Finding Nouf (16 page)

"That's it?"

"Well"—he smiled wistfully—"I remember one time she beat me at soccer when we were kids. We were on the roof of my parents' house. I think she was six. Anyway, she threw me on the cement and started pounding on my chest. I was taken by surprise. I'm three years older; I didn't want to hurt her. She was screaming that she'd kill me if I let her win again." He laughed. "She thought I was letting her win on purpose."

"Were you?"

"No. I let her believe it until she beat me again and—" He stopped smiling. "Well, we were kids, but the only way to protect myself was to take the offensive, throw her on the ground and punch her." He shook his head. "I gave her a bloody nose. I still can't believe I did it. She told me later that she didn't hold it against me."

"So she was a strong girl," Nayir said. Qazi didn't reply, so he went on. "People change when they get older. If it were me, I would have been curious to see what she'd become."

Qazi chewed his lip.

"Look," Nayir said, "the family didn't ask me to come here—I just wanted to talk to you. You're the only link I have to understanding her. Her brothers—well, they were older than she was. They didn't know her so well. I was hoping you could tell me more. She would have been different with you, am I right?"

"They didn't ask you to come here?"

"No. And I won't say anything. You have my word."

"All right," he said softly. "I called her once or twice." He looked up at Nayir. "It wasn't what you think."

"What was she like on the phone?"

"She was ... I don't know, she sounded sweet." A secretive look stole over his face and he gave the hint of a smile. "She asked me if I liked dogs, and I said yes. And she wanted to know if I'd take her to New York for the honeymoon. She made me promise." He gave a soft laugh. "At first I was worried about it, because she seemed so excited, but she said that she'd always dreamed of going to New York and that she wanted me to be there when she finally made it."

Nayir hoped that his face didn't reveal his woe. It was getting to be too much—this tall, careful, considerate man heading off to New York with no idea at all that his new wife was about to abandon him. It seemed impossible that he could have killed her. Even if he suspected that he was being used, it didn't seem like a strong enough motive for Qazi.

"What else did you talk about?" Nayir asked.

"Mostly New York—what we were going to do, where we were going to stay. She kept asking me if it was all right if she left her face uncovered and only wore her scarf."

"And what did you say?"

"I said it was okay. I wanted her to be able to see New York."

Nayir looked at his lap to conceal a wince. He hated what was happening; he felt his anger coming back, and all the pity he'd felt for Nouf seemed pathetically misplaced. He had to remind himself that she'd probably been murdered and that if anyone stood to be humiliated by her behavior, it would have been Qazi.

"I realize that she was beautiful and that's what drew you in. But what was it that made you want to marry her?" Nayir asked. "There must have been something special about her."

Qazi gave a soft smile and bowed his head. "Yes. She was beautiful, that's what drew me in, but once I started getting to know her, she seemed happy." He looked up. "She's the only cousin I had who laughed like she did and didn't talk about proper behavior all the time. She talked about her dogs, and taking walks to the beach, and jet-skiing for fun. But she wasn't silly all the time either, she was just ... a perfect balance." He pressed his hands to his mouth. Nayir could see that the loss had affected him deeply and that he hadn't quite dealt with his grief. Tears threatened to fall, but Qazi excused himself and went into a small bathroom adjoining the office. It surprised Nayir to feel so much sadness from him. He had spoken to her on the phone only a few times, had met her once in a
burqa,
but he must have become deeply attached to her anyway, or at least to the idea of her. And why not? They shared a childhood connection. She was going to be his wife. He must have thought of her as his wife already.

Qazi returned a moment later with redder eyes. He sat back down at the desk and apologized for the interruption. Nayir gave him some time before plunging into his next question.

"When did you find out about ... her behavior?"

Qazi's hands seemed to grow unsteady and he drew them onto his lap. "My father told me at the funeral."

"I see. That's late. You didn't have any idea before then?"

Qazi frowned. "No, of course not."

"Can you tell me where you were on the morning that she disappeared?"

"I was—actually, I was at their house."

"The Shrawi estate?"

"Yes. I had to drop off another part of the trousseau." Glancing nervously at Nayir, he added, "I was only there for fifteen minutes. Othman can vouch for me."

"What time were you there?"

"Before noon," he said. "You don't think I'm involved in this?"

"And where were you after that?"

"I came back here. But first I stopped for lunch, and I drove around for a while." He was tense now, his arms rigidly crossed on his chest. "I had nothing to do with her running away, I hope you know that."

"How long were you out?"

"About an hour. I do that every day at lunchtime. You can ask anyone."

"So no one can really vouch for you around the time that Nouf went missing."

Qazi sighed and sat forward again. "No," he said. "I thought you just wanted to know more about her."

"I do," Nayir said gently. He felt bad for pressing, but Qazi seemed to have handled it well. "But you have to admit, you stood to lose the most from her indiscretions. If anyone found out about her behavior, they could have told you—"

"But why would they?"

"To stop the wedding."

Qazi shook his head sadly. "And my answer to the problem would have been to kidnap her? That's crazy." He looked straight into Nayir's eyes. "If I'd wanted to stop the wedding, I would have called off the wedding. It would have been that easy."

He was right—it would have been easy, and if anyone had asked why, he could have come up with a dozen excuses. He wasn't ready. He'd had a change of heart. No one would have blamed a nineteen-year-old boy for his hesitation. If Nouf's fiancé had kidnapped her, he would have had to be a much more arrogant, prideful man, someone for whom her indiscretion would have been deeply insulting. Qazi just didn't seem like that man.

W
HEN KATYA OPENED
the door, the screech of the blender deafened her. Sighing, she took off her shoes, unwound her scarf, and laid her cloak and purse on the coffee table. A second later the blender stopped.

"I'm home!" she called.

Her father appeared in the kitchen doorway holding a smoothie in a frozen glass.

"Is that for me?" she asked.

"If you like."

She collapsed on the sofa and held out her hand—exactly, she thought, like a chick in a nest. Her father came closer and, looking down on her, gently handed her the glass. "How was work?"

"Good," she said. He nodded and turned back to the kitchen. "Thank you, Abi," she called after him.

"Othman called this afternoon."

She waited, the smoothie chilling her hands, but Abu was quiet, so she stood up and went to the kitchen doorway. He switched on the tap and began to wash the dishes.

"What did you do today?" she asked. He didn't reply. Tentatively she tasted the smoothie. It was odd and earthy, as if he'd added grass, but she managed to swallow it. "So what's for dinner?" she asked.

He shrugged. "The fridge is almost empty, but we do have some eggs."

She was hungry enough to eat a carton of eggs, but if she asked him to cook them, she knew he would say, "Do it yourself."

The frustration of working long hours was finally beginning to catch up with her. When she'd started this job almost a year ago, she'd been so excited about having a job at all that she never felt tired, or if she did, it was satisfying. But now she felt worn out. She'd been up since six this morning and now had no energy to go to the grocery store or cook a meal. Abu ought to have done it.

He's retired,
she thought with a stab of frustration.
He has all the time in the world.
But the look on his face told her that he didn't have all the energy in the world. Something was bothering him, and it wasn't just Othman.

After Katya's mother had died, he'd quit his job at the chemical plant and settled quickly into retirement. Almost overnight his salt-sprinkled hair had gone completely gray, his sharp black eyes no longer were so keen, and his body, once unusually hearty and tall, had withered somehow. Maybe it was the fact that he no longer wore his well-fitting suits; he wore only his house robe, which made him look permanently frumpy.

Without his job, they had little money. His retirement income wasn't enough to cover expenses. Thankfully, they already owned the apartment, a two-bedroom walkup in the old town, but some months they couldn't afford to pay the bills, and when their phone got disconnected for nonpayment, Katya decided to find a job.

For years she'd tutored high school students in chemistry. All of her students were from the school for girls just down the street. They came in pairs with their escorts—usually brothers or cousins—who waited while Katya helped the girls with their homework. Every once in a while, as the girls were leaving, she'd hear their escorts tease them: "Why are you studying chemistry? Can you use it for cooking? It's not like you're going to get a
job.
" The comments hurt her as much as they wounded her students. She enjoyed the work; encouraging young girls to become more than good cooks was meaningful to her. It paid decently and it was something she could do at home. But she had longed for many years to have a job where she could put her skills to better use.

She had received a Ph.D. in molecular biology from King Abdul Aziz University, but like every other woman in her program—an all-women's program—she had finished her degree with the bittersweet knowledge that although she had accomplished a terrific feat, she had precious few prospects for the future. There were very few jobs for women, especially educated women. Women were allowed to work only in places where they wouldn't interact with men, or so infrequently as not to draw attention to themselves, which limited them to girls' schools and women's hospital clinics.

Fresh out of college, Katya had taken a teaching job. She had survived a year. It had been too much work for too little pay, and she simply wasn't motivated enough. She preferred the quiet of a laboratory, where she didn't have to be around people all the time, where she could experience the excitement of discovery and the pleasures of cleanliness, organization, and control. It seemed that there should be ample jobs for women in environments like that. Yet the country's scientific jobs were filled by men first. Frustrated, and growing more resentful, she'd stuck to tutoring biology and chemistry for nearly two years.

Just when it became clear that she had no choice but to find a better job, the city crime lab opened a department for women, and she applied. They accepted her immediately, impressed with her educational background. The prospect of working in a laboratory thrilled her, but she dreaded telling her father. He hadn't liked the idea of her teaching, and that was in a strictly female environment. Although the crime lab would be segregated, there was the potential that she would see men on occasion.

She broke the news to him with enormous trepidation. They were sitting at the kitchen table, peeling carrots and sipping tea. The fridge was empty, the stove wasn't working, and they were both feeling down. When she told him about the job, he jerked upright and narrowed his eyes. "Come on, we're not
that
poor," he said.

It had stung her so deeply that she'd wanted to cry. Letting a woman work was a desperate thing to do. They had sunk in the world. Her face must have showed her disappointment, because Abu backpedaled.

"Wait," he said. "Is this something you
want
to do?"

She nodded, not trusting herself to speak.

"Then for now..." He struggled to say it. "Take the job." He smiled sadly at her just as the tears spilled down her cheeks. She wiped them angrily away, embarrassed by her crying. "If it doesn't work out," he added, "you can always quit."

She nodded again, feeling deeply relieved. Even though they didn't really have a choice, she was grateful that he'd been big enough not to care what other people would think about his daughter's working. It was exciting that she would have a job in the public sphere, but there was still a secret anguish at the thought that in working, she represented their poverty, and that somehow it shamed him.

He was careful after that. He told her he was proud that she'd found such a well-paying job and that she was a molecular biologist. Katya suspected that deep down he still felt the shame. It manifested itself as a reluctance to tackle the problem of housework. Every morning he would stop her at the door. "Who's going to cook dinner tonight?" he would ask.

She promised that she would still do the cooking and keep up with the housework, the cleaning and laundry and shopping that her mother had done before she'd died. It seemed a reasonable deal, because even though it was patently unfair, for Abu it was better to take things one step at a time. For now he was supporting her having a job, and that was enough.

Katya went to work. Although being around death took some getting used to, she delighted in the fact that she was helping solve crimes. Over the course of the year Abu had realized that she didn't have the time or energy to do everything herself, and he'd begun to take up some of the slack. Now he cleaned and did laundry; he even went shopping. But he cooked dinner only when he was genuinely hungry, and even though he was only sixty-four, he was seldom hungry.
He has an old man's appetite,
she often thought,
and I have an appetite for both of us.

She realized that he was slightly depressed—who wouldn't be, after losing a wife of thirty years and quitting a lifelong job? She had hoped that time would heal his sadness, or at least make it more bearable. Sometimes she'd come home to find a whole dinner laid out for her—lamb, rice, eggplant, and bread—and other times it happened like this, eggs in the fridge, an experimental smoothie.