Gravel Heart(77)

Hakim said the last words with that same lingering smile then he rose to his feet and went to his desk. A few moments later Abdalla Haji appeared at the door, and after listening to Hakim’s softly spoken instructions, he escorted Saida downstairs. He too was smiling, and Saida guessed that he had known all along what news the Chief Protocol Officer intended to give her. As she waited for the car which Abdalla Haji had summoned to take her to the prison, she saw from the clock in reception that it was not yet eleven o’clock, so she had only been in the Chief Protocol Officer’s office for ten minutes, yet it felt like hours. A short while later she was back in the car and on her way to see Amir. The driver parked in front of the main gate of the prison and knocked on the wooden door. After a brief exchange with the armed guard who appeared at the small inset panel, Saida was allowed inside on her own. Another guard escorted her through a large dark hallway, which was cool and surprisingly tranquil, like the entrance hall of an old mansion. It was not what she had expected. She was directed to a small room containing a medical trolley and a small desk and chair. It smelt strangely. She guessed this would be the examination room when the medical officer visited and she thought the smell was the odour of anguish. So far she had seen no sign of the yard or the cells, or heard the groans of the prisoners or the angry shouts of the guards that her imagination had prepared her for. She expected to be searched, but the guard who accompanied her merely pointed to the chair and told her to wait there, then he locked the door on her.

When he came, Amir looked dishevelled, as if he had only just woken up, hair uncombed, shirt creased, eyes swollen, but otherwise he looked unharmed. His skin was unbroken, as Hakim had said. The guard pulled the door to without closing it and waited outside. Saida embraced her brother and asked him her anxious questions to which he replied reluctantly, aggrieved and petulant. She thought how like her father he looked, and how unlike him he really was, how reckless and demanding, how sullen. They sat in silence for a moment while she considered how to proceed.

‘What happened? Tell me what happened?’ she asked.

‘What are they saying happened?’ he asked.

She tried to gauge his tone of voice: suspicious, cautious, assessing how much to tell her. She had imagined her brother terrified and confused by his arrest, but he seemed alert in that familiar way of his, unravelling a small idea of his own, plotting.

‘I would have liked to hear from you first,’ she said. ‘Nobody is saying much, not even that you’ve been arrested. Only that you were picked up from the Coral Reef. We had to ask around … What happened?’

She saw the same calculating look on his face, assessing what she had said, deciding how much to tell. ‘Nobody has told me why I’ve been arrested,’ he said. ‘Two men came to the hotel and told me to get in the car. One of them had a gun,’ he said, his voice rising to an exaggerated pitch, but she heard its faked intensity as he played for time behind the appearance of drama. ‘They brought me here and put me in an isolation cell. I’ve been in here for the last two days and nights. It’s hell, the heat and the mosquitoes … using a bucket. Can you imagine that? The smell … I don’t even know what I’ve done or what they are planning to do to me. Nobody will say anything to me, not even you. Who did you ask? What did you find out?’

‘We were told you raped an under-age schoolgirl,’ Saida said briefly. After a second’s silence, Amir snorted derisively, disbelievingly. Saida continued: ‘The Vice-President’s youngest daughter.’

‘I did not … do such a thing,’ Amir said, dropping his voice to a whisper. ‘Who said that?’

‘Her brother Hakim,’ she said.

‘He came to see you?’ asked Amir, still whispering, his voice incredulous.

‘We went to try and see the girl’s father, to plead for you, but he is out of the country,’ she said. ‘How do you know these people?’

‘Not so loud,’ Amir said, nodding towards the partly open door. ‘What did he say?’

‘He plans to punish you,’ she said. ‘He is the one who ordered your arrest, and he is very angry with you. That was why I wanted to hear your side of this, to see if they had any kind of case.’

Amir shook his head. ‘Of course I did not rape Asha,’ he said. ‘I didn’t know anything about her age. I’ve met her a few times, and we became friendly. She came to a party at the hotel,’ Amir said and then paused to consider his words. ‘I did not force her. She came back to the hotel three times after that, looking for me. She wanted me to be her boyfriend.’

Saida nodded. ‘Her brother says you raped her and she is under-age. Apparently that is what Asha reported to him. Two crimes. Against her and against his family.’

‘No,’ Amir said softly, and ran his hand wearily across his face. ‘How can you believe such a thing? Of course I did not rape her. She came back to the hotel three times … it was her idea. She wanted me to show her a suite. It was her idea. How can you say such a thing?’ Then after a moment he asked: ‘What will happen now? How did you get permission to see me?’

‘Hakim arranged it,’ Saida said. ‘He wanted me to see that you are unharmed … yet. Do you know him? Is he another of your new friends?’

Amir nodded. ‘I know him a little. He is a hard man. He likes to be like that. Is there anything we can do? Did he say anything else?’