Glancing around her room, at the prayer mat, the clothes, wardrobe, chair, lamp, she thought upon Comrade’s Demidov’s lesson. If an agent were to search her room the only possessions that revealed something distinct and controversial about her were those given to her by the Soviets – an exercise book and a cheap pen. Normally when she wanted to study she was forced to smuggle her textbooks into her bedroom. The books were stashed outside, sealed in plastic against weather and dirt, in a crevice in the broken mud-brickwork of the narrow side street. It was laborious to remove them without being seen by the neighbours or the boys who played in the alley and she often wondered if she was being excessively cautious, whether her training had altered her judgement. Caution made sense as a tactic: if her parents had reacted coolly to her enrolling in university it was troubling to conceive of their anger at her new occupation, working for the Afghan secret police.

Nara’s father, Memar, was one of the country’s leading architects. Appointed leader of his guild, he’d been elected as a liaison to the State functionaries, making him one of the most influential voices when it came to any major construction project in Kabul. A veteran of his craft, known as a master, ustad, he ran a programme for apprentices, including Nara’s older brother. Her brother had squandered the advantages handed to him. He was lazy, spending most of his time racing through the streets of Kabul on a customized, imported motorbike, impressing his friends. Handsome and popular, he was more interested in socializing than study. Nara had never been asked if she wanted to enrol in the programme, nor had she visited one of her father’s construction sites. The possibility of following his career had not only been denied to her, it had never even been imagined. He did not and would not discuss his affairs directly with her. In order to know anything about him she’d been forced to do her own investigations, listening to private conversations, reading his letters – a precursor to the profession she’d chosen.