Aziz sat watching on a bar stool. “It will be hot today,” he said. They had not spoken of Soumeya since last night. Aziz was grateful for Ghazi’s not asking questions. It would be explained in time, Ghazi’s attitude said.

“Here, give me some of this,” Aziz said. “I will chop.”

“To really help, do this.” Ghazi demonstrated taking the chicken out of the oil.

Soon they would come. First John Hill. Then Aderley, the old man. Then Mariah, who had two babies, twins. Then Ramona, who loved Marco, the headwaiter. Then someone whose name Aziz could not say: Birgin. Birginia. Some called her Ginny.

“There was one for me,” Ghazi said.

Aziz sat up.

The raw chicken roared up in oil.

“Her mother was sick,” Ghazi began, after the chicken quieted. “They sent her mother to France. She was living there for medical problems, and the one for me, she was in Arzew.” Ghazi’s face was turned to his chopping. Aziz was lifting chicken from the second pot. He could barely see this chicken. His heart drummed.

“Her father was dead, but her uncle, he worked in the courthouse and had known my father, though not long. That was the connection, how it was arranged.”

Aziz nodded. “Was she—to look at, something good?”

“She is not, but fuck that. She is private, modest. Her voice is young. If it pleases my father, who favors my brother and kicks me, I am happy. It worked. My father, I swear it, softened to me.”

Aziz nodded. Still Ghazi was chopping. Still Aziz kept at the chicken. It was important to act ordinary. Everything typical.

“I go to college. I go to the army. I come back. There are the usual things. We get along. I see she is always talking about her mother, so I give her money to give to the mother, to send to France. This money I get from security work; there is nothing for architects.”

“Security?”

“At the navy base. Then taxi. Then vegetables on the sidewalk.”

“The uncle of her, couldn’t he find something at the court?”

“He says no.”

“And your father, at military intelligence?”

“DRS? Hell, no.”

“Nothing?” Aziz asked. Ghazi’s father had joined Direction du Renseignement et de la Sécurité long before it had that name, back when it was called what many still called it, Sécurité Militaire. Someone as proud as Ghazi’s father would let his son sell vegetables?

Ghazi had stopped chopping. He leaned toward Aziz.

“I would not throw myself in with such soft hens.”

Aziz was jolted. This was opposite to what anyone said about DRS. It was feared, hated, vicious. Military intelligence—soft?