Maggie and Kafka sat alone in the abandoned office, the chill of night taking hold.
Maggie brought up the subject that had been silently plaguing her. “Who knew about you meeting Dara that day at Café de la Nouvelle?”
Kafka grimaced into the darkness past her shoulder.
“If you have any idea who set up that suicide attack,” she said, “you need to tell me. Otherwise all our lives are at risk. Your parents too. And possibly the lives of many others. ”
“I told my parents,” he said, looking down. “I told them that I’d met a woman, that she wasn’t Muslim. But they would never betray me.”
Was that so? “And how did they respond?”
Kafka looked up, eyes glistening. “Both of them accepted it. My father is—was—a university lecturer. Political science. My mother has a degree from the London School of Economics. Just because they’re Muslim doesn’t mean they’re jihadists.”
No, Maggie thought, it was their son who had succumbed to radical Islam, for whatever reason. “Did your superiors know you were planning to meet Dara?”
He gave a wry frown. “Of course not.”
“What was the excuse you used to come to Paris?”
“I told the caliph’s secretary I had an appointment with a doctor. Jihad Nation is generous with benefits in that regard, as I have said. Higher ranking people come to Europe frequently, and doctor visits are often the reason.”
“And did you actually make an appointment with a doctor?”
“Oh, yes. With the ENP, The École des Neurosciences de Paris. I said I was complaining of dizzy spells. Which happened to be true. In my case, it was stress. I had gotten myself into a situation I didn’t know how to escape. The beheadings I was forced to videotape brought that to bear. But I laid the groundwork by describing conditions of Ménière’s Disease to my doctor in Mosul. He wrote a recommendation. I did my best to justify my trip, in case anyone was watching.”
“Do you have to clear such plans with the caliph’s secretary?”
“Oh yes. They don’t tolerate you wandering off on your own—especially if you’re leaving the country.”
“Well, it seems you were thorough, but someone got wise.” And Kafka was still able to access the Abraqa network, thanks to his cornering the responsibility. It was one of the reasons Maggie had wanted to see the operation in action—to make sure he was still in control.
“I’m the one who set up Abraqa. I’m the one who runs it. As you can see for yourself, it’s not complicated. But to the uninitiated, it’s smoke and mirrors. For the time being, Jihad Nation has to let me live.”
For the time being. “How much time?”
He shrugged. “In my part of the world, we have a different philosophy about these things. Life for us is much more tenuous. In my world, you could be gone”—he snapped his fingers—“like that. Nothing is certain. Unlike the United States.”
She smiled. “We only think our future is certain.”
“Tell me which is better—the land of freedom and prosperity for all, an illusion created by your annoyingly positive outlook that actually applies to very few of your citizens? Or knowing that no government can be trusted? No business? No institution?”
“Is that why you were radicalized?” she said.
“One doesn’t have to look far to see the injustices our people have suffered. Much because of your government’s policies. One only has to open one’s eyes. But one needs faith to survive. Something sorely lacking on your side of the globe. Allah provides that. What do you have? Disneyland?”
“I prefer a faith that includes women. It has nothing to do with Disneyland. But I’m curious. You grew up in a Muslim home.”
“Oh, yes. A comfortable, upper-middle-class home. A soft life. An easy life, bending the rules when it suited us, adopting your culture. While most of my people had nothing, couldn’t read or write. Thanks to the oppression of the United States.”
How they loved to blame the US for their problems. “Seems to me you’re subject to the oppression of Jihad Nation right now.”
“You Americans gave us no choice.”
“Do you honestly believe that? Saddam’s ex-generals run Jihad Nation—not the US.”
“That’s an argument that could fill a hundred books. And still we would not come to the same opinion.”
“Perhaps.”
“What are your religious beliefs, Maggie?”
She shook her head.
“You must have something. You have to believe in something.”
Her mother had believed in Indian folklore that had served her people for a thousand years but she died poor and brokenhearted. Her father . . . she didn’t know what her father believed—if anything. Maggie had her code. There was right and there was wrong. You didn’t need a book to tell you which one to follow. And talking about it made no difference. You just did it.
“That’s my business,” she said.
“Disneyland?”
“Fundamental Islam or Disneyland,” she said, giving a wry smile. “Both fantasies if you ask me. But one is far more dangerous. One requires blind faith. Last time I checked Mickey Mouse wasn’t beheading people.”
“The Koran has much to offer.”
“Seventy-two virgins? For holy jihad?”
“I’m not saying I agree with that. I understand what it means, though—to struggle. That’s the pure meaning of the word ‘jihad’.”
“But Dara made you see an alternative.”
He blinked. “Dara opened my eyes.”
Even though he was prepared to kill her. “How?”
“You wouldn’t understand.” He shook his head disdainfully. An Arab man would not discuss matters of the heart, especially with a woman. But the irony of it was that Kafka barely knew Dara. He saw what he wanted to see. And Dara knew that. Pictures and flirtatious chat did the work. Kafka’s heart, such as it was, had betrayed him.
“What I need to know,” Maggie said, “is whether you’re really willing to go through with this. Willing to betray Jihad Nation, the people you once believed in.”
“All I want is to see my parents safe. I’ll take whatever consequences come with that.”
“Even your own death?”
He looked away, then back. “Even that.”
Such courage was possible—in the abstract. But when one was put to the screws—having water poured up one’s nose, fingernails pulled out—it was a different matter. Everything Maggie had seen so far, however, seemed to imply Kafka was willing to go through with it. Then again, her precious instinct, that elusive characteristic she valued so highly, had failed her before.
“Good enough,” she said. She got up from the table, went to the door.
She found John Rae and Dieter talking.
“Let’s go for a walk,” she said to John Rae.