CHAPTER 5: ALGBAK

We have an operative free in San Luis Obispo,” said Russ Snow to his boss, “I’m getting him on the phone right now.”

Tidewater paused, two files in hand, nodded, put the files into his briefcase, and closed it, setting it upright on the desk so he wouldn’t forget to take it home with him. Sitting, Marion Tidewater took the phone from his assistant, covered the mouthpiece, and asked Russ, “What’s the name?”

“Claybourne, Curt Claybourne out of the LA station.” Russ half whispered.

Into the phone, Marion Tidewater announced himself and proceeded with, “Claybourne, are you assigned anything you can’t get out of for a few days?” Tidewater listened and nodded, “Okay, I want you to tail a lady named Bonnie Seastrand Ixey.” There was a pause and Tidewater smiled, “Yes, I guess she could be the same as the Ixey of the Ixey Posie Farm. I certainly wouldn’t know. Well, as surprising as it is to you, I want you on her…yep, twenty-four hours, so get a sub for when you need it. And do a complete background check.”

Tidewater paused again, then answered, “Don’t be so sure. The Ixeys may have been stanchions of the community and Mrs. Ixey just a librarian but, trust me, that may be all surface stuff. Don’t expect it to be as tame as you believe right now. Especially, keep your eyes peeled for Iranian Security operatives.”

Tidewater grinned at whatever was being said on the other end and added, “You betcha, ISF guys. Don’t think the Saudis are on it yet. Can’t be sure so be careful. Your little librarian’s hot property.” Another pause and Tidewater said, “You do that. Report daily or if anything major breaks. Yeah, thanks, Agent Claybourne.” He handed the phone back to Russ Snow who traded him for the folder in his left hand.

“This,” Russ put the phone back as he indicated the manila folder, “is all the material I could collect this afternoon on your Mrs. Bonnie Ixey.”

“Thanks, Snow, you’re fast,” Tidewater heaved his stocky body out of his chair, added the folder to the ones already in his briefcase and headed for the door.

“Ummm, might I ask a question,” began Russ, “about this case?”

“Case?” The bulgy black eyes regarded the taller, handsome young man with ill-concealed envy.

“Well, this Ixey thing,” Russ plunged ahead. “Just, I’m really new to putting tails on people and doing operative stuff, you know, since I did my first two years here in the documents section.”

“Yeah, right,” Tidewater paused at the door. “You’re obviously good at tracking book-style information down and that’s valuable to me, guy. What’s more valuable on this side of the building is the real world stuff. So you gotta learn how we do that, right?”

Russ Snow nodded with the proper humility and went on with a very low voice, “For example, why do we care what a battered women’s shelter does or what happens to a fifty-year-old widow in Morro Bay, California?”

Tidewater had a hand on the doorknob. He considered for a moment before deciding how much to tell this new man. “It ain’t the women really, ‘cause they don’t have any value to us, it’s this international smuggling of persons. We simply don’t know how EW does it.”

“How’d we even know they were doing it?” Russ got braver.

“That old weasel Sadiq-Fath asked me to look into it on this end about three years ago,” laughed Tidewater, grimly. “Seems an EW operative, a haji, an Islamic holy man, no less, got a condemned Baha’i woman smack out of the high security prison in Tabriz. That’s in central Iran, for God’s sake. Got her to India, we still don’t know how, where a Tibetan monk sent her along as a stewardess on a BOAC jet to Australia where she disappeared into the outback. Damned ingenious. Pissed the hell out of Sadiq-Fath.”

Tidewater moved into the common room where the secretaries were hustling toward the double security doors and said over his shoulders as an afterthought, “Sadiq-Fath put a fatwa out on the haji and threw in anybody from EW he could identify for good measure.”

“A fatwa?” Russ queried.

Tidewater nodded, a grim expression on his face. “That’s a death sentence given by the holy guys of Islam. You don’t want one of those in your worst nightmare. It’s what that writer, Rushdie had put on him. Any righteous Muslim is supposed to kill a person with a fatwa laid on him, on sight. Tried, convicted, and executed in one fell swoop!”

“Shit!” exclaimed Russ. “So what we want to know is how EW manages these rescues?” Snow persisted, staying close.

The senior officer, now moving toward the door and home at a faster pace, glanced back. “Our agency wants the inside scoop on any subversive activity like this.”

“Subversive?” Russ Snow raised his thick black eyebrows.

Tidewater stopped in his tracks and gave the new man a penetrating glare, “Damned right, Snow. Somehow these women and often children along with them get expert false passports made, new identities, hustled from one country to another with impunity. Their husbands are completely stymied. Sometimes even parents of the woman are kept in the dark. It’s the process, Snow, the system. We wanna know their system.” The ugly man glowered. “What EW is doing is illegal. Don’t forget that in any ill-advised moments of kind-hearted, liberal, weak-kneed leanings, Snow. It obviates everything HS has in place and our agency don’t like it much neither. Hell! It borders on kidnapping.”

Snow got the message. Be very careful how he asked questions. Don’t give away his own feelings, ever. He smiled and bowed slightly toward his boss. “Well, such an ingenious system will offer me a real challenge. I look forward to solving your puzzle.”

The older man seemed mollified. “Yeah, you got a useful curiosity, guy. Keep it bridled, that’s all, saddled and reined in. Okay?”

“Sure thing,” said Snow.

Tidewater strode after the last of the secretaries toward the big security doors. As he was punching out, he called back to Snow, “Have me beeped if Ixey buys it. ‘ Cause if she does, we gotta make a move on the baron’s money. Okay?”

“Yessir,” Snow replied from across the room. He watched his boss go out, watched the big doors latch shut behind the last secretary and he felt a chill cascade down his spine. He went into his cubby and sat down at the computer. The material he’d gathered on Mrs. Bonnie Ixey still glowed on the screen. He was glad he had not succumbed to telling Tidewater that today had been Bonnie Ixey’s fiftieth birthday. It would have made Russell Snow seem just that much more a hated liberal. A softhearted wimp. A pussy of the first order.

The tall young man sighed. This was not turning into the job he’d imagined when he’d applied to get out of documents. True, the information-gathering department had taught him a life’s worth of computer search skills, but it was deadly dull. Most of it had been straight-out clerical work and of course, he’d been completely desk bound. He’d gone days in mid-December when he hadn’t seen daylight at all. He’d come to work at seven a.m. in the pitch dark and gotten loose around six-thirty p.m. when the darkness had settled in again. Certainly this was not a happy situation for a boy from the wilds of northern Minnesota.

When word had come down that he’d gotten the assistantship to Tidewater, everyone, including his former supervisor, had raved. Tidewater had an excellent reputation, or so the portrait had been painted. Adventure lay in wait for Russell Snow. But here, on his first day, he had already become genuinely discomfited. He knew it was due to the fact that his first real assignment, Mrs. Ixey, had, as of today, achieved the age at which a woman became an elder in his tribe and he, Russell Snow, might well have to stand by and report her assassination.

It was a truth that he was not the dedicated tribal warrior his Menomonee father would have desired, although Russ had gone to Harvard, as his Mohican mother had wanted. Russell Snow-from-Night-Sky was, in the eyes of the greater Iroquois nation, a shining example to the coming generations, which was the most important thing the greater Iroquois nation considered in judging people.

That he had chosen to work at the Agency didn’t go down well. His father had written it off as Russ’s wanting to sow wild oats. Russ had told his dad that the experience in the most complex information gathering organization in the world would assure him a job for the rest of his life. That part, at least, was true.

Russ noted that Mrs. Ixey had an e-mail address. Old lady’s up-to-date, he smiled. It was all he could do to keep his fingers from typing out a simple little message and sending it through some nondescript and anonymous source. As he pushed save and filed the information in the bowels of cyberspace, he wondered what he could have said? You’re in danger, watch your back, the ISF is after you? He reflected sadly that the chances of her believing such a message were very minimal. A woman her age, with her well-documented staid background, would hardly be able to come to terms with suddenly being the center of international intrigue.

Russ morosely decided to brave the nasty traffic and the miserable snowy weather and go home to his little house near the river. Whatever information might come into the office would be routed over his computer and sent to the one he had at home. He’d rigged that up last year so he’d never be out of touch with the Agency. For safe keeping though, he had established a security code to keep his own stuff private.

Of course, for tonight, this was all dependent on if the snow didn’t worsen and knock out power again. He sauntered to the big double doors, slipped his card through the punch-out clock, put in his code, and the latch on the doors clicked open. The cavernous long hallway was chilly compared to the offices. He bundled his down-filled, thigh-length coat around him and threw the hood over his head. He was glad he had kept the trusty old Land Cruiser.

Sture woke up feeling like he had a hangover, which was not true, not this morning. He was too stressed last night to have gone with his buddies into the small village of Norrkoping for beer and pizza. He would have been very poor company. And it was lucky he hadn’t. His father had called at eleven to tell him nothing could be done about the financial mess in Israel.

Just what the kid needed, Sture thought bitterly. Now he’d have to put off going into Stockholm until this afternoon, perhaps even until tomorrow. His autopsy lab results were all hanging on, waiting for him to arrive. His professor had to be notified that he wouldn’t make it to the lecture on child abuse trauma this afternoon and what the accounts department would say…! Damn! Why him?

The bedroom was chilly. They never kept much heat on in the castle and although the living quarters in this wing were tolerable, it still meant a brisk awakening. The six-foot six-inch tall, skinny lad stretched, looked out the window into the darkness through the beautiful lace curtains. Only this year had the centuries-old ones been replaced by some of more modern, washable material, but in exact imitation of the old ones which had been folded away safely in the vast attic with original furniture, paintings—God knows what all was stored up there. Even some weapons and armor, Sture recalled.

Icicles hung from the upper outside window frame and sparkled from the reflected light of his room and the lamps around the faraway stables. Snow, brittle and dry, blew in huge mounds across the balcony. Beyond, in the shadowy early morning darkness, below on what in summer was the broad lawn, deer and a couple of alg—the cow-size Swedish moose—picked their way along a deeply trodden, snow-lined path from the frozen river toward the barns. Winter-feed had always been available to the wildlife. Birds in great numbers came, as did the birdwatchers from all over Scandinavia. The predators came too: foxes, wild dogs and cats, stoats, weasels and naturally, what the estate was famous for, mink. Last week, Sven, the head groundskeeper and stable man had sworn he’d seen a wolf. There had been rumors in Sweden for the last five years that some wolves had returned, probably running over the Finnish ice pack straight from Siberia. Maybe. Maybe.

Sture could hear the brittle snow rustle like dried leaves along the balcony. He guessed it was near minus thirty-five degrees Fahrenheit out there with a wind chill factor of about sixty below. Normal for central Sweden in late January.

He buzzed for Gustav before slipping into warm underwear and sweats. He’d change into his polypros before he set off for Norrkoping. He dreaded the whole prospect of going into town, of going to the Pastorkirche. No different than any warm-blooded Swede, he despised the whole business of dealing with bureaucratic officials. Sture, like most Swedish fellows of twenty-two was still very much a kid, comfortable, well cared for, raised in a totally undemanding environment. He would only after college have to face the frantic workaholism of the grown-up Scandinavian existence, and university studies for someone of his status, an incipient Baron with lots of money, could go on for as long as he desired being a student.

Or so it had seemed three days ago. His father’s predicament, now Sture’s also, was quite rudely interrupting his pleasant lifestyle. He was putting on fuzzy slippers over heavy socks when Gustav knocked discreetly and stuck his grizzled head in.

“God morgan, ers nad. Vad will er?”

“Kom in,” Sture ordered. “Some breakfast first and then call around my car, I have to go into town this morning.”

“Jawohl, min herrevalde,” the ancient servant responded. Gustav had been more of an attending parent than his father, but then he’d helped raise his dad too. The ancient one handed the young man a woolen overshirt and reached to help button it and was brushed off by Sture. Gustav backed away politely and asked, “Do you wish to drive yourself or have Krister drive?”

“I’ll drive…” said Sture, by habit, and stopped in mid-sentence. “ No, have Krister drive. We’ll take the big Saab. It’ll be sure to make a better impression on those damned bureaucratic toads when I pull up in that.”

“Jawohl, min herrevalde.” The old man turned to go, thought a moment and said, “Urskulda mig, but were you not supposed to be back at the Karolinska Universitat today?”

“Yeah, I was supposed to go.” Sture grimaced, “More paperwork for Far’s estate must be done.”

“Aha, it must be important work for your father to interrupt your studies,” said Gustav with great deference. He bowed as he went out the door, “I will tell Astrid you wish breakfast? Ja?”

“Right, tell her I want a big breakfast. I’ll need the energy.” Sture went into the bathroom. All the plumbing had been added years after the castle had been built, meaning it was quite aged in and of itself. He and his father had the only two master bedrooms with attached baths, fully updated. The other rooms in this wing had to share a bath and toilet at the end of the long hall. The other wings of the castle had ridiculously small toilets and baths and Sture had once commented that hell would freeze over before the estate invested the huge sums needed to update all of that space. His father, on his way to somewhere else in the world, as usual, had absentmindedly agreed.

The recently installed, under the sink, little hot water cooker was functioning well this morning, giving him plenty of steaming water to wash with. He regarded in the cloudy mirror the attempt he was making to grow a beard like his dad had had at his age. He’d seen photos of the baron as a young man and he loved the swashbuckling appearance the bristled, thick gray-blond beard had given the senior Baron Hermelin. Oh well, Sture mused looking into his own icy blue eyes, it has only been a week. He tried not to be too disappointed. Perhaps it was because his hair was so red. He trimmed the edges and rinsed his face well, scrubbing his pink skin dry with a thick, cream-colored towel.

When he entered the hallway, he could smell from far below in the great kitchen, the wondrous odors of pancakes, ham, coffee, and his most favorite blabar syrup. Astrid had picked those blueberries herself last summer from the garden behind the castle.

As his foot hit the first step, he suddenly thought a most distressing thought. Pay…how were they going to pay the servants? Gustav, Astrid, the maids, Krister the chauffeur, Sven, and the stable hands…the only person he could think of who came for free was the postal worker, and in second thought, he or she wasn’t free either, really. Taxes, incredibly heavy taxes, paid the salaries and benefits of government workers. Surely there must be housekeeping money available?

Sture sighed deeply and slumped down the wide balustrade stairs. Generations of Hermelins had used those stairs, lords and ladies all. Portraits of them regarded the tall, skinny young Sture as he decided, on the second landing, that the attorney’s office, Person, Person and Alexanderslund, should come first, then the Pastorkirche. Maybe he could even browbeat Ms. Person into coming with him.

***

The vizier of the i-Shibl family compound was most polite, though Commander Yusef knew full well his soft words were an imperative invitation. The i-Shibl sultanate was of Shi-ite belief and thus, conservative to the point of being only one step removed from the believers who paraded their sacrificial urges.

Commander Gurgin Yusef hung up the phone and wondered with a headshake how Sheikh Sultan i-Shibl’s eldest daughter ever had been sent to France for schooling anyway. None of this bother would have taken place if the girl had been kept at home. The commander buzzed his assistant and called for a car to be brought around. If the sheikh sultan wanted him to check out the compound’s security, so be it. Gurgin Yusef suspected the real reason for the summons was the sultan’s desire to have this tough-looking uniformed commander lecture his daughter on decorous behavior. Which, thought Gurgin, picking up his belt with holster and gun and strapping it on, was like trying to corral the last camel after the others had been scared off by jackals.

His assistant, Faruq, knocked on the door before poking a head in to tell him the Hummer was waiting. Commander Yusef settled his hat on his head and proceeded on his mission. Faruq drove and made good time across the interminable sand and scrubland, arriving at the modernized outer security gate of the i-Shibl’s compound in under an hour.

The vizier, that is, the sheikh sultan’s number one man and major-domo, waited inside the outer gate. A huge man whom Yusef suspected of having some African forebears, the vizier bowed to the commander and walked alongside the camouflage-colored Hummer as they proceeded through the iron-barred inner gate. The numerous guards were well armed with Uzis. No problems with security here, Yusef harrumphed to himself. Yes, he was being summoned to lecture the girl. He knew it.

At the door of the palace, an obviously Asian servant jumped forward to open the Hummer door for the commander. As he stepped out, the vizier elbowed his way forward.

“Welcome to our home,” said the vizier, whose width equaled his height. This was a man of substance. His clothes were of finely woven cotton and silk, his pink-and-blue turban was of silk, he cut a fine figure. “If you will follow me?” His hand, every finger of which had a ring on it, waved forward and they went through the brilliant blue front door.

Commander Yusef was led from room to room, one cool hallway leading into another until he was quite turned around. His general sense was that they were proceeding north, that is, toward the back of the immense structure. The fittings of the rooms, the halls, made it very evident that this sheikh sultan had a substantial oil field on his property.

They crossed a lovely patio with a tinkling fountain and passed into a sizable room with a set of low Roman couches and chairs at the far wall surrounded by large pink-and-blue pillows. On one of the couches was Sheikh Sultan Rassid i-Shibl. He was much younger than Yusef had thought he would be, perhaps thirty-eight, but not more than forty. Slender, small, the sheikh sultan pulled his bright pink, embroidered topcoat vest down with a jerk to cover the top of his whitish-gold cotton trousers as he stood. This was a tense and unhappy man, the commander noted.

“How do you like my modest domicile so far, Commander?” asked the sheikh sultan.

“It is of inestimable beauty, your majesty,” he replied and cut to the chase. “Your security lacks of nothing that I can detect.”

The small man nodded. He was being told what he intimately knew already. “I would have you look at the back wall and installations before you leave. Vizier Rida will take you that way as you leave. Now, may we share coffee? Some breakfast?”

“If your majesty pleases,” the stocky commander bowed. He also realized the vizier had vanished. A silent, cunning one that fellow…

i-Shibl sent a servant scurrying and he himself sat in one of the low chairs next to a table, inviting the commander to do the same. Yusef pulled up a pillow and sat in front of the man, decorously making himself shorter than the sultan. He had not achieved the rank of commander without learning all the necessary manners around royalty.

The ritual of coffee and food was precisely accomplished. The servants were well trained. The preparation didn’t take long and the conversation remained on security, despite that moment’s acknowledgement of it’s being topflight already. Yusef noted as they conversed that i-Shibl had probably been educated in England, or at least in an English-speaking school. The man mentioned in passing his hobby of desert biology, in particular, the study of the small lichens that grew on the lee side of dunes where moisture would collect in minuscule quantities at night. That seemed to be the cue for a woman to appear.

The vizier brought her in. Despite her full covering in colorful dress and scarf, the commander could tell this was a woman in her mid-thirties and, he suspected, a very good-looking one. From the two strands of hair that peeked from her scarf, she could be seen to have dark auburn hair.

“My first wife,” said i-Shibl.

Neither man stood. The commander simply gazed past her, the polite thing to do. She lowered herself onto an uncomfortable chair on the other side of the large room.

“Jani,” said the sultan, “come closer.”

She got to her feet and approached to within a couple yards.

“This,” i-Shibl said, “is the reason for our daughter Zhara’s unruly behavior. When I was a very young man, attending the Birmingham University in England, I met Jani Felice McCreesh. Her father is an engineer from Ireland, her mother a Saudi citizen. I believed Jani had been happy to marry me. We had a good life until I came back here to take the rule after my father died. I thought Jani was fitting in well here. Then five years ago, as is the custom if the first wife can give no sons, I took a second wife. Jani insisted shortly afterward to send our eldest daughter, Zhara, to school and this woman chose a girls’ school in Paris.” The man sighed.

Commander Yusef, quiet and attentive the whole time, saw the slightest nod from Jani at the mention of the daughter. Ah, yes, i-Shibl was right, here was the cause of the dissension. Secretly, perhaps even unconsciously, although Yusef suspected not, Jani Felice McCreesh i-Shibl had converted her daughter to wanting more Western ways. This was becoming so common! Despicable, he snorted.

“You must tell your wife not to disobey the teachings of the Koran, my sheikh,” said the commander with as much concern as possible, “for if she has the wishes of the Western world in her heart, even if they are unspoken, even if she tries to keep them hidden, she will transmit them like a disease to her children.”

“So I have said many times,” the sheikh sultan responded with a meaningful look at his first wife. “I sincerely do not think she does it intentionally. Yet,” he put his hands into the air almost in supplication, perhaps of Allah, “I am partly to blame. I had a big-screen television put in the common room last year and it is hooked up to a satellite dish.” A note of bragging slipped into his voice, “We can pick up hundreds of stations, all of European satellite transmissions, all of ours and some of India’s. It is quite extraordinary.”

“Television alone did not make your daughter unwilling to be a bride,” was the commander’s rejoinder.

“Ah, you are right, of course,” sighed i-Shibl, motioning the servant to pour more coffee for himself and the old warrior.

Yusef accepted it willingly. This was a superior French espresso blend not usually obtainable by the likes of himself.

“I’m certain,” continued i-Shibl, “that being around boys, especially boys of European countries, and being unchaperoned and being in Paris, of all places…” this time he positively glowered at Jani i-Shibl who responded by looking away, far, far away.

The sheikh sultan, holding a tiny coffee cup in hand, stood and walked back to the chair he used as a dais. “Did you know, Commander, that Zhara has had the effrontery to say she wants to marry one of those boys? She will not tell us his name, but I happen to know he is French.” i-Shibl laughed cruelly, “Why, he is a commoner to boot. The son of a wealthy Parisian merchant. I am surprised,” he growled harshly, “she didn’t pick a Jew! There were a number of them at that school!”

Jani seemed imperturbable. Perhaps, no, definitely, she had heard this argument many times already. What must it be like, wondered the hatchet-faced old warrior, to be ripped from your Western world where women drove cars, voted, carried on as if they were men—why, often wore men’s clothing!—to be brought to the safety and security of a compound where everything was done for you, where you were cared for with all your best interests at heart? The commander smiled past the woman and said to her husband, “Do you wish me to have a word with your daughter?”

The objective of the visit being reached, Sheikh Sultan i-Shibl motioned to the vizier. “I am so delighted you would do that, Commander Yusef! Rida, fetch Zhara.”

Vizier Rida quietly nodded and slipped away.

“How is your wife, Commander Yusef, and your son?” i-Shibl asked in an off-handed remark.

“My wife is as well as can be expected,” he said, “she will go to Florida next week for her third cancer operation. My son will go with her.”

“Oh, I am so sorry to hear she is that ill. Please, give her my regards,” said i-Shibl, “and those of my wives.”

Zhara must not have been more than a couple rooms away because the big vizier reappeared with her in tow at this point. She was taller than her mother and most probably very distressing to her father being taller than her father. She was dressed in a long skirt made of stunning gold sari material and a white blouse with a scarf that matched the skirt. The scarf was not well wrapped, her eyes and nose and some of her reddish hair could be plainly seen. Yusef felt deeply embarrassed by her forwardness. Rida indicated for her to stand about ten feet away from the old warrior.

Commander Yusef stood and was inwardly dismayed to find the girl was only an inch shorter than he was. “Your father wanted me to have a talk with you. He wants me to remind you of the seriousness of your stubborn behavior.”

Her eyes flicked past him and gallantly remained staring at some distant carpet design on the opposite wall.

“I imagine,” Commander Yusef went on, trying to be kind in his very gruff way, “that you are aware of the penalty for adultery, and that includes the intention of an adulterous act?”

Her eyes flicked across his face, rudely, and instantly returned to their target on the wall. Yusef resisted the urge to slap her hard, although he bet her father had done it several times, or had had the vizier do it for him.

“I can only plead with you to consider your actions,” he continued. “Your marriage to Sheikh Sultan Mustafa Bayigani will assure you of a home, of a future, especially if you give him sons. He is one of the wealthiest landowners in Kuwait. He has the ear of many American governors. I’m sure you may get to travel with his entourage. I see no downside to your situation.”

Princess Zhara i-Shibl felt the bile rise in her throat. The image of the aged Sultan Bayigani was enough to make her gag, the mere thought of that man sticking his withered old penis into her made her want to throw up. She suppressed an inner painful, wrenching laugh. At eighteen, most girls in her circumstances, would have been long married, and if not, would not only still be virgins, they wouldn’t have the slightest notion of a penis, of sex, of how babies were made. In fact, Arab girls from these conservative families still bought the whole business of the woman determining the sex of the child. Ignorant fools, she swore under her breath.

Her father spoke up, loudly, “She was caught using the telephone last night, Commander. I want you to trace that call. I want to know with whom she spoke.”

Ah, the truth comes out, thought Yusef, the real reason he had been summoned here. “Of course, your highness,” he smirked. “I can do that with a mere call to the telephone company.”

The sheikh sultan waved a royal hand over the heads of the people in the room, stopping at his daughter. “You see, Zhara, nothing you do is secret! You watch out. I will catch your friends and I will have Commander Yusef bring them to trial just as you will go to trial if you do not behave yourself!”

Zhara nodded, solemnly.

“Hear me,” Yusef reproached her sternly, “your life is on the line. You can be executed. Do you understand that?”

She cast her eyes down and pretended shame. The rage she had felt as she had been dragged from her teacher’s flat in Paris, the all-consuming fire of desire for Emil, she struggled to keep invisible. She knew the passion of Juliet and she would have it no other way. Death was so much more preferable than being a slave. How could these men not understand?

The shaming went on for some time, until they got tired. She covertly watched the vizier lead the brutal old commander away toward the back of the house and, inwardly sighed relief at his parting company with them. When she and her mother were dismissed from her father’s presence, she grabbed her mother’s arm and the two of them scuttled down the hallway to the women’s quarters.

“Momma,” whispered Zhara, “don’t stay! Please don’t stay! Come with me when I go.”

“My dear, my dear,” her mother said softly, patting her beloved daughter’s hand, “how can I? It would make the hunt for you all the more intense. I want you safe. That is my only, only wish in life.”

As they took off their scarves and Jani her outer robe, Zhara said emphatically, “You know full well, Momma, that after I escape your life won’t be worth pennies. It will be just what second wife wants. She has the two sons, she has Father’s fancy, you are a fool if you stay. I can tell Haji…”

“Shhh!” Jani put a hand to her daughter’s mouth, “Never say that name in here. There are ears in the walls.” Jani hugged her daughter tightly. “I do wish you’d been able to hide away with that teacher in Paris. Oh, how I wish you were already safe.”

“Momma, I beg you, come with me,” Zhara felt the tears starting down her cheeks.

Her mother brushed them with her fingers and whispered, “Let me consider it, Zhara, let me think. I…only if they can assure both our safety.”

“That’s all I ask,” Zhara hugged her back, “think about it.”

Into her daughter’s ear, the mother whispered in the barest minimum of sound, “Who did you call? Not the haji?”

“Oh, blessed Allah! No!” Zhara laughed out loud. “I ordered pizza for me and my half brothers to eat while we watched The Empire Strikes Back.”

Her mom threw her head back and laughed with her, the laughter grew into peals of hilarity and like the cap off a bottle of shaken champagne, they giggled until they cried.

Zhara thought with a smile that she could never have been so foolish as to contact the underground through so traceable an instrument as the phone or over the computer. Her news would come by donkey boy, as if she were being held in the encampment of a desert king two thousand years ago. Sad, so sad, how little it’s changed. Saudi Arabia of today is little different from the testosterone-driven existence on the dunes of history.

As her and her momma’s laughter subsided, she reflected on how wonderful it would be to be shed of all these clothes, of this slavery, and to be in the arms of her beloved Emil.

Commander Yusef got his view of the back battlements and was happy to take his leave shortly thereafter. His thoughts went to the reports he was scheduled to give to two local men regarding catching the daughter of one and the wife of the other—two sisters—driving to town yesterday. Regardless that they were hurrying a sick child, a daughter, to the hospital, they should have had a man to do it. He wasn’t sure which had been driving. The hospital personnel who’d reported it hadn’t seen them get out of the car. So Yusef would be kind to the women, he would have them fully restricted to quarters, he would give their fathers and husbands heavy fines and make sure the child was well.

Yusef motioned to Faruq to get going. Sitting back, he pulled off his scarf and wiped the sweat from his head. After all, he thought, he could see the women doing such a chancy thing if the youngster had been a son.

Sound carries great distances in clear bitter cold and the brisk wind helped. Sture heard sleigh bells. He paused as he was about to get into the Saab and Krister, holding the door open, looked around also.

“Probably the Johannsons, my lord, exercising their Belgians.”

Sture nodded. “Bloody big beasts to keep in shape this time of year. Can you imagine the feed alone…” he ducked into the warm front passenger seat “…not to mention the combing and brushing and hoof trimming and stable cleaning,”

Krister nodded, taking the driver’s seat, “and it’s every day of every month. Where are we going, min herre?”

“To Norrkoping, to Person’s office.”

“Right, my lord.”

The Saab slid forward into the murky darkness and the special snow tires caught on the gritty drive. They were on their way. It was a little over six miles to the gathering of shops and schools called Ostby. They passed skiers, shoooshing along the lane and eventually, passed the four-in-hand huge brown Belgian horses pulling a large sleigh with the bright crystal lamps lit. Old Mr. Johannson was driving and Sture lowered his window to wave. The Belgians were dancing with energy, their breath sending clouds of steam along their backs. Their stable mate, a giant wolfhound romped alongside, seeming to enjoy the sub-zero chill.

Near the Ostby ICA food store, the only place for miles and miles where the local residents could buy supplies, Sture lowered his window again and Krister slowed the car.

“Hej da!” he shouted.

The very pretty Katrina, all bundled up in polypro and wool, paused in her long ski strides and her eyes, the only visible part of her body, smiled at him. Her Great Pyrenees dog, massive and white, bumped his muzzle into her. Sture could hear the old dog grumble as the sled he was pulling hit his hind legs. She patted the massive head and said something kind to him that was indistinguishable to Sture. She looked up at the Saab. “Come skiing with me this afternoon!”

“I must return to Stockholm!” Sture shouted back.

Her gloved hand waved a hopeless gesture at him. “You study too much, Sture Nojd!”

“Next week, Katrina, I will ski with you next week!” Sture assured her and let the window slide back up. The Saab moved along the lane, careful to avoid other skiers and dogs with sleds on their way to the ICA store.

“You should be more attentive to that young lady,” Krister admonished him gently, “or she’ll surely find another young man, my lord.”

Sture laughed. “You are quite right, but when will I ever get five spare minutes’ time?”

The lane ended at the intersection with the slightly larger road which led to Norrkoping and from there to the big highway which went east, skirting the shore of Lake Malaran, to Stockholm and west, up into the rolling hills, to Dalarna parish. From this point on, they could travel faster and the ten kilometers to Norrkoping would go quickly.

Traffic was fairly heavy once they reached the suburbs of Norrkoping and within a mile of the city boundary, the snow on the road vanished. The entire small city, all the buildings, under the streets, throughout the plazas, was heated by the steam exhaust from the big central electric facility on the tip of Lake Malaran about two miles south of the city. This warmth and lack of snow seemed a wonderful idea at the outset and certainly in the long run it was a lot cheaper than snowplows and individual heating units, but it brought a nuisance none of the planners had counted on—the drunks.

From all over central Sweden, the alcoholics who didn’t want to be shut up in care facilities, to which they were entitled, would arrive in Norrkoping along with the freezing weather and first snows. The police would get after them, though without much success because the vagrants would simply move from plaza to park to alleyway gratings.

Sture noted four men and a woman sitting, huddled, just barely visible in the pale lights of the steaming fountain in front of the attorney’s office. How, he wondered to himself, was it fairly easy to tell the difference between a male and a female although completely bundled up? The big Saab was parked near the café and after Krister had opened the door for him, then locked up the car, he hustled off to his favorite table for coffee and sandwiches. The bums held out their hands rather dispiritedly as he passed and he gave them nothing. Sture went around the other side of the fountain and avoided them.

Mr. Ingmar Person, the brother, was out, Mr. Alexanderslund was meeting with a client, and Ms. Inge Person, the clerk told Sture, would be with him shortly. Please sit.

He sat.

Inge Person, mid-forties, tall, blond, and regal in her sharply cut yellow suit appeared about five minutes later. She extended her hand to him as he stood. “I am so sorry about your father,” she said.

For a second, Sture didn’t know what she meant, then remembered that to all these people, Dad was dead. What a farce! he thought and answered, “Yes, yes. Thank you.”

“Come into the office,” she led him back and indicated a chair in front of her desk. “Isn’t there going to be a funeral? Or at least a memorial service?”

“Ummm,” Sture’s mind was racing, “well, I guess so, as soon as we can get the body out of Egypt. There’s still an investigation going on. You know how those countries operate.”

“What a shame!” The woman smiled consolingly at him. “What can I do for you this morning, Baron Hermelin?”

“I have to find a way to make sure there is money coming into the housekeeping accounts and into mine. I must pay the servants. I must pay my tuition at college.” He scooted forward in his chair and put his hands, clasped into fists, on her desk.

She nodded. “As soon as I found out about the Pastorkirche’s decision last week, I began gathering all the paperwork. So far, as I told you over the phone, I’ve not seen any way to undermine what has happened.” Glancing at his huge hands, she said, “I can understand your frustration.”

“I don’t think so,” the young man said firmly, “you don’t have an entire castle to run without the slightest idea where the money to operate it will come from. The National Swedish Historical Trust won’t cover expenses for our private wing, that’s for sure!”

“Did you get a copy of the letter the Pastorkirche sent to your father’s first wife?” She opened the rather thick folder containing all of the Hermelin affairs, probably back into the last century, perhaps earlier. Her father’s father had passed it on to her father who’d given the trust to her and her brother. Somehow, she had taken over most of the work for the Hermelins and Sture often suspected she had the hots for his Dad. Too bad, he thought through gritted teeth.

“Yes, I got it,” he replied almost in a snarl, “and I spoke over the telephone with the person in charge of doing all these investigations, someone named Miss Birgitta Algbak.”

“Funny name, isn’t it?” Inge Person allowed herself a chuckle.

“Hysterical.” Sture sat back in his chair and crossed his arms.

“I’m working as fast as I can, Mr. Hermelin,” said the attorney, “I’ve submitted all sorts of objections, I’ve asked for a probate court to give an opinion. I’ve sent an overnight letter to this Bonnie Ixey requesting confirmation on her end, I’ve sent for the original marriage certificate from the State of Nevada and all residence records from the state of California. I don’t know what more I can do!” She raised her hands in semisupplication.

“Why California?” asked Sture.

“That’s where they met, or so I understand, and where they lived together for several months until your father, under the name Carl J. Mink, got his green card. It was easier then, for an outlander to do that in the US.” She handed the reluctant Sture a photocopy of the form that documented Carl-Joran’s US green card.

Sture held it in his hand. “I’ll bet Dad didn’t even read this or any of the forms before he signed them.”

She shrugged. “Regardless, it’s still legal and so is the marriage certificate.” She dug out another form, glanced at it. “They were married in Las Vegas.”

“Is that a state?”

“Ha! Almost,” she laughed. “No, it’s a gambling city in Nevada, which is next to California, where people can go to get married in a hurry.”

“Sounds about right,” he muttered, “getting married in a hurry is a gamble.”

“So I’m not sure why you’re here,” she coaxed him, “or what you want from me.”

“Money.”

Her head went up, then down, her chin falling onto the fluffy cravat tied onto the top of her blouse. She said, “There is an open account for housekeeping, I told you that on the phone. There is your private account which was in trust and which came to you automatically. That’s to cover your college tuition. How are your studies coming, by the way?”

“Fine, fine. I graduated from Uppsala last summer and I’m studying medicine in the Karolinska Institute now.” He brushed the accomplishment aside and said, “What, exactly, does this first wife inherit? And how will it affect me?”

There was a long silence while Inge Person shuffled through the folder. She produced a sheaf of papers held together with a bright yellow plastic paperclip. “Mrs. Bonnie Ixey,” she read, “inherits all the estate, except accounts held in trust for the castle upkeep, your college expenses, and the organization your Dad was helping, Emigrant Women, which has a small Swiss account.”

“I had a call from…someone in EW,” began Sture—which was the truth, he had, “and they’ve not been able to access their money.”

“Ahhh,” she said, “that’s because the Swiss banks have a hold on the accounts until the Swedish authorities get a response from Mrs. Ixey confirming her acceptance of the inheritance. You see, the trust accounts are not of one certain amount. They get money from the accounts, which keep monies from the businesses’ and investments’ profits. So you and the castle can keep on running since they’re from Swedish accounts, but EW’s account is frozen until the Swiss banks get papers from the Pastorkirche that everything has been transferred.”

“Damn it!” swore Sture. “I know Dad wants, er, wanted EW to go on operating without any hiccough. It’s probably life and death for them.”

“You’re probably right. But there’s nothing I can do, absolutely nothing. The Swiss banks are a world unto themselves. Not even a Swiss lawyer could do anything for you or EW.”

Sture hesitated a moment before springing the real reason he came to her. Taking in a breath, he asked, “Would you come with me to the Pastorkirche to talk to this Birgitta Algbak?”

“Why do you want to talk to her face to face? And why have me come with you?” Her had been said with complete distaste.

“Because I don’t want to face her by myself,” explained the giant of a young man rather shamefacedly. “It’s devilishly important to find out what’s been done, how all this came about and if Algbak has any word from Mrs. Ixey yet. Come on, you’re supposed to be my advocate.”

Inge Person wrinkled up her handsome face. “I’ll charge you for the time, oh yes, I will.”

“Thank you, Ms. Person,” Sture Hermelin replied in mock ruefulness. “Let’s go.”

“I’ll get my coat.” Her sigh of resignation was heart rending.

As they exited the office, she gathered up a handful of kronor for the drunks and, although Sture tried to lead her around the other side of the fountain, as he had come, she went directly past them and slipped the coins into their outstretched hands.

When they had reached the Saab, Sture commented, “That’s illegal.”

“My own philosophy,” she said back, “I feel they have the right to remain free. Why should they be locked up in the winter if they don’t want to?”

“‘Cause they’re sick and they need to dry out,” Sture responded with the appropriate explanation. He knocked on the café window where Krister sat, drinking coffee, and reading the Dagbladet newspaper. He dropped the paper and jumped to his feet.

“We could walk,” Ms. Person said.

“No, we’re going to drive up in the Saab,” the young man insisted and when Krister opened the back door, he motioned the attorney in, before sliding in himself. “To the church offices,” he told Krister.

They drove around the block and down the boulevard that led over the twelfth century bridge into the part of Norrkoping that was much as it had been for centuries. Some of the wooden buildings, painted the traditional dark red, were in the exact spot they had been since the church, always the center of feudal towns, had been established in the ninth century. Archaeologists were finding that some of the huge oak logs, corner pieces of the houses sitting right on the river’s edge, had come directly from the hills around Mora far to the east in Dalarna, probably at the same time the church was being constructed. Only recently had the church, a beautiful example of an early Gothic abbey, been renovated, with the help of archaeologists, who managed to save authentic historic features, such as the ancient woodwork, the graffiti on the back walls drawn by bored parishioners in the back pews, and the uneven floor trod by so many feet.

The Saab drove past the freshly whitewashed, small abbey and pulled up at the office next door, which was fairly modern, built in 1920. They parked in a spot quite visible to the rows of lighted windows on the left. Sture and Ms. Person got out and trailed by Krister, who would wait in the lobby, they went into the small area where supplicants to the bureaucratic system could call for various officials. Sture filled out a little piece of paper requesting an interview with Birgitta Algbak. The secretary hurried away.

Minutes passed. White-haired women in business attire came and went from the front desk, collecting other attendees of the system. Finally, a chunky woman, most likely in her mid-fifties with pitch-black hair, so obviously dyed as to hurt one’s sensibilities, came to the desk. Half-lens reading glasses hung by a cord around her neck. In her hand was their little paper.

“Sture Hermelin and Ms. Inge Person?” her matronly voice croaked. The absence of a title before Sture’s name was emphasized.

Inge pushed ahead in her role as advocate for the Hermelin estate and Sture followed her through the desk gate, which Miss Algbak held open for them. They wandered along through hallways until they reached a tiny office where, as Miss Algbak sat, she motioned them into plastic chairs that had surely been designed for robotic imitations of humans, certainly not for a real human, in front of her desk.

“Why did you come here?” Her directness was accented by sliding her reading glasses onto her nose and peering over them as if examining a couple of bugs that had had the audacity to crawl into her office.

Inge sat on the edge of her uncomfortable chair and began, “We are requesting any update on the status of Baron Hermelin’s estate. We understand the Swiss accounts, which feed money into the trusts accounts, are locked up until word comes from the…” She almost said supposed and thought better of it, “first Mrs. Hermelin.”

A smile of majestic proportions filled the lower part of Miss Algbak’s face. The red lipstick she was wearing made it all the more grotesque. “Why yes, I imagine young Mr. Hermelin here would like to know when he’ll have money available to him.”

“It would be useful,” Sture glowered.

“Oh, your estate monies can be used at any time. Except for the household budget, most of that trust fund has gone into holdings by the Swedish National Historical Trust.”

Inge said, “That happened a long time ago. The entire west wing of the castle is a bed and breakfast for travelers and hikers and scientists visiting the Ostby area. What’s of much more urgent concern is the trust fund for the organization Baron Hermelin was working with…”

“You mean that group in Israel?” Miss Algbak’s smile became a half sneer. “The one helping battered women? Yes, that is too bad their funds are on hold, but there is nothing I can do until the first,” which was said with a severe tone and a told-you-so glance at Sture, “Mrs. Hermelin sends her forms back to us filled out and complete. Even then, legally, we are required to do a thorough check on her to make sure she is the correct person. This will be done after she’s come to Sweden and presented herself in person to this office.”

There was no doubt in Sture’s mind at that moment that Miss Algbak meant to drag this whole process out as long as was possible. “That organization is a very worthy one. You as a woman should be trying your damnedest to help.”

“I imagine you feel you are right, pys,” she responded insultingly by calling him a young twerp, “it is all a matter of opinion, and my opinion has always been that the family together is a much healthier way to live.”

Inge’s bottom was only barely on the edge of her chair. She was so frustrated she plunged ahead, “Regardless of your opinion, legally you must move forward with the paperwork as soon as the forms are returned by Mrs. Ixey of California, whether she is here in person or not. The Swiss banks will proceed with monies for Emigrant Women as soon as you acknowledge Mrs. Ixey’s assignment of the estate.”

“As an attorney of such good standing,” that also came out as an insult, “you realize we cannot be too careful in these matters, especially when this has all been such an unusual case.” Miss Algbak peered again over her spectacles, this time giving the attorney a piercing stare that would have fried lesser mortals than Inge Person who, being one of the only lawyers in the entire parish, had actually done a number of criminal trials.

“I’ll warrant your finding of Mrs. Ixey and her legitimacy of being the first wife, I’ll even grant your holding up of the accounts as proper until receipt of Mrs. Ixey’s credentials, but,” Inge fought back, “I don’t see why you have such antipathy toward an organization such as Emigrant Women.”

An enigmatic frown crossed Birgitta Algbak’s face, her body slumped back into her chair, not in relenting, rather in ownership. One bony, pale white hand slowly moved to point straight up in the air. “The baron has his lordship thanks to Swedish royal decree in 1546. The Hermelin money has come through the good graces of the Swedish people; it would seem only right,” the bureaucrat’s righteousness oozed, “that it be reinvested in Swedish interests. In this instance, he chose to invest in an Israeli organization. So we shall see…”

“It’s a bloody international organization which is headquartered in Israel for safety!” exclaimed Sture, furious.

“Sweden is a perfectly safe country for women. I’ve never heard any complaints.” Algbak’s pointing finger lowered and pressed upon the papers in front of her. “He should have founded it here.”

“Miss Algbak,” the attorney stated in her deepest voice, “Baron Hermelin was not the founder, nor does…did he have any administrative capacity with EW. It actually works through the auspices of the United Nations.”

“Not my concern,” said Birgitta Algbak and quickly changed the subject. “My particular goal is to help the Swedish government gain a way to reestablish tax rights on the Hermelin profits which heretofore have gone into Swiss banks.”

“Fy fan!” cursed Sture Hermelin jumping to his feet. “So that’s what’s up.”

Inge put a hand to his arm and tried to calm him. In a voice fit for telling a jury the truth, and nothing but, she said to Miss Algbak, “Almost every penny of the Hermelin wealth was made through investments in humanitarian enterprises in both Sweden and foreign countries. The baron was amazingly astute at picking starter companies, cottage industries, small ecologically oriented firms, and kicking them into full gear. Reindeer ranching in north Sweden, fish farms in Vietnam, medicinal pharmacology in the African jungle, a factory using hemp for building materials in Mexico, and every bit of that money is accounted for and taxed by the Swedish government.” Inge stood also, “No more, Miss Algbak, no more. I’ll fight you on this.”

Birgitta Algbak smiled sweetly up. “There is only one person who can make any changes in the way things are disposed at this present time.”

“That damned Mrs. Ixey,” grumbled Sture.

Inge Person’s pert blond eyebrows scrunched together, “Bonnie Ixey is an American.”

“No…wait!” exclaimed Sture. “Her father was Swedish. I remember seeing it on the copy of the papers Miss Algbak sent her.”

Birgitta Algbak nodded. “As soon as Mrs. Ixey officially registers in her Pastorkirche in Dalarna, she becomes a Swedish citizen.”

Inge’s whole body went rigid. “And her newly acquired holdings become taxable through death duties.”

Birgitta Algbak had a thoroughly smug expression on her ugly face.

“Let’s leave. It does no good to stay,” insisted Sture, pulling on his attorney’s arm.

“This does not end here,” Inge said grimly as Sture forced her out the door.

“Goodbye, my dears,” a self-satisfied Algbak responded.

The two collected Krister in the lobby and, each bundling up against the bitter cold, headed for the big car. It was a relief to be in the warm Saab.

“Back to your office, Ms. Person?” asked Krister.

“Yes,” she replied, then turned to her young charge, “what time is it in America, specifically in California?”

“You mean now?” he asked and shrugged, “I’m not sure.”

“Pardon me,” interrupted Krister, “it’s about nine hours earlier than us. My wife’s sister lives in Seattle. That’s the same time as California.”

“Drat. One a.m. That won’t do,” she reflected. “Sture, what say we give the first Mrs. Hermelin a call around four o’clock this afternoon? Catch her at breakfast.”

The Saab pulled up in front of the little café again. The drunks noticed and their expressions looked hopeful.

“Sure, why not?” Sture said. “What do we ask her?”

“When she’s coming over? What her decision will be on the funding of EW?” Inge continued more to herself than to the young man, “I’d like to find out if she understands all the implications of this. She may not have any idea at all!”

Sture Hermelin said, “You could well be right. I’m sure old moose’s behind didn’t tell her everything.”

Both Krister and Inge Person laughed at the translation of the bureaucrat’s name. Inge went on, “Perhaps that’s why the moose’s-behind biddy has it in for anyone with money and why she instantly hated me!”

“Why?” Sture inquired, puzzled.

“Her name!” Krister managed between guffaws. “Who could stand having the name algbak, moose’s back, without going crazy. Every kid in school must have called her algbakdel, moose’s butt.”

“Bakslug, that’s what she is! Underhanded, conniving…an algbakdel by any other name…” muttered Sture, remaining grim. “Okay, we ring Mrs. Ixey at four today.”

“I’ll set up a conference call from my office. You be near a phone in the castle. We have a date.” She hopped out of the big car, walked back past the drunks, and handed them some more coins.

It was as the big car was heading out along the highway at a higher speed that it happened.

“Dad?” came Sture’s voice over the phone, shaky and unsure.

“Yes, min son, what news do you have?” It was lunchtime in Haifa. Carl-Joran sat perched on the edge of the bed, phone to ear, Siddhu sat at the table cum desk. He had brought sandwiches from the Jewish deli and was unwrapping them. Halima Legesse stood near the balcony windows looking out toward the harbor.

“Dad, I know you want to hear about money,” Sture almost stuttered, “But…Dad, I know you’re in danger, but…am I? Now that you’re supposedly dead?”

Carl-Joran tensed. “What…?”

“The engine in the Saab blew up.”

“Blew up!” the exclamation, although in Swedish, made Halima and Siddhu look around at the tall Swede. “How? Are you hurt?”

“No,” said Sture, “only by the grace of God. Krister’s face and hands got burnt, not badly. He’s home now. The Saab’s ruined, Dad. The whole engine blew to pieces and caught fire.”

“When did this happen?” asked Carl-Joran.

“Two hours ago. The police came. They’re investigating. One of the officers told me he thought someone put sugar in the petrol tank.”

“Sture,” Carl-Joran was insistent, “you ask the police for the results of their investigation, and then tell me what they found. Okay?”

“Yes, I…I’ll do that.” The young man sighed deeply, “Dad, tell me the truth, am I in danger from some enemy of yours?”

“I don’t see why you should be,” responded Carl-Joran sincerely, “There’s no reason you should be. That’s why I became deceased. So, calm down. Thank God no one was badly hurt. Now, call our insurance company, they should give us a replacement car right away.” The frustration of everything as it was made Carl-Joran grit his teeth between words. “Did you talk to the Pastorkirche when you were in Norrkoping?”

“Yes. Ms. Person came with me. We spoke to an absolutely disgusting individual named Algbak.” Sture managed to laugh a little, it was harsh and bitter. “Old algbakdel wants to screw over our entire estate and make the government tax all our accounts for death duties. She’s managed to do a good job so far. EW is really stuck. Their account is held up until this Mrs. Ixey decides on the disposition of the accounts.” He went on to describe everything Miss Algbak had said and finished with, “Ms. Person wants to talk to Mrs. Ixey today, this afternoon, on a conference call.”

Carl-Joran agreed and added, “Perhaps Dr. Legesse also?” He looked around at the tall black woman who raised her eyebrows, puzzled at hearing her name in the Swedish conversation, “When are you going to make this phone call?”

“Four this afternoon…” Sture, his voice trembly, interrupted his own words. “Dad, are you sure someone isn’t after me like they’re after you?”

“I…” the father thought a moment, “I’ll have Habib check. It wouldn’t make sense to put a fatwa on you. There’s no reason. That’s why I became deceased—to stop such behavior.”

“What’s a fatwa, Dad?” Sture inquired.

“Umm, it’s one of those death sentences fanatic Muslims put on an enemy. Like they did to Rushdie.”

“Oh, swell!” Sture tried to joke and then went deadly calm. “Can you find out for certain I’m safe? Was the engine exploding merely an accident? Far, you go have your adventures, but I don’t want to get assassinated.”

“I’ll try to find out. Habib should have some sources he can ask. Okay?” Carl-Joran said firmly, working very hard to keep the fear out of his voice.

Sture sighed again. He was growing old before he had any desire to do so. “Well, Ms. Person will contact us as soon as she makes connection with Mrs. Ixey. Where should she call to get hold of Dr. Legesse?”

“Uh, at EW, that would be safest.” Carl-Joran felt terrible. He had not wanted this for his son. It must have been a bad coincidence, someone in Norrkoping who hated the royalty, such people did still exist in Sweden. No way did he want his only son to experience the constant anxiety, the looking over the shoulder, the nightmares that would surely come if it were a fatwa.

This was not what Baron Hermelin had planned five years ago when he offered to help battered women. Somehow he had neglected to consider that in helping the victim he must eventually face the perpetrators, which included the authorities that both condoned abuse and more often than not participated in the societal system that perpetuated the victimization of women. He had believed that he could have his adventures and Sture could peacefully pursue his medical studies. After forcing himself to relax, Carl-Joran said over the phone, “You be careful. You are my only son. I love you very much. I will try to fly home soon and deal with everything.”

“You mean you’ll be alive again?” Sture asked hopefully, “I sure hope so, this is a mess.”

“Let me discuss it here,” his father replied. “Goodbye, kille.”

“Adjo, Far.”

The big man clicked off the phone and pensively laid it on the nightstand. He glanced first at Halima Legesse and then at Siddhu Singh Prakash. In English, their common language, he said, “My attorney, Miss Person, will be calling Mrs. Ixey at four this afternoon. That’s five o’clock here. She’ll make it a conference call and that way, Halima, you’ll have a chance to tell Mrs. Ixey about Emigrant Women.”

Halima moved closer to the baron. “Did I hear the word fatwa in that conversation?”

Siddhu handed around sandwiches and between bites, the Swede translated for them what Sture had related.

“Your poor car,” said Halima. “It is, as you told him, only a bad coincidence. Surely.”

“Do you want me to call a meeting?” asked Siddhu.

Halima nodded. “Yes, at five. We can all listen to what Mrs. Ixey has to say.”

“I hope she’s home when we call.” The baron carefully chose one of his dirty sweatshirts from the floor and used it to wipe his mouth.

Cringing, Siddhu handed him a clean napkin. “When will you ever do your laundry?”

Completely unfeigned, the baron replied with the great disappointment an employer might have at an errant servant, “The maid should do it and she hasn’t.”

Siddhu, sandwich in one hand, used his other hand to gather up some of the soiled clothes. “You have to put these in a laundry bag, my friend, and set it in the hall.”

“When did they start that policy?” Carl-Joran asked. “I’ve been here a year and…”

The elegant Dr. Legesse put a hand to her forehead and pretending great exasperation, exclaimed, “Maybe you have a new maid! Do you know? Have you paid this new one extra?”

“I always leave tips for whoever the maid is,” said Carl-Joran perplexed at the suggestion he should be aware of which maid was which. He looked imploringly at Siddhu who had found a stack of laundry bags in the bathroom and had brought them out to show his big friend.

Registering the entreaty, he dropped the bags and raised his hands as if supplicating one of his Hindu gods for assistance, “I am so sorry that I do sometimes question why I must live this life.”

“I’m going back to the office,” muttered Dr. Legesse, “while you two men solve the really important problems of the world.” Shaking her head, she quickly departed.

“This is how you put laundry into the bags,” Siddhu instructed the baron and with his quick, efficient movements, he scooped one mound of clothes after the other from the floor and stuffed them into the long white bags.

As the massive Carl-Joran watched his friend bring order to the chaos of the hotel suite, a memory of another thin, bearded man who had been concerned for him many years ago crept, at first slowly, into consciousness. A man who had extracted the young Swede from a very scary situation in Nicaragua and dropped him on the coast of California. A caring man who protected him from the American immigration authorities and finally, in order to hide him from the overly zealous FBI, had gotten him a new identity by arranging a marriage to a plain little lady in the local resistance group. A delightfully cheery, sunny kid, half Scots, half Swede, named Bonnie Seastrand.

That brought a flood of images rising unrelentingly through the morass of his present-day thoughts: the taste of saltwater and the smell of low tide along beaches stretching from Morro Bay to San Simeon; the narrow roads winding through golden dry hills and skirting sheer drop-offs above the surf; the pelicans flying in strict formation on the wave crests; the dark and twisted pines on looming higher cliffs; the log cabin hotel in Big Sur in pounding rain with driftwood blazing in the fireplace, and the woman who had been his first love.

In fact, the emotion he felt surging up from his groin was more than the mere word love could describe.

Where had he hidden this feeling? Where had it secretly resided all these years? How could a person just lose so powerful an emotion and not miss it? Lust, affection, caring, and a kind of respect that bordered on adoration. The pain—oh, such pain! How that separation had ached when he had gone away and his question to himself was answered. He had kept it suppressed so deeply…so long…and the answer was spoken in a small, subconscious voice: because there had been an utter ripping of his soul when he was made to disappear that second time.

Carl-Joran, pushing this revelation to a safer internal place, regarded his Indian friend lugging one laundry bag after another to the door, five in all. Toby Hughes had been very much like Siddhu in height and weight. Toby’s beard was much shaggier and lighter colored. Where was that nerdy, bespectacled Toby now, Carl-Joran wondered, and what did he finally do with his life?