The Harafish (2 page)

“And harsher than you think. You don't know the first thing about it,” said Darwish scornfully.

“At least I'll find work and get a living.”

“Your body's the biggest obstacle. You won't find lodgings and no tradesman will take you on. And you're almost twenty. Too old to learn a trade.”

“I've never used my strength to harm anyone.”

Darwish laughed loudly.

“No one will trust you all the same,” he said. “The clan chiefs will see you as a rival, and the merchants as a bandit and a thug.”

Then he added evenly, “You'll starve to death if you don't make use of your strength to survive.”

“As God's my witness,” exclaimed Ashur with passion, “I'll gladly give it in the service of others.”

“If you don't get rid of your stupid notions, it will do you no good at all.”

Ashur gave him a bewildered look, then said, “Let me work as a porter with you.”

“I've never been a porter in my life,” Darwish replied derisively.

“But…”

“Forget it. What did you expect?”

“What is your job then?”

“If you're patient, I'll find you some work. Take it or leave it.”

Sounds of a funeral ceremony could be heard from the graveyard. “Ashes to ashes, dust to dust,” remarked Darwish.

“I'm famished!” said Ashur, losing patience.

Darwish handed him a small coin. “That's the last time I give you charity,” he warned.

Ashur left the house as dusk settled over the graves and the open country. It was a summer's evening and a gentle breeze blew, smelling of damp earth and basil. He went along the path to the little square. He could make out the archway in the darkness and the dim shapes of the mulberry trees over the walls of the monastery gardens. The songs rose into the air, impenetrable as always, and he resolved to lay his cares aside.

“Don't be sad, Ashur,” he told himself. “You have countless brothers in this world.”

The singing echoed in his head:

Ay furughe mahe hosn az ruye rakhahane shoma

Abruye khubi az chahe zanakhdane shoma

7
.

Ashur took deep breaths of the night air. The stars' bright gaze flowed into his heart. His soul soared up to the clear summer sky.
What better night could there be than this to fall to his knees in worship, give voice to hidden desires, call upon loved ones beyond the veil of the unknown?

A shadowy figure stood a few paces from him, clouding his serenity, dragging him back to the world of trouble.

“What are you doing here, master Darwish?” he inquired in his husky voice.

Darwish punched him in the chest.

“Lower your voice, you fool!” he said in an angry whisper.

The two men stood close up against a hedge bordering the graveyard, on the side that overlooked the desert. The hills were far to their right, the graves to their left. There was not a sound, nobody passing by. Even the souls of the dead seemed absent at this hour of the night. Vague notions took on substance in the darkness and became forebodings, and Ashur's heart beat anxiously.

“Tell me what you're up to, for the love of God,” he whispered.

“Wait,” scolded Darwish. “Can't you be patient?”

He leaned toward him and went on, “I'm not asking you to do anything. I'll do it all. Just cover my back if you need to.”

“But I don't know what you're going to do.”

“Shut up. Nobody's forcing you to stay.”

A sound floated up from the desert. The scent of a living creature was carried on the breeze and an old man's voice apparently encouraging an animal.

Soon they could make him out, sitting astride a donkey. As he drew level with them Darwish jumped on him. Ashur was astonished. His worst fears were realized. He could see nothing clearly, but he heard Darwish's voice threatening, “Hand over your money.”

“Have mercy. You're hurting me,” said a voice trembling with old age and terror.

Ashur rushed forward without stopping to think. “Let him go!” he shouted.

“Shut your mouth!” screamed Darwish.

“I said let him go.”

He wrapped his arms around Darwish's waist and hoisted
him off his feet. Darwish elbowed him frantically in the chest and cursed loudly. Ashur immobilized him so that only his tongue still moved, then turned to the old man. “Go in peace,” he said.

Only when he was sure the man had escaped did he release Darwish. “I'm sorry if I was rough,” he said apologetically.

“Ungrateful bastard!”

“But I saved you from doing something you'd regret.”

“You miserable idiot! Begging's all you're fit for!”

“God forgive you.”

“Dirty bastard!”

Saddened, Ashur fell silent.

“You're a bastard. Don't you understand? It's the truth.”

“Don't let your anger get the better of you. The sheikh told me where I came from.”

“I'm telling you the truth. He found you on the path where your whore mother left you,” said Darwish venomously.

“God rest them all.”

“On my honor and my brother's soul, you're just a bastard. Why else would they have got rid of a newborn baby in the middle of the night?”

Offended, Ashur said nothing.

“You've wasted my good work. Thrown away an opportunity to make some money. You might be strong, but you're a coward. You've just proved it.”

He landed a punch full in Ashur's face. Ashur, stunned by his first direct experience of physical violence, did nothing.

“Coward! Weakling!” shouted Darwish in a fury.

A wave of anger swept over Ashur, its violence shattering the sanctuary of night. With the flat of his great hand he struck his master on the head. Darwish sank to the floor, unconscious. Ashur struggled with his anger, forcing himself to calm down, and realized the gravity of what he had done.

“Forgive me, Sheikh Afra,” he muttered.

He lifted Darwish in his arms and made his way among the graves to the house, where he laid him down on the sofa, lit the lamp, and stood watching him, full of anxiety and remorse. The
minutes dragged by. At last Darwish opened his eyes and moved his head feebly.

Rage flickered in his eyes, showing that he remembered. The two men looked at one another in silence. Ashur felt as if Afra and Sakina were there, watching them sorrowfully.

He left the house. “God knows what's going to happen to me now,” he murmured.

8
.

Ashur wandered here and there. He slept on the ground, which is father and mother to the homeless, getting food where he could. On warm nights he slept below the wall of the monastery and on cold nights under the archway. He finally believed what Darwish had told him about his origins. The bitter truth hounded him and closed around him. A few nights in Darwish's company had taught him more about the realities of the world than twenty years spent under the wing of the good sheikh Afra. The wicked are harsh but honest teachers. He was a child of sin. The sinners had vanished, leaving him to face the world alone. Maybe he lived on as a painful memory in some restless heart.

His grief made him listen to the songs from the monastery more eagerly than ever. The meanings of their sweetly intoned cadences were hidden from him behind a veil of Persian, just as he imagined his mother and father were hidden behind the faces of strangers. One day he might find his mother, or his father, or discover the meanings of the words. Perhaps some of the riddles would be solved, he would cry tears of happiness, find cherished desires realized in the person of someone he loved. He spent hours gazing at the monastery garden, with its graceful, arching trees, grassy lawns, and trilling birds, and at the dervishes moving nimbly in their flowing robes and tall felt hats.

“Why do they do menial tasks like the poor?” he mused one day. “They sweep, lay the dust, water the plants. Perhaps they need a reliable servant.”

The great door was calling him, whispering to him to knock
and enter. The joy and serenity of the place scared him. He was in the garden, a fruit swollen with sweet juices, leaves yielding silk. A pure hand will come to pluck you in ecstasy.

The soft whisper won him over. He approached the door and called out modestly, politely to the men of God.

He called again and again, to no avail. They were hiding. No one answered. Even the birds regarded him suspiciously. The men of God didn't know his language, nor he theirs. The stream stopped flowing; the grass and flowers stopped dancing. Nothing needed him.

His enthusiasm waned. His inspiration was stifled. He was covered in confusion. He reproached himself for the strength of his feelings and struggled to control his will.

“Don't let yourself become the talk of the neighborhood,” he told himself, tugging on his splendid mustache. “Forget about people who refuse your help and look for someone who needs you.”

After this he earned his living any way he could, helping at weddings and funerals, acting as a porter or an errand boy, grateful for the odd coin or loaf of bread, or even a kind word.

One day an ugly man with a rat face accosted him: “Hey, boy!”

Ashur went up to him politely, ready to help.

“Don't you know me?” asked the man.

“Forgive me. I'm a stranger,” answered Ashur, embarrassed.

“But you come from this alley?”

“I've only lived in it a short time.”

“Kulayb al-Samani. I'm one of the clan chief's men.”

“Pleased to meet you, master.”

The man stared hard at him, then asked, “Will you join us?”

“I haven't the stomach for it,” replied Ashur, without hesitation.

Kulayb laughed scornfully. “The body of an ox and the heart of a bird,” he said, turning to go.

Ashur used to see Zayn al-Naturi's donkey tied up in the stable after a hard day's work. He took to brushing her, feeding her, sweeping the yard and sprinkling it with fresh water, never asking anything in return.

One day Zayn called him over. “You're Sheikh Afra's boy, aren't you?” he inquired.

“Yes. God rest his soul,” answered Ashur humbly.

“I heard you refused to join Qanswa's clan?”

“There's nothing in it for me.”

Zayn smiled and offered him a job as a donkey boy. Ashur accepted on the spot, his heart dancing for joy.

He led the donkey to work with energy and enthusiasm. As each day passed Zayn grew more sure of his good conduct and his piety, while Ashur for his part was glad to prove that he was trustworthy.

While he was working in the courtyard of Zayn's house, he carefully avoided looking anywhere he might catch a glimpse of his master's wife. But he saw his daughter Zaynab going out one day. He glanced for a few brief moments, and regretted it immediately. His remorse grew as a hot flame burned through his chest and innards and settled in his groin, blazing with unbridled desire.

“God save me,” he murmured, intoxicated by a rich, wild craving.

For the first time he had mentioned God's name while his thoughts were somewhere quite different. This sexual experience, limited and basic as it was, sent through him a shudder of embarrassment, anxiety, and strangeness.

Zayn al-Naturi decided he would make a dependable watchman. “Where do you live, Ashur?” he asked.

“By the monastery wall or under the archway.”

“Wouldn't you like to sleep in the stable here?”

“Thank you, master,” answered Ashur happily.

9
.

He used to wake at dawn. He liked the darkness streaked with smiling light, the hum of activity from the pious and the dissolute, the pure breathing of existence still wrapped in dreams. He would push aside Zaynab's provocative image, say his prayers, swallow a flat loaf with pickled olives and onions, pat the donkey affectionately, then drive it ahead of him to the main square, looking forward
to earning his daily bread. He was overflowing with vitality and full of boundless confidence in his ability, his powers of endurance, his control over the unknown. At the same time he was caught up in a vortex of feelings which threatened to uproot him: Zaynab was always ahead of him, triumphantly drawing him with her secret call. She had a pale face with a prominent nose and thick lips, and a small, solid body, but she had a bewitching effect on him. A fire burned constantly in his entrails. Sometimes he was oblivious to the donkey and its rider.

When he broke for a rest he would stand in front of the house, watching the stream of passersby: market traders, barrow boys, hawkers and peddlers, vagrants and tradesmen in search of work. Were his father and mother there somewhere? Were they still alive? Did they know him? Who had bequeathed him the giant frame, filled out by the benevolence of Sheikh Afra Zaydan? He chased away these futile thoughts and was immediately accosted by Zaynab al-Naturi's secret call.

“Nothing stays the same,” he said to himself. “Something must happen. Let God be on my side as a reward for my pure intentions.”

The furious voice of Zayn al-Naturi broke in on his thoughts. He saw him in the yard, locked in a verbal confrontation with a customer.

“You're nothing but a thief,” he shouted.

“Watch your tongue!”

Zayn slapped him around the face and grabbed his collar. Ashur rushed up to them, shouting at them to stop, and threw himself between them. Swearing viciously, the customer kicked out. Ashur held him pinned until he screamed in pain. Relaxing his grip, he said, “On your way, or you'll regret it.”

He took to his heels as the women crowded to the window and Zaynab's mother shouted, “Next we'll be raped in our beds!”

Zayn al-Naturi fixed grateful eyes on Ashur. “God bless you, son,” he murmured, doing his best to hide his embarrassment.

He went indoors. Only Zaynab was left at the window. Ashur returned to his place by the door, thinking that it was only a matter of time before their eyes met.