The Gilgamesh Conspiracy (7 page)

Rashid woke up as the dawn sunlight shone into his eyes. They were on the Basra to Baghdad highway with a military escort up front and behind; two open jeeps with watchful soldiers carrying automatic weapons. The jeep out in front displayed the flag of a senior Baath party official and any slow-moving traffic shifted out of the way when the small convoy approached.

Heading in the opposite direction towards the border, Rashid saw military trucks with soldiers riding in the back chattering cheerfully and smoking cigarettes, their weapons propped on the floor between their feet. As part of his education Rashid had been taught about the Iraqi army’s heroic defence of their country against the Iranian invader in 1982 and its various exploits in the following years until the war finally ended. It was not until he went to Europe that he found out that the war had started when Saddam Hussein had ordered the invasion of Iran, but he was pleased that there was nothing false about the Iraqi army’s courageous defence of its homeland. However he had also learned that the Iraqi military had used chemical weapons not only against their Iranian foe but also against dissident sections of their own population. He blamed Saddam Hussein and his henchmen for that, and he reluctantly admitted that the jovial Hakim Mansour was one of those henchmen.

Now he wondered how the soldiers in the trucks would be able to defend their land against an army that could see in the dark and navigate effortlessly across the open desert. While in England he had learned that in addition to poison gas the regime had threatened to acquire biological and nuclear weapons and he was terrified at the prospect of his countrymen being involved in such a war.

‘Hey!’ Rashid turned round and saw Hakim Mansour watching him. ‘We’re going to stop at the next town for a minute. Stretch our legs, ok.’ Mansour smiled at him and Rashid nodded and forced a smile in return.

After they had bought some drinks at a café, Mansour lit a cigarette and beckoned Rashid away from the others. ‘Your parents are looking forward to seeing you. Ali told me it’s been eight months since you were home. It’s not good to stay away for so long.’

Rashid nearly said that his father had told him to stay in England until the crisis had passed but instead he declared ‘You’re right. It’ll be good to be home again.’

Mansour nodded. ‘I bet you were surprised when the Yankee colonel told you what was in that package, though, weren’t you?’ Mansour asked.

‘He didn’t tell me anything about it. He just told me I had been chosen as the messenger boy, someone whom you would recognise,’ said Rashid.

‘Oh yes, of course, but when you opened it and found out what was in it, you were probably shocked,’ said Mansour with a grin.

‘No, no,’ cried Rashid, feeling rather scared. ‘Colonel White told me that I was to hand it over to you with the seals intact. Which I’ve done! I’ve really no idea what it’s all about.’ He paused. ‘White said I would be shot if I opened it,’ he added.

Hakim Mansour stared at him for a moment, then smiled, then burst out laughing. ‘Shot! Ha, ha, ha. How ridiculous! Oh dear! These Americans!’ He clapped Rashid on the shoulder and led him back towards the trucks.

Rashid’s parents and his father’s parents were waiting for him at the family home. After they had embraced and exchanged traditional greetings, Ali Hamsin sat his son down. ‘I’m so pleased to see you, but it’s not safe in Baghdad. I really hope you’ll be able to get back to England before the invasion starts. I hope this interruption to your studies will not prove a problem.’

Rashid stared at his father. He had expected him to ask what he was doing here, why he had left England without a word of warning and how he had suddenly arrived in Baghdad as part of a military convoy. Then he noticed the worried frown on his father’s face; how both his parents seemed to have aged since he was last home. ‘I’m sure it’ll be fine. I expect I’ll be going back in a couple of weeks or so.’

‘Good, good. Now I’m sorry to be leaving so soon, but I do have some work to attend to.’ He glanced at the clock. ‘It’s at the Ministry, so a car will be coming to pick me up in ten minutes.’ He smiled and held Rashid by the shoulders. ‘It is good to see you again. You can tell me about your course, your life in England, when I return. How is Omar?’

‘He’s fine. He’ll be surprised when I tell him I’ve been at home.’

His father frowned. ‘Mansour told me to expect you, but I’ve no idea why you’ve made this strange journey. Maybe you can tell me everything this evening.’

The next day the family had breakfast together. Rashid had stayed up late last night with his parents explaining the extraordinary series of events that had brought him home. Ali’s advice was to never breathe a word about his journey to anyone else, which Rashid readily agreed to. Then they had chatted about life in England, the friends he had made and his university studies. His mother Tabitha had told him about his sister Farrah, now living with their relatives in Amman, and her prospects of marriage with the son of a family friend.

This morning his father was unwilling to tell Rashid about his own work, but he was pleased to discuss his university life in England, Shakespeare and the contrasts between Arabic and English poetry. ‘I have invited Professor Khordi to visit us this evening,’ Ali announced. ‘He wants to hear about his old friend Professor Gilbert, and to learn your latest idioms. He has always been proud of his grasp of vernacular English. I’m sure you’ll confuse him with your student slang and modern idioms,’ he said with a smile. He rose from the table and hunted about for the case of papers he had to take in to the ministry and hurried out of the door.

After breakfast Rashid spent some time looking through the books on his father’s shelves. Besides the collection of dictionaries, thesauri and encyclopaedias, his father had acquired a fair collection of English novels, both classical and modern and as he had hoped he found the novel “Heart of Darkness” by Joseph Conrad. He was required to hand in an essay to his tutor next month with his critique of the book. He took it off the shelf and began to flick through it to find the place he had reached when there was a bell from the outside gate and a loud knocking.  Rashid replaced the book and hurried out the front door and across the front garden and looked through the spy hole. A police car had pulled up outside and two armed officers were standing outside. Rashid unbolted the gate and opened it. ‘Yes?’

‘Are you Rashid Hamsin?’ asked the policeman, looking down at some papers and then at the bewildered young man.

‘Yes I am. Of course.’ He heard some rapid footsteps and Tabitha came up beside him.

‘What’s happening Rashid? Why have they come here?’ she asked in a trembling voice. ‘Has something happened to your father?’

‘We’ve just been told to bring Rashid Hamsin to the Foreign Ministry. There’s someone there who thinks he can help out with some kind of report,’ said the police officer. ‘I can’t tell you anything else.’

‘I’d better go then,’ said Rashid, trying for his mother’s sake to hide his anxiety. ‘I don’t expect I’ll be very long. Tell father where I am if he’s back home before me.’

His mother nodded and watched her son being guided into the back seat of the police car. She gave him a little smile and a wave as the car drove off and then closed and bolted the door. Then she shuffled back towards the house weeping anxiously, hoping that her son would not join the list of mysteriously vanished young men that was murmured about in the bazaars of Baghdad.

Rashid presumed he would be driven to Hakim Mansour’s office at the Foreign Ministry where he would be asked to describe his journey from England to Iraq in greater detail. He was alarmed when the car stopped outside an anonymous five storey office block. If he had known that the building housed a division of the secret police he would have been terrified; as it was he was merely apprehensive as the senior of the two policemen escorted him up the chipped marble stairs and into the building.

An elderly man stopped mopping the floor and stared at the new arrivals. He gave a slightly mad-looking grin and then continued cleaning the stained stonework while muttering quietly to himself. Rashid looked around; in one corner a policeman with a heavy moustache and broad cheeks sat at a table furnished with a telephone and a ledger. Rashid wondered if every minor official in Baghdad strived within the limitations of their physiognomy to look as much as possible like Saddam Hussein. The policeman pulled a ballpoint pen out of a breast pocket and opened the ledger. ‘So who’s this? Which exit will he be leaving from?’

‘That depends,’ replied one of his escorts. ‘If he behaves himself we’ll bring him out the front and take him back home. If he doesn’t…’ The policeman paused and slapped Rashid firmly on the back. ‘Well, maybe it’ll be the rear exit for him.’

‘Who’s he going to see?’

‘Rukan Khalifa.’

The policeman seated at the desk gave a broad grin. ‘Ah…so, could be out of the window then. I’ll mark him down with a large question mark. What’s his name?’

‘Rashid Hamsin.’

‘Take him through.’

Rashid presumed that the policemen were indulging in some ponderous humour with their talk of back exits and windows but he found it difficult to hide his reluctance as he was ushered through a pair of swing doors and into an elevator. The car carried them up to the top floor and he was led to a door upon which one of his escorts knocked.

‘Come in.’

The policeman opened the door and shoved him inside and then closed the door behind him. Inside the room was a table at which two men in military style fatigues were seated. One of them was small and dapper and he was smiling at Rashid. The other was large and grim faced. He merely pointed to the seat on the other side of the table. Rashid reluctantly sat down. ‘You are Rashid Hamsin?’ asked the small man.

‘Uh…yes.’

‘My name is Rukan Khalifa.’ He indicated his big colleague. ‘This is Tariq Kayal.’ The big man nodded briefly. ‘I will call you Rashid, if that’s alright?

‘Er…of course.’

‘Good!’ he said. ‘We once started questioning a man and he kept denying that he knew anything. We were all beginning to get rather angry, but then we realised we were questioning the wrong man. There were apologies all round.’ Rukan grinned at him. Rashid looked around the room. The walls were bare apart from a picture of Saddam Hussein. On the table was a clipboard with a ball point pen and a telephone. On the floor between the two men was a large briefcase. Rukan reached inside and pulled out a small tape recorder and placed it on the desk.

‘So, a few questions.’ Rukan smiled again.

‘I’m happy to answer any questions,’ Rashid offered.

‘Excellent. So tell us everything that happened from the day of the protest in London. Start with when you woke up.’

Rashid began to relate his story, haltingly at first as he saw the two other men staring at him. He glanced out of the window where a few wispy clouds were passing through the blue rectangle of the sky. He recalled more clearly the day he had spent with the English woman, and he described how he had been happy to invite her back to his flat.

‘So you hoped to screw the infidel bitch?’

Rashid was shocked by the sudden gross interruption and he looked in alarm at Rukan. He was smiling at him but the smile had an unpleasant sneering quality.

‘No. I just wanted to be friendly.’

‘Crap! You’ve been in England long enough to become a traitor to the Republic.’

‘No, that’s not true!’ said Rashid and he realised at last that he was being interrogated by the secret police. Rukan reached into the briefcase and slowly pulled out a length of electrical cable and placed it on the table. On each end were some big crocodile clips. Rashid realised they were a set of vehicle jump start leads. Rashid squirmed uncomfortably in his seat. He felt a sudden urge to empty his bladder.

‘You know that if you lie to us we will fry your balls so that you will never have the urge to fuck another woman.’ He paused. ‘Now tell us the truth. You wanted to screw the English woman.’ He picked up the forked end of the cable and waved it about.

‘Yes. Yes. I did!’ Rashid shouted. Rukan smiled at him.

‘Of course. Why not? She was an attractive woman, eh? Of course you did. Now tell us what happened next.’ Rashid felt his heart pounding in his chest and he tried to control his breathing and speak in a normal voice. He described how he had woken up as a prisoner and was taken to an unknown airport and on to a military transport and flown to Kuwait. He told them of his briefing by Colonel White and his journey across the desert under the watchful eye of Major Hansen and Dean Furness. Then he described how he had met Hakim Mansour and handed over the package that the Colonel had entrusted to him, and then their subsequent journey to Baghdad. Lastly he told them of the night he had spent at his parents’ house right up to the moment that he had arrived at the building in which he was now being questioned.

Rukan Khalifa listened in silence. Occasionally he made notes on the pad, sometimes he frowned or nodded briefly, but he never interrupted. When Rashid had finished he smiled at him once again.

‘Thank you very much Rashid. A very good, succinct account, and very well delivered. I have a few questions for you. What was in the package? What did you read?’ He looked up at Rashid and stared.