by Rafik Schami
On this day Isam arrived carrying an impressive cage. When he entered the room he set off a storm of laughter.
"No, no—this one's real!" he shouted. "A magnificent goldfinch. My son had his eye on this one, but I am bringing it to Salim. May he speak as beautifully as this wonderful bird can sing. And may God protect him from the envious!"
The friends were so moved they didn't know whether to laugh or cry. The small songbird didn't keep them waiting long: as soon as Isam had hung the cage from a hook on the wall, it started warbling away.
Salim smiled with delight and handed his friend a glass of tea.
Isam sat down on the sofa and was silent for a while. Salim was already rubbing his hands in anticipation, and instead of taking the free chair next to the sofa, he crouched on the floor at the feet of his guests. He looked at Isam expectantly.
"You know," Isam said to him, "I spent twelve years in solitary confinement. The cell was dark even in the middle of the day. Who are you supposed to tell stories to there? If you had paper, you could at least tell them to the paper, but what are you going to tell to four damp and dirty walls? Besides, at the time I could neither read nor write. And last night I was barely able to sleep. You know, I was thinking about how long I've been alive. I'm sixty-eight years old, but really I'm just fifty-six, since those twelve years can't count as life at all."
Isam began to choke with emotion, and Salim placed his hand on his friend's knee.
"Salim, you are wonderful! You know, your hands can speak, even if your tongue cannot. There was this man I knew in prison. He was mute, but we understood his words through his hands.—But now on to me! When I was a child I loved to sing. Everyone liked my voice, and I was always allowed to sing in the mosque and at weddings, and whenever I sang, people cried and said that someday I would be a famous singer. But one day, all that came to an end. Who was going to believe me—when there I was, standing right beside my cousin's body, and holding the knife?
"I had never forgiven him for humiliating me in front of the whole bazaar. But my wife said it was wrong for cousins to carry on a feud like that, and since I was the younger, it was my place to try to patch things up. You know, my cousin was convinced that I had swindled him out of all that money. And I could see why he thought that way, too. I mean, I was a pretty sly devil in those days."
"You still are!" joked Musa.
"Maybe so, but only at the Friday market—back then I was one every day. But I didn't swindle him at all."
"How so?" asked Junis.
"We—a man from Aleppo named Ismail, my cousin, and myself—had found a treasure. The man had read in one of his secret books that a large urn filled with gold coins was buried in my cousin's courtyard. Supposedly it had been hidden there by some Ottoman officer who was fleeing the French. The officer figured he would, you know, sneak back once everything had settled down. But then a cholera epidemic came and snatched him away along with his entire family. Ismail claimed to have been his servant, but today I'm sure that he was the devil in person. How else could he have picked me out from among the thousands of people in Damascus? You know, to this day I get goose bumps whenever I mention his name. Here, just look. The devil himself, I tell you. You know, we first met next to the Takiya Suleima-niya, right where the man who had built the mosque jumped to his death. Of course, that should have told me that nothing good could come of it, but I was still young and stupid."
"What are you talking about?" asked the emigrant, somewhat confused.
"You don't know the story of the mosque?" When the emigrant shook his head, Isam went on: "The great Ottoman sultan Suleiman commissioned a famous master, by the name of Sinan, to build a mosque and a dormitory for dervishes on pilgrimage. Sinan worked day and night for years and years until he finally completed the beautiful mosque. The sultan visited the mosque with his courtiers and was pleased. He praised the masters work, and especially the slender minaret. Sinan then recounted for his patron the trials and tribulations he had had to endure to erect that minaret. The guests clapped their hands and hailed the sultan and his great master builder. But then, all of a sudden, this old man spoke up and said in a very matter-of-fact voice, Trials and tribulations my foot! A minaret like that is child's play!' The sultan had the old man brought before him—he turned out to be a journeyman who had worked for Sinan the builder.
" 'Child's play?' repeated the sultan. 'Woe unto you, you shameless old fool! I shall give you one year to build a similar minaret, and if you don't succeed, then off with your head!'
" 'One month is all I need!' answered the old journeyman. 'Take master Sinan with you, so he doesn't see anything, and in one month have him brought here blindfolded. If he can tell which minaret is his, then I shall gladly pay with my life.'
" 'Master Sinan will be my guest for one month. But woe betide you, old man, if you have let your envy lead you astray,' said the sultan, who then journeyed with the master builder to his palace in the north.
"After exactly one month, the sultan, his guests, and the builder Sinan traveled back to Damascus. Crowds thronged the main square, itching with curiosity. You know, the people were standing so close together that if you had dropped a tiny needle from the minaret, it wouldn't have reached the ground, it would have got stuck on one of the thousands and thousands of heads.
"Sultan Suleiman was famous for his fairness. He held to the conditions of the bet and kept the master builder blindfolded until they were all standing on a platform in front of the mosque. Then the master turned pale, because the two minarets were mirror images. He rubbed his eyes, but he couldn't tell which of the two spires was his.
" 'I have to climb up; it's easier for me to tell from up there,' Sinan said and hurried up one of the minarets. He was sure he would find some of his secret marks. You know, some of the stones had notches, and he had painted a few of the tiles himself. When he reached the top, he saw the stones and the tiles and was about to announce that this minaret was his, when he suddenly glanced over and saw the same stones and tiles on the minaret's twin. He hurried down and climbed up the second tower. There, too, he found his signature. Sinan stood on top of the tower, looking down at the crowd, which began to jeer at him. He cried out so loud that the earth shook, then cursed the old journeyman and leaped to his death."
"That's not true," the minister interrupted. "After the mosque in Damascus, the great master Sinan went on to build many wonderful mosques, both large and small, including the one at Edirne in Turkey. My father once took me there. A dream in paint and stone, shadow and light. The man found murdered here under the minarets the day after their unveiling was a dervish in love with the daughter of the regent of Damascus. He used to visit her secretly at night in the garden of the mosque. It's a sad story. I was . . ."
"What does it matter?" Isam picked up where he had left off. "In any case, it was on that spot where I met this devil. He knew more about me than my parents. He told me our stars had met in heaven. You know, words know how to tickle better than fingers. And his words were so clever and so sweet, he could have moved a hippopotamus to sprout wings and fly! He claimed that my cousin had been born under an unlucky star, and so he should stay out of the house on the day we dug up the treasure, otherwise his presence might turn the gold coins into snakes—but he would still receive his third of the treasure.
"Now, my cousin was always suspicious of everybody. He was afraid that Ismail was out to swindle us, but I convinced him otherwise, and so he took his wife and child and left the house. Then this devil and I started digging; from dawn until noon we shoveled out a tremendous hole in the middle of the courtyard where the treasure was supposed to be, but we didn't find anything. At noon we ate some bread with cheese and olives—I remember to this day—and after that I made some tea. Then I had to use the bathroom.
"When I came back, there was this devil, calm as could be, sitting there sipping his tea and talking about his travels. I sat down under an orange tree and drank the tea without the slightest s
uspicion. It tasted good. All of a sudden I felt this strange drowsiness start to overpower me. I staggered into the kitchen and doused my head with cold water, but I couldn't make it back outside. Then everything went dark, but I could still hear this devil laughing loudly.
"When I came to, the man was long gone. The shards of a great clay urn were lying scattered on the pile of dirt. On a flat stone I found two gold Ottoman liras. Without thinking, I put them in my pocket.
"When my cousin came back I was still groggy. 'So where's my share?' he asked, when he saw the shards.
"I was a complete wreck. 'Ismail drugged me and took off with the money,' I answered. My cousin grabbed hold of me and tore off my pants and shirt. The two gold liras came tumbling out of my pocket. Now there was no man on earth who could prove to him that I had fallen into the scoundrel's trap just like he had. As far as he was concerned, those two gold liras were more than enough evidence of my guilt. He pounded away at me without mercy, and if the neighbors hadn't come to my aid I would have been a dead man. But he didn't stop there! He slandered me everywhere he went, so that people avoided me like the plague.
"One Friday I went to the mosque. When I came out he beat me once again, right in front of all the believers, and this time no one bothered to help me. I cursed him and swore I would kill him. For three months we didn't say a word to each other. But then the Feast of Sacrifice was coming up, and my wife said it wasn't right that we should begin the holy days full of hate. So I made my way to his house.
"When I pushed open the door, none of his family came to greet me. I called out for him, but everything was quiet. I called out again. Then I heard someone gasping in the kitchen. I ran there right away, and found my cousin lying on his stomach in a pool of blood. I turned him over, but it was too late. He died in my arms, without saying a word. The knife was lying next to him. I started to run out to the courtyard and call the neighbors for help, but all of a sudden his wife and younger son appeared in the kitchen doorway. The woman stood there, frozen. She looked at my hands and clothes smeared with blood and started screaming. To this day I don't know why, but I picked up the knife and started to stammer: 'With . . . the knife . . .' That was it. For the judges it was clear as day that I had done the deed."
"And why did the real murderer do it?" asked Faris.
"The devil only knows! My cousin was always getting into tangles with people. He wasn't a very pleasant man. I later found out that he had hired this murderer to beat up a certain highly respected merchant. This thug had come to collect, and my cousin tried to throw him out. He was always setting people like that on his opponents, but he never let them come to his house, to keep everything secret."
"Then what happened?" Ali wanted to know.
"No, let's get on with your story," the teacher interjected.
"Story?—Oh, that's right, I wanted to tell you about one of my fellow prisoners who never wanted to bet."
"Just a minute!" Ali interrupted.
Musa sided with the locksmith. "The night is long," he said, "we'll get to that story, but first I want to know what happened to you next. We've known one another for years, and you've never told us any of this before. In this blessed night you have opened your heart. Finish telling us about yourself. That's more important than some story or other."
Isam looked at Salim. "Aren't you tired of all this dumb stuff I'm telling about myself?"
Salim smiled, pressed his friend's hand and gave a sign as if to say, "Go ahead, there's no rush."
"So, then hell opened its gates for me. For twelve years the prison warden—may God rain curses upon him—kept me locked up in a basement, until I looked exactly like the monster he imagined I was. Not until after his death—and may his soul languish and broil in hell—did the new warden have me taken to a group cell. That's where I spent the second half of my time. It was a lot easier than the hell of solitary confinement. You know, when you don't talk for years, even your dreams become mute. Your words wilt and rot inside your mouth. The only company I had in that hole were the rats. Sometimes I wished they would attack me and put an end to my misery, but they showed me more mercy than the human beings did. You can't imagine how it tormented me that I was the only one who knew I was innocent. It's true, my wife believed I was, and she stood loyally by my side, but I was the only one who really knew."
"And your friends?" asked Faris.
Isam smiled bitterly. "Oh, my friends believed me, all right, at least at first, but later they believed the judges. And after I was sent away, did they even once look in on my wife? No, they just left her in the lurch, with two sons to raise, all by herself. Meanwhile, I was sitting in prison and the thought that she was suffering along with me was more than I could bear. You know, there were times when I even hated the fact she was so loyal.
"And then there were times when I felt this fire in my head—you know, a fire that wants to burst out. It kept burning inside me, and even when I was so exhausted I just keeled over, it continued to smolder. I would suddenly wake up and start to hurl myself against the walls and howl like some wild animal, until the fire went out.
"When I was finally moved to a cell with other people I felt reborn. The fire never burned my soul again. Of course, life there was difficult enough: we were often beaten, you know, back then. Whenever they brought someone back half dead, we gave him cigarettes and tea and sang to him, and then his wounded face would slowly break out in a smile. That's when we knew that we had beaten the guards.
"There was this poet who served five years with us because of a song, and he taught me how to read and write. We became good friends. He had read thousands of books in his life, and I was as thirsty as a sponge. I was able to teach him a few things as well. He spent too much time brooding; the only reason he managed to cope was because the others felt sorry for him. I taught him how to wangle cigarettes, tea, and even arak. He was a good pupil. First he watched me do it, and then he went at it. He wound up winning the respect of the worst thugs; besides, they needed his advice. He knew more than a lawyer, you know, and in prison only one out of a hundred inmates could read. Even years after his release he used to visit me every week, until he was forced to leave the country.
"But that's enough babble about me! Now I want to tell you a real story. As God is my witness, I will tell you only what Ahmad told me.
"The prisoners all liked to gamble. You know, it's a good way to kill time, and you can also win a little tea, a few cigarettes, or a piece of bread. But we had this one prisoner who never bet. His name was Ahmad. We would be gambling away like mad, and he would just sit in the corner like a stone. He was dirt poor, and whenever I won something I gave part of it to him. Now, I'm not one to pry, but one day I asked him why he never played along. 'Why don't you ever bet?' I said. Well, you know in the beginning I thought he was a miser, but actually he was very generous. There was this one time I had a run of bad cards and lost everything I had after just a few hands. Bankrupt. So I was sitting down in the corner next to him, and he took off his new shirt and gave it to me, without saying a word. I traded the shirt for three boxes of cigarettes, and then I was able to win back everything I had lost. But he himself never gambled.
"We would bet on anything. Sometimes, if we couldn't find anything better, someone would holler: 'Any bets on whether this fly's going to land on my nose?' and we'd all rush to place our bets. There were tricks, you know, that you could use to influence the fly. If you brush a fly off in a certain way—just a little bit, not too much—it will come back to the same spot as if it owned it."
"I know about those damned rascals! Whenever one takes a fancy to my nose, it always ruins my nap," Musa confirmed with a laugh.
"I can tell you," Isam continued, "that you go into prison with one profession and come out with a thousand and one professions. You can learn anything there. I told you how I learned to read. You can become a baker, a butcher, or a locksmith like Ali here, but that's not all—you also learn how to use a knife, how to counterfeit
money, how to smuggle, and how to tell jokes. You want to hear a joke?"
"Let's hear it," said Tuma encouragingly.
"This is a political joke I heard from that poet I was talking about. The only jokes he told were political. Well, this joke goes like this: there are these two assassins hiding right outside the presidential palace. They're waiting for the president to come out, and their fingers are glued to the triggers of their pistols. Well the whole day goes by, but this president never leaves the palace. So the assassins keep waiting. The next day comes and goes, and still no sign of the president. Then the third day comes and the same thing happens. By now the men are pretty upset.
" 'Where the hell can he be?' asks one.
"The other man turns to his companion, full of concern, and says, 'God, I hope nothings happened to him!'
"We used to tell jokes all the time. The guards treated us worse than animals, you know, but we just laughed at them—among ourselves, that is. You want to hear another joke about the guards?"
"No, no, why don't you tell us about this man who didn't want to bet," the minister requested impatiently. He was the only one who hadn't laughed at the joke.
"Right. Let's see. His name was Ahmad. Once I asked him why he never bet. Right, I said that. Oh. So once he told me his story. It was incredible, like many of the prisoners' stories. You know, you hear a lot of stories in prison. Fifty percent you throw overboard, and another thirty percent you're bound to forget. But what's left is still unbelievable. Absolutely unbelievable! There was this Armenian serving a year's sentence. His name was Mehran. A small guy—short, and skinny as a rail. When we asked him what he had been sent up for, all he said was: 'Beat up big bear.' He didn't speak Arabic very well. It took us a month to put together what had happened. Apparently he had this neighbor who was as big and strong as our Ali, and the man used to beat his children every afternoon. Mehran asked him to stop because he—Mehran, that is—wanted to enjoy his afternoon nap, and besides, he couldn't stand children being beaten. So this big bear of a neighbor growls back that from then on not only would he beat his children, but Mehran as well. Then he went after Mehran, but Mehran caught him with his right hand and hurled him several yards. And the bear wound up in the hospital.
