Page 158 of Never

‘We believe that all religions are good, because all worship the same God, though they give him different names.’

‘I guess that displeased the jihadis.’

‘They left us alone for years, but then we opened a village school. Baha’is believe that women should be able to read and write, so the school was for girls as well as boys. That seems to be what angered the Islamists.’

‘What happened?’

‘They came with guns and flame-throwers. They killed older people and children, even babies, and set fire to the houses. Both my parents were murdered. I’m glad I wasn’t married. They captured the young men and women, especially the schoolgirls.’

‘And brought them here.’

‘Yes.’

‘What did they do with the girls?’

‘Put them in that light-blue-painted building with no windows in the guards’ compound. It’s called the makhur.’

‘The whorehouse.’

‘They were at the school, you see, so they could not be true Muslims.’

‘Are they still in that building?’

‘Some will have died: bad food, untreated infections or sheer despair. There might be one or two hardy individuals still living.’

‘I thought that building was a prison.’

‘So it is. A prison for heathen women. It is not sin to rape such women, so our captors believe. Or pretend to believe.’

Abdul thought of Kiah with her silver cross.

All too soon the whistle blew. Abdul struggled to his feet, aching all over. How much longer did he have to handle that jackhammer?

Akeem walked with him and they stepped down into the pit. Akeem lifted the drill. ‘I’ll take the first session,’ he said.

‘Thank you.’ Abdul had never meant those words more sincerely.

Painfully slowly, the sun crept across the sky and began to go down in the west, and as the heat became less Abdul’s aches turned into torture. The geologist left and Mohammed blew the whistle for the end of the shift. Abdul was so glad that tears came to his eyes.

Akeem said: ‘They’ll give you a different job tomorrow. Orders from the Korean. He thinks it’s the best way to keep the strong men alive. But the day after tomorrow you’ll be back on the jackhammer.’

Abdul realized he was going to have to get used to this – unless he could do what no one else had managed, and escape.

As they were leaving, walking wearily towards the unchained gate, there was some kind of fracas, the guards seizing and holding one of the workers, a small dark man. Two guards held him, each taking an arm, while Mohammed harangued him. They seemed to be telling him to spit something out.

The other guards ordered the workers to stand in line and wait, and pointed their guns threateningly to deter anyone who thought of intervening. Abdul had a nauseating feeling that he was about to witness a punishment.

A fourth guard came up behind the worker and clubbed him on the back of the head with the butt of a rifle. Something came out of the man’s mouth and fell to the ground, and a guard picked it up.

It was about the size of an American quarter, and a dirty yellow colour: gold.

The man had been trying to steal a small nugget. How did he imagine he could ever spend it? There was nothing to buy here. He must have hoped he could use it to bribe his way out.

The guards ripped off his threadbare clothes and threw him down naked on his back. They all reversed their rifles, holding them by the barrels. Mohammed hit the man in the face with the butt of his rifle. He cried out and covered his face with his arms, then Mohammed clubbed him in the groin. When the man covered his genitals Mohammed hit him in the face again. He nodded at the others, then each of the guards in turn lifted his weapon high and swung it through a long arc in order to hit harder. The rhythm was relentless: they had done this before.

Blood came out of the man’s mouth when he screamed. They hit him again and again, going for the head, the groin, the wrists, the knees. Bones cracked and blood flowed, and Abdul saw that this was a beating from which the man was not meant to recover. He curled into a foetal position and his screams turned into animal whimpers. The beating continued remorselessly. The man fell silent and still, but they did not stop. They hammered the unconscious body until it was hardly recognizable as human.

Eventually they tired. Their victim seemed to have stopped breathing. Mohammed knelt down and felt for a heartbeat, then for a pulse.