Spoils of War, page 7
Al-Shaheb swung into a gateway in the whitewashed wall and halted briefly to speak to the soldiers slouching behind piles of sandbags. Then he drove through, waving an arm out of the car in a signal for Jack to follow.
They parked side by side in a big courtyard, empty but for a few other vehicles and surrounded by a variety of nondescript buildings. Lights showed behind some of the windows but most were in darkness. There was a strange sense of hidden activity going on behind this lifelessness, though Jack wondered how much of it was due to his imagination. These buildings had been the headquarters and main barracks of the Kuwait City police, and Vincent Hand had told him something of the horrors enacted in the cells and living quarters after the Iraqis had taken them over. Men, women and young boys given electric shocks, beaten with clubs, burned with cigarettes, strangled, stabbed, mutilated. The women repeatedly raped by the soldiers and secret police quartered in the barracks. – Late at night, Vincent said, the screams could be heard from their own apartment block hundreds of metres away.
When the liberating forces had arrived they’d found implements of torture left lying casually about like so much dirty cutlery. They had also dug up the body of Noura Hamadi, among a dozen others, from beneath the flagstones in one of the basements.
Major Al-Shaheb strutted purposefully ahead of Jack across the quiet courtyard, up some steps to an open walkway and into a lighted room. Three uniformed policemen engaged in desultory conversation around a desk leaped to their feet and saluted. The major barked a guttural order at them, then opened a door into another office and ushered Jack through.
The room contained a battered desk, two chairs, a steel locker and a table stacked with brown file covers, each boldly marked in ink with a line of Arabic characters. Beside the single window was a framed photograph of the Emir that seemed new as well; possibly it had displaced one of Saddam Hussein.
Al-Shaheb showed Jack to a seat. Instead of joining him he went to the locker and opened it. He carefully removed his gutra and put it on a shelf at the top, then pulled the dishdasha off over his head and placed it on a hanger. Beneath the robe he wore dark slacks and a blue shirt and tie. His head was revealed to be narrow and bullet-shaped, the black hair woolly and tinged with grey. When he finally sat down behind his desk he seemed transformed in character as well as looks. He was a tough cop, back in his own world and comfortable with it.
Sensing Jack’s thoughts, he smiled for the first time since they had met, giving a flash of gold pre-molars.
‘A disguise I wear for the more traditional social occasions,’ he said. ‘It also helps to keep me anonymous.’ The smile went as quickly as it had appeared. ‘Now, what exactly do you want to know?’
On the way here Jack had thought about the awkwardness of asking questions without being able to explain their purpose. It was easy for Hamadi to say that Al-Shaheb would not want to know; but the man was clearly smart enough to draw his own conclusions. For the moment he was saved from answering by a knock on the door. Two of the policemen from the outer office came in, one of them carrying a couple of folders, the other with a tray holding cups of mint tea. All were placed with great care in front of Al-Shaheb before the men saluted and left.
‘I’d like you to tell me whatever you can about Colonel Jalloul: his background, and his disappearance. But first it might be useful to know how Noura Hamadi came to be arrested.’
‘Of course. Her father finds it too painful to talk about. Not that there is much to tell. There was an arrangement for Jalloul to collect the girl at the house on the night of the third of September. We know from the servants that he did arrive and that they left together, apparently to go to the airport where he would have a private plane waiting to take them to Baghdad. From there she would travel to Amman on a scheduled flight, carrying the papers of an Iraqi citizen.
‘What happened after that is not clear, but we know that she never caught the plane. There were rumours of some kind of shooting incident at the airport that night, but it’s impossible to know if there was any connection. Noura, anyway, was arrested at some point and brought here. After that, nothing was heard of her until her body was found.
‘As for Jalloul, he was an officer of the Estikhbarat – that is, the Iraqi Military Intelligence. He was, at the time, in charge of military security in the western sector of Kuwait City.’ The major flipped open one of the folders and at once began in a steady monotone to translate what he read. ‘Ibrahim Faysal Jalloul. Born in December nineteen fifty in the village of Jalibah, in south-eastern Iraq. A man of humble origins: his father was imam of a small Shi’a mosque. Joined the army in nineteen sixty-eight and graduated four years later from the Military Academy at Ar-Rustamiyah. Married a woman of the Takriti clan, which no doubt helped his career. Perhaps you want to write some of this down?’ From a drawer of the desk he took a pad of lined paper and passed it to Jack, together with one of the cups of tea. ‘He was a captain by the time the Iran-Iraq war broke out, and . . . yes, this may interest you: just at that time he was attending a course at the British Army Staff College at Camberley, which he passed with honours. And here he is, looking quite pleased at his achievements.’
Al-Shaheb turned the open file around. For the second time that evening, and with unwilling fascination, Jack found himself studying a photograph. It was a group picture of a dozen men in the uniforms of different armies, taken against a background of sweeping lawns and distant, imposing buildings. One of the faces in the second row had been ringed in ink, a lean, rather handsome Arab face with a trim moustache and a forced smile.
‘Could you give me a copy of that?’ Jack asked.
‘Our copying machines were all stolen. But doubtless we have other prints elsewhere. I don’t see why you shouldn’t have this one.’
Al-Shaheb slid the picture across the desk. As he retrieved the folder and continued to read from it, Jack caught a glimpse of some photocopied pages of typing that might have been in English.
‘Jalloul was promoted to major soon afterwards. He commanded a company on the Iranian front for four years before transferring to the Estikhbarat and moving to their headquarters in Baghdad. Another promotion went with that. But these formal details tell only part of the story. Jalloul was a professional soldier and one of their more capable officers, not merely a Ba’athist lackey like so many of them. He was also a Shi’a Muslim from the south of the country, not one of the Sunni clique that surrounds Saddam. For all these reasons he was not entirely trusted. Is all this of some help to you?’
‘I’m impressed by how much you know,’ Jack said evasively.
‘There are reasons for that.’ The major closed the file and sipped some tea. ‘Before I became a policemen I was with Military Intelligence myself. We kept a close eye on people like Jalloul – that is, on officers who were disaffected, who as they rose in rank might represent a threat to Saddam Hussein, or at least be seen as such. One day he might have been useful to us.’
‘You mean . . . as a spy?’
‘Perhaps, but more likely as a client, a friend. An agent of influence or a fifth columnist . . . whatever you care to call it. All armies, all intelligence services, seek out such people among the ranks of their enemies. In his case, the opportunity to try out his loyalty never arose.’
‘I heard that the Iraqis had accused Noura of trying to smuggle gold out of the country.’
‘That was rubbish. Another rumour, one that they put about themselves to try to discredit the resistance. They were the ones who stole our gold –’
There was suddenly a commotion outside the room. From the walkway that led past the windows they heard pounding footsteps and a shout of alarm, followed by a series of scuffling noises and incoherent grunts. Major Al-Shaheb sprang to his feet. From the outer office came the noise of the policemen scrambling for the door, and on the walkway there was more excited yelling and then a thump as though someone had fallen heavily to the ground.
Al-Shaheb had a grimly knowing look on his face. ‘Excuse me,’ he said, and stalked out of the room.
Jack had stood up as well. The shouting and bumping had stopped and now there came a cry of pain, repeated at length and punctuated by the unmistakable sound of violent blows. He went quietly to the window and peered out.
At the edge of the courtyard the three policemen from the office, and two or three others, stood surrounding a man who lay curled up on the ground. Even by the thin light that fell from the windows it could be seen that he was completely naked and was flinching from the beating he was being given. The policemen were taking turns at it, raising their truncheons high and whacking down at whatever part of the squirming body was nearest. Beside them Major Al-Shaheb stood impassively watching.
Jack felt shock and revulsion at once. An instinct arose in him to protest at what he was witnessing, but at that moment Al-Shaheb gave an order and the beating stopped. Two of the cops dragged the man to his feet and Jack saw that his wrists were handcuffed in front of him. He was a young man. Blood gleamed on his face and his eyes were wide with terror. The policemen turned him around and frog-marched him away.
When Al-Shaheb returned to the office Jack was sitting back at the desk again, but his expression must have told the major he had seen something.
‘Some trouble with a prisoner,’ Al-Shaheb said equably. He sat down and spread his hands in a gesture of helplessness. ‘One of our Palestinian collaborator friends. Tried to make a run for it as he was being taken from his cell for interrogation. Without clothes, and in handcuffs!’ The major laughed at the absurdity of the idea. ‘Now, Mr Rushton, what else can I tell you?’
6
Vincent Hand had got hold of a radio with a short-wave band from somewhere, and batteries to power it, and when Jack joined him for breakfast the next morning he was twiddling the tuning knob in search of the BBC World Service. Surprisingly, he was also wearing a jacket and tie. It was Easter Sunday, he reminded Jack; although it was a normal working day here, he was taking the morning off and going to mass at the small Catholic church by the Al-Maqsab Gate.
‘By the way,’ he said, ‘did you know the phones were working again?’
‘They are?’
‘Well, mine is. It rang a few minutes ago. I hardly recognized the sound.’
They ate bread and cheese again, this time with the refinement of pickled cucumbers from a jar. Vincent said his American colleagues had promised him a Sterno stove to boil water on, and a supply of tea-bags and instant coffee. He announced this with the simple pleasure of an old lag who has won an unexpected privilege; Jack decided not to diminish his enjoyment by mentioning the feast that had been laid out at Dr Hamadi’s house the night before.
They listened through a storm of static to the news on the World Service, still dominated by events in the Gulf. There was a brief mention that more than five hundred oil wells were still burning in Kuwait. The focus, however, had long ago shifted to Iraq and the civil wars that Saddam Hussein was fighting on two fronts, against the Kurds in the north of the country and the Shi’a rebels in the south. Although the details were sketchy, the general impression was that his forces were gaining the upper hand. Thousands of Kurdish civilians were fleeing into the mountains bordering Turkey. It seemed unbelievable that the man whose army had suffered such a devastating defeat barely a month ago was not only still in power, but capable of crushing two separate rebellions.
‘Surely somebody will overthrow him soon,’ Jack remarked, remembering what Al-Shaheb had said about disaffected officers.
‘Wishful thinking, I’m afraid,’ Vincent said. ‘I don’t think many people understand how tightly he’s got that country sewn up. He’s worked his relatives and cronies into all the key positions. And he’s careful to eliminate any officer who shows signs of becoming too ambitious. He topped a lot of the generals who’d carried on the war against Iran for him, you know, just in case they started getting notions about themselves. The result is he’s got a pretty mediocre army, but one that isn’t likely to turn against him. And the secret police answer to him personally. But listen to this . . .’
There was a supplementary report on the radio about claims that Saddam and some of those same cronies had been milking their own government’s treasury. Western governments, the newsreader said, were investigating allegations that the Iraqi leader and his close associates had transferred billions of pounds of the country’s oil revenues and contract commissions to private bank accounts in Europe and the United States.
A reporter elaborated on the story. It seemed that the exiled Kuwaiti government had commissioned private financial investigators in New York and London to track down hidden Iraqi assets abroad. The Kuwaitis’ interest lay in the hope that the money would be paid over as part of the reparations due for the invasion. The investigators had had the help of political opponents of Saddam, now living in Europe. What the inquiry had uncovered was that over a number of years as much as five per cent of the country’s oil earnings had been diverted for the private use of Saddam Hussein, his family and his political friends in Baghdad. The money had been diverted into bank accounts abroad and much of it had been reinvested through nominees in American, French and German companies.
Jack said: ‘I wouldn’t mind betting that my old firm, Hellig’s, were involved in that. It’s just their kind of thing. But doesn’t it rather disprove what you were saying? The father of the nation turns out to be just another cheap crook. Why would he salt away money like that unless he foresaw the possibility of losing power?’
‘All it shows is that he’s more of a realist than we’ve been led to believe,’ said Vincent. ‘He keeps the people he trusts sweet by lining their pockets, and gives them a guarantee of a gold-plated bolthole if times get tough. The only question is how many generals and party officials he can afford to go on paying.’
Jack found the report vaguely disturbing. Although it had no apparent bearing on what Hamadi had told him last night, it did have parallels – corrupt officials, laundered money, secret accounts, the familiar vocabulary of financial sleaze – that suggested something of the morass into which he might be stepping by accepting the doctor’s proposal.
And if he did accept it, what would his motives be? The idea of having fifty thousand dollars dropped in his lap was certainly attractive. It would go a long way towards rehabilitating him financially; but that wasn’t everything. He didn’t mind helping Hamadi out of a personal mess, but he had no instinctive sympathy for him and his kind, or for propping up the position of near-feudal privilege they enjoyed. If he said yes, it would be because the job seemed to offer him something to focus his energies on; if nothing else, it promised him a temporary way out of the confusion surrounding his own life.
He had no particular plans for the day. When he got back to his own apartment he picked up the telephone receiver and was gratified to hear the dialling tone. It was too early to phone Alison in England, though, and he couldn’t think of anyone else to call. Instead he went down to the water tanker that was parked in front of the Meridien Hotel and fetched back two bucketfuls, one for himself and one for Vincent. He did his best to shave and wash himself in cold water, then put on a clean shirt and slacks. He noticed that the smell of oil smoke had worked its way into the fabric of the suit he had worn last night and he wondered if a faint odour of the Nayef Palace wasn’t there as well, the reek of carbolic not quite disguising something less pleasant.
A feeling of strain had entered his conversation with Major Al-Shaheb after the incident involving the Palestinian prisoner. On reflection, he wasn’t disturbed so much at seeing the man being beaten as at the way the major had stood there letting it happen. And the sight of the blood pouring down the man’s face had seemed less shocking than the fact that he’d been naked when he had tried to run from the guards. Clearly he was being questioned in circumstances that were degrading and humiliating, and possibly worse.
Al-Shaheb, guessing his thoughts, had said: ‘I would not like you to waste your sympathy on a man like that, Mr Rushton. He’s a traitor. I’m like most people here, I believe in the cause of the Palestinians, but it’s a fact that many of them co-operated with the Iraqis. They betrayed members of the resistance. They helped in the looting. Even since the liberation some of the pigs, like that one, have given shelter to their soldiers and secret police who are still on the run.’
The policeman’s look was challenging. Jack couldn’t argue with him, sensing the futility of comparing what had happened just now to what the Iraqis themselves had done in this place. He decided to revert to the matter that had brought him here.
‘What do you think happened to Colonel Jalloul?’ he asked carefully. ‘How did he disappear?’
Al-Shaheb shrugged. ‘My only information was what came to me in the reports smuggled out by the resistance. In order to plan the liberation it was necessary to have all possible tactical intelligence from inside Kuwait. We asked our people to identify as many senior Iraqi officers as they could, to establish what their jobs were and where they were posted. Jalloul had his headquarters at the air base of Ali al Salem. One day he was there, the next day not. After that he was of no interest to us.’
