Casablanca Blues (2013) (18 page)

Seventy-five

A pair of hobnail boots clattered down the slim corridor before coming to an abrupt halt outside Cell No. 3.

The guard pulled the inspection hatch back with his claw-like fingernails, blinding the prisoner with a stream of low-watt light. He stood there for some time. Omary could hear him breathing, as though he were making up his mind what to say.

‘You were on the television,’ the guard growled in a slow cold voice. ‘Seems like you are very rich.’

‘I am a prisoner,’ said Omary. ‘And that’s all I am.’

The guard flicked a switch to the right of the door, bathing the cell in blinding light.

‘You could buy yourself a little luxury,’ he said. ‘Better food, a blanket, even a chair.’

Squatting at the back of his cell, Omary crept forward on hands and knees, until his mouth was an inch from the door.

He could smell the guard.

‘Bribe my way into a world of luxury?’ he said incredulously. ‘How dare you?! I’d rather rot to death in here than demean myself by paying you off.’

The inspection hatch slammed shut and the light vanished.

Then the thud of the boots came again, more deafening this time. It was followed by a gushing sound in the distance.

More boots, steel keys rattling, blinding light, and by a bucket of ice-cold water being flung into the cell.

Seventy-six

The sales assistant at Les Cafés du Bresil had slipped a hardbacked envelope across the counter, identical to the one hidden in Bar Atomic’s toilet. It smelt of roasted coffee, having lain undisturbed for decades in a drawer at the back of the shop. The clerk showed no surprise that it was being collected at long last.

A little later, when Blaine opened it up at Baba Cool, he found a third postcard – bearing the image of a snake charmer standing in front of an ancient minaret. As before, he separated the card from the photograph, and found a line and a half of Bogart’s almost impenetrable scrawl.

Directions, which began at a place called ‘Koutoubia’.

As he sat there pondering the clues and what they might lead to, Ghita arrived.

‘I thought I’d find you here,’ she said.

Blaine showed off the postcard and explained where he had found it.

‘I don’t understand how clues could have been left unnoticed for so long,’ he said.

Ghita ordered a
nous-nous
.

‘We’re not a young country,’ she replied, ‘not like your America. Here in Morocco something has to be over a thousand years in age to be considered properly old.’

‘But Casablanca’s far newer than that.’

‘I know,’ Ghita replied. ‘And that’s why it’s an embarrassment to most Moroccans, and the reason why they’re happy to rip down the buildings without a second thought.’

‘But they’re jewels... Art Deco jewels.’

‘They may be to you. But to the locals they’re ugly, like a monstrous eyesore from the ‘sixties... An eyesore created by colonial oppressors.’

Blaine put the card away and, as he did so, his eyes lit up.

‘Did you know that Casablanca was once the gender reassignment centre of the universe?’ he said with a smile.

‘Gender...?’

‘
Reassignment
.’

‘I don’t understand,’ Ghita said.

‘Sex change... it’s where all the early sex changes were done. I met a guy – I mean a woman – called Rosario, who had her tackle chopped off here forty years ago.’

‘That’s disgusting.’

‘No it’s not.’

‘Then what is it?’

Blaine thought hard.

‘It’s a cry for help,’ he said.

There was a thunderous roar of applause from the back of Baba Cool, and all the tired old men hiding from their wives cheered. Some waved their fists in the air; others slapped their friends on the back.

‘What’s going on?’

The waiter, who was distributing fresh ashtrays, cocked his head back towards the oversized screen.

‘One-Zero to Morocco.’

‘Who are they playing?’

Disbelieving that anyone could be unaware of the match, the waiter replied:

‘Algeria, Monsieur. Our most bitter rival.’

Five minutes later, Morocco’s old adversary equalized and, a moment after that, Saed hurried in, a cardboard box in his hands. He was hawking baseball caps with the Moroccan flag glued unevenly to the front.

‘I’ve sold fifty this afternoon,’ he said. ‘I got them from a Chinese store in Derb Omar.’ He put down the box. ‘I’m the champion of champions.’

‘Because you’re good at selling hats?’ said Ghita.

‘No, not that. Because I’ve found out where they’re holding your father.’

Ghita froze, her eyes filling instantly with tears.

‘
Where
... where is he?’

‘In a prison high in the mountains.’

‘We knew that already.’

Saed took out a scrap of newspaper. There was something scribbled on the back.

‘You read it,’ he said, passing it to Ghita.

‘Why don’t you?’

‘I don’t read much. Been too busy selling hats to learn.’

‘It’s the name of the jail – beyond the Gorge of Ziz.’

‘Where’s that?’

‘A long way.’

Blaine held up his hands.

‘Wait a minute,’ he said. ‘What’s your plan... to turn up and ask sweetly for them to hand your father over?’

‘I’ll plead with the guards,’ said Ghita. ‘I’ll beg them.’

‘And you really think that’ll work?’

Saed put a second scrap of paper on the table. It was larger than the first, and looked as though it had been torn from a child’s exercise book.

‘I think this will help,’ he said.

Ghita looked at the thick unruly Arabic script.

‘It says:
Abdelkarim
Hamoudi the goldsmith will repay the favour owed by his grandfather. The password is the name of the Prophet’s steed
.’

‘The Night Journey,’ said Saed. ‘The Prophet ascended to Heaven on a horse with wings...’

‘It was called Buraq,’ Ghita said.

Another chorus of cheering erupted at the back.

‘What is the favour the goldsmith is willing to repay?’ Ghita asked.

‘Am I missing something here?’ asked Blaine. ‘
Who
is the goldsmith?’

Saed seemed unusually serious for a moment.

‘When my father died he left me nothing,’ he said. ‘Nothing, that is, except for three favours that were owed to him. The first was a favour owed from a fisherman down in Agadir. The second was one owed by a doctor in Oujda. And the third, it was owed by a man up in Tangier.’

‘But surely you can’t call in a favour if the person it’s owed to has died,’ Blaine said.

‘Of course you can,’ Ghita replied. ‘Or at least you can here in Morocco. This is a medieval country, you see – a place where the repayment of a favour is an almost sacred duty.’

‘A duty of blood,’ Saed added. ‘The man in Tangier knows that. I found out that the cousin of his wife is related to a man who works as a guard at the prison. If I demand the favour to be repaid he will help. He has no choice.’

‘Even if it’s breaking the law?’ asked Blaine.

‘Of course. You see, repaying a favour... having the burden removed from a family’s shoulders, is a great blessing.’

Saed reached over and touched Ghita’s sleeve with his hand.

‘I want to help you,’ he said.

‘But why?’

The boy grinned mischievously.

‘Because when you have saved your father perhaps you will remember me.’

Ghita leaned forward and pressed her lips to the shoeshine boy’s cheek.

‘You may be filthy and rough on the outside, but you have a heart of gold,’ she said.

The American rolled his eyes.

‘How are you gonna get to the mountains?’

‘You would have to drive,’ said Saed.

‘But you don’t have a car.’

‘I think I know where to get one,’ Ghita said.

Seventy-seven

The next day Blaine was near the old Shell headquarters, when he thought of the Argentine pianist. Crossing the street, he went up to her apartment building and took the wooden elevator up to the fifth floor.

At the sound of the buzzer, a small dog began barking inside, as though it had been patrolling. It was followed by a gruff woman’s voice telling it to hush, then the clattering of fake pearls.

The door swung back.

Rosario stood in the frame, clutching a nervy chihuahua to her breast.

‘I was passing and thought I might drop by,’ said Blaine.

‘What a nice surprise, please come inside.’

She led the way into a small cluttered apartment, a sanctuary dedicated to the wonders and mysteries of the female form.

The walls were covered mostly in nudes – some photographs, others hand-drawn. The sitting-room was strewn with sculptures in bronze and in glass. Some were studies of female genitalia, others a little more abstract.

There were potted plants galore, and books, pamphlets, and yet more books, and dozens of cushions, some embroidered with sequins.

On the back wall, mounted in a sumptuous golden baroque frame, was an oil painting of a nude woman. Life-size and leering, her arms were outstretched as though she were hoping to embrace the world.

The pianist tossed the chihuahua onto the couch.

‘It’s Coccinelle,’ she said theatrically. ‘The first celebrity to undergo Dr. Burou’s blade.’

‘She’s beautiful,’ Blaine said.

‘Ah, she was a dream, a sensation, a real star.’ Rosario pressed a hand to her hair. ‘She was so brave... such a pioneer.’

Blaine sat down on a chaise longue. The dog climbed onto his lap and licked his face.

‘Stop that Popsi! Stop that at once! Oh, I am sorry,’ Rosario exclaimed, ‘but he craves the attention of men.’

She went off into the kitchen, returning with a pot of tea and a bottle of cheap cognac. Pouring an equal amount of each into two mugs, she sat primly on a low chair, and rearranged her skirt in the name of modesty.

‘Casa’s very damp at this time of year,’ she said in a loud voice. ‘It gets into your bones.’ She sipped her cognac tea. ‘Are you going to be in town long?’

‘I’m not quite sure,’ Blaine said. ‘I’m here on a kind of mid-life crisis.’

‘You don’t look old enough for a mid-life crisis,’ said Rosario with a smile.

‘I guess it’s come early.’

‘Oh.’

‘Anyway, I don’t really know what’s gonna happen,’ said Blaine. He sipped his alcoholic tea thoughtfully. ‘By the way, you were right,’ he said, pulling out the postcard.

‘Right about what?’

‘About Les Cafés du Bresil.’

The Argentine pianist added a little more cognac to their mugs and glanced at the photograph.

‘Marrakech?’ she asked.

‘I guess so.’

‘A pleasure dome of wonder and delight!’ Rosario sang. She gazed up at the sumptuous form of Coccinelle, let out a sigh, and sipped her tea. And, after a full minute of silence, she said: ‘Talking of Marrakech, a little bird told me that you were at the Hotel Marrakech the other day when the student was...’

‘
Murdered
.’

‘Yes. Murdered.’

‘That’s right, I was.’

The pianist frowned.

‘I heard it was very horrid,’ she said.

‘And I heard that the police had arrested a gangster, and got a confession out of him.’

Rosario leaned forward and crossed her ankles.

‘Did the student give you anything?’ she asked insouciantly.

‘No. We only spoke for a moment. The next thing I knew he was lying there with his throat slashed. It was unbelievable, like right out of Hollywood.’

‘How terrible.’

‘I don’t understand how the murderer could have passed me, or got out without me spotting him.’ Blaine took in the flowery print on Rosario’s dress, as his mind replayed the events.

He felt as though he could trust her.

‘Do you know why a gangster would have wanted him dead?’ he asked.

‘Well, my little bird said it was because he had something to deliver. He was a mule, a mule carrying something that didn’t belong to him.’

‘What?’

‘A passport.’

‘Is that really worth a life?’

‘It seems as though this one was. You see, so my bird tells me, it’s a very special passport.’

‘How special?’

‘A red laissez-passer issued by the UN. And what was so special about it was that it was signed and countersigned, but blank – just waiting for a name and a photograph.’

‘
So
?’

‘So it could guarantee almost anyone free passage anywhere on earth.’

‘It all sounds so familiar,’ said Blaine wryly.

The pianist poured a little more tea into his mug, followed by another dribble of cognac.

‘Are you quite sure you don’t have it?’ she asked.

Seventy-eight

With the sun dazzling in the bright blue sky, Ghita directed the driver of a petit taxi towards the old French residential quarter of l’Oasis. Blaine sat beside her on the back seat, wishing he had been firmer and gone straight to the American consulate, to report the loss of his passport.

‘I told you six times,’ Ghita said in a matter-of-fact tone, ‘I don’t know anything about cars. They all look the same to me. So I appreciate your advice.’

The taxi stop-started its way in heavy traffic past the hulk-like French Cathedral of Sacré Coeur. An Art Deco gem to some, and a colonial monstrosity to others, it had been deconsecrated decades ago, and turned into a centre for the arts.

‘Hey, wait a minute!’ Blaine shouted. ‘There’s the American consulate! I’m getting out here!’ He signalled for the driver to pull over. But Ghita spat something fast in Arabic and the driver locked the doors and jerked the pedal to the floor.

‘What are you doing? I need to go there! Let me out!’

‘There’ll be plenty of time later.’

‘It’s Friday afternoon. If I don’t get in there now, I’ll have to wait till Monday.’

Ghita touched a hand to her eye and coaxed out a small shiny tear.

‘Then couldn’t you wait, just until after the weekend?’

‘Give me one reason why I should?’

‘Well, I know you don’t know my family, but I’d be very grateful for your help...’

‘In springing your dad from a high security jail?’ Blaine balked. ‘Are you absolutely out of your mind?’

‘But...’