As for Ali, there was no need to lose his favor, either—as long as he could be persuaded to exercise restraint. All Abdallah needed to do was unravel yet another secret—the whereabouts of Amira and Karim Rashad.

35. Karim

Karim

Americans have no understanding of the Arab world.

Their foreign policy in the Middle East is bankrupt.

Their arrogance in presuming to know what is best for us is both hypocritical and destructive. And their so-called peace initiatives will prove to be temporary at best.”

Good Lord, thought Jenna. She’d never heard such a soapbox speech—at least not in her own living room, and certainly not from a teenaged girl.

The speaker was Jacqueline Hamid, daughter of Professor Nasser Hamid, a well-known Egyptian novelist at Boston University. She was a classmate and, it appeared, a special friend of Karim’s. He sat at her side, hanging on every word.

Now he nodded vigorously, eyes shining with admiration. “Exactly. Even you can’t disagree with that, can you, Mom?” It was a challenge.

How to respond? Jenna not only disagreed but also found Jacqueline pompous, opinionated—in short, insufferable. But to express that opinion would surely alienate her son, who was clearly enthralled by the petite, dark-haired beauty with pouting red lips and enormous jet-black eyes.

“I heard your father’s lecture on Egyptian feminism,” Jenna said, dodging Karim’s question. “It was very informative. But I wonder why he’s not alarmed by the resurgence of the veil in a big city like Cairo, even among university students.”

“Perhaps you don’t fully understand the implications of current socio-religious movements in Egypt,” Jacqueline said primly. “You’ve been in this country a long time, and Karim tells me that you grew up mainly in Europe. You’re Westernized. You’ve lost touch with your Egyptian identity.

Jenna was shocked. Although Karim spent much of his free time at the Hamid home, and was constantly quoting either father or daughter, it hadn’t occurred to her that she was being discussed with Jacqueline—and found wanting.

Taking Jenna’s silence to mean she had seen the error of her remark, Jacqueline launched into a defense of Arab customs in general and the veil in particular. “In conservative countries—like in al-Remal, for example— women enjoy a level of protection and respect that Western women have never known. All that the so-called feminist movement has done in the West is to turn women into second-class men. I’m not at all sure I prefer that.”

Jenna’s blood ran cold. How foolish young people could be—and how dangerous, especially when they were so sure they knew all the answers. Didn’t this overprivileged girl realize how lucky she was? How blessed that she could open her mouth and say what she pleased? Didn’t she know that she could be punished, perhaps even killed, for doing that in a conservative Arab country she so admired?