The Disappeared (16 page)

'Whatever
he says it is, it isn't.'

She
left the room.

Jenny
sat back in her chair, closed her eyes and tried to relax. She had conducted
stressful inquests in the full public glare before and got through, just. All
the morbid, anxious and unwanted thoughts that were assailing her were merely
the by-products of stress. They had no meaning. She was in control.

Her
limbs were finally starting to feel heavy when her phone bleeped alerting her
to a text message. Her eyes started open and she reached for it. It said:
Have
it you're way. Your on you're own
. Working for MI5 and he couldn't even
spell.

The
mood was noticeably more sober when the court reconvened and Anwar Ali took his
place in the witness chair. Composed and confident, he seemed to command
respect among the young Muslim men. Jenny ran her eyes over the faces in the
public gallery and couldn't see Rhys. She felt a flutter of anxiety and
realized how quickly his presence had become a safety blanket. She found
herself desperately curious about what he might have said had she let him
speak to her. A coroner only ever acted alone, she had to remind herself; a
coroner was independent and answered only to the Lord Chancellor. She didn't
need anyone else.

She
began with the uncontroversial questions, establishing that Ali was thirty-two
years old and had been part way through a post-graduate MA in politics and
sociology when Nazim and Rafi disappeared. He was currently employed by Newport
Borough Council as general manager of the refugee centre where Jenny has
visited him, and was a part-time doctoral student at the University of Cardiff.
His thesis was entitled: 'Anglo-Muslim Identity: Integration or Cohabitation?'
He claimed not to be a member of the British Society for Islamic Change
although he admitted to having contributed several articles to their website.
He described himself as 'a politically engaged British Muslim concerned with
promoting peaceful coexistence between communities'.

'During
your time at Bristol, Mr Ali, you were a regular at the A1 Rahma mosque, were
you not?'

'Yes,
I prayed there on Fridays.'

'And
this was a small mosque in what had once been a private house?'

'It
was.'

'What
was its purpose? There were other mosques in the city, weren't there?'

'It
was progressive. Mullah Sayeed Faruq established it in the mid-1990s to cater
for young men and women who had a different vision of their place in the
world.'

'How
would you describe Sayeed Faruq's theology?'

'Mainstream.'

'His
politics?'

'Questioning.'

'Could
you enlarge on that?'

Ali
thought carefully before responding. 'He questioned to what extent Muslim
identity was being diluted by Western influences and values. Many of us wanted
to talk about a future that wasn't based on materialism and violence. We wanted
to rediscover the essence of our religion.'

'I
understand the police believed him to hold radical and extremist views. Did
he?'

'If
you mean did he personally advocate violence, no, he did not. Persuasion, force
of argument, asserting that the Islamic way was better for the spiritual health
of mankind, yes.'

'Was
Sayeed Faruq a member of Hizb ut-Tahrir?'

'I
believe he was,' Ali said. 'I was not, nor to my knowledge were Nazim or Rafi.
But you ought to understand, ma'am, Hizb specifically does not advocate
violence to promote Islam. Its purpose is to argue and persuade. It has
attracted much suspicion, but in the vast majority of free countries it is not
an illegal organization.' He turned to the jury. 'The name means party of liberation.'

'Thank
you, Mr Ali. I've done a little research myself. I've read that Hizb's methods
of persuasion involve inviting young people to meetings - halaqah - such as the
ones you held in your flat at Marlowes Road.'

'I
hosted discussion groups, but I was never a member of Hizb or any other
organization.'

Unflappable,
he had a smooth, well-rehearsed answer for everything. Jenny pushed and probed,
but he wouldn't budge from his position that at both the mosque and his
discussion group only peaceful means of spreading the Islamic message were
discussed. Both he and Sayeed Faruq had believed in working towards the
establishment of an international caliphate, but violence and terrorism were
condemned as sacrilegious except in self-defence.

Interesting
as their exchange was, Jenny noticed a number of jurors beginning to yawn. The
finer points of Islamic theology weren't holding their attention. It was time
to push on into more contentious territory.

'When
did Nazim Jamal first come to the Al Rahma mosque?'

'In
October '01, I think. I couldn't say exactly. Rafi came first, Nazim a few
weeks later.'

'And
when did they start attending your discussion groups?'

'About
November time.'

'Who
else was there apart from you and them?'

'Various
people came and went. They were mostly students.' He rattled off half a dozen
names but claimed not to have kept in touch with most of them. Jenny made a
note. She'd track them down if necessary.

'Can
you give us an idea of a typical discussion - the kind of subjects covered?'

Ali
shrugged. 'We talked about Palestine, possible solutions to the conflict; the
war in Afghanistan; American paranoia and how Muslims should respond to it.'

'How
would you describe Nazim's politics?'

Ali
glanced over at Mrs Jamal. She met him with a searching gaze. She was looking
at a man who had seen a side of her son she knew nothing of.

'At
first he was quiet . . . then he became more confident, more inspired. I
remember he was a good scholar. He knew his Koran.'

'Inspired
to what, exactly?'

'Ideas.
To the notion of a society built on religious principles. He had the untainted
enthusiasm of youth, you might say.'

'What
was his take on the use of political violence?'

'He
was against it, as we all were.'

'And
Rafi Hassan?'

'He
was quieter. More of a listener than Nazim. I didn't feel I knew him as well.'

'Did
he hold similar views?'

'As
far as I know. Really, you have to understand, no matter what the police or
Security Services may have thought, our discussions were no more radical than
those you would have heard at any of the university's political societies. We
were young men grappling with ideas, that's all. I believe we were watched
simply because Sayeed Faruq was on a list of Hizb members. He was automatically
assumed to be part of a fifth column. Little was known about British Muslims at
the time except that they shared a faith with some notorious terrorists.'

Thus
far Jenny hadn't learned a single piece of new information from the one
witness who had been closer to the two missing boys than anyone else she would
be calling. She went in harder, pressing Ali to admit that the subject of
fighting the Muslim cause must at least have been discussed, but he wouldn't
have it. He denied coming into contact with anyone recruiting potential jihadis
to fight abroad and maintained that none of the regulars at Marlowes Road
halaqah had ever shown the slightest inclination to take up arms. He insisted
that he had no clue as to where Nazim and Rafi had disappeared to and denied
even suspecting that they had extremist tendencies. She pressed him as to
whether he recalled a change in Nazim's mood the weekend before he disappeared,
as Mrs Jamal had described: he claimed not to have. Ali had been close to the
members of his halaqah, he said, but not so close that he knew the details of
their lives. They held spiritual, intellectual gatherings, not social ones.

It
was a masterful performance and Jenny didn't believe half of it.

Growing
frustrated, she said, 'You must have some idea where they went. You would have
heard rumours, at least?'

'No.
I must have spent hundreds of hours answering these questions at the time and
my answer hasn't changed. I swear before my God, Allah the most merciful, that
I do not know where they went or what became of them.'

The
solemnity of his oath was greeted with a respectful and reflective silence. All
the young men room were still and sombre. Even Alison seemed to be affected by
its sincerity.

Jenny
said, 'What became of Sayeed Faruq? Where did he go?'

'He
went to Pakistan. He was wise enough to know that he would always be under
suspicion in this country.'

'You're
sure he had nothing to do with their disappearance?'

'Again,
I swear it. Whatever happened to them is as mysterious to me as it is to you.'
He turned to Mrs Jamal. 'I sincerely wish it wasn't so, ma'am.'

Fraser
Havilland and Martha Denton both declined the opportunity to cross-examine.
Having failed to open up a single fissure, Jenny sensed they were content not
to risk accidentally succeeding. It gave the lie to Gillian Golder's claim
that the Security Services were as anxious as she was to find out the truth,
but came as no surprise. Jenny was beginning to agree with Yusuf Khan that her
inquest had only been allowed to proceed because they were confident it posed
no danger other than to project the already diabolical image of young Muslim
men. The meaning of Rhys's text message still puzzled her, but perhaps he
simply meant that she would have to face the consequences of a non-result
alone: it would be she, personally, who would take the blame for failing to
unearth the truth.

Pushing
these troubling thoughts aside, she asked Yusuf Khan if he wished to
cross-examine.

'Only
briefly, ma'am.' He turned to the witness. 'Mr Ali, you must have heard the
rumours, as I have, that in the preemptive war on terror, agents provocateurs
have been used to lure potentially radical young men abroad to a fate we can
only guess at.'

'Yes,
I've heard those rumours.'

'Has
anyone ever approached you, or anyone you know, in this way?'

Ali
stalled long enough before answering no for Jenny not to believe him. And from
the look Yusuf Khan gave him, she could tell he didn't believe him either.

Dani
James was twenty-eight years old and now practised in a prosperous solicitor's
firm in Bath which specialized in handling the estates of the seriously
wealthy. She had an open, attractive face which inspired trust, and spoke with
an endearing trace of a Manchester accent. Uncomplicated, was Jenny's first
impression: straightforward. Dani had waited patiently all morning and didn't
seem to begrudge her enforced absence from a busy professional life.

Jenny
established that she had been a law student in the same year as Rafi and Nazim
and had occupied a room on the first floor of Manor Hall. She hadn't had much to
do with Rafi, she said, apart from attending the same seminars; he was a quiet
student and kept mostly to himself. She had seen him talking with other Asians
in the common room and had formed the impression that he liked to be among his
own. Nazim, on the other hand, was more sociable. She remembered seeing him at
a number of parties in the autumn term - he was a good dancer and always full
of energy. What she saw of him, she liked.

In
the spring term she hadn't recognized him when he passed her in the corridor
wearing a beard and a prayer cap. She tried to say hello a few times, but
didn't receive much of a response. She noticed that he and Rafi had taken to
dressing the same way and had seemed to have withdrawn from student society.
They didn't come to parties or hang out in the bar as they had in their first
term, even to drink orange juice. She remembered thinking it was a shame, but
it had happened to a number of Muslim students. They seemed to develop chips on
their shoulders and form cliques. There was a girl on her course who had
started out wearing mini-skirts and sleeping with a different man each weekend,
who, by the end of the spring term, was teetotal, celibate and fully veiled.
Each to his own, had been Dani's attitude. She didn't blame them for being
defensive when everyone talked about Muslims as terrorists.

'You
made a statement to the police on 8 July 2002,' Jenny said. 'What prompted
that?'

'They
were coming round the halls knocking on doors, asking everyone what they knew
about Nazim and Rafi. What was the last time we saw them? Who were they with?'

'Were
you able to help?'

'Not
really. 1 just remember telling them that I'd seen someone strange coming out
of Manor Hall on the Friday they were meant to have disappeared.'

'Friday,
28 June?'

'Yes.
I'd been out late somewhere. It was about midnight. I was coming through the
main door, not exactly sober, and this tall man, fortyish, came rushing down
the stairs and shoved past me. He was in a real hurry and didn't seem to care
he'd thrown me halfway across the room.'

'What
did he look like?'