The Fist of God

“Draw the curtains,” he said quietly. The girl did it. Woman’s work. Then he put the light back on.

“Never sit in a lighted room with the curtains open,” he said. “You do not want to be seen together.”

He had divided his six residences into two groups. In four he lived, flitting from one to another in no particular sequence. Each time, he left tiny signs for himself—a leaf wedged in the doorjamb, a tin can on the step. If ever they were missing, he would know the house had been visited. In the other two he stored half the gear he had brought in from its grave in the desert. The place he had chosen to meet the students was the least important of his dwelling places, and now one he would never use again to sleep in.

They were all students, except one who worked in a bank. He made them introduce themselves.

“Now you need new names.” He gave them each a new name. “You tell no one else—not friends, parents, brothers, anyone —those names. Whenever they are used, you know the message comes from one of us.

“What do we call you?” asked the girl, who had just become Rana.

“The Bedou,” he said. “It will do. You—what is this address again?”

The young man he pointed at thought, then produced a slip of paper. Martin took it from him.

“No pieces of paper. Memorize everything. The Popular Army may be stupid but the Secret Police are not. If you are frisked, how do you explain this?”

He made the three who had written down the address burn their slips of paper.

“How well do you know your city?”

“Pretty well,” said the oldest of them, the twenty-five-year-old bank clerk.

“Not good enough. Buy maps tomorrow, street maps. Study as if for your final exams. Learn every street and alley, every square and garden, every boulevard and lane, every major public building, every mosque and courtyard. You know the street signs are coming down?”

They nodded. Within fifteen days of the invasion, after recovering from their shock, the Kuwaitis were beginning a form of passive resistance, of civil disobedience. It was spontaneous and uncoordinated. One of the moves was the ripping down of street signs. Kuwait is a complicated city to start with; deprived of street signs, it became a maze.

Iraqi patrols were already becoming comprehensively lost. For the Secret Police, finding a suspect’s address was a nightmare. At main intersections, sign posts were being ripped up in the night or turned around.

That first night, Martin gave them two hours on basic security. Always have a cover story t

hat checks out, for any journey and any rendezvous. Never carry incriminating paper. Always treat Iraqi soldiers with respect verging on deference. Confide in no one.

“From now on you are two people. One is the original you, the one everyone knows, the student, the clerk. He is polite, attentive, law-abiding, innocent, harmless. The Iraqis will leave him alone because he does not threaten them. He never insults their country, their flag, or their leader. He never comes to the attention of the AMAM. He stays alive and free. Only on a special occasion, on a mission, does the other person appear. He will become skilled and dangerous and still stay alive.”

He taught them about security. To attend a meeting at a rendezvous, turn up early, park well away. Go into the shadows. Watch for twenty minutes. Look at the surrounding houses. Check for heads on the roof, the waiting ambush party. Be alert for the scuff of a soldier’s boot on gravel, the glow of a cigarette, the clink of metal on metal.

When they still had time to get home before the curfew, he dismissed them. They were disappointed.

“What about the invaders? When do we start killing them?”

“When you know how.”

“Is there nothing we can do?”

“When the Iraqis move about, how do they do it? Do they march?”

“No, they use trucks, vans, jeeps, stolen cars,” said the law student.

“Which have petrol caps,” said the Bedou, “which come off with a quick twist. Sugar lumps—twenty lumps per petrol tank. It dissolves in the petrol, passes through the carburetor, and turns to hard caramel in the heat of the engine. It destroys the engine. Be careful not to be caught. Work in pairs and after dark.

One keeps watch, the other slips in the sugar. Replace the petrol cap. It takes ten seconds.

“A piece of plywood, four inches by four, with four sharpened steel nails through it. Drop it down under your thob till it slips out by your feet. Nudge it with your toe under the leading edge of the tire of a stationary vehicle.

“There are rats in Kuwait, so there are shops that sell rat poison. Buy the white, strychnine-based kind.

Buy dough from a baker. Mix in the poison, using rubber gloves, then destroy the gloves. Bake up the bread in the kitchen oven, but only, when you are alone in the house.”