HE HAD THE ADDRESS of the Iranians in her hand, so she headed to the vicinity of their residence, on the dirtiest side of the Bronx.
Someone is definitely keeping an eye on them... — she thought as she drove.
Gregory Evans was no fool, he knew very well how things worked in serious cases like this. No suspicion would go unnoticed. The government that monitors its own citizens would never let a suspect out of its sight.
He needed to be shrewd. Walking up to the door of the house, ringing the bell and asking to come in would not be a good idea. It would be the same as asking the security guards to add his own name to the watch list. He parked a considerable distance away and observed every corner of the place. It didn't take long for him to realize that near the residence there was a parked car, with a man inside, reading the newspaper.
All that's missing is a billboard over his head... — he mocked the other agent's poor disguise.
Seeing the strange man standing in the car reminded him of an old saying:
Patient people watch, smart people discover...
There was certainly nothing more tedious and unproductive than surveillance work. Greg thought of a better way to get in without being noticed, until he decided to go through the back.
The family lived in a neighborhood of very simple houses. Carefully, he walked around the block and entered through another backyard, trying to find the right direction.
The place was dangerous; he didn't know if he would get into trouble if he passed by a drug dealer's backyard or something similar. A resident even yelled at him, but when he showed his credentials, the man was intimidated.
— Shhh! Quiet! I'm just passing by! — whispered Greg.
He went through some hallways, jumped fences and wire fences and finally arrived at a backyard that seemed to belong to that house. Still on the other side of the wall, Gregory Evans could see an American man, dressed as an FBI agent with his gun in the holster, walking in the backyard. Surprised, Greg looked for a hiding place as quickly as he could, so as not to be seen by the stranger who was prowling the place.
Damn!
If he were seen by the guard, he would certainly be recognized as an agent and asked to answer what he was doing there without superior orders, which would make him an internal suspect, if the whole case was as deep as he thought it was.
The sound of his hurried steps in hiding caught the man's attention, who turned in his direction, trying to see over the wall what was happening. Luckily, Greg got out of sight in time. After looking with some reluctance, the man decided that there was nothing suspicious and returned to his morbid steps in that dirty backyard.
— I can't believe it, are you going to stay there for long? — he mumbled from his shelter, afraid to go out and be seen.
The discouraged man, after a few minutes of lethargy, woke up from his inertia and walked to the side hallway of the house, signaling that he would go out onto the street. Perhaps he was going to swap shifts with his companion who was waiting in the car, or just chat to help pass the time. Gregory saw his opportunity there.
Carefully, he crept across the dirt floor until he reached the balcony. He looked out the corner of the window and saw a woman, with a Muslim appearance and clothing, in the kitchen. He was still not sure if it was Zareen Al Faruj, Fadiq's mother, as she had worn a burqa the whole time Peter was away from home. His doubt, however, was dispelled when he saw a boy emerge from a door that seemed to lead to the living room and come towards her, probably speaking Persian. Greg recognized him; he was certainly Fadiq's younger brother!
Greg approached the back door and knocked twice, very quietly, trying to be as discreet as possible. After a brief moment and two glances through the shutter on the door, the handle turned and it opened, still held by a chain lock.
Frightened and wide eyes stared at him, full of confusion and curiosity, waiting for an answer. She began to speak exasperatedly in Persian and he was already nervous, not knowing what to do. He tried to gesture something to show that her intentions were good, but she did not understand. The confusion continued until the boy called her and took his place in the crack of the door, with his big, innocent child's eyes.
— Hi, buddy — Gregory Evans said, with a smile — I came here to talk to your father. I want to help you.
— My father is not here — the boy replied, in regular English.
— Do you know where I can find him?
— I was told that my brother died.
— Your brother?
— My father said not to trust anyone. Did he go to heaven?
— Your father said? — he asked thoughtfully. — Well, listen to what your father says...
The mother, not understanding what was going on, shouted at the boy again, very suspicious. He answered her a few things, and she responded with something similar to an order.
— Young man, what do you want? — said the boy, rehashing the conversation.
— Your mother asked?
— Yeah...
— Tell her I don't believe what happened
I want to know what you have to say.
The boy turned to his mother and spoke to her. Greg was unsure whether the child would be able to reproduce the long sentence he had said in an acceptable way. In addition to the many words, they still needed to be translated into Persian. In any case, the little boy was proving to be quite eager and intelligent.
Suddenly, the door slammed. Greg was stunned, unsure whether that was a positive sign or an expulsion, but soon he heard the sound of the chain and the door opened again, this time without the lock.
Zareen said a few things in Persian that he interpreted as an invitation to come in. After exchanging glances, he went in and was led by her to the living room, where he sat on the sofa. The woman went to the kitchen and then came back with a glass of water in her hand, stretching her arm towards him and speaking insistently in her native language.
Trying to interpret her speech by the tone of her voice, he just nodded his head in agreement with everything she said. Suspicious, he felt a strange form of fear at that embarrassing situation. Even though he was afraid of what was in that water, and didn't know what to do, he picked up the glass and held it with him, forced. After mumbling a few more things, she returned to the kitchen and continued her chores.
The boy was watching television. For a long time, all Gregory Evans had in his mind was the glass of water he was holding, the smell of the food being prepared, the company of the boy and the pink dinosaur singing on television. He deeply wished he were in the place of the man who watched them in the car, reading the same newspaper over and over again. The minutes passed slowly, until the door to the living room opened and Bashar Al Faruj, the father, came in.
Greg could see his expression change when he found him, sitting in his living room. The man was shouting angry phrases in Persian, spitting saliva everywhere, the veins bulging on his forehead. Just as he was about to fly over Greg, Zareen appeared between them and started a strange argument with her husband.
After all that, Gregory Evans was surprised by the fact that she had truly understood his intentions with the visit. The most amazing thing was the boy's ability to remain still in the face of the situation, paying attention to the children's program as if nothing was happening behind his back. After an exchange of unintelligible phrases, the argument ended and Bashar turned to Greg.
— What are you doing here? — he asked, still nervous, now speaking in his poor English.
— Forgive me for intruding, sir. I'm here to talk.
— What are you?!
— I'm from the FBI, agent...
— Go away, there's nothing more to talk about! I've already told you everything! — he shouted again, dismayed.
— Mr. Al Faruj, I'm here to listen to you. I want to know your version of the facts.
— What for? — the man asked, trying to control his emotions by swallowing hard as he spoke. — Who will listen to a Muslim in the land of the Americans!?
— That's what I'm here for. — Greg tried to calm him down.
— We're leaving here! It's already been decided!
— Just tell me, Mr. Bashar, I just want to help them. I don't believe what people say...
Hearing this, Bashar fell silent, thinking. He mumbled Persian words in a monotone and, finally, decided to sit down and talk better:
— Fadiq wasn't bad — he said sadly, resting his arms on his knees and looking at the carpet spread out in the center of the room. — A good boy... He was very studious, always got good grades in school, a special young man... He taught me English when we came to these lands...
His eyes filled with tears as he spoke of the boy, Greg noticed a certain sincerity in his father's gaze.
— Cursed day I decided to come to this place! I wanted a future for them, a college degree, studies, and to return to our land afterwards. Tell me, Mr. Evans, where does his future lie now?
Greg didn't know if his father's story was true. Fadiq would never be willing to trade his life for a cause. Even though he wasn't an expert in the radical world, he was sure of it. Terrorists don't dream of worldly things. He risked going deeper with the gloomy Bashar. He needed to clarify some issues:
— I heard you use the term 'scapegoat' during the interrogation earlier. Why did you say that?
Bashar Al Faruj put his hand to his nose, pressing hard between his eyes to keep the tears from falling. He sighed sadly and shook his head repeatedly, as he seemed to see the memories of his eldest son before him.
— My boy wouldn't do something like that. He wasn't like that, he wasn't a radical. I dreamed of becoming a doctor, studying science here, returning to our country and working in a hospital in Tehran... I wouldn't trade it all away just like that... — at this point, she no longer cared about the tears. After pausing to breathe, she continued, looking at her youngest son who was still watching TV.
— He said he had received an email from the school the night before, arranging a group project at the marathon site
Taking pictures, videos... I don't understand much about these strange American jobs. Studying is about books, you know? In my time, we used to read books... They were supposed to meet and do the work right there. Even Fadiq himself found this strange, because he had never done any work like that at that school.
His friend, Amir, poor Amir... didn't get this notice, but decided to go with him.
Minutes before everything happened, when they arrived at the agreed place, they called me and said that no one from the school was there, that they didn't understand what had happened...
Greg was surprised by the story. A last-minute assignment was not the profile of an organized school. One fact that caught his attention concerned his colleague Amir. Only Fadiq had been called for the job.
Why was that?
To save time, he asked his father:
— And do you know who sent the email?
— He said it was physical education, that this was a special assignment.
— I see... And what school did they go to?
Bashar told him about the school. It was a high school in New York, where Fadiq would be doing his senior year.
This would be Gregory's next destination.