The Beggar, the Thief and the Dogs, Autumn Quail (10 page)

           

W
hen your heart achieves its desire, you will have transcended the confines of time and space. But you still feel oppressed in this cottage, in the midst of a grassy lawn surrounded by a fence lined with cypress trees. And you await the day when the cypresses and all they enclose will disappear, the day when the plants will no longer whisper of the night's sorrows, the day when the scuttling of the cockroaches and the croaking of the frogs will fall silent, the day when memory will lose its tyranny and you'll merge into nothingness. Then the chants of India and Persia will no longer echo and the rosy beams of ecstasy will fall directly upon you. That precious, hard-won ecstasy of dawn will draw you with all the force of the unknown into heaven's dome, where your heart will awake while the bodily senses sleep.

Buthayna stood in front of him, like a graceful cypress, and turned her green eyes to the garden, to the canal running between the acacia trees, and to the fields stretching beyond. “For the sake of this?” she asked reproachfully.

Affected by her presence, you stroked the wavy locks of her hair and murmured, “For the sake of nothingness.”

“Aren't you afraid of loneliness in this empty place?”

You whispered in her ear, “I was oppressed by loneliness in the midst of the crowds.”

She retreated a step. “Yesterday, Othman said…”

He interrupted her gently. “My girl, haven't you realized yet that I'm deaf?”

She left the garden through the wooden gate in the ivy-covered fence and vanished from sight. I sighed wearily and opened my eyes to the dark. This dream could only mean that I've not yet escaped the call of life. However often I think of you during my waking hours, these weird fantasies mock my sleep.

Mustapha embraced you affectionately and then peered sadly into your eyes. You noticed that on his bald pate there now grew a heavy black shank of hair and couldn't help remarking, “Congratulations. How did you manage to grow it?”

He answered with unaccustomed seriousness. “I recited the ‘All-Merciful Sura' at dawn.”

You were astonished. “When did you find your way to God?”

“When you departed from the world for this place.”

“Why did you come?”

“To tell you that Zeinab is working with the energy of ten men.”

“God help her!”

He looked around at the house, the garden, and the fields. “What an ideal love nest or artist's retreat this place is!”

Nonplussed, you said, “So you're still the jester!”

He sighed. “For us children of the Stone Age, jesting is the only recourse, but I see you've become infatuated with despair.”

I backed off, saying, “Haven't you realized that my senses are dead?”

He shrugged his shoulders and climbed up a cypress tree until he'd overtaken the current moon high above the horizon. His bald head glimmering in the moonlight, he shook a bell in his hand, and as it rang, insects of all sorts came to the tree and proceeded to dance in a circle around it.

I sighed wearily and opened my eyes to the dark. This dream could only mean that I've not yet escaped the call of life. However often I think of you during my waking hours, these weird fantasies mock my sleep.

Yesterday as I was roaming around the garden, reciting the poetry of Majnun, I suddenly heard a gruff voice coming from behind the northern wall where the canal runs.

“Hey, man, where's the door?”

Peering over, I saw Othman perched on a motorcycle. Little flags, the sort used by people of the village for decoration on feast days, embellished the handlebars and wheels.

“Don't come in,” I said peremptorily.

“Haven't you witnessed the miracle?” he exclaimed. “I've crossed the surface of the canal by motorcycle.”

“I don't believe in miracles.”

He laughed loudly. “But we live in an age of miracles.”

I retreated a step. “What do you want?”

He said augustly, “I've come as the family delegate.”

“I have no family.”

“Don't you know of the miracle? New branches of your family have appeared on all five continents. Wouldn't you like to return to that remarkable mixture of platinum and coal?”

I defied him. “Aren't you aware that our real family is nothingness?”

“I'm going to chase you with a pack of trained dogs,” he said menacingly.

As the motorcycle roared and the dogs yelped, I sighed wearily and opened my eyes to the darkness. This dream could only mean that I've not yet escaped. However often I think of you during my waking hours, these weird fantasies mock…

I stayed up all night in the garden, alone in the darkness with the stars shining overhead in the dome. I asked them when my desires would be fulfilled, and shouting so that the atoms of the cypress tree shook, reprimanded both everything and nothingness.

“I want to see,” I said, gazing at one of the stars.

“Then look,” it whispered.

I looked and found only emptiness. This is not the vision I've yearned to see.

“Look,” it whispered.

The darkness lifted from the figure of a naked man. He was savage in appearance with shoulder-length hair and held a stone club in readiness to fight. Suddenly a wild beast sprang upon him. It was an unrecognizable species; though it resembled a crocodile, it stood on four legs and had the face of a bull. A bloody battle ensued between them, but in the end the beast was vanquished and the man staggered away. Blood splotched his face and chest
and flowed from his arms, yet pain did not prevent him from smiling.

But this is not the image I've yearned to see, as you well know.

“Look,” it whispered.

The darkness faded, revealing an open space in the forest at the bottom of a mountain. Mountain men armed with stones rushed into the clearing and were opposed by men of the forest, equally fierce, equally ready for the kill. They fought ferociously. The flowing blood and frenzied screams so frightened the wild animals that they fled for refuge in the canals, in the treetops, and up the mountains. Eventually the forest men were routed, killed, or taken prisoner, and the mountain men made merry.

Nor is this the image I've yearned to see.

“Look,” it whispered.

I saw nothing at first, but then a sudden surge of happiness filled my heart, a sudden sense of victory. I remembered the glowing sensation which preceded the other revelation, that dawn in the desert, and I was sure that ecstasy was approaching, and that the bridegroom's face would break forth as the music played. The darkness lifted from a scene which gradually became clearer and more distinct and my heart throbbed as it never had before. I saw a bouquet, not of roses, but of human faces, and I was stunned when I recognized them—the faces of Zeinab, Buthayna, Samir, Jamila, Othman, Mustapha, and Warda. Suddenly my fervor abated and I felt bitter disappointment in its place. This is not the vision I've yearned to see. You know that very well. Where is it, where is it? But the vision held fast and only grew sharper with time. Then the figures played tricks. Zeinab and Warda exchanged heads. Othman had Mustapha's bald pate, while Mustapha looked at
me with Othman's eyes. All at once Samir slid to the ground, and putting on Othman's head in place of his own, started crawling toward me. Frightened, I tried to escape this hybrid of Samir and Othman, but the faster I ran, the faster he pursued me. I jumped over the garden fence, but like a cricket, he cleared it with a hop. I ran alongside the canal, but like a stubborn bull, he followed in my tracks. Out of breath, my muscles aching with fatigue, and my head in a spin, I collapsed to the ground, and as I lay face down on the damp grass, I heard the feet of the creature coming closer and closer.

The devil has played havoc with the dream. Ecstasy has become a curse, and paradise a stage for fools. I lay there submissively, no longer trying to resist, then raised my head slightly to look around. A willow recited a line of poetry, a cow approached and stated she was giving up the milk business in order to study chemistry, a spotted snake crept forward, darted out his poisonous fang, then proceeded to dance merrily. A fox stood upright, guarding the chickens, a choir of beetles sang an angelic hymn, and a scorpion confronted me, wearing a nurse's uniform.

I sighed wearily and opened my eyes to the darkness. This dream could only mean that…However often I think of you during my waking hours…

           

I
lay on the grass, gazing up at the trees which swayed in the darkness, and resolved to wait as long as necessary. Suddenly I heard steps approach and a voice whisper, “Good evening, Omar.”

A ghost loomed up beside me. Another dream, and yet I fail to perceive anything.

“I'd almost lost hope of finding you. Why are you lying here? Aren't you afraid of the damp?”

He sat down on the grass and stretched his hand toward me. I ignored it.

“Haven't you recognized me yet? Have you forgotten my voice?”

I groaned. “When will the devil let me rest in peace?”

“What are you saying, Omar? For God's sake, talk to me, for I'm very upset.”

“Who are you?”

“How strange! I'm Othman Khalil!”

“What do you want?”

“It's Othman, don't you understand? What I should have avoided has happened, and now I'm being chased.”

I felt him with my hand. “But this is not Samir's body. What guise have you come in this time?”

“Samir?…You frighten me!”

“But you won't frighten me. I won't go tearing off like a madman.”

He touched me, “Talk to me, for God's sake, as a friend. Don't make me despair of you!”

“What does that matter?”

“Listen, Omar, I'm in a bad situation. They're looking for me everywhere. If they catch me I'll die.”

“So it's you who's running away this time.”

“I'm going to hide at your place until it's safe to run.”

I asked sadly, “How did the devil know I was here?”

“We've known your whereabouts all along—not a hard thing for a journalist like Mustapha to track down. He often comes around here, asking the peasants who bring your food to keep an eye on you. We didn't want to disturb you.”

I groaned. “It's they who've blocked his face from me.”

“During the past year and a half we haven't once disturbed you.”

“I don't care even if Samir's head has been replaced by yours.”

He sighed sorrowfully. “What's happened to you? No, I refuse to believe that you haven't recognized me yet.”

“You can believe it or not.”

“Pay attention to me, Omar, I have some startling news for you. I've married Buthayna.”

“Let the devil go ahead and play his tricks.”

He stuck his face in front of mine. “In spite of the difference
in age, we got married, for we love one another, and now in her belly a new life throbs, my son, your grandson!”

“As you have been both my son and my enemy!”

“Hasn't this incredible news awakened you?”

“Like the snake who darts out his fang and dances.”

“What a pity!”

“That's what I always say, but no one replies.”

He patted my shoulder. “Come back down to earth. I've escaped just in time. They're combing the place for me now; they've searched your office and may try to implicate you. Go back, clear yourself, and look after your family. They're in great need of you. Buthayna's expecting a child and will never see me again…”

“And I have never seen him.”

“Don't you want to understand?”

“I die a score of deaths every day in order to understand, but still I've not understood.”

“Can't you understand that I'm married to your daughter and that I must hide or else die?”

“Run until you drop from fatigue, then you'll hear the beetles sing.”

“How awful!”

“Yes, it's awful.”

He shook me and said angrily, “Wake up. This is not the time for hallucinations. I must make you understand before I leave.”

“Go. Don't sully the purity of my dreams.”

“How wretched! What have you done to yourself?”

“The devil is giving up on me.”

“You must wake up. Your family is in danger. If suspicion falls on you, they'll be exposed to all sorts of abuse. I
don't fear for myself, I'm resigned to my own downfall, but you must get back to your family.”

“Go back to hell where you belong.”

Exasperated, he shook me once more. “I must run and you must go back.”

“Stay, if you'd care to witness my victory.”

He shook his head sadly. “What a fool you are. You've wasted all your ability searching for something that doesn't exist.”

“When will you realize that you don't exist?”

The man stood up. “I now attest that I've despaired of you, though the word ‘despair' has been eliminated from my dictionary.”

“There, the devil has given up…”

The specter retreated into the darkness, saying sadly, “Farewell, old comrade-in-arms.”

The night was still once more, but suddenly the moon returned. “They've come. God knows how they found me so soon.”

He ran through the garden toward the western wall, but soon fell back, shouting frantically, “I'm surrounded.”

He ran to the cottage while I gazed up at the stars. But my peace was disturbed by a voice which shouted, “Give yourself up, Othman Khalil. Give up. You're surrounded on all sides.”

There was no answer. I turned my eyes in the direction of the voice, but saw nothing in the darkness. “The devil persists in playing tricks, but I'm not surrounded. On the contrary, I'm free.”

Voices came from all around the fence and gradually drew closer. One of them barked out, “Resistance is useless, meaningless.”

The man in hiding didn't answer.

“There's meaning in everything,” I murmured.

Suddenly the beam of a searchlight flooded the house with light. A noose was tightening around the place. “Give up, Othman,” the voice shouted. “Come on out with your hands up.”

“When will these infernal voices leave me alone?” I sighed.

But the dreadful voice persisted. “Don't you see that resistance is futile?”

“Nothing in this world is futile,” I whispered.

The running footsteps and yelling voices went around to the back of the house. A specter lunged out onto the front porch, then screamed.

“It's over, he's been caught…it's all over.”

I whispered, “Nothing has an end.”

Other specters now ran from the garden toward the house. One of them tripped over my leg and shouted as he fell, “Watch out! There are others.”

A shot rang out and I moaned. It felt like a real pain rather than a dream confounded by the devil.

I sighed wearily and opened my eyes. This dream could only mean that I've not yet escaped. Why is it I think of you whenever I'm awake, yet these delusions mock my sleep? But wait. Where am I? Where are the stars, the grass, and the cypress trees? I'm riding in a car, lying on a stretcher, on the edge of which a man is perched. On the other side of the car, Othman sits in silence between two men. I must still be dreaming, but the pain in my shoulder causes me to moan.

“The bullet fractured his collarbone, but it's only a superficial wound. He's in no danger.”

What is the meaning of this dream, where is it taking
me? When will the pain in my shoulder ease up? When will the devil and his follies be put to flight? When will the world disappear from my dreams? I moaned in spite of myself.

“Be patient a little longer,” a voice said.

I answered defiantly, “Disappear, so I can see the stars.”

“You're going to be all right.”

I said stubbornly, “I'll be all right when I succeed in vanquishing you.”

“Calm down. The doctor will see you right away.”

“I don't need anyone.”

“Don't tire yourself by talking.”

I said insistently, “The willow tree talks, snakes dance, and beetles sing.”

He went on talking to himself in a low voice. He shut his eyes, but the pain persisted. When would he see the vision? Hadn't he deserted the world for its sake?

He had the feeling that his heart was beating in reality, not in a dream, and that he was returning to the world.

He found himself trying to remember a line of poetry. When had he read it? Who was the poet?

The line reverberated in his consciousness with a strange clarity: “
If you really wanted me, why did you desert me?”

Translated from the Arabic by Kristin Walker Henry and Nariman Khales Naili al-Warraki
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