Ayesha’'s Gift

I had researched the death of Kelly Stafford in Burnley, scouring the records for any mention of local taxi driver Ibrahim Rahman. But it was a historical case and beyond the newspaper reports there was little to go on. I rang the Burnley police, who wouldn’t or couldn’t comment. The officers who worked on the investigation had left the force and I didn’t have enough time to go looking for them in their bungalows and retirement homes. I thought about raising it again with Ayesha – I wondered if she too harboured suspicions of her father and if this were the reason for her fear of what our probing might unearth. But I decided against it. We were about to spend a lot of time in each other’s company and I didn’t want the atmosphere to be any more difficult than it already was.

I didn’t tell her what Aled had said about Mohammed Asif and the UF. There seemed little point in further inflaming matters. I went to the Pakistani High Commission in Lowndes Square and got my tourist visa. We booked flights to Karachi with an open return and made a hotel reservation for the first ten days of our stay. We agreed we would see how events played out before deciding how long we would need to be there.

Our flight was booked for 9 a.m. on Thursday. On Tuesday evening Tom emailed to say that his mental health tribunal, the psychiatric assessment that would determine his fate, had been fixed for the following afternoon, Wednesday. But there was a lot to do in the day and a half before I left for Pakistan; I emailed to ask if he would be okay without me. His reply was reassuringly unequivocal.

Thanks, Martin. You definitely do not need to come tomorrow. I am certain the tribunal will go in my favour and they will let me out. I have spoken to all the doctors and they confirm I am completely safe. I have a good Mental Health Advocate who says he cannot see anything going wrong. I am so looking forward to getting back to my own home.

I am really grateful to you for all your help, for supporting me and for liaising with Tara and the children. I just want to tell you that the hug you gave me before you left last time meant a very great deal to me xx

Thank you, Tom. I haven’t done much except to keep the conversation going between you and Tara, but I think that is the most important thing at the moment, yes?

I love you, bro, and I want things to be good for you.

Martin xxx

I packed for the flight with a fretful heart, waiting for the news that would stop me going. On Wednesday evening a text pinged on my phone. I knew it would be Tom telling me his application had been refused.

Ayesha and I had agreed to meet at check-in so we could get seats together, but I was early and went to get a coffee in the airport terminal. I was at the cash register when my phone rang.

The options flashed before me. I knew the right thing to do; I should cancel my trip and go to rescue my brother. But other thoughts crowded in.

‘Okay. Where are you now, Tom? Can you find a café and sit there until I ring you back?’

I called Tara but there was no reply. Tom picked up as soon as I rang his number.

‘Listen, Tom. This is some cock-up. I have to get on a plane to Karachi. Could you go and stay with Rick Taylor tonight? You’ve probably got no money, right? So here are the Internet codes for my bank account.’ I read them out to him. ‘Take as much cash as you need. If this isn’t sorted by the weekend and you can’t carry on imposing on Rick, you should go and see Rob Butcher, the estate agent who sold Mum and Dad’s house. I’ll ring him and say you might need a short-term let. You can use my bank account for the deposit and the rent. When I get back from Pakistan we can figure out what to do about a longer-term solution. In the meantime, don’t drink, Tom. And please don’t do anything foolish, okay?’

Guilty and anxious, I rang Tara again but there was still no answer and the flight was closing. At the desk I asked if Ayesha Rahman had checked in and if I could sit beside her, but the Pakistani Airlines clerk shook his head. ‘You’re the last passenger, sir; there’s one seat left and it’s in the last row.’

I looked for Ayesha in the departure lounge. The boarding process was chaotic. I couldn’t spot her. The gate was manned by PIA staff, I was the only white face and 450 Pakistani travellers were besieging the exit. Precedence seemed to go not by row number but by subtle gradations of social rank that are invisible to non-Pakistanis. People pushed and shoved; all struggled to board first, but there were fiercely proclaimed levels of self-perceived importance. Elderly gentlemen of military bearing and smartly dressed businessmen harangued the ground staff demanding to be let on first, demands that were usually complied with. Once on board, families manifested their standing by displays of gold jewellery, by shouting, argumentative children and by the loudness and rudeness of their complaints to the air stewardesses. One man berated a steward because someone’s case was in the luggage bin above his seat. The steward offered to place the gentleman’s bag in an adjacent locker but was rebuffed. The dressing-down continued, imperious and audible to the whole cabin, until the steward pleaded with the owner of the offending case to be allowed to move it.

The seats next to mine were occupied by two young Asian men. They were in jeans and T-shirts and addressed each other in what I took to be Sindhi; when they spoke English it was the slangy, dismissive argot of young British Pakistanis parodied by Ali G. They looked at me, I thought, with suspicion; there was no attempt at conversation.

After take-off I went looking for Ayesha, who was seated further forward on the other side of the plane. Judging by her smile I evidently looked relieved to find her. When I got back to my seat lunch was being served. The two young men had lamb curry on their trays, but the stewardess offered me the choice of Pakistani or English food. I asked what the English dish was and she said ‘Chicken Forestière’. One of the young men sniffed. ‘That’s a bit racialist, isn’t it? She didn’t ask us!’ It was unclear if he was joking or serious, or to whom the remark was addressed, but I tried to lighten the mood. ‘You’re right. And what’s worse is that the English food is actually French . . .’ They didn’t smile. I decided we weren’t going to have much in common.

An hour into the flight an announcement came over the Tannoy, in Urdu then in English. ‘If there is a doctor on board, please would you make your way to row fifteen.’

I looked to see if anyone was responding and was surprised when the man on my right tapped my shoulder.

When they returned they told me an elderly woman had fainted but been revived with a glass of water and some deep breathing.

‘We weren’t even needed; there were four doctors there already. That’s Pakistan for you – endless supplies of qualified medics . . .’

My preconceptions were confounded. Conversation flowed. The men were brothers and both were doctors, the elder a GP in Bradford, the younger a surgeon at Leeds General.

They had been born in Yorkshire and were thinking of emigrating to Australia, where there was a shortage of young doctors and pay and climate were considerably better.

I asked where they were travelling to and they said they were going to visit their parents. Their father had decided to sell up in England and return to his roots by building a house to retire to in the Orangi district of Karachi.

‘But isn’t Orangi meant to be dangerous?’ I asked. ‘I mean, I’ve heard a lot of bad things about it . . .’

‘Karachi’s the most dangerous city in Pakistan, and Orangi’s the most dangerous part of Karachi,’ the brothers said, laughing. ‘At least it is if you don’t come from there. It’s overrun with criminals, Taliban and terrorists. But we know the place and our parents live there, so we’re okay. Where are you heading for?’

‘Well, eventually I have to go to a place called Kahin Nahi. Do you know it?’

‘Yeah, sure. And you were calling Orangi dangerous! Good luck in Kahin Nahi, mate!’

Four hours into the flight, the older brother asked again if he could get past me. I expected him to go to the toilet, but he took out a mat from his rucksack and laid it on the floor. With the aid of a pocket compass he aligned himself with Mecca and prostrated himself to pray.

In the passport queue at Karachi, the brothers complained about the squalor, the smell and the chaos.

‘It’s so third world. God knows what Westerners must think when they come here for the first time. This country could have a massive tourist industry – there’s so much to see and so much history – but the Pakistanis can’t get their act together. Wait ’til we get to customs. There are queues for everything, the luggage always gets lost and nothing works.’

Ayesha appeared as we were waiting for the bags, spoke to the brothers in stumbling Urdu then laughed and switched to English as we said goodbye. In the crowded arrivals hall we found our driver and set off into the smothering heat of Karachi’s fieriest summer for twenty years.

CHAPTER 19