Throwing Sparks (9 page)

Issa decided there and then to run off and hide on the islet called Umm al-Qumari.

He was hurrying down the street when he heard his father roar, ‘Don’t you dare run away!’

Issa spun around and stepped back instinctively. ‘You’re going to hit me,’ he said with alarm.

‘No, I am not going to hit you,’ replied Abu Issa sternly. ‘But I am going to punish you.’

‘Punish me?’

‘That’s right. I’ve sworn that your grandmother will be going on the Hajj riding on your back.’

‘And you think I’m crazy enough to let your fat mother go to the Hajj on my back?’

‘Shame on you,’ his father shouted. ‘Don’t you dare talk like that about your grandmother.’

‘Yes, she’s my grandmother. So I’m supposed to carry her and break my back?’ Issa stood a safe distance away even though he knew he could easily outrun his father. ‘If you’re so concerned about your mother going on the Hajj,’ he added, ‘why don’t you carry her on
your
back?’ His legs were ready for flight and he glanced around quickly to stake out the best escape route.

‘Where’s the money you stole?’

‘You already know I bought a donkey with it.’

‘Why bother when you’re already such an ass?’

‘Yeah, and another ass sold the donkey for less than it was worth, huh!’

At this brazen rejoinder, Abu Issa could no longer contain himself and he lunged at his son, who dodged and jumped up on to a wall by a neighbour’s house. From his perch, Issa decided to change tactic and apologise.

But his father was too angry to listen to Issa’s pleas. ‘By God,’ he fumed, ‘I’ll see your grandmother make the Hajj on that back of yours if it kills me!’

At this point, Issa was also playing to an audience, pleading for mercy in the hope of drumming up sympathy from the crowd that had gathered. ‘
Ya
Sheikh
,’ he begged, choosing the term of respect like a dutiful son. ‘Have some pity. It would kill
me
. My grandmother is heavy enough to break a camel’s back!’

Abu Issa was not amused. He ordered his son to come down off the wall and when he failed to comply, he reached down to pick up some stones which he threw at his boy.

Issa hopped down to the other side of the wall and disappeared.

Abu Issa returned home, his blood boiling, swearing that he would show the boy what was what as soon as he could lay his hands on him.

Umm Issa was annoyed with her husband. ‘You won’t be satisfied until we lose him, will you?’ she asked accusingly.

Issa was gone for two days and three nights, hiding out – he claimed – in one of the islet’s crevices and setting in motion a chain of events that would determine all our destinies.

Finally, driven by thirst and hunger, he swam ashore and, standing dripping wet before his family, he said to his father, ‘I’ll carry your mother to the Hajj for the next two years.’

‘Son of a gun!’ exclaimed Abu Issa, desperately relieved to see his son. But he had to show his displeasure, so he added, ‘Where’ve you been hiding?’

‘I was waiting,’ replied Issa. ‘I waited for Grandma, but she never showed up.’

At this, the grandmother burst out laughing and Issa bent over and told her to climb on. ‘Hurry up now, Grandma, your donkey is waiting.’

She pounded her hands on his back, overcome with mirth. She was as amused by the thought of riding her grandson to the holy sites as by the idea of going on the Hajj in the wrong month. ‘Do you honestly expect me to go on the Hajj in
Sha’aban
, you dolt?’        

‘Who cares about the month?’ Abu Issa said seriously. ‘What’s important is that I keep my word.’

The grandmother said nothing and Issa stayed bent in half.

‘Just hop on his back and he’ll take you to the end of the street and back.’

Since she hesitated, Issa took the initiative, darting in between her legs and hoisting her up on to his shoulders, which almost caused her to fall flat on her face.

Abu Issa rushed to steady her and then, grabbing a thick cane, he set about thrashing his son.

The boy screamed and hollered.        

Salwa, Issa’s aunt and suckling sister, burst into tears and added her voice to his, crying for someone to come and save Issa from the caning that had already lacerated his back.

No one in the neighbourhood could believe that Issa had spent three days hiding in the crevices of the islets slumbering on the surface of the sea. But from then on, the crevices became our refuge, a secret place of solace and comfort. We would sneak into them, too old now to be scared by fishermen’s tales or to listen to our mothers’ dire warnings. Our mothers held that the crevices sheltered only wayward and rebellious spirits, the unfortunate souls destined to endure the miseries and agonies of both this world and the next. With every passing day, we – the neighbourhood ruffians – sneaked into those crevices in growing numbers.

*  *  *

The largest of the islets, Umm al-Qumari, was the first to fall victim to the Palace’s need for ever more space to expand its dominion. After it was reclaimed as a marina, it became the anchorage of
The Dazzling Beauty,
the most luxurious of the yachts anchored there by Jeddah’s business elite. From the marina, yacht owners ran regattas, threw raucous parties and set off fireworks. To the oldest residents of the Firepit, Umm al-Qumari remained a landmark, the springboard from which their most rebellious children had learned to jump.

Piloted by Sheikh Omar,
The Dazzling Beauty
set out on its excursion two hours later than scheduled. The guests were unable to disembark or even change places during that time for fear of provoking the organisers, and everyone now knew better than to ask the ship’s captain the reason for the delay.

The Master had appeared at the appointed departure time, only to retreat to his cabin where he could unleash his fury, unobserved.

I was at the receiving end of his profanities over the interphone.

‘Where is Maram?’ he barked irately.

The fact that I did not know did not stem the tidal wave of obscenities.

‘I’ll fix you later, and
then
you’ll be sure to know how to do your job.’

A good many phone calls had to be made before Maram finally emerged from the Palace and, as soon as she stepped on board, the Master dashed over, grabbed her hand and led her directly to his cabin. Despite speaking in hushed tones, his features clearly revealed the extent of his exasperation at the wait he had endured.

Only Maram could still ignite such passion in his otherwise cold and lifeless body.

She was his dazzling beauty.

Until her arrival at the Palace, the Master would spend every night in the company of a different girl.

All that changed with Maram. After just one night in her company at the last New Year’s Eve party, he could no longer bear to carouse if Maram was not there with him, at the centre of the gathering.

Before her, he had spent New Year’s Eve in Geneva or Madrid or on the French Riviera, but after meeting Maram he lost all interest in travelling to distant places. Now, wherever he went, she had to go, too.

Until Maram stepped into the Master’s life, he had needed a steady supply of new girls, deploying teams of scouts across the city to pimp for him. At the head of each team there was always an achingly handsome young man who sweet-talked nubile girls with amorous banter.

The love games were practised with an old whore who had been the Master’s lover when he was young. Having grown bored of her, both in body and spirit, she was nonetheless able to strike a deal whereby he promised not to discard her if she, in return, kept him supplied with young women to invigorate his jaded appetites. She spent her last years catering to his whims and dedicated herself untiringly to procuring all kinds of girls, whether she knew them personally or not.

The Palace staff never used her real name and only referred to her as ‘Madame’. When it became my job to hand out payments to the young women who were in charge of the entertainment at the parties, I’d try and spot Madame among the women parading themselves before the revellers.

Before the teams of young pimps were deployed through the souks of the city, it had been her job to scout for girls. She would go out every night accompanied by two black women who walked behind her and referred to her as the
Sheikha
, implying noble lineage.

She spoke little and with a mere gesture could convey to her assistants when her observation should be interpreted as a command. Her bearing was such that people did her bidding unquestioningly. At every stop they made through the souks, people whispered with excitement, ‘The
Sheikha
is coming’ or ‘The
Sheikha
is leaving.’

She made the rounds in places known to throng with young women such as weddings and malls, and enticed them with descriptions of fairytale nights at the Palace where they would be safe from scrutiny or detention by the ubiquitous religious police – the roving squads from the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice.

For a while I even entertained the thought that Madame might be none other than Tahani. I was haunted by Tahani’s words to me those years ago: ‘I’ll never leave you. Wherever you go, I’ll be there.’ I became obsessed with meeting Madame.

In all, there were three women who were involved with procuring a steady supply of nubile young women to Palace parties; they also trained the young men in the best approaches to lure girls and ensnare the more difficult ones.

Osama was trained by a woman who had worked Beirut’s nightclub scene until the Israeli siege of the city in 1982, when the Master extended her indefinite hospitality at the Palace. Cosseted in luxury and accolades, she groomed Osama in the arcane art of luring women. He became very successful and always came back from his forays with freshly caught game still rosy with life.

Osama had reeled Maram, the dazzling beauty, into the Palace, like countless women before her and since. He had set his sights on her but had not imagined the Master would be so captivated by her good looks that he would be unable to let go. It was not the first time a woman had entranced the Master, and those who knew him well had believed Maram would go the way of all the others – seduced one day, discarded the next. They were totally confounded when Maram breathed new life into him.        

From the minute I first laid eyes on her, I too was bewitched.

5

Issa escaped from the Firepit and only returned to smuggle the rest of us into Paradise. I was among the first victims of this human trafficking.

Bound together by a miserable childhood, Issa, Osama and I were foul-mouthed children. For those we regarded as opponents, no obscenity or profanity was too vile or hurtful, no sarcasm too biting. The neighbourhood folk avoided us and then shunned us altogether. Although we came from decent families, we were regarded as deviants who had strayed so far from the norms of decency that we had become unredeemable.

Osama’s father, Muhammad al-Bushri, periodically left his family to pursue his livelihood as a pilgrimage guide – a
mutawwaf –
in Mecca. Whether for the Hajj or the lesser pilgrimage, the Umrah, he welcomed the pilgrims at Bab Ismail, accompanied them on their seven circumambulations of the Kaaba, and was grateful for whatever munificence they bestowed on him. In the evenings, he repaired to a café inside a small souk and quickly went to sleep so as to be up bright and early to welcome the pilgrims after dawn prayers and get a head start on earning his living.

Muhammad had grown accustomed to being away from his family, disappearing for a week and sometimes two weeks at a time. When he came home, he would soak his swollen feet in warm saltwater and his wife would massage his feet and relieve him of the discomfort from the long hours he spent on them. He would fall asleep groaning with relief. In fact, when Osama’s father was home, he spent most of his time lying in bed to rest and recuperate.

It was on one such trip to Mecca that Muhammad lost his life to a random bullet in the courtyard of the Kaaba. A self-proclaimed Mahdi and his band of heavily armed men chose the dawn of a new century in the Islamic calendar – 1
Muharram
1400 AH – to take control of the entire site, and Muhammad al-Bushri was one of the many victims to fall that day. His was killed trying to escape from the holy sanctuary after refusing to pledge allegiance to the Mahdi, who would meet his own death three days later.

Muhammad’s family received no compensation or blood money for his death, so Osama’s only inheritance was the
ihram
clothing
his father had worn to perform the circumambulations and a few religious books. Among these was a book of prayers that Muhammad had known by heart and that his son could not even begin to decipher.

Osama’s mother had wanted her son to inherit the mantle of pilgrimage guide. But her wish was never realised because the senior
mutawwafs
ranged themselves against Osama on the grounds that he was too young, wayward and unruly. While his forehead bore the black mark from frequent prostration, they felt his conduct had not exhibited the requisite reverence for such a holy place.