Quicksand Read online

  “Yes, I know. But that was a very rookie thing to say. Toughen up. We’re not baking cupcakes here, we’re fighting crime.”

  Nora gave him a half smile. “I’ll make a note of it.”

  Imam Anwar wore a gelabiyya that grazed his bare ankles. He was not happy to see them at all. Before opening the outer door, he looked uncomfortably at John. “I thought that the sister would be coming in alone.”

  John asked, not masking his irritation, “Is it a one-room home, sir, or is it possible to speak with you in a dining room while Officer Khalil interviews your wife in the family room?”

  The imam blinked rapidly. “I need to be present while my wife is interviewed.”

  Nora answered firmly, “That’s completely impossible. May we come in please?”

  The imam stepped to one side, bristling. The house was spare, the home of a new immigrant, free of inherited furniture and the accumulated clutter of years spent in one place. An IKEA shoe rack designed for a closet was placed prominently in the foyer, and Nora promptly slid out of her shoes, with John reluctantly following suit.

  The imam ushered John into a dining room that held a bruised and rather wobbly-looking second-hand table surrounded by six mismatched chairs. Nora watched him scan the room for every exit, noting every feature before seating himself at the head of the table.

  She then followed the imam into the living room. Two small sofas faced each other, each covered in bedsheets that apparently masked the flaws or stains of the original upholstery. A straight-backed chair was piled high with neatly folded prayer rugs. On one wall was a large poster of the Ka‘ba back-lit by neon-laced minarets; the surrounding open mosque was packed with thousands of devoted pilgrims. The walls were completely bare except for this. The north end of the room ended in what Nora guessed was the basement door, not far from steep stairs ascending to the second level. Shaykh Anwar called upstairs to his wife, and she descended, cloaked in full niqab.

  Nora watched her apprehensively. Her form was slight, and her steps were measured. When the woman greeted her with an accented Hello, Nora replied by saying As-salaam alaykum. Shaykh Anwar narrowed his eyes at Nora, then explained to his wife in Arabic that he would not be allowed to sit in on the interview, and he would be in the dining room with the other agent.

  She followed his retreating form with her eyes, and Nora saw through the slit in her face veil that they were light, almost amber-colored. When Shaykh Anwar entered the dining room, John rose and closed the door, giving Nora a pointed look.

  Nora held out her hand to shake that of the imam’s wife. She was met by a tiny gloved hand that felt birdlike in her grasp. “My name is Nora. May I ask yours?”

  The woman nodded slightly. “Khulood.”

  “It’s nice to meet you,” Nora said, but the woman did not reply. “Madame Khulood, I need to ask you to remove your face veil for our interview,” Nora continued, as gently as possible.

  The woman sat stock still, considering this. “I don’t—” she began

  Nora cut her off. “You know that the face veil must be removed for praying and for performing the pilgrimage…” she said, gesturing at the poster on the wall. With a start, Nora realized that she had been paying attention to her mother’s occasional discussions about Islamic law after all. “You must also remove it for official appearances like marrying and giving witness. This is an instance of giving witness.”

  Khulood’s light eyes met Nora’s. Slowly, reluctantly, she pulled the veil up over her head. Her face was thin and her cheekbones high. She had a pointed chin and a small mouth. The lashes that surrounded the light eyes were pale and feathery.

  “Did you know Hafsa al-Tanukhi?”

  The woman nodded slowly. “Yes, yes I did.”

  “Did you study English with her?”

  Khulood narrowed her eyes. “A few times … yes.”

  “I need to know the names of the women who studied with her. In particular I am trying to find a woman named Basheera. Do you know a woman named Basheera?”

  Khulood looked worried, and cast her eyes at the closed door to the dining room. “I don’t think so…”

  Nora tried hard not to show her irritation. “What did you think was the purpose of my visit today, Khulood?”

  She received no response.

  “Were you there for the lesson your husband gave on Saturday?”

  Khulood looked flustered. “I’m not sure…”

  “You’re not sure if you were there or not?” Nora pressed.

  Khulood quickly shook her head. “No, no, I was there, of course, I just … I can’t remember everything…”

  “Well, try to remember one thing.”

  Khulood shrugged. “He gave the lesson. We listened. We all left. Nothing happened unusual.”

  “What were the names of the women who attended your husband’s lesson?”

  The woman began to tremble and her eyes started welling with tears.

  Nora didn’t back down. “Did Hafsa speak to your husband that day?”

  The small woman widened her wet eyes. “No!” Then she looked again at the dining room door, giving off the aura of being adrift.

  “Khulood, I came all the way over here to save you the inconvenience of having to come to my office. I would be very happy to call you into the office if it will make it easier for you to share information.”

  Khulood shook her head slightly, then murmured, “May God forgive you. Basheera Johnson. I do not know her telephone or address. There were others, another black woman named Karima … something. Some Arabs like Fatma al-Bakry, Marwa Abd al-Hamid, they had taken some of the English lessons because they had no language skills at all. And very little Arabic literacy, frankly.”

  Nora was scribbling in her notebook. “Why would Hafsa have wanted to talk to your husband, Khulood?”

  “She had no reason to talk to him at all. She taught language. He taught religion. That was all,” the woman replied simply. “I’m sure whatever happened to her was God’s plan for her.”

  Nora’s pen paused in midair over the notebook page. “Her eyes were cut out, Khulood. Her throat was slit.”

  Khulood dropped her eyes. “God is the most merciful,” she said softly.

  * * *

  Both agents were quiet as they headed back to the Philadelphia field office.

  John finally spoke. “How did it go?”

  Nora shook her head. “She lied. A lot.”

  John Wansbrough nodded. “The same with her husband. He was very scared, very on edge. I think his life is being threatened.”

  “Did you let him know you thought so?”

  “Yes. He said that was preposterous. I wasn’t very convinced.”

  “I think he coached his wife. She had a script she was supposed to stick to. She really didn’t want to give me the names I got.”

  “We’re gonna need to track down those names,” John said, guiding the car over the South Street Bridge.

  Nora asked, “Could one of the gangs be threatening him? Is that why he’s so scared?”

  John shook his head. “That could be the link. But why him—what he has that would concern either gang, I don’t know.”

  * * *

  It was the middle of the night when she got the call.

  The shaykh’s house had burned to the ground.

  Nora was up and dressed in less than a minute.

  “Where are you going?” her father asked as she came out into the kitchen. He was wearing plaid pajama bottoms and a sleeveless undershirt, and he was watching the Food Network. “It’s one A.M.!”

  She finished twisting her hair into its tight bun. “Work,” she said.

  Her father pursed his lips, muting a rerun of Chopped. “I say again, it’s one in the morning!”

  “Well, you should let the criminals know, Baba, okay?” she snapped.

  He watched as she stuck one arm into her jacket. Finally, reluctantly, he said, “Okay, you hungry?”

  She shook her head.
“John’s on his way to pick me up—salaam.” She heard his response as she made her way out onto the street to wait. She couldn’t wait inside; she wasn’t in the mood to talk, and her heart was pounding against her chest; she felt sick. John had said the couple was in intensive care; the imam’s wife was in critical condition, while the imam himself had suffered serious burns all across his body. Nora fought against the feeling that she was responsible.

  When John Wansbrough drove up, she entered the mercifully warm car, then looked up and saw her father watching her from his bedroom window. She slammed the door, making John look at her as though she’d slapped him.

  “Hey, now, we’re just breaking in this beauty. Be gentle.”

  She ignored him. “What do we know?”

  He shook his head. “The fire department thinks it was a Molotov cocktail thrown through the front window. The first floor was nothing but old wood, and it went up fast. They pulled the Islahis out from a second floor window.”

  “No witnesses?”

  “Of course not. Are you new here?” he said.

  She sighed. “I feel…”

  John looked at her with a deep frown across his features. “This one isn’t about feelings, Nora. This isn’t our fault. The imam was scared, scared of maybe just this. If he had told us from the beginning who he was scared of, then maybe he wouldn’t be in this position. You yourself told me that you thought his wife was lying to you. Honesty might have prevented this whole thing. Are we clear?”

  Nora nodded. “So what’s next?”

  “We’re going to the hospital. Watt’s going to the scene to be our eyes and to see if he can assist.”

  They passed swiftly through the empty streets and soon arrived at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania. Wansbrough left the SUV on a curb outside the emergency room, and they walked in. After flashing their badges at the desk, they were guided by an indifferent nurse to Anwar al-Islahi’s room in intensive care.

  “Can he talk to us?” John asked the nurse.

  She nodded. “He’s conscious. Might be a little loopy from the morphine, but conscious.”

  The imam was, yet again, not happy to see them. His black eyes managed to produce a look of fury. They greeted him, and he turned his face away.

  John circled to the other side of the bed. “Mr. al-Islahi, what’s happened here is very alarming. Do you think you’re ready to tell us the truth now about what’s going on at your mosque?”

  The imam’s voice was a harsh whisper. “This is your fault. I told you to leave us alone…”

  “With all due respect, sir, if you knew there was a threat, it was your obligation to inform us. Now, who is responsible for burning your home and putting you and your wife in the hospital?”

  At mention of his wife, the imam’s eyes filled with tears. “Khulood,” he murmured. “My wife is pregnant, you bastards. How could you do this to us?”

  Nora felt sick, and she looked desperately at John before saying, “Shaykh Anwar, you must tell us who’s responsible so we can prevent another attack on another family. Please.”

  He turned on her, his eyes flashing. He spoke rapidly in Arabic. “You fools, do you think if they can do this just to scare us, they won’t kill us if I tell you anything? I didn’t come here to die. I didn’t come to this country to die!” He broke down in tears then, and Nora watched in shock as the imam sobbed. “I will not speak to you. You cannot make me, you cannot!”

  The nurse who had ushered them in returned, her shoes squeaking against the highly polished floor. “I said you could speak to him, not that you could give him a nervous breakdown,” she said angrily. She patted his hand and injected an extra shot into the dangling bag of saline.

  As they watched Shaykh Anwar slide into unconsciousness, Nora asked about Khulood. The nurse shook her head. “She’s in critical condition.”

  “Outlook?”

  “I couldn’t say,” the nurse replied. But her eyes said enough.

  * * *

  The four of them sat grimly at their desks, at an impasse, as Schacht stood looking from face to face.

  Finally, Nora said, “Look, a price has been paid already for these names. Time is ticking. And I’m not seeing how these women should be considered armed and dangerous.” She did not bother to mask the frustration in her tone.

  Burton said, “Let’s think about that for one moment. Not armed and dangerous. Except, maybe they are the perfect killers.”

  Nora listened intently, trying not to hate everything that came out of his mouth.

  He leaned in, seeming to address her colleagues, in much the way the imam would only talk to Wansbrough. “A woman in full veil binds up her hair, covering it. So she’s leaving nothing behind. And she’s wearing gloves. No fingerprints. Plenty of immigrant women still know how to slaughter an animal using a simple kitchen knife.”

  “Motive?” Nora demanded.

  “You tell us,” Wansbrough countered.

  She thought for a moment, trying to settle her brain into this theory. “He said ‘they.’ If they can do this just to scare us… …they can kill us for giving you information. Or something like that.”

  Ben offered, “So if it’s not one of the gangs we already know and love, then it’s a new gang or group.”

  Nora said, “I don’t think it’s anything we can understand unless we talk to the women whose names Khulood gave me.”

  Wansbrough said to the group, “I don’t want to keep sending Nora into a situation alone simply based on her gender. I think we should request that these women report to the Bureau and answer questions.”

  She could tell that Ben Calder had wanted to say exactly that; his features expressed vigorous assent. “Any interviews have to be done in pairs, and it would be way better to do them here,” he said.

  Nora shook her head vehemently, directing her protest to Schacht. “Like the imam’s wife, these women will never talk freely unless they’re in their comfort zones.”

  “But if the result of talking with the FBI is that their homes are burned, how can you put them in danger by entering their homes?” Burton countered. “Obviously the neighborhood is under close surveillance.”

  SAC Schacht looked again from face to face, thinking. “How about if you hold the interviews in the mosque?”

  Nora considered this, nodding slowly.

  He continued. “Is it one of those mosques with a separate women’s prayer section?”

  Nora recalled the physical layout of the mosque from when they had visited after dawn prayer. Slowly, she nodded.

  “Good,” he said. “You can interview them in the women’s section. And there’s no reason why you can’t take another female agent with you.”

  “From outside of the task force?” she demanded. “Seriously?”

  But Schacht was nodding. “We can make a temporary appointment. There’s strength in numbers. You have no idea what you might encounter. You need a partner for backup, and maybe to record the conversations.”

  Nora sighed, hating the idea of working with someone new.

  Ben said, “Ooh, you could take Libby. That would be fun!”

  “I heard that,” Libby’s voice pierced the divider.

  Ben whispered to Schacht, “We need walls…”

  Schacht ignored him. “And I think it’s safe to say from your last experience that you have learned the value of wearing a vest.”

  “We’ll pick the right person together,” John said, as though to console Nora.

  She sighed, nodding, unable to imagine who that might be.

  * * *

  The Philadelphia field office had fifty-eight women agents. After sifting through their files, Nora and John selected and received Schacht’s approval for the inclusion of Special Agent Laurie Cruz on their team. With her dark hair and chestnut-colored skin, Cruz looked slightly more Arab than Nora herself. She was about thirty-five, fighting her weight, and had distinguished herself tracking drug routes from the streets of South Philly deep
into Mexico. She had initially trained Calder, helping him become the resident expert on domestic interstate drug trafficking issues. It had been with great reluctance that she had passed him off to Safe Streets.

  Nora liked Laurie Cruz, and she knew the feeling was mutual. They had greeted each other amicably enough in the halls before, but now they spoke comfortably on the way to the mosque. Laurie, too, was the only woman on her team. She drove her Buick aggressively, bullying the other cars. Still, even as she was cutting people off and running red lights, Laurie chatted away. As unobtrusively as possible, Nora slipped her hand into what Wansbrough called the “Oh Jesus! handle” anchored above the window; she gripped it tightly.

  Agent Cruz told Nora about the day that a rookie Ben Calder had been chasing a carrier who held a bag full of heroin; when Ben tackled him, the bag exploded and they both got noses full, making for a very affable Ben. Nora laughed out loud. “No wonder he just shoots the perps now.”

  “John Wansbrough brags about you, you know. Says you’re the fastest feet in the building.”

  Nora flushed, pleased but flustered. “I—”

  “And very modest,” Laurie added. “Listen, I don’t know as much about the local gang scene as I do about their international suppliers, especially Los Zetas. Mixing in this whole religious and immigrant subculture introduces so many new variables to this puzzle. I’m curious what you expect to find today?”

  “I don’t know,” Nora responded honestly. “We had to work hard to get these names. We didn’t send summonses, because we’re sure the neighborhood is being watched. I’m hoping to catch some of them after the noon prayer, but it may be hard to get anyone to talk to me. That’s if they’re even attending prayers—probably recent events have them spooked.”

  Laurie listened intently. “Sounds explosive. Look, I know it’s awkward bringing in someone new. But I think they’re right. You need someone to have your back.”

  “Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad you’re here, Laurie. I just don’t think these women pose a threat, you know?”

  “No, but it’s not that. It’s just that we have partners for a reason. One can sense something the other doesn’t, can’t … Can be aware of responses that the questioning partner can’t perceive. It’s not a perfect system, but it helps to have someone on your side. And to back you up in court, of course. But you know all that.”