Legends

“Precisely. We know what we know because of our faith in Allah and His Prophet, who guide us to the right way, the only way. It may be seen as a transgression when a lapsed Catholic like you does not accept this; normally a believer such as myself should attempt to convert you or, failing at that, expel you.” He glanced at the spy. “When one of our own turns his—or her—back on faith, it is a mortal sin, punishable by execution.”

The imam muttered an order in Arabic. One of the gunmen came up behind the Israeli spy and tugged off the hood. Dante caught his breath. Patches of Djamillah’s long dark hair were pasted to her scalp with dried blood. One of her eyes was swollen shut, her lips were badly cut, several front teeth were missing. A large hoop earring dangled from one lobe; the skin on the other lobe hung loose, the result of having had the earring wrenched off without first undoing it.

“You do not deny that you know her?” Dr. al-Karim said.

Dante had trouble speaking. “I know her in the carnal sense of the word,” he finally replied, his voice barely audible. “Her name is Djamillah. She is the prostitute who worked the licensed tabernacle I visited in Beirut. She carted me off upstairs to what the Irish call the intensive care unit.”

“Djamillah is a pseudonym. She claims she cannot remember her real name but she is obviously lying; she is protecting members of her family against retribution. She was passing herself off as a prostitute in order to spy for the Jews. Aerial photographs of several training camps, ours included, were discovered hidden in the room she used. Some of the photographs had notations, in English, describing the camp layout. We suspect you may have provided her with these notations when you visited the bar in Beirut.”

A rasp of a whisper came from Djamillah’s cracked lips; she spoke slowly, struggling to pronounce certain consonants with her mouth open. “I told the ones … ones who questioned me … the Irishman was a client.”

“Who, then, made the notations on the photographs?” demanded the imam.

“The notations … were on the photographs when they … they were delivered to me.”

Dr. al-Karim nodded once. The gunman behind Djamillah slipped two fingers through the hoop of the remaining earring and pulled down hard on it. It severed the skin on the lobe and came free in a spurt of blood. Djamillah opened her mouth to scream, but passed out before the sound could emerge from her throat.

A pitcher of water was flung in her face. Her eyes twitched open and the muted scream lodged at the back of her throat like a fish bone exploded with savage force. Dante winced and turned away. Dr. al-Karim came around the desk and planted himself in front of Dante. “Who are you?” he demanded in a low growl.

“Pippen, Dante. Free-lance, free-minded, free-spirited explosive expert of Irish origin, at your beck and call as long as you keep depositing checks in my off-shore account.”

The imam circled the prisoner, looking at her but talking to Dante. “I would like to believe you are who you say, for your sake; for mine, as well.”

“Come on, now—she must have seen dozens, perhaps hundreds of men in the room over the bar. Any one of them could have been her contact.”

“Were you intimate with her?”

“Yes.”

“Does she have any distinguishing marks on her body?”

Dante described the small scar on the inside of her thigh, the trimmed pubic hair, the vaccination scar on her left arm, or was it her right—he wasn’t sure. Ah, yes, there was also the faded tattoo of a night moth under her right breast. Dr. al-Karim turned to the prisoner and, gripping the loose fitting shirt at the buttons, ripped it away from her body. He gazed at the faded tattoo under her breast, then flung the shirt closed, tucking the loose fabric under the strips of white masking tape.

“How much did you pay her?” the imam asked.

Dante thought a moment. “Fifty dollars.”

“What denomination bills?”

“Two twenties and a ten.”

“You handed her two twenties and a ten?”

Dante shook his head. “I put the bills on the desk. I weighed them down with a shell casing.”

“What was she wearing when you had sex with her?”

“Her shoes.”

“What were you wearing?”

“A condom.”

Dr. al-Karim watched Dane closely. “She, too, said you were wearing a condom—on your circumcised penis. I assume you can explain how an Irish Catholic from Castletownbere came to be circumcised?”

Dante rolled his eyes in frustration. “Of course I can explain it. In a moment of intense stupidity, I let myself be talked into it by my first American girlfriend, who more or less made it a condition of sleeping with me. She’d somehow convinced herself she stood less chance of my passing on a venereal disease if I had my foreskin lopped off.”

“What was the girl’s name?”

“For Christ’s sake, you don’t really expect me to come up with the name of every girl I slept with.”

“Where was the operation performed?”

“Ah, that I remember. On the fourth floor of an ether-reeking clinic.” Dante supplied the clinic’s name and address.