Susan called Hiba from St. Thomas Hospital several hours later. Her ribs were badly bruised from the force of the weight that had pinned her to the floor. The doctors told her that Daniel’s satchel underneath her must have helped soften the blow, as they would have expected to find a separated shoulder or perhaps even a broken collar bone. Her worst injury was to her right ankle, which had been fractured clean by a box of books that crashed down on it. No doubt, some absent-minded scholar had left them on the Oxford Tube. For these kinds of items, Alfie used a small forklift to hoist them onto the top, leaving room on the lower rungs for suitcases and lighter items that he could heave himself. No one was coming to take books to the charity shop, after all. And as no one was allowed to climb the shelves, a fact Alfie thought went without saying to a government official, he never worried they would fall and hurt someone.
Surgery was not necessary, but Susan would have to stay overnight. Her parents would come the next day on the train to fetch her car from the FCO, collect her in it, and take her back to Buckinghamshire. Her mother had a principled aversion to modern pharmacology and looked forward to nursing her daughter back to health homeopathically, with arnica first, then perhaps silicea or symphytum.
It would be at least a month before Susan could put weight on her right foot, let alone drive, and she planned to discuss work arrangements with her colleagues in a couple of days. In the meantime, Susan asked Hiba to phone the Minister and apologize for standing him up for lunch. Then she needed a big favor. Could Hiba come to St. Thomas, retrieve Daniel’s satchel, and take it up to him in Oxford? He’ll need his recently-discovered computer for his work, Susan suggested. She instructed Hiba to take the full amount from their department’s petty cash box, £1,000, to pay for her journey, and then give the rest to Daniel as compensation for whatever may have been in the fateful suitcase, which under no circumstances would Susan or anyone else be allowed to return and claim.
Hiba found the whole arrangement scandalous. None of this had been handled with paperwork or following any protocols. Really, none of it concerned Her Majesty’s government at all. It was true that as head of their little department, Susan was at liberty to authorize the use of petty cash as she saw fit. No doubt, she would submit a report to the auditor, connecting the whole operation and expenditure to the department’s responsibility to the scholars, and the Minister would sign off without question. Nonetheless, Hiba resented that Susan would bend over backward like this – almost kill herself even, over a pathetic crush with a much younger, mixed-up man. More importantly, to ask Hiba to carry on her boss’ little flirtation for her was beyond the pale. Nonetheless, a trip out of town was a welcome break from the monotony of an early commute on the District Line from Barking, with a return journey and little excitement awaiting her back in the East End after work. She told Susan she would collect the bag on her way home that evening, and she would go up and back to Oxford the next day. Susan told her she was welcome to spend some of the funds to stay over, but Hiba said her father would never allow it. Strangely, going to America with Susan and returning with a group of scholars was acceptable to her family, but disappearing into provincial England by herself for a night was something else entirely.
Later that evening, with a wad of £20 notes and Daniel’s bag, in addition to her own little backpack and lunchbox, Hiba began walking the half-mile distance from the tube station to her family home. Suddenly, a voice called out to her from the shadowy doorway of a quiet chip shop on Fanshawe Avenue. “Oi,” a voice called out hesitatingly, as if having chosen the wrong word. “Hiba Dar!” The voice belonged to Amir Khan, a boy she had grown up with in the neighborhood. He had disappeared for a while, back to Pakistan or maybe Afghanistan, some said. Others said he was just working temporarily for a cousin in Birmingham. His mother and Hiba’s were friendly, and Amir’s father once owned the very chip shop where he was now standing, but he had sold it a few years earlier to a new arrival, a businessman from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, and he died of lung cancer shortly after.
If Hiba had been two steps farther away from hearing the sound of her name, or if the street had been busier and louder, she may have been able to get away without obviously ignoring a familiar voice. She was pretty sure she was in no danger of violence, but she had no desire to stop and chat. What was the point? It was bad enough she had to come back here every night. Nonetheless, she decided to turn around and play polite.
“Amir? Is that you? Oh my God, how long has it been?” Hiba had not known Amir to be particularly religious, and he had had run-ins with the police for shoplifting and vandalism. His older brother had become a successful businessman in the City, but Amir had fallen into the kind of aimlessness that jeopardized the reputation of their community. “The National Front would like to make an example out of you,” Amir’s father told him. Amir would always fire back, “There ain’t no National Front no more, Baapu.”
Hiba was a little apprehensive of Amir’s next move. To her surprise, he put his hand on his heart and offered the traditional greeting, “Assalamu alaykum,” to which she instinctively replied, “Wa alaykumu s-salam.” Now in full view under the street light, Amir appeared different than he had in the shadowy doorway, more mature than Hiba remembered him, without the bloodshot eyes that would occasionally catch hers when their paths crossed as teenagers. He was clean shaven and dressed in designer jeans, a white dress shirt, white Adidas Superstars with black stripes, and a black leather jacket. He asked if he could walk Hiba the rest of her way home, and she accepted.
“It’s been a long time, Amir. Where have you been?”
“Back in Pakistan mostly. A few other places. My life was headed in the wrong direction, Hiba. Meaningless, really. But I’m on track now. I hear you work for the government.”
“Yes, that’s right. A junior civil servant. The most junior, really,” she confessed.
He stopped walking and faced her, his brown eyes looking straight into hers. “Are there many people in that world like us? I mean, do you feel like yourself there?”
No one had asked her such a question before, not even her parents, who were as proud of her in their way as Susan’s parents were in theirs. But Amir’s question was timely. She had begun to wonder for the first time in her life, during her trip to the States, why had her grandparents rejoiced to have their own country, to be free of British rule, only for her parents to raise their own family in Britain? Economic opportunity was the normal answer, the obvious answer, but what kind of answer was that really? Surely one’s own country, the sense of belonging where one’s ancestors had lived and died, was worth more than money. She finally answered, “I dunno. Not really, to be honest. In fact, I’m angry a lot now, like I never was as a girl here in our neighborhood. I find the world where I’m trying to move up a decadent place.”
Decadent? She asked herself, where had that word come from?
“That’s exactly it, Hiba. I had a feeling about you,” said Amir. “I just knew. To be honest, I’ve seen you walking back from the train several times lately. You look sad. I’ve asked about you round the neighborhood a little bit too. See, I’ve come alive.” He had omitted his habitual “innit,” a Cockney convention he was trying to eliminate from his vocabulary. “Actually Hiba,” he continued, “I plan to go back to Pakistan for good someday. That is, if Allah gives me long enough.”
“Gives you long enough?! Amir, what are you saying?”
“Hiba,” he replied, “I could use your help. Britain and America are about to wage war on our people. The people I’ve been with over the last couple years have shown me how evil this system is that our parents wanted us to live in. But you’ve said it, ‘decadent.’ There must be a wake-up for them. A real wake-up. Not pattin’ themselves on the back for hiring a girl with a hijab at the Foreign Office.”
She stepped back, then began walking again. Amir followed. After a few seconds she asked, “How did you know I worked at the Foreign Office, Amir? Plus, they didn’t just hire me. It’s the government. There’s an exam. It’s a rigorous process, you know.”
“Like I said, I’ve asked around,” he said with no hesitation.
“Amir, I’m glad you’ve cleaned up. You look very well. You’re so confident. But you’re hardly a revolutionary. You seem, well, more like them. The people I work for.”
He remained silent for half a minute, contemplating how to express the complexity of his situation. He liked Western fashion. She hadn’t even noticed his Omega wristwatch. He had no interest in growing a long beard or wearing flowing robes, and his friends abroad had taught him not to pretend with outward appearances. He was useful as he was. But would it impress Hiba to say he was a sleeper agent, then? Maybe she would run away, or worse, she might laugh. Is that even what he was? Finally, he answered, “I know my role now.”
As they continued up Fanshawe Avenue, the large Al Madina Mosque loomed large ahead of them. The green dome topped with a gilded crescent moon set the building apart, but otherwise, its red brick edifice blended in well with the local aesthetic. The mosque was in noticeably better shape than the weathered, brown brick buildings of the Roman Catholic parish of St. Mary and St. Ethelburga next to the station. The church was a grimy, midcentury bunker, but it was usually full of people. Poles and Nigerians mostly, with a few Italians.
The Anglican parish church on North Street, however, was of another order completely, a Grade I listed historic structure from the early fourteenth century. At one time, it had been the flagship of the Open Evangelical tradition of the Church of England. Now they were happy to get thirty souls inside the walls on a Sunday morning. A few years earlier, the Parish Council had approved a little extension in which the vicar opened a bookshop, an evangelistic venture that had yet to produce much if any tangible advance of the Kingdom of Heaven in the East End. But everyone in the neighborhood knew that walking through the graveyard was a way to escape the otherwise relentless pound of pavement underfoot and the deafening noise of traffic during busy times of day.
Amir resumed his sales pitch. “Where is all this headed, Hiba? Co-existence? The melting pot, as they say in America? You see, the water is so tepid now, everything just sits in it and stays the same. Can there be a society within a society? An oasis in the desert? Funny to imagine we would be the oasis in this dreary, sodden England, innit?” He had let one localism slip.
“Don’t be daft, Amir,” she replied half-heartedly. “People like us are the future here. Or at any rate, us and them are making things better together.”
“I don’t know, Hiba,” he said. “Even if the mayor of this city had the same surname as me, England would be England. I love it here, and I also hate it.”
He waited another thirty seconds and decided to be bold.
“Hiba, I…we could use someone like you.”
At that moment, they arrived in front of Hiba’s door. She was eager to get inside quickly, to avoid her younger siblings spotting her talking to a man and running off to tell their parents. For that matter, the pair were in plain sight now of a half-dozen nanis looking out their front windows. Word would spread quickly. Amir handed Hiba a plain business card with only a phone number printed on it, beginning with the familiar London 020 prefix. “That’s my mobile. Call me if you want more than this,” at which Amir raised his arms, indicating the surrounding buildings, the metropolis, the West. “Khuda Hafiz,” he said, this time translating it into English, “God protect you, Hiba,” and he walked into the night.
Later on, Hiba could not sleep, mulling over the strange encounter with Amir. Her eye caught sight of Daniel’s bag, an alien presence on the floor of the room she still shared with her sister, a dental hygienist who was one year older and four inches taller, a stunner who was arranged to be married to a newly qualified doctor.
“Surely Amir doesn’t mean killing people,” Hiba thought. “Who has he been with? What does he see in me that makes him think I’m unhappy about my life, about the world? But he’s right. I am. And he’s so handsome now.”
Hiba got out of bed and reached for her mobile charging on the nightstand, along with her appointment diary into which she had slipped the little card Amir had given her. She went downstairs and found the kitchen empty, so she sat down and dialed. Amir picked up. “Hiba?” Surprised again by Amir’s seeming foreknowledge she replied, “How did you know? Never mind. I have an idea for how to help you. I’m going to contact someone I know.” Amir paused. “Someone you know? All right. Yes. Thank you.” A little panicked she whispered, “I’ve got to go. Bye.” Before she could press end, Amir interjected, “Wait, Hiba…. Can I phone you back on this number? Maybe tomorrow?” She said yes, ended the call, and breathed out, relieved.
Buzzing from the clandestine activity, she opened her diary and found an e-mail address ending in ed.ac.uk. It belonged to Sullivan Gallier, recently of Edinburgh University. It was an open secret, known to everyone but Susan and Daniel it seemed, that Sully was the inside man responsible for the Embassy protest. Hiba had found the whole affair amusing, apart from Daniel getting hit in the head. She quietly admired Sully for turning the kind of everyday celebration of old-fashioned values that she had often seen in her work at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office into a statement modern people could read into. The ambassador’s crescendo of tolerance was obviously not good enough. In fact, it was absurdly patronizing.
Hiba walked over to the living room, also empty, and turned on the family computer. She drafted Sully an e-mail, which began:
“If you want to do something in this country like you did in yours…”
Hiba filled out the message, looked it over, and pressed send. She was an activist now.
