Chap 12
Aaliya was dressed primly and properly in a beautifully cut Italian suit that she had no idea had cost Zain over four grand. Sitting in the back of the stretch limo, she kept pulling on the short skirt until Zain picked up her hand and kissed her fingertips while giving a look that asked her to please stop fidgeting. The man across from them glanced from one to the other but made no comment.
"The man is your grandfather," Zain said. "There's no reason to be nervous. And, besides, darling, I'll be there to take care of you."
Aaliya shot him a look that said, "drop dead," and snatched her hand away. She wasn't nervous about meeting an old man who claimed to be related to her; her nervousness was caused by her asking herself what she was going to do after she left New York. This morning a groggy Zain had asked her if she was packed and if she'd made her plane reservations. It was her turn to lie and say that she had. Plane reservations to where? she wondered. There was nothing in Louisville for her; there was certainly nothing in Santa Fe. Maybe she'd go to San Francisco. Or maybe she'd travel for a while and see something of the world. After all, she was free to go and do whatever she wanted. But the idea of traveling alone didn't send any great charge of excitement vibrating through her.
Now she sat on the plush leather seat of the long limousine and wondered what she was going to do with her life. After this meeting, after Zain got what he wanted from her, there'd be no reason to stay in New York. No reason at all.
They rode through the country in the long, black car that Zain's old gangster had sent to pick them up. She and Zain had done little talking this morning, because Zain had walked into the kitchen with what Aaliya could tell was a prepared story about the cut on his head. "If what you're about to tell me is a lie, I'd rather hear nothing," she'd said. She'd watched him struggle as he tried to form words, but at last he'd said nothing about his injury. Instead he had asked her if she knew how to make coffee. She said she didn't and had no intention of learning. She had been so furious with him that she'd spent the morning in the garden pulling weeds.
After a deli lunch that she'd refused to share with him, she'd dressed for the meeting with Taha. At one-thirty there had been a call, and Zain came to tell her that the car would be on time.
"Why are you so angry with me?" he'd asked.
"You spied on me and you started to lie to me about what you'd done. I think that's reason enough for anger."
He hadn't been in the least contrite. Instead, he'd said smugly, "There are some things that you shouldn't know."
That had infuriated her more than what he'd done, and she was determined not to speak to him again, but then the long, black car stopped in front of the house. Zain had picked up her hand and started to slip a ring on it. Instinctively, Aaliya drew back from him.
"If you're my fiance you need a ring. Will this do?"
In his hand was a gorgeous diamond ring that was about five carats of a pale yellow. She knew without being told that this was what was called a canary diamond. "Is that real?" she said under her breath.
"It belonged to my grandmother, and as far as I know, it's real."
She stared at it as he tried to slip it on her finger, but it stuck above her second knuckle. When the doorbell rang, she started to draw away from him, but to her consternation, Zain put her ring finger in his mouth and moved it around. Aaliya's eyes widened, for she'd never before experienced anything as utterly sensual as her finger inside this man's warm mouth. She watched Zain's lips, those lips that fascinated her, as he slowly pulled her damp finger out of his mouth then easily slipped the ring over her knuckle.
"That's better, isn't it?"
"Yes," she said, but her voice came out in a croak. Trying to get control of herself, she cleared her throat. "Ah... thanks."
"Anytime, Aalu, my girl. Anytime,any place, any body part," he said as he slipped her arm in his and led her out to the waiting limo.
Now, as they finally reached Taha's house, Aaliya looked out the window in awe, for it wasn't a house but an estate, in the full meaning of the word. Huge gates that were flanked by high brick walls opened to a long drive that meandered through a tree-lined park. They seemed to drive for hours before they reached the house, which was as big as an institution.
Everywhere they looked there were muscular men jammed into too-tight suits with wires running from their ears down into the backs of their ill-fitting jackets. Two men with lean, hungry-looking dogs on leashes walked around the perimeter of the walls. As Aaliya got out of the car, she thought that this must be how the president of the United States was protected, except that there looked to be more men here than she'd seen in photos of the president.
Standing for a moment looking about the place, Zain was trying his best to memorize every rock, every tree, and, more importantly, every face around him. He was the first and maybe only outsider to see this compound since Taha had moved here many years ago, and he was going to have to describe it all in his book.
Zain dawdled as long as he could, even once bending to retie his shoelace. On the surface, everything about the place looked good, but on second glance, Zain saw evidence of neglect: gutters that hadn't been cleaned, a window pane that had been cracked and not replaced, flower gardens that needed weeding. Was it that Doc didn't care how the place looked? On the other hand, maintaining a place this size took a lot of money.
"Move it," the big man who had ridden with them - and not said a word during the entire trip - said as he gave Zain a shove. Zain had to force himself not to retaliate to the man's pushing as he followed Aaliya into the house.
Inside, Aaliya was looking about in astonishment. The rooms in the house were huge, made for a time of gracious living, and they were filled with antiques and paintings. Porcelains filled the niches in the walls.
While Aaliya was feeling that she wished she had on a hostess gown and a few emeralds, Zain was looking at the place with the eye of one who has grown up in a house that made this one look like a pauper's den. For the most part, the antiques were fakes, as were the paintings and the porcelains. They weren't even very good copies, and there were a couple of places on the walls where the flocked wallpaper was lighter, as though a painting had been removed.
Also, there were no servants in sight, only the goons with the ear wires. Surreptitiously, Zain ran his hand over a table, feeling the dust on it as the guard motioned for them to follow him into another room.
The living room was big and light with windows looking onto the ocean, and at once Aaliya went to them to look out, but Zain stayed where he was, looking about the room. There in a corner, sitting in a wheelchair, was the old man Zain had spent the last few years of his life reading and writing about. Zain liked to think he would have known him anywhere, although there had never been, to his knowledge, a photo made of the man, for Taha had always had an aversion to photographs that verged on an obsession.
At first glance, Taha looked like any very old man: shrunken, shriveled, dark brown skin - but his eyes gave him away. All the intelligence that had brought this man up from the slums of New York to controlling most of the crime in the city still showed in his eyes. The skin around those eyes might be old and wrinkled, but what was inside them was as young and alert as it ever had been.
Now those eyes were looking at Zain. He'd scanned Aaliya and dismissed her, as though she were of no significance, but he was studying Zain, looking him up and down as though trying to judge his physical strength as well as trying to figure out what was in his mind. In spite of himself, Zain shivered. It was as though he'd just been subjected to some sort of other-worldly intelligence that could look inside a man and see what was in his soul.
"Won't you sit down?" the old man whispered. His voice was as frail as his body, and Zain had an idea that Taha's physical disabilities infuriated him.
Aaliya nearly jumped when she heard the man's voice as she had not known anyone else was in the room. Turning, she saw a small, thin old man sitting in a wheelchair. Immediately her heart went out to him, as she wondered if he was lonely here in this big house. Did he have friends and family? She smiled at him.
He gave her what looked like a smile, and she thought, Why, he's shy. Going forward, she offered him her hand and he took it. Holding her hand for a long while, he turned it over in his dry, leathery old palm and studied her young skin.
After a while he released her and motioned for her and Zain to sit down. Aaliya did so, starting to take a chair, but Zain pulled her to the couch to sit near him. Giving Zain a bit of a frown that she didn't allow Mr. Taha Hussain to see, she sat forward on the edge of the couch while Zain leaned back in silence.
"You have come to ask me about Masuma," Taha said.
Aaliya hadn't thought much about this meeting; she'd thought little past getting away from Zain and out of New York, but now she was interested. "My grandmother left my family the year after I was born, and I... We thought perhaps..." She looked down at her hands.
Pushing the controls of his electric wheelchair, Taha moved closer to her and again took her hand. "And you want to ask if Masuma left your family to come to me."
"Actually..." Aaliya began, then looked up at him. "Yes."
He smiled at her warmly. "I have not been so flattered in all my life," he said, squeezing her hand, then put his hand on her chin and moved her head so that the light played on her hair and cheeks.
At other times Aaliya would have been annoyed at a stranger touching her, but now all she could think of was that this man might be her only remaining relative and that she had nowhere to go when she left zain's house.
Taha dropped his hand from her face. "You look like her. You look very much like her."
"I've been told so." Leaning toward him, she put her hand over his on the controls of the chair. "Do you know what happened to my grandmother?"
He shook his head no. "On the twelfth of May, 1928, she disappeared from my life and I never saw her again."
Letting out her pent-up breath, Aaliya suddenly felt as though she'd lost something. In just a few minutes she had seemed to fill herself with hope. Never mind that she'd told Zain that she didn't care about a grandmother who'd committed adultery, she knew now that if an old woman who said she was Ghazala Haider, also known as Masuma, had walked through the door, Aaliya would have thrown her arms about the woman's neck.
"I didn't really believe..." she said, stammering over the words, then not knowing what else to say. She couldn't very well say, By the way, did you and my grandmother have a cuddle about that time and maybe, perhaps possibly, produce a kid that was my father?
"Come in here," Taha said, leading the way in his wheelchair. "We'll have tea and I'll tell you what I know."
"Yes, please," Aaliya said, quickly getting up and following him.
Zain, who she'd almost forgotten, slipped her arm in his. He was looking at her oddly, as though he were warning her about something, but she didn't have the time or inclination to try to figure out what was bothering him.
She followed the old man into a pretty yellow and white room that had a huge bay window looking out toward the sand and the ocean. Refusing to see the four men, two of them with dogs, walking up and down the area, she saw only the beauty.
The round table, with only two chairs at it, was set with a pretty teapot and two matching cups and saucers, and there was a large plate of little cakes that looked on the edge of being stale.
"Would you pour?" Taha asked Aaliya, pleasing her with his request. He refused to eat or drink, so she served only Zain and herself while Taha sat quietly and watched her.
"With the right clothes and hair you could be Masuma," he whispered. "Even your movements are like hers. Tell me, dear, do you sing?"
"Some," she said modestly, for she had always liked to sing, but only for her family.
The three of them were quiet for a moment, Zain sitting on his chair looking like a preacher at a po*nography convention. For some reason he seemed to be disapproving of everything she said and did. His absurd jealousy couldn't extend to this sweet old man, could it?
"Would you like for me to tell you about that night?" Taha asked.
"Please do," Aaliya said, sipping her tea and eating a small cake. "If you would like to tell us, that is. If you're not too tired." She ignored Zain's foot stepping on hers to tell her that this is what they came for. She was not going to tire a ninety-one-year-old man just so Zain Abdullah could write some nasty book about him.
"It would give me great pleasure to tell you," he said, smiling at her. In the sunlight he looked older than he had in the living room, and Aaliya had an urge to tuck him up on the couch so he could take a nap.
Taha took a deep breath and began to talk.
"I guess it's an old-fashioned term and it seems out of place now, but I was a gangster. I sold whiskey and beer to people when the government had declared it illegal to sell liquor or even to drink it. Because of some bad things that happened, we sellers of alcohol got a very bad reputation." He paused to smile at Aaliya again.
"I can't offer an apology for what I did. I was young and I didn't know any better. All I knew was that it was the Great Depression, and while other men were standing on bread lines, I was making fifty grand a year. And making money was important to a man when he was in love as I was."
Taha paused a moment in memory. "Masuma was beautiful. Not loudly beautiful, but quiet and elegant, a real knockout." He smiled at Aaliya fondly. "Like you," he said, making her blush.
"Anyway, Masuma and I had been a pair for months. I'd asked her to marry me hundreds of times, but she said she wouldn't marry me until I went legit. I wanted to, but I was making too much money and I couldn't see myself settling down somewhere selling insurance. But then came that Saturday night that changed so many lives. May the twelfth, 1928."
"When I look back on it, I wonder that I didn't have a premonition that night that something was going to happen, but I didn't. I was on top of the world. My right-hand man, Joe,a man who'd been my friend since we were kids together, had picked up the receipts that day and they were the best ever, so I bought Masuma a pair of earrings. Diamonds with pearls. Nothing big or flashy since Masuma didn't like showy jewelry, but these were real nice.
"I went to Jubilee's Place - that's where Masuma was singing - feeling on top of the world. Right away I went to Masuma and gave her the earrings. I thought she'd be happy, but she wasn't. She sat down on a chair and started to cry. I couldn't figure out what was wrong with her, and it took me a long time to get it out of her."
Taha's voice lowered, as though what he was saying was very difficult. "She told me she was going to have our baby."
Drawing in her breath sharply, Aaliya wanted to ask questions, but she didn't dare stop his story.
"Masuma was very upset about her pregnancy, but I was the happiest man in the world," Taha said, continuing, "because I knew then that she'd have to agree to marry me. But I was wrong. Even when she was going to have a baby, she still said she wouldn't marry me unless I gave up the rackets."
Taha gave what on a younger man would have been described as a grin. "I agreed that I would. I would have agreed to anything that night if it meant having the woman I loved marry me. But between you and me, I don't know if I would have stayed away from the rackets. Maybe in a year or so I would have gotten restless and gone back, but that night I meant it when I said I would get out.
"I wanted us to leave the club right then and go get married, but Masuma said she had to sing that night, that she couldn't let Jubilee down. I agreed only if she'd promise that it would be her last time to perform in public. In those days there was no talk of a woman wanting a career. All Masuma wanted was what I wanted: a home for the two of us and our children."
Taha stopped and looked out the window. "She sang that night and I'd never heard her sing prettier. Like a bird.
"About ten o'clock, I guess, she took a break and I got up from my table to go backstage to see her. On the way I made a trip to the... you know, and when I was about to leave, just as my hand was on the door, I heard the first shots and the first screams. I knew right away what had happened. Back in those days I was small potatoes in the business. By that I mean I sold to only a few places, most of them up in Harlem. Most of the city was controlled by a man named Salman. I had already figured that Salman would have heard of our haul that day and I knew he'd be mad, but I thought he'd just send some of his guys over to try to work out a deal with me. But he didn't do that. He sent eight men to Jubilee's Place with typewriters - machine guns.
"I knew the men were after me, but all I cared about was getting to Masuma. I pushed open the door and already the club was full of screaming, hysterical, running people and blood - blood was everywhere. I had to push a woman's body aside to get the door open, then I had to walk over two people who were screaming on the floor. The bullets were flying everywhere and I took one in my shoulder then a second one in my side, but I kept going. I was afraid Masuma would leave her dressing room and come out or that maybe Salman's men would go after her because Masuma wasn't the kind of woman to think of herself first. She'd never run out the back door if she heard shots coming from the front.
"I almost made it to the back when something fell and hit me on the head. I think it was a chandelier. Whatever it was, it knocked me out cold. When I woke, it was hours later, and there was a man in a white coat bending over me. This one's alive,' he yelled and walked past me. I grabbed his ankle and tried to ask questions, but he shook me off. I think I passed out after that, because when I woke again, it was the next day and I was in a hospital, and my side and shoulder were bandaged. It was another day before I found out what happened. Salman had decided to get rid of me and all the men who worked for me, so he sent his men over to shoot all of us."
It didn't matter to him that there were probably a hundred people in the nightclub that night and that most of them had nothing to do with me. Salman meant to kill us all and he very nearly did. I lost seven men that night."
He paused for a long while, and when Taha spoke again, there was a catch in his voice. "I lost Joe that night. Joe was my childhood friend, and he'd saved my life when we were kids. He was the only person I have ever before or since trusted. Joe was dead, took a bullet right through the forehead, so he must have died instantly. And there were twenty-five or so others either killed or injured that night. But worst of all, Masuma disappeared. No one knew what had happened to her. For a long time after that I searched for her, but I couldn't find any trace of her. She walked out, and I'm sure it was my fault. Maybe she knew I wouldn't be able to do anything that wasn't exciting, maybe she didn't want her child raised with a gangster for a father. I don't know. All I know is that I never saw or heard from her again."
He stopped talking for a moment, then took some long, slow breaths to calm himself. "I changed after that night. I'd lost the two most important people in my life - my best friend, my only friend, and the woman I loved. Aaliya, can you understand how miserable I was after that night?"
"Yes," she whispered. "I understand what it feels like to lose everyone."
"It's better not to talk about the next few years of my life. I was not a pleasant person. I don't know what I would have become if this hadn't happened." He put his hands on the controls of the wheelchair. "I was in a car accident two years later, and my spinal cord was severed."
Comfortingly Aaliya put her hand over his.
"I've done things in my life that I'm not proud of, but I think I would have been a different man if that night hadn't happened. I used to think about it a great deal, what would have happened if Masuma hadn't stayed to sing that night. If she'd left with me before Salman's men showed up, we probably would have been married before we heard the news of what had happened. If she'd left with me, Joe would have gone with us and he wouldn't have died either."
He looked off into the distance. "If Masuma hadn't wanted to stay and sing, everything would have been different." Reaching out, he touched Aaliya's cheek. "Maybe if I'd married her and waked up to hear of the bloodbath at the club, maybe it would have scared me into going straight. Maybe..." His eyes grew misty. "Maybe now you would be my granddaughter, not just my biological granddaughter, but living here with me." He smiled. "Perhaps not here. Perhaps I'd be living in a house in suburbia somewhere, a retired insurance salesman." He touched her blonde hair. "Like Midas, I'd trade all my gold for the warmth of a child."
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