The Dark Side of Love Read Free Page A

to Damascus, and quite often went out late in the evening to eat together.
    They were standing on the balcony in front of the steps leading up to the attic. “We found obvious marks left on the old ivy. The murderer climbed up it to the balcony, then just went upstairs to the top floor,” explained Ismail, his right hand pointing. “And then,” he continued, leaning on the balustrade, “he must have taken the body through the balcony room and out of the front door of the apartment. We found fibres from the sack on the sharp metal edge of the safety lock. He went down the main staircase and into the street.”
    â€œWhy do you say he ? Are you sure it was a man? And are you certain he was acting on his own?” asked Barudi, his eyes tracing the way from the street back up to the balcony.
    â€œThat broken neck is clearly a man’s work, no woman did it, but of course there could have been several men,” replied Ismail.
    â€œSo why not a man and a woman?”
    The expert smiled. “That may sound likely, but if the murderer had
the wife helping him, he was a fool. Far too risky to climb the ivy into the apartment if you can just walk through the front door unnoticed.” He paused briefly. “No, I have a feeling that the murderer didn’t care about anything, even being arrested himself, so long as he killed the major. There’s a whiff of bitter vengeance about this, not cold-blooded murder by the wife’s lover.”
    â€œAnd suppose the whole thing was planned well in advance? It seems our man had a sensitive position in the secret service. I don’t know details yet, but he was a major, after all, and such men live dangerously,” said Barudi.
    â€œWe can’t rule that out. The climb itself wouldn’t take a real pro more than two or three minutes,” replied Ismail, going thoughtfully up the steps to the top floor, just as the widow came to tell the commissioner that his adjutant Mansur wanted him on the phone.
    It was after eleven by the time he left the widow’s apartment. He couldn’t help thinking of her. “Major Mahdi, my husband, had many enemies,” she had said straight out, only quarter of an hour into the interview. And Barudi had the impression that she herself didn’t much like her husband either. She didn’t even bother to pretend she did. Instead, she always called him Major Mahdi, like a stranger, and then, quietly and almost as if ashamed of it, added the explanatory “my husband.”
    What was the woman’s secret? How dead inside must a man be, the commissioner kept wondering, to sleep alone in a rundown attic instead of in the soft arms of this beauty? He could find no answer.
    A ravenous hunger for bread was gripping his guts. The widow had served him coffee and sweetmeats five times. He drove his beat-up Ford to Iskander’s delicatessen shop in Straight Street, near Abbara Alley and, as usual, ordered a flatbread filled with thinly sliced pas-turma. Iskander knew this delicious air-dried beef with its piquant crust of sharp spices was his favourite food, but nonetheless, every day he asked politely, “The usual?” And as usual the commissioner had a flatbread sandwich and a glass of cold water. Together they cost a lira, and while the commissioner ate his sandwich Iskander quickly made two coffees, hoping to hear some tale or other about the depravity of human nature. His wish was quite often granted. Commissioner
Barudi liked talking to the little man, although on condition that he never asked for names.
    Today the commissioner said, “No coffee, thank you. I’ve drunk five already and I feel quite dizzy.”
    The man could tell that the commissioner didn’t plan to tell him anything, so he kept quiet and hoped the net of his silence would soon catch a bigger fish.
    Omar the ironer had stepped out of his little shop opposite Iskander’s for a moment, to get a breath