The Swallows of Kabul (4 page)

Though scandalized, Mirza restrains himself and tries to go easy on this misguided friend of his childhood. “My poor Atiq, I live with four women. I married the first one twenty-five years ago, and the last one nine months ago. I feel nothing but suspicion for the lot of them, because I have never for a single moment had the impression that I understood anything at all about the way things work in their heads. I’m convinced that I’ll never fully grasp how women think. It’s as though their thought processes move counterclockwise. Whether you live one year or a century with a concubine, a mother, or your own daughter, you’ll always feel that there’s a gap somewhere, like an insidious ditch gradually cutting you off in order to expose you better to the hazards of your inattention. These creatures are intrinsically hypocritical and fundamentally unpredictable, and the more you think you’re going to tame them, the less chance you have of breaking their evil spell. You can warm a viper in your bosom, but that won’t make you immune to its poison. As to the number of years, however high, it can bring no peace to a household where the love of woman betrays the weakness of man.”

“It’s not a question of love.”

“In that case, what are you waiting for? Kick her out. Divorce her and get yourself a strong, healthy virgin who knows how to shut up and serve her master without making any noise. I don’t want to see you talking to yourself like a mental patient again, not in the street, and especially not on account of a woman. That would be an offense against God and His prophet.”

Mirza abruptly falls silent. A young man with a faraway look and bloodless lips has just stopped beside the door of the little shop. He’s tall, and thin patches of boyishly wispy beard adorn his handsome, youthful face. His hair, long and straight, falls to his shoulders, which are as narrow and fine-boned as a young girl’s.

Mirza reaches over and shakes him. “What do you want?”

Attempting to concentrate, the young man brings his fingers to his temples in a gesture that further irritates Mirza. “Make up your mind. Step inside or go away. Can’t you see we’re talking here?”

Mohsen Ramat notices that the two individuals have whips in their hands and are preparing to lash him across the face. Walking backward and apologizing effusively, he moves away toward the tent encampment.

“Can you believe it?” Mirza asks indignantly. “Some people have no manners whatsoever.”

Atiq shakes his head and mutters something. The intrusion has just brought some clarity to his thoughts. Now he’s aware of how indecent such confidences as this are, and he’s cross with himself for having been unable to resist the morbid compulsion to display his dirty linen on the sidewalk in front of a café. An embarrassed silence descends upon him and his childhood friend. They dare not even look at each other. One of them falls to contemplating the lines in his hands; the other pretends to be looking for the owner of the shop.

T hree

MOHSEN RAMAT pushes open the door of his house with an uncertain hand. He hasn’t eaten anything since this morning, and his ramblings have worn him out. In the shops, in the market, in the square, wherever he ventured, the immense weariness that he drags around like a convict’s ball and chain caught up with him immediately. His only friend and confidant died of dysentery last year, and Mohsen’s had a hard time finding anyone to take his place. It’s difficult for a person to live with his own shadow. Fear has become the most effective form of vigilance. These days, everyone’s touchier than ever before, a remark made in confidence can easily be misinterpreted, and the Taliban are indisposed to pardon careless tongues. Since people have nothing but misfortunes to share, everyone prefers to nibble at his disappointments in his own corner and thus avoid burdening himself with other people’s problems. In Kabul, where pleasure has been ranked among the deadly sins, seeking any sort of solace from anyone not closely connected to you has become an exercise in futility. What lasting solace could one hope to obtain in a chaotic world bled white by a series of uncommonly violent wars, deserted by its patron saints, and given over to the executioners and the crows, in a world the most fervent prayers cannot bring to its senses?

In the room, apart from a large woven mat doing service as a rug, two ample, aging, burst ottomans, and a worm-eaten lectern that holds the book of Readings, nothing remains. Mohsen has sold all his furniture, piece by piece, to survive the various shortages. The windows in his darkened house are blocked up. Every time a Taliban passed in the street, he would order Mohsen to repair the broken panes without delay, along with the rickety shutters, lest the glimpse of a woman’s unveiled face offend some unsuspecting passerby. Since Mohsen couldn’t afford these improvements, he covered the windows with canvas curtains, and now the sun no longer visits him at home.

He leaves his shoes on the little flight of steps and collapses on one of the ottomans. A woman’s voice from behind a curtain at the end of the hall asks, “Can I bring you something to eat?”

“I’m not hungry.”

“Perhaps a little water?”

“If it’s cold, I won’t say no.”

Tinkling sounds come from the next room; then the curtain is drawn aside, revealing a woman beautiful as the dawn. She places a small carafe in front of Mohsen and sits down on the other ottoman, facing him. Mohsen smiles. He always smiles when his wife shows herself to him. She is sublime, her freshness never fades. Despite the rigors of her daily life, despite her mourning for her city, which has been turned over to the obsessions and follies of men, not a single wrinkle marks Zunaira’s face. It’s true that her cheeks have lost their former translucence and the sound of her laughter is seldom heard, but her enormous eyes, as brilliant as emeralds, have kept their magic intact.

Mohsen brings the little carafe to his lips.

His wife waits until he finishes drinking, then clears the carafe away. “You seem exhausted,” she says.

“I walked a lot today. My feet are on fire.”

Zunaira brushes her husband’s toes with her fingertips, then begins gently massaging his feet. Mohsen leans back on his elbows, abandoning himself to his wife’s delicate touch.

“I waited for you at lunch,” she says.

“I forgot.”

“You forgot?”

“I don’t know what came over me today. I’ve never had this feeling before, not even when we lost our house. It was as though I’d passed out, yet I was still wandering around, groping my way along. I couldn’t recognize any of the streets I was on. I walked up and down them, but it seemed that I wasn’t able to cross them. It was truly strange. I was in a kind of fog. I couldn’t remember the way to where I was going, and I didn’t know where I wanted to go.”

“You must have been in the sun too long.”

“No, it wasn’t sunstroke.”

Suddenly, he reaches for his wife’s hand, compelling her to stop the massage. Bemused by the desperate force of the grip on her wrist, Zunaira lifts her bright eyes and looks him in the face.

Mohsen hesitates a moment, then asks in a toneless voice, “Have I changed?”

“Why are you asking me that?”

“I’m asking you if I’ve changed.”

Zunaira furrows her splendid brow and reflects. “I don’t understand what it is you want me to talk about.”

“About me—what else? Am I still the same man, the one you preferred over all others? Have I kept the same habits, the same ways? Do you think my reactions are normal? Do I treat you with the same affection?”

“It’s certainly true that many things around us have changed. Our house was bombed. Our relatives and friends aren’t here anymore—some of them have even left this world. You’ve lost your business. My career has been taken away from me. We don’t have enough to eat anymore, and we’ve stopped making plans for the future. But we’re together, Mohsen. For us, that’s what has to count. We’re together so that we can support each other. It’s up to us, to us alone, to keep hope alive. One day, God will remember us. He’ll see that the horrors we’re subjected to every day haven’t diminished our faith, that we haven’t failed in our duty, that we deserve His mercy.”

Mohsen releases his wife’s wrist and runs his fingers along her cheekbone. It’s an affectionate gesture, and she leans into his caress.

“You’re the only sun I have left, Zunaira. Without you, my night would be darker than the deepest darkness and colder than the grave. But, for the love of God, if you find that I’m changing toward you, if I’m becoming mean or unjust, please tell me. I feel that things are escaping me, I don’t think I’m in control of myself anymore. If I’m going crazy, help me to be aware of it. I’m willing to fail everyone else’s expectations, but I can’t let myself do you any harm, not even inadvertently.”

Zunaira clearly senses the depth of her husband’s distress. To prove to him that he’s done nothing wrong in her eyes, she rests her cheek against his diffident palm. “We’re living through some difficult times, my dear. We moan and groan so much, we’ve lost the idea of tranquillity. When there’s a lull all of a sudden, it terrifies us, and we grow suspicious of things that pose no threat.”

Mohsen gently withdraws his fingers from under his wife’s cheek. His eyes mist over; he has to stare at the ceiling and struggle mightily to contain his emotion. His Adam’s apple panics inside his skinny throat. So great is his remorse that a trembling begins in his cheekbones and spreads out in waves, all the way to his lips and his chin. “I did something unthinkable this morning,” he declares.

Zunaira freezes, alarmed by the trouble she sees in his eyes. She tries to take his hands; he holds them up in front of his chest like a man warding off an attack.

“I can’t believe it,” he mutters. “How did it happen? How could I?”

More and more intrigued, Zunaira sits up straight. Mohsen starts panting. His chest rises and falls at a frightening rate. Though the words horrify him, he tells his tale: “A prostitute was stoned in the square. I don’t know how, but I joined the crowd of degenerates who were clamoring for her blood. It was as though I’d been taken up by a whirlwind. I, too, wanted to be in a good position to watch the impure beast perish! And when the rain of stones began to overwhelm the demon, I found myself picking up rocks—me, too—and pelting her with them. I must have gone mad, Zunaira. How could I dare do such a thing? All my life, I’ve thought of myself as a conscientious objector. Some people made threats and other people made promises, but none of them ever persuaded me to pick up a weapon and kill another person. I agreed to have enemies, but I couldn’t bear being the enemy of anyone else, no matter who. And this morning, Zunaira, just because the crowd was shouting, I shouted with it, and just because it demanded blood, I called out for blood, too. Since then, I can’t stop looking at my hands, and I don’t recognize them anymore. I walked along the streets, trying to shake off my shadow, trying to put some distance between me and what I’d done, and at every corner, at every pile of rubble, I came face-to-face with that moment of . . . of confusion. I’m afraid of myself, Zunaira. I don’t have any more confidence in the man I’ve become.”

Zunaira is petrified by her husband’s story. Mohsen is not the type to bare his soul. He rarely speaks about his tribulations and almost never lets his emotions show, but a little while ago, when she detected that great pain deep inside his pupils, she knew he couldn’t keep it to himself. She was braced for trouble of this kind, though not of this magnitude.

Her face pales, and for the first time her eyes, as they grow wider, lose most of their brilliance. “You stoned a woman?”

“I even think I hit her on the head.”

“Mohsen, come on, you couldn’t have done such a thing. That’s not your way—you’re an educated man.”

“I don’t know what came over me. It happened so fast. It was as if the crowd put a spell on me. I don’t recall gathering up the stones. I only remember that I couldn’t get rid of them, and an irresistible rage seemed to come into my arm. . . . What frightens me and saddens me at the same time is that I didn’t even try to resist.”

Zunaira stands up like one who has been knocked flat but then rises again to her feet. Weakly. Incredulous, but without anger. Her lips, which a moment ago were lush and full, have dried up. She feels around for support, finds only the end of a horizontal beam that juts out from the wall, and holds on tight. For a long time, she remains still, waiting to regain her senses, but in vain. Mohsen tries to take her hand again; she eludes him and staggers toward the kitchen amid the gentle rustling of her dress. The instant she disappears behind the curtain, Mohsen understands that he should not have confided to his wife what he refuses to admit to himself.