Girls of Yellow Read online

“Spicy curry made with peanut powder.”

  “How can you possibly know that?” Ali said. “What are you, an expert in curries?”

  “There were once ten Indian restaurants in Budapest. Three have survived. Only one of them makes curry with peanut powder and mutton. They’ve been buying the mutton from the same butcher for fifteen years. That butcher is my father.”

  Ali studied her expression and could see that she was dead serious.

  “What’s the name of the restaurant?” he said.

  “The Curry House. And that kind of curry? With peanut and mutton? It’s not the most popular dish.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “It’s an acquired taste,” the priestess said.

  “That might be helpful. Was there anything else about him? Anything else that made him seem different from other men?”

  The priestess thought about the question for a moment. “There was this thing he did but I might be making too much of it.”

  “What thing?”

  “After he gave me the tin and started walking away, he flicked his right wrist three times, like this.”

  The priestess turned her hand in a semi-circle as though to stretch it out. Then she brought her wrists together and held them out for him to cuff.

  Ali turned away, powered up the scaffolding and hit the lever for it to begin its descent.

  “You better get back to work,” he said. “Your supervisor said you’re behind schedule. Just remember that this is a nation, it has laws and they must be abided. If you don’t like them, leave.”

  Ali wanted to ask her if she understood that men of her faith had told men of his faith that exact same thing for centuries, but that would have been self-indulgent. Instead, he watched as she vaulted gracefully to her own scaffolding and vanished out of sight.

  He wasn’t sure if he didn’t arrest her because he was grateful, he liked her, or he was indifferent, and he didn’t care. All he knew for certain was that the scaffolding couldn’t move quickly enough for his liking.

  He no longer had a murder to solve.

  He had two murders to solve.

  CHAPTER 12

  Elise knew that Salim’s business partner, Zaid, would be expecting a call from her fictional cousin this evening and that if he didn’t get one he’d begin questioning her integrity immediately. Most likely he’d wonder about her professionalism or the level of influence she held with Imam Labib, the man she’d pretended was her relative. Zaid probably wouldn’t suspect she was an imposter yet because there wasn’t sufficient cause for him to do so. But he might place a call to Labib in the Maldives himself, nonetheless, if he were an extraordinarily enterprising young man.

  Elise didn’t dare ask Darby to use a local asset to fake a call from Labib. Darby was already risking plenty by offering to help with Valerie’s extraction. Asking him for more help meant putting him at greater personal risk for a non-sanctioned operation and Elise’s conscience wouldn’t allow her to do that. Her only solution was to extract Valerie before Zaid or Miss Mona knew for certain that she was a fraud. Thankfully, her timetable was immediate, because as soon as she verified the treasure’s authenticity and acquired it for Christendom, she’d be gone.

  With her official mission firmly in mind, Elise rang the buzzer to one of the units in a broken-down multi-family house at six o’clock in the evening in a grim section of Dhimmi Town on the outskirts of Pest. Light shone from behind the curtains of the unit next door, and a man sat reading a newspaper in his living room. In contrast, the home that belonged to the man in the wheelchair appeared dark and empty.

  When no one answered, Elise reached out to press the buzzer again but the door budged first. A middle-aged woman with a face full of tumors and sores appeared in the doorway. Elise had never seen a leper in person before and the sight rendered her mute. She had to clear her throat to find her voice.

  “My name is Elise De Jong,” she said in Arabic. She’d hidden her morality police ID in her hotel room. As far as she and the rest of the world were concerned, she was a diplomat from Christendom meeting with a highly reputable antique dealer to complete a legal, private transaction. “I have an appointment to see the owner.”

  The woman lifted her right arm to open the door further. A black metal hand with silver knuckles emerged from beneath her hijab instead of a human one. After creating a wider opening for Elise to enter, she pulled her hijab over the bionic hand with her other one. That one, too, had been severed at the wrist and replaced with the same state-of-the-art prosthetic.

  Elise drew four conclusions from this as she entered the home. First, the man in the wheelchair made a comfortable living as a dealer in arts and antiquities to be able to afford such devices. Second, he cared about this woman very much. Third, she’d been a thief at one time. Hands were usually cut off as punishment for stealing. In her case, she appeared to have been caught and convicted not just twice, but three times. The right hand was cut off after a thief’s first offense, the right foot was amputated after her second offense, and the left hand was removed only after a third offense. Elise’s fourth conclusion followed—the woman had at least one prosthetic leg, too.

  The bionic leper led Elise down a corridor. Dim lights flickered from around the corner. When the corridor veered left, candles ensconced on the walls came into view. It was darker than hell, Elise thought. As they moved onward, a sliver of light appeared in a doorway on the right toward the inside of the house. The bionic leper pushed it open and went in first. Elise followed her, the floor squeaking as she walked.

  Paintings and maps filled the walls of the large room. The man in the wheelchair rolled toward her from the far corner. The warped wood floor buckled and creaked. Elise saw the man in the wheelchair and almost winced. Blisters and boils covered his face, his nose was an inch too long, and the tips of two front teeth protruded over a pair of lips that slanted downward at an angle.

  “Don’t be alarmed,” he said in English, his voice hoarse. “I get medical treatment. I’m not contagious anymore.”

  “Oh, no,” Elise said, so quickly and awkwardly as to confirm the depth of her shock. “I’m not worried about that.”

  “Don’t mind my housekeeper, either,” the man in the wheelchair said. “She’s deaf and mute. Been with me for eighteen years. The three of us, we have much in common. The Christian, the handicapped and the man in the wheelchair. We’re all lepers in Eurabia.”

  He laughed at his own joke, then raised his eyebrows for the bionic leper to leave.

  She closed the door on her way out.

  “Have a seat?” the man in the wheelchair said.

  “Let’s get down to business,” Elise said. “I’m here to verify the merchandise.”

  “I told your man that’s not realistic. For you to verify it, you’d have to see it. And once you see it, I’ll have nothing to sell you.”

  “I don’t understand,” Elise said.

  “You will once you buy it,” the man in the wheelchair said. “And besides, my reputation speaks for itself or your people wouldn’t have sent you.”

  “What exactly is it you’re selling?”

  “Something every citizen of every theocracy craves and every leader of every theocracy fears.”

  “You already told us that,” Elise said. “And your reputation for authenticity in arts and antiquities is the reason I was sent. But now I’m here, and I need more.”

  The man wheeled himself over to a metal serving tray with three pots. “Coffee, tea, hot chocolate?” he said. “Please. I never get visitors, let alone someone like you. It would mean so much to me.”

  “I haven’t had hot chocolate since forever,” Elise said.

  The man in the wheelchair smiled.

  Elise almost vomited at the sight.

  “I like you already,” he said. “I like a person who can pause to enjoy the finer things in life under any circumstances. Do you want hot milk with that?”

  “How else can you have it?”


  “You could have just the melted chocolate. I use Belgian stuff. The chocolatier at Central Market is a friend of mine.”

  “I’ll take mine fifty-fifty. How does that sound?”

  “Like a diplomatic solution.”

  The man in the wheelchair poured melted Belgian chocolate from a sterling silver container into a porcelain cup and added steaming milk. After mixing it with a spoon, he brought it over to a side table beside a plush velvet chair.

  He watched as Elise sat down, took a sip, and made a few noises that might have previously been heard only in her bedroom. This seemed to please the man in the wheelchair immensely because he exhaled with satisfaction, poured himself a clear liquid from a crystal decanter, and rolled to a halt in front of Elise.

  “What I’m offering to sell you,” he said, “is proof of God.”

  Elise burned her tongue on the hot chocolate. “Proof … of God?”

  The man in the wheelchair let her words hang in the air for a few seconds.

  “Tantalizing, isn’t it?” he said. “And wonderful and terrifying and …”

  “And hard to believe.”

  The man in the wheelchair shrugged. “If you’d rather I sold it to the Hindus or the Buddhists—”

  “I didn’t say that,” Elise said. “I’m here to acquire the details of what you’re selling. I’ve been sent to establish authenticity. So you see, I need proof.”

  His eyebrows shot up. “You want proof, of proof of God?”

  “Yes.”

  “I love it.” He laughed. “You’re more provocative than my housekeeper’s hands, but that I cannot give you.”

  “Let me put it this way. What exactly will we get for our money? Is it a picture? Pictures can be created. Is it a witness? Witnesses lie. Is it an artifact? Artifacts can be forged.”

  “It’s none of those things,” the man in the wheelchair said. “What I’m selling you is a set of numbers and my reputation for delivering what I promise.”

  “A set of numbers?” Elise said.

  “An angular unit of measure, a prime meridian, and a datum. Those are the three numbers that form a geographic coordinate system. These coordinates will lead you to proof of God. So you see, I can’t show them to you because you’d memorize them right away and then I’d have nothing to sell you.”

  “If that kind of proof exists,” Elise said, “how did you get a hold of it?”

  “I use scavengers to help me accumulate my inventory.” The man in the wheelchair motioned toward the paintings on the walls. “The one who brought me this information has never let me down. He’s a Ukrainian from the irradiated territory of Chornobyl. No one gets stuff like he does. No one. He sold me the information and vanished. He understands the magnitude of his discovery and the personal risks of having discovered it. So don’t try to find him. Neither you, nor I, or anyone else will ever find him.”

  “Why are you selling this to us? Why not to the Hindus or Buddhists, or quite frankly, why not to the Caliphate?”

  The man in the wheelchair reflected for a moment. “I’m an atheist. I don’t discriminate for or against the religions. History says Jesus cured leprosy while Muhammad told people to run from us. I couldn’t care less about history. What I do care about is modern medicine. What I do care about is civilization. I got my treatment at a dhimmi Christian hospital. The Christians saved me. Now I’ll save them.”

  “Save them how?” Elise said. “Why is this proof of God necessarily going to save any religion?”

  The man from the wheelchair raised his chin before he answered. His facial tumors stretched horizontally and the lips beneath his saber-teeth curled upward. He was smiling the smile of a man who’d reached the top of his profession. In his case, a dealer who’d acquired the most priceless treasure ever known to man.

  “Because it consists of evidence that the dead have risen,” he said. “And that all the dead who have risen belong to one and only one religion.”

  Elise pictured the hands of the dead thrusting up through solid ground as they returned to life from their graves. It was a preposterous idea. But so was a world where a woman couldn’t drive a car. The reasons for Christendom’s interest were clear now. Not only would such proof of God validate a single religion, it might also destroy the others.

  That which every citizen of every theocracy craves and every leader of every theocracy fears.

  “What can I assume about the religion in question if you’re selling the proof to us?” Elise said.

  “Oh, anything you like,” the man in the wheelchair said. “Cemeteries are filled with people who make simplistic assumptions. I have no knowledge of the religion of the resurrected. I made certain the scavenger didn’t tell me so that I didn’t know.”

  Elise took another sip of the hot chocolate.

  “So do we have a deal?” he said.

  “I have to report to my superiors. But let’s make an appointment for tomorrow night. Same time?”

  “This time you’ll bring the diamonds?”

  “How will you deliver the goods?” Elise said.

  “In the belly of a porcelain cat. It’ll look like a Herend but this one will be much more valuable.”

  “Thanks for the hot chocolate,” Elise said, as she stood up to leave. “It was … authentic.”

  CHAPTER 13

  Ali returned to his car after he descended from the Chain Bridge and called Ismael.

  “What’s the flaw in the Christian ritual of baptism?” Ismael said.

  Ali sighed.

  “They don’t hold them under water long enough,” Ismael said.

  Ali waited a beat. “Another girl was killed three weeks ago.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Greta Gaspar was the second girl killed. Another girl was killed before her and I’m guessing it was the same way by the same guy.”

  “How do you know this?”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Ali said. He didn’t want to give up Petra Noel’s name for fear Ismael would enter it into the dhimmi database and expose her. “Is there a record of another dead dhimmi girl? Her name was Hanna Kalmar. Did someone in your office work that case?”

  Unspoken was what they both knew Ali to be asking. Had Ismael worked that case and not told him about it?

  “Your sister’s vagina,” Ismael said. “I never heard anything about a Hanna Kalmar or any other dead dhimmi girl and nothing goes down in CSI without me knowing about it. But just to be safe, let me check the records.”

  Ali waited a minute before Ismael returned.

  “Nope,” Ismael said. “No record of a Hanna Kalmar or any other dhimmi girls except for Greta.”

  “Zaman,” Ali said. “Now I understand why the murder of a single dhimmi mattered to him so much. Now I get why he put me on the case to get it whitewashed without an investigation.”

  “The Intertheocratic Conference. You can’t show the rest of the theocracies how superior your culture is if you have a killer running around. And a killer of girls, no less.”

  “It makes a man wonder, Ish.”

  “What? What does it make you wonder?”

  “It makes me wonder if there’s more.”

  Ismael muttered some obscenities.

  “Do me a favor and call Arabiapol,” Ali said, in reference to the network of police departments throughout Islamic lands. “See if there’s any unsolved murders of teenage girls in the last year. Especially in Eurabia. I’d make the call myself but—”

  “Say no more. The last thing you need is for Zaman to find out that you’re nosing around murders that don’t even belong to us. What are you going to do next?”

  “Get some curry for dinner.”

  “Curry?” Ismael said. “You hate curry.”

  “I’m trying new things, going where the leads take me.”

  “I think that’s what detectives are supposed to do.”

  “Then it’s no surprise it’s a new thing for me.”

  Ali drove to the curry
restaurant that the priestess had told him about. He knew from the dhimmi records that the restaurant was owned by Hindus. Parking spaces were hard to find so he had to settle for one three blocks away. When he got out of his car he had a clear view of the nearby Szabadsag Hid, the Liberty Bridge, which connected Pest to Buda over the Danube. Ali took a quick glance to make sure no one was about to jump. The bridge overlooked the slums of Dhimmi Town and was the venue of choice for suicidal dhimmi teens.

  Then he marched toward the Curry House. Halfway to his destination, a waif in the prime of her life with haggard jade eyes and razor-sharp cheekbones hustled up to him with her hands cupped together. She begged him to buy whatever it was she was holding. Normally, Ali would have blazed past the beggar before she could finish pleading in broken Arabic. But beauty compromised even the strongest man’s discipline, and Ali found himself unconsciously slowing down, his heart breaking as he imagined what this girl had looked like when her parents had been able to hold decent jobs.

  The waif uncupped her hands to reveal a gold tooth. When she smiled to try to entice Ali to buy it, the gap between her candy corn teeth revealed the source of her loot. Ali hurried past her, cursing her parents for not leaving for Christendom where their own kind might take care of them.

  But then a previously unfamiliar wave of sympathy washed over him and he found himself doubling back to the girl. He gave her enough coin for her to buy food for a week and left her staring at the dinars in her palm with complete and utter shock. Afterwards, Ali continued onward to the Curry House unsure if he should be proud of having helped a citizen whose rights he’d sworn to protect, or ashamed of having encouraged her to continue breaking the law by begging. What he did realize was that he’d made his own choice and acted on it, and this, like conducting a real police investigation, felt real and true.

  The Curry House was no larger than a two-car garage. The smell of coriander, cumin, and paprika blew Ali away when he walked inside. The seating area was a barebones affair with folding tables and room for no more than twelve. The take-out business was booming, however, with the phone off the hook constantly and a line of six beside the door waiting for their dinners.