Zeba’s prosecutor had probably heard by now that Yusuf had gone to the village to poke around. He was doubtless entertained by Yusuf’s naïve efforts. The prosecution could write his case up on toilet paper and unfurl it in the qazi’s office—it would still be stronger than Yusuf’s defense.
Two men passed Yusuf walking in the opposite direction. One, who had a white beard and a triangular karakul hat, reminded Yusuf of his grandfather. The other had a stubbly chin and walked with his two hands knotted behind him. Their unhurried pace gave them ample opportunity to take in Yusuf’s incongruous appearance.
“Salaam-ulaikum,” Yusuf said with a nod.
They returned his greeting and continued to look at him unabashedly.
Yusuf wanted to return to Zeba’s neighborhood today. If he could just find a person who had actually been in their home that day when they’d all descended upon the murder scene, he might have a chance of learning something. There had to be information he could use.
Yusuf was lost in thought and barely noticed the rickety sound of uneven wheels approaching. It was the woody scent of fresh almonds that caught his attention and caused him to stop short. A three-wheeled cart had rolled up close enough to tempt him with its stock.
“Agha, wait. Let me see what you have,” he called out.
The man stopped his cart but kept his hands wrapped around the two handles, his elbows bent and tucked close to his sides. He wore a round wool hat that did little to block the sun from his face. It was only late morning, but his forehead already glistened with a light sheen of sweat.
Yusuf took a few steps toward the cart, leaning over it to inspect the stock in each of the tall, thick plastic bags that made up the load. Dried chickpeas, long green raisins, almonds, and walnuts.
“Salaam-ulaikum.” Yusuf felt the man’s eyes on him.
“Wa-alaikum,” the man replied. There was a pause before he spoke again. “These raisins are so sweet, you’ll think they’ve been sugared. You’ve not had anything like them, I promise you.”
“Very well.” Yusuf nodded. “I’ll take them and some of the almonds as well.”
The vendor flipped open a paper bag and scooped almonds into it. His tawny hands and face had been weathered by many days under the unforgiving sun. It was hard to judge his age. He looked to be in his midforties, but Yusuf had come to realize that everyone in Afghanistan looked ten to twenty years older than they actually were, and few could expect to live past sixty-five. It was as if life was in fast-forward, though it did not seem to give anyone a sense of urgency to do more in the abbreviated time he or she had. The vendor grabbed a second bag and was about to flip it open when he paused.
“Where are you from?” he asked curiously.
“I’m visiting from town,” Yusuf said, hoping to skirt the question. He could tell people where in Afghanistan he’d been born, but he knew that wasn’t what they were asking.
“What have you come here for?” The man squinted as he looked at Yusuf, whose back was to the sun. He was also a good six inches taller than the fruit vendor.
“I’ve come to ask some questions,” Yusuf said, being unnecessarily careful with his words. “I’m sure you know that a man was found dead in his home not too long ago.”
“Mm.”
“I’m trying to find out what might have happened to him. People say his wife killed him, but no one saw it happen.”
The man scratched his beard.
“They call me Walid.”
“Good to meet you, Walid-jan,” Yusuf replied. Walid was not much older than himself, he realized with a closer look. “My name is Yusuf.”
Yusuf stuck out his hand. Walid met it with his, calloused and gritty.
“You’re not a police officer,” Walid remarked. “Why are you asking questions?”
“No, I’m not a police officer. But I want to be sure we find the truth so that justice can be done.”
“The government sent you?”
“Not really. An organization. We work for justice.”
Another dodge.
“Has anyone told you what happened?”
Yusuf shook his head and frowned.
“Not yet. If you have something to share, I’d be very interested to hear it. Did you know the man who was killed or his wife?”
“I know everyone who eats almonds and raisins.”
“I’m sure you do. What did you think of him? God forgive his soul,” Yusuf added to play it fair.
“Yes, God forgive his soul,” Walid echoed, blankly. “He was a lucky man. He had a wife and children. His eldest son is a good boy—looks after the family even now that the mother is gone.”
“You’ve seen the children lately?”
Walid nodded.
“I saw them two weeks ago. They’re with their father’s family. They look well enough.”
Yusuf could pass this along to Zeba. It wasn’t much, but he was certain she would be grateful for any news about her children.
“That’s good. They’ve been through a lot, those poor children. They’re missing two parents now.”
The raisin vendor nodded and gripped the handles of his cart. He leaned in as if about to push off then thought of something else and stopped.
“What kind of truth are you looking for?” he asked.
Yusuf was surprised by the question.
“Just the truth. I want to know if she was really responsible for killing him. I want to know if she deserves the punishment that she’ll get if the judge believes she’s guilty.”
“They’ll kill her, won’t they?”
“Maybe.”
“How can you say maybe? Why wouldn’t they kill her?”
“There’s always a possibility she didn’t do it, I suppose. And even if she did do it, maybe there was a reason that we’re not aware of.”
“A reason.”
“Yes, a reason.”
“What reason do you think?”
“I think I came all this way to ask questions because I don’t have all the answers.”
A street mutt scampered past them. The sound of boys playing rose from the distance. The dog’s ears perked and he ran off in the opposite direction with the fearful look of the abused. Yusuf was getting the distinct feeling that he was not in control of the conversation.
“Of course you have questions. Everyone does. No one can imagine why a decent woman would do such a thing,” Walid said, shifting his weight on his feet.
“Exactly.”
“What did her neighbors have to say about it?”
“I’m surprised you don’t know what her neighbors are saying about it.”
“I don’t hear everything,” he admitted as if it were a personal shortcoming.
“They didn’t say much. Seems that no one wants to talk about it.”
“I’m sure you found someone to talk to. The old woman down the road from them always has something to say, even if it has nothing to do with anything.”
Yusuf felt a tickle on the back of his neck.
“You saw me yesterday.” It was a question disguised as a statement.
Walid was silent. He held Yusuf’s gaze, which was all the confirmation he needed. Yusuf opened the paper bag, peered inside, and shook it slightly to rearrange the almonds. He plucked two out and held them in his palm.
“She said Zeba was a nice woman. She seemed to think it was a shame when family matters spilled into the street.”
“Spilled into the street?”
“Yes.”
“I think the street spilled into their home, to tell you the truth,” Walid quickly replied. There was the hint of indignation in his tone.
“What do you mean by that?”
Walid took a deep breath and straightened a bag of walnuts that was threatening to topple over.
“Akh, nothing. Just that . . . nothing really. But there were so many people in that home after the shouting. Everyone came running over to see what had happened.”
“Were you there tha
t day?”
“In their home?”
“Yes. I hear lots of people rushed in. Were you one of them?”
Walid shook his head.
“I didn’t go in. My job is in the street so I stay in the street. I know my place.”
“Weren’t you curious to find out what had happened?”
Walid wiped his forehead with the back of his hand.
“I’d heard enough.”
“Enough that you didn’t need to see it with your own eyes,” Yusuf surmised.
Walid squinted. The two men were figuring each other out.
“You don’t sound like you think she’s a killer. Your questions are different. Are you her lawyer?”
Yusuf casually tossed the two almonds into his mouth. Toasted by the sun, they were indeed delectable.
“I am,” he admitted.
“I heard she confessed to killing him.”
“I wouldn’t say that.”
“What would you say?”
“That there are lots of things that don’t make sense and there is something about her that makes me very concerned. She’s not been well since she’s been in the prison.”
“Not well?”
“My friend, sometimes people under a great deal of stress become fragile. Sometimes they start to come undone.”
“What does that matter? If she killed him, she killed him. Who cares if she’s upset?”
Walid was becoming tense. His breathing was laborious, nostrils flaring a bit.
“Well, I don’t think she’s in her right state of mind, right now. And I’m also wondering if she wasn’t in her right state of mind at the time that her husband was killed.”
“So you do think she killed him.”
Yusuf smiled and shook his head.
“No, I didn’t say that. Even if she did, it’s not right and it’s not legal to convict someone of murder if she’s crazy.”
Walid looked at him skeptically.
“The things you’re saying. You’re not making any sense.”
“It’s the law,” Yusuf explained. “The law of this country states that she can’t be guilty of a crime if she was insane at the time it happened.”
“That can’t be true.”
“It’s true. It’s written into the judicial codes that govern this country. We have to respect that. But tell me, Agha Walid, tell me about the man who was killed. Did he prefer walnuts or almonds?”
Walid snickered, both at the notion that a single set of codes could govern this whole country and at the young lawyer’s odd question. His snickers turned into a rattling cough. Yusuf waited for him to catch his breath and continue.
“He was a man with peculiar tastes—nothing I could offer him.”
“What do you mean by peculiar?”
Walid shrugged his shoulders.
“Since he didn’t care much for what I had to sell, I don’t know.”
Walid looked down the road. A mother carried a little girl in her arms. The child was probably old enough to walk but not quickly enough to keep up with her mother’s pace. For now, she would be carried safely.
TALKING ABOUT WHAT HE’D SEEN WOULDN’T DO ANY GOOD, Walid knew. The best thing for that poor little girl would be for no one to know what had happened, not even her parents. Walid had five children of his own, two of them girls. They were much younger than the girl he’d seen that day, but it still gave him chills.
If only he’d chosen a different route that day—he’d be a much happier man right now. As it was, he hadn’t been sleeping very well lately. His wife, after hearing him recount that day’s events, shook her head and looked at him with disappointment. She’d pulled their two- and four-year-old daughters closer to her, a gesture that had angered him. Was she pulling them away from him? He wasn’t the dangerous one.
What was I supposed to do? He was just talking to her!
Walid. She was just a girl. And now that poor woman . . .
Walid was smart enough to know what he was and what he wasn’t. He was a simple man who sold nuts and fruits. He worked with his back and his hands to make barely enough to feed his family. He was no oracle. He was no authority figure. He resented his wife for implying he could have done something more even when that very thought had nagged at him since that awful day. If he hadn’t known what was to happen, why had the hairs on the back of his neck stood at attention to hear that man speak to the girl?
If Walid hadn’t known, why had he turned away so quickly? Why had he pushed his cart back down the street in such a hurry, his eyes glued to the nuts and raisins as if they were the ones that needed saving? God shouldn’t have put him on that street that day. There was no reason for him to be there. He’d barely sold more than a few handfuls of anything there in months. It had been a mistake.
YUSUF WAS WATCHING HIM, PATIENTLY WAITING FOR WALID TO break the silence, a silence that had gone on so long it was obvious he had something to say. The streets were unexpectedly empty, and the sun hung high in the sky, undimmed by the wispy clouds. There wasn’t even the faintest stir of dust.
“I can tell you this . . .”
But what could he say? He didn’t need to say which girl it was. He didn’t need to lead Yusuf back to her house to dig up things that shouldn’t see the light of day. The woman. How could he help that woman?
“Kamal, God rest his soul,” Walid said awkwardly, “was not a right man. I knew that. Other people knew that. I’m sure his wife knew it, too.”
Yusuf felt something pull at his stomach. He tried not to appear too excited. He nodded, a small gesture but one that Walid seemed to need in order to continue. Like an exhalation, a breeze drifted through, causing the dust to rise and settle around their ankles. It was there, under the gaze of the round and brilliant sun, that Walid began to unravel the story of Zeba and Kamal.
CHAPTER 28
MEZHGAN, IN A FLURRY OF HUGS AND KISSES AND PROMISES TO reunite beyond the prison’s bars, had been returned to her family. They would have a real wedding in a month, but for now, the judge had been appeased by the formal union between her and her beloved. Before she’d gone, she’d pressed her cheek against Zeba’s and tried to kiss her hands though Zeba had pulled away.
“I can’t begin to tell you how grateful I am,” she’d said. “And just to show you how much you mean to me, I want to show you what I’ve done.”
She rolled up the sleeve of her dress and Zeba gasped. On the pale flesh was a fresh tattoo, black writing raised from the skin and haloed in red. It was as clumsy as a child’s scrawl but clear enough to read—Zeba. Zeba couldn’t believe the girl’s foolishness, to sit while another prisoner had pierced her flesh with a pin, dripping melted rubber thinned with shampoo into each divot, to embed the letters of her name into her young body.
“Mezhgan, why?” Zeba had been baffled. “Why would you put that on your arm?”
Plenty of women had tattoos in Chil Mahtab—names of lovers, hearts, and other symbols. But Zeba had never expected to see her own name carved into another person’s flesh.
“I’ve never met a woman as strong as you,” Mezhgan had professed. “There’s something special about you. I knew that from the day they brought you into the cell. You have magic. You’re powerful. Just look what you’ve done for me! And I know that whatever you did to your husband, you did with God on your side. Every woman in here agrees with me. Every single one.”
ZEBA WATCHED HER TWO REMAINING ROOMMATES SITTING cross-legged on the floor of their cell. It was morning and an odd time for a game of cards, but Mezhgan’s absence left a void none of them had anticipated and there were few ways to fill emptiness in prison. Latifa had borrowed a deck of cards from a woman whose cell was on the second floor. She’d been jailed for leaving the husband who had stabbed her in the belly. Her neighbor, a girl she’d known for a few years, had been jailed as well for helping her to escape.
“There’s absolutely no way I’m letting you deal the cards again,” Nafisa declared with exasperation.
Latifa’s eyebrows shot up jovially. The cell was stifling and hot.
“Accusing me of cheating? Don’t flatter yourself. I don’t need to cheat to beat you at this game. You’re even worse than Mezhgan was.”
Nafisa held her fan of cards over her heart and looked wistfully at Mezhgan’s vacant bed.
“I am so happy for her,” she said. “She’s going to be married soon to her sweetheart. I do miss her, though.”
Latifa threw a queen of hearts onto Nafisa’s nine of hearts.
“Killed that one, too,” she said smugly before slapping a jack of diamonds in front of her frustrated cellmate. “Don’t bother missing her. I doubt she’s wasted a second thinking about us.”
“What a spiteful thing to say!” Nafisa snapped.
“But it’s true! What would you do if you were released today? I’ll tell you what you would do,” Latifa said with the conviction of a politician. “You would turn your back on this place and everyone in it. You would never let the name Chil Mahtab cross your lips again. You would deny you’d ever been here, just as you deny what got you sent here in the first place.”
“I would not!” Nafisa huffed, with equal conviction. “I would never turn my back on you, Latifa. And if you were a nice person, I would write to you and visit you, maybe even bring you chocolates from my shirnee whenever that happens. I wouldn’t want to forget you, even if you do cheat like a thief.”
Latifa scoffed and shifted her hips on the ground. She kept her eyes on her cards, but her face had softened.
This early game of cards was not as relaxing as Latifa had promised it would be—not when there was still a prison full of women looking to Zeba for help she couldn’t provide. If she were all that powerful, she should have been able to do some good for herself. The women of Chil Mahtab were not bothered by that small point, though. Their need to believe in Zeba loomed so large that it eclipsed all skepticism. Zeba thought, again, of her name carved on Mezhgan’s young forearm like a blood tribute.
When Asma, the guard, came rapping at their door, Zeba was not at all disappointed.
“Zeba, come. Your lawyer’s here to meet with you.”