'There!' Jab. 'That'll show you!' Twist.
He stole that needle, took it up to his room, and put it in with the bloody tissues.
A neat room. Lots of neat stuff.
But he liked the knives the best.
More interviews, more dead ends; five detectives working like mules.
Lacking any new leads, Daniel decided to retrace old ones. He drove to the Russian Compound jail and interviewed Anwar Rashmawi, concentrating on the brother's final conversation with Issa Abdelatif, trying to discern if the boyfriend had said anything about where he and Fatma had stayed between the time she'd left Saint Saviour's and the day of her murder. If Abdelatif's comment about Fatma's being dead had been more specific than Anwar had let on.
The guard brought Anwar in, wearing prison pajamas three sizes too big for him. Daniel could tell right away the brother was different, hostile, no longer the outcast. He entered the interrogation room swaggering and scowling, ignored Daniel's greeting and the guard's order to sit. Finally the guard pushed him down into the chair, said, 'Stay there, you,' and asked Daniel if there was anything more he needed.
'Nothing more. You may go.'
When they were alone, Anwar crossed his legs, sat back in his chair, and stared at the ceiling, either ignoring Daniel's questions or turning them into feeble jokes.
Quite a change from the puff pastry who'd confessed to him two weeks ago. Bolstered, no doubt, by what he imagined to be hero status. According to the guards, his father had been visiting him regularly, the two of them playing sheshbesh, listening to music on Radio Amman, sharing cigarettes like best pals. The old man smiling with pride as he left the cell.
Twenty fruitless minutes passed. The room was hot and humid. Daniel felt his clothes sticking to him, a tightness in his chest.
'Let's go over it again,' he said. 'The exact words.'
'Whose exact words?'
'Abdelatifs.'
'Snakes don't talk.'
Like a broken record.
Daniel opened his note pad.
'When you confessed, you said he had plenty to say. I have it here in my notes: '? he started to walk toward me with the knife, saying I was dead, just like Fatma. That she was nothing to him, garbage to be dumped.' You remember that, don't you?'
'I remember nothing.'
'What else did he say about Fatma's death?'
'I want my lawyer.'
'You don't need one. We're not discussing your crime, only Fatma's murder.'
Anwar smiled. 'Tricks. Deceit.'
Daniel got to his feet, walked over to the brother, and stared down at him.
'You loved her. You killed for her. It would seem to me you'd want to find out who murdered her.'
'The one who murdered her is dead.'
Daniel bent his knees and put his face closer to Anwar's. 'Not so. The one who murdered her has murdered again- he's still out there, laughing at all of us.'
Anwar closed his eyes and shook his head. 'Lies.' 'It's the truth, Anwar.' Daniel picked up the copy of Al fajr. waved it in front of Anwar's face until his eyes opened, and said, 'Read for yourself.'
Anwar averted his gaze.
'Read it, Anwar.'
'Lies. Government lies.'
'Al Fajr is a PLO mouthpiece-everyone knows that, Anwar. Why would the PLO print government lies?'
'Government lies.'
'Abdelatif didn't murder her, Anwar-at least not by himself. There's another one out there. Laughing and plot-ing.'
'I know what you're doing,' said Anwar smugly. 'You're trying to trick me.'
'I'm trying to find out who murdered Fatma.'
'The one who murdered her is dead.'
Daniel straightened, took a step backward, and regarded the brother. The stubbornness, the narrowness of vision, tightened his chest further. He stared at Anwar, who spat on the floor, played with the saliva with the frayed toe of his shoe.
Daniel waited. The tightness in Daniel's chest turned hot, a fiery band that seemed to press against his lungs, branding them, causing real, searing pain.
'Idiot,' he heard himself saying, words springing to his lips, tumbling out unfettered: 'I'm trying to find the
