Kingdom of Strangers

by Zoë Ferraris

  “All?”

  “Yes. Each one was cut off with a single stroke after the victim was killed.” Adara’s hands were making rough work of the stitching. She threw down the needle, went to the sink, and threw up.

  “Sorry,” she muttered. “Pregnant.”

  “Oh. Congratulations.”

  Adara wiped her mouth and rinsed it with some water before coming back to the table.

  “Do they still have their feet?” Katya asked.

  “Yes.”

  “I know the investigators have just gotten some facial-reconstruction sketches,” Katya said. “They’re planning on showing them to the consulates.”

  “And you think…?”

  “That that’s going to take a few years. The consulates won’t know anything. Look how bad they are with the living.”

  “Well, yes,” Adara said. “I think they’re right to presume that most of these women were foreign laborers, probably housemaids.”

  The biggest shock to the department was the possibility that one person had done this, that one person, over the course of many years, had been silently killing women and no one had noticed. Katya had already begun assembling missing-persons files, but it was likely that these women had never been reported missing. Their employers probably assumed that their housemaids had run off, like many of them did, in search of a better job or to get away from an abusive situation. The housemaid wouldn’t want to be found—she might be sent to prison.

  It was possible, too, that whoever killed these women had hired them as housemaids himself. That he kept them in seclusion, tortured them slowly, one at a time, before killing them. That from the very moment these women entered the country, no one but the killer knew they existed.

  “What do you know about serial killers?” Adara asked.

  Katya shook her head. “Not much.”

  “Well, I just heard that they’re bringing in a man from the American FBI, someone who specializes in serial killers.”

  “That seems excessive,” Katya said. “I mean, we’ve had them before.”

  Adara looked at the bodies lined against the wall. “I guess they figure that this one is different. A new breed, perhaps. He’s been working for at least ten years. Chief Riyadh is ashamed. Everyone is feeling humiliated. They didn’t know this was happening. They’re ten years late. It took the police four years to track down that serial killer in Yanbu. Riyadh’s not going to let this case last that long.”

  On her way back to the women’s lab, Katya stopped at Majdi’s office, but he was on the phone, and ministry agents were milling about. She quickly ducked back into the corridor and took off down the hall. Just this week the religious establishment had issued a fatwa against female cashiers, saying it was sinful for women to work in public positions where they might come into contact with men. It might have become yet another ridiculous fatwa that Saudis would allow themselves to feel guilty about but would roundly ignore, except that the grand mufti in charge of validating the fatwa actually extended its reach by banning women not only from cashier positions but from every other kind of job that would bring them into contact with men. The first line of battle on these things was in government positions, and especially those in law enforcement. She hoped the king’s brothers or the king himself might do something to overturn it, but until then all the women in the lab were holding their breath.

  3

  It was only to be expected that at the worst possible moment, his son’s life would implode. Zaki’s marriage had been a disaster from the beginning. Ibrahim had watched the pressure build for three grueling months. Even the shocking appearance of nineteen dead bodies was not enough to alter this inevitable motion toward the deep, dark, inward-sucking force of his failed family.

  His favorite son, Zaki. Ibrahim sat in the courtroom and listened as the boy tried to explain himself to the judge once again. He had made a mistake. It was all too easy when you didn’t know the bride before you married her. They—both of them—were just asking for a divorce.

  The judge made no sign that he’d heard but something in his eyes told Ibrahim that he wasn’t buying it, that he heard men say this sort of thing all the time. But what was Zaki supposed to say? That he had never meant to marry a woman like Saffanah: righteous, religious, praying five times a day, and asking him to take her to Mecca once a week? The judge would kick him out of the courtroom for his disrespect to Islam.

  The way Zaki told it, when he woke in the morning, he’d find his robe, his ‘iqal, and his ghutra neatly laid out on the bed. And socks—she always put a pair beside the robe, on the off chance that he was one of those idiots who actually wore them. In the kitchen, he’d find his breakfast on the table, his coffee poured and sugared, his bread fresh from the oven. After breakfast, he’d find his wallet and keys on the table by the front door. He would only see Saffanah once he’d climbed into his car and looked back at the apartment. She’d be standing behind the half-shuttered window looking out at the street. At least he assumed it was her behind the burqa; there was no one else at home. He had no idea what she did all day. She was too pious to own a cell phone. She said they were tools of moral ruination. When he came home in the evenings, his dinner was waiting for him. His prayer mat was laid out with a clean change of clothes. She did such a good job of taking care of him while the whole time refusing to give him the one thing a husband expected. At night, in the bedroom, she wouldn’t touch him. He had never seen her naked. He knew it was his right to demand it, but he didn’t want to force her. In fact, he wasn’t sure he wanted it at all.

  Just a few days after the wedding, even before Zaki had started to complain about it, Ibrahim had sussed out the situation. Though Saffanah was never in his way, her distance, silence, and pitch-perfect obedience were going to start getting in the way.

  “This,” Zaki had shouted one night, “is why I hate religion!”

  “Don’t say that,” Ibrahim said, shocked. “She is not Islam. She is not even a good version of Islam.”

  They had already told the judge that they hadn’t consummated the marriage and that Saffanah was still a virgin. Delicately, Zaki had suggested that a doctor could confirm it. Saffanah’s father, Jibril, had shot out of his chair, shouting in protest. The judge had quieted him with a wave of his hand and then turned to Zaki with a look of deep skepticism.

  “But it’s true!” Zaki said.

  Jibril was quick to respond. He argued that it didn’t matter what had happened in the bedroom. Saffanah had been married for three months now. No man was going to believe she was a virgin, even if she was. Ibrahim hated to admit that the bastard had a point. It was going to be difficult for Saffanah to remarry.

  She was sitting on the other side of him. Not a single piece of skin was showing anywhere on her body; her burqa was an impenetrable slab of black, and she was wearing socks and gloves. But her posture said everything. She slunk down in her chair, arms curled around her torso, head bowed. Saffanah—“pearl.” She was awkward, clumsy, painfully self-conscious. Her face was misshapen, lumpy like bread dough. Nothing glimmering. Pearl-like only in that she had become the hidden wound in Zaki’s soft interior.

  The only time Ibrahim ever saw them interact was when she brought Zaki his dinner. She wouldn’t eat with the men because she believed it was improper for a wife to eat with her husband. What would happen if she ate faster than him? She’d finish before him! She might even eat more than him! She would, in her own words, be “acting like a husband,” which was a capital crime. Ibrahim tried explaining that “acting like a husband” was a legal euphemism for the crime of homosexuality, but when he said the word homosexuality she covered her ears and started muttering prayers because the word was sinful. She prayed for Ibrahim’s protection as well, since he was the offender who spoke the wicked word, and when he said no, don’t be ridiculous, she spent the rest of the evening sprinkling the house with holy water—quietly, mind you—and submitting herself to Allah.

  She made Zaki’s mothe
r look like a rare specimen of moderation.

  Ibrahim knew that his biggest mistake had been not standing up to his wife, Jamila. She had pressured Zaki into marrying Saffanah, a spinster at twenty-two. She had been terrified that she would never marry because the Prophet had said that good Muslims should marry. She was desperate, and no one would have her. And Zaki, at nineteen, was not terribly handsome, a younger son with a mediocre job, or so his mother liked to remind him. Ibrahim could have done more to stop this from happening. What was the rush? But with Jamila he had learned to pick his battles, and in this case, she had opened with a volley of bazookas and RPGs, followed by a mini nuclear device, and he just hadn’t had the strength to fight back. Now he was paying for it, having to shepherd Zaki and Saffanah through months of misery.

  Ibrahim looked at the couple, both facing forward, ignoring one another. He wondered what would happen if Saffanah spoke up in her defense. Their defense. She would probably ruin it by telling the judge that her husband was an infidel: He smoked. He didn’t pray five times a day. In fact, he didn’t pray at all. And he listened to music. It struck Ibrahim suddenly as the saddest part of this whole fiasco that Zaki had once owned a guitar, had had ambitions to play it, had even formed a loose band, and then, because of his foolish and overbearing mother, had married a stranger when he should have been off plucking guitar strings in someone’s garage and enjoying the last of his young adulthood.

  From the other table, Jibril was gloating. The longer the silence dragged on, the more pleased Jibril seemed with himself. He had the law on his side, the bastard. The marriage contract stipulated very clearly that if Zaki should decide to ask for a divorce, he would have to pay Saffanah fifteen million riyals—enough to support her comfortably for the rest of her life. As a divorced woman with no one to keep her, she’d have to beg off her parents for eternity. But of course no one in the family had that kind of money. Who would? He’d known plenty of men who’d divorced their wives and never paid a penny, or at least had never paid the millions they’d sworn to pay. So it should have been simple for the judge—Zaki and Saffanah wanted a divorce, and the Hadith said that all you needed to do was tell your wife “I divorce you!” three times, and that was it. Done. Could it have been any easier? But her father refused to take her back.

  It was annoying the judge too. He sat there, exchanging the odd glance with Ibrahim, scratching his already overscratched beard, staring at his water glass, the ceiling fans, the broken tiles on the floor, all in an effort to look studious when clearly he was at a terrific loss. Ibrahim could see his mind working. The good side was saying: Let the kids have their divorce! But the pompous side was grappling with the legality of breaking the contract.

  When it was his turn to speak, Jibril stood up and told the judges that Zaki had ruined his daughter and that until he could pay what the marriage contract stipulated, her family wasn’t going to take her back. Clearly it was taking all of Zaki’s self-control not to start shouting. Ibrahim felt the urge himself. He wanted to tell the judge that Jibril was the king of the pimps. That he’d divorced his first wife without paying so much as a halala and that as a result, Saffanah and her mother were wretchedly poor. That Jibril had seven ex-wives and four current wives, every one of them pregnant, with twelve children between them already, and if he weren’t so prodigious in the bedroom, he might actually have more generosity of spirit for his first child, the poor Pearl, and her tragic mother.

  Jibril was still speaking. As much as he loved his daughter, he simply couldn’t take her back. Saffanah was already twenty-two; her chances of remarriage were practically zero. How would she support herself ? Was she supposed to be a burden on her parents for the rest of her life? Were they going to pay for her meals, her lodging, her regular trips to Mecca? What would happen when he died? His daughter would be alone, with no children, no money, no husband, no future. Then it would be the job of the state to take care of her, would it not? And everybody knew what a wonderful job the state did of caring for its independent women! She’d wind up a prostitute, and everyone knew it.

  Only he didn’t actually say the word prostitute, he said indecent. She’d wind up indecent. Yes, Saffanah—the woman who pulled crumpled prayer schedules out of the trash and ironed them flat—Saffanah would start turning tricks at the Corniche. Ibrahim watched as the judge silently churned that bit of cream. Indecent. It was precisely the sort of word he needed to focus his resolve. The problem had been complicated until that word arrived. Now it was simple: there was no way to justify condemning a woman to a life of dissolution, no matter how much she might want to escape her current woes.

  The judge’s face told him everything: No divorce, kids, sorry.

  Ibrahim felt his temples throbbing. Just last week a man had divorced his wife in this courtroom because she’d been watching a male newscaster on TV all by herself. She’d been alone in a room with a strange man. Never mind that he was on a flat screen. That stupid husband could get a divorce, but Zaki couldn’t?

  Triumphant, Jibril took a seat and turned to his daughter. “I love you, Saffanah,” he whispered, “but it’s the truth, and you and I both know it.” Then he looked at Zaki and actually smiled.

  They stood outside the courtroom and watched Jibril drive away. Zaki helped Saffanah into the back of the car. She fumbled for the seat, banging her head on the door frame. Ibrahim had seen this performance before. Zaki would tell her to put her seat belt on. More people died every year from not wearing a seat belt than from any other reason, did she know that? She’d shake her head—not No, I didn’t know that, but No, I’m not buying it. She’d cross her arms, the Saffanah seat belt, and sit that way until he started the car. There was no wearing seat belts where Saffanah was concerned because the belt might outline her body and any man in a passing car would be able to see her shape, and that was unacceptable.

  After watching her bump her head on the door frame, Zaki said: “You should get a burqa with a slit for the eyes.”

  She didn’t reply.

  Ibrahim went to climb in the passenger seat but Zaki stopped him. “Baba, please drive. I’m going to walk.”

  “What?” Ibrahim blurted. “No. Just come home. It’s too hot to walk.”

  Zaki’s face was pale with pent-up rage. “If I get too hot, I’ll take a cab,” he said. He shot one final glare at Saffanah and walked away.

  Ibrahim got into the car and looked at Saffanah in the rearview mirror. She was facing forward, her head tilted in a defiant way. “Put on your seat belt,” he said, just for good measure.

  He started the car. He knew it was wrong to be angry at her, but he couldn’t help it. Her hostile, guilt-charged silence was familiar. Jamila did it all the time, only without the religious overtones.

  They were three blocks from the courthouse when he heard a choking sound from the backseat. He spun around to find Saffanah pulling on the door handle. He stopped quickly. She pushed the door open, leaned over, and vomited onto the street, but because she wouldn’t raise her burqa, the vomit spilled onto the fabric of her veil and down the front of her cloak. Only a small splash of it reached the pavement.

  Ibrahim leaped out and went running to her side, but by the time he got there, she was sitting upright again, her vomit-stained veil sticking to her chin. She would never take it off in public, even in the car, even covered in vomit.

  “Wait here,” he said. He left the car double-parked and jogged down the street until he reached a corner bodega, where he bought tissues, bottled water, and chewing gum. The shop owner, God bless him, was a generous man who rushed upstairs to his apartment, nicked a face covering from his wife, and gave it to Ibrahim. When Ibrahim got back to the car, he laid the items on the backseat next to Saffanah. “Here,” he said, “something to clean you up. And a new burqa.” Then he got in and started driving.

  He took the freeway and was nearly home before he noticed Saffanah using the tissue to wipe off her face. She bent over so that no one driving by could see the
delicate operation, and she removed the stained veil and put on the new one. Then she put a stick of chewing gum in her mouth. A few minutes later she opened a bottle of water, slid it under her veil, and took a sip.

  Ibrahim breathed in relief and turned his attention back to the road. He’d driven past the turnoff for their neighborhood and was now heading into the southern outskirts of the city. Traffic was thin here; he could already see desert ahead. On impulse, he decided to keep driving.

  A few minutes later, Saffanah started watching the window. He wasn’t sure how much she could see through her veil and the tinted windows, but clearly she realized they’d gone past their usual exit. He decided not to explain it. The air in the car smelled of vomit, so he cracked a window and turned up the AC.

  He took an exit for a housing complex that looked newly built. He drove past the empty homes, imagining how boring it would be to live out here, with strangers for neighbors. There were no stores here yet, just empty, palatial houses.

  He could tell from her posture and the tilt of her head that she was alert, curious. Coming up on the right was a large field and a few camels behind a wire fence. There was a small house to one side. He stopped the car, parked on the side of the road, and went to the back door to help her out.

  It surprised him that she didn’t protest. She hadn’t asked a single question or spoken one word since she’d gotten in the car. He’d been trying to think of her as a daughter—had been trying for a few months now—but he kept coming up against the knowledge that he would never let one of his own daughters act like this, he would never encourage this kind of pious isolation and flaunting of religion—a variation of religion, somebody else’s version. But when he opened the car door and Saffanah got out, the lightness in her step pleased him. Maybe this whole time she’d just needed to get out of the city.

  A middle-aged Bedouin man came out of the small house and started up a conversation with Ibrahim. Saffanah stood to the side looking at the camels, three of whom had come to the fence and were now leaning over it, stretching their long necks to reach her. Nervously, she approached them, lifting her hand carefully to rub one behind the ear. The camel snorted and stuck his nose in her neck. Doesn’t he smell the vomit? Ibrahim wondered. But apparently not, because the camel fixed his teeth around the bottom of her burqa. Saffanah twitched and pulled away, and with a rip the burqa came free. She quickly ducked to the side, hiding her face from the Bedouin, but she needn’t have worried. The man was quicker than her. He turned to the camel immediately, shaking his head with a laugh and reaching for the burqa. But the camel was trotting away and the Bedouin had to chase him across the yard.