Khalil

by Yasmina Khadra

  “Who is that?”

  “The less you know, the better it is for everyone.”

  “This isn’t the way to Knokke-Heist.”

  “Change of plans. We’re going to Zeebrugge.”

  * * *

  —

  We reached our destination in a thick fog. The car ahead of us stopped in front of a fancy villa; the driver briefly flicked on his left-hand blinker and then continued on his way. Bruno turned toward the place indicated. A sliding gate opened onto a courtyard covered with crunchy gravel. Two men armed with Kalashnikovs were waiting for us on the veranda steps.

  “Where are we, in narco land?” Bruno shouted at them. “Hide those fucking popguns! A neighbor might see you.”

  The pious Bruno had not totally renounced the use of foul language.

  The two men ignored his commands. They showed us into the villa’s entrance hall, turned us over to a black colossus dressed in a tracksuit, and returned to their post.

  The sheikh received us in an immense salon furnished in Moroccan style. He had aged a great deal, our good, revered imam. He didn’t give us the traditional embrace of greeting, simply pointed us to an upholstered bench.

  Lyès was there, sitting on an ottoman.

  There was nobody else.

  An unhealthy atmosphere weighed on the room.

  The sheikh was in a bad mood. He curtly dismissed the black colossus, who had come to ask us if we needed anything. Prayer beads in hand, the sheikh sat on a cushion and gazed at us, Bruno and me, as though to assure himself that we were really there.

  “Imam Sadek has been delivered to his gravediggers,” the sheikh announced. “A special aircraft was used for his extradition. According to our sources, he was in an unknown location in Casablanca before being transferred elsewhere. We’ve lost track of him. Evidently, the king’s minions are going to torture him to death in their efforts to extract information about our organization from him. Imam Sadek is a saint, but he’s a man of flesh and blood. Torturers have developed sophisticated techniques that sometimes succeed in overcoming the most stubborn resistance. Therefore, we must conduct ourselves with greater vigilance.”

  “All measures have been taken,” Lyès assured him.

  “Every fortress has its weak points, Emir.”

  The sheikh turned toward us: “One thing is certain, Imam Sadek will not emerge alive from the wolf’s jaws the Belgians have thrown him into. We know the cruelty of the Sherifian regime too well to believe it capable of performing the slightest act of humanity. Many brothers have perished in the king’s jails after being humiliated, flayed, and eviscerated in septic pits.”

  He fingered his beads and bent his neck, like a man suppressing a sob. His emotion embarrassed us, Bruno and me. Lyès did his best to maintain a solemn attitude.

  The sheikh wiped away a tear I hadn’t had time to see and shook his head. His beard quivered with his effort to cope, to push away the grief that was overwhelming him.

  After an oppressive silence, he began to tell his prayer beads again, and soon he spoke: “Imam Sadek represents an excruciating loss for our Cause. He was our master and our guide. Imagining him in those devils’ hands is intolerable to me. Something tells me that his sufferings are already over, but the king’s henchmen are capable of resuscitating a dead man in order to go on with their dirty work.”

  He slapped his thigh in vexation. “The Council has decided to react with great force. Morocco wants to play with fire, so we will bring the flames of hell down upon them. I’ve brought you here, Brother Zakaria and Brother Khalil—”

  “I’m in,” said Bruno.

  “I haven’t finished my sentence.”

  “I know what you expect of me, Sheikh.”

  “I don’t need your answers now. I’ll leave you enough time to consider thoroughly—”

  “It’s all been considered, Sheikh,” Bruno persisted.

  “I have no doubt of your fervor, Brother Zakaria, but in order to leave nothing to chance, it’s imperative that you both consider your decision. Your enthusiasm touches me, as well as your full willingness, but I must grant you a period of reflection. That way, I won’t have the feeling that I’ve caught you off guard or confronted you with a fait accompli. The Council thought about the two of you for simple reasons. They chose you, Zakaria, because your in-laws live down there and because you have no criminal record, and you, Khalil, because you’re Moroccan, and also because you’re not on file anywhere. I confess that you two are not alone on the list of candidates. The Council will make its decision based on the specifics of the mission.”

  “I’ll take it very badly if the choice falls on someone other than me,” Bruno said obstinately. “I’ve had a terrible time coming to terms with having been pulled from the Paris operation at the last minute. Ever since I was forced to return to Belgium, I’ve done nothing but wait for orders. I’ve never understood why I was made to come back. I was doing fine at the front. With all due respect, Sheikh, I demand to be sent into action.”

  Lyès nodded approvingly.

  “All in due time,” said the sheikh. “The Council has not yet decided.”

  “I want this mission!” Bruno cried, almost shouting.

  “So do I,” said I in my turn.

  The sheikh and Lyès exchanged satisfied looks.

  “I will inform the Council of your request, I promise you.”

  “And I will be infinitely grateful,” Bruno thanked him.

  The sheikh rose to embrace us.

  “Personally,” he confessed, “I would like to see you entrusted with the mission. Morocco needs a good lesson. The desolation I feel for Imam Sadek will be less painful if the Council chooses two of my men to avenge us.”

  He asked us to follow him into another large room. “I presume you haven’t had dinner yet.”

  “We had a snack.”

  “You shouldn’t have. I’ve planned a meal for the four of us.”

  It wasn’t a meal, but a feast.

  * * *

  —

  Bruno and I returned to Brussels that same evening. Once again, we didn’t exchange a single word.

  Bruno wasn’t pleased. The idea that the two of us might be assigned to carry out an operation together was one he could hardly find reassuring, convinced as he was that a believer who fails pitifully at carrying out his most sacred task is accursed. In his view, I would bring bad luck to the most valiant fighters and thwart the noblest missions.

  His attitude didn’t affect me all that much. Bruno was more to be pitied than to be put in his place.

  11

  Ramdan rang my doorbell. He was making an effort to look worried. I stepped aside to let him enter; he refused with an annoyed gesture. He said, “I called you on your cell ten times.”

  “I couldn’t call you back. My SIM card’s empty.”

  “That’s not an excuse, Khalil. We all have to be reachable. Day or night.”

  It was around eleven in the evening. I was getting ready to go to bed after a rough day. I’d delivered and assembled two mirrored armoires, one chest of drawers, and a pair of bunk beds that gave me a really hard time.

  “Get dressed,” he ordered me. “I have to talk to you.”

  “We can’t talk here?”

  “No. Let’s take a ride.”

  I put on a jacket over the sweat suit that served as my pajamas, stepped into a pair of gym shoes, and followed him.

  A full moon flooded the residential neighborhood with silvery light. Except for the vehicles parked in single file along the curbs, it was like walking around in a full-scale model. Not a sound, not the shadow of an insomniac. People had shut themselves up inside their houses, facing the TV, acting as if they didn’t exist. Since the day I’d moved into this dismal gray dump, I hadn’t managed to run into a single one of my neighbo
rs.

  Ramdan opened his clunker’s door for me and then climbed in himself. I didn’t like his affected obsequiousness. He was too disorganized to be well-mannered and too cunning to be credible.

  He put the car in gear and let the engine idle for a few seconds.

  “You know a nice place around here somewhere?”

  “There’s a police station just a few steps away.”

  He frowned and then, catching on to my little joke, burst out laughing. “Ah, you…”

  He struck my thigh with the flat of his hand. This friendly tap annoyed me.

  “Isn’t there a quiet little restaurant?”

  “This is a residential neighborhood. There’s not even a shop where you could buy a length of hemp rope and a stool.”

  “You’re right. This kind of neighborhood gives me the creeps. It’s like a giant dormitory for people whose lives are almost over.” He swallowed hard, realizing his blunder, and then quickly added, “Me, I can’t sleep a wink if there isn’t a bunch of young folks yakking away in the street in front of my building. When I’m in my warm bed and I hear a car pass, it feels like a caress. I can’t stand it when things are too calm. Once I was at a job site deep in the countryside. I had terrible nightmares because of the silence.”

  “You dragged me out here to tell me the story of your life?”

  He gave me a hateful look. “Why are you so disagreeable, Khalil? It’s like you forgot your smile somewhere. I’ve always been straight and chill with you.”

  “I’m beat and I need to get some rest.”

  He put the car in gear and drove around the block.

  “Me too, I’m beat too. If it was up to me, I’d be under my duvet at this very minute. But there are priorities. Running things during the interim is no picnic. I have to be in two places at once, but what I’m in most often is a mess. Some things have to be straightened out here, some activities have to be coordinated there. Responsibility’s a burden, not a privilege. So if you don’t mind, let’s have a little respect.”

  He was waiting for me to apologize. I said nothing. He cleared his throat, slowed down to find his way, and plunged into a muddy alley that led to the vacant lot.

  He parked under a tree and shut off the engine. “What did you do with your bomb belt?” he asked me abruptly.

  If he’d fired a weapon at me point-blank, he would have caused less damage. Such an outburst was the last thing I was expecting.

  Ramdan immediately knew that he’d hit the bull’s-eye. He drummed his fingers on the steering wheel like the master of the situation.

  It took me some time to collect my wits.

  “I destroyed it.”

  He nodded, pursing his lips. “You destroyed it. Good…And what did you do with the charge?”

  “What are you getting at, Ramdan?”

  “You were wearing an explosive belt. I want to know what you did with it. It’s the least I could ask, no? We’re talking about a piece of equipment that has not been used. When a soldier returns from his mission, he turns his weapons in to the supply officer. You don’t have the right to conceal evidence when it could harm our group.”

  “I repeat, I destroyed it.”

  “Maybe you got rid of it in Paris. If the enemy find it, they’ll identify you right away, what with the fingerprints and the traces of DNA you must have left on it.”

  I was cornered, with no plausible means of escape. I hadn’t foreseen having to return anything at all. There was another problem too, and a big one at that: I couldn’t remember where I’d buried the belt. I had a vague impression of an unusual roundabout in the middle of the fields, and a ribbon of asphalt running along a riverbank, but I found it impossible to recall the expressway exit Rayan had taken on the way back from Mons, or to visualize any other landmark I could use to get my mental bearings.

  Ramdan had me by the throat. But oddly enough, he was the one who spoke up and spared me further embarrassment. He said, in a soothing voice, “But if it’s true that you destroyed the belt, the problem’s resolved.”

  Air returned to my chest. “There’s no chance the services will find it,” I told him.

  “Then I’m reassured…I was really worried.”

  He blew his nose in a Kleenex, exhaled an “ahh” of relief, and lowered his window to get some fresh air.

  “You’ve just removed a very painful thorn from my side, Khalil. I was imagining all sorts of scenarios. Naturally, I didn’t talk about them with anyone. We have enough worries as it is. But you have to admit, I had some excellent reasons for fretting. The intelligence services have such state-of-the-art technology, they can start with a pubic hair and dismantle an entire network…I can finally think about something else.”

  He tapped me on the thigh again. “Tell me, how did it go yesterday, with the sheikh?”

  So that was it. Ramdan had been pressuring me by way of getting at the real question preying on his mind: Why had I been summoned to meet the sheikh? Very clever of him, the scumbag. I had to restrain myself from lunging at him after he’d given me such a fright.

  “As far as I know, you’re the sheikh’s closest collaborator,” I said sarcastically. “He didn’t tell you anything?”

  “I’ve been too busy recently. And besides, I’m in Brussels and he’s somewhere else…Well?”

  “Well, what?”

  “Your meeting, of course.”

  He was practically salivating.

  “You promise to keep it to yourself?” I asked, goading him on, delighted to make a fool of him.

  “You have my word as interim emir.”

  I let him wriggle on the hook for a good minute before administering the coup de grâce: “The sheikh offered me Lyès’s position.”

  He tensed up like a frightened crab. In the pale moonlight, his face looked like a wax mask.

  “You don’t…you don’t have the requisite experience for that,” he stammered. “Or the seniority. You’ve never commanded anything at all. Why you? The list of candidates is long…So what happens to Lyès? He’s been removed from his post?”

  “He’s been promoted,” I lied, deliberately enflaming his jealousy. “In two or three months, he’ll be joining the Council.”

  “And what about me?”

  “The sheikh didn’t talk about you…”

  “I can’t believe it! Tonight I’m running you, and tomorrow you’ll be telling me what to do. It’s not fair. After all the hard fucking work I’ve done, and the interim command I’ve carried out flawlessly, I deserve better.”

  “Relax, I declined the offer. I don’t have the necessary skills. I told the sheikh you would be a better choice than me for the post.”

  “You proposed me in your place?”

  “I don’t see who else I could have proposed. Given your seniority in the Association and your self-sacrifice, the position of emir should be yours by right.”

  Ramdan, resuscitated, passed from affliction to jubilation faster than a meteorite. His eyes began to flash again.

  “So what did the sheikh decide?”

  “He has to submit the matter to the Council first. But he wasn’t against it. If what I’ve just told you in confidence doesn’t leak out, I think you’ll have a chance. You know how they are in the Council, right? As soon as rumors spring up around a name, they put an X on it.”

  “In that case, you haven’t told me anything.”

  “Come on, we don’t even know each other.”

  Ramdan mopped his face with another Kleenex, shaking like a fever patient. He got out of the car to take in some big lungfuls of fresh air, did a little stretching and twisting, and then, sitting on the hood, he abandoned himself to his fantasies. He already saw himself climbing up the ladder of the Levant, all the way to the sun.

  Driss had been right: there are those who make
war, and then there are those who do business.

  I’d stayed sprawled in my seat, watching Ramdan concoct a thousand plans inside his cervine head. I didn’t remember ever having seen him volunteer for a hit-and-run operation or even prowl around a synagogue. He was nothing but a vulgar place-hunter, scrounging for privileges, and a first-class schemer constantly on the lookout for an opportunity to make a profit while being careful not to take the smallest risk.

  He sickened me.

  When I think that I was ready to sacrifice myself body and soul for a world free of madmen like him! Even in Paradise, I would have been downcast at the thought of having left such a sleazeball behind me.

  12

  My twin sister arranged to meet in front of the post office. It was a fine day: Brussels was offering itself to the sun, unreservedly. The sidewalk tables at the cafés were full. The stores were sparkling in the daylight. People overflowed the boulevards. In Brussels, the sky had only to clear for the streets to assume a festive air. But who would mistake a sunny spell for redemption? This town had always lied to me. It had been a long time since I’d stopped taking its promises at face value.

  Zahra was waiting for me on the sidewalk, wrapped in the overcoat I’d given her for her twentieth birthday. She made big gestures in my direction and crossed the roadway without worrying about the traffic because she was so happy to see me.

  “So how was your trip to Antwerp?”

  I needed a few seconds to grasp what she was talking about. Then I said, “Just routine.”

  “You were only supposed to stay there two or three days.”

  “Yes, well, it turned out to be longer than expected…But it paid well. I’ve got a job now.”

  “Really? In Antwerp?”

  “Here in Brussels. I’m working for a furniture merchant, a very decent guy. If all goes well, I intend to go into partnership with him.”

  “You’re going to be your own boss? That’s awesome!”

  “We’re not there yet, but we’re moving in that direction.”