Nouf.
He rubbed the back of his neck against a quick chill. He had imagined her many times, but he'd never had quite this feeling before, as if at any moment she would step into the room. He went outside and looked around, half expecting someone to be there. The beach was empty, but the eerie sense of her presence remained.
He ran a hand down his face and went back inside. The motorcycle was slender and elegant. He walked around the bike, but in the shadows behind it his foot hit a soft spot, and with another loud crack the floorboard splintered and his foot dropped into the sand below. He extracted his foot and saw an edging of black beneath a thin veil of sand. Bending over and prying out the floorboard, he found a hollow space, almost a compartment. In the space was a small black book, no larger than his hand. He was so surprised that at first he didn't touch it; he just stared as if waiting for it to become an old brick or a rotten slab of wood. But no, it was a well-worn, leather-bound book. Gently he brushed the sand from its surface and took it out.
In the empty compartment, a hint of light came from the left, and putting his face as close to the floor as possible, he saw that the compartment was an arm's length away from the sunlight. Someone had probably slid the book in here from the outside.
Opening the book's cover, he discovered a journal, as densely packed with text as a Quran commentary—written text, in this case, in the same elegant script he'd seen on the map.
"Allah forgive me." Turning to a page at random, he began to read.
In the name of Allah, all-merciful, all-knowing, I almost killed myself today, but I was too frightened to do it. I didn't have the courage to see my own blood. So I got on my jet-ski and rode like crazy, I rode and rode until I ran out of gas and I was all alone in the middle of the sea. I could still see the coast, but it was getting dark and I thought I would die by accident then, because THEN I realized I didn't really want to die, I just wanted to get away. I was so happy to realize it, and so, so scared to realize that I MIGHT die, because of stupidity. But then, like an angel's messenger, he showed up on the boat. He came with the spotlight and the horns and somebody else, and he pulled me out of the water. Allah, forgive me, I held on to him and cried and I didn't let go until he took me home. And I never even asked how he found me.
Nayir skimmed the next few pages and read another passage at random.
Allah, please forgive me, I know it's wrong to love him, I know it would chain me and make me miserable for the rest of my life, but my whole body yearns for him. I can't stop thinking of him. I remember every little thing he does. I wish I could always see his smile, hear his voice, so soft, so secure and intelligent. I long for his touch and he KNOWS it, but he doesn't act. He can't. Neither can I. It would lead to so much pain, so much danger for me—and for him too, I know it.
He tore his eyes away. Who was she writing about? Someone with a boat, or access to one—but that could be anyone. Boating was an extremely popular pastime, especially on summer nights, when being on the water was the only way to cool down. What sort of man would have followed her out to sea?
Miss Hijazi was right; there had to be a third man. Nayir skimmed a few more pages but found no mention of a name, only a vast outpouring of frustrated longing. He decided to read the journal later, when his mind was clear. He tucked it into his pocket.
Then he got up to inspect the bike. It was covered in a fine coat of sand. The glove compartment was unlocked but empty, and much too small to hold a pair of shoes. He peered at the handlebars, the pedals, the seat, any place she might have touched, if only to make sure that he'd covered all the bases. There was a heavy coating of sand on the tires, caked into the treads. He stuck his finger into one of the grooves and scraped the sand into his palm. It was a fine grain, the palest beige. Most likely it had come from the desert.
When he stood up, his eye fell on the chrome logo on the gas tank. A Honda logo. His fingers traced the familiar design: a bird with a single wing spread to the side. Each feather was deeply grooved. Then he saw it.
"Allah, what a fool!" He touched the logo again. Five feathers, as neat as the stripes on the camel's leg. Looking closer, he saw a trace of blood and hair on the logo. It was probably from the camel.
In a rush, it came together. So
this
was how the killer had returned from the desert. Nouf had arrived at the zoo on the motorcycle. The killer met her there, knocked her out, and put her in the truck. He squeezed the motorcycle into the back of the truck with the camel, then drove to the wadi. The heat must have turned the logo into a brand—thus the marks on the camel's leg. Once the killer had abandoned Nouf, the camel, and the truck in the desert, he hopped on the bike and rode back here.
Nayir left the cabana and stared at the sand. Ten dozen pairs of footprints led down to the water, and another five dozen led up to the gate. At least one thing was obvious: after ditching the motorcycle, the killer could have gone in any direction.
He took a miswak from his pocket and began to chew. Although the killer hadn't left obvious prints in the sand, he had left a curious print of sorts: the fact that he'd returned the motorcycle at all. Clearly he knew Nouf well enough to know about this beach and its cabana, just big enough to hide a bike. It was what a person would know if he'd been following her around on a boat at sea. But once he returned the bike, which way had he gone?
Nayir walked down to the water's edge. There was no jet-ski there, only the small boat. He looked around for a pair of oars but saw none. Muhammad had said that Nouf used a jet-ski to get to the beach. According to Othman, the servants had found her jet-ski at the island's dock on the afternoon she'd disappeared, so whoever had returned the motorcycle here must have taken the jet-ski back to the island. Did he do it to get rid of the evidence that Nouf had been at the beach? Or did he do it because it was his only way to get home?
Nayir looked down at the mysterious whirl of footprints and decided it was time to call Mutlaq.
***
Later that afternoon the two men climbed over the wall. When Mutlaq saw the sand, he gave a low whistle.
"An awful lot of activity," he said, rubbing his hands with relish.
Nayir followed him around, listening to every
hmmph
and trying to divine its meaning from Mutlaq's face, but his friend wore a look of intense concentration.
"You were here," Mutlaq noted. "And so was your friend Othman. But not at the same time."
Nayir struggled to understand how Mutlaq would know that, then he remembered that Othman's prints had also been at the campsite in the desert.
"He was here before you," Mutlaq said. "These are his prints—very recent, too." The prints were deep, and once Nayir had isolated them from the dozens of others, he saw something else.
"He came here with someone?"
"With a woman, I think." Mutlaq pointed to the other prints, which were smaller but also deep. "It's a strange fact that people make deeper prints in certain types of sand at night."
Nayir thought Othman must have come here with Katya, although perhaps he'd come with one of his sisters. "So you think they were here in the evening?"
"I'd say it was pretty dark."
"Do you recognize any other prints from the desert?" Nayir asked.
"Yes. Othman didn't come here with the girl from the desert. But she came here before him. Here." He traced a set of tracks leading from the jetty to the cabana, and another set from the cabana to the gate. Apart from shoe size, the two sets looked nothing alike. When Nayir pointed this out, Mutlaq merely shrugged. "So she changed her shoes in the cabana. From the cabana to the gate, she was walking with a motorcycle—here are the tire marks. She probably needed sturdier shoes to ride the bike."
Nayir didn't know what to say. He trusted Mutlaq.
"In any case," Mutlaq said, pointing to the prints near the motorcycle marks, "these are the same footprints we found in the desert."
"So let's say Nouf left here with the motorcycle," Nayir said. "Who brought it back? It's in the cabana right now."
Mutlaq wandered around. He was able to isolate the motorcycle's return, but the footprints beside it had all but been obscured by more recent marks. There was only a single print, and it belonged to Nouf.
Mutlaq walked around the print, studying it carefully from a variety of angles. Then he knelt and got very close to it. He even pressed his cheek to the sand and inspected it from the side. When he stood up again, wiping his cheek, he said, "It's Nouf's print. She brought the motorcycle back."
Nayir was stunned. "Are you sure?"
"Yes."
"Do you see any evidence that she was kidnapped here?"
"No. Nothing yet." Mutlaq continued to inspect the sand, squatting down in places, tracing outlines with his finger, touching the heel prints, toe prints, feeling for firmness. Nayir watched with admiration. He was like a search-and-rescue man who knows a terrain well enough to know its secrets, only Mutlaq's terrain was a landscape in miniature, the hills and valleys of a footprint ridge.
In the fact that Allah sends down sustenance from the sky, and revives the Earth after its death, and in the change of the Winds, are signs for those that are wise.
Allah could be known by His signs, and the scenery of the world was one of the biggest; but Mutlaq's scenery, being smaller and manmade, held its own divine secrets.
Mutlaq made no other discoveries but was able to reaffirm what Nayir had already learned: that Nouf had not been kidnapped here and that she was the last person to have returned the motorcycle to the cabana.
Nayir felt a terrible, desperate sinking of hope and began scrambling for alternative theories. "Is it possible she was meeting someone here?" he asked. "Maybe she brought the motorcycle back and then got into a car with someone."
"There is no sign of it. In fact, her freshest footprints lead straight down to the water. I think she got into a boat."
Nayir thought back to the short section of the journal he'd read. Nouf had met a mysterious man on a boat. It was possible that her kidnapper had arrived on a boat, but if that were the case, then where was the jet-ski she'd used to get to the beach in the first place? Had her kidnapper disposed of it? Or had she in fact gone back to the island?
It was all becoming muddled, and his one good theory—that Nouf had been kidnapped at the zoo—was about to collapse under this new evidence. Mutlaq noticed his concern. As soon as Nayir explained it, Mutlaq offered to accompany him to the zoo for another look. Gratefully, Nayir agreed.
T
HE NEXT DAY
Nayir pulled onto the Shrawi island armed with a box of dates from the Balad souk, where they still rolled them by hand, layered them in geometric patterns, and wrapped them in decorative gold foil. He parked in front of the house and carefully lifted the dates from the seat. The box was heavy and warm, and he wanted to keep it, not because of a sudden appetite for dates or because of the sparkling box, but because his mission today was not generous at all, and the giving of such a fine and simple gift smacked of deceit.
A woman met him at the door. She wore a black house dress and a black
burqa
through which he could just see her eyes. Glancing at her hands, he saw that the fingernails were modestly short and that a chain of prayer beads was wrapped around her wrist. She quickly bowed her head, tucked her hands into her sleeves, and welcomed Nayir with an
Ahlan wa'Sahlan.
He averted his gaze.
"I'm sorry," she said, her voice low and humble. "I can take you to the sitting room."
"No, no. If you would be so kind as to tell one of the brothers that Nayir ash-Sharqi is waiting at the door."
Nervously she took a step back and whispered, "Please,
Ahlan wa'Sahlan.
Make yourself at home. If you know your way to the sitting room, you're welcome to go there yourself." As if embarrassed by her own forwardness, she quickly turned and skittered down the hallway.
He watched her go. Once she disappeared, he stepped into the hallway and shut the door. As he tiptoed down the hall, he wondered if she would be considerate enough to inform the men of his arrival.
Ten minutes later a veiled-and-cloaked woman appeared in the doorway bearing a coffee service. The woman seemed nervous, hesitating at the door, her unsteady hands gripping the edge of the tray. Instead of leaving it by the door, she entered the room and attempted to bring it to Nayir, but she was short and the tray was heavy, sloping under the weight of glass cups, a bowl of dates, and a brass coffeepot. To make matters worse, pillows were scattered about, and someone had left a book on the floor, another coffee service, and a deck of cards. Nayir leaped to his feet and reached out to her but couldn't prevent her from stepping on a pillow.
"
Ya 'rub!
" she yelped, stumbling. He caught two cups before they slid off the tray.
He saw her hands and realized she was the same girl who had met him at the door. She extended the coffee service to Nayir and he took it, giving her time to raise her
burqa.
When she lifted the black veil, Nayir stood back.
She was the very image of her sister Nouf.
Blushing bright red, she took the service back and bowed her head. Nayir blinked a few times and glanced away, but his eyes were drawn uncontrollably to her face. He had seen only a picture of Nouf, but his memory of the examiner's office was clear enough.
"Pardon me. You're ... a Shrawi."
"Yes. My name is Abir."
"Nouf's sister."
The one on the jet-ski.
He thought she was the same, but he couldn't be sure. She was the only sister close to Nouf's age. His eyes wouldn't move; he couldn't take them from her face, and the longer he stared, the easier it became to keep his eyes there, to trace the curve of her temples, her chin, her jaw, scanning for an aspect that would prove she wasn't Nouf. At least that's what he told himself. Even though it was foolish, he felt that he knew her, and that in some way she should know him too.