23

‘Who makes these?’Arwood asks, regarding the black hood on the floor. He’s sitting on the mattress and playing with it on the end of his foot.

‘What?’ Benton replies.

‘Who makes them?’ he repeats. ‘I’ve never seen one for sale in London, New York, Milan, or Cape Town. I’ve never looked in a shop window and seen one over the head of a mannequin. No Christmas sales at Bloomingdale’s. No pop-up ads on the Internet.’

‘I don’t know, Arwood.’

‘These are not repurposed items. They’re useless for anything other than covering or carrying heads. How do supply and demand find each other? And for real … how much do they cost?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Has anyone considered that if we simply raided the factories that make these and grabbed hold of their mailing lists, we’d probably have the entire global terrorist network by the balls? Even knowing where the orders have been placed, and for how many, would wrap up the entire intelligence game. Am I the only one who has this figured out?’

Adar starts to cry again. Benton looks at the fourteen-year-old child who is traumatised, isolated, and under continued stress. If she even survives this, he knows, she’ll never be the same, or whatever she might have otherwise been.

‘Is something wrong?’ Benton asks Jamal, in the hope it is something specific.

‘She knows one of them,’ says Jamal, who is still standing in the corner as though he’s ready to go at any time.

‘One of them was in the convoy attack?’ Arwood asks.

‘No. One of them is from Shaddad. South of al-Hasakah. West of here and near her village. It is Sunni. She says the village has a dark history. They have been treated very badly by the Shiites. Very bad. She does not know his name, but she knows his family. She says she has heard that the father was murdered by the Shabiha. This is Assad’s secret militia. His death squads. They are Alawite tribe. They are Shiite. They hate the Sunni. Adar is Sunni. So she runs away to Iraq to hide.’

Arwood pulls up his knees and leans back against the wall. ‘If he’s all disgruntled, he should be off killing government troops with the rebels. Not blowing up civilians in traffic or murdering cops. This doesn’t help us.’

‘No, no,’ Jamal says. ‘That’s not what happened. She said he came from a good family. Everyone knows their family. Mother is very nice. Boys are nice. But he became very angry. And then he met someone who explained that these people are heretics. They are infidels, and they are the reason the Muslim people are weak. She says that the boy is like all the others. No one wants to be weak anymore. They are tired of being weak. They want to return to a time when they were strong and united. They cannot stand the humiliation anymore. The West does not understand our humiliation.’

‘The fourteen-year-old said all this?’

‘No, I say all this.’

‘You’re not much of a translator,’ Arwood says.

‘I am a driver.’

‘And you think,’ Arwood says, ‘that if these people felt proud and respected, they’d stop packing ice-cream trucks with explosives to kill as many children as possible? They need jobs and a hug?’

‘I’m saying there are reasons.’

‘There are always reasons, Jamal, but not justifications. Listen, I’ve been watching these douchebags for years. These guys aren’t choosing between a job in auto mechanics and beheading infidels. Yeah, they’re discontented, and maybe they’ve got a good reason, too. Fair enough. The thing is, there are a lot of hard-luck cases in the world, and a lot of places on the losing side of history. But not all those places celebrate mass murder because they’re angry. See, little Johnny Hardluck might feel bad one day and say to his mummy, “Mummy, I feel so bad I’m going to cut somebody’s head off.” That could happen in Pittsburgh. We have psychos, too. But how Mummy responds is kind of what makes one place different from another. So if his mummy says, “That’s a good idea, Johnny, you slice them up real good, and if you die, we’ll be extra proud of you,” then we know what kind of people we’re dealing with. Around here, you kill a hundred children with an exploding ice-cream truck, and your family gets a pension and its own website. That doesn’t happen in Pittsburgh. That is not a minor distinction. When we act badly, we at least feel really bad about it, and try to find ways to avoid it later. These people do exactly the opposite. That’s why we’re better than them. Got it?’

‘They are being manipulated by the elites,’ Jamal says.

Arwood gently bangs the back of his head against the concrete cell. This is not the first time he’s had this conversation. But usually, when he does have these conversations, he’s trying to get laid. At least this time he can speak his mind.

‘Jamal, you can only manipulate ideas that make sense to people already. If an imam gets on his soapbox and tells all the Sunnis to go out and kill all the New York Yankee fans, they wouldn’t make much headway. Because it wouldn’t make any kind of sense. Go kill the Shiites? That makes sense. Unfortunately, everything happening down the mountain, and even up here, makes sense to people, whether they like it or not. And these Stooges? In there? They aren’t gonna stop. You see, it’s all explained by Loggins’s Law. You know Loggins and Messina? No? Doesn’t matter. It’s like this, Jamal: we will never get along with anyone — not now, not later, not ever — if their mamas don’t dance, and their daddies don’t rock and roll. Because it’s mind over matter, my friend. And you cannot change people’s minds about what matters.’

Jamal does not translate any of this for Adar.

‘You should both rest,’ Benton says, taking a position on the mattress similar to Arwood’s. ‘You’ll need your strength. And if they offer you food and water, don’t be proud or stubborn. Take it. You, too,’ he says, looking at Arwood.

‘Yeah, yeah.’

Jamal and Adar don’t move.

‘What’s the name of his family?’ Arwood asks.

Jamal asks Adar, but she bows her head and says nothing.

Benton leans his head back against the wall, and the paint flakes behind him, dropping little pieces down his trousers. The air is dry. It is tinged with a scent of cooking oil and a familiar spice he can’t name. Benton cannot hear, but still feels, some manner of village life outside. Over some hills. Gently, as on a breeze, he closes his eyes, and he drifts over the mountain they climbed, turn upon turn upon turn.

Charlotte once explained to her father how everything in life was connected. She could tell him which aspects of an organism were connected by evolution to others — either closely or distantly, but unified from common origins. It didn’t really matter to her how far apart they had become over time; the shared evolutionary characteristics remained. ‘We’re not on a ladder of evolution with missing rungs,’ she’d explain. ‘It’s more like a big bush.’ When she came home from university and stayed with them in Fowey, she’d try to share her enthusiasm for her studies. She’d read essays aloud from Stephen J. Gould with wonderful names like ‘Bully for Brontosaurus’ and ‘George Canning’s Left Buttock and the Origin of Species’ and ‘A Darwinian Gentleman at Marx’s Funeral.’ She said the twigs on the branch were expanding and splitting and growing. Some twigs stopped, while others pressed ever outward. In the end, the bush of life is populated by what lives farthest out. ‘We are not at the top of the ladder,’ she explained. ‘We are only the farthest from the centre, on our own fragile and particular twig.’

‘Which,’ said Benton, trying to get his head around it, ‘means that everything still alive after all this time is also a successful twig.’

‘Right. Isn’t that wonderful? It means we’re all connected, and always will be.’

He had said ‘Yes,’ because she obviously thought it was, which was nice.

‘We really are out here on our own,’ Benton says, aloud.

‘We’d better not be, because if we are, we’re royally—’

Then the Stooges come in.

Curly is the first through the door. He speaks English, but his accent is thick and he slurs his speech.

‘Where you from?’ he says, looking at Benton.

‘England,’ he says.

‘America?’

‘No. England. Perhaps you’ve heard of it.’

‘What is your name?’ he says.

Arwood jumps right in and answers for all of them. He is even helpful enough to spell them out. Benton hopes the man doesn’t have the inclination or skills to type them into Google.

‘What are you doing in Ninawa?’ he asks Arwood.

‘I’m here for my health. The climate is good for my allergies. He’s a journalist. He’s covering the film festival.’

Curly ignores Arwood, and takes hold of Jamal and Adar. He pushes them through the rusty green door into the adjacent room as Shemp follows them out, walking backwards, training his rifle on Arwood and Benton, whose hands are still bound.

‘Don’t you fucking hurt them!’ Arwood yells.

Shemp is expressionless as he closes the door. The bolt slides into place from the other side, and a padlock is reinstalled.

Despite his hands being tied behind him, Arwood hops up like a karate instructor and rushes to the door. He places his ear against it and listens.

‘Curly and Shemp locked it,’ Benton says, sitting down again, this time with his hands behind him. ‘We’re locked in.’

‘That’s what you’ve named them?’ Arwood asks as he wanders around the room, looking closely at it.

‘I don’t know their real names. I have to call them something to keep them straight in my mind. It’s important to remain sorted in these circumstances.’

‘Yeah, that’s true,’ Arwood says, scanning every aspect of the room. ‘Stooges, though. That’s pretty good. I didn’t think of that.

‘So, listen,’ Arwood says as he walks slowly along the wall, looking for … something. ‘Did you get laid last night?’

‘That’s not an appropriate conversation, and it hardly seems significant, given the circumstances.’

‘You mean for a hostage situation?’

Benton tips his head and concedes that Arwood may have a point. ‘What are you looking for?’

‘Usual stuff. A nail, a sharp edge, wire cutters, machine gun, talkie-walkie. Anything useful.’

‘I thought you had a plan.’

‘Wire cutters won’t hurt my plan.’ Not finding any, though, Arwood flops down again onto the other mattress. ‘Was it any good?’ he asks.

‘You honestly think I’m going to tell you?’

‘The weird thing about my plan is how much it depends on whether or not Märta woke up feeling like she’d stick her neck out for you in a pinch. It’s not much of a nail to hang this plan on, I admit, but I still need to know. So how was it?’

‘You’re a troglodyte.’

‘We’re in a cave.’

Benton is unresponsive.

‘Look, I don’t need any of the fluid and sticky details, I simply need to know what level of risk Märta is prepared to take to get you back. So was it not nice, nice, very nice, or complex?’

‘It was nice and complex,’ Benton says.

‘We stand a chance, then.’

They both face outward into the empty room, which is as large as a two-car garage. There is nothing to look at except the burning bulb and the two machine-gun slits about six feet up the eight-foot wall.

‘I’m terrified for those kids. I don’t want them to die,’ Benton says.

‘The Three Stooges were all Jewish,’ Arwood says. ‘In fact, all four of the Three Stooges were Jews. That’s the problem with your labelling scheme. I don’t think these guys are Jewish. I suppose we could ask.’

‘Probably not,’ Benton says.

‘I dated a Jewish girl once,’ Arwood says. ‘Rebecca Caplan. For three whole years.’

‘What happened?’

‘She came to her senses, obviously.’

‘Obviously.’

‘The thing about Jews—’

‘Arwood, please.’

‘No, seriously. The thing about Jews is that they know everyone else who’s Jewish. It’s a thing with them — people you wouldn’t have known were Jewish. Like the Stooges. Or Lou Reed.’

‘That’s fascinating, Arwood,’ Benton says.

‘Amy Winehouse.’

‘Did anyone see you kill the colonel?’

‘Julianna Margulies — you know who she is? The Good Wife? I like that show. Mark Knopfler from Dire Staits. Rebecca would point out Jews like it was a version of punch buggy. Jew. Not a Jew. Like that. Everyone knows Einstein and Kafka and Barbra Streisand, but not necessarily Scarlett Johansson or Harrison Ford.’

‘It could be why the security forces set up the roadblock. Because they were looking for you.’

‘Jack Black. You see High Fidelity? That was a great movie. I’ve heard it’s a book now, too.’

‘And then ISIL attacked the security forces,’ Benton says. ‘But they did it quickly. So was it a target of opportunity, or a coincidence?’

‘Captain Kirk and Mr Spock were both Jewish. Shatner and Nimoy. So was Chekhov, as a matter of fact.’

‘You’re not answering my questions.’ Benton’s shoulders are beginning to ache. He lowers his head to stretch, as on long-haul flights.

‘OK, you want to talk about this? Fine. I was in the car thinking about what these knuckleheads are up to,’ Arwood says, ‘and all I can think is that none of this was planned. An attack was probably planned. Killing people was planned. Blowing up the cops, the whole thing. Was it because of me? Who the hell knows? All you need to do to get the emergency services to show up around here is blow something up real good. And if it was a roadblock set up for me, and the Stooges took advantage, what of it? They were obviously planning to do it at some point anyway. But not this part. Capturing us could not have been planned. We didn’t even know we were gonna be there, so they sure as shit didn’t. They’ve now got themselves some hostages they don’t know what to do with. And I think Abu Shemp got pretty annoyed when the rest of the barber quartet came back with us. I think we’re off-book. I think orders are not being upheld. I think this is improv, and we can affect the dynamic. That’s what I think.’

‘Abu Shemp?’

‘Fuck ‘em.’

‘I was actually reaching a pretty similar conclusion,’ Benton says.

‘Which means the situation can be influenced.’

‘It also means,’ Benton says, ‘that it can be scrubbed.’

‘I don’t know what that means.’

‘It means they could kill us all, and pretend their error never happened.’

‘They could let us go, too,’ Arwood says.

‘Letting us go has a downside. Killing us doesn’t. They’re killers, and killers kill people to solve their problems.’

‘I see your point,’ Arwood says. ‘This might be a good time to call back Märta. She called you at least three times.’

‘How do you know that?’

‘Vibrations through the seat. If Abu Larry—’

‘Abu Larry was driving. Abu Curly was in the back.’

‘I don’t want to play who’s on first. I’m just saying that if he’d been sitting next to us, we’d all be dead.’

‘I guess we’re very lucky people, then.’

‘The luckiest,’ Arwood says.

‘You’ll need to get my phone.’

‘Isn’t it down your pants?’

‘No, it’s down my trousers. My pants are what I wear under my trousers. You people are making a mess of this language, you know that?’

‘Let’s hope there’s a signal in here.’

That is when they hear two gunshots from inside the next room.