to me. I am going to have to return to Syria in about two months on a family business visit. I may be gone for about a week. Those two men were here today to inform me that my brother passed away this past week and the family has asked me to come home and to go over his papers…..”

“His papers! Aren't you going to the burial? I should think you would want to attend.”

“No! That will not be possible as he is already buried. I will of course pay my respects at his grave when I'm there. I could have a memorial service for him here in Paterson, but that too, just does not seem to be the right thing to do. I hate to tell you this but you see we never did get along too well and.… My brother has always been jealous of me, as is the rest of the family. Anyway a special service would just be sort of hypocritical.”

“Jealous? I would think that they should be proud of you. Why would they be jealous?” asked Joseph.

“Because I was the one that 'got out'. Think about it for a moment or two. Coming from a rural family yourself, I am sure that you can appreciate how the rest of my family felt about my escaping that life. To them I was just the lazy boy who would not accept his family's place in life and ran away leaving them to struggle. In the beginning I sent them money when I had it. Who knows what they did with it. My family still lives in a very remote rural section of the country. There are few if any telephones and a good road is unheard of. They seldom even go to the nearest big town, let alone the capital. I think I was the first in the family to even see a train, let alone ride on one. They still think radios are a tool of the devil. Anyway it has been decided that because I was so tied up here with the fund; that the earliest we could get together was in two months. By that time the fund should be well on its way and the money should have begun to flow. The two months will also give my family time to gather up his papers as well as time to recover somewhat from their loss. Then we can all sit down and be better able to make the decisions required with calmer heads.”

“I'm so sorry to hear of your loss. Is there anything, anything at all that I can do? Perhaps you would you like me to go with you?” Joseph asked knowing that this would put him in more solid with Fazzi. “Having someone close to you at this time is important. Perhaps there is something I can do there to help; after all I am going to be a part of your family, one way or the other.”

“What about your job, the school and the army? Would you get in trouble if you were to drop everything and come with me?” Fazzi questioned hoping that he could find a diplomatic way out of having to take Yussef with him at this time. Maybe he could take him another time, one when he would not be so involved with the Jihad.

“Well I do have a little leave time coming, however for this, since it involves leaving the United States, I would have to make a special request for