Fortress

48

How could he sleep? The adrenalin that had been coursing round him seemed to intensify until he thought he might have a stroke. Then she was shaking him awake.

‘They are ready for you. Turn left out of the front door and go to the corner. You will see a black people-carrier.’

‘Is there a name?’

‘They’ll make themselves known to you. Go.’

He pulled on his jacket and shoes. He hadn’t undressed.

She followed him to the door and closed it behind him.

Close to the junction the people-carrier, an old Toyota Previa, was parked with no lights on. As he came towards it the side door slid open. ‘Sahim?’

‘Yes.’

He couldn’t see who was speaking. The voice came from deep inside the vehicle.

‘Come to the door.’ A small sharp beam of light was pointed at his face. ‘Get in.’

He hesitated.

‘Now, please.’

The engine started. He climbed in. It was very warm inside. There were four of them. He saw a phone, its screen glowing with an image. They thrust it in front of him.

‘Watch.’

It was a video of a man lying on a mattress. Whoever was recording him moved closer and pulled back the sheet covering him. The figure on the bed shrank away as if he was about to be hit.

Something was shouted that Sam didn’t understand. A hand grabbed the man’s head and turned it to face the camera.

‘Is that him?’

For a second he wasn’t sure. The eyes were completely bloodshot. The face had several weeks’ growth of beard and was shrunken and emaciated, but when the camera was pointed at him the eyes lit up. He whispered, ‘Help me, brother.’

A wave of shock and relief came over him. ‘That’s him.’

He felt something sting his arm, then everything went black.

Sometime later, he had no idea how many hours had passed, he came to. His head was resting against the glass. He could see road rushing by. Three lanes. A motorway. He tried to lift his head to see who else was in the vehicle but he couldn’t move. Then he felt a pain in his upper arm and was out again.

When he woke the next time his hands were tied and some fabric covered his face. A voice he hadn’t heard before addressed him. ‘Sahim?’

This was a new voice, older, with a strong accent he couldn’t place.

‘What’s happening?’

‘Sahim Kovacevic, confirm your name.’

‘Yes, that’s me. But I need the toilet.’

He was led through a couple of doors, his jeans were undone and pulled down and he was manoeuvred onto a lavatory seat. There was a strong smell of oil and he heard an engine being revved. Maybe they were in a garage. He was led back and put on a hard chair.

‘Can I have a drink?’

There was some mumbling, then steps, then a door being closed. The hood was lifted just enough to uncover his mouth. Sam could see part of a face: a man in his early twenties, Asian, with a small scrub of beard round the outline of his chin, holding a can of Coke to Sam’s mouth. He smelt of tobacco and garlic. Sam drank, the Coke running down his chin. The hood came back down.

The older voice spoke again. ‘You are the brother of Karza, that is right?’

‘What’s happened to him?’

‘He is injured. You will pay for his release or he will be killed.’

‘Who has him?’

‘One million dollars.’

‘What?’

This couldn’t be happening.

‘I don’t have anything like that. I’m just an ordinary person.’

‘You are in the government.’

‘I’m just a spokesman.’

‘Then he won’t survive.’

‘But this is madness! He had no idea, he went to help. He was just an innocent—’

The older man cut him off. ‘What are you?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘What are you?’

‘I’m a British citizen.’

‘That’s what your passport says. When you walk down your street at night, is that what you think? That you are one of them?’

‘I’ve never thought of myself as particularly different.’

‘You’ve never thought at all. Have you?’

‘This country hasn’t done anything bad to me.’

This was not the right thing to say.

‘This country and its allies, its coalition of infidels, is killing your brothers. When you turn on the television and you see the dead and dying Muslims, mutilated by bombs and bullets, do you not see your brothers?’

Sam was starting to sweat under the hood. He could hear the older man’s anger rising.

‘Do you understand anything about what is happening in Syria?’

Sam shook his head. This wasn’t a time to bluff. ‘Only minimally.’

‘Since you are a servant of this government, you should inform yourself so you better understand what your masters are capable of.’

He was tired, frightened and now angry. Two days ago he’d been assaulted by Dink for his race; now this. What had he ever done to deserve it?

‘Okay. Inform me, then.’

‘You know who encouraged us to go to Syria at the beginning?’

Sam shook his head. He could feel a lecture coming his way.

‘The British government. They sponsored us to go and help the resistance. Go and be heroes, liberate Syria from the dictatorship. So we went to help our brothers. Young Muslims from Britain, many without jobs, without respect, feeling isolated by the licentiousness and decadence that surrounds them, spat on, shunned because they were obedient to God, because they prayed and didn’t drink. A chance to do something worthwhile, to attain some worth in the service of Allah, praise be upon him.

‘So we jumped at the chance. We trained, we prepared, and we saw for ourselves the suffering. But where were the arms we were promised, where were the bullets? They didn’t come. So we rationed the bullets, we shared the weapons. We had to steal to eat, to get fuel. We, who had come to be liberators, were stealing from the people we had come to liberate. Imagine, if you can, the shame, the betrayal.

‘The men your brother was with, they are surviving on almost nothing. The West has deceived them, and they are trapped. Every day there is a choice. Do we buy bullets or food? They can’t even come back now. Because the government that encouraged them to go now looks on them as criminals. So they have no choice but to side with the Islamists who have bullets and food.’

Where was this going? Sam’s neck and back ached. The man leaned forward suddenly and he felt his breath through the hood.

‘Find the money. You have a week.’

He was pulled onto his feet, frogmarched back to the van and sedated again.

When he came to he was lying on a bench, with traffic whizzing past a few feet away. He looked round. Cockfosters tube station was just up the road. He got to his feet and stumbled towards the entrance.