Jinny watched the expelled brass somersault, land, roll on the floor, circle on its rim, and stop. Little Asif opened his eyes, leaned back on his hands, and looked up. “Is Safeed safe?”
Asad blurted, “Yes, he’s okay.” But Asad wasn’t. He had peaked over the sill and witnessed the horror. Forever scarred, he moved mechanically on his knees, retrieved, and blew softly into the empty bullet casing. “This gold whistle needs some work, too.” He peered into the void, brushed the brass against his sleeve, dropped it in his pocket, and sat in a funk. “I saw Safeed step into his house and close the door. Well, I only think there was a door, but anyway, he disappeared.”
Jinny tried not to imagine the nightmarish scars that had been carved into her and the children. She backed from the window and lowered her weapon, but there was not time to commiserate. Lively neurons telegraphed the same message: Another attack is imminent. “We must leave before we can’t,” she said calmly. “How’s your ankle, soldier?” She noted Asif’s knee-jerk reaction. He had scooted across the floor toward the hutch, stopped midway, and pulled at his leg.
“Still hooked to my foot, Mama.” Jinny knelt, ruffled his hair, and gave him bear hug.
“What I meant was, ‘how much does it hurt?’”
He teasingly batted his eyelashes. “Do we get to slide down the pole now?” Anticipating a ‘yes’, he climbed to his feet and hobbled to the hutch.
“Yes, Asif, it’s time, and you are master of the game bag. Asad, will you help me move the hutch?” Asad was slow to respond. His ears hurt, but he wanted to be equally yoked with Jinny. As it turned out they were as poorly matched for the task as a Gayal ox and her calf. The hutch didn’t budge. “Ding-louie.”
“Can Safeed come back and help us?”
“No, we’re on our own.”
“Is he on vacation?”
“No, he’s on the run, but this cabinet acts like it’s nailed to the floor. Shall we try again? Ready Asad?”
Asad nodded, “Do you think we can do this? I am so scared.”
After another failed attempt Jinny tried to appear tranquil, but inside she hosted a thousand screaming ‘ding-louies,’ all wanting out. Think Jinny, think ‘options’. What do you mean, ‘options’? We’re out of options. Safeed was right. Escaping through the window was a dumb idea; and the door, despite the wedge, won’t preserve us for long; we’re trapped and cornered. “But not yet defeated,” she said aloud. “Asif, are there any marbles in your bag?”
“Do you mean these? They are kulla. Does that sound right, Asad?”
“I do not know, but I do not think now is a time to play games.”
Jinny nodded. “Asif, carefully empty the kulla on the floor near the door and spread them out.” Asif complied while Jinny and Asad looked on. Soon thirty-two dazzling marbles slicked the surface.
“Oh, yes, I see why.”
“I think you do, Asif. Let’s get ourselves ready. Boys, when I say, ‘Bravo’, quickly line up and kneel behind me so you can’t see the door.”
“Can’t?”
“Yes, can’t.” Jinny chambered a live round in the rifle and then knelt on one knee seven feet behind her own temporary Maginot Line—a weathered old door, wedged with a piece of firewood, and missing lock and latch.
Above and behind Jinny’s left shoulder, a meek little voice suggested, “Do we have time to pray? It helped last time.”
Taken aback, Jinny dropped her other knee to the floor and without turning to face the boys asked, “Asad, will you ask God to help us?”
“No, no.”
“Asif? . . . We haven’t much time.”
“Okay, Mama. Heavenly Father, we’re stuck. We need help. In Jesus, amen, I think.” It was the boy’s first uttered prayer. Neither a desperate cry for help, nor a demand, it was the simple expression of a child’s faith that someone up above heard and would help. Now, both touched and embarrassed, Jinny laid aside the rifle, and this time she and Asad put their backs to the hutch and pushed. And pushed. Nothing. Nada.
“Mama, it didn’t help.”
Jinny gasped, forehead veins filled to capacity, red-faced, and straining every muscle. “Keep pushing . . . Augh! Ding-louie . . .THE LATCH, the latch, the latch.” she relaxed long enough to reach below a low-slung shelf. Click. Again, Jinny leaned into the hutch. “Push, they’re coming back. It’s time to go-ho-ho-ho.” The cabinet relinquished its hold on the floor and slid to the side, exposing the secret passage. Jinny was exhausted. Asad was relieved. Asif was speechless. He beamed but refused Asad’s proffered hand up. Instead, he stood, smiled, swung the small bag over his shoulder, hobbled into the sanctuary, and grabbed hold of the iron rod. Asad and Jinny followed his lead, but Asad insisted on lugging the ruck sac, helmet, and the folded BDUs, which required two trips. Jinny carried her rifle; the hutch yielded to encouragement, slid quietly, the gap narrowed, and, click—darkness
“Oh, Asif, this is like Tora Bora. Mama, that means, ‘Black Cave.”
Without warning, something hard slammed like a wrecking ball against the apartment door. Asad wrapped himself around one of Jinny’s legs, and Asif, the other. Without a word, Jinny gently separated herself from the boys, knelt, and lifted the pieces of flooring, exposing an opening the diameter of a Schwinn bicycle tire. The iron rod looked more beguiling than a furlough. Jinny loosely secured her gear to the pole and—with no need of encouragement—it slid down-paused-and slid some more while Jinny and the boys watched like children who had just dropped a rock into a deep well, awaiting the splash. Goaded by gravity, the load signaled its arrival at ground-zero with a thump; the rifle came loose and clattered to the floor.
Ratib, by all appearances the most lustful of Karim’s mob, had crawled on his knees to the apartment door, ostensibly to peep through the keyhole for a salacious glimpse of the American woman. Drooling with anticipation, he licked his lips and popped his knuckles to relieve stress. His companions leaned forward, hands on their knees, and waited for their breath to catch up. Ratib whispered, “Did you hear that?”
Ajani and Coco stopped breathing and looked at each other. “Did we hear what?”
“I dunno. It sounded like . . . oh well, I might as well say it—a metallic click.” Ratib kept gawking through the keyhole.
“Could be the safety on her rifle, loaded and pointed at your pink-eyed peeper.” Ratib reacted as if somebody had just jammed a drinking straw up his nose.
“You know what, Ajani? You are one spooky dude,” he squawked, “but I didn’t see anyone in there. Why don’t you have a look-see for your own-self?”
“Yep, yep. Do you really think I’m as stupid as you?” Ajani stood to the side and pounded on the door three times. “We know you’re in there. Open up.” He waited and listened. Next, he tapped lightly. “Come on lady, your friend with no hair sent us with some food for you and the kids. Yep, yep, it’s the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth; so help me out.”
Convinced he was about to die from a heat stroke and miss out on all the fun, Coco shoved his way past his cohorts, twisted, and broke the doorknob off in his hand. “Well, I’ll be darned; guess I didn’t know my own strength.”
Ajani ground his teeth, snarled, and shook his fist in Ratib’s face. “You forget who’s in charge here? Get ready, we go on my signal. Three, two, one.” Ajani assaulted the door with his size 12 boot. Coco and Ratib laughed out loud.
“I told you to put a rag in it.” Fuming, Ajani squared up and kicked again. This time the weakened jamb gave way—the door flew open; Ajani played marbles; his arms flailed; he landed on his back; his gun hit the floor and discharged. Hot lead ricocheted off the potbellied stove and punched a hole through the hutch.
“I told you nobody’s home,” chided Ratib. Ajani looked up.
“Yep. Yep. No one’s home—between your ears.” Ajani picked up his weapon, stared angrily at the marbles, and kicked a break shot with his toe. Like airborne billiard balls a few marbles careened off the walls and one hit the kicker in the forehead. Ratib tempered his temptation. He retrieved a few marbles, dropped them in his pocket, walked to the window and stood by Coco, surveilling the vacant alley.
“Why are you two standing there? The woman didn’t sprout wings and jump out the window. Stop daydreaming and help figure out how she got out of here.” Ajani warned, “We must not, again I say, we must not go back to BJ empty-handed.” But to him the prospects looked dim. He mumbled, “I should have never left the states. Yep, yep. I should have gone north to Trenton, lived with Nabil and my cousins, and made pipe bombs for cash. But no, here I am, stuck with a Moslem beatnik from the 60s and a one-footed, Coco-puff nincompoop.”
“Ratib! Look for loose floorboards.”
Half-heartedly Ratib reached under the potbellied stove. “Ouch. Let go. No, no, no.” He howled and shook his arm as if something had bitten his hand and wouldn’t let go. In agony, he jerked and fell backwards, his thumb and forefinger stuffed in the mouth of a carpet viper. An imitation. A child’s toy. “My hand. Ajani, my hand,” he wailed. Ajani’s horrified reaction gave way to disgust. Ratib looked up at his lieutenant with a smile. “Gotcha!”
“Funny? You think that’s funny? I’ll show you funny. Go guard the alley through the window. Here, I’ll give you a lift.” Jerking the older irritant to his feet, Ajani grabbed Ratib by the seat of his pants and—airborne without a parachute—the fledgling flew, gravity governed, and, Splat! Ajani acted like he’d just put out the trash for collection.
“Keep looking. Karim will kill us if we return empty handed.” Ajani’s calloused knuckles rapped the walls of the dingy, third story room. Soon he and Coco were both knocking on the same wall. Ajani stood, tiptoed, before the bookcase, squinted, and leaned. “That’s a bullet hole.” After extricating his pinky from a probe, he retrieved a round from his belt, dropped it through the hole and heard it roll. Coco thought Ajani was about to have a seizure until he motioned him forward, pointed, and whispered, “The woman.” Together they wrenched cabinet forward, raised their weapons ready to fire, and watched the heavy case belly-flop face down and die. Befuddled, Ajani stepped into the vacant enclosure and looked down. Nothing. “THEY’RE GONE. ESCAPED!”
Limping down the stairs, Coco still beat Ajani to the courtyard. Both men crawled like children on all fours, poked their heads into the open hatch and, exasperated, swore like seasoned sailors. “Let’s split up.” You go 100 yards north and I’ll go that way,” he said, pointing to the south. “If you see the woman, fire twice. Otherwise run back here and we’ll search east and west.”
Coco replied, “Fire what? My knife? Karim took my gun away.” He refrained from confessing he had no idea what Jinny looked like.
“Okay, yell like a stuck pig! Let’s move.”
Twenty minutes later they sat together on an upturned stone bench in the courtyard, catching their breath, and fearing the worst. “When we come back empty-handed, Karim will choose one of us for his sacrifice. You have my vote.”
“Very funny.”
In no hurry to face the music, they meandered side by side down the alley. At about the same pace, but coming from the opposite direction, a man covered with soot from head to toe approached in slow motion. He was bald. “Will you looky there, Coco Puff, here comes tar-baby. Yep, yep, he’ll do.” Attitudes improved.
Too tired to duck or run—his face streaked with charcoal and sweat— Safeed approached the wary brigands. Like a school crossing guard, Ajani raised his hand. “Stop. Is the fire out? Hey, you look familiar.”
Safeed recognized Ajani and replied sullenly, “Yes, yes the fire in the village is out, but the one burning in your eyes remains. You have murdered a woman, her child, and a beloved patriarch. Many have burns, but Karim refuses access to the hospital.” Safeed paused. “What do you want from me? Haven’t you done enough? Let me pass. I am going home”
Sobered by the reminder of his own foul deeds, Coco asked, “Where is home?”
“Near the Caspian Sea where the grass is green, the crops grow tall, and the breeze is cool.” He studied the faces of his foes. “But in some seasons the Caspian seethes, the grass dies, the crops fail, and the people mourn.”
“And your family?”
“My family? All dead. I am dead. Now if you permit, I will pass.”
Ajani’s mind whirred like an unmanned Ferris wheel in overdrive, and he feigned a sanctimonious reply. “You look tired my friend. Go in peace.” Ah, so the pilgrim lies; the woman, she hides at his apartment. We will permit him to pass, follow him to his door, and with him as bait, hook Karim’s Catfish after all. Yep, yep.”
Safeed nodded as they parted company, steadied himself against his building’s bricks, and continued to play the hand he’d been dealt. This was no time to fold. He pretended to fish a key from his pocket—but it was Alim’s knife—and braced for the attack.
Coco followed Ajani as they trudged a few steps east toward death’s door—the Hospital door. Up until that moment, Coco had reluctantly played along, but he sensed the end of the game was at hand and feared he’d not get to cash in his chips. He clenched his teeth and, limping two steps behind, whispered, “We had him! Where are we going? Have you lost your nerve?”
Ajani, proficient at dealing from the bottom of the deck, turned and showed his cards. “The woman is stashed upstairs in this building. I am sure of it. See? He pauses at the door. We strike fast, hard, and now. Tackle him before he gets inside, do you understand? Coco nodded and pulled a knife as they ran; Ajani left his 9 mm pistol holstered and imagined swinging Safeed around with one hand, wrapping an arm around his scrawny neck, and applying a choke hold. Coco went in low for the tackle.
Safeed abruptly hunched down and, with his right leg extended, spun toward his assailants, jammed a heel into Coco’s gut, and deflected Ajani’s outstretched arm, all in one fluid motion—but not before Coco had slashed a gash in Safeed’s leg, below the knee. Coco landed on his backside, lost his grip, and his knife clattered on the cobbled street.
Alim’s dagger in hand—and while blood oozed from the deep gash—Safeed swept the blade in wide arcs to keep his snarling assailant at bay. Ajani drew his gun, angled it to the side—a useless technique he’d learned on TV—and aimed at Safeed’s head.
“Gotcha!” he sneered. “Might as well surrender, scum-bag. Where’s the woman? Easy now, easy now, good boy, drop the dagger.”
“Easy now,” mocked Dalal as she aimed and dropped a potted plant from the third story window—down—down—down. Karim’s best friend in the world collapsed next to Coco, and before Coco could yelp, Ajani was comatose—slain by a desert cactus.
Fearful that another bomb might be dropped, Coco rolled over and over and picked up his knife. Panicked and in pain, he struggled to his feet and rushed Safeed, screaming, “Now it’s your turn, Sunni.” Safeed sidestepped his stumbling enemy and drove Alim’s blade home between two ribs. With a final gasp, Coco toppled to the ground.
Safeed, in shock, slumped to the ground but kept the dagger clenched in his fist. Worried faces and anxious voices vacated the window. Footfalls. Locks unlatched. Two women rolled the mugger aside, knelt beside Safeed, and tried to quell the flow of blood. A hurried examination disclosed that his tibialis anterior muscle had been severed.
Jinny yelled, “Dalal! We need more help. Safeed is hurt . . . bad.”