One took his ankles. One took an arm. One took the other arm. Someone kicked his head, but softly.

They began to argue, in whispers.

“It is too early. He should not be here yet.”

“Wait. This is not so easy.”

“You are a woman.”

“You are a whore.”

“Think.”

“He is DRS.”

“He is not.”

“Ask him his name.”

Aziz lifted his head. “What if I belonged to Tahar?”

An informed gamble, but instantly someone said, “Prove this.”

He had no idea.

“How many know of Ben Aknoun?” Aziz asked. He knew of this place from overheard conversations. It was where Aziz believed this Tahar, a DRS colonel, hid the shock troops of military intelligence. Perhaps these ones were they. Ben Aknoun was also rumored to be the stronghold for torture. By mentioning Ben Aknoun, they could think he had been there, tortured there, and was, like them, a militant.

Someone let go of his ankles.

“Wait. Wait.”

“No one knows of Ben Aknoun!”

“I told you to wait.”

Hands held his ankles again. It dawned on him: These must be the irhabiya that had attacked the nearby unit trying to defuse the land mines.

“Where is Ben Aknoun?”

He had no way to know where in Algiers this hidden DRS place could be. Even Benane did not know of Ben Aknoun. How could he? Benane was worthy. He had no truck with someone like Tahar. Tahar’s men were the ones Aziz feared had taken his fellow soldiers or killed them, and it was Benane he had hoped to tell of it. He had pictured their rescue: Benane’s gratitude. Their mothers’ weeping joy.

Boy dreams. A brutal imagining, that was all there was now: imagining how these ones on his ankles think. Imagining how they talk. Imagining he was they. But which they were they? How to tell an irhabi from a secret soldier? He hardened his voice. As if they, if they doubted his answer, were the impostors, not he.

“On my mother’s grave, I have sworn I cannot say.”

They pulled him up. A bearded one clapped Aziz to his chest. Bearded: the sign of Islamists. They were irhabiya.

“Brother,” said the bearded one.

“We feared you would not come,” another said. “That slipping away—”

There was a crunching sound.

All of them dropped to the ground.

Aziz could see Nazzar straining to see, his hand on the tent flap. Had they come for Nazzar? It couldn’t be. And yet, Nazzar had been checking if Aziz was awake. He had been aggravated by Aziz outside the tent. Yet none of these secret ones seemed to recognize Nazzar. Maybe they didn’t know who they were looking for by sight.