Allure of Deceit

by Susan Froetschel

  Henry groaned, and Annie advised such a maneuver would violate the law. The US Fair Credit Reporting Act required that employees be notified about background checks with specific notice. The correspondence could cover no other topic.

  “Some employees would quit over that,” Henry added.

  Elliot asked if a background check was all that necessary.

  “Skipping a background check?” For the first time, Cara turned to Lydia. “No way. If a candidate refuses to undergo a background check . . . if some issue is exposed later, that defeats the purpose of good publicity.”

  Elliot threw up his hands. “This is an award, for Pete’s sake. We all know Paul.” He looked around the boardroom, but found little support. Michael had always welcomed Elliot’s brash ideas, but the foundation staff did not feel the same.

  “He works for us, people,” the director of communications said. “Can’t we fire an employee for refusing a background check? The board and the foundation are liable for what they do!”

  Annie shook her head. “Federal law prohibits checks on current employees without notification—unless criminal activity is suspected. I’ll send you the text later.”

  The group was silent, absorbing the information.

  Lydia kept her voice light. She could not show how much she cared about Paul keeping his name in the ring for the award. “Giving an award away may not be so easy.”

  CHAPTER 16

  Paul arrived alone shortly after sunrise, and once again, the village of Laashekoh had little warning. The air was clear and cold as gusts whipped at trees and clothing. He explained that he had camped near the river and left his off-road vehicle far enough away before tackling an early-morning climb toward Laashekoh. Parsaa was surprised by the aid worker’s prolonged stay in the area, but Paul had already traced the origin of Najwa’s blade.

  “If the girl and the peshkabz come from the same place, she is from Helmand and not Ghōr.”

  The detail mattered less with Najwa away from the village. Parsaa asked if Paul would help search for the foreign workers. “Did you see Afghan soldiers?”

  Paul looked surprised and shook his head, and Parsaa explained how the soldiers had mentioned that the village was the last to see the women. “But I’m not so sure.”

  Paul stopped. “Really?”

  The women had talked about another stop nearby before returning to the city, Parsaa explained. “Did they say where?” Paul asked. “Did you tell the soldiers?”

  Parsaa shook his head. “A helicopter can shift direction once it moves out of sight.”

  The villagers were heading out for a search. Parsaa wanted to check the ridges near the canyon leading to Zahira’s compound, though he couldn’t imagine why a group intent on helping orphans would visit the lonely place. He invited Paul to join them.

  Frowning, Paul asked if the villagers had seen or heard any sign of a crash, and Parsaa shook his head.

  “Then the helicopter is not around here,” Paul insisted. “There is no point in wasting your time.” Instead, he advised that they wait for the Afghan military to coordinate a search.

  The other villagers were pleased, easily convinced to give up on a day of searching, but not Parsaa. The women could be injured, waiting for assistance. It was better if the men of Laashekoh found the women first. Besides, he didn’t want large groups of strangers arriving in ­Laashekoh and asking questions.

  Paul pointed out that Afghan conditions, the dust and sand, were tough on helicopters. He was critical of the women’s operation and suggested that they had not invested in proper maintenance. “The helicopter may have broken down. They could be anywhere between here and Kabul.”

  “All the more reason to find them quickly,” Parsaa said. “They were not prepared for a long stay.”

  “Wait, friend,” Paul urged. “If an air search produces no results, the army will organize a grid search, and then we can help.”

  Paul seemed so sure, and other villagers agreed. The men were eager to expand the fields before winter hardened the soil. Parsaa acquiesced and Ahmed signaled that the search could wait until Afghan soldiers arrived.

  Once the two men were alone, Paul was blunt. He didn’t trust the women. One of the missing women, the one in charge, was married to a man who headed a major mining company. “Who knows? She could be scouting this area for her husband. The charity could be a way to build connections. Or the missing helicopter could be a stunt to draw attention.”

  Parsaa was not worried. The government owned all underground resources. Foreigners could not take over mining operations. Paul pointed out that Afghanistan needed foreign partners to access the minerals. The big companies were good at nagging governments to change rules for jobs. “It would change the landscape around here.”

  “There will be no mining leases here.” Parsaa was firm.

  The American seemed surprised. Parsaa wasn’t sure if it was because of the villagers’ lack of interest in mining wealth or the confidence that Laashekoh could keep prospectors at bay.

  Paul didn’t argue and offered to help in the fields. “I’d rather grapple with dirt and boulders than paperwork,” he said.

  The frost from the night before had vanished, and men were already marking out the new edges, planning where to place walls. They divided sections and competed among themselves, using shovels and picks to loosen the dirt, clear brush, and separate rocks. Paul grabbed a shovel and tackled his section. When one of the men encountered a large boulder, a call went out and the entire group gathered, working to apply leverage and scrape soil before rolling the boulder to one side where it would serve as the base of another winding wall. Saddiq was especially industrious in rolling the massive rocks, and the other men cheered him on.

  Throughout the day, children delivered water, fruit, and bread sweetened with honey. By midday, the village women joined the men, loosening and leveling the soil before covering the newly bared sections with leaves, grasses, and waste from the animals, folding the organic material into the earth before adding another layer of stalks left over from the harvest, to prevent erosion over the winter months.

  As the sun moved toward the horizon, the pace of work slowed and conversations became livelier. Parsaa was quiet, thoughts of the stranded women still nagging at him. He wanted them found.

  The work of expanding fields, digging and moving boulders, was tough on hands and backs. The men agreed to stop work for the day, but only after removing a massive, uneven boulder buried deep in the field. Paul joined villagers using tools to etch the soil away. The villagers worked together like a machine, without words, and Paul marveled at how the group could read one another’s minds.

  Shrugging, Parsaa tightened a leather strap around the boulder and then belted it around his chest, leaning forward to pull as Paul and another man pushed from behind, with others scraping away the soil underneath. The men took turns, shifting places, and sweat dampened their clothing despite the cold air. Twilight had hit by the time the group rolled the boulder out of the way. The men drained what was left of the water and drifted toward the village center.

  Exhausted, Paul and Parsaa stayed behind to sit on the defeated rock, their backs to the cool breeze playing across the field, and watch the setting sun. Parsaa quietly asked the other man if he wanted to stay the night. They could head toward the ridge where the helicopter was last seen. “In the morning light we might see some sign of them.”

  Paul closed his eyes, nodding as if a decision had been made. “I should contact my office. For all we know, the women have already been found. You should not trouble yourself. They are not worth it.”

  He did not expect the Afghans to put much effort into the search. All the more reason to search, Parsaa thought to himself, and he was surprised the other man kept talking. Maybe Paul was trying to convince himself.

  “The women were cocky, moving into an area researched and cultivated by others.” He also complained that the women did not purchase high-risk insurance, a concep
t he had to explain to Parsaa. The foreigners put up large sums to pay for search-and-rescue operations by air and evacuations in the event of attack or disaster. If the group lacked insurance, the search would last but a few days.

  “But we are here, ready to go,” Parsaa protested.

  “Don’t you see? It’s wrong for foreigners to expect that from villages.” Paul was bitter. “People think the work is easy here. They arrive poorly prepared and disrupt the work of other groups who have been here for years. For all we know, the women changed their plans or decided to camp out.”

  Parsaa tried to convince the man to stay for dinner so they could talk more, but Paul declined. He had to visit other villages and expected snowfall.

  “Surely not yet,” Parsaa said. “The air is not that cold.”

  Paul smiled. “You will see over the next day. The clouds are gathering and temperatures will plunge before tomorrow evening.” He didn’t mention that poor weather would complicate a search for the women.

  After Paul left, Parsaa joined the other men dining on a thick lamb stew, with lots of bread and goat’s milk. The fire blazed and they lingered, rubbing sore arms and discussing plans for the upcoming winter.

  Paul had been right—once the sun fell behind the mountain, the temperatures tumbled. Any night could be the last for such easy village gatherings. The men would no longer meet around the fire once winter’s harsh winds and snow blasted their way through the valley. No village home was large enough to accommodate the entire group over winter, and villagers deliberately avoided smaller gatherings that might hurt feelings and polarize the village.

  Winter was a time for families.

  As the group pondered winter plans, a shrill cry broke the silence, followed by a woman’s voice issuing orders, sending children scurrying to other homes.

  “I cannot find her!” Karimah insisted.

  Ahmed hurried to his frantic wife. “It’s Thara,” Karimah cried out. “She is not here! The foolish girl doesn’t know when to return.”

  Ahmed called the villagers to gather at the center courtyard, and it was determined that Thara was the only one missing. Ahmed and Karimah pointed out that the girl was well behaved and considerate. Such a late return was unusual.

  The men organized groups of men and boys to search the most likely places, the meadows, the fields, even the hillsides where the goats and sheep roamed. The girl may have simply fallen asleep, but Parsaa was strict about the groups staying together rather than separating to search on their own. He watched as his own sons took off into the night. Soon the eerie sound of young voices surrounded the village, calling out the girl’s name.

  Ahmed and Parsaa headed toward the path leading to the stream, and once there Parsaa crossed over a shallow area. Each man followed along the banks, checking among the nearby brush and rocks, and using sticks to test the deeper pools.

  The men and boys covered the immediate surrounding area that night, but there was no sign of Thara. After a few hours, Parsaa ordered the children to head home and get sleep for the next day. By sunrise, the exhausted adults sought rest, promising one another to start the search again later in the day.

  Parsaa could not sleep and stood alone by the fire ring. The wind raced down from the mountains. His chest pounded with guilt. He was not superstitious and paid no heed to omens. But he was mindful of patterns. The village had refused to search for the missing women, and now Laashekoh had a missing child of its own.

  With the entire village worried about the missing girl, few adults slept soundly. Sofi mixed flour, water, and ghee to fry small cakes with eggs. Then she prepared lunches—slices of lamb and mashed beans spread on naan—so that the search could continue nonstop throughout the day. The smell of fresh baking bread and spicy fillings took over her home, and Sofi was surprised that her husband had to rouse their oldest son.

  Groups organized once again, and Parsaa advised the villagers to be alert for signs of the missing helicopter, too. Sofi and Karimah had searched the space where Thara slept at night and found nothing missing other than the clothes she had worn the previous day. Karimah also checked the storage space where Thara’s baskets were kept until Ahmed decided the time was right to carry them to market for the best prices. Karimah counted and recounted.

  “None are missing.” Karimah shook her head and put her hands to her mouth in anguish.

  From all appearances, the girl had not run away. Worried about an unknown menace, the mothers cautioned their children to avoid stepping away from the village alone. The villagers focused on nothing else the entire day, extending the search out farther and farther, much as Saddiq had predicted to Thara. An early snow started falling in the higher elevations. The searchers examined their assigned territories with care, but the only tracks found were their own.

  CHAPTER 17

  After a long day of searching, the villagers returned exhausted and tumbled into beds. Saddiq had to stay quiet to hide his exhilaration. Sleep was impossible, with so many racing thoughts and his heart pounding in his chest.

  The snow kept falling, sticking to the ground even in the valley, and that changed his calculations. The snow could both expose and obscure his trail. He decided to leave before the skies cleared.

  Starting his journey shortly after his parents went to bed could give him a head start. And he couldn’t wait to see Thara again. He was confident about reaching the city, but he had no idea what to expect afterward.

  Burying his head underneath the blankets, Saddiq pretended to drift off to sleep, murmuring that he had an idea about where to find Thara, one he might try the next day. His younger brother pressed him, but Saddiq mumbled and shook his head, waiting for the whispering and squirming underneath the covers to end.

  Soon, he heard the soft, easy breaths.

  His parents extinguished the lantern in their room nearby.

  After a long wait, he sat up, crawled to the side of the room, and donned clothes he had worn earlier that day. Retrieving two old canvas sacks from the kitchen, he slowly moved toward the main doorway, pausing and listening with every step.

  Saddiq had to open the door without disturbing his father. The man was sensitive to changes in the house and would hear the door scrape against the dirt floor or feel a draft from outside.

  Crouching, Saddiq rubbed his hand back and forth, smoothing dirt near the doorway and feeling for twigs, pebbles, anything that could add noise. He reached among the pile of shoes left near the entranceway, finding his and pulling them on slowly. Then he turned full attention to the door. Using two hands, he slowly lifted the thick wooden bar and gave the slightest tug. Gripping the side of the door with both hands, Saddiq pulled steadily just enough to slip outside. The lower edge rubbed against the floor with the softest whoosh. Holding his breath, he stepped outside, gently closing the door.

  He looked about and waited. The night was magical. Thick flakes of snow swirled, clouds smothered the starlight, and bitter cold pierced the night.

  His father did not storm outside with questions. Saddiq heard no sounds from inside the house at all. He quickly added the old sacks over his shoes, tying the tops to his upper calves. Walking was awkward, but the sacks enlarged and blurred his footprints.

  Avoiding a direct exit from the compound, Saddiq zigzagged around homes, circling the courtyard, then the village, before heading toward the forest beyond the fields. With Allah’s blessing, more snow would fall. Other villagers would awake and head outside, covering his tracks long before his parents realized that their son had left.

  Once away from the village, Saddiq proceeded carefully, studying the ground and avoiding the most traveled paths. He deliberately took a meandering route, circling back several times. Empty-handed, he used his hands to reach for trees and tried to pounce on tufts of grass or roots spreading from tree trunks to avoid leaving a trail should the snow abruptly end.

  As he approached the cave, he climbed an old log and looked behind him. The snow still fell, smothering the outlin
es of his footprints. Allah was with him. Waiting, making sure that no one followed, he let out a birdcall, a partial chirp of the laughing dove—ur-ur-ur, ur-ur-ur.

  A head peered from the cave and spotted him. Silent, Saddiq held up his arm and waved. Thara nodded and vanished from view. Waiting, he thought about her following his instructions inside the cave, retrieving anything she had brought with her, eliminating every sign, before slowly walking backward, sweeping the rocky floor with a handful of dried grass tied to the end of a stick.

  Before long, Thara shoved two sling packs out of the cave’s entrance —both made from an old wool blanket left in the rag bin that he had sliced in two—and then the small handmade broom. He studied her and decided she could pass for a boy. She wore old clothes that belonged to Saddiq’s younger brother. Saddiq had given her a razor and directed her to cut her long hair as soon as she reached the cave, hanging onto the clumps, saving every strand for later disposal far, far from Laashekoh. A pakol was set at a jaunty angle on her cropped hair.

  Again nodding toward Saddiq, she hurried off in the opposite direction. He glanced upward. The dark-gray sky was monotone, offering no hint of sunrise or an end to the steady snowfall.

  They could not be too careful. Saddiq took a wide berth away from her path, hiking parallel with her for a long ways. Then he shifted direction gradually until he found her trail, placing his feet directly over her footprints.

  Upon catching up with Thara, Saddiq passed without word and forged ahead, once again avoiding worn paths and focusing on shortening his pace so that she could follow by stepping inside his footprints.

  The plan was that he would walk ahead by a hundred paces or so, close enough that she would not get lost and far enough, if either was caught, to give the other time to take cover. If Saddiq was caught close to Laashekoh, he’d explain that he had followed Thara’s tracks and become lost. If she was caught, she would describe horrible traffickers who had cut her hair before she could escape. Both would vehemently deny knowing that the other one was nearby. The plan was rough, but that kept them moving, guarding against followers.