The Second Saladin

there.”

“What bus? Tell me of this bus.”

“Jack, back way down. Take a cab rent a Hertz car, ride the train or the subway. Man, stay away from me.”

“You must help.”

“No way, Jack.”

Ulu Beg shoved some money at him. “Here. Show me. Show me.”

“Jesus, Jack, you must be hungry.”

It was a small place, tucked away in an obscure old section of the city. He memorized the route, returned late the next night. The neighborhood was quiet then. He waited across the street, watching in the shadows until he was sure the place was empty. Then, at last convinced, he ran across the street and hid in the back another ten minutes. Occasionally a car rolled by, and once a police vehicle crept down the alley, but he lay still until it passed. He stood finally and tested the door, which did not give to his effort. He’d expected nothing else. He moved to the window and examined it carefully.

“Bars you’ll see right away. But look especially for wire. Everybody in America has wires connecting them to the police or to alarm bells, because in America everybody steals from everybody all the time.” He was beginning to see that they were very cynical about America; they hated it. But their vision of it was usually correct and their counsel well taken; he always obeyed. “In the window, along the edge of the glass, the wires. It’s a small place in a poor part and they probably can’t afford anything fancy. But in America, who knows? A salesman may have come along and sold them something fancy. It happens all the time in America. There may also be a dog. If so, it must be killed immediately.”

He looked again at the window: no wires, nothing.

He reached into his pack and pulled out a short-bladed knife. He leaned forward and — expertly, as he had been taught — inserted the blade in the slot between upper and lower windows. It was so easy. He worked the blade to the lock quickly and nudged the point against the lever of the lock. Twisting and shoving the blade, he got the lock to move — it fought him for just a second, and then popped free. He withdrew the blade and quickly lifted the window.

He listened for the yapping of a dog. Only silence. He looked each way in the alley; it was empty. From the open window a current of warm air rushed toward him, carrying a familiar range of odors with it. But he could not pause to admire them; he tossed in his pack, and followed.

He lay on the floor, letting his eyes adjust in the dark. A splash of light from the street cut across the floor. It was a simple room, with a few tables encased in cloths, their chairs stacked atop them. Ulu Beg moved swiftly across the floor to a door on the other side and came into the kitchen. It smelled largely of strong industrial soap, but even under this blinding American smell he could pick out the familiar: scents of lamb and chicken, of falafel and grape leaves, of honey cake, spinach and cabbage, kibbe cakes, mint, other spices. It all felt good in his nose and the temptation came to tear open the cupboard, but he didn’t; first, because the longer he stayed, the more danger he was in, and second, because to yield would be to admit how he missed what he’d left, how the grief at losing it cut so very deep.

He moved swiftly. He opened his pack and there, under the wrapped Skorpion, removed a tin.

They had explained it to him very carefully.

“Americans, who live in vast houses, aspire to more primitive things. They cook over coals, like hill people, and think this makes them rugged and vital. You may buy the fluid by which they light their coals anywhere for a dollar without suspicion. It’s less volatile than gasoline and less pungent; it is, quite simply, perfect.”

He opened the linen cupboard and squirted the fluid into it. He moved through the kitchen, squirting rapidly. He could smell the fumes filling the air in the dining room; he doused the curtains and sprayed patterns on the walls.

Then, with a match, he ignited the curtain. The flames spurted in one hot instant, billowing up with a crackling hiss, filling the room with light. He winced in the power of the blaze, watching it go from one puddle to another, in each unleashing a pool of flame that splashed through the room.

He stood for just a second by the window; he could see half a dozen fires in the room, each feeding and leaping. Two joined to become a single larger one; then a third joined in. Through the door of the kitchen he saw bright flames.

He hoisted himself through the window, feeling the air cool and sweet in his lungs. It seemed to him that once in a battle against the Iraqis he’d been trapped in a burning building. A memory of encircling flame came to him, but he could not remember how or when. He only remembered the same joyous feeling as the cool air hit him.

Gripping the pack tightly, he cut down two alleys and was on a far street when he first heard sirens. A police car rushed by, light flashing.

Another thought came to Ulu Beg and he rationed himself one more bitter smile: for had not Jardi once made a prophecy? Some day, Jardi had promised, you’ll burn Baghdad. You’ll burn it to the ground.

As before, Jardi was right.

Ulu Beg turned and walked more quickly into the night.

28

They could see a Ford parked outside the shack.

“That’s it,” cried Roberto. “That’s their car.”

Trewitt grunted uncomfortably.

“Now go shoot those guys,” said Miguel.

“Just a minute,” said Trewitt. He looked about in the twilight and saw nothing, no policia, no other humans. It was the quiet hour in this slum. Usually there were chickens about and goats and children and old ladies and tough young men. But up and down the crooked little lane he could see nothing.

“Use that gun.” coached the younster. “You got a fifty-dollar gun. Go up there and shoot those cocksuckers.”

This kid was really beginning to get on Trewitt’s nerves. Sure, use the gun. Who do you think I am, kid, G. Gordon Liddy? An immense bitterness settled over Trewitt. His options were so bleak. It was not fair.

“Sure,” the older boy now, “go on, shoot those shitheads.”

“You just don’t go shooting people,” Trewitt instructed. But his thoughts were beginning to focus on the pistol, for there seemed no other place to focus them. He sure wasn’t going up there without it. A crappy little Beretta, probably fifty years old, older than he was, a veteran of the Abyssinian campaign, where he was a veteran of nothing beyond several libraries.

“You better do something fast, mister.”

“I know, I know,” said Trewitt, who did not want to do anything at all, much less anything fast. “Maybe we ought to wait,” he said, through a sudden accumulation of phlegm in his throat.

Both boys looked at him. How did he ever get stuck in this anyhow, with an ancient pistol and two kids?

“Okay, okay,” he said.

The sun, a huge orange ball, a grapefruit, rotting and opulent, descended behind a line of sleazy blue and gray hovels.

“You better do something, mister,” Roberto said.

A scream rose from the house. They could just barely hear it.

Trewitt reached for the pistol, and found that it had worked its way around until it was almost in the small of his back. He plucked it out of his pants with two fingers. He looked dumbly at the thing, oily and ugly and squat. He couldn’t remember if it were cocked or not. His mind was empty.

“I think somebody just got killed,” said Roberto.

Trewitt finally remembered the principle of the automatic pistol and threw the slide with an oily klack, ramming back the hammer. A perfectly fine cartridge spun out of the breach.