A Gentleman's Game (18 page)

21

Yemen—San’a’, Old City
9 September 0959 Local (GMT+3.00)

It was the first time
Sinan had prayed in the air, since the Saudia flight didn’t land them in Yemen until just before nine in the morning. When he’d finished his
ziryat,
he’d looked out the windows to see that the endless desert had transformed to ragged mountains, and he’d stared in delight at the view of San’a’ from above, the houses built tall on the high rocks, the minarets of the city’s more than one hundred mosques.

When they landed, they were met by an airport official who walked them, Kalashnikovs on their shoulders and carrying the Prince’s bags, past the long lines waiting for customs. An SUV awaited them at the curve, one of the Prince’s American-trained security men behind the wheel, and they climbed inside and drove the eleven kilometers into San’a’, to the Sheraton Hotel, where the other member of the Prince’s security detail had already booked them into their suites.

The first thing the Prince did when they reached the suite was point Sinan to the menu on the coffee table near the largest couch, the one facing the television.

“Order food,” the Prince said. “Whatever you want, lots of food. We’ll have a meal and then go to the medina to meet my friends.”

“Your friends?” Matteen asked.

“Men like us,” the Prince answered, disappearing into one of the bedrooms and then reemerging with a frown. “That one is for you two. I’ll take the room on the second level.”

Sinan nodded, opened the menu. He wasn’t hungry, though whether it was a result of the travel or the Prince’s company, he wasn’t certain. The resentment he’d been fighting had returned on the plane, as the three of them had sat in a cabin that could have seated eighty and instead held only seven, including four flight attendants who had been solicitous to the point of obsequiousness.

The menu was very Western, and Sinan scowled. Bad enough to stay in a Western hotel, but now to eat the food? There was alcohol available on the menu, and Sinan suspected that the Prince would want him to order some, but unless he was asked directly, Sinan wouldn’t do it.

The Prince came back down the stairs, apparently satisfied. “Not Mirabella, but it will do,” he told the two of them, then took the menu from Sinan and proceeded to make the room service order himself.

The meal came quickly, and Sinan was surprised at the Prince’s restraint. The meal was mostly fruit and rice, served with a local flatbread and hot tea.

“Lunch is the big meal here,” the Prince explained. “After we meet my friends, we’ll have lunch.”

Sinan nodded, ate another fig. The Prince was watching him with a grin.

“Your Highness?”

“You’re curious, I know. You’re wondering who these people are we’re meeting, why I’ve brought you two here with me.”

“I am curious, yes.”

“You know both of them, I have heard. One not well, but you have met him. The other, you know him well and have not met him.”

Sinan couldn’t hide his confusion.

“Before you came to my friend Abdul Aziz, you studied in Cairo.”

“Yes, I did.”

“You met this friend there, in Cairo. He told Abdul Aziz about you, and Abdul Aziz told me, and that is how you were chosen for the Hajj.” The Prince refilled his tea, chuckling at the look on Sinan’s face. “You should remember him. You made an impression on him.”

Matteen was dipping a piece of his
khubz
in some honey. “What about this other friend?” he asked. “Anyone that I would know?”

“Dr. Faud bin Abdullah al-Shimmari,” the Prince said. “Yes, I think you
should
know him, Matteen.”

Sinan gaped, and the Prince saw his reaction and laughed, then reached out and grabbed his right hand, giving it a solid squeeze of friendship. “Yes, I thought you might react like this. The doctor is a very good friend of mine. He taught me when I was in school, and I listened to his sermons all throughout my childhood. I have supported him and his work for years.”

“We’re going to meet the
imam
?” Sinan asked. “We’ll actually meet with him?”

“My business comes first, but, yes, you will meet with him, dine with him, pray with him, talk to him. You will enjoy his company as I have.”

The Prince released Sinan’s hand, chuckled, resumed his meal. He talked about past visits to Yemen, told them about the riot less than a year ago that occurred outside the Great Mosque on a Friday, after prayers. The faithful had been incensed at some news or other from Iraq, had poured onto the streets screaming Death to America and Death to Israel.
Jambiyas
had been drawn and blood had been spilled, and the San’a’ police had responded brutally to the unrest, killing four and hospitalizing dozens.

Sinan listened with half an ear, mind running with the possibilities of meeting Faud, trying to imagine what he would say to the great man, what questions he would ask of him, how best to make an impression. He wanted desperately to make a good impression, to receive Faud’s blessing.

It surprised him how much he wanted it.

•

A little before noon they left the Sheraton, taking the SUV into the Old City, kicking up clouds of dust with their passing. It was in the low eighties Fahrenheit, and the air conditioner kept them cool as they drove past the Qubbat al-Mahdi Mosque and dipped into the wadi, still dry enough to be used as a street, then onto Talha Street. Sinan caught glimpses of the remains of the city wall that had given San’a’ its name—the Fortified City—but he was disappointed to see that the segments still visible were made of stone and were clearly new patches, not part of the original mud that had made up the ancient fortifications.

The going was slow the farther they went, the SUV practically crawling through crowds at some points, and the guard who was driving was liberal with the horn, and with his gestures and curses. The Prince was uncharacteristically quiet, and when Sinan caught a glimpse of the man’s reflection in the side mirror, he thought he saw nervousness. It surprised him and once again made him reassess his opinion of the Prince. Clearly, meeting with Faud meant a great deal to the Prince as well.

They parked on the north side of the Great Mosque, and there were four other vehicles already there, all of them Toyota Land Cruisers like their own, and Sinan counted eight men standing by the vehicles, smoking and chewing
qat,
leaning on their Kalashnikovs. He and Matteen got out of the car, waited for the Prince to join them, and the Saudis in the group recognized the Prince, if not for who he was then for what he was, and they immediately offered him greetings, asking Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful, to watch over him. The Prince returned the courtesies in kind, and then the muezzin’s call crackled out over old loudspeakers, and all of them made their way to the entrance of the mosque.

Inside was as beautiful and sacred a ground as any Sinan had seen, second only to his visit to Mekkah. Along with the others he removed his shoes, setting them with his Kalashnikov in the growing pile against the wall. There were already some thirty or forty of the rifles there, and at least five times as many pairs of shoes, and once again Sinan rejoiced in the fact that theft was unheard of in places such as this. He listened to the voices all around him, the sounds of conversations ending as men turned their minds to worship. Once or twice he thought he heard women’s voices, but he could not see where they had entered, or where women would be going to worship. A mosque as old as this one would have clearly segregated areas, and his chances of encountering the women were next to none.

With Matteen and the Prince, he made his way to the ablution pool, cleaned himself in the water from the fountain. Again, he felt the comfort in sharing ritual with so many others, all of a like mind. Young boys ran past his legs, trying to catch up with their fathers, laughing.

They found places on the field of wool and silk rugs that covered the floor, facing the
mihrab
wall, facing Mekkah. Sinan felt a rush when he saw the old man at the
minbar,
black-robed and bespectacled, for it was Faud himself who was leading the congregation, accompanied by another man, similarly dressed but younger.

So Sinan prayed with Faud and a thousand others in the Great Mosque in San’a’.

•

There was an immediate bustle when
salat
ended, people moving with everything from reluctance to enthusiasm as they headed back to work, or to lunch, or to a thousand other tasks that needed attending. Sinan tried to keep an eye on Faud but quickly lost sight of him as he moved away in the opposite direction, disappearing into the mix of nooks and half-rooms that peppered the sides of the mosque.

The Prince saw him straining to look and grabbed his hand again.

“Soon, my friend,” the Prince said. “My business first, and then you will meet him.”

Sinan felt, for a moment, embarrassed. Not by the hand-holding—it was a Western bias that made the act of two men holding hands shameful; to Arabs, as he had learned, it was a sign of true friendship, and not at all an uncommon sight. Rather, it embarrassed Sinan that he was so nakedly eager, that the Prince could read him like a small child.

They made their way back toward the entrance, and one of the Saudis they had seen outside moved to meet them.

“Your Highness, His Eminence is hopeful that you will meet with him now. If I may take you to him?”

“Of course. I know his friend has very little time to waste.”

“Yes, I think that is the concern,” the man said. “Please, if you’ll come with me?”

The Prince turned to Sinan and Matteen. “If you wish to wait outside at the car, that will be fine. As soon as we’re done here, we’ll all go to lunch.”

“All of us?” Sinan asked, despite himself.

“Sinan! Have faith!” The Prince laughed, then moved off, escorted by the Saudi.

Matteen chuckled. “Careful, Sinan. You don’t want to be called
mushrikun.
”

Sinan shot him a glare. “That’s not funny.”

“It was a joke. You seem to have some hero worship, that’s all that I am saying.”

They sorted through the piles of shoes, finding their pairs, then recovered their rifles and put them back in place at their shoulders.

“His words speak to me,” Sinan said as he was pulling on his boots. “More than the others’, I don’t know why. From the first time I heard him—it was on a cassette, I bought it at the mosque I attended in London—it was like he talked straight to me.”

Sinan glanced at Matteen, to see if he understood. From Matteen’s look, Sinan guessed that he didn’t.

“Here,” Sinan said, and tapped his heart. “He spoke straight to here.”

“I’ve had enough of words,” Matteen said dismissively. “I’ve heard all of them before, Sinan, and if you last long enough, you will, too. The words become nothing in the face of the deeds. Remember that.”

“The words give rise to the deeds.”

Matteen gestured with his elbow, roughly indicating the way the Prince had gone. “And with him? With him, the words come in place of the deeds. Not even, they excuse his
lack
of deeds.”

“He acts. Without his money, where would we be?”

“He could give more money. He
should
give more money, and since when have you found it necessary to defend him, Sinan? I’ve seen you these past three weeks. There have been times when I’ve wanted to unload your rifle just to make sure you didn’t lose your temper and do anything stupid.”

Sinan hesitated, caught, and honestly a little surprised himself that he had been so willing to come to the Prince’s defense. They got to their feet again, stepped out of the mosque into the bustle and noise of the street. One of the guards from the SUVs offered them each a can of Coca-Cola.

“Allah, All Knowing, All Merciful,” Sinan said. “And being All Knowing, he knows what is best for each of us, how we can serve Him. We do not decide how best to serve, that is for Allah alone.”

“Perhaps some are not meant to serve at all, Sinan,” Matteen replied.

Sinan wasn’t sure, but for a moment, he wondered if Matteen was talking about him.

He turned away abruptly, opening his can of soda and taking a long drink. It was warm, and too many bubbles filled his mouth, and he was considering spitting it out when he heard shouting and laughter, and he looked back to the entrance of the mosque in time to see a woman in her veil and
balta
hurrying out and onto the street, arms folded over her middle, head down.

An old Yemeni man was leaning out of the doorway, the yellow
kuffiyah
on his head wobbling as he hollered at her.

“Your husband should beat you!” he shouted.

Matteen and a couple of the others laughed, then laughed harder as the old man stepped out onto the street, brandishing his
jambiya
at the woman. She continued on without glancing back, and Sinan was about to turn away when he realized that she wasn’t wearing shoes but black stockings. He stared, thinking he had to be wrong, that it was a trick of the light, but as she hurried along, he saw it again. Rushing without shoes over the dirt street, a hole had opened in the heel of her stockings, and the foot that was visible was white, as pale as his own had once been.

The sight shocked him forward a step, and then she had turned away again, weaving through the crowd and then around an ironmonger’s stand, vanishing.

“Addled,” Matteen commented. “She shouldn’t even be out alone.”

“Did you see that?” Sinan asked.

“Of course I saw that. Whoever her husband or brother is should beat her, the old man’s right. Letting her wander around alone like that—”

Sinan didn’t hear the rest, he was already running back into the mosque, and the panic he felt was such that he didn’t think to remove his shoes or drop the Kalashnikov. The Saudi who had spoken to them before was sitting on a rug near the fountain, reading his
Qu’ran.

“Where are they?” Sinan shouted. “Where are they meeting?”

His shouting drew attention, shocked the man, and he started up, pointing back toward the
mihrab,
in one of the shadowed corners. Sinan ran, hearing people shouting at him to take off his shoes, to show respect, and Matteen calling after him to slow down, asking what was wrong. Sinan didn’t stop, running through the pools of light that fell through the magnificent windows above, to the shadows of the alcoves near the back. He rushed from one to the next, seeing lone men prostrated in prayer or deep in study.