The Collaborator of Bethlehem

“None of us will survive except Allah,” the policeman said. “Let’s go.”

Chapter 11

The wind drove cold through the open sides of the jeep. The policemen hunched their shoulders inside their parkas. One of them made his teeth chatter loudly to amuse the others. From the front seat, Khamis Zeydan turned and silenced his men with a disapproving click of his tongue. Omar Yussef shivered in his tweed jacket. He almost regretted the coat he had left with George, but he could stand a little chill for a short time if it made his friend more comfortable in that bare cell.

The freezing drive to Irtas seemed to go on forever. In the time it took the jeep to leave Bethlehem and cross the hill to the Abdel Rahman family’s house, Omar Yussef felt that his mind raced a distance ten times further. Who could have killed Dima Abdel Rahman? He felt sure her end was connected to that of her husband. It occurred to him that Louai’s killing might perhaps not even be linked to his status as a resistance figure. If Louai had died at the hands of the Israelis for his actions against them, Omar Yussef couldn’t see how that would lead to Dima’s murder. Even if they targeted him as a terrorist, they wouldn’t care about his wife. Only if Louai were killed in some criminal conspiracy did it seem possible that his murder would also bring this girl into the compass of death.

Omar Yussef rubbed his hands and blew on them. He grabbed the side of the jeep as a sharp corner threatened to toss him from the bench. It was as though the sudden bend snapped his mind into a new channel. The road sloped down toward the valley of Irtas and Omar Yussef could see the Abdel Rahman house and the glade where he had stood with Dima, and then it hit him: it was because of him that Dima died. Someone had seen her talking to him. Someone noticed her gesturing toward the spot where Louai died and telling the story of how it happened. The cause of her death could be that she had talked to Omar Yussef.

Nauseating pain gripped him in his guts. Wedged between two policemen on the benchseat of the jeep, he wanted to sway side to side in grief. Had he killed her? His stupid ideas about investigating Louai’s death and saving George Saba had only accomplished the death of an innocent girl. He closed his eyes and saw himself in his classroom making a joke, and Dima was laughing. She was such a pretty girl, with a serious face, which was only more beautiful when laughter crossed it. In that way, she reminded him of his granddaughter Nadia. What would he give now to be back in that classroom listening to Dima reading aloud her homework paper on Suleiman the Magnificent, rather than bouncing down the hillside in a police jeep to see where she died? He heard her voice, deep and gentle even when she had been a child, telling him about her husband’s death, and he wondered what the last words had been that she spoke in her precise, intelligent diction.

Khamis Zeydan turned to his squad and issued orders to cordon off the Abdel Rahman house, as the jeep reached the floor of the valley and sped toward the murder scene. When he sat back, his eye caught Omar Yussef’s for a second. It scared the schoolteacher, because it was such a severe, intent, dark glance.

Omar Yussef watched the police chief. Perhaps no one had seen him with Dima at the mourning tent after all or, if they did, no one thought it suspicious for an old teacher to console his former pupil. Who had Omar Yussef told about that conversation with Dima? Who knew that she had told him about “Abu Walid”? He felt confused. He thought he had told his son and his wife, but he couldn’t quite remember. The only person he was sure he had told was Khamis Zeydan.

The police chief looked back at him again, but Omar Yussef glanced away immediately. Could it be that his old friend had betrayed him? Had Khamis Zeydan informed Abu Walid that Dima was able to incriminate him? If so, that meant the policeman knew who Abu Walid was. But why would he tip him off? It wouldn’t have been the first time Khamis Zeydan was involved in a double game. He had followed his people’s leaders all over the Arab world and Europe, assassinating rivals, murdering innocent people who got in his way. I was, for many years, what the world chooses to call a terrorist. Yet this was worse. This was his old friend Omar Yussef whom he had betrayed.

The jeep pulled into the field outside the Abdel Rahman family’s home. The officers piled out noisily, stamping their feet to get their bodies moving again after the cramped ride. Khamis Zeydan distributed them around the house with a clap on each shoulder and the point of a finger. He reached up to help Omar Yussef down from the jeep, holding out his prosthetic hand in its tight black leather glove.

“I can get down myself,” Omar Yussef said.

Khamis Zeydan turned and strode toward the family, which was gathered by the cabbage patch in front of the house. Omar Yussef stepped stiffly off the back of the jeep and landed awkwardly on a clump of grass that disguised a small rock. His ankle twisted. He shook his foot and grimaced. He followed Khamis Zeydan and noted that his friend seemed to move with greater power now that he was on an operation, in command. Or perhaps he just seems stronger now that I believe he played some part in the death of an innocent girl. She may even have died while I was in his company this morning.

One of the policemen went to the glade where Louai had died. He stood sentry over a lumpy object covered in a white sheet. Omar Yussef stopped. That must be Dima’s body. He choked on a gulp of bile and coughed to get his breath. He turned his eyes to the ground, but he swayed, dizzily. He looked up at the gray sky and spread his legs to steady himself. He breathed deeply until he felt able to follow Khamis Zeydan.

The police chief was listening to Muhammad Abdel Rah-man describe how his daughter-in-law’s body was found. The old man went silent as Omar Yussef approached and stared suspiciously at him with his black eyes, but Khamis Zeydan told him to continue.

“I awoke for the dawn prayer and found my son Yunis downstairs. He told me that he saw something through the window. We came out to look, and over there, we found her, just where her body remains now. We put a white sheet over her. From the position in which we discovered her, I believe some sex pervert must have killed her.”

“Did you see anyone else?” Khamis Zeydan said.

“No one. It must have happened during the night. We all turned off the lights at the same time last night.”

“What time was that?”

“Just before twelve. We are all up late for Ramadan these days. We have a lot of family visitors, as well as people wishing us their condolences for the death of my son Louai.”

“Did anyone visit you last night? Was there anyone in the house who didn’t usually stay here?”

“No, our guests left at least half an hour before we went to sleep. Dima went to her room at the same time as the rest of the family.”