Then He Was Gone

by Stephen Edger

  Becky stubbed out her cigarette and quickly lit another.

  ‘They switched off the video camera, and turned to look at us. I thought they’d kill us next, but the giant helped us to our feet and untied our wrists. It was then that the English-speaking guard, the one who’d shot the other guards, came over and started speaking. He told us that if we wanted to live we had to leave with them now. They promised us safe passage away from the prison. They didn’t need to ask us twice. We followed them out of the room, along several corridors and through a couple of locked gates and out into the open. Fresh air, albeit warm and arid air, had never felt so good on my cheeks. We’d been captive for nearly a month, and freedom was suddenly so close.’

  THIRTY-ONE

  The sandwiches arrived. Owen tucked into his. Becky looked inside the baguette. He’d chosen brie and grape for the two of them. He had taste. She tucked into the crusty bread, surprised by how ravenous she suddenly felt. Julia ignored her baguette.

  Owen continued to speak between mouthfuls. ‘They took us to their base high up in the mountains. Conditions were better than the previous hole, but not much. At least we had running water and fresh air, but food supplies were limited. We expected them to take us back to Camp Bastion, sorry, I mean Camp Shorabak. I’ll never get used to the new name. But they didn’t take us back. Instead, we were introduced to the leader of their group, and everything became clear. The English-speaking guard who’d aided our escape was part of the Black Shadows, and had infiltrated the cell some years earlier, allowing him to report on their activities from the inside. When we were captured, he reported back to the group, and they instigated their plan to get us out. The giant deliberately got himself caught to lead the escape. He was introduced to us as their Head of Operations, but he only had that title because the rest were too scared to challenge him. He wasn’t the brains of the outfit though. That role was reserved for a man who called himself Yasin, though I’m not sure that was his real name. It’s all cloak and dagger stuff in these insurgencies. Yasin really was something special though. He spoke English, French and Spanish as well as his native tongue. He was educated in Britain until nineteen, but returned to Afghanistan after 9/11 to help his parents’ business. As the Taliban took control of the area, the business nosedived, and he was going to return to the UK when his parents were caught in an attack. They lost their lives, but Yasin found a purpose for his life. He had vowed to fight until Afghanistan was back in the power of its people. He spoke eloquently about his vision for his homeland.’

  ‘He sounds like a good man.’

  Owen shook his head. ‘That’s what we thought. We thought we’d found the one sane man in a place filled with fanatics and lunatics. When he asked us to support his cause, we felt obliged to help.’

  ‘I don’t understand. You joined his group?’

  ‘Not exactly. Adie and I were both keen to haul our arses back to Camp Shorabak and tell them that they’d made a mistake, and we were both still alive. It wasn’t fair that our families thought we were still dead. Adie was really shaken up by what had happened in that room. He wasn’t sleeping much, and when he did sleep he re-lived that room in his nightmares. He lost weight, and he had these thick bags beneath his eyes. I joked that he was turning into a zombie, but he no longer found anything funny. He was a shadow of his former self. I knew he couldn’t return home in that condition. It was PTSD of the worst variety, and unless he fixed himself, he would bring this hell home with him. I asked Yasin to help him, and that’s precisely what he did.’

  Julia looked round, suddenly more interested in the story.

  ‘Adie was raised a Christian in this country, right?’

  She nodded. ‘His father was from Iran, but his mother was English and they decided to raise him as Anglican. He hadn’t been to church since our wedding though.’

  ‘I guess he thought that God had abandoned us in that room. Yasin disagreed. He said that the fact that we were still alive was proof that God had listened to his prayers. Yasin didn’t have a copy of the bible that Adie could read, but he did have a copy of the Qur’an, which he shared with us. Adie didn’t want to listen at first, and shut himself away. Meanwhile, Yasin told me what he wanted us to do: he said he had a raft of volunteers ready to join the Black Shadows, but these were simple men and women. They needed to be trained to set explosives, and fire weapons. They needed to know how to spot and shake a tail. He appreciated that we wanted to be reunited with our families, but he asked us to delay our return until we had trained his new soldiers. What else could I do? Adie wasn’t ready to go home, and I felt like I owed this guy my life. After all, if it wasn’t for their infiltration, my head and body would be buried in separate holes. I agreed to help. The idea was we would train a handful of his team to train the rest. He gave us weapons, and phrasebooks and the freedom to teach.’

  Julia’s eyes watered. ‘My Adie wouldn’t have turned mercenary.’

  ‘We weren’t mercenaries. We weren’t being paid for teaching them how to protect themselves. As far as we knew, their interests were the same as our own: peace in the Middle East. I started training them, and updated Adie on a daily basis with progress I was making. I hoped that if he saw the good in what I was doing, he would join me.’

  Becky wiped her mouth with a napkin. ‘What kind of things were you teaching them?’

  ‘Handling and maintaining a weapon was first up. You’ve no idea how many guns will jam in the warm desert air. It’s the sand you see; it gets stuck in the mechanics of the weapon. It’s vital to regularly dismantle, clean, and oil your weapon, whether a handgun or rifle. Most of the men Yasin presented to us had handled a weapon before, but knew little about cleaning. They were used to pointing and shooting. That’s fine if you have a machine gun and no target, but if you only have a handgun, and you want to stop a specific target, you need to be able to aim. I set up a target range, and spent weeks working with them on improving. We spent most mornings at the range, and in the afternoon, we would practice hand-to-hand combat.’

  ‘You sound like you enjoyed it.’

  ‘To tell you the truth, I did. I was proud of how those fathers and brothers and sons developed.’

  Julia pushed the sandwich away. ‘And what was my Adie doing while you were off being Mr Miyagi?’

  ‘Regrettably, Yasin was teaching him. I knew nothing about it. I mean, I noticed slight improvements in Adie’s behaviour. The nightmares became less frequent, and he started exercising again. I thought he’d got his mojo back, but I didn’t realise how much time he was spending with Yasin. Every morning I would leave Adie in bed and head off to the range. By the time I got back, I’d see him lifting weights or running sprints, stuff like that. I had no idea that he was regularly praying with Yasin or just how much time they were spending together. One day, maybe four or five weeks into the training, he came by the range and said he was ready to help out. As you know, Adie was trained to disarm IEDs by the army. He knew his way around explosives better than me. He said that Yasin had asked him to train the men how to build devices to be used against Taliban groups. I was just relieved to see Adie back in the land of the living. It didn’t bother me that he’d join in the prayer sessions with the group. His sense of humour returned, and it was like having my brother back. I thought when the training was complete, he’d be ready to come back to the base with me. I started to plan what we would say about where we’d been and what we’d been up to. Two dead soldiers can’t turn up at an army base without questions being asked.’

  Julia sat forward in her chair. ‘I don’t understand. If Adie was better, why didn’t he go with you?’

  ‘Yasin wanted to test his new soldiers, so he gave them a mission, which he asked us to go along on. He’d received intelligence about a weapons store used by an activist group. The plan was to destroy the haul. That was it. If we attacked at the right time, there would be no loss of life, just a massive explosion and then the fireworks party to end all fireworks parties. We waite
d until nightfall and headed down to the site. It felt good to get the adrenalin pumping again. It was me, Adie and five of the others. We were like a little unit again. Everything was going like clockwork. We scrutinised the store, and couldn’t see any sign that it was being watched, so three of the five hurried to the building to set the devices. Adie then went over to check their work, before signalling we were good to go.’

  ‘Oh God, something went wrong, didn’t it?’

  ‘No, it blew up exactly as planned. We made our way back up to Yasin’s hideout, celebrating. I knew that our work was complete, and that we’d be free to head home in the days that followed. I started to pack up our gear, but something wasn’t right with Adie. I pestered him until he eventually came clean. He told me that Yasin had lied to us about the real reason he had put an army together. I didn’t understand what he meant until he dragged me to Yasin’s office in the middle of the night and showed me what Yasin had planned. He was a mini-Hitler in the making. I told Adie we needed to get away quickly, but he said he couldn’t leave Yasin to fulfil his vision. He said: how many of us wish we could go back in history and stop Hitler before his rise to power? How many innocent lives would be saved?’

  He paused and looked away. ‘I said we should get back to Camp Bast-, I mean Camp Shorabak. I told him we could report Yasin’s actions to the head of the base and they could determine how to take care of him. But Adie wasn’t having any of it. He said it was too much of a risk, and that Yasin would probably be gone by the time we got back to the base. He said it was up to him to take care of Yasin. I didn’t want to know anything about it. What he was suggesting was tantamount to murder. He told me we would delay our escape by one day and that he would stop Yasin before we left.

  Julia shook her head dismissively. ‘My Adie wouldn’t do that.’

  ‘He was different.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘Yes! He’d changed, Julia. I’m sorry, but that’s how it is. He planted a bomb in Yasin’s office and waited to detonate it. But something went wrong and Yasin survived the attack. Adie didn’t. Yasin swore revenge on Adie for his actions. I think that’s why Yasin snatched your son.’

  THIRTY-TWO

  Julia lowered her window. ‘I’m sorry, but I don’t believe him.’

  The Twingo bounced along the track, until they finally reached the road back up to the A16. Becky was finally getting used to the biting point of the clutch. ‘Really? I thought he sounded sincere. It makes sense.’

  ‘What does? That some Arab vigilante has come all the way to France to snatch Noah? If he did, where are his demands? Why hasn’t he been in contact? Where is he now? Why haven’t Durand’s team found him? And the biggest question that I can’t answer is: how did he know where we’d be? I certainly didn’t broadcast that we were coming to France for the day. Who else knew we would be in the hypermarket at that exact time, or that Noah would wander off? There’s too many unanswered questions.’

  ‘So, what, you think he’s making it up? Why invent something so elaborate?’

  ‘I don’t know why. Maybe he’s not well.’

  ‘How well do you know Owen Kennedy?’

  ‘I’d never met him before today. Adie mentioned him occasionally, and there’s a photograph of the two of them in our living room -’

  Becky snapped her fingers. ‘That’s why I recognised his face this morning. I know exactly which photograph you’re talking about. I knew he looked familiar.’

  ‘Well, as I said, I don’t know him. He’s a virtual stranger.’

  ‘A virtual stranger who seemed to know a lot about you, and about Adie.’

  ‘That’s what troubles me most about him: if Adie didn’t die in that explosion, why did the army tell me he did?’

  ‘Owen explained all that. It was impossible to identify bodies following the attack on the armoured car.’

  ‘Yeah, but surely we would have heard stories about these little missions they were running in the dead of night? Right? There were so many reports on the news of victories over the Taliban insurgents, but I don’t recall any of the stuff he told us today.’

  Becky frowned as something triggered a memory. ‘Does the name Badar mean anything to you? Or Bahadur?’

  Julia’s head snapped round. ‘No. Why: who is that?’

  ‘It’s nothing, don’t worry.’

  ‘Tell me. Who is Bahadur?’

  ‘I don’t know. It was something Antoine told me yesterday. He said he thought he remembered Noah calling his abductor by that name. I just wondered if it meant anything to you.’

  ‘No. Nothing.’ Julia stared out of the window again.

  Becky sighed. ‘I still think we should tell Durand though.’

  ‘Tell Durand what? That the man in the baseball cap and faded shirt is a former Afghan rebel called Yasin? Oh great! I’m sure they’ll be able to punch that information into some database and find his exact address, and all will be fine.’

  ‘What is with you today? I thought you would have been pleased to know that Noah isn’t in the hands of a gang of people traffickers, or worse, some paedophile.’

  ‘But I don’t know that! I don’t know anything apart from the fact he isn’t with me…’ She covered her eyes with her hand.

  Becky glanced over at her friend softly crying. She hated fighting with Julia, and at the moment she was walking on eggshells, in an effort not to upset her. The rest of the journey back to the hotel was driven in silence. Becky had expected the car park to be empty of journalists, and was shocked to discover there were now even more than there had been the day before. Becky had to carefully drive around large vans parked along the narrow road to the car park entrance, which was blocked by camera stands, and at least thirty journalists.

  Becky blared the horn until they separated to a storm of camera flashes. ‘What the hell is going on here?’

  Julia’s cheeks were rosy and her eyes puffy. ‘God knows.’

  Becky parked the Twingo, and looked towards the hotel. ‘I’m sure I just spotted Durand inside. Maybe there’s news. Oh God, Jules, maybe they’ve found him. That would explain the reporters.’

  Julia didn’t answer, yanking her seat belt off and racing from the car, leaving Becky to close their doors and lock the vehicle, keeping her head low to try and avoid her face appearing on the next day’s front page. Durand was standing at reception as Becky entered. There was no sign of Noah, and the expression on Durand’s face wasn’t one to inspire hope.

  The judge grimaced at the group outside, before turning to Julia. ‘Is there somewhere private we can talk?’

  Julia nodded and led Durand and one of his agents through to the dining area. They sat at a table in the corner. The kitchen staff were busy preparing the room for the evening’s dinner, which was due to start in an hour. Becky was disappointed to see that the small bar in the opposite corner wasn’t open. She sat next to Julia, and across from Durand. The agent remained on his feet, standing by the entrance to the room.

  Durand cleared his throat. ‘Who is Hussein Shadid?’

  Julia scratched her head. ‘Wh-why? How did you come by that name?’

  ‘You know him then?’

  ‘Well, yes, I know him. I don’t understand why you do, or why you’re asking about him. He’s nothing to do with any of this.’

  Becky looked from one to the other. ‘Can someone enlighten me, please? Who the hell is Hussein Shadid?’

  Durand remained silent, waiting for Julia to answer. Julia gently shook her head, her eyes welling up. ‘He’s just a friend. Someone I knew way back.’

  ‘I’m confused,’ Becky said. ‘What does he have to do with anything? My question is: have you made any progress in finding Noah?’

  Durand narrowed his eyes. ‘Madame Saidi, when we first met, I told you how important it was for you to be honest with me. I told you that in abductions like this one, the most likely suspect is a friend or family member. I asked you about your dead husband’s family, but you said it couldn’t be
any of them.’

  ‘It can’t be. I wasn’t lying to you.’

  ‘What about Hussein Shadid? You never mentioned him to me.’

  ‘That’s because he is nothing to do with this.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Of course I am. I don’t understand why you suddenly know his name.’

  ‘He is your husband’s cousin, non?’

  She sighed. ‘Yes, he was Adie’s cousin.’

  ‘You were close with this man?’

  ‘I was dating Hussein when I met Adie. Hussein invited me to a family wedding, and he was the one who introduced me to Adie.’

  ‘When did you last speak to Monsieur Shadid?’

  ‘I don’t know, it’s probably been years.’

  ‘Was he angry when you left him for his cousin?’

  Julia slammed her hand on the table. ‘Listen, there was no bad breakup or anything. Okay? I’d only dated Hussein for a couple of months, and things weren’t working out between us. I broke up with him, and a few weeks later I told him I had started seeing Adie. He was fine with it. He was already seeing another woman by that time anyway. Okay? End of story.’

  Durand slid an iPad across the table. ‘I wouldn’t be so sure.’

  Julia scooped up the tablet and began to read. A minute later she dropped the tablet on the table. ‘I’m going to be sick.’ She pushed her chair back and raced out of the room towards the public toilets near the reception desk.

  Becky lifted the iPad. The screen was open on a tabloid newspaper’s website. The headline read: THE TRUTH ABOUT NOAH. She read the story, before handing the device back to Durand.

  ‘Did you know about this?’ he asked.

  She shook her head. ‘No. I’ve never heard of him before. This story isn’t true though. Noah is Adie’s boy. This guy Shadid is obviously making shit up to help them sell more newspapers. I can’t believe how anyone could exploit a situation like this.’

  ‘The article says Mr Shadid had a one-night stand with Madame Saidi while her husband was abroad. He claims to have evidence that the liaison happened around the time that the boy was conceived.’