Agency Rules - Never an Easy Day at the Office (29 page)

One of the men tossed orange overalls into the cell, yelling, “Get dressed! Quickly! You have wasted enough of our time,” as he unchained him from the metal bars. Faheem didn
’t hesitate pulling on the overalls, hoping that it would restore some of the dignity he had lost to the pressure hose. It did not. Now he looked like a prisoner. As he stepped out of the cell, soaking like a wet dog, they slipped a black bag over his head and led him to the waiting choppers. He could only hope that his next destination would be better than this one. Hope was all he had left.

* * *

The secretary had a habit of arriving an hour before he did to sort, file and deliver all the memos from the previous day’s activities. The memos were the Prime Minister’s source of information to the meetings and calls, briefing him on salient points from each government functionary. Most Prime Ministers didn’t bother to read the actual memos themselves, farming them out to associates and advisors to prepare summaries in the interest of time. That had been the practice in Azam Shah’s Prime Minister house, but wouldn’t be carried forward into Ahsan Chaudhry’s. The new Prime Minister was not interested in underlings reading confidential information no matter how long they had served the party or him.

So it was the secretary
’s morning ritual, over a strong cup of Earl Grey tea, to sort all the memos under the Prime Minister’s categorization system. While serving as Interior Minister, Chaudhry spent the majority of his time reading position papers from aides with no actionable information or guidance, so he implemented a system. For the outsider to the office, the folders looked no different than the standard Government of Pakistan emblazoned manila folders, but inside each folder was a colored paper clip attached to the front page that alerted Chaudhry to the importance, or lack thereof, of the information contained within. Only he and the secretary knew the system and when the files were returned to the outer office, the clips were gone. That was their little secret, one of many that could never see the light of day.

When the Prime Minister arrived at his office that morning, Hina was waiting in the lobby to receive him, as she did every morning, with his updated schedule for the day. Hina had joined Chaudhry at the tender age of twenty-two when he was a young Member of Parliament in the Punjab Assembly. It seemed like a lifetime ago, she thought to herself, recounting the fifteen years and three children that had followed him all the way to the Prime Minister House. The Prime Minister
’s security detail entered first, followed by Prime Minister Ahsan Chaudhry.

“
Good morning, Prime Minister,” Hina said with a smile.

“
Good morning, Hina,” the Prime Minister replied jovially. “How does the morning look?”

“Back to back meetings from ten onwards,” she said, checking her watch. “Just enough time for a cup of coffee and a quick review of the memos,” she said handing him the schedule to review. For Chaudhry, Hina was more like his personal assistant, overseeing all the affairs that he could not be bothered with remembering. As a result, she was also given her own administrative team that took care of all the tasks that Chaudhry passed on to her, unless otherwise specified. They walked together to his office.

Chaudhry glanced through the color-coded schedule, looking for important names and those that could be pushed to make room for more essential tasks. On today’s schedule, he noticed a few that didn’t need to be there.

“Hina, can you move the Commerce Minister and Petroleum Ministers to tomorrow?” he said, taking the pen from her hand to circle the two names. “I want more time with the Speaker and the leader of the opposition to discuss new legislation.”

“Yes, Prime Minister,” she said, pulling another pen from her pad to make identical circles and a notation. “Would you like the Interior Minister in the noon meeting?”

The Prime Minister returned his attention to the schedule, looking for the noon meeting. There was a simple notation blocking off two hours on his schedule, personal time. Chaudhry had implemented this phrase to keep the records clean of meetings with influentials in case someone leaked the schedule, which happened on a daily basis in Azam Shah
’s term.
It has yet to be repeated in mine even with all the curiosity from every corner of Islamabad.

“Have him join towards the end.” Chaudhry replied. “There are some things that I want to consider privately before briefing him.”

“I’ll have him informed, sir,” she said, scribbling another notation on her copy.

The security detail opened the door to the Prime Minister
’s office as he approached. His echoing footsteps deadened as he stepped onto the plush carpeting in the outer office. The outer office was a lavishly decorated, expansive room with the seal of the government woven into the carpet below. This was Amna’s, the receptionist and gatekeeper to the Prime Minister’s private office, domain. Amna was a hard taskmaster for the administrative team that operated under her command. Amna herself was there to receive visitors, direct them to the waiting area and make sure that their needs and questions were addressed before meeting the Prime Minister. For anyone entering, she was a stone wall that kept the day’s schedule on track, not allowing anyone to interrupt without Hina’s direct approval. They all rose as the Prime Minister passed through to the doorway framed with two flags, Pakistan and the Prime Minister’s office. His detail pushed open the doors to his private office.

Ahsan Chaudhry had spent many hours in this same office, both as an advisor to Azam Shah and as Interior Minister for the government, making his move more comfortable than for others who occupied his seat. That comfort hadn
’t stopped him from pausing in the doorway every morning for the past two months of his government to admire the surroundings. Unlike the outer office, the Prime Minister’s private office was more ceremonial where guests and heads of state were entertained when privacy was required. He still felt uncomfortable looking at the wall of treasures that had been left behind from Azam Shah’s state visits. He hoped to replace each item there with his own treasures, so that he could return these to the former Prime Minister’s family at the right time. Towards the back of the room sat a large, hand-carved oak desk, behind it a credenza that showcased photographs of his family. As he moved around the desk, he looked at Hina to close the door, lifting the bowl of mangos from the center panel to reveal a hidden safe. He applied his thumb to the biometric reader and heard the safe click open. Inside the safe were all of the nation’s secrets, available to only three people – the President, the Prime Minister and the Chief of Army Staff. He remembered signing the official secrets act before his thumb was coded to open the safe as a requirement for anyone who sat in the Prime Minister’s chair.

He pulled a couple of files from the safe related to the meetings of the day to familiarize himself with past actions and alliances. There was a knock at the door, and the PM slid a daily newspaper on top of the confidential files. The tea boy entered the office carrying a tray with coffee and biscuits.

“Good morning, Prime Minister sahib,” Bacha said in his broken English. He was one of the causalities of Pakistan’s public educational system, not educated enough to sound educated, but motivated enough to earn a middle class living. There were times over the past two weeks when Chaudhry spent time talking to him, mostly to understand his background and family. Chaudhry himself was an educational elitist having studied at Aitchison and then Harvard.

Bacha placed the coffee and biscuits on the desk. The man started to walk away when the Prime Minister called his name, as he did many mornings at teatime.

“Bacha,” Chaudhry said.

“Gee, janab,” he said turning around to face him.

“I was told that it’s your daughter’s birthday today,” Chaudhry said, remembering the note that Hina had placed on his schedule. Bacha’s broken English didn’t seem to register the Prime Minister’s comment, causing Hina to translate into the native Urdu for him. He smiled when he understood. “How old is she today?” the Prime Minister asked, waiting again for Hina to translate.

Bacha
’s flattery at the Prime Minister’s question quickly turned to embarrassment, recalling that he would need to give him a treat of some kind, as was tradition in Pakistan. He hesitated for a second, trying to frame the words correctly, “Prime Minister sahib, she is the…
paanch saal
today,” he said now even more embarrassed that he had forgotten five in English. “
Gharwalay bohot khush hain
,” he said with a smile.

Chaudhry smiled, laughing a bit at the foolishness of the boy, “
Gharwalay? Keya app khush nahin hain?
” he asked. Bacha smiled and nodded before dropping his head, remembering that he was in the Prime Minister’s office. “Hina has a gift…
tohfa
… for your beti,” he continued. “Tell her
saalgira mubarak
from me.”

Bacha
’s embarrassment disappeared and a smile covered his face from ear to ear. In the nearly two years of working for Azam Shah, he had not once remembered a birthday or wedding, but Chaudhry did. “Thank you Prime Minister gee. Thank you.”

Amna swept into the room behind Bacha during the conversation, handing a note to Hina before turning to exit, grabbing Bacha by the sleeve to guide him out with her. Chaudhry could hear her scolding Bacha behind the closed door, “
Mubarak bol diya. Aur kiya chahiye?”
He chuckled as Hina passed the note to him. Picking up his reading glassed, he quickly scanned the contents, looking at Hina, “Show them in.”

Hina got up from her chair next to the Prime Minister
’s desk, adjusted her kameez and dupatta before moving to open the door. She stepped out, leaving it slightly ajar. He could hear her say, “He’ll see you now.”

The door immediately filled with the largesse of the speaker
’s frame, almost obscuring the wiry leader of the opposition behind him. He stood there, waiting for the Prime Minister to look up from whatever he was reading, but as the minutes passed, his impatience got the better of him.

“Mr. Prime Minister, may we come in?” Tariq Nadeem, Speaker of the National Assembly, asked, each word liberally coated in venomous hatred for the man who occupied the chair he felt belonged to him.

Prime Minister Chaudhry’s head popped up from the memo he was reading, not realizing they were standing there. “Speaker sahib, you need no invitation!” he said, getting up and coming around the desk. “This is our office, not mine alone.” His hand was engulfed by the Speaker’s mammoth mitts. “Please take a seat. Hina, can you join us?”

Hina stepped in, closing the door behind her. She stopped for a moment to ask if anyone would like a beverage, before taking her seat at the small table behind the Premier
’s chair. The Prime Minister returned to his desk to gather some notes, glancing at the memo he had been reading. He caught three words before closing it, “Suspect zero identified.”
I’ll have to ask about that during the noon meeting.

* * *

Faheem’s mind was playing tricks on him. He kept flashing back to the 4x6 cell in Nowshera where he had first met the men in black. They were nondescript, unidentifiable, and devilishly sadistic.
If I knew this was my fate, I would have struggled harder in Nowshera.

The entire helicopter ride was a blur to him, memories of being hung over the side and feeling the ground disappear beneath him still flashing within his troubled psyche. The fear of falling hundreds of feet to his death danced in his head. He could still hear the men
’s laughter echoing in his head, followed by their commander’s encouragement, “Again.” And they did it again and again, as he was helpless to fight them, the whole time wondering if this was how he would die.

Why won
’t they stop playing this incessant music
? The same four tracks repeated over and over since he had been thrown into the box, only stopping for prayer and interrogations, which were controlled by the jailers. Temperatures fluctuated to extremes, further throwing him into a confused state.
Was it day or night? Was he in Pakistan or not?
His mind was no longer his own, a slave to whatever thought or feeling the jailers wanted to torment him with. He had heard of secret prisons, black sites, like this before and the tactics used in them, but the reality of the experience was too much for him to comprehend.

He recalled the first time an interrogator had entered the concrete box. Dressed in a black shirt and blue jeans, Smith, he called himself, was polite and friendly, bringing him a cup of hot tea along with a bowl of soup. He offered to help get his freedom if he would just cooperate with him, help them understand why he had done what he was accused of, but Faheem still had no idea what he was accused of, and no one would tell him. Smith
’s last words before going out the metal door were ominous, “You’re just going to make this harder on yourself the more you resist. They take great pleasure from the ones who resist here.”
I am not trying to resist, I just don’t know what you want from me.
But that thought, like all of his others, had disappeared in the volume of the blaring music that filled his cage all day.

He had curled himself into a ball in the corner of the cage, trying to get respite from the cold, when four men rushed into the cell. It was a common occurrence during his stay to have men barge in and verbally abuse him. They only struck him occasionally and that when a jailer would momentarily lose control, letting his own anger explode. The other jailers would quickly pull the abuser back from Faheem, almost in a practiced act of preservation. He was almost grateful to his jailers in times like these. Confusion was warping his mind.