Jihad

CHAPTER 37

Dr. Ramil nodded at the desk clerk as he left the hotel, stepping out in the overcast day. He started up the hill toward the Blue Mosque, then turned left and walked through the small array of shops that stood at its base. The open windows of the Mosaic Museum drew his attention; he went through the small alley to the entrance, paying a few lira to walk above the faded stones that had once decorated a Byzantine emperor’s palace. The scenes of daily life roughly fifteen hundred years ago didn’t hold his interest, however, and he soon found himself back outside, walking in the direction of the Bazaar Quarter. He made his way across Veniçeriler Caddesi, one of the old city’s main boulevards crowded with shoe stores and banks. Ducking one of the trams that ran down the wide street, he wandered into the tangle of alleyways near the Grand Bazaar. Everything was for sale here; he passed rows of stores with toys, then a handful of others selling guns, still more with kitchen goods. He’d been in the Bazaar Quarter a week before, while getting oriented to the city, but nothing looked familiar until he reached the Ṣark Kahvesi, a cafe on the western side of the bazaar, far from where he had started. He stopped and had some Turkish coffee, extra sweet, and listened to the merchants nearby complaining in Turkish that business had fallen off. From there he wandered farther south, passing through the Spice Bazaar and emerging near the New Mosque and the Galata Bridge. A man with a stubble beard waved an array of Turkish flags at him, trying to coax him into buying one before moving on.

The New Mosque stood before him on the right, a towering succession of domes that topped graying concrete. He turned and began walking in the other direction.

He’d been avoiding mosques all day, Ramil thought; he’d walked by not only the Blue Mosque but the majestic Süleymaniye at the heart of the Bazaar Quarter as well.

Just then, the call to prayers sounded. Ashamed, Ramil changed direction and went toward the gate. As he did, a flock of pigeons took flight; the birds were so numerous that they darkened the sky. Surprised, Ramil shielded his head as they flapped by, ducking his head as if afraid they would hit him.

He washed his feet at the fountain, then left his shoes at the door. The air inside the mosque was cool. The air and filtered light cleared his head. He began to pray, holding his hands up and then clasping them, bending and bowing, kneeling and kissing the ground.

“God is Greater,” he said in Arabic, using the words inscribed in his memory as a child. “In the Name of God, the Compassionate Source of All Mercy, All Praise be to God.”

The words resounded in his head as if his entire body were hollow. At the end of his prayer, turning right and then left to wish peace to those nearby, he felt slightly dizzy. He stayed on his knees, lightheaded.

When he rose, Ramil caught sight of an old man with a prayer cap nearby.

The man eyed him accusingly. Unnerved, Ramil turned and found another man, this one very young, glaring at him as well. There were others back near the door, whispering.

Were they talking about him? He couldn’t hear what they said.

Was he just being paranoid? No one could possibly notice him here.

Ramil glanced around. The men he’d thought were watching him before were looking at other parts of the mosque.

It must have been his imagination; the stress of the mission was starting to make him paranoid.

Ramil stepped back, admiring the soaring dome above him. The mosaics made the ceiling seem as if it were floating in air.

A traitor and coward.

Though hushed, the voice he heard was distinct, and nearby. Ramil turned but could not see who had said it.

Traitor? Were they referring to him?

Asad bin Taysr would claim that any Muslim who worked against him was a traitor. He and all of his ilk claimed that any Muslim who collaborated with the “Crusaders” should face death as heretics.

But Ramil was not a traitor. Neither was he a coward. He had not accomplished much in life, perhaps — not in many years — he had no children, or a legacy to speak of, but he was not a bad man. Asad, bin Laden, al-Qaeda and all their filthy, twisted comrades — they were the evil ones.

Traitor! Coward!

By the time Ramil reached his shoes, his heart was thumping fiercely. He started for the nearby tram stop, then, seeing a taxi, ran in front of it to flag it down. The driver jerked his head out of his window, looking at him as if he were a madman.

“I need to go back to my hotel,” he told the man in Arabic.

The driver scowled at him.

Was he accusing him as well? Of what? Of being a coward? Of being worthless? A traitor?

No. Few people understood Arabic in Turkey, aside from the prayers they memorized.

“My hotel,” Ramil repeated, this time in English.

The driver jerked his thumb toward the back. He had another fare.

Another taxi stopped a few feet away. Ramil stepped back, nodding, bending his head in apology. Panic rose in his chest, but he fought against it, walking to the other car and gently opening the door.