The side streets of Danish Abad were packed with barefoot children chasing each other, hardly noticing the men who walked down the alley near the canal. A stream of water no wider than the length of a man’s arm, the canal drizzled through a ditch cut between the mud-brick houses stacked tightly together one upon the other.
The orphans who lived in Danish Abad knew that the canal was a necessity. A stranger would not be able to bear the overwhelming stench from it, and many of the locals would hold their hands over their nose to force themselves to breathe through their mouths as they passed by. Everything that the poor had no use for was dumped into the canal. Carcasses of dead dogs, punctured plastic jugs, and torn trash bags lined the banks. Rats were the only creatures that seemed to flourish there. They poured out of the pipes that constantly dripped green liquid into the countless tiny tributaries that fed the canal.
Most times of year the canal seemed to be an unfortunate trash dump, but it had a purpose. In the desert, once in several years, a colossal storm would come, and with it days and days of rains. The monsoon would turn the creek and canal into a raging wall of water. In a matter of minutes, the stream would turn into a torrent that poured over the banks and ripped through the mud-brick walls, sucking the orphans of the city into it. Without the canal, everyone and everything in Danish Abad would be pulled into the churning brown water.
The men in the alley had been here many times before, and they were being led through the maze of alleyways by a friend who had lived his entire life in the place. He had never left Danish Abad of his own choosing, and he’d returned a hero after his sole departure.
The Pakistani Taliban controlled Danish Abad. It was described as being lawless, but it was far from lawless. The Taliban set the rules. Those who disobeyed the Taliban’s laws suffered greatly. Only the week before, two men disobeyed the directions of Zulfiqar Mehsud, the leader of the Taliban in Danish Abad. Their real crime was that they hid some of their profits from burglaries on the other, more affluent side of the city. But they were accused of being spies for the West. The charge was convenient and their sentence simple. Their heads were cut from their bodies with dull knives as their screams turned to gasps and pleas, then gurgles, and finally silence. They didn’t die bravely. They died like the desperate men they were.
Yousef knew that the man who led them through the alley could be trusted. More important, he knew the village could be trusted. Especially since the release of the video. Now, even the urchin children and simple thieves, from orphans who lived in the culvert to backstreet pickpockets, knew to say nothing to outsiders about Yousef ’s arrival in Danish Abad. The law of the Taliban in Danish Abad now mandated that Yousef al-Qadi be protected at all costs.
Yousef and Umarov took the stairs on the side of the house to the second floor. The meeting would be short. They would never meet in the same place twice. The room had no furniture to speak of. Several of the men had laptop computers. They had their prayer rugs, they would remove their sandals, and then when the call came, they would turn to Mecca and pray. Then they would sit with their legs folded and plot and plan. It was an odd clash of old and new, prayer rugs inherited from grandfathers and wireless notebooks. It was in a room like this that the World Trade Center attack had been planned.
On the wall was a map. A black marker boxed in several provinces of eastern Iran, Afghanistan, and some of the western provinces of Pakistan. A thin thread of tribal cooperation and shared Muslim beliefs formed this state. It looked like an early colonial map of the United States. On the side of the map, a chart listed the governors and structure of each of the subterranean governments that ruled within this federation.
Yousef now stood in front of the map. “The true and perfect state. From this we will build a Muslim world.”
Yousef was not the only one in the room who believed, but he was, among the men, uniquely on edge. They had driven through the night and he had not slept now in more than twenty-four hours. The trip to Riyadh only added to the exhaustion. At least Danish Abad gave him refuge from the constant threat of Predator strikes when they were near the border.
I will sleep tonight.
“Samullah?” Yousef was speaking to Samullah Ullah, the man who had guided them through the spiderweb of alleyways. He was an officer of the Taliban. He was also a lieutenant of Al Jihad. If asked, he would say he worked with the IIRO, a charity worker helping the orphans of Danish Abad, keeping them away from the canal during the rains.
Samullah could be trusted for another important reason. He had a particular hatred for the Americans after spending five years in Guantanamo. Eventually they had released him, convinced that he only wanted to return to his simple farmer’s life. Again, they were wrong. He had kept his Koran from Guantanamo. The children of Danish Abad revered it, touching it like the holy relic they believed it to be.
Samullah was an asset for yet another reason. Guantanamo gave him a particular understanding of how the Americans thought.
“Tell us what you see.”
Samullah nodded. “The word is traveling. The tribes of the north have heard of your war with Abaidullah. They have heard of Spin Boldak.”
“Allah be praised.”
Yousef turned to Umarov. “It’s time we brought the battle back to American soil.” He rubbed his hands over his face in a prayer like motion. “The limp daughter of Danish Abad will change the world.”
Umarov knew when to say nothing.
“Samullah, your sister will serve us well.” Yousef paused. “This is good.” He smiled, suddenly reversing his thinking. “This is very good.”
Umarov gave him a quizzical look, but still didn’t say anything.
“Attacks on Islam. Dissent in the Saudi Council as anger grows against America. True believers everywhere are looking for someone to carry the battle flag. And, lo and behold, a London journalist is coming to meet with us in only a few days.”
Samullah and Umarov relaxed visibly, suddenly grasping what Yousef envisioned.
“We will have opportunity out of this chaos.” Yousef smiled at his map. “It has been a thousand years since Mahmud of Ghazni built his Islamic empire on these grounds.” Yousef took a black marker and outlined a new country that extended from the south of Iran, across Afghanistan, and into western Pakistan. “His empire was on these same lands. It was of the true faith.”
The other men in the room stirred, clearly feeling the elation, seeing the possibility grow before their eyes.
“As Mahmud the Great did a thousand years ago, on the foundation of the Koran, we will commence a battle cry that will cause all the tribes to unite. A holy war with a purpose!”
The men murmured in agreement, smiles widening all around the room.
“But first we must spread the word.”
Loud cheers now, from all in attendance.
“A holy fighter will rise, one who’ll rid your lands of the unbelievers. A mujahid to rid the land of unbelievers and expand the faith.”
The men repeated his words, and then cried them again in a chant.
And Sadik Zabara will be the one to introduce the world to the new mujahid.
CHAPTER 26
“An inopportune time.” The secretary finished his cigarette, the last of the pack of Marlboro Gold Touch, as he thought of Yousef. He stared at the empty pack before crushing it in his hand. As he inhaled, he twisted the gold signet ring on his little finger, stopped, removed the cigarette, and crushed it in the Rolls’s ashtray.
A nasty habit. He had picked it up as a teenager at the private school his father sent him to in Lebanon. The stretch Phantom’s windows were tinted extra dark, so as to ensure that no one would see him smoking. In Riyadh, it was forbidden. No one would question his smoking, but there would be talk. It was better to smoke behind the tinted windows.