Allure of Deceit Read online

  “You cannot believe all that you hear.” Parsaa’s laugh was harsh. “Her attorney should look into her other crimes.”

  “Many donors want to help her.” Bacha looked around. “They would help here, too, but only if you let them.”

  Laashekoh would have nothing to do with groups that supported Leila, and Parsaa offered a warning. “Leila is young, but she is treacherous. The attorney, anyone else who deals with her, should be careful.”

  Pir’s pale eyes sharpened as Bacha translated. “My friend claims you don’t want the children hearing us talk about Leila,” Bacha said. “Do others in the village feel the same about her?”

  Karimah spoke up. “If anything, he is too kind. She is evil, and we do not speak her name.”

  The visitors were stubborn. “Villages often find it too easy to blame a young woman,” Bacha said. “Refusing to talk buries truth.”

  Parsaa leaned in close. “The American soldiers investigated and that is why she is in prison. You can check on this.”

  “But the Americans are not here anymore, are they? We heard her story and only wanted to help the girls she described.”

  “She did not tell you her entire story,” Parsaa retorted.

  “Perhaps men are too impatient to listen.”

  He was weary of twisting words back and forth and refused to prove her point with harsh words. The best response for fools was silence. The conversation stalled, and Parsaa explained that he needed to return to harvesting wheat. Bacha asked if the village would sell them vegetables. She explained the orphanage’s policy—to rely on Afghans for as many supplies as possible. “We pay well,” she added.

  Ahmed offered carrots, cauliflower, potatoes, and other root crops and asked how many crates they needed.

  “The pilot always worries about overloading the helicopter.” Bacha sighed. “And we have one more stop nearby before returning to the city.”

  The helicopter had an empty seat, and it was decided that three crates of vegetables could safely fill the empty space. Older boys ran to fill the crates before showing them to the women. Letting loose a happy noise, Pir pulled a sweet potato from a pile and tucked it into her bag.

  “Her dinner tonight!” Bacha announced. Parsaa and Ahmed, followed by boys lugging the crates, accompanied the women to the waiting helicopter. As the group approached, the young pilot, the man who had attempted to take pictures, looked upset by the additional load. He did not argue, though, and stacked the crates on the one empty seat, binding them in place with thick straps.

  The women then thanked the village men and children, exchanging farewells as if all were close friends. The engine roared, and the helicopter lifted, hesitated, and then banked toward the north with a chugging roar.

  Ahmed bantered with the boys as they climbed the hill. Once the village gate was in sight, the boys raced ahead. “I hope the women don’t return,” the younger man said.

  Parsaa agreed but offered no other comment. His goals had once seemed so simple, so reasonable—providing for his family with a comfortable home and harvests, encouraging others in the village to do the same, while keeping Laashekoh secure. For too many, home, food, and safety no longer offered enough.

  There would be more visitors, and he wondered, how long would Laashekoh say no? He often sensed that others, even his own wife and children, wanted more. The worst part was that deep inside he yearned for more, too. Not more money or success with farming. Not more friends or another woman.

  Perhaps it was less change. Or at least, the power of knowing what the future held.

  He shook his head. He was not old enough for such vague fears. Like the steady shift of the sun, the water pouring down the mountainside, the lines on a human face, nothing on earth had real permanence. Parsaa kept his worries to himself. No need to worry Ahmed. Strangers would pass through the village quickly, spreading ideas like dust whipped by the swirling helicopter blades.

  CHAPTER 3

  Only two people knew who owned the property surrounding Laashekoh.

  Parsaa had an urge to talk with Zahira, a friend since childhood, and tell her about the visitors. Her home at the canyon’s end was centered amid the stretches of land owned by Laashekoh. Her father had been one of the region’s fiercest warlords, cultivating a reputation for ruthlessness and swift justice. The man was brutal but knew how to apply a kind word for lasting influence. Blacker built his militia by offering protection to the most desperate of refugees, families who longed for homes and safety. He had invited groups of refugees, including Parsaa’s father, to build small villages and farm the best land. Blacker allowed villagers to keep most of their harvests, and in exchange, the families raised their sons to train in his militia and respond to any command from the man.

  It was a small price to pay. The sense of permanency and security was priceless.

  But Blacker was long dead. His militia disbanded, many of the lieutenants had scattered, looking for new battles with foreign fighters. Zahira, his only child, remained at the compound after a life of contradictions. Her father claimed to fight for Afghan traditions, but he surrounded his daughter with western comforts. She had left Afghanistan to study medicine, but she saw few patients and lived as a hermit. The warlord who expected unquestioning obedience from his deputies had cherished his daughter as an adviser, treating her as equal.

  Happiness eluded her because Zahira had always wanted more. Parsaa had known her father well and regretted that the old memories were not part of their friendship.

  The walk along the river and the descent into the canyon took about two hours. Parsaa paused at the compound’s edge. He wanted to speak with Zahira alone and would not approach the house until he was sure that her husband was inside his workshop at the far end of the compound.

  The compound had about twenty buildings, most in disrepair. Only a few lights gleamed from the main house, though Zahira’s husband, Arhaan, could be anywhere. The blind man had no use for light. Others could not be sure if he was working or prowling the grounds.

  Over the years, Arhaan spent more time in his workshop, one wall of which was lined with cages for his mynas. The man ate and slept there and devoted the rest of his hours to studying the birds, taking each for long walks, and training them to converse. The mynas studied the man and every twitch of his mouth.

  Parsaa was grateful to arrive at night and not see the overgrown fields, the faded carvings, walls in need of patching, and other reminders of how time and weather wore at the compound.

  The place was quiet except for a plaintive mewing. A cat with a swollen belly waited outside the main house. The door opened and the desperate creature stumbled inside.

  Parsaa waited, listening for sounds of the blind husband. Once, Parsaa had envied Arhaan and regretted his own marriage, arranged when he was a child, but only for a short while. Over the years, he had come to appreciate his parents’ wisdom. Parsaa was not so foolish to talk about such feelings with one woman or the other. The tightest connection for families was loyalty. His relationship with his wife was better for not talking much about the meetings with Zahira.

  If anything, the years and secrets had strained the friendship with Zahira. He was content with his life and marriage, and she was not.

  After sundown, Zahira let the mother cat inside. Ready to give birth, the old yellow cat headed for a worn blanket in a dark corner to wait out the contractions alone. One by one, four kittens slipped out into the world. Zahira tried reading by the fire, but the cries made it hard to concentrate. Ignoring glares from the anxious mother, Zahira approached the blanket to watch the activity. As expected, the first kitten was toughest, and each one born afterward was smaller and weaker than its predecessor.

  Zahira kept the cat to irritate her husband, and she would keep the yellow kittens, too.

  The mother cat was spent after giving birth but had enough energy to twist away from the desperate pink mouths of her two smallest kittens. Impatient with their ineptitude, she blocked them fro
m getting near her belly. One squirming kitten squealed with fear.

  The cat was livid about another creature witnessing the indignities associated with giving birth. Zahira had seen such hostility from women before. Crouching, Zahira slowly reached for the unwanted offspring, gently placing them closer to the swollen teats. Irritated, the mother swatted at Zahira’s hand, and the firstborn kitten moved on to another teat, filling its stomach and ignoring mews from the neglected pair. Zahira tried again—one managed to get a taste, enough to know what it was missing—and the provoked mother hissed.

  Zahira chided the old cat and rearranged the kittens. “It’s up to you,” she said, then hurried to her bedroom. There, she checked the baby girl, who was sleeping in a basket, before climbing into her own bed nearby.

  Moments later, a slight tap came from outside—a sound she had not heard in months. Her stomach turned and she wondered if her ears played tricks. Then another pebble struck the outer wall. Zahira called Aza, more like an aunt than a house servant, from another part of the house, and Zahira pointed to the basket. “He must not know about the child,” she whispered. “Keep her quiet until I return.”

  Zahira snatched an oversized wool scarf, wrapping it tightly around her head and shoulders, before heading to the outer room and opening the door.

  And there was Parsaa. They had not talked alone in months, and she held his stare. “I need your advice,” he whispered.

  She stepped aside and let him enter. A tiny mew interrupted, and Parsaa approached the blanket. The mother cat was alert with two kittens nestled between her legs. The other two had moved away from the blanket. One was still and the other crawled helplessly along the edge.

  “I already tried.” Zahira spoke up. “She won’t accept them.”

  Of course, he took that as a challenge, kneeling to poke the rejected kitten. Then he held the back of the mother cat’s neck and pinched her teat. The cat flattened her ears and opened her mouth with a long hiss. But Parsaa pinched again, before rubbing his damp fingers against the kitten’s mouth and guiding it into position. The frantic kitten latched on with aggressive new hope.

  The weary cat glared but did not roll away. Zahira didn’t like being wrong. Not with him. “She may still refuse the kitten later. We should not intervene.”

  Parsaa stood. “We must talk. Two foreign women came to the village today.”

  She put her finger to her mouth. “You are sure Arhaan did not hear you?”

  Worry was contagious. Parsaa looked guilty, explaining how he had spoken with Mohan, the caretaker and Aza’s husband. “He will signal if Arhaan steps away from the workshop.”

  Still she worried. Her husband had ways of sensing what she did not want him to hear, and Mohan and Aza did not like her meeting with other men in the house. She waved her hand for Parsaa to leave the house and wait by the clinic door. Then she circled the perimeter of the home, checking whether her husband or others lurked and listened nearby.

  Parsaa was foolish to trust Mohan, who had lived more than seven decades. Arhaan knew the compound well. His hearing was keen enough to hear another man breathing. The compound was small, yet she and her husband lived in separate worlds. She had once admired his academic pursuits, but the work had become so narrow and strange over the years. The two no longer understood each other.

  As she turned the corner toward the clinic, she studied the dark workshop where Arhaan spent most of his hours. At night, her husband had every advantage over her.

  Zahira unlocked the clinic doorway with the only key, careful about cupping her hands around the lock to muffle the clicking noise. She held the door open and Parsaa emerged from the shadows. Once inside, she turned the deadbolt, switched on the desk lamp, and crossed her arms. He waited by the door, uncomfortable in the modern structure with its tile floor, stainless surfaces, and shiny cabinets.

  There was no place like the clinic within a day’s walk, yet most villagers resisted seeking care from Zahira. She heard what they said about her. She was eccentric and, if she were so skilled, they wondered, why did she remain in the remote area? Those with the best skills should not return home, or so the myth went. Then there were the rumors about abortions, though Parsaa had never spoken about those with her.

  “Our meetings upset Mohan and Aza,” Zahira said. “It doesn’t matter how long we have known each other.” She glanced back at him. He was sheepish or impatient, but it didn’t matter. Parsaa only visited when he needed something from her. Foreigners visited, and he wanted advice. A child fell ill, and he asked for medicine. He purchased ammunition, and then arranged for secret shipments to her compound. He had questions and asked her to check the computer.

  She could not admit it out loud, but Zahira missed her father. He knew how to control others. Unfortunately, Blacker had trusted Parsaa more than he did his own daughter. Parsaa owed his livelihood, his home, his comfortable existence to Blacker. And all that was based on her assessment of a man’s loyalty years ago.

  Parsaa was no longer a loyal friend. He wasn’t disloyal, but such was the problem of old friendships—memories softened by age were cherished more than recent encounters.

  She pointedly asked how long it had been since his last visit, though she knew exactly the number of weeks. Parsaa ignored her question. “Did two foreign women stop here today?” he asked. “Did you see the helicopter?”

  She shook her head quickly.

  “They are from an orphanage and are looking for children.”

  “So why would they come here?” she snapped.

  “They mentioned a nearby stop.” He leaned over the counter. “I thought you could check on them with the computer.”

  “The computer,” she said bitterly. She did not hurry to turn on the machine, run by a special terminal and equipment purchased with funds from a foreign charity. Parsaa often asked Zahira to look up news about the government, fighting, the weather. He was curious about everything but her. During his last visit, she had coolly reminded him that he could afford similar equipment, but he dismissed that notion. He was hypocritical, seeking access to the modern world while denying it for the rest of the village.

  The argument had kept him away for months. She didn’t want to argue again.

  Zahira tried to assure him. “If you told them there are no orphans, they will leave quickly. Women around here do not hand their infants over to strangers!”

  But Parsaa suspected the women wanted something other than children. “They have read about Laashekoh on the Internet. I need to know what has been said and remove any mentions of the village.”

  Zahira felt sorry for him and told him that what he asked was impossible. “Sometimes you can pull down what you have said, but not what others have said about a village.” She asked where the women were from, and he told her a place named Texas in the United States.

  She grimaced. “They are probably Christians. They think they can control the destiny of our souls.”

  He asked how they could know so much about the area, and she was impatient, pointing out the same way he read stories about other parts of the world. “An outpost with nearly a hundred people was stationed nearby. Who knows what any of them have said about the village online?”

  Laashekoh had no cell phones, no computers, and Parsaa still assumed that he could restrict the information’s flow to one direction.

  “Did they ask about me or the clinic?” To avoid eye contact, she started the computer.

  He shook his head, and she dismissed his worries. “They came and you sent them away.”

  “They had questions about the land, who owns it and when the transaction took place. I thought they might question you and Arhaan.”

  She typed search terms before showing him photos of adults and Afghan children. “Would you recognize them?”

  He shook his head, and she tried more phrases. “No,” he said.

  She pointed out the government continued to sort out quarrels over land transactions that took place between 1996 an
d 2001, when the Taliban were in control. “That is not our transaction. Besides, we have a proper deed, and we have had no quarrels about ownership.”

  “So there should be no questions for Laashekoh about the land?”

  He had always cared more about the village than he did about her. She was but an extension of Laashekoh. “No,” Zahira said wearily. “The property deed is valid. The exchange was registered in 1990.”

  “Is that enough?” he pressed.

  “For you,” she retorted, and then she quickly controlled herself. The time was not right for her to press a claim. Others in Laashekoh had no idea who really owned the surrounding land.

  She stood and let him sit before the computer. “Parsaa, all these years and you do not feel secure. No level of security is enough if someone wants what belongs to another.”

  His long fingers jabbed at the keyboard with its overlay for Dari, and he asked for reminders because he used the computer so irregularly. How to search, how to use Google Translate, how to navigate among the pages. He was intent on knowing what was said about Laashekoh and did not notice her reticence.

  Zahira felt foolish for how much she had once longed for Parsaa. The match had seemed so logical when she convinced her father to delay her marriage arrangements.

  Blacker had one child and explained to his lieutenants that the strategy was to avoid making a compact and eliminating opportunities for an alliance. The marriage plans would not be finalized until she neared completion of her medical degree. Besides, Blacker wanted his daughter to be happy. Plenty of suitors were willing to wait for the prize—not Blacker’s demanding daughter but rather the land and militia.

  Afghanistan’s political future was unclear. The ability of warlords to control a territory and its governance was slipping away. Larger forces could change the country overnight. But that was true in other lands, too. Blacker was torn between hoping his only daughter would live near the compound or leave the country for her safety, hoping she married a strong man who kept her in line or a weak man who welcomed her control. A young woman with no husband, brothers, uncles, or sons was vulnerable and could not control large tracts of land. No woman could oversee the militia Blacker had developed over the years.