The Abd-Al-Rahman Mandate

By José Miguel Roig

It tells the story of Carlos Lopez, a Latino journalist who on assignment in Baghdad for The Miami Herald, buys from a street vendor an inexpensive copy of the Koran and on his flight back to the US, he finds inserted in its pages an old parchment. It has a text written in an unknown language. He consults with a professor of classical languages that he knows from his university days atFloridaUniversity. The professor informs him it is a very valuable Byzantine document whose text could influence the Islamic world. The professor is murdered and the parchment disappears. There are several probable culprits: a Belgian antiquarian and Iranian, Saudi Arabian and Pakistani agents, all possible murderers and all eager to get hold of the parchment. Carlos Lopez has kept a copy of the parchment. The resolution of its text takes him first to Cairo, where he joins a Coptic policeman, and together they set out to search for the meaning of the parchment. Pursued and threatened by the antiquarian and the agents, Lopez and the Coptic policeman travel toDamascus, then Yemen and finally to Morocco, where the enigma is solved.
This document could be Mohammed's testament. It holds the "solution" to the antagonism between the Shiites and the Sunnites.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse UK
• Release date: Apr 1, 2011
• ISBN: 9781467891530

José Miguel Roig

Jose Miguel Roig was born inSpain. He spent his youth in the Philippinesand has lived most of his adult life inVenezuela. He graduated from Cornell University,New York and is professor of History and Theory of Architecture at the Simon Bolivar University in Caracas. Roig has written and published novels both in Spanish and English. Some of them have been translated into French and Danish.

Book preview

Contents

ONE

1   

2   

3   

4   

5   

6   

7   

8   

9   

10

11

12

13

14

15

16

17

18

TWO

19

20

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

29

30

31

32

33

34

35

36

37

38

39

40

41

42

43

44

45

46

47

48

49

50

51

52

53

54

55

56

57

THREE

58

59

60

61

62

63

64

65

66

67

68

69

70

71

72

73

74

75

FOUR

76

77

78

79

LIST OF CHARACTERS:

By the bright day

And the night without ray

The Lord forsakes not nor casts thee away.

The hereafter the present will more than repay;

Thy Lord will give, nor say thee nay

         The Koran

ONE

1

Carlos Lopez buys the book. It costs him twelve thousand dinars. He pulls out a bill from his wallet and hands it to the street vendor. The man doesn’t have change. He is nervous and looks about as if someone were after him. The streets of Baghdad are dangerous. Suicide bombs explode anywhere and at any time. The police roam the city, driving at crazy speed, picking up anyone who looks suspicious. The US army is worse, they bring with them death. The man sticks his hands into his robe but can’t find any change. Lopez fans his hand to tell him to forget it, he can keep the change.

"Shukran, he says in Arabic. Thank you."

The man nods, bends over, folds the four corners of the cloth that he uses to exhibit the books, makes a knot and runs off with the merchandise.

Although he has been on assignment to several Arab countries while working as a reporter for the Miami Herald, including a couple of years in Amman as head of the news department, Carlos Lopez’s Arabic is limited. It’s the language of the Koran, the book he has just bought. A new edition. Beautiful, bound in leather, the cover with colorful and sensual scroll-like calligraphy.

He arrived a week ago from Miami via London where he changed flights. Bagdad is a risky destination but he had to accept it. He can’t afford to turn down the work he is offered. He is divorced and has a son, and has to pay alimony. And he loves his son and likes to contribute more than the minimum monetary arrangement stipulates. Charlie is seven and a very alert and intelligent boy.

Lopez got a phone call from Sigman, his former boss at the Miami Herald. He needed material on what was going on in Iraq. He wanted a journalist like Carlos Lopez to write a piece on the animosity between the two sides of Islam. He was uncertain of why the two sides were antagonistic nor what the differences meant.

It’s one religion, correct? Sigman inquired.

Yes, but there are, how could I say, certain disparities, answered Lopez.

What kind of disparities?

It was nearly eleven at night. He wasn’t in the mood for lecturing. It wasn’t the moment to get into that.

Well, the Shiites and the Sunnites… it’s too complicated! he gave up.

So?

With the Prophet’s death…You have heard of the Prophet?

Yeah, sure, extending the last word.

When He died, Islam split in two. The division stemmed from who was to succeed Mohammed… Mohammed, the Prophet. Abu Bakr, the father of his second wife Aisha or Ali, his cousin and son-in-law, married to his daughter Fatima. Those were the two competitors.

Who won?

Neither. First, Abu Bakr became his successor and Caliph. Then came Ali and he founded another dynasty. They have been divided ever since.

Any religious differences?

Not really, said Lopez with a touch of impatience. What is it you want me to do?

In Baghdad he tried to interview some of the important personages, but few were willing to collaborate. And most of the Iraqi politicians that did accept didn’t want to go into what they considered a delicate matter. They were either Shiites and Sunnites and preferred not to venture judgments. This wasn’t a real issue, they all said. In time the differences would vanish. The clergy on both sides were even less inclined to comment. Lopez talked to two Iraqi journalists, whom he had met while traveling in other Arab countries. They had quite distinct opinions. The differences were unsolvable, irreconcilable. They came from way back, from the beginning of Islam.

When the Prophet died, Abu Bakr, his intimate friend of many years and one of his fathers-in-law, assumed the title of Caliph. Within a year he was master of Arabia and had conquered Syria. He in turn appointed Omar as his successor, and Omar continued expanding the Islamic world. Next came Othman who was assassinated. And after him, Ali, the Prophet’s cousin and son-in-law, who had been bypassed three times, became Caliph. Umawiya, appointed governor of Syria by Othman, succeeded Ali, who was also assassinated. Umawiya became Caliph and founded the Omayyad dynasty. Shiites consider Ali to be the rightful heir to the Prophet, and to be followed after him by his sons, who were grandsons of the Prophet. The Shiites claim that the Prophet himself named Ali Caliph, but there is no proof of this. They believe that the Omayyad Dynasty founded by Umawiya was illegitimate and they still curse Abu Bakr on Friday evening prayers at the mosque. The Sunnites think they are the Prophet’s rightful heirs. There is no conceivable way of going back, of bridging time. It’s not written in the Koran. The Prophet left no testament and both sides claim they are right.

The theme of the article Sigman wanted him to write, the confrontation between Shiites and Sunnites, was nothing new. Neither side was going to give in. No matter what happened in Iraq, regardless of the outcome, there would still be that confrontation. After three sleepless nights, Lopez had finally come up with a few pages of text. It had little to do with original commission. But then Sigman would probably not read it. He had to meet his readers’ requirements and Lopez, whom he trusted as an earnest and experienced journalist, would do an efficient job.

Lopez had emailed the article to Sigman the night before and once he sent it, he felt relieved and slept peacefully for hours. The first good sleep since he arrived in Baghdad where nightly sporadic and unaccountable shooting is common.

After breakfast he went to the British Airways offices to see about his trip back to the United States. He went in person, for flights out of Bahdad are always oversold and even driving to the airport requires planning. Later he decided to walk back to the Ishtar Hotel, although he was advised not to. While walking in the general direction of the hotel, in a narrow side alley he found the vendor with his ware of used books spread on an open cloth. One of them caught his eye. It would make a perfect gift for his father to place in the window of his bookshop, next to the old edition of Don Quixote and a first edition in Spanish of James Joyce’s Ulysses. It wasn’t expensive. And not too big. He travels lightly, duffel bag for his clothes that fits snugly into the airplane overhead compartment and a roomy but well packed knapsack where he keeps all the things his work requires including his laptop.

Suddenly he has the sense of being watched: by pedestrians walking past, by a fat woman pulling at a child, by the beggars gathering about him. It’s the first time he has this feeling since he arrived in Baghdad. He doesn’t stand out. His clothes might give him away. But he is a Latino and he can dissolve into the crowd. He could be one more Iraqi. His four day stubble, helps. He is tall for a Latino, strong, wide shouldered. His skin is light brown, his hair straight and ebony black. His eyes are black too. His eyelashes are long and give him a slightly feminine touch. According to his mother they are long because she clipped them when he was a baby. Carlos is an only child. His parents are Cuban, both from Havana. When Castro came to power, they moved to Florida, first his father and later his mother, when Communism was imposed on the island, just before they closed the borders. They met and married in Miami. In Havana he was a journalist and worked for the Diario de la Marina. In Miami, since he spoke no English he had to do all sorts of odd jobs: waiter, gardener, night watchman, eventually opening La Abeja, a small bookshop in Little Havana, carrying books in Spanish that he imports from Spain and Argentina. It’s well known among Spanish speaking people who come all the way from the wealthy suburbs, like Coconut Grove, Coral Gables and even from far away Weston.

Carlos was born in Miami. His mother, homesick for her country and the relatives she left behind, instilled in him a love for all things Cuban: the music, the food, the geography. His father on the other hand imbibed in him the idea that there was no going back for them, that he had to pursue the American Dream. In the United States, he would often tell him, there are no limits, it’s all a question of ambition. True to the script, Carlos had studied at Thomas Jefferson High School, the best in Miami and had won a University of Florida scholarship. He was one of the youngest graduates to have an article published nationwide and he had won several prestigious prizes in journalism.

Lopez closes the book. He pulls his knapsack from behind his back and sticks the book in between papers, notebook, the laptop. He gives a quick look around him and heads toward the hotel.

2   

He runs up the steps to the hotel entrance. Red granite columns, sandbags on the sides, a couple of Iraqi soldiers guarding. He goes through the metal detector. He shows his American passport and credentials, correspondent for the Miami Herald. He could be a terrorist, a bomb strapped to his waist or inside his knapsack. No one trusts anyone in Baghdad. It’s a city in permanent fear. He heads straight to the reception desk to see if there is any mail. Nothing. His airplane leaves at three that afternoon, so he has time for a shower and to write a few emails.

He rides alone in the elevator. The window of his room is ajar. The maid must have left it open. Often the electricity runs out and the air conditioner stops working. But Lopez knows it’s unwise to leave the window open. Although his room is on an upper floor, there are ways to climb down from the roof.

He pulls out clean underwear and a shirt. He leaves the duffel bag open on a chair. Nothing in it is worth much. He doesn’t care if they rob him. He keeps valuables in the knapsack that he carries with him at all time. He undresses, pushes the dirty clothes into a plastic bag which he stuffs inside the bag, and steps into the shower. It’s what he needs. He is hot and sweaty from trudging around the city. The water is unheated, but it feels just right. He lets it pour over his body. While he is lathering he hears the phone ring. It’s probably Sigman. Who else knows he is in Baghdad at the Ishtar Hotel? He lets it ring. It stops. He comes out of the shower, picks up the towel and dries himself. He ties the towel around his waist and walks over to the knapsack. He unlocks it and takes out his laptop.

He searches for a socket. He carries with him an electric adapter. He has learned from his traveling that different countries have different voltage. He presses the power button, waits for a few seconds until the monitor lights up. Then he goes on-line to check his email. There are three messages, the usual spam offering of sexual gratification, which he has been unable to eradicate entirely and two personal messages. One is from his son. Charlie reads and writes quite well and is getting good at using the computer. The message doesn’t say much. He is going to play soccer with his friend Pete and the rest of the gang. Also they are planning a picnic at school for next Sunday. Charlie, or Carlitos as his Cuban grandmother calls him, doesn’t speak Spanish. His mother, Linda, is American and shows no interest in his learning it. When they were still married and lived together Lopez tried to teach his son by speaking to him in Spanish whenever he could. But since they divorced and she moved to Tampa, Charlie has forgotten it. He writes two words: te amo, I love you.

The other message is predictably from Sigman. He has received the article and is editing it. Editing? Yes, Sigman isn’t convinced that that’s what he ordered. But it’s OK, it reads fine. He will have his check ready. Lopez shuts the laptop and places it inside his knapsack. He dresses, runs a comb through his hair, pats some cologne on his cheeks, gathers his toiletries and finishes packing. He looks into the closet, raises the bed sheets to see if he is leaving anything behind, and grabbing his bag, he goes down to the lobby. First he stops at the desk to pay the bill. He owes six whiskies and three meals. Breakfasts are included. He pays with his Visa Card. He reminds the reception employee of the taxi he ordered to take him to the airport. He decides to wait at the bar. It’s a small place, with leather covered stools, dark red curtains and mirrors in the back. The barman approaches and he orders a scotch. Just then another man comes into the bar and sits beside him. He looks American, lean, light colored hair, wearing a safari suit.

Hello. How are you? says the man.

Hi, Lopez replies.

The man doesn’t sound American. There is a slight accent, hard to place.

You’re leaving? he asks pointing at Lopez’s duffel bag on the floor beside him.

Definitely not an American accent. Nor English. Canadian, maybe?

Obviously, he answers.

Nothing is obvious here in Iraq, the man says, ordering the barman, who has just served Lopez his drink. A bottle of champagne. Dom Pérignon.

No champagne, the barman says.

No champagne?

No, adding after a while sir.

Then, a whisky.

Lopez takes a long sip of scotch. It’s not a good scotch. He should have specified the brand. Perhaps that’s the only one they have.

In most of the Arab countries he has visited, alcohol is difficult to come by. There are exceptions, Jordan, Lebanon, and of course Dubai. The Koran prohibits drinking alcohol, just as it prohibits gambling. It’s very specific as to what a good Muslim can or can’t do. Prostitution is condemned and so is homosexuality. In truth the good Muslim doesn’t have too many obligations, apart from the obvious ones such as being a true believer and a good human being, which seems to be part of all religions. Islam means submission and a Muslim is he who submits. The core of the belief is expressed in the phrase: There is no God but God and Mohammed is the Prophet of God. The obligations are simple, the pillars of Islam:

One: Believe that there is one God and that the Prophet is His messenger.

Two: Pray facing Mecca five times a day.

Three: Give alms to the poor.

Four: Fast during Ramadan.

Five: Go on a pilgrimage, the hajj, to Mecca once in a lifetime.

Nothing is obvious in Iraq, wouldn’t you say? repeats the man, this time expecting a reply.

Well, the situation isn’t normal.

I wasn’t referring to politics, says the man, eyeing suspiciously the drink the waiter is placing on the counter.

Lopez doesn’t answer. He takes another sip.

You meet someone, continues the man, who looks respectable. Apparently respectable and it turns out he’s… a thief.

"Carajo! That happens everywhere!" laughs Lopez using a Spanish expletive that his mother would disapprove.

You’re right, says the man, but here in Iraq it’s worse. Maybe the war. By the way my name is…

He doesn’t finish the sentence. Trying to light a cigarette his arm hits the drink and the glass topples over. He stands up abruptly to evade the liquid that runs over the edge of the counter.

Sorry, did you get wet?

The waiter doesn’t rush over. He slowly selects a fresh glass and pours another drink and without saying a word, he offers the whisky to the man. Only then does he dry the counter.

I’m in the art business, the man goes on. What did you say your name was?

Carlos Lopez hasn’t said his name. He doesn’t say it now. Instead he asks: Art business? You’re an artist?

You could say that, says the man, leaving his drink untouched.

Lopez has noticed that he hadn’t touched the other one either.

As I was saying, yesterday evening I was sitting, right here by the way, no not exactly here, over there at that table, when a man came up to me, introduced himself, saying he was there representing the government. He handed me a very elaborate visiting card, gold embossed, one of those long Arab names, ibn something or other.

Lopez takes another sip. The last one. He looks at his watch. He will have to leave in a few minutes. The hotel employee will come now to let him know