Bright Shiny Things Page 3

  ‘So what are their strengths?’ Lee asked.

  She thought for a moment and then she said, ‘Their ability to get inside people’s heads. The message ISIS sends is uncompromising and takes no prisoners. It is sure, it is certain and there is great comfort in it.’

  ‘Comfort?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘Any kind of certainty is comforting. What ISIS offers is right and wrong, heaven and hell with no ambiguity. Break the rules and you will die both here on earth and in heaven. But do everything we tell you and we guarantee you will have dominion over all others and you’ll go to heaven too. What’s not to like?’

  THREE

  ‘Rajiv-ji!’

  For a moment the tall, leather-clad man kept on walking. As one of the few Hindu traders on Brick Lane as well as being the only openly gay man, Rajiv Banergee was deaf to any sort of approach on the street. And even though the caller had addressed him politely, Rajiv spat back a venomous ‘fuck off!’ just in case. But when he did turn around he saw a friendly face and he blushed.

  ‘Oh, Baharat-ji!’ he said. ‘I do apologise for my language! I am so, so sorry.’

  The old man, Baharat Huq, smiled. ‘You get a lot of unwanted attention, Rajiv-ji,’ he said. ‘I would do exactly the same myself if I had to put up with these terrible boys round here.’

  ‘Them?’ he laughed. ‘They’re a joke, Baharat-ji. I don’t worry about them.’

  He looked at a small group of teenage boys wearing shalwar khameez and kufis. Some of them he recognised as members of a street gang known as the Briks Boyz. All of Pakistani and Bangladeshi heritage, they fancied themselves as guardians of Muslim pride in the Spitalfields area. In reality they were at best anodyne, at worst, thuggish.

  ‘Rajiv-ji, I wanted to speak to you,’ Baharat said.

  ‘Oh.’ He frowned. ‘Nothing bad, I hope.’

  The old man smiled. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said.

  Rajiv brightened. ‘Oh well, come to the shop,’ he said. ‘I’ll get my boys to make tea.’

  Rajiv had inherited the Leather Bungalow from his father when the old man had died back in the 1980s. Back then Rajiv had cross-dressed with pride, but now although still as slim as a whip, he contented himself with a little eyeliner, some mascara and an assortment of large, very dressy rings. The world had changed and, to Rajiv’s way of thinking, for the worse.

  Sitting in the dingy little office at the back of the leather shop, the two men made idle gossip until one of Rajiv’s assistants brought them tea. Once the boy had gone the old man said, ‘Rajiv-ji, I understand from my friend, Mr Berman …’

  ‘Ah, Lionel, yes.’

  ‘I understand from him that yesterday you were abused in this your own shop by a boy who is currently staying with my son, Ali.’

  ‘One of the Arab boys?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Rajiv laughed. ‘Oh, yes. He put his head around the door and shouted “Faggot”. Then he ran away. It was pathetic. Actually it would have been funny if Lionel hadn’t been so upset about it.’

  ‘Yes, well I too am upset about it,’ Baharat said. ‘And I wish to apologise. Ali will not, as you know. I have told and told that boy that what he is doing with these riff-raff he takes in is not in any way advancing the cause of Islam, but he takes no notice. I tell him, real Muslims do not persecute any creature, human or animal. But he continues with this, excuse me, shit, about my being taken in by “Zionist lies”. One day the police will come for him. I know it! How can a man have two such wonderful children in Asif and Mumtaz and then such a ridiculous boy like Ali?’

  Rajiv shrugged. He didn’t have any children, what did he know? But he did like Baharat’s daughter, Mumtaz. In an attempt to change the subject, he asked after her.

  ‘Still working as a detective,’ the old man answered proudly. ‘And her stepdaughter is doing very well with her A levels. She will go to university. I tell you, Rajiv-ji, it is a good job that girl has my daughter as her mother. That waste of space, her father, put the child into a private school and forgot about her. Mumtaz takes an interest. But then, she is a clever girl.’

  ‘She always was, Baharat-ji.’

  ‘Indeed. Worth ten, no, a hundred of that vile trickster I gave her to.’ He shook his head. ‘There are days, you know, Rajiv-ji, I find it hard to live with myself. My Mumtaz has endured such hardships because of that man! And you know, sin though it is, I am happy that Ahmet Hakim is dead. May God forgive me.’

  Uncomfortable with ‘God talk’ Rajiv again changed the subject. ‘Well you tell Mumtaz and Shazia to come in when they visit you next time,’ he said. ‘If the little one is going to university she will need a nice stylish jacket. I see all the smart girls wearing leather bombers these days. And no charge, Baharat-ji.’

  ‘Ah, but—’

  ‘No, it will be my pleasure,’ Rajiv said. ‘Truly. Only cost will be a chat with the lovely Mumtaz.’

  It was only when Baharat looked closely that he saw the shadow of a bruise on Rajiv’s right cheek, underneath his foundation.

  He wasn’t her type. Mumtaz had never been attracted to musclemen and Fayyad al’Barri was clearly muscle-bound. She preferred thin, aquiline men, like her late husband, like Lee Arnold. Also, Fayyad had a wispy beard that he’d dyed red. A lot of the ultra-religious men did that. But in spite of that, she could see why people would find him handsome. He had full lips, almost like a girl’s and the most soulful, large green eyes. Predictably his profile was an exercise in bragging. He was a ‘warrior’, a ‘sword of God’ and ‘fearless’. His life was exciting, meaningful and ‘almost perfect’. The only thing he lacked was a pious, obedient wife who would give him a lot of lion-like sons and daughters whose beauty would only be matched by their chastity.

  Mumtaz looked away from the screen and said, ‘Yuck.’

  Lee laughed.

  ‘This guy could get a degree in self-aggrandisement,’ she said. ‘The kind of woman he wants is a cipher.’

  ‘Then that is what poor little Mishal must be,’ Lee said.

  Abbas al’Barri had come to the office that morning. Delighted that Lee had changed his mind about helping to, hopefully, get Fayyad home, he’d hardly listened to the list of conditions his friend had put on the operation. Lee was sure that Abbas still didn’t know that if Mumtaz felt threatened at any time she’d be able to just stop it. And that was a real possibility.

  It had been once Abbas had gone that they’d come up with the name Mishal for their phoney jihadi bride-in-waiting. On the basis that it was about the youngest that Mumtaz could pull off convincingly, they’d decided that Mishal was eighteen. Like Mumtaz, of Bangladeshi heritage, she lived with her parents and two brothers on Brick Lane where her father worked as a minicab driver. It was important to keep as many details as possible close to Mumtaz’s own life story. That way she was less likely to make mistakes in her conversations with Fayyad.

  Although ideally they would have wanted her to have an arranged marriage, Mishal’s parents didn’t approve of coercion and were happy to consider any suitable young man she may suggest. Mishal found that very disappointing.

  ‘They’re being affected by the beliefs of the non-Muslims around them,’ Mumtaz said.

  ‘Mishal doesn’t approve.’

  ‘She’s tried to talk to them about it but she finds challenging authority difficult,’ Mumtaz said.

  ‘Mmm. That’s good. Showing disapproval for their outlandish beliefs but also respecting them because they’re her parents.’

  ‘Fayyad, or rather Abu Imad, to use his jihadi name, will expect her to transfer that kind of loyalty to him,’ Mumtaz said. ‘He’ll reel her in because she’s questioning her parents’ authority – her dad also takes the odd beer – she’s hormonal, she’s studious and quite lonely. She has recently started to break her parents’ rules, however, by going on Facebook.’

  ‘So we’ll have to give her “friends” or she’ll have no “profile”. Christ, I sound as if I know what I’m talkin
g about!’

  ‘Yes, but kids are quite indiscriminate about who they “friend”,’ Mumtaz said. ‘I can “friend” a clutch of Shazia’s distant acquaintances in the certain knowledge they will reciprocate even though they have no idea who Mishal might be.’

  Lee sighed. ‘That’s so weird to me.’ Then he asked, ‘Does she cover her head?’

  ‘Yes, but only in the same way I do. She’d like to go further but she’s worried about what her parents might think. She may well change into niqab when she goes to college.’

  ‘Does that happen?’

  ‘Yes,’ Mumtaz said. ‘And in the other direction too. Girls from pious families uncover when they get to college. Shazia has got two friends who do that. One of them has a Lithuanian boyfriend. Lee, do you know anything about Fayyad’s interests? If Mishal is going to make contact with him, then he has to find her, doesn’t he? I mean if she contacts him he may well become suspicious.’

  ‘He’s the one touting for a bride.’

  ‘I know, but I think that if he can find her online that will be a lot more convincing than if she contacts him.’

  It was a good point. But it would take time. Also, were he in fact reaching out, it may be time they didn’t have.

  Lee hadn’t seen Fayyad for at least five years. He said, ‘He was always a big Hammers fan. I don’t know whether that all went out the window when he got religion. And would a girl like Mishal be into football? Wouldn’t it be a bit undignified for her to be looking at all those men’s knees?’

  ‘Her father is a fan,’ Mumtaz said. ‘She was brought up with the Hammers. She is enormously loyal to the team. But her devotion does give her problems. Only God should be worshipped and Mishal feels that she should really drop her interest in football because she fears it may be sinful.’

  Lee shook his head.

  ‘I know it’s weird,’ she said. ‘But this is how radicalisation, be it Islamist or some other form of brainwashing, works. Gradually the “victim” is distanced from whatever makes her herself until only the ideology is left. If Fayyad is actually trying to make contact with a view to coming home, he will respond to mention of West Ham. It’ll probably be negative, for the sake of his ISIS masters, but it may well mark Mishal out from other potential brides.’

  ‘As well as her photograph,’ Lee said.

  Mumtaz put a hand up to her head. ‘Oh, I’d forgotten about that.’

  ‘I don’t know how you do modest but sexy …’

  ‘Oh, not sexy! No!’ she said. ‘God, will I be attractive enough for him …’

  ‘If you’re not then he must’ve lost his mind …’

  ‘Be serious!’ she said. ‘And will he believe I’m eighteen? Lee, I am thirty-four! That is geriatric for these people!’

  ‘Yeah, but you can do younger. I think.’

  ‘But eighteen? God, this is madness! What am I doing?’

  ‘You don’t have to do anything,’ Lee said. ‘We’ll stop it. I’ll do it. I’ll—’

  ‘You can’t!’ she said. ‘And you won’t!’

  He said nothing. They sat in silence, stumped by their own fears. However much Lee felt that he owed Abbas, this was proving too hard. It was also potentially dangerous both psychologically and, possibly, physically. ISIS killed people and their reach was long. But then he remembered something.

  He said, ‘Photography.’

  ‘Yes, it’s a problem,’ Mumtaz said. ‘We know that.’

  ‘Yes, but it could also be another way in,’ Lee replied.

  He hadn’t even tried. Shereen threw the graffiti-spattered homework book on the floor. ‘Suk my Cock’, ‘Ass-Fuck’ – it wasn’t even good graffiti. Juvenile and boring. But Shereen knew that the author was far from being a child. Harrison Yates at fifteen was the product of an alcoholic mother, an absent father and a life hanging around the periphery of street gangs, none of whom would accept him. He was one of only five white British boys in Year 10 and he was about to become a father. Why should he bother with his maths homework?

  She looked at the photograph of Fayyad she kept on her desk. She touched it. That was the real Fayyad; beardless, smiling. As soon as they’d arrived in London everything had gone right for that boy. Of course, he’d put the time in to master the language and get to university, but he’d worked at getting in with the right people at school and had made brilliant friends who would have stayed with him for life had he not gone off to join ISIS. Shereen still saw Dwayne who had become a plumber as well as ‘Mo’ Mohammed who was married and had two little daughters. Nice, normal boys who had done well for themselves. Why had he rejected them? And for what? What had happened to the boy who had once dreamt of being an officer in the British Army?

  Shereen picked Harrison Yates’s book up off the floor and wrote ‘See me’ where his homework should have been. If he even turned up to her class it would be a miracle. Why would he when most of the other boys in his set didn’t bother? These days Shereen seemed to teach almost exclusively girls. Sometimes every head in her class was covered. She knew that as long as the girls were happy, it didn’t matter. But Shereen was still at heart a part of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq which, for all its faults, had allowed women to choose how they dressed. She had never covered and neither had her mother. Covering, in Shereen’s head, was something your grandmother did.

  She looked at the clock. It was almost five, which meant that she had just over an hour to finish marking and organise dinner. Layla was going out with her friends and so it would just be Abbas, Hasan and her. She went to the fridge to see what she could assemble with ease, when there was a knock on the front door.

  ‘That’s my mother’s garden.’

  Mumtaz thought that it looked more like a patio. Plants she couldn’t identify grew in pots and old oil drums while, in the middle of the space, an attractive woman in a sundress sat beside a fountain.

  ‘And that’s my mother,’ Shereen said. ‘She was a biologist.’

  She could have been almost anything. Italian, Spanish, Portuguese.

  ‘Fayyad liked photography too?’

  ‘When he and Djamila were little, I used to take them with me every time I went out with my camera,’ Shereen said.

  ‘Portraiture.’

  ‘I always liked that,’ she said. ‘Black and white medium was my favourite. And you know that on the Nineveh Plain we had such a wide range of subjects. We had tattooed nomads, Kurds, Assyrian Christians, Yezidis.’

  She showed Mumtaz a photograph of an old woman whose face was so wrinkled and sun-blasted it looked like oak. She wore the most extraordinary earrings in her long, stretched lobes. They appeared to be bundles of coins.

  ‘That lady was the wife of a Yezidi sheikh,’ Shereen said. ‘She believed that photographs stole people’s souls. But she let Fayyad take her picture. He was eight years old. A long time before he decided that he wanted to work in banking, he wanted to be a photographer and, for a while, a soldier. I always encouraged him. Photography is what I would have done had my life gone differently. When he left, we had not talked about photography for years.’

  Mumtaz looked at Lee. He’d brought her to the al’Barris’ home when he’d remembered Shereen’s photography. In spite of their strictures against the deification of images, ISIS fighters liked photography. There was, it seemed, nothing they enjoyed more than photographing each other, the land they conquered and their victims. All for the purpose of propaganda. An interest in photography could well single Mumtaz/Mishal out from the other girls intent upon catching the eye of Abu Imad.

  ‘Why do you need to know about my photographs?’ Shereen asked.

  He’d had two reasons. But he told her just one.

  ‘You’re so good, I wondered if you’d take some shots of Mumtaz,’ he said.

  Coming to Shereen wasn’t ideal, the less she and her family knew about how they planned to make contact with Fayyad the better, but Mumtaz was nervous about her ability to look eighteen and Lee knew that if anyone could help h
er do that, it was Shereen.

  ‘Of course,’ she said.

  She didn’t ask what for, but of course she knew. Lee said, ‘An innocent look, you know?’

  ‘I know,’ Shereen said. Then she smiled. ‘You know, Fayyad never brought a girl home here to meet us. When I think of that, it makes me sad.’

  It was Fight Club. He’d grown up with that film, he knew that. He was well aware of the ‘rules’.

  Brick Lane was less than a mile from the sky-piercing tower where he worked making unimaginable amounts of money for people already so rich they didn’t notice the odd billion either way. He’d met a few. When he’d first started with Vanek Brothers he’d wanted to become one. But then, in spite of the amazing salary he earned, and the bonuses, Amir Charleston began to come to the conclusion that he was unhappy.

  As he jogged past Spitalfields Market, he saw a few faces he recognised from work, one or two he vaguely recalled from Eton. But they didn’t notice him in his black Club R.W.R. T-shirt and shorts. He could have been any one of any number of high-functioning private equity fund managers out for a power-run. And that was good. Because had he been recognised he might also have been followed. Only by colleagues. But he didn’t even want them to know what he was doing. This was his thing.

  Amir turned down Fournier Street, past the Ten Bells pub and into the streets of old Huguenot houses that had once characterised almost all of Spitalfields. But the houses didn’t interest him. Headed to Brick Lane and beyond, Amir had an appointment with the only thing in his life that was making any sense to him. The only thing that was making him happy.

  Rajiv grabbed Ali Huq’s sleeve.

  ‘This isn’t you,’ he said.

  Ali Huq squirmed as he tried to pull away.

  ‘What happened to you, eh?’ Rajiv said.

  Under his breath the younger man said, ‘Get off me, pervert!’