madamupstairs, in mariam's room, zalmai was wound up. hebounced his new rubber basketball around for a while, on thefloor, against the walls. mariam asked him not to, but he knewthat she had no authority to exert over him and so he wenton bouncing his ball, his eyes holding hers defiantly. for awhile, they pushed his toy car, an ambulance with bold redlettering on the sides, sending it back and forth between themacross the room.
earlier, when they had met tariq at the door, zalmai hadclutched the basketball close to his chest and stuck a thumb inhis mouth-something he didn't do anymore except when hewas apprehensive. he had eyed tariq with suspicion.
"who is that man?" he said now. "i don't like him."mariam was going to explain, say something about him andlaila growing up together, but zalmai cut her off and said toturn the ambulance around, so the front grille faced him, and,when she did, he said he wanted his basketball again.
"where is it?" he said. "where is the ball baba jan got me?
where is it? i want it! i want it!" his voice rising andbecoming more shrill with each word.
"it was just here," mariam said, and he cried, "no, it's lost, iknow it. i just know it's lost! where is it? where is it?""here," she said, fetching the ball from the closet where it hadrolled to. but zalmai was bawling now and pounding his fists,crying that it wasn't the same ball, it couldn't be, because hisball was lost, and this was a fake one, where had his real ballgone? where? where where where?
he screamed until laila had to come upstairs to hold him, torock him and run her fingers through his tight, dark curls, todry his moist cheeks and cluck her tongue in his ear.
mariam waited outside the room. from atop the staircase, allshe could see of tariq were his long legs, the real one and theartificial one, in khaki pants, stretched out on the uncarpetedliving-room floor. it was then that she realized why thedoorman at the continental had looked familiar the day sheand rasheed had gone there to place the call to jalil. he'dbeen wearing a cap and sunglasses, that was why it hadn'tcome to her earlier. but mariam remembered now, from nineyears before, remembered him sitting downstairs, patting hisbrow with a handkerchief and asking for water. now allmanner of questions raced through her mind: had the sulfapills too been part of the ruse? which one of them had plottedthe lie, provided the convincing details? and how much hadrasheed paid abdul sharif-if that was even his name-to comeand crush laila with the story of tariq's death?
