My Name Is Not Jacob Ramsay (39 page)

"I have the religion of a dog? Am I correct?" asked Michael.

"You are a spy, yes?"

"No," Michael replied.

"Yes! You are a CIA spy from Denmark!"

"Denmark? I've never been to Denmark. I've never been to Denmark!"

"Liar!" Hamid punched Michael in the face. "You live in Denmark. You insult Muhammad."

"No. I live in..."

"In hell! You live in hell."

Michael was about to respond, but sneered again instead.

"You find my words funny? You live in a funny hell? Yes?"

"It could be considered by some to be hell. What do you expect? It's South London," Michael quipped.

He felt as though he was in a half-sleep, like when he woke up in the morning. A dream-state, but not quite.

The Iranian curled his top lip, confused by Michael.

A guard handed him a scruffy, green exercise book. It looked like a child's school book, which had endured every possible weather condition. Gone were the days of "my dog ate my homework", this was more like "a terrorist organisation kidnapped my maths book, Miss." Battered, torn, dampened, dried out, faded and dirty. Hamid waved the book in front of Michael's face, aggressively and extremely annoyingly.

Michael scrunched up his face up and moved his head away.

Hamid pointed a dirty forefinger at an inkblot on the front cover of the book.

"I have this. This says you live in Denmark. It says you live in Luxor. It says you're a lying, fucking dog."

"It says all that?" mumbled Michael.

Hamid opened the book. "Here! Look! Your name! Ja... Jac... What is this word? Read this word to me." He put the book close to the man's face and Michael looked at the childlike block capital writing, penned in black biro.

"It says Jacob. The word is Jacob. It's a name."

"And this word. What is this word?" Again, the dirty forefinger waggled and pressed down into the book against another poorly practiced word.

"Ramsay. It's another name," said Michael.

"Say them together. The two words. Fucking say them."

"Jacob Ramsay."

"Jacob Ramsay. That is your name. Your name is Jacob Ramsay."

"No," replied Michael.

"Yes. Your name. It says so in the book."

"Then give me a red pen and I'll correct the book."

"A red pen? I stick a red pen in your fucking eye, you fucking dog! Your name is Jacob Ramsay. You live in Luxor and Denmark. It says so here. Look." Hamid once again pressed his dirty finger hard onto the paper and smudged the ink that said the words, "NAME: JACOB RAMSAY. ADDRESS: LUXOR ST NR DENMARK HILL".

Michael darted his eyes left to right, across the words. "Luxor Street. S and T stand for street. N and R must stand for near. Luxor Street is near Denmark Hill. Listen to me. I live in Luxor Street, in London, not Egypt. I've never been to Egypt. Luxor is the name of a street. Denmark is the name of a street. I have never been to Denmark. These are names of streets in London. The United Kingdom," explained Michael, frantically.

"Liar! You are lying, bro. You are a fucking lying, spying dog who spy in Egypt! You were in Egypt and started the revolution to get Mubarak out. You spy in Egypt and spy in Denmark and your fucking name is fucking Jacob Ramsay."

"No, it is not!"

Hamid punched Michael in the face.

Michael was punched in the face again and again. His nose and lips split and he fell to the ground with Hamid towering above him.

Hamid pulled him to his feet for Michael to stand once more.

Michael's lips bled and his eyes were glassy. He had a vacant expression and had the face of a heartbroken man. Beaten, distressed, weakened and messed, pale and bloody, dirty and muddy, angered yet hopeless. Don't give up, just don't give up, he told himself in the whispered voices of his loved ones.

Siamak rubbed his stubbled cheeks as he looked on with another Iranian man.

Hamid held the collar of the orange jumpsuit with his left hand and slapped Michael around the face with his right palm. He slapped him again and his eyes blinked and rolled to meet Hamid's.

"My name is not Jacob Ramsay."

Hamid dragged a metal chair along the cold, concrete ground in the bunker-type room where Michael was being held captive. The noise was equal to someone clawing their nails down a school blackboard. The metal legs squealed as they scraped across the stony floor. It just added to the eerie feel of the medieval, industrial style of the place.

It was days later.

Michael had newly-formed black eyes, featuring brilliant blues and yellows around his eyelids and cheekbones. He was forced to sit on the chair as an Iranian, with the Sony DSR-570WSP camcorder, moved his tripod to within a few feet in front of him, adjusting the equipment, setting up to film.

The interrogating Hamid stepped out of the shadows and dropped a smouldering Bahman cigarette butt to the floor. He stamped it out with the toe of his Italian-made brown leather shoe. He folded his arms, looked at the camera and then at Michael. He brought forth the stained and tatty exercise book from within his back pocket. He unrolled the book and opened it, pointing his dirty forefinger at some handwritten, scribbling, scrawling text.

"Arsenal is a football team, yes?" Hamid said.

"Yes. It's a football team," replied Michael.

"Arsenal Football Club. The Gunners?"

"Yes. The Gunners," Michael responded, wearily.

"They are successful?" asked Hamid.

"Very."

"They are a good team?"

"Yes. They're a good team. They're in the Premier League," said Michael.

"Why are they so good?" enquired the Iranian.

"They have lots of money and a good manager."

"Who is their manager?"

"His name is Arsène Wenger," Michael replied.

"Is he British? It is not a British name."

"He's French."

"French? You know him?" Hamid was curious.

"No," Michael sighed, weary of Hamid's questions, weary of life.

"You know football good?"

"No, I don't know football good," mocked Michael, with a slight touch of sarcasm.

"But you know Arsenal and the football manager good. You are telling me good answers, so you know it good," said Hamid, who stepped closer to Michael, creating a shadow in front of his feet, where he sat.

"It's pop culture," explained Michael. "Everyone knows a little."

"Pop? Pop music? We are not talking about pop music, bro. We are talking fucking football." 

"No, not pop music," Michael sighed and looked up to see the Iranian just a foot in front of him. "Pop culture. It's short for popular. It means-"

Michael suddenly received a slap around his face from Hamid, cutting short his explanation.

"I know what fucking popular means, bro. I fucking know what it means. You fucking understand? I know what fucking popular means."

"Then you should fucking know what I was fucking saying in the first fucking place, then you wouldn't have to fucking ask me so many fucking times." Michael wished he had responded that way, but he didn't, as it would have no doubt resulted in him being dragged to the middle of the room and shot in the head, or beheaded, or worse. Could there have been any worse than that? There was always something worse. Always. Michael was being tortured, traumatised, terrorised under extreme interrogation by people unfamiliar and foreign to him in a place equally as frightening and terrifying as those tormenting him. He wasn't thinking of a 'this could be worse' situation. This was the worse situation.

Hamid rubbed his cheeks with the forefinger and thumb of his right hand, rolled his tongue around inside his mouth, filling out his cheeks and gums, thinking as he looked at Michael. He looked at the exercise book and narrowed his eyes at the writing, as he had done many times before, perhaps finding it difficult to read. He showed it to Michael.

"What does this say?"

Michael looked at the book. He knew it was a pathetic copy of some of own writing from his Paperchase notebook, but he didn't have the energy to work out why. He squinted, however his squint was merely due to his bruised eyelids, which made it hard to see anything at all.

"It says "Woolwich"."

"Wool..."

"Wool-itch. Woolwich," corrected Michael.

"Woolwich is an army place, yes?" quizzed Hamid.

"How do you mean? What do you mean by army place?"

"Army place. Army place! Where army live. Where army work. Is Woolwich where army live and work?"

"Yes. Yes, Woolwich is an army place," answered Michael.

Footsteps sounded. They circled and stopped behind his chair. Michael swallowed and gulped, but he was swallowing hardly anything at all. His mouth was so dry and he was ever so tired. Weary, drained, tired of speaking, tired of breathing, tired of hurting.

He saw a flicker of silver, twisting in the dull fluorescents. A shadowed figure grasped Michael's right hand, yanked it back behind him and sliced his palm with the shiny blade of a butterfly knife.

Michael winced with pain, twisted in his chair, but the arms of another shadowed figure held him tight as the slicing man unscrewed the cap off a small bottle of Bell's whisky and poured it onto Michael's open wound. He yelled out in extreme discomfort.

Hamid grabbed an oil-stained cloth and suddenly rammed it into Michael's mouth. He locked his eyes onto a can of oil, reached for it and dragged it in one swift motion. Hamid poured the oil down onto the rag in Michael's mouth. The brown, goopy liquid seeped into the rag and down into Michael's throat.

He gagged and choked. Michael leaned forward and the cloth fell from his mouth to the floor.

"America will create more bad guys. You know that, don't you?" said Hamid.

Michael breathed heavily, in and out, ever so fast. He wrapped his bloody hand with the dirty cloth and pressed it tight. His eyes were wide and raging.

"It's about pipelines. America and their eff sake oil, huh, ma man? You know there is plan for Arab pipeline to go from Saudi Arabia? It was meant to go through Syria, but they cannot run it because of Assad. He is Iran and Russia's friend. You just wait, ma man. You just wait. Wait for the Big Apple Americans to create a new bad man. Already I hear of this. Bin Laden, Al-Qaeda, Islamic State International or the Incredible Hulk. All fucking bullshit, ma man. Just an excuse to attack Assad and lay down pipes for oil." 

"I don't know what you're talking about. It has nothing to do with me," said Michael.

"But you're wrong, bro. It does. You know Israel wants to take over Syria. It's all their plan, ma man. Israel want a Palestinian gas reservoir. It has a trillion cubic feet of gas. I know this. It's why they attack Gaza, ma man. To take their gas," Hamid chuckled. "All gas and oil, bro. Did you know Russia is main provider of gas to Europe? Effed up world, ma man." Hamid lit a cigarette with a cheap plastic disposable lighter and took a long drag from it. "You are in the army, you lying dog."

"No!"

"YES!" screamed Hamid. "Woolwich is an army place. You have been seen every day in Woolwich army place. You are in the army."

"I don't understand. Who saw me? Woolwich is a town, not just an army place!" responded Michael, trying to explain through quick, painful, tired breaths.

Hamid flicked open the exercise book and waved it around, as if it were a flag on Coronation Day. "It says everything in here. Everything you do. Every place you go. You go to Woolwich Arsenal. Explain to me what arsenal is, you Christian bastard."

"Arsenal is-"

"Yes, you know. You know it is a place for guns. It is a place for army. You know that Woolwich is army place."

"It's the name of the town. Woolwich Arsenal is the name of a town in London. South-east London," explained Michael dully.

The shadowed slicing figure grabbed Michael's hair, yanked his head back and exposed his bare neck and pulsing jugular.

Michael gritted his bloodstained teeth that exposed his bleeding gums.

Hamid the interrogator edged his face nearer to Michael's and eyeballed him, curiously.

"You know why I ask you about football and Arsenal football team?"

Michael couldn't answer as his jaw had been gripped by the dirty hand of the shadowed figure, behind him. He could only breathe heavier.

"I ask you about Arsenal football because why? Why do you think I ask?" Hamid smiled and formed a satisfied expression, as if he had just got one over his teacher or a parent or smart-arsed his way, cockily, through a TV quiz. "What does Arsenal football have on their clothes? What is their symbol?"

Michael breathed faster and louder while his Iranian captor and his big grin stared close at him. "It's a big gun, like the old American cowboys have, bro. You know that," said Hamid, as he slapped Michael's face and nodded to the unseen, silhouetted figure holding his head, instructing him to let loose his grip. Michael rotated his jaw around and rolled his eyes upwards.