I ignored her. ‘About Faisal’s ghusl — it was indeed my honour to be asked, Aunty.’ I picked up a mug and put it to my lips. I blew on the hot surface and added, ‘Your son Mustafa, he is fearless.’
‘Mustafa was a dentist, you know.’
I nodded.
‘But he followed Faisal abroad. It was Faisal who had the calling, Faisal who first studied the Holy Koran. But Faisal was easily led and hot-headed, and his brother Mustafa felt he had to follow, to look after him.’
‘A dentist. A good job,’ said Azra to me, as though in rebuke.
‘As a young man, Mustafa was always hunched over a table, his head in a book. He was a good dentist but they took away his licence on account of his poor eyes.’ Aunty paused for breath. ‘Mind you, he still pulled teeth. Mustafa would joke that to make up for his eyesight he would feel his way around his patient’s mouth. It was in London he first practised dentistry, and in the evenings he would devote himself to the Holy Koran. In London he met brothers who taught him to read the Holy Book as a direct instruction to a way of life. Well, when the authorities found out he was operating without a licence they stopped him from practising dentistry, and do you know what they said to him?’ For a brief moment Aunty forgot herself and laughed. ‘They said to my educated son, why don’t you retrain as a butcher? So what does Mustafa do? Ever resourceful, he gathers up his tools and follows his brother Faisal to jihad. “My tools,” my son once said. “In the service of jihad my forceps are of greater value than the gun.”’
She nodded slowly. ‘He always thinks of others. The Taliban were more in need of a dentist than they knew. They took him to far-off places deep inside the mountains and led him blindfolded to work on their leaders.’
The azan sounded out of the alarm clock on the manteclass="underline" ‘Allahu Akbar. ’
‘He didn’t just pull teeth. He was the nearest they had to a surgeon. Mustafa carried out their justice.’
This part Mustafa had failed to tell me. I wanted to hear more.
‘We should go.’ Azra got up to leave. I gestured to her to sit down, but she remained standing.
‘Mustafa said it was more humane to do it with anaesthetic, cleanly and surgically, than with a scythe. The hands of a thief — the arms of a traitor — primitive justice.’ Aunty was clearly irritated by Azra, still standing, her thin black frame looming large in the small room. ‘Stay,’ she continued. ‘Pray with me. It would honour my family if my dear son Akram led the prayer.’
I could sense Azra seething inside her burqa. It felt like a small victory. ‘Very well, Aunty,’ I said. ‘As you wish.’ I picked up three prayer mats folded on a side table and spread out the first one on the floor.
‘You can’t touch the mat with that,’ said Azra, her voice a low shriek.
I looked down to see the blackened rubber stump at the end of my walking stick pressing into the prayer mat.
‘Your cane,’ she said, ‘it is dirty.’
‘You will follow me,’ I said, emboldened by Aunty’s presence.
‘You have soiled the sacred surface.’
I appealed to Aunty with a smile.
‘Ladies behind men — come on, girl,’ said Aunty brusquely.
The women fell into position behind me. I couldn’t bend or prostrate, so Aunty brought up a chair. Comfortably seated, I led the proceedings, listening for the gentle sound of Azra’s gold bangles clicking against each other as they rose and fell on her arm. I conducted the prayer as slowly as I could. I was no longer aware of my painful thumb, and my voice was clear, without a hint of fever. I sang, not recited, the Arabic words, stressing each syllable precisely as I had heard them in Afghanistan. It felt good, like being an imam, and I felt a cheap satisfaction to know that Azra had to follow, as though finally, however reluctantly, she had to bend to my will.
17
‘It was the one thing I looked forward to, my monthly visit to the contact centre. I’d wait in a room with plastic chairs, bright pictures on the walls and toys on a mat on the floor. They’d bring in Britney, and for two short hours, under the watchful eye of the social worker, we would play. There were conditions: I wasn’t allowed to encourage her to call me Mum, although she still did. I wasn’t to be too affectionate or over-kissy. Taking photographs was not allowed. Imagine you’re her big sister, the social worker had advised.
‘They promised that over time they’d look to increase our contact, and one day, out of the blue, a kind secretary from the social worker’s office calls me up and invites me in for a meeting. I hope that they’re calling me in to increase our hours, and I put on my Sunday best. It takes ages to find the office and it doesn’t help that I don’t even know who I’m meeting. Eventually I’m shown into a shabby room with flaky, painted brick walls and tall metal windows onto the street. It reminds me of an old classroom.
‘“We’re here to discuss what’s best for Britney.”
‘I’m sitting opposite the chaperone lady, just the two of us, and I nod earnestly.
‘“What do you think that is, Miss Booth?”
‘“To hang out more with her mum?”
‘“That’s disappointing. I was hoping. ” She shook her head. “Never mind. I wanted to tell you about a family, miles from here. They live in the country with land and animals and are particularly fond of their horses. They have two older children, teenagers, a boy and a girl. My colleagues from their borough sent me their file and I’ve had a very good look through it.”
‘“What part of the country?”
‘She shook her head again.
‘“What’s it got to do with me?” I felt suddenly sick and wanted to leave.
‘“Miss Booth, you’re still young. You can start again. Maybe, in time, have other children.”
‘There was a square window cut into the door of her office and a colleague of hers was waving through it. “Wait here.” She stood up, her chair scraping loudly. “I’ve got a treat for you.”
‘The door opened and in walked Britney, nervous at first. She saw me and beamed. In her hands was a card she had crafted.
‘“I’ll leave you two for a few minutes. Think on it, Miss Booth. It’s best for the child.”
‘I settled Britney on my lap on the floor. We looked at her card, two stick figures in crayon under a yellow sun. I stared at her small pudgy hands and wobbly red cheeks. She looked back at me with huge round eyes. I couldn’t cry, not with Britney in the room, and maybe I did, for a moment, lose my mind, just like the barrister in court had said I did.
‘Leaving Britney on the floor, I got to my feet and locked the door to the corridor. The chaperone came back after a short while, her face through the window surprised to find the door locked. She knocked lightly at first, trying not to frighten Britney, then a bit harder, her eyes wide and fixed. She called her colleagues, who crowded into the corridor outside, different faces silently taking turns to pull worried expressions through the window. Britney and I played on the mat with wooden farmyard animals, ignoring them all.
‘Finally, the police were at the door. At first a woman officer tried to talk to me, but I ignored her and we continued to play, our backs to them. Then a male police officer, saying he would have to bust open the door. It was only then that I picked up a paperknife that lay among the papers on the chaperone’s desk, went up to the window and put it to my neck.
‘I guess they figured that as long as I stood by the door, Britney, at the far end of the room, was safe. That’s why, why I think anyway, the door bust open in my face. I was knocked out cold. Later the nurse in the hospital told me I was choking on a loose tooth in my throat. They must have bundled Britney out of the room.’