After putting the last of the Paris suburbs behind them, they rode for an hour through sleeping cropland and postcard villages, seemingly without aim or purpose or destination. Or was it two hours they journeyed? Natalie couldn’t be sure. Her view of the world was limited. There were only Jalal’s square shoulders, and the back of Jalal’s helmet, and Jalal’s narrow waist, to which she clung with guilt, for she was thinking of Ziad, whom she loved. For a time she tried to maintain a grasp of their whereabouts, noting the names of the villages they entered and exited, and the numbers of the roads along which they sped. Eventually, she surrendered and tilted her head heavenward. Stars shone in the black sky; a low luminous moon chased them across the landscape. She supposed she was back in France again.
At last, they arrived at the outskirts of a midsize town. Natalie knew it; it was Senlis, the ancient city of French kings located at the edge of the Forest of Chantilly. Jalal sped through the cobbled alleyways of the medieval center and parked in a small courtyard. On two sides were high walls of gray flint, and on the third, darkened and shuttered, was a two-story building that showed no sign of habitation. Somewhere a church bell tolled heavily, but otherwise the town was eerily quiet. Jalal dismounted and removed his helmet. Natalie did the same.
“Your hijab, too,” he murmured in Arabic.
“Why?”
“Because this isn’t the sort of place for people like us.”
Natalie unpinned her hijab and tucked it into the helmet. In the darkness Jalal scrutinized her carefully.
“Is something wrong?”
“You’re just . . .”
“Just what?”
“More beautiful than I imagined.” He locked the two helmets in the bike’s rear storage compartment. Then, from his coat pocket, he removed an object about the size of an old-fashioned pager. “Did you follow my instructions about phones and electronic devices?”
“Of course.”
“And no credit cards?”
“None.”
“Mind if I check?”
He moved the object methodically over her body, down her arms and legs, across her shoulders, her breasts, her hips, down the length of her spine.
“Did I pass?”
Wordlessly, he returned the device to his coat pocket.
“Is your name really Jalal Nasser?”
“Does it matter?”
“It matters to me.”
“Yes, my name is Jalal.”
“And your organization?”
“We seek to re-create the caliphate in the Muslim lands of the Middle East and establish Islamic dominance over the rest of the world.”
“You’re from ISIS.”
Without responding he turned and led her along an empty street, toward the sound of the church bells.
“Take my arm,” he said sotto voce. “Speak to me in French.”
“About what?”
“Anything. It doesn’t matter.”
She threaded her arm through his and told him about her day at the clinic. He nodded occasionally, always at the wrong times, but made no attempt to address her in his dreadful French. Finally, in Arabic, he asked, “Who was the woman you had coffee with yesterday afternoon?”
“I’m sorry?”
“The woman at Café de Flore, the one with the veil. Who is she?”
“How long have you been watching me?”
“Answer my question, please.”
“Her name is Mona.”
“Mona what?”
“Mona el-Baz. We studied medicine together. She lives in Frankfurt now.”
“She’s a Palestinian, too?”
“Egyptian, actually.”
“She didn’t look Egyptian to me.”
“She comes from an old family, very aristocratic.”
“I’d like to meet her.”
“Why?”
“Perhaps she could be helpful to our cause.”
“Don’t bother. Mona doesn’t think the way we do.”
He seemed shocked by this. “Why would you associate with such a person?”
“Why do you attend King’s College and reside in the land of the kufar?”
The street brought them to the edge of a square. The tables of a small restaurant spilled onto the paving stones, and on the opposite side rose the Gothic towers and flying buttresses of Senlis Cathedral.
“And the clothing store on the rue Vavin?” he asked over the tolling of the bells. “Why did you return there?”
“I forgot my credit card.”
“You were preoccupied?”
“Not necessarily.”
“Nervous?”
“Why should I have been?”
“Did you know I was following you?”
“Were you?”
He was distracted by the sound of laughter rising from the tables of the restaurant. He took her hand and as the bells fell silent led her across the square.
“How well do you know the Koran and the Hadith?” he asked suddenly.
She was grateful for the change of subject, for it suggested he had no concerns as to her authenticity. Consequently, she did not confess that she had not cracked the Koran before settling into a farmhouse in the Valley of Jezreel. Instead, she explained that her parents were secular and that she did not discover the beauty of the Koran until she was at university.
“Do you know about the Mahdi?” he asked. “The one they call the Redeemer?”
“Yes, of course. The Hadith says he will appear as an ordinary man. ‘His name will be my name,’” she said, quoting the relevant passage, “‘and his father’s name my father’s name.’ He will be one of us.”
“Very good. Go on, please.”
“The Mahdi will rule over the earth until the Day of Judgment and rid the world of evil. There will be no Christians after the Mahdi comes.” She paused, then added, “And no Jews.”
“And no Israel, either.”
“Inshallah,” Natalie heard herself say softly.
“Yes, God willing.” He stopped in the center of the square and gazed disapprovingly at the darkened southern facade of the ancient cathedral. “Soon it will look like the Colosseum in Rome and the Parthenon in Athens. Our Muslim tour guides will explain what went on here. This is where the kufar worshiped, they will say. This is where they baptized their young. This is where their priests whispered the magic spells that turned bread and wine into the body and blood of Isa, our prophet. The end is near, Leila. The clock is ticking.”
“You intend to destroy them?”
“We won’t have to. They will destroy themselves by invading the lands of the caliphate. There will be a final battle between the armies of Rome and the armies of Islam in the Syrian village of Dabiq. The Hadith tells us the black flags will come from the east, led by mighty men with long hair and beards, their surnames taken from their hometowns. Men like Zarqawi and Baghdadi.” He turned and looked at her for a moment in silence. Then he said, “And you, of course.”
“I’m not a soldier. I can’t fight.”