Mattias showed his Swedish passport. “I’m not here to register. I came to visit a friend.”
“Three hours,” said the young man.
“Excuse me?”
“Visits are not to last more than three hours. If your friend leaves now, he may miss lunch. The cafeteria closes at one p.m. No exceptions. Dinner is not until five o’clock. We are not responsible.”
“We plan on having lunch together,” said Mattias.
“Name.”
Mattias gave the name of his friend and his refugee number.
“Sit,” said the man. “I will notify his barracks. It will be a few minutes.”
Mattias took a seat.Thank God,he thought. The sheikh had found him.
He’d approached Mattias five months earlier at the local mosque, one of just two in Gothenburg. It was after Friday prayer; the Iman had preached a sermon on sacrifice and forgiveness. Mattias was collecting his shoes, dreading the bitter cold of the December afternoon that awaited him outside.
“A fine sermon. There is another verse I might add. A verse particular to you. ‘Nothing you’ve ever given has gone unnoticed. Every sacrifice you’ve made, Allah has seen it.’”
The man was sixty, of medium height, with a trim beard and deep-set mournful eyes, and by his dress, wealthy. From his accent, Mattias placed him as a Kuwaiti or, perhaps, a Saudi.
“Me?” said Mattias. “But I’ve made no sacrifices. Allah has blessed me with abundance.”
“But it was not always so, was it.…Ibrahim?”
Mattias regarded the man with interest. How had he known his true name? Why was he, Ibrahim, of interest to this rich stranger?
“You have suffered greatly,” the man continued. “It is only right that Allah bless you with what you kindly speak of as ‘abundance.’”
“I’m sorry, but we have not met.”
“My name is Abdul Al-Obeidi. You are Ibrahim Moussa, survivor of theMedusatragedy. It is an honor. Would you believe that I have traveled all the way from Jeddah to speak with you?”
“Truly, I would not,” said Mattias. It had been a long time since he had heard his given name and he was uncomfortable at being the subject of undeserved flattery. “But you are here, so I must. I hope I do not disappoint you, Sheikh Abdul.”
“You? You do not have it in your heart to disappoint another.”
“I try my best,” he said earnestly. “For my family, at least. I’m afraid I fail Islam.”
“You are here for Friday sermon. That is what is most important. I am a man of the world. I know that our earthly commitments make piety—at least as the Prophet defines it—difficult.” A smile. A complicitous pat on the shoulder.I am not perfect either.“Will you join me for tea?”
“I cannot, Sheikh. I must return to work.”
“Please. I will not keep you long.”
Mattias checked his watch. He was due back at the counter in a quarter hour. “But quickly.”
The two men crossed the street and entered a nearby café. The sheikh ordered tea for the both of them. He returned from the pastry counter with twomille-feuilles. “I cannot resist them,” he said. “Please join me.”
Mattias thanked him but declined. He no longer had a sweet tooth. The sheikh ate one of the cream-filled pastries in three ravenous bites, leaving a rime of custard on his beard. “I can’t help myself,” he said. “A treat.”
Mattias relaxed at the show of informality.
“I will be brief,” the sheikh went on. “I need your help, Ibrahim. It is for something I know you have never considered but for which only you and a few others are qualified.”
“What others?”
