Allure of Deceit (8 page)

But he didn't need the lantern. An orange glow beckoned him. The intruder knelt before the stove, shoving an object into the flames. Sparks flared and hit the floor. There was a whiff of burning flesh.

Before Parsaa could cross the room, one of his sons emerged from the darkness, wrapping an arm around the intruder's neck and pulling the person to the floor with a thud.

A girl groaned and twisted to one side but did not resist.

Saddiq, Parsaa's oldest son, quickly removed his hands and stood, staring at the girl and then at the tongues of fire curling and swelling around the flat object in the stove.

Sofi approached, holding the lantern high.

Najwa. The girl had arrived in Laashekoh with other children, gathered by traffickers to be sold in Pakistan. Parsaa and American soldiers, with the help of Paul Reichart, had returned the children to their homes in a province just north of Helmand. But the men had never found Najwa's home. The other children did not know her and could not remember when she had joined the group. “She may have been among the first,” offered one of the older boys before leaving to reunite with his family.

The soldiers, the aid worker, and Laashekoh women had questioned the girl.

Sofi placed the lantern on the floor. She poured what was left of the day's water into a bowl, gathered clean rags, and began gently dabbing at the burns on the girl's hands. Sofi urged Saddiq to go outside and collect extra water stored in a large cylinder.

Parsaa examined the fire, poking at the object with a stick.

“It's a book,” Sofi murmured. “The one we were reading.”

An old copy of
The Historical Geography of Afghanistan
. It was too late to rescue the book from the flames
.

Najwa did not move and stared off to the side of the room with a strange expression, as if in a satisfied trance. Saddiq placed a bucket of water next to his mother, and she sprinkled drops on the loose bandages. Parsaa crouched next to the girl. “What are you doing in here?” he demanded.

She stared at Saddiq and then at Parsaa, before turning her head, trying to hide behind her headscarf. “I meant no harm,” she said softly. “I am awake now.”

The story was strange and short. Najwa insisted she did not know how she found her way into the house, let alone the bedroom. Parsaa asked Sofi to search the girl. His wife complied and found a
peshkabz
tucked in the roll of one sleeve. The knife's curved blade was honed to a vicious point and the handle was lapis lazuli. Sofi held it up wordlessly and then handed it over to her husband.

Parsaa told Saddiq to check his brothers. The group waited in silence until he returned and advised his father the other boys were fine and sleeping soundly. His father then sent Saddiq off to wake the family who had been keeping Najwa. Before long, Saddiq returned with Talibah, who was shaken about being woken in the middle of the night. She glared at Najwa, and Parsaa showed her the weapon. She shook her head.

“She must have brought it with her,” Parsaa said.

Bending over, Talibah struck Najwa about the head, shouting that the girl could not be trusted. Parsaa pulled the woman away. Still, Talibah refused to allow Najwa to return to the small room that the family had set aside for her, and Sofi nodded in agreement.

So others could feel secure, Parsaa locked Najwa inside a storage shed, along with plenty of covers, food, water, and a pot so the girl could relieve herself. Sofi promised to change the girl's bandages in the morning.

When Parsaa returned, Saddiq waited by the dying fire, staring at the thin layers of gray ash. The father placed a hand on his son's shoulder. “Try to get some sleep.” The boy looked troubled and turned away without a word.

Parsaa returned to the bedroom, where Sofi was straightening Komal's covers. His wife's hand lingered on the child's soft hair before she joined him under the wool covers.

“Do you think Najwa intended harm?” Sofi whispered.

Parsaa didn't think so. He wrapped his arms around his wife and reminded her that many women and boys carried knives for work.

“Perhaps Najwa grabbed the book to defend herself? Could she have been after Komal and changed her mind?”

Parsaa murmured that the girl reached for the book and not the child. “She was walking in her sleep.”

Sofi asked about the struggle. “But why didn't she wake up when you reached for her in the bedroom? Why did she rush to the stove?”

Parsaa couldn't answer. He agreed that it was strange.

“The girl is sneaky. You must take her away.”

“Soon,” Parsaa promised.

“The village women are angry,” Sofi insisted. “Tomorrow.”

After the disturbance, Parsaa and Sofi did not sleep well. Both awoke long before dawn, and Komal squirmed and whimpered soon after­­ward. The boys were still asleep, and Parsaa retrieved more wood for the fire, warming the kitchen, while his wife wrapped Komal snugly in a blanket and placed her near the stove.

Cold weather was coming, and the village could not keep a young girl inside a storage shed. Once again, his wife warned him that everyone in the village would soon hear about the girl wandering about at night and entering another family's bedroom. The village women would expect Parsaa to remove her quickly. If not, every misfortune would be blamed on Najwa.

They would not give her another chance.

The complaints were many. Since her arrival in Laashekoh, the girl had not spoken much, yet she exuded a boldness that was odd for a stranger. Neither the children nor the adults of Laashekoh trusted her or liked her. Most families refused to allow Najwa into their homes. The women prohibited letting her work alongside the older village children or caring for younger ones. They would not let her join them when cooking or washing clothes. Instead, they sent her to work in the fields for long hours alone during the day, and at night she cleaned the heavy cookware and beat rugs.

The girl worked hard and did not complain, though her eyes narrowed with angry judgment. She often lingered behind walls and corners, listening to conversations not intended for her ears. Najwa frightened the other children.

With her awkward ways, she truly seemed to be an orphan. Orphans were expected to work hard and save for the future, and for girls, that meant securing a good marriage, but Najwa lacked both a dowry and pleasant appearance. Slight in build, she was shorter than other girls her age, but she appeared older than her eleven or twelve years. Her hair was dry and uncombed, and her face was marked with blotches and a few old scars. Clenched teeth gave her mouth a stubborn edge, as if she anticipated disagreement. She could not see well and squinted even when directly facing others, as if she could not trust their words.

The commotion in the middle of the night confirmed the village women's worries. Najwa was trouble. It didn't matter if she was locked away in the shed, out of sight. Parsaa couldn't blame the women for wanting a return to normality. The village was burdened by caring for too many girls without parents. Najwa was one problem too many.

Once the fire was blazing, Parsaa reached for his wife's hand and pulled her to sit with him before she prepared the breakfast. Parsaa went over the options with Sofi, as Komal amused herself by chewing on a rag soaked in goat's milk.

Najwa was old enough for a marriage contract. The village could send her to live with the groom's family and wait for marriage. But few families would allow their sons to enter such a partnership—not without knowing more about her family background. Parsaa could provide a suitable amount for a dowry, but planning marriages took time. Families were suspicious about hasty arrangements that involved excessive sums. He should travel alone to make initial arrangements and negotiate as carefully as he would for a daughter. If he brought Najwa along during the first trip, the negotiators would understand that he was desperate.

Besides, her parents might have already promised her to a groom, and it was a crime to provide a girl already promised for marriage to another man. That could be a reason why Najwa was not eager to return to her home and parents. But then she wasn't keen on cooperating with the residents of Laashekoh.

Regardless of what the girl wanted, Laashekoh was too small to absorb strangers for very long, especially girls with no fathers, uncles, husbands, or brothers to watch over them.

Parsaa had wanted to keep trying to locate the girl's family. Paul Reichart, the aid worker who had helped return other children from the traffickers to their homes, had promised to investigate. Parsaa had also asked around at the market about families in need of a servant, but with no success. Most villages had plenty of children and did not need another mouth to feed. He thought about taking her to one of the larger towns and paying a fee so that brokers would find her a servant's position.

Sofi shook her head. “She won't be easy to place. They will send her back before the next full moon.”

He sighed. “It would be best for all concerned if we found her family.”

“Don't be foolish,” Sofi chided him softly. She no longer believed Najwa and her claims about not knowing the whereabouts of her own family. Many villagers had questioned her, and all Najwa could say was that she was from Qarya, a small village in northern Ghōr. But that was of little help.
Qarya
meant “small village,” and even the Americans with their maps could not locate the place. When asked to describe her home, Najwa rambled on about three hills nearby.

Most Afghan villages could count three hills nearby.

Parsaa had long advised villagers to keep asking questions and listen closely. Najwa had to remember more.

But her stories were vague, the details varying with listeners. She couldn't describe roads or waterways or markets with specifics. One day, she suggested her parents did not own their own land, and her father had left for long periods to do odd jobs. With another, she explained that her father left and vanished. Her mother worked in fields belonging to a family whose name she could not recall. Then, she talked about a mother near death after bearing too many children. Yes, she had brothers. None had attended school, and all had left to fight in wars.

There were no uncles, she told Sofi.

To the aid worker, she explained that her parents had lived in one village all their lives. With Parsaa, she suggested that her parents had moved about in Ghōr more than once.

When asked if she had already been promised to another family for marriage, all Najwa could say was she did not know.

Sofi interrupted his thoughts. “You have spent far too long searching for a family that may not exist.”

“The girl could be afraid to return.” Parsaa also suspected Najwa knew more about her background. “Perhaps they were cruel.”

His wife was impatient. “She does not show fear.”

“Why would a child lie?” He appealed to his wife. “Why would she act in ways that jeopardize her future?”

“Perhaps they wanted nothing to do with her.”

Women could be hard on other women.

Sofi poured more hot water and leaned close to his ear. “Najwa does not like us. She does not want to be here.”

“We cannot hand our problem to another village,” he said.

“She needs training,” Sofi agreed. “But that is no longer possible here.”

Parsaa asked about Najwa's skills with chores, and Sofi thought a moment. “As good as one can expect at that age,” she admitted. “Granted, the women have been hard on her lately. But she does what she's told.”

“Has Najwa stolen others' belongings?”

Sofi shook her head. “But she should not be near other children.”

He pulled a thread at the edge of the wool carpet. “Think about it,” his wife urged. “The foreign women came. They spoke loudly about offering rewards for finding orphans. And not long afterward, Najwa was in our bedroom. I fear she has picked up dangerous ideas.”

“She would abduct a child?” he asked.

Komal chortled from the corner of the room. The little girl tossed her rag and squirmed to escape the cover. Smiling, Sofi retrieved the toddler and returned to Parsaa's side. Time alone with her husband was rare with five children in the house and so much work.

Sofi tucked Komal between the two adults and placed her hand so the child could bend and play with the fingers. “I'm not sure she wanted just any child.”

They quietly played with the youngest sister of Leila. Parsaa worried about his wife's attachment to the little girl for many reasons. Komal's mother and her older sister, Leila, were serving prison sentences for trafficking, and after the arrests, Leila's sisters were divided among village families. The years would pass quickly. The child's mother could leave prison and retrieve her daughters. Raising another woman's child was like tending a neighbor's garden, and love did not ensure control.

Early on, Sofi and Parsaa had tried keeping a distance, but the child seemed so cheerful and content to be away from her sisters that it was unthinkable that evil pulsed through her veins. Perhaps Shaitan had overlooked the little one. Baby Komal was easy, watching Sofi as she worked in the fields, laughing and trying to keep up with the boys during the evening. The child did not complain or demand attention. If left alone, she fingered strands of grass or folded and refolded the edge of her
perahaan
, her eyes wide as if listening intently to conversations she could not understand.