Fara came in. Siesta time was over. She greeted Jane respectfully, looked at Chantal, then, seeing that the baby was asleep, sat cross-legged on the ground, waiting for instructions. She was the daughter of Rabia’s eldest son, Ismael Gul, who was away at present, with the convoy—
Jane gasped. Fara looked inquiringly at her. Jane made a deprecatory motion with her hand, and Fara looked away.
Her father is with the convoy, Jane thought.
Jean-Pierre had betrayed that convoy to the Russians. Fara’s father would die in the ambush—unless Jane could do something to prevent it. But what? A runner could be sent to meet the convoy at the Khyber Pass and divert it onto a new route. Mohammed could arrange that. But Jane would have to tell him how she knew the convoy was due to be ambushed—and then Mohammed would undoubtedly kill Jean-Pierre, probably with his bare hands.
If one of them has to die, let it be Ismael rather than Jean-Pierre, thought Jane.
Then she thought of the other thirty or so men from the Valley who were with the convoy, and the thought struck her: Shall they all die to save my husband—Kahmir Khan with the wispy beard; and scarred old Shahazai Gul; and Yussuf Gul, who sings so beautifully; and Sher Kador, the goat boy; and Abdur Mohammed with no front teeth; and Ali Ghanim who has fourteen children?
There had to be another way.
She went to the mouth of the cave and stood looking out. Now that the siesta was over, the children had come out of the caves and resumed their games among the rocks and thorny bushes. There was nine-year-old Mousa, the only son of Mohammed—even more spoiled now that he had only one hand—swaggering with the new knife that his doting father had given him. She saw Fara’s mother, toiling up the hill with a bundle of fire-wood on her head. There was the mullah’s wife, washing out Abdullah’s shirt. She did not see Mohammed or his wife, Halima. She knew he was here in Banda, for she had seen him in the morning. He would have eaten with his wife and children in their cave—most families had a cave to themselves. He would be there now, but Jane was reluctant to seek him out openly, for that would scandalize the community, and she needed to be discreet.
What shall I tell him? she thought.
She considered a straightforward appeaclass="underline" Do this for me, because I ask it. It would have worked on any Western man who had fallen in love with her, but Muslim men did not seem to have a romantic idea of love—what Mohammed felt for her was more like a rather tender kind of lust. It certainly did not put him at her disposal. And she wasn’t sure he still felt it anyway. What, then? He did not owe her anything. She had never treated him or his wife. But she had treated Mousa—she had saved the boy’s life. Mohammed owed her a debt of honor.
Do this for me, because I saved your son. It might work.
But Mohammed would ask why.
More women were appearing, fetching water and sweeping out their caves, tending to animals and preparing food. Jane knew she would see Mohammed shortly.
What shall I say to him?
The Russians know the route of the convoy.
How did they find out?
I don’t know, Mohammed.
Then what makes you so sure?
I can’t tell you. I overheard a conversation. I got a message from the British Secret Service. I have a hunch. I saw it in the cards. I had a dream.
That was it: a dream.
She saw him. He stepped from his cave, tall and handsome, wearing traveling clothes: the round Chitrali cap, like Masud’s, the type most of the guerrillas sported; the mud-colored pattu, which served as cloak, towel, blanket and camouflage; and the calf-length leather boots he had taken from the corpse of a Russian soldier. He walked across the clearing with the stride of one who has a long way to go before sundown. He took the footpath down the mountainside, toward the deserted village.
Jane watched his tall figure disappear. It’s now or never, she thought; and she followed him. At first she walked slowly and casually, so that it would not be obvious she was going after Mohammed; then, when she was out of sight of the caves, she broke into a run. She slithered and stumbled down the dusty trail, thinking: I wonder what all this running is doing to my insides. When she saw Mohammed ahead of her she called out to him. He stopped, turned and waited for her.
“God be with you, Mohammed Khan,” she said when she caught up with him.
“And with you, Jane Debout,” he said politely.
She paused, catching her breath. He watched her, wearing an expression of amused tolerance. “How is Mousa?” she said.
“He is well and happy, and learning to use his left hand. He will kill Russians with it one day.”
This was a little joke: the left hand was traditionally used for “dirty” jobs, the right for eating. Jane smiled in acknowledgment of his wit, then said: “I’m so glad we were able to save his life.”
If he thought her ungracious he did not show it. “I am forever in your debt,” he said.
That was what she had been angling for. “There is something you could do for me,” she said.
His expression was unreadable. “If it is within my power . . .”
She looked around for somewhere to sit. They were standing near a bombed house. Stones and earth from the front wall had spilled across the pathway, and they could see inside the building, where the only furnishings left were a cracked pot and, absurdly, a color picture of a Cadillac pinned to a wall. Jane sat on the rubble and, after a moment’s hesitation, Mohammed sat beside her.
“It is within your power,” she said. “But it will cause you some small trouble.”
“What is it?”
“You may think it the whim of a foolish woman.”
“Perhaps.”
“You’ll be tempted to deceive me, by agreeing to my request and then ‘forgetting’ to carry it out.”
“No.”
“I ask you to deal truthfully with me, whether you refuse or not.”
“I shall.”
Enough of that, she thought. “I want you to send a runner to the convoy and order them to change their homeward route.”
He was quite taken aback—he had probably been expecting some trivial, domestic request. “But why?” he said.
“Do you believe in dreams, Mohammed Khan?”
He shrugged. “Dreams are dreams,” he said evasively.
Perhaps that was the wrong approach, she thought, a vision might be better. “While I lay alone in my cave, in the heat of the day, I thought I saw a white pigeon.”
He was suddenly attentive, and she knew she had said the right thing: Afghans believed that white pigeons were sometimes inhabited by spirits.
Jane went on: “But I must have been dreaming, for the bird tried to speak to me.”
“Ah!”
He took that as a sign that she had had a vision, not a dream, Jane thought. She went on: “I couldn’t understand what it was saying, although I listened as hard as I could. I think it was speaking Pashto.”
Mohammed was wide-eyed. “A messenger from Pushtun territory . . .”