Requiem (19 page)

I did not go
back to sleep. I drank some water and sat outside the cave on my prayer mat. I
closed my eyes, sealed my lips and repeated the name silently to myself, with
my tongue pressed to the roof of my mouth. On the stroke of noon I reached the
count of 137,612. I had but to pronounce the name one more time. But I was
terrified. Never without my teacher had I summoned the
djinn
.
Would I be able to control it? Would I be able to bind it? My tongue stuck
to the roof of my mouth, and my mind refused to repeat the terrible name for
the 137,613th time.

I was paralysed.
I felt the sun's heat on my brow. The planet missed a beat somewhere. Sweat
drained from me. I felt something out there, waiting with terrible, awesome
patience. Then at last I spoke its name for the last time, and I opened my
eyes.

Nothing.

There was
nothing. No falling dust. No desert singing. Only the sun, like a blast-furnace
in the sky. I waited for half an hour, astonished at my own sense of emptiness.
My stomach was like the open plain of the desert.

The ritual had failed.

I got
up, drank some water, ate a piece of seed cake. I felt crushed by the terrible
weight of loneliness. Where was my brother
Mehemet
?
How I missed him now. I felt ashamed that I'd tricked him into leaving me. I
retired to the shade of the cave and lay down, immediately falling into a deep
sleep.

When I
awoke, she was sitting next to me. I woke with a cry on my dry lips. 'Are you
the
djinn
?'
I squealed, scrambling back
from her further into the cave.

'Of
course not.' She laughed. Her eyes were like the eyes of a lioness. Her smile
was like light glittering on a stream. 'Don't you know me? I'm the daughter of
the goat-herd! You asked my father if you could marry me, and he refused. Well,
I left him to come and live here with you. Here I am!'

She was indeed the same
girl who'd made a fever of my imaginings all those months. And she'd grown even
more beautiful. Her hair was as dark as the raven. Her smooth skin was the
colour of sand. I pressed my hands to my face and silently thanked God that she
had been delivered to me.

I
asked the girl her name. She was about to reply when a shadow fell over me.
Something blocked the sun. I looked up, and it was
Mehemet
,
who had returned from his errand. He looked suspicious.

'When
did you come here?' he said, dumping his heavy bags of provisions on the floor.
I could see he thought she'd been with me these three days.

But
the girl leapt to her feet, and kissed him, and called him by his name. 'I've
just arrived,
Mehemet
. To be a companion. To learn
whatever I can from the pair of you. Tell me I can stay here! Please don't send
me away!'

It was
obvious that
Mehemet
, too, was utterly captivated by
the girl. Before he could say anything she was busy unpacking the provisions
and set about cooking a meal.
Mehemet
looked at me
and shrugged. The decision was made.

But
the decision which remained unmade was whether she would choose
Mehemet
or myself. That night she slept a little way off
from both of us. This was completely unlike the situation we'd experienced
before. We could not both have the girl: we knew each other too well and knew
it was impermissible in both our minds. And yet we were equally smitten. No,
sooner or later she would have to choose between us.

We began to compete. We
behaved appallingly with each other. Under the guise of merrymaking, I would
mock
Mehemet
for his squint, and he would berate me
for the largeness of my nose. I would perform tasks to advertise my physical
strength; he responded by straining his sense of humour. A deadly courtship was
being conducted, which neither of us openly acknowledged. She stayed with us
for some weeks, and every day, relentlessly, the skin was tightened across the
drum.

One
night she amazed us by dancing like a dervish. I think I'd always known what
she was, but that night confirmed it. She whirled round and round and the
desert sand followed her turning feet in spirals of smoke. Her skirt flung
outwards higher and higher as she went spinning, exposing the smooth flanks of
her strong, sweat-soaked thighs. I thought the sand would catch fire. Her eyes
were bright, like the shining carapace of a beetle or insect. Lust lifted its
head like a cobra inside my loose pants. I'd never wanted a woman so much in my
life. But there was
Mehemet
, also mesmerized. What
could I do to get him away?

When she
stopped dancing, the desert began ticking. It was the sound of falling dust I'd
heard before. Suddenly I realized that, despite her having lived with us all
these days, we still didn't know her name. She had an amazing ability to
distract us or to make us forget it whenever the question was put.

When
she finished the dance we applauded loudly, and I called her to sit between us.
She was breathless. The human smell of her sweat was maddening. I could scent
her woman smells from between her legs. I was determined at that moment, woman
or
djinn
,
to find out her name. I began
to speak to her in soft tones, stroking her hair and reassuring her, fixing my
eyes on her, until her own eyelids became heavy. She was falling under my
influence, and I was about to ask her to tell me her true name when
Mehemet
broke the moment of trance by calling out a line of
his poetry.

'The veil of
the false self is an earthly darkness; but the veil of the heart is the
radiance of love!'

She started
suddenly and looked up at
Mehemet
. He was on his
feet, standing over us with his fists clenched. The moonlight shone in the
whites of his eyes, and on his teeth, making him seem like a demon. The trance
was broken, and I was furious. What did he mean by barking out this cant?

She
scrambled to her feet, seeming angry that I had almost caught her. Then she
turned to
Mehemet
, gently cupping his cheek in the
palm of her hand. 'But are these your lines,
Mehemet
?
Truly you are a poet. Come and walk with me on the hill, and treat me to more
of your poetry. Ahmed, would you stay here and see that the fire does not go
out?'

She
was telling me I was not wanted. After they had gone I sat in a kind of fever, imagining
them walking together under the brilliant moon as
Mehemet
spouted his appalling, portentous verse. It was no good. I couldn't keep still.
I had to follow them.

I came upon
them resting their backs against a rock. I was able to spy upon them from a
short distance. The moon hung low, smiling upon them like a benevolent mother.
Their arms were entwined. She leaned across to him, and they kissed. And then
again I saw his tongue leap to her mouth and hers to his, even in the darkness,
like copulating serpents, and then their hungry mouths were locked together.

I
gasped. I bit my knuckles in anguish; I beat my head against a rock. I couldn't
bear to watch any more. I scrambled away from the scene, weeping hot, venomous
tears. I went back to the fire and sat before it, shivering in a kind of frost,
unable to get warm. I sat there for a long time.

'You have
let the fire go out.' It was
Mehemet
. He was alone. I
didn't know how much time had passed. It was still night, though the moon
bathed us with its pearly light.

'Where is
she?’ I said.

'Gone to prepare a marriage bed,' he said
simply.

'So at last she's made her choice between
us.'

'Yes. You are not angry?'

I got
up and embraced him, '
Mehemet
, my little brother, who
is dearer to me than everything, how could I be angry with you? She has made
her choice, and in choosing the finer thing she has chosen my brother. It is
God's will. So be it.'

Mehemet
wept with relief and clung to me. He had been afraid that this would destroy
our friendship. He cried uncontrollably, and he praised Allah that he'd been
granted the love of both this woman and his wonderful brother.

I made him
sit down. 'But we have things to do,' I assured him. 'We must rebuild the fire,
and we must arrange a wedding breakfast and prepare the groom for the wedding.
When does she return?'

'At dawn.'

'Then we have much to do.'

I rekindled
the fire and
Mehemet
laid out everything in the cave
for a wedding breakfast. It was an hour before dawn. I helped him to wash and
dress, and then I sat him down at the mouth of the cave.

'Let me make a prayer and a blessing for
you,' I said.

'Will you?'

'I will make
a special prayer. Let us invoke the powers fitting to a groom. We'll make you
worthy. I'll give you the strength of a lion to love her until you're both
exhausted. And the wings of inspirational poetry, that you may whisper rare
words in her ear with every thrust!'

Mehemet
giggled as I drew a
circle around him in the sand. 'For protection,' I said.

I began to
whisper prayers in a soothing, reassuring voice. As I saw
Mehemet's
head begin to nod, I slipped in the key words.
Mehemet
had been my subject for hypnosis on many occasions, and he had allowed me to
plant in his memory certain words to accelerate the process of hypnotism. His
breathing became shallow. Within moments he was entranced. I brought him gently
back to awareness.

'You
are aware, little brother. You can see all around you. Look how the herald of
dawn comes across the mountain top. How beautiful! But you cannot move outside
this circle, not for anything. Even if a lion were to attack you. Indeed you
cannot lift an arm, nor raise an eyebrow, nor twitch a muscle.

'More
important, for the moment, you cannot speak. Not a word, not a single syllable,
not the smallest sound. Not even if an eagle were to swoop on you. Which is all
the better because it means I won't have to listen to your appalling poetry.'

Mehemet's
eyes were now wide
open and regarding me strangely. But he couldn't even blink. Yet in his eyes I
saw the microscopic splash, signalling to me that part of him had detected my
change of tone and was already struggling to escape from the hypnotic command.
In that effort, I knew he would fail.

'Dear
Mehemet
, for some years I have had to tolerate the
gibberish which you have offered as poetry. Enough is enough.-Open your mouth.
Let me see the chief organ of offence.'

He opened
his mouth and slowly thrust out his tongue. His entire body was stiffening in
resistance. His eyes were fighting me.

'My, my. I
see your tongue has turned black with the awfulness of your vile poetry. Let
that be a lesson to you.'

He
gagged slightly, and his tongue flushed from pink to purple to black.

'Put
it away!' I cried. 'It's as vile as the filthy poetry it utters!' His mouth
closed and his teeth bit down hard on the tip of his tongue. 'What a sinful
thing is a tongue,
Mehemet
. People should be more
careful about the things they say and the words they speak. They treat words as
if they were not real things. Yet you and I know they can be sins. Living
sss
ins
, even after they have passed from hearing.
Ssssss
.
Now what is
thi
sss
?
What is
thi
ssss
I hear? How
sss
trange
. It
sssseeemsss
that tongue of yours has become alive in your mouth. A living  
sss
in
!'

Great
blisters of sweat broke on
Mehemet's
forehead. His
eyes rolled in his head as he made a supreme effort to break from his
paralysis. Now I could smell his fear. But something inside his mouth was
writhing and lashing against his cheeks.

'Better let
it out,
Mehemet
, before it turns in on you! Before it
bites!'

He opened
his mouth. I heard him gag. With
mesmeric
slowness,
the black head of a hooded cobra unwound from his mouth, steadily emerging from
between his swollen lips.
Mehemet
was still gagging.
His entire body trembled. The cobra uncoiled from his mouth, swaying gracefully
until at last it dropped to the sand at his feet. It lifted its head and
proceeded to edge towards the circle scratched in the sand. When it reached the
line, it was unable to cross. It hugged the curve of the circle and traced the
full circumference, finally arriving back at its starting point.

'Isn't it
beautiful,
Mehemet
?' I whispered pleasantly. 'Study
its markings. See it glisten. But look how it wants to escape the circle. We
must make it go back where it came from.'

The cobra
slithered across
Mehemet's
foot and along the length
of his thigh, pausing briefly at his groin. It climbed his arm and on to his
shoulder. There it danced, inching towards
Mehemet's
still-open mouth. At last it slipped head-first between his jaws.