A Riffians Tune (25 page)

On the nineteenth of June, coming out of the revision room on my way to the refectory for lunch, I was handed a scrunched-up letter from home by the prefect counting students at the refectory door. It was extraordinary the letter had even arrived, with an incomplete address and indiscernible writing. I hadn't received or expected any letters for the whole year. Looking at it, my heart shivered. I shoved it in my pocket until lunch was over. Out of the refectory, away from the boys, I opened the letter and read, ‘Your mother has been sick in bed for three months.'

By this time, I had sat two-thirds of my exams, but the more difficult and important ones were still to come; Professor Sculli's subject was one, and I knew he hated me. He had expressed more than once his dismay that I was still in the school.

The moment I finished my exams, I went to the rector and asked to leave.

‘Won't you wait to see your exam results?' asked the rector.

‘I would like to, sir, but my mother is ill and I'm needed at home,' I answered.

‘Very well.'

The night before I left, I asked Faissal, ‘Would you write to me?'

‘Shall I tell you all the results?' he asked.

‘Of course,' I replied.

In a hurry, I packed. From jinxed Bab Ftouh, I took the night coach. As it moved north, so did the moon across the sky. A strange transcendence absorbed me, as if I had no legs, no arms, no body, just a mind perching here and there, home, school, moon, anxiety.

B
ack home, I did not recognise my mother. She looked threadbare-thin, frail, pale, and just waiting to shut her eyes and leave. She couldn't stand up. I put my hands under her arms and tried to lift her, but she kept falling like a newborn calf, long legs but no power, and no dignity either.

‘Has Mrs Malani been here recently?' I asked Amina, who was standing, watching and wondering.

‘Yes, she's been here every day,' she said. ‘She's tried everything, but produced no magic.'

Worn out, Rabbia and Amina were ready to see our mother be called home where she could find peace and leave the pain behind. The drought was devastating, the fields produced nothing, and it was not worth picking the sparse amount of grain amidst the nettles. Only the fields at the foot of Makran and Tassamat produced some barley, yet they required a lot of work, much of it fruitless.

Baja and I toiled like father and son. Sickling, threshing and winnowing produced very little to take home and only a little hay to bale.

One hot day, Baja stood up straight, looked at the sky and the mountain, and yelled at me. ‘Jusef,' he said, ‘I quit.'

Stunned, I didn't know what to say. ‘What's next then?' I asked him.

‘I wish I knew,' he said.

At the foot of Tassamat, in the middle of the field, under the burning sun, he shook my hand and said, ‘Goodbye', a nauseating word. Baja went east to his home, and I south to my dying mother. After ten months of work, Baja went home with nothing to show for it.
I will be in the same position if I've failed my exams.

Whenever my mother needed to relieve herself, Rabbia called me. We each held her under one arm, helped her onto the pot in the corner of the room, but she never managed to sit and was rarely able to crap. Rabbia would wipe her bottom while I held her around the waist.

I had wanted to take my mother to the doctor from the day I arrived, but had faced many barriers, not least of which was financial. While there was a wizard or a witch in practically every house nearby, there were no doctors, never mind a hospital, in the whole region. Nador, the nearest town, was over a hundred miles away on dirt roads. Hiring a taxi from Nador to our house would cost a king's ransom, and most taxis didn't go that far anyway, refusing to travel the country roads.

All Wednesday night, Rabbia and I discussed what to do about mother. At dawn on Thursday morning, I went to my brother-in-law Himich, a few miles away. I knocked at the door and awakened a fierce dog which refused to retreat or stop barking. Opening the door, Himich looked shocked to see me. He must have thought my mother had died, but soon realised from my gentle, faked smile that wasn't the case.

‘I need your help,' I asked him.

‘To do what?' he asked.

‘To take Mother to the doctor.'

‘Doctor?' he said. ‘Let God finish His job!'

How was it possible for my father to hand his daughter to a man with such thoughts? How was it possible for my beautiful sister to spread her legs for a man like this?
I wondered.

I made a beeline to catch the coach to Nador, and it was a long walk, two hours with my legs stretched to the max. I waited four hours for the coach coming from Oujda. Numb from the journey, I found myself finally in the middle of the town surrounded by expensive Mercedes of differing sizes, colours and models. With no order, the drivers all yelled, ‘Taxi free! Taxi free!'

‘I want to bring a sick woman from the mountains, Makran and Tassamat,' I said to one. He slithered away. While standing and wondering what to do next, a taxi driver sitting in his car and playing with the steering wheel, called me.

‘I will take you,' he said. ‘Three hundred dirhams.' I jumped in the taxi and sat beside him. ‘People living near Makran and Tassamat don't hire taxis,' he remarked.

‘You're right,' I replied.

He drove fast and got extremely angry when we reached the dirt road. He became even angrier when he had to drive across the field. We arrived at home, but my mother could not sit up, and he was worried she might soil his Mercedes. Rabbia and I carefully wrapped her and laid her on the back seat, with Amina and Rabbia at each end. After driving a few miles, the driver became curious and talkative. The beauty and innocence of mountain girls contrasted with the seasoned thieves and sophisticated prostitutes he knew in the city. The contrast between Rabbia and Amina, one blonde and one brunette, puzzled him.

‘Are those girls sisters?' he asked me.

‘Yes,' I answered.

* * *

DOCTOR MEHDI WAS A
living god in the town, was well known and highly regarded. His surgery was in a typically small, Spanish, terraced house. It was packed with sick men, women and children, with a queue of patients lying against the wall outside. His receptionist was a Spanish girl called Señorita. She was beefy, small and stocky, but not overly so, beautiful, fresh and clean with a beet-red face. Because she spoke only Spanish, I couldn't explain to her how ill my mother was. The most I could get was a ticket with the number twenty-nine. Seeing me stuck, a Moroccan woman, a maid, butted in and translated, ‘The doctor might see you later this afternoon, but, if not, tomorrow.'

I cringed when I heard ‘tomorrow'.
Where am I going to take my mother tonight?
I wondered.
No hotel would rent a room to someone as sick as she was.
A wave of panic washed over me.

‘What is your ticket number?' I asked a man sitting uncomfortably on a wobbly, bare wooden chair.

‘Nine,' he answered.

‘Would you like to sell it?' I asked.

He looked at me as if I were out of my mind. ‘It's not a passport,' he said with a smile. ‘I have been here since dawn. I am a miner,' he said. ‘To be here, I have lost my day's wage.'

I paid him and handed him my ticket number twenty-nine, but the deal created a riot in the reception room. ‘I am before them!' shouted a woman to the receptionist. ‘They bribed you with eggs and chickens!' she shouted.

‘No!' I intervened in her defence. ‘I bought this man's ticket. My mother won't last until tomorrow!'

The woman continued to heap personal insults on Señorita, as she knew the Spanish girl didn't understand Tarifit.

My mother was a puzzling case to the doctor. He failed to diagnose her illness, but prescribed two injections a day for three weeks. I was shocked when the pharmacist told me I needed a nurse to administer the injection.

The doctor knows we are in a land of witches and wizards, not nurses
. I had heard Mr Yamani, an old nurse, was extremely arrogant and charged for just moving his fingers. He had taught Uncle Mimoun how to administer injections when his son Mohamed had fallen ill. Uncle Mimoun had bought a vial of penicillin and had injected him with it. Within one hour, he had died.

I remembered Mohamed's death. I had been shepherding on a high hill when I heard women yelling and lamenting, going in and out of Uncle Mimoun's house.

With no other choice, I went to Mr Yamani, who lived on a steep slope, and whose house was protected by four fierce, hungry dogs. I couldn't get near it. I waited until a boy came out and saw me waving. The child ran inside and the entire family emerged. Mr Yamani was first, and the rest appeared to be either his sisters or wives. His arrogance showed from the start. He peered at my open shirt and sandals, covered in dust, with a look of contempt.

‘What has brought you here, boy?' he asked.

‘Uncle Mimoun told me you are a qualified nurse,' I answered.

‘Of course I am,' he answered. ‘I learned from masters, Spanish doctors and nurses, and served the best army in the world, General Franco's unit.'

It was getting late, dusk was creeping, and my mother was getting worse by the hour. Frustrated, I waited until he finished his glowing self-appraisal.

‘My mother is very ill and needs injections. Could you help?'

‘No,' he answered. ‘You live too far away, but I could teach you as I taught your Uncle Mimoun. I still have some syringes that I stole from the Spanish army, and, if you wish, you could buy a few.' This turned out to be more complicated than I had anticipated, but I agreed to pay and be taught.

Mr Yamani arrived at our house the following morning at eleven and I received him like a king. I took care of his mule, which was black, beautiful and showed all the energy of youth. I tied it to a carob tree and provided it with a cauldron of water and a bowl of barley.

After a big meal of chicken
tagine
and tea, I asked Mr Yamani to see my mother in her room. Ready, he pulled out a small pan, filled it with alcohol, threw all his tools in it and lit the fire. After all the liquid was evaporated, he picked everything up with a flimsy tong and gave my mother an injection. He expected me to remember and do as he had done.

I tried to remember visually every movement of his hand, but I couldn't shake off the memory of Uncle Mimoun who had killed his son, Mohamed.

‘It's time for my injection,' shouted my mother the following morning.

Remembering Mr Yamini's lesson, I gave my mother an injection. Despite two injections per day for two weeks, my mother showed no progress. If anything, she was worse, but for my sisters, life went on as if she weren't ill.

Sanaa and Rabbia mounted the family donkey and, like two idiots, headed to see Thamrabt, a powerful witch, who refused no one. Sanaa recounted the visit, her eyes shining with enthusiasm.

Sanaa and Rabbia sat quietly side by side, and Thamrabt sat cross-legged, facing them, a long, narrow table between them. On the table was a clear glass of water. Thamrabt's head was covered with a loose, white silk scarf. Underneath it, her black hair shone like a wet raven's feathers. Her hands were busy counting a string of ninety-nine beads. The room was exceptionally big, with windows on each side and a door at each end, one leading into the garden and the other into the house. At odds with local custom, the walls were completely bare, with no mirrors, pictures or wardrobe; it was like a mosque. The floor was tiled, with a Persian rug in the middle of it.

Thamrabt didn't ask Sanaa or Rabbia their names or even what their problems were. ‘I will share this glass of water with you,' she told them. She stretched her long, left hand, lifted the glass of water and passed it to Sanaa, who happened to be sitting across to her right. ‘Take a sip,' she said.

Sanaa sipped several times and felt nothing. She put the glass back on the table. Thamrabt picked up the glass and sipped from it. Immediately, she yelled, put her left hand behind her back and shouted, ‘My back hurts me!' At the same time, Sanaa felt a burning heat, like fire, passing through her bones.

Hearing Thamrabt's words, Sanaa exploded in tears. Thamrabt handed her a small bottle of dark brown water to sip when she felt depressed. ‘This is all I am allowed to give you now.'

Thamrabt picked up the same glass and handed it to Rabbia. ‘Have a sip,' she said.

Rabbia did as Sanaa had. She put the glass back, and Thamrabt picked it up and finished the rest of it. Rabbia felt nothing, nor did Thamrabt for a while.

After a threatening silence, Thamrabt lifted her eyes, looked at Rabbia, smirked peevishly and cried, ‘Rabbia! Rabbia! You want my soul! For the life of me, as long as I live, you will not get it! Get out! Get out of my house!'

After the visit to Thamrabt, Rabbia sank into depression and left me alone to wash and care for our mother. In this climate of poverty and despair and unable to work our land, I resorted to a cursed and primitive practice called ‘temporary swap', where the landlord passed the land to the user, and the user paid a fixed amount to the landlord. Until the landlord paid back the exact amount, the land was in the user's hand. If after a certain number of years passed and the landlord hadn't repaid the money, the swap became a sale. I swapped two fields with Mr Mashtro in the presence of three witnesses, members of the bingo club. With the swap, my mother got some money to bridge the winter, if she survived.

Thinking she would not recover, my mother became obsessed with her mortality and embarked on finding husbands for Rabbia and Amina. For me, she wanted her niece, Samira, a beautiful girl of medium height with big, brown eyes, a straight nose, and olive skin. She was good-tempered, kind and had a soft voice.

My mother spoke to my ear, but not to my mind. She had no clue how life was in school, and Samira was not in my heart. My mother wanted me to settle close by, but she didn't realise how unhappy that would make me.