Page 296 - Leadership in the Indian Army

vaguely familiar about the doorman.

When the doorman went inside, Mariam and Rasheed waited. From this

vantage point, Mariam had a view of the Polytechnic Institute, and,

beyond that, the old Khair khana district and the road to Mazar. To the

south, she could see the bread factory, Silo, long abandoned, its pale
yellow fa9ade pocked with yawning holes from all the shelling it had

endured. Farther south, she could make out the hollow ruins of

Darulaman Palace, where, many years back, Rasheed had taken her for

a picnic. The memory of that day was a relic from a past that no longer
seemed like her own.

Mariam concentrated on these things, these landmarks. She feared she
might lose her nerve if she let her mind wander.

Every few minutes, jeeps and taxis drove up to the hotel entrance.
Doormen rushed to greet the passengers, who were all men, armed,

bearded, wearing turbans, all of them stepping out with the same

self-assured, casual air of menace. Mariam heard bits of their chatter as

they vanished through the hotel's doors. She heard Pashto and Farsi, but
Urdu and Arabic too.

"Meet our real masters," Rasheed said in a low-pitched voice. "Pakistani

and Arab Islamists. The Taliban are puppets. These are the big players
and Afghanistan is their playground."

Rasheed said he'd heard rumors that the Taliban were allowing these
people to set up secret camps all over the country, where young men

were being trained to become suicide bombers and jihadi fighters.