Page 44 of A Perfect Devon Christmas
‘I see,’ he said. He sighed and added, ‘when the water passesover your head, whether by an inch or a hundred reeds, it makes no difference.’
‘Meaning?’
‘It’s an old village saying. You know part of my secret; you might as well know it all.’ And then, the dam broke.
Omar began speaking, haltingly at first, but soon the words flowed, and his story unfolded in raw, painful detail. He had been granted asylum in England. On hearing those words, Ivy dipped her head in silent prayer – she had broken no laws protecting him. Neither had Fred.
‘Because of your religion?’ she suggested.
He shook his head. ‘No. Because I was an interpreter for your army.’
She gasped. ‘That’s why you speak such excellent English.’
‘Yes. People think you’re just translating, but there’s much more to the role than that. You must be able to explain the implications of the words someone has chosen, so your vocabulary becomes extensive. You must observe body language. Notice not just who is present, but question who should be there and isn’t.’
He went on to tell her that when the Western forces had pulled out of Kabul, he had been away in the mountains visiting an uncle. ‘Everything moved so fast. I had no chance to get to the airport before the Taliban were in power.’
‘So, you were left behind?’
His eyes grew distant. ‘Yes,’ he whispered.
‘That must have been very frightening, to see your world crumbling around you, see the people who you trusted, abandon you to save their own skins. That was not our finest hour.’
‘What could you do? You British were America’s pawns. When they pulled out, you had to follow. You couldn’t stay there alone.’
‘You must hate the Americans.’
He shrugged. ‘No. They did what they thought was right.America couldn’t stay forever. They believed what they were told – that the new regime was strong enough to survive without them.’ He gave a short laugh. ‘Those of us on the ground, we knew they were wrong. I was painfully aware of how the regional tribal system operates in Afghanistan. I knew the regime would crumble.’
‘That’s very philosophical of you.’
He closed his eyes, and a long sigh escaped his lips. ‘I’ve had a lot of time to think about it.’
‘We should still have done more to protect people who risked their lives to help us. It was obvious the Americans were getting out too quickly. They should have delayed, allowed more of you to escape.’
‘That would have required trusting the Taliban. Trust is difficult to rekindle once the flame goes out.’
Ivy gave a wry laugh, thinking how true that statement was. ‘What did you do?’
‘When they took control again, they started hunting us down. We had been promised safe passage, but it never came. I reinvented myself at a charity training teachers – the Fowler Foundation, FF as we called it, and buried myself in work. And no one questioned my background. The Taliban didn’t want to upset aid donors, so they left us alone.’
As he spoke of his work, it was obvious that it had been his passion.
But over time, he said, he started suspecting the charity was being used as a cover for something sinister. When he raised concerns about discrepancies in the finances, payments for shipments that didn’t appear to have been made, with invoices that looked oddly fabricated, his fears were dismissed by the local manager. But Omar couldn’t let it go. With the help of a friend in accounts, Farid, he dug deeper and discovered large payments to a supplier, listed asmarine supplies.
‘I couldn’t work out why we’d need any of those for teaching. I couldn’t ignore it. Couldn’t let money donated for a decent cause end up being misused. I suspected it might be bribes to the Taliban.’ He looked at Ivy, his eyes seeking acknowledgement that she agreed.
‘But what could you do?’ she asked.
‘There was only one thing I could do. Farid and I started to dig for evidence, we knew it was risky, but—’
‘Risky! You were taking on the Taliban!’
‘Yes. Someone saw me in the accounts department and must have guessed what I was doing. Farid had a reason to be there; I didn’t.’
Shortly afterwards Omar was accused of drug smuggling. ‘I couldn’t risk being taken in for questioning, with my background I would just disappear. It wasn’t only me I was worried about. I didn’t want someone to suspect I had help, for suspicion to fall on Farid. And sometimes the Taliban extend revenge to include the families of people they brand as traitors. And my sister Laila, the one I showed you the picture of – she was an interpreter too.’
Ivy didn’t want to interrupt but couldn’t help herself. ‘A female translator – that’s brave.’
