Brother Kemal

Chapter 13

‘I don’t know either, she was just suddenly standing at our table. Eighteen or nineteen, I’d say. Done up to the nines — moist lipstick, sexy hippie mini-dress, brightly coloured platform shoes and a book in her hand. By your Monsieur Don’t-I-Just-Love-Women.’

‘Did he say that?’

‘He said a lot of other shit like it.’ Slibulsky sighed. ‘Particularly when he’d had a drink.’

‘An alcoholic drink?’

‘Yes,’ said Deborah. She was standing behind the bar drying glasses. ‘Although he kept on telling us how he never really touches a drop of the stuff. But he could certainly put it back. Almost a whole bottle in half an hour. I bet he binge drinks every few months.’

Tugba cleared her throat. ‘And he seems to have loved no end of women. Turkish women, like me. Jewish women, like Deborah. Women who make jewellery, like Lara …’

‘But do women who make jewellery love him back?’ growled Benjamin, with his eyes half closed. ‘When he was asked to shut up for a bit he first looked insulted, then turned to the boutique dolls at the next table. “I just love clothes!” Okay, so I’m pretty toasted myself at the moment, but he was much, much worse.’

‘Yes, well,’ said Slibulsky, returning to the real subject. ‘And then Titty-Mouse was suddenly standing in front of him, making out she was a fan of his and asking him to sign her book. Of course he went off like a rocket. To be honest …’ Slibulsky cast a quick glance at the bench where Lara had fallen asleep. ‘If I’d written a book, and I suddenly had a fan like that standing in front of me — well, I can understand it’s a great moment in an author’s life.’

‘And her shoes alone,’ murmured Benjamin, his eyes now tightly closed. ‘With those flower stickers all over them — wow!’

‘Can we have our bill, please?’ called a man in the corner. He and the woman with him were the last guests in the bar.

An hour later Deborah and I were lying in bed. While I told her about the day’s events in rough outline, her eyes were closing, and by the time I finished I was sure she was asleep. But suddenly she said, with her eyes closed and her voice husky with wine, ‘What possessed you to pin the murder on him?’

And all of a sudden I had Sheikh Hakim in bed beside me.

I thought again about the moment when I’d got to work on Abakay’s chest with the knife. And of how I hadn’t just left it at assumptions when I was talking to Octavian, I’d claimed there was no alternative to Abakay as the murderer.

Finally I explained, ‘There was a sixteen-year-old girl in that barred and soundproofed room. She was shaking all over. She’d put her finger down her throat and smeared herself with her own vomit to keep a fat drunk from raping her. I’d rather not know how many girls’ lives Abakay has ruined like that, and I thought he never ought to get the chance to do it again.’

For a while Deborah didn’t react. Then she opened her eyes, turned to me and put a pillow under her head.

‘I hope you remember who you’re sharing your bed with? That’s the kind of thing that happens to tarts. Not all of them, but a great many. I was lucky, but I knew some girls who weren’t. And you yourself, you’ve only forgotten it. Today what happened to your client’s daughter seems to you like the worst of nightmares, but back then — don’t you remember how we would sit in some bar at five in the morning, finished, broke, drunk — just hoping for another customer, or not to get AIDS, or to find some fool ready to pay for a round of drinks? You, me, Tugba, Slibulsky, all the others. Some dead and buried long ago, others living in the West End. You’ve grown old, darling, old and soft, and that’s just fine — but you’ll call Octavian tomorrow and withdraw that stupid statement.’

I said nothing. I imagined Abakay’s sense of triumph.

‘Do you have any idea who the real murderer might be?’

Would he dare to turn up at the de Chavannes villa again?

‘I asked you a question.’

‘I don’t know,’ I replied absentmindedly.

‘Oh, come on, darling.’ She dug a finger into my stomach. ‘You’re only a little bit old and a little bit soft, and what’s more, you only live in the West End because of your ambitious girlfriend. Could you please put the light out now?’

Next morning I rang Octavian. It was Sunday, and he was having breakfast with some Romanian relatives.

‘What did you say?’

‘I said I’m withdrawing parts of my testimony. When I got into Abakay’s apartment I supposed, wrongly, that Abakay had killed Rönnthaler. Unfortunately I didn’t leave Abakay time to explain himself, but believing that I was in acute, life-threatening danger I overpowered him at once. Well, you know the rest — I tied him up and gagged him.’

‘You did … And how about the cuts on Abakay’s chest?’

‘No idea.’

There was a pause. I could hear Deborah squeezing oranges in the kitchen. Octavian’s agitated breathing came over the phone.

‘You realise this means we’ll have to let Abakay go free?’

‘He’s still a pimp and a drug dealer. It’s just that you don’t have me as a witness anymore.’

‘Oh, nonsense! Kayankaya, you really are such an idiot! How do I look now?’

‘Good luck, Octavian. That’s all I can say.’

‘Wait a minute! This will have consequences. People will make life hard for you, and it wouldn’t surprise me if you lose your licence.’

‘People? Or you?’

‘You can at least be sure I won’t lift a finger for you again!’

‘That’s a pity, when I was hoping for your support, my friend.’

‘Asshole!’

We hung up, and I called Sheikh Hakim.

‘I’ve withdrawn my statement.’

‘Excellent, Herr Kayankaya. The rest will be as we agreed.’

‘How’s the hostage?’

‘The hostage wants for nothing, don’t worry. You’ll be hearing from me. God be with you.’

For a change, I hoped so too.

At eleven I was supposed to be at the Book Fair with Rashid. According to his schedule, he was reading at eleven thirty with Ilona Lohs on the subject of losing your native land, under the heading ‘Sweet Homeland, Sore Hearts.’ According to the flyer for the reading, Ilona Lohs was born in the GDR, and her novel Moon Child, about eighteen-year-old Jenny Türmerin who wants to flee former East Germany, was based on autobiographical experiences. Malik Rashid — also according to the flyer — missed ‘the old, multi-cultural Morocco where Muslims, Christians and Jews lived side by side,’ and in his new novel Journey to the End of Days he described, ‘among other things, the consequences of increasing ethnic uniformity: the dumbing down and brutalisation of Moroccan society as a whole and the loss of imagination and dreams.’

I was nervous when I called Katja Lipschitz.

‘Good morning, Herr Kayankaya. Everything all right?’

In the background I heard what was now, even for me, the familiar roar of the Book Fair. All the sounds in the huge hall mingling into a single, metre-high, continuously rolling ocean wave.

‘I can’t call it that. Rashid has been abducted.’

‘What?!’

‘There obviously was something to those threatening letters and phone calls.’

‘Phone calls?’ She raised her voice. ‘There weren’t any phone calls! I was only saying so! And as for the letters … Oh, nonsense! For God’s sake! Are you sure he hasn’t simply gone off somewhere, met a woman, oh, I don’t know what …?!’

‘I’m sorry. The kidnappers called me.’

‘What are they asking?’

‘Nothing so far. But they told me the name of their group: The Ten Plagues.’

‘But … but that’s the exact title of Dr. Breitel’s speech!’

‘Well, maybe they read the Berliner Nachrichten, or Breitel found the name on the Internet in the course of his research.’

‘I can’t understand it, Herr Kayankaya! Not in my wildest dreams did I think that Malik would really … oh, poor man! I’m so sorry.’

‘You must keep calm now, Frau Lipschitz. Say that Rashid is sick, a bad sore throat or something like that. And whatever you do don’t call the police! I’ll do all I can to get him out of there as soon as possible.’

‘But I must tell our publisher. What will happen if they demand money? Or if they want us to pulp Rashid’s novel? Like the Rushdie case, do you remember?’

‘Wait before speaking to your publisher. I didn’t get the impression that the kidnappers were after money. They’re probably more interested in setting an example: see how we can scare you in the middle of your own country. A demonstration of power, if you see what I mean? Or to satisfy their vanity — with terrorists that’s usually the main motive. Maybe it can be settled with a simple press release giving the name of the group.’

‘I hope with all my heart that you’re right. But what am I to do now?’

‘As I said, announce that Rashid is sick and say no more. I’ll call you the moment I have any news.’

‘Do you know what? It’s those supposed men of God! I’ll pray for Rashid!’

‘That’s a good idea, Frau Lipschitz. You can’t do anything better. See you soon.’