.’

  He talked without taking his eyes off the screen as he clicked through one window after another until he came to what he was looking for.

  ‘What am I looking at?’ Makana leaned down and squinted at the screen.

  ‘This is Friendster.’

  ‘Which means what exactly?’ Makana asked, reaching for his cigarettes. It was going to be a long business if he was going to have to ask for an explanation of every term that came up.

  ‘It’s a networking site.’ Makana just looked at him. Ubay elaborated. ‘It’s a space where people can hang out. You know, to meet? There are a few of them around and they seem to be catching on.’

  ‘How does something like that work?’

  The long fingers twitched as Ubay fished for words. ‘It’s like a room, except it’s not real. I suppose it’s like a noticeboard, but it’s interactive.’

  Why not call a room a room? ‘You mean they don’t actually meet, in person?’

  ‘Not necessarily. I mean they can do, but they don’t have to.’ Ubay shrugged. ‘It all happens in a kind of virtual dimension. You go in. You set up an account and you tell people about yourself.’

  ‘What’s the point?’

  ‘The point?’ Ubay stared blankly at Makana.

  ‘Why would anyone do something like that, telling people about themselves?’

  ‘I suppose because they want to meet people.’

  ‘People they don’t know?’

  ‘Sure. People anywhere in the world. Lots of people do it. Millions, in fact.’

  The concept of millions of people signing up to a room that didn’t exist to meet like-minded souls made Makana wonder what he was missing.

  ‘So what is this?’

  ‘This is Raul Santos.’ Ubay clicked the mouse and brought up the page. A stocky Latin American man in his thirties with a broad face and floppy bangs of shiny dark hair hanging over his brow. ‘From Honduras originally, but on Friendster he’s busy telling everyone how he became an American citizen.’

  ‘I thought that was meant to be difficult.’

  ‘It is, for most of us. But there are a few exceptions.’ Ubay clicked his way through. ‘One of them being when you join the army.’ As he scrolled down the page more images of the same man appeared, this time in olive-green fatigues, his hair shaved to a bristle, proudly holding up an M16 rifle. Another showed him on a dusty track wearing a heavy pack. ‘Raul signed up to the US Marines. He thanks his buddies.’

  ‘Is that Iraq?’

  ‘Afghanistan in 2002.’

  ‘So, he’s a soldier?’

  ‘Well, that’s the interesting thing. It seems that soon after he got his citizenship, Raul’s contract ran out and he dropped out of the Marines.’ Ubay brought up another page. ‘He decided to make some money.’ In the next image Santos had exchanged his uniform for a less regular outfit. He was posing casually with another automatic weapon balanced on his hip. Now he wore a pistol in a holster on his thigh, wraparound sunglasses and a black bandanna tied about his head.

  ‘What’s changed?’

  ‘He became a private contractor. A soldier for hire. It’s the new thing. There are thirty thousand of them in Iraq, more than all the other so-called allies combined.’

  ‘What’s this?’ Makana indicated the logo on Santos’s sleeve.

  ‘The company logo. Let me zoom in.’

  Magnified, it showed a jackal’s head in green superimposed on a pair of crossed bones.

  ‘Green Jackal Securities,’ Makana read the lettering that capped the image.

  ‘They’re a private security firm engaged by the Pentagon for special missions.’

  ‘In other words, mercenaries.’

  ‘Uh huh. It got me thinking, so I started looking for the other names under the same company.’ Ubay clicked the mouse with his right hand and then leaned back in his chair and chewed away at his stick of cane. ‘Two more came up. Hagen and Clearwater.’

  ‘What about the fourth one, Jansen?’

  ‘No luck with that
.’ Ubay shook his head. ‘After that I did some background checking on them individually. It turns out there was something on both of them. Eddie Clearwater has a criminal record. He’s been to prison several times, always short stretches. He specialised in burglary and pickpocketing.’

  ‘Any pictures?’

  ‘Not for him. I had more luck with the other one, Randy Hagen.’

  Makana found himself looking at a newspaper article. USA Today and a picture of a crime scene. An overweight police officer stretching a strip of yellow tape across the entrance to a shop.

  ‘A man was killed while trying to rob a supermarket in South Dakota. It’s not clear what he was after. Turns out he was on day release from a mental institution and was living on the streets. He was armed with a child’s toy pistol. One of the other people in the shop shot him dead.’ Ubay tapped the sheet of paper with the names on it. ‘Randy Hagen. It was considered self-defence. Hagen proved in court that he felt his life was in danger and he had to react quickly. He was charged a small fine for carrying a concealed weapon.’

  ‘Hagen became something of a local hero.’ Ubay pulled up several more pictures of a smiling Hagen celebrating his victory outside what appeared to be a courthouse.

  ‘Did you find any more pictures?’

  ‘Not really. These are exceptions. Santos celebrating with his friends online and Hagen shooting someone.’

  ‘And no images of a Charles Barkley in the art business?’

  ‘I have lots of them, if you’re looking for a basketball player. Other than that, no.’ Makana started to get to his feet. Ubay leaned back and cocked one enormous and very worn shoe on the edge of the desk. ‘I get the impression they try to avoid publicity, apart from Kane, of course.’