by Paul Bowles
“We’re interested in your head, too,” he said. “It’s no good having a heart if you haven’t got a head. You haven’t got much of a head. That didn’t matter until today. But now—” he looked at Amar fixedly—”you’ve got to have a head, you understand?”
He did understand perfectly. Benani was saying that since he had stumbled onto Moulay Ali he was necessarily involved; there was no way of pretending otherwise.
“I have a head, but no tongue,” he said.
Benani laughed shortly. “I know, I know. They all say that. But after the first five minutes in the commissariat they have a tongue that would reach from Bab Mahrouk to Bab Fteuh. Until you get to the commissariat you need a head. It’s only when you get there that you find out what sort of heart you have, and know what’s more important to you, your own skin or your Sultan’s faith in you.”
Benani was watching him closely, probably to trace the effect of his words on Amar’s countenance. This seemed scarcely the moment to recall Mohammed Lalami’s words: “The Sultan will never come back, and the party doesn’t want him back,” but he could not help hearing them again in his mind’s ear, as well as what Mohammed had said immediately afterward: “It’s not the party’s fault, is it, if the people of Morocco are all donkeys?” Benani was taking him for one of the donkeys, was telling him, in fact, that he had got to be one. The lie had to be at the center of any understanding he could have with these people. He nodded his head slowly, as if he were pondering the profound wisdom of Benani’s statement.
“We’re your friends,” Benani said, leaning forward and wrapping the debris of the meal in the newspaper, “but you’ve got to prove that you know how to have friends.”
What bad luck, Amar thought. He did not want any of them as friends. “B’cif,” he said, “of course.” He looked at them. There was the pimply one who seemed to consider himself Benani’s henchman, a yellow-skinned, sickly one with thick glasses, a rather fat one who looked as though he had never walked farther than from the Kissaria to the Medersa Attarine, and a tall Negro whom he seemed to remember having seen at the municipal swimming pool in the Ville Nouvelle.
Benani sat up straight again, holding the folded paper in his hand. “Rhaddi noud el haraj men deba chouich,” he said sententiously. “It’s going to be war this time, not just games.” Amar felt a thrill of excitement in spite of himself. “Do you know what’s happened?” Benani went on, his eyes suddenly blazing dangerously. “Tonight five thousand partisans are sleeping outside Bab Fteuh. Did you know that?”
Now Amar’s heart was beating very fast, and his eyes were wide open. “What?” he cried.
“It’s no secret,” said Benani grimly. He called to the qaouaji, who got sleepily to his feet and staggered to where they sat. “We’re on our way,” Benani told him. The qaouaji shuffled back to the door, opened it, and peered out. Then he shut it again. The four others rose, shook hands solemnly with Amar and Benani, and went to the door; the qaouaji let them out. Benani remained seated where he was, silently staring at the mat on the floor, and Amar, not knowing whether the audience was over or not, also merely sat, until the other, who was taking the precaution of waiting until those who had left should be completely dispersed, finally rose to his feet.
“You’d better not go outside the walls tomorrow,” he said, “or you may not see your family for a long time. I’m going to walk home with you.”
Amar protested politely, although he knew that Benani’s decision had not been made through solicitude for his safety.
“Yallah,” said Benani paying no attention to him. “Let’s go.” He paid the qaouaji, said a few words to him, and they stepped into the street. The arc-lights in the Medina were so sparsely placed that they had to walk awhile before they could tell whether the electricity was still cut off. It was, but Benani had a flashlight which he used from time to time. The wind was damp and the sky was still covered over. So far they had not met a single passer-by.
“It’s going to rain,” said Benani. “Yes.”
“But it won’t last. Not at this time of the year.”
Amar thought this a useless sort of thing to say. Only Allah could know whether it would rain and for how long. He held his tongue, however, and continued to walk along beside Benani. When they got to the entrance of his alley Amar said: “Here’s my derb,” and began to thank him and bid him good night. But apparently Benani wanted to see exactly where Amar lived. “I’ll take you to your house,” he said. “It’s nothing.”
“You’ll have to come all the way back. There’s no way out,” Amar warned him.
“Nothing.”
Even when Amar had knocked on the door, Benani did not leave. He stood against the wall where he would not be seen by whoever opened to let Amar in. It was Amar’s father who called out: “Chkoun?” and who eventually, with a good deal of banging about and clinking of keys, swung open the door, shielding his candle from the wind with his key hand. Seeing Amar, sensing that there was someone with him, he held the candle up and out, trying to see beyond. “Where have you been?” he demanded querulously. “Who’s with you?” Amar could not answer. Benani, now convinced that this house was not a false address, and, from the genuineness of the scene, that the old man was indeed Amar’s father, darted off into the night, leaving Amar to cope with the situation. For once Si Driss’s relief at seeing his son was greater than his anger at having waited for him.
“Hamdoul’lah,” he said several times, as he bolted the door and padded across the courtyard to wash his hands in a pail by the well. The doves shivered and fluttered once, startled at having been wakened.
Amar’s principal desire was to get upstairs quickly, before the old man’s mood changed. He stooped and kissed the sleeve of his father’s gandoura, murmured: “Good night,” and started up the first steps.
“Wait,” said Si Dtiss. Amar’s heart sank.
A minute later they both went slowly up the stairs, the old man first, carrying the candle, and Amar following. When they got to the top of the second flight Si Driss was panting, and reached for the support of Amar’s arm. Inside his room Amar fixed the candle to the floor, and they sat down on the mattress.
His father leaned toward him, to see him better.
“Yah latif! What’s the matter with your face?” he cried. “It looks like a rotten peach. How did that happen? Who hit you?”
“One,” said Amar quietly. He did not expect his father to press the point, and he was right. The old man merely said despairingly: “Why do you fight?” The question that Amar was expecting: “Where have you been?” did not come. Instead, after a pause, his father asked him: “Have you seen anything?”
There was to be no punishment. Amar was astonished. “No,” he said uncertainly.
“Tomorrow, incha’Allah, we must get up very early and buy whatever we can get. Who knows when it will begin? We have nothing in the house. Si Abderrahman will sell me fifty kilos of flour. That we can be sure of. The rest is in the hands of Allah.”
“Yes,” said Amar. He did not know what else to say.
The old man was shaking his head back and forth. “This time it will be very bad. The French have sent the Berbers to make war on us. May Allah save us all. Who knows what will become of us? There’s not one gun in the Medina; they saw to that.”
Amar comforted his father with inadequate phrases, secretly amazed that Si Driss should at last be taking politics so seriously, and uncomfortable to see that the calm he had always thought adamant was now shattered.
“You must sleep a little,” said his father at last. “We have work to do tomorrow.”
When he had gone, Amar lay wide-eyed, staring into the empty night. A light rain had begun to fall; beyond its soft sound there was only silence.
CHAPTER 12
The next day was not the day that Si Driss had feared it would be. The Berber troops outside Bab Fteuh stayed where they were, making their temporary quarters more comfortable for themselves. Rain fell quietly in
the morning, but at noon it suddenly cleared, and a curtain of rising mist over the city made the light painful. Amar and his father had gone out at dawn, leaving Mustapha at home with the womenfolk, and had brought back the flour from Si Abderrahman’s house, which was near by. Then they had scoured the Medina to find sugar, chickpeas, candles and oats. Almost all the shops had been boarded up, and at those which were doing business there were clusters of agitated men trying with cajolery, threats and pleas to buy food at normal prices. The food was there, but the few shop keepers who were courageous enough to have remained open (for roving bands of young vigilantes were reported to be wrecking the shops in the center of the city) hoped to profit quickly by their daring. Tramping through the streets were groups of glum-faced French policemen who looked straight ahead with hard eyes. No children were visible, and there was a noticeable absence of young men.
Amar arrived at work only about an hour late. The potter was squatting on his terrace as usual, but there was no sign of his merchandise lying about; all the water jars, bowls and dishes had been stacked inside the shed. There was an unaccustomed silence lying over the mud village below, and the smoke rose from only a handful of ovens.
“Sbalkheir,” said the potter, looking up at him unhappily. “I was afraid they’d caught you.”
Amar laughed. “Sbalkheir,” he replied. For a moment he was not sure whether Said meant the French or the Istiqlal, then his own doubt struck him as absurd; he could only have been referring to the French. “No, I had a lot of work to do for my father,” he said, hoping that the potter would let it rest there and not press him for details.
“It doesn’t matter,” said the other, fingering his beard. “I’m going to close up anyway, until they—” he gestured with his head toward Bab Fteuh—”go back where they came from. Allah! There’s a city of them out there. This is just the beginning. There’ll be more tonight, and they’ll be at Bab Guissa and all the other gates. They put them there first because of the sheep market. Only four days to the Aid.”
Amar’s face fell. If that were the case, it meant that they would surely have no sheep to sacrifice this year at his house, because all the money had gone to buy the staples he and his father had just lugged home. He had not realized the time was so short; vaguely he had hoped that somehow between now and the festival there would be a way of amassing enough money to buy a sheep, even if it were a small one. The prospect of having no sheep at all was a social disgrace of enormous proportions, and one which the family had never yet had to face. “Four days,” he said sadly. The warm rain suddenly fell with more force, spattering their legs with the mud from the roof. They shrank against the wall.
“There are a lot of fools out there buying sheep anyway,” Said went on. “There’ll be trouble. Wait; you’ll see. In my derb this morning they beat up an old man who was leading his sheep home. They beat up the sheep too, left them both lying there against the wall in a heap.” He grinned at the memory. Amar was listening incredulously.
“It’s the only thing to do,” Said continued. “What right has anybody got to make a feast when the Sultan is in prison in the middle of the ocean?”
“But it’s a sin not to have the Aïd el Kebir,” said Amar slowly. “Which is greater, the Sultan or Islam?”
The potter glared at him. “Sin! Sin!” he cried. “Is there any sin worse than living without our Sultan? Like dogs? Like heathens, kaffirine? There are no sins any more, I tell you! It doesn’t matter what anyone does now. Sins are finished!”
Secretly Amar agreed with him, but he would have preferred to say all that himself. Coming from Said, it sounded a little silly. He was too old to feel that way, Amar thought.
Saïd’s rancor had been aroused; his expression was distinctly unfriendly now. He seemed to think he was having an argument with Amar.
“At any rate,” he grumbled, “I don’t need you around here. I’ve let the others go. I don’t need anybody. Who’s going to buy jars now?”
Amar was thinking of the money the potter owed him. It was not much, but it was something. “And afterward?” he said.
“Afterward, come back. If there is any afterward,” he added with a harsh laugh.
“We’ll leave the money until then, Si Said.” Amar looked at him dreamily; it was the soft, veiled look which is meant to hide the scheming behind the eyes, but no Fassi could mistake it. The potter jumped to his feet and dug into his pocket.
“No!” he shouted, holding out some bills. “I don’t do things that way. Here.”
Amar took the money with bad grace. He had hoped to gain two things by letting it go until later: prestige in the eyes of Said, and possibly a greater sum when the time for collection came, in the event that Saïd had forgotten the exact amount.
“Very good,” he said hesitatingly, pocketing the money. “I’ll be around now and then, to see you.”
“Ouakha,” replied Said without enthusiasm. And as Amar moved away he called after him, possibly remembering the prosperity the boy had brought to his establishment, and feeling that he had been abrupt with him. “These are bad days, Si Amar. We’re all unhappy. We speak quickly.”
Amar turned, stepped over to the man, and kneeling, kissed the sleeve of his djellaba. “Good-bye, master,” he said.
The potter looked down at him distraughtly and pulled him to his feet. “Good-bye,” he said.
So now he was free again, Amar reflected, as he wandered back through the wet streets. On the one hand he was happy to feel that the world was open, that once more anything might happen; at the same time, he had enjoyed the sensation of building up his power and prestige, the feeling of moving toward something which he had had while he had been working at Saïd’s. Now it had all been destroyed at one blow. But no man has the right to lament the arrival of the inevitable.
A string of donkeys came plodding through the narrow street, their panniers bulging with sand. “Balek, balek,” chanted the man at their rear. He wore a slit sugar sack over his head as a djellaba to protect his face from the rain. As he passed by, Amar for some reason looked down at the ground. There, directly in front of him, lay a twenty-rial coin in the mud. Swiftly he bent over and picked it up, murmuring: “Bismil’lah ala maketseb Allah.” And suddenly he was reminded of a similar occasion long ago, when he had been working at the brick factory in the Taza road. That time it had been more than a hundred rial that he had come upon, lying in the street unnoticed. Since he had been on his way to work, he had taken the money directly to his master. The man had flown into a rage, and flinging the money on the ground, had struck him in the face, a blow whose unexpectedness made it only more painful. “Is that money yours?” the man had demanded. Amar had said it was not. “Then why did you pick it up? Next time when you see something in the street, leave it there and go on your way.” Then the man had sent a boy to Amar’s home to fetch his father. When Si Driss had arrived, the master had given him the money and advised him to beat his son, but Si Driss had taken exception to the man’s counsel and gently led Amar home, telling him that the man was right about the money, but wrong in his desire that Amar be punished, and that he would find a new master elsewhere. A few days later he had installed him as a shoemaker’s apprentice in the Cherratine. How many times, he wondered, had his father gone to protest the unjust treatment of his son by his employers? A great many times, certainly; Si Driss could not countenance even the smallest infraction of his conception of the Moslem code of justice, and on this account primarily Amar bore him an intense, undying love. Beyond the gates of justice lay the world of savages, kaffirine, wild beasts.
When he got home, his father and Mustapha were there, sitting quietly in the room off the courtyard, waiting while his mother and Halima prepared tea in the corner. His father was not surprised to hear that he was no longer working; he took the money that Amar handed him without saying anything more than: “Sit down and drink tea.” (The twenty-rial piece, the gift from Allah, remained in his pocket, but he had given him all that h
e had collected from the potter.)
Mustapha sat there, looking even glummer than usual. He had not had any work in several weeks, and it had secretly irked him to see that Amar had stayed on at the potter’s so long; now he could meet his brother’s gaze with equanimity. The center of his life seemed to be elsewhere than at home—in the cafés of Moulay Abdallah most likely, Amar thought; around the house he was merely a hollow shell, grunting a reply if he were spoken to, but never coming to life.
“It’s still swollen,” said his mother, looking up at the bridge of Amar’s nose from where she sat on the floor fanning the charcoal.
Si Driss sighed. “His nose is broken,” he said gently.
“Ay, ouildi, ouildi!” she began, and burst into tears.
“It’s nothing, woman,” the old man said, looking at her sternly. But she was inconsolable, and abandoned herself to a fit of weeping. Halima continued the tea-making. When she had served the others, she handed her mother a glass and induced her to sip a little.
“Listen!” said Si Driss, raising a silencing finger. In the distance there was the sound of strenuous chanting, as if the people who were doing it were walking very quickly. “The students,” he said. It was hard to tell how far away they were, because there were none of the usual neighborhood noises. “Our soldiers,” the old man added with bitterness.
“May Allah preserve them!” sobbed Amar’s mother.
Mustapha spoke up unexpectedly. “Every tobacco store in the Medina is smashed.”
“Good,” said Amar.
Mustapha glared at him. “Good in your head,” he growled.
Si Driss overlooked the impropriety of this exchange of conversation in his presence, motioning to Halima to refill his glass. Amar rose and went upstairs to his room. He sat on his mattress, thinking of what a useless and unpleasant man his brother was going to be. It seemed certain that Mustapha’s present ill-humor was due solely to the fact that he had not been able to get any kif in the past few days. Probably his usual source of supply had been cut off by the trouble.
