The Septembers of Shiraz (2 page)
Read The Septembers of Shiraz Online
Authors: Dalia Sofer
He finds himself praying, the same prayer he would recite as a boy, before going to sleep at night.
Hash-kiveynu Adonai Eloheynu lâ shalom, Vâ ha-amideynu Mal-keynu lâ ha-yimâ
“Cause us to lie down, God, our God, in peace,
and awaken us to life again, our King.”
U-fâ ros aleynu sukkat shâlomekha, vâ tak-neynu bâ eytzah tovah mil-fanekha, vâ ho-shi-eynu lâ ma-an Shâ mekhaâ
“Spread over us Your shelter of peace, guide us with Your good counsel. Save us because of Your mercy.” When he is done he whispers “Amen,” and is surprised that a few sentencesâa mere assembly of wordsâcould fill him with such stillness, even if only for the seconds it took him to say them.
After what he estimates to be about forty-five minutes, the steady sound of wheels on asphalt slowly gives way to a kind of rumbling. The gears have been changed several times, he has noticed, from third to second, and now, as they inch their way up a hill, to first.
The van comes to a halt. Isaac hears doors opening and feet hitting the ground. The door slides open and a hand takes hold of his right arm. “Follow me,” someone says. He steps out of the van. The air is clean and brisk, the breeze carrying a scent of poplars. They walk several steps then stop. A metal door rattles open. “Be careful,” the voice says. “There is a small step.”
Inside a hand reaches behind his head and unties the handkerchief. When Isaac opens his eyes he sees a man wearing a black burglar's mask. “I am Brother Mohsen,” the man says. “Please follow me.”
Â
H
E FOLLOWS
M
OHSEN
through a long and narrow corridor. Several men, also masked, walk back and forth, carrying
files. Mohsen leads him down a flight of stairs into a cement basement with no windows, where the air stands heavy, pregnant with the perspiration of the men who breathed it before him. A wooden table is the centerpiece. Two chairs, one of which Isaac is invited to occupy, face each other. Mohsen sits first and spreads the file open.
“So, Brother Amin. What exactly do you do?”
“I'm a gemologist, and a jeweler.”
Mohsen's left hand glides cautiously across a piece of paper. “Our records show you travel to Israel quite a bit. Is that correct?”
“Yes.”
“What for?”
“Well, sir, I⦔
“Please call me âBrother,'” Mohsen interrupts.
This is one of the hardest things to get used to, this business of calling everyone “brother,” “sister,” “father,” “mother.” This revolution, like all others, wished to turn the citizens into one big family. Once there had been guillotines for “brothers” who strayed, and later, there were gulags. Who knows what awaits him here?
“I have family in Israelâ¦Brother. There are no laws against traveling there, are there?”
“Brother, are you familiar with the Mossad?”
“I've heard of it, yes, Brother. I've read about it.” He brings a clammy palm to his forehead and rubs it. Sweat spreads across his chest, his lower back, and around his underarms. He feels dizzy, nauseated; vomit makes its way to his throat then retreats, quickly, leaving behind the foul taste of undigested lentils.
“Brother Mohsen, what is this all about? Am I being accused of something?”
Mohsen's eyes narrow inside the mask's cradle, tiny wrinkles forming on the outer edges.
“I see you like to get right to the point.” He shuts the file, places his sturdy hands on the table; his right index finger is amputated at the joint closest to the knuckle. He walks to the door, opens it, and sticking his head out yells, “Hossein-agha, bring me some tea, will you?” As he walks back toward Isaac he mumbles, “This headache is killing me.”
This intimate confession by his interrogator calms Isaac. “Look, Brother,” he says. “I have nothing to do with government affairs, neither here nor in any other country. I'm a businessman, who happens to be a Jew, that's all.”
Mohsen sits back down. “It's not that simple. We're going to have to investigate.”
A faint knock introduces a slight man, masked also, holding a tarnished copper tray on which a small glass of tea and a pyramid of sugar cubes rest. The man walks in carefully, tiptoeing almost so as not to interrupt the proceedings, and slides the tray in front of Mohsen. The spicy aroma reaches Isaac's nose from across the table; he stares at the steaming orange liquid through the glass. It has been freshly brewed, he can tell, and the glass, just like the ones he has at home, just like the ones everyone has at home, is the kind they call
kamar-barik
â“slim-waisted,” because it curves in the middle like a woman's body. He bought the set with Farnaz on their first trip to Isfahan some twenty-five years earlier, shortly after their wedding. The night the first one chipped, Farnaz stood still by the sink, water running over her hands. He was there, had
witnessed it from his seat at the kitchen table. “Oh, no,” he had heard her say. “Oh, no.” And when he casually told her not to worry, they would get another set, he thought he heard a sniffle but wasn't sure. He was never too sure with Farnaz.
Mohsen places a sugar cube in his mouth then lifts the glass and takes a sip through the opening in his mask. “Brother Amin, you have relatives in the Israeli army.”
“Yes. Those relatives are Israeli citizens. Every male Israeli is in the Israeli army.”
“Yes, well⦔ He shuffles papers. “Tell me about your wifeâ¦Farnaz Aminâ¦right? What does she do?”
“She's a housewife.”
“Really?” Mohsen pulls out a magazine, opens it to a flagged page, and points at the byline with his left index finger, which unlike its right twin, is intact. “So who's this? Let me seeâ¦I believe it says Farnaz Amin. Is that not your wife?” He slides the magazine across the table.
Isaac stares at the letters swirling on the page, each indistinguishable from the next, until his eyes zero in on the byline, and there it is, in a capricious typefaceâhis wife's name. “Rendezvous at the Ice Palace” is the title of the article, and he suddenly feels the chill of the ice skating rink, remembers being on the ice with Farnaz as she held young Shirin's hand, gliding to the breathless beat of disco tunes, the three of them trying to catch up with Parviz, who would be showing off like the other teenagers in the middle of the rink, spinning into a pirouette now and then. “She used to write, an article here and there, or a translation⦔
“And yet you forgot to mention it⦔ Mohsen gulps
down the last of his tea, throws back his head, and places the glass on the tray. Sucking on the leftover sugar cube, he says, “That skating rink was a haven for sin, you realize. And your wife's article was a piece of propaganda for it.”
What if Farnaz isn't sitting by the phone, wondering why he is so late for lunch? What if she is facing Mohsen's twin, just on the other side of the courtyard? An acidic liquid rushes from his stomach to the rest of his body, filling in crevices between muscles and bones. He breaks into a sweat, his voice won't come.
“No, Brother, it wasn't what you think,” he manages to say. “She just wrote about what was happening around her.”
“I see.” Mohsen gets up and walks, sneakers swishing against the floor. “And does she still write about âwhat is happening around her,' or is that no longer interesting to her?”
“Well, she hasn't written in a long time. That's why I even forgot to mention it. She hasn't been feeling well lately, Brother; she's often ill.”
“Oh, how terribleâ¦And what would you say is wrong with her?”
“Migraines.”
On their last trip to their beach house in the north, she had slept the better part of their ten-day stay, except for the evenings, when her headache would subside along with the sun, and she would emerge from the bedroom, wearing a wool sweater despite the August heat. “Dracula has come out,” she would joke, and Shirin, pleased to see her mother, would run to the kitchen to bring her a snack, a bowl of blood-red cherries or white peaches.
“Brother, please tell me. She's safe, isn't she? I mean, she's home, right?”
Mohsen looks back down at the file. “Many factors play against you at the moment. Like I said, we'll have to investigate.” He shuts the file, presses his temples with his hands. “Brother Hossein will take you to your cell.”
Mohsen disappears and the man who brought in the tea earlier returns. He stands by the door, motioning for Isaac to follow. In the dim hallway Isaac looks down at his wrist, at the empty spot where his watch used to be.
“What time is it?” he asks.
“Brother,” says Hossein, “you have to learn not to think about time. It means nothing here.”
T
he guard, Hossein, stands by the door of the cell, holding a candle to allow Isaac to settle in. Isaac recognizes Ramin, the sixteen-year-old, half asleep on a mattress; so he was brought here, too. Another man sits on the floor, peeling a soiled bandage from his feet. Isaac catches a glimpse of the man's swollen toes before the flickering candlelight vanishes and the door slams shut.
“It reeks, I know,” the man says. “I'm sorry.”
In the dark, Isaac lets his body fall back on an empty mattress; the loose coils bounce a few times before settling. “What happened to your feet?” he asks.
“Lashings,” says the man.
The night before him seems very long, as do the many nights that may follow. He unties the laces of his hard leather shoes, removes them, and lies flat on his back. The fullness in his bladder makes him wonder how many hours separate him from dawn, which most likely will be accompanied by
a visit to the toilet. He is not sure he can hold out that long; like the man in the pajamas, he may have to just let go. He hears a foot being dragged against the bare cement floor, followed by moans and the squeak of coils. His cellmate must have made it to his mattress, which is adjacent to Isaac's and across from the boy's.
“Ah, my poor foot.” The man sighs. “I'm Mehdi, by the way,” he whispers in the dark.
“I'm Isaac.”
“How is it outside?” Mehdi says.
“Outside? Since when? How long have you been in here?”
“Close to eight months now.”
“The situation is the same,” he says.
“That's hard to believe,” Mehdi mumbles. “It's got to be getting worse, since I'm seeing more and more of my friends here.”
Isaac tucks his hands under his head. Someone in the neighboring cell clears his throat every thirty seconds or so. The room spins, an endless black carousel circling around his head.
“I'm here because I'm a
tudeh
âa communist,” Mehdi says. “A friend of mine denounced me. I'm almost sure it's him, because I heard he's here, too. We were both professors at the university. They must have beaten my name out of him. They tried to get names out of me too, but I wouldn't give in. Now I look at my feet and I wonderâ¦I suppose I shouldn't tell you any of this, but I can't get into any more trouble than I already am.” There is restlessness in the man's voice, a controlled urgency.
“So you've been fighting against both governments?” Isaac asks.
“Yes. This regime isn't what we fought for, you know? This is even worse than the old monarchy.”
“And the boy? You know anything about him?”
“You mean Ramin? He threw red paint on a mullah.”
“Is that all? He is here for throwing paint?”
“His mother is a
tudeh
,” Mehdi says. “So they're assuming the boy is, too. They got the mother a couple of months ago. The father they killed about a year ago. And you? What is your crime?”
“I don't know yet,” Isaac says.
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H
E LIES AWAKE,
notices a shoebox window high up on the wall, a sapphire sky wrapped around its black bars. The glass is broken, allowing a warm breeze to enter the cell. It's a beautiful night, he realizesâcalm, dark, moonless. He tries to sleep but cannot, sees fickle shapes in bright colors, the same kaleidoscopic monsters that would visit him in the dark as a boy, when the voice of his drunken father and the faint whines of his mother would reach him through the locked door of his bedroom. When he shuts his eyes he smells his wife's orange blossom lotion, which she dabs on her face and hands every night. For a moment he thinks he sees her walking toward him, nightgown and all. He whispers goodnight to her, believes somehow that she hears it.
I
n the dark Farnaz traces the outlines of the furnitureâthe curving bedpost where Isaac's striped pajama pants still hang, the half-moon of the alabaster table lamp by her bed, and the sandalwood Buddha, arms stretched toward the sky, a lotus blossom in his hands. Isaac's reading glasses lie in wait on his night table, his magazine still open to an article he must not have finished. Last night she was annoyed with him for reading while she wanted to talk. She had come to bed, way past midnight, her head buzzing from the hours spent watching the news on television. She knew not to unload the latest riots on him; he did not want to hear it.
“They are moving Picasso's
Guernica
from New York to Spain,” she said finally, this being the only topic from the day's events to which she thought he might respond.
“Yes?” he said, without taking his eyes off his magazine.
“Apparently Picasso had specified in his will that the
painting could only be taken back to Spain once the country became a republic.”
“Well, it's not a republic,” he said. “It's a constitutional monarchy.”
“It's close enough. That's what the shah wanted to do here. Of course, he was too late.” And as soon as she had said this, she knew she had lost him again. He did not want to discuss the failing health of his country, and she insisted, like a careless physician repeating a terminal diagnosis. My dear sir, she seemed to be saying. The cancer has spread. She reaches for his glasses now, and holds them, their metallic earpieces cold against her fingers.
Since yesterday's call from Isaac's brother, Javad, who had heard about the arrest from a friend who had joined the Revolutionary Guards, the phone has not rung once. She thinks of Kourosh Nassiri, how she had seen his name among the list of executed in the paper. She had tried calling Isaac many times that day but he would not take her call; the secretary answered each time, saying Isaac was very busy and would it be all right if he called her back later? But he never called. When he came home that night, looking gray, he put down his briefcase, sat on the sofa, and sobbed. She sat next to him and cried with him. They never spoke of Kourosh Nassiri's execution again.
The dog, a black-furred German shepherd abandoned by Austrian diplomats who had left the country abruptly, gallops back and forth in the garden, howling at the wind. Farnaz wonders if Suzie has detected Isaac's absence, sniffed her way into the void. The day their gardener Abbas brought
her in, pleading that they adopt her, Farnaz had resisted the idea. And even as she saw the dog's downcast eyes and smelled its musky fur, wet and disheveled from the morning rain, she shook her head no. She told him she is afraid of dogs, and besides, they are dirty. “They say this dog is very smart and well-behaved; they say it can even open doors,” Abbas said. She laughed. “That's all I need! A dog that opens doors.” When she snuck another look at the orphaned animal, she saw Isaac patting its head. Soon the two of them were at play in the garden, Isaac throwing a yellow tennis ballâone of Parviz's relicsâand the dog running after it, carrying it back in its mouth and dropping it at Isaac's feet. She saw the delight in her husband's eyes and gave in. “Fine,” she said. “The dog can stay, but he will not enter the house.” A smile spread across Abbas's creased face. “God bless you. And by the way, he's a she. Her name is Suzie.”
It amused her to be jealous of this dog, this Austrian-raised Suzie who could make Isaac's eyes laugh in a way she herself had not been able to do in months.
Â
A
SHARP PAIN
behind her right eye migrates to the nape of her neck and down her back. On the opposite wall, trees peering over the terrace make swaying shadows that most nights manage to put her to sleep. Tonight, as she watches them, she sees a shape hanging from a branch, a shape with flaccid limbs and a limp head. She shuts her eyes and counts to ten, but when she opens them it is still there.
She unlocks the glass door leading to the terrace, hears its rattle as it slides open. A breeze rushes into the bedroom, sending the curtains into an unchoreographed dance. She stumbles through them and steps with her bare feet on the icy marble outside. Leaning against the balustrade, she sees itâa man wrapped in a white sheet, hanging on a low branch of their cherry tree. Isaac? Urine gushes down her legs. She goes back inside, makes her way down the stairs and out to the garden.
When she reaches the damp cloth she runs her hands over it, front then back, finds nothing in its folds but dead air. The housekeeper, Habibeh, probably hung it there after drying the dog and forgot to remove it. She sits on the grass, its wetness seeping through her already-soaked nightgown and into her skin. Feeling a chill settling in her thighs, she goes back in, to her quiet house, which suddenly seems unnecessarily vastâthe white limestone facade, the lanterns illuminating the garden path, the shimmering blue of the pool, all posing as elaborate gatekeepers to the unraveling inside.
Â
“F
ARNAZ-KHANOUM
? A
RE YOU
all right? Shall I bring you some tea? You don't look so good. And why are you sleeping with just a camisole? You'll catch cold⦔
Farnaz opens her eyes, sees Habibeh standing over her bed. “No, I'm getting up, thank you. I have to go out.” Her mouth is dry, a bitter taste trapped in her throat.
“Yes?” Habibeh looks at the bed, at the unruffled side, where Isaac should have been. “Amin-agha never came home?”
“No, Habibeh. They got him.” She pushes back the comforter, brings her feet to the floor and stares at them, her toenails painted a pinkish whiteâlike seashellsâreminding her of promenades along the beach, where they had been, just weeks ago.
Habibeh rests her hand on Farnaz's shoulder. “Don't worry, khanoum. He is a good man, and he will get out.”
“Yes. But wasn't Kourosh a good man? Where is he now?”
“Don't think about that now.” Habibeh walks to the windows and pulls open the curtains. The room plunges into a harsh brightness.
“Remember Farnaz-khanoum, that gold silk sari Amin-agha brought me from India? I still have it wrapped in its paper in my closet. From time to time I take it out and run my fingers over itâit's the softest thing I've ever touched. You remember that, khanoum?”
This reminiscence, Farnaz thinks, has the flavor of old stories rehashed at funerals. “Yes, of course I remember,” she says.
“It breaks my heart to think of such a good man behind bars.” Habibeh shakes her head, taps one hand against the other. In a lowered voice she says, “I've never been the religious type, khanoum, but I will ask Kobra, my half-sister who prays five times a day, to say a few words on agha's behalf. I'd do it myself but I don't think my plea would carry
much weight. That's my way of wishing his safe return.
Har Haji yek jour Makeh miravadâEvery
pilgrim goes to Mecca his own way.”
“Thank you, Habibeh. You are so good to us.”
“Now get up, khanoum. Get up. Go do what you have to do.” She stands for several seconds, then reaches out to the night table and takes the empty glass of cognac. “This, Farnaz-khanoum, will have to stop.”
“I take only one glass, Habibeh, you know that. It calms me down.”
“One glass or ten, makes no difference. Not only is it bad for you, it's illegal now.” She puts the glass back down and leaves.
Illegal? Yes, drinking alcohol was now on the long list of illicit activities, along with singing, listening to music, going out with uncovered hair. But when did Habibeh become so law-abiding?
Farnaz showers quickly and wears navy slacks, a white turtleneck, and her long black coatâthe new government enforced uniform. Her shapeless reflection in the full-length mirror strips her of the one lure she had possessed before the days of the revolution, when a hip-hugging skirt, a fitted cashmere sweater, and a red smile were enough to get an entire room of a house painted for free, or the most tender meat saved by the butcher. She leans into the mirror and applies powder to conceal the dark crescents under her brown eyes. She twists her long black hair into a bun and covers it with a scarf.
Out in the garden the air is crisp, diffusing the sweet,
clean scent of jasmine. The dog is sprawled by Isaac's old Renault, sniffing a tire. She will take Shirin to school then start looking for Isaac. Last night she told Shirin that her father had gone on an unexpected business trip. “Yes? Just like that?” Shirin said. “Yes, just like that.” And when the questions would not stop, Farnaz told her to keep quiet and go to bed. The questions stopped, leaving in their place a muddy silence.
She stands by the iron gate, tea in hand, watching the day unfoldâpedestrians walking hurriedly past, cars honking to salvage lost minutes, children bearing the anxious look of the first weeks of school, their backs hunched under massive book bags. A neighbor emerges from her house and hurries down the street. “They brought eggs today!” she yells to Farnaz, and whizzes by. The war with Iraq, already a year old, has made the most mundane itemsâeggs, cheese, soapâworthy of celebration. Farnaz cannot reconcile the normalcy of the world around her with the collapse of her own. That the city is short by one man this morning makes so little differenceâstores still open their doors, schools ring their bells, banks exchange currency, grass-green double-decker busesâmen on the bottom, women on topâfollow their daily routes.
Â
T
HE PRISON SQUATS
under the afternoon skyâsterile, unsparing, and gray.
“Yes, Sister?” A young man at the gate walks toward her.
He is barely eighteen, with that seriousness of expression peculiar to young people given a grave task for the first time. A cigarette hangs loosely from the side of his mouth.
“I'm looking for my husband, Brother. Can you help me?”
The boy removes the cigarette, exhaling with exaggeration. “Who is your husband?”
“His name is Isaac Amin.”
“Yes? Who says he's in this prison?”
“That's what I'm trying to find out, Brother.”
The boy takes another drag, looks out in the distance. “Why should I help you?”
“Because my husband is innocent. And because you're a kind, decent person.”
“You say he's innocent. Why should I believe you?” He drops the cigarette and crushes it with his foot.
“Brother, I'm just asking you to tell me if he's here. I'm not asking you to release him.”
He bites his lower lip, considering her request, then flings his arm in the air. “Ah, to hell with you,” he says. “I don't want to help you. And you can't make me do anything I don't want to do, not anymore. Now get lostâ¦Sister.”
She walks for a long time through the city. Above her, windows and balconies close, shutting out the cool September breeze. Summer is leaving, and with it the buzz of ceiling fans, the smell of wet dust rising through air-conditioning vents, the clink of noontime dishes heard through open windows, the chatter of families passing long, muggy afternoons in courtyards, eating pumpkin seeds and watermelon.