Dust on the Paw

by Robin Jenkins

  As he sat wondering whether to wait modestly or go down boldly to find out what it was all about, the telephone rang. He had to clear papers and books to get at it. Hoping it might be Laura he picked it up; but his eager smile instantly changed to a timid frown when the voice of Dr Habbibullah crackled harshly in his ear.

  ‘Good morning, Wahab.’

  ‘Good morning, Excellency.’

  It was right of course to show the man, or rather his position, proper respect, but surely this tremor of subservience was ignoble, especially as the boys were now tramping up the stairs, shouting his name triumphantly?

  ‘Maftoon was telling me you had some trouble yesterday.’

  ‘Did he say I had the trouble?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Let me tell you then that what trouble there was he provoked it by sending for the police. However, the matter was settled intelligently.’

  ‘By you?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, I think I am entitled to say so; but I should add I had the support of the boys.’

  Habbibullah grunted, in surprise as much as in anger. ‘I want to have a talk with you, Wahab. I find I can spare a few minutes this afternoon, at four sharp. Here, at my office.’

  ‘As you wish, Excellency.’ Wahab’s voice was a little hoarse with nervousness, but it was bold too, for outside the office the boys were calling on him to come out.

  ‘What’s that noise?’ asked the Minister. ‘I understood the boys were on holiday.’

  ‘So they are. It seems they have come to offer me some flowers.’

  ‘Flowers? What for?’

  ‘I do not know yet, sir, but I think in appreciation, which is usually the reason why flowers are offered. Please listen.’ He held out the telephone as far as the flex would reach, with the mouthpiece towards the door.

  ‘How many are there?’

  ‘Hundreds, as you can hear. I think, sir, it is the most hopeful sign of all that our youth is so ready to applaud honesty and fairness, and to condemn corruption and injustice. Do you not agree?’

  Habbibullah grunted. ‘I shall expect you at four.’

  ‘I shall be there, Excellency.’

  A slight pause. ‘Come alone, Wahab.’

  ‘Of course.’ Wahab smiled. The Minister was alarmed lest he should march to the meeting escorted by hundreds of singing boys.

  Replacing the telephone, with a tiny spit of disdain at it, he rose, knocked some pencil shavings off his jacket, and limped boldly towards the door. The key wasn’t in the padlock as it ought to have been. He looked on the floor below, where the hole in the carpet was like a nest of lost keys; but when he stooped stiffly to investigate he found only cigarette-ends, spent matches, and a toothpick. The boys were now banging on the door, assuring him they were there in friendliness, and urging him to come out and receive a surprise.

  He shouted as gaily as he could that he had mislaid the key, but they were making such a din themselves they couldn’t hear him. He searched his pockets; it wasn’t there. Wildly, he thought of getting out by the window, but the drop was at least twenty feet and he would be sure to break a leg. Now the boys were attributing his non-appearance to modesty, and their acclamations grew even warmer but he knew that if he did not soon appear all this generous emotion in their hearts might be driven out by disappointment and exasperation. Smiling, but whimpering too a little, he rushed about, looking on chairs, sofa, and the table, where at last, under his papers he found it. By which time he was so nervous he could hardly insert it into the small hole.

  Outside, the landing and stairs were crowded. What struck him first, even before the wonderful friendliness on their faces, was the fact that the air was richly fragrant. Yet so few of them had baths in their houses. It was the flowers, of course. Grown in Afghan soil, they sweetened not only the air here and now, but the whole future. It was an enormous bouquet, as he now saw. Rasouf was almost hidden behind it.

  When they saw him they cheered, clapped, whistled, and laughed.

  He held up his hands. ‘Why is this?’ he cried. ‘Is it not a holiday? It is strange for boys to come to school during a holiday.’

  He noticed some laughing involuntarily as they heard how cautious his voice had to be because of his sore lip, but it was the kind of laughter that did not detract from their homage, but rather made it more human and acceptable.

  Rasouf was pushed forward with the flowers. His stern young face peeped out from among them.

  ‘Sir,’ he cried, ‘we have heard that you are going to marry an Englishwoman, who has arrived in Kabul. Please give these flowers to her, with our best wishes.’

  From the shrieks and whistles of approval that broke out then it was obvious that they looked upon his acquiring of an English wife as the culminating stroke in his courageous defiance of what in their country’s laws enraged them most: this having to pay for a wife, exorbitantly for a pretty one, dearly for a passable one, and excessively even for one ugly and ill-tempered.

  He could not help catching a glimpse of himself through their admiring eyes. Unhappily he knew what they did not; that having jumped on her like a jowey dog, with slavering lust instead of love, he had been justly punished by losing her.

  Yet there was nothing he could do but take the flowers. They filled his arms and tickled his swollen nose. Treacherously, they reminded him, not of Laura, but of Mrs Wint, wife of the British Head of Chancery, who had smelled like them and had hair like these yellow ones.

  ‘This is very kind of you, boys,’ he cried, with tears in his eyes.

  Rasouf’s eyes were dry and stern. ‘Sir, I have been asked on behalf of the whole school to assure you that if they try to dismiss you for what happened yesterday we will all go on strike.’

  It was only then that Wahab realized Dr Habbibullah’s purpose in sending for him must indeed be to warn him he was going to be dismissed. Prince Naim was still Minister of Education, but for days he had not been at his office; in any case even if he wished to take Wahab’s part he would not dare oppose Habbibullah and the latter’s friends, who were said to include more than half of the Cabinet.

  About to appeal to the boys not even to think of striking, Wahab thought again; in the meantime he gagged himself, as it were, with the flowers. Why should they not strike in such a cause? Yesterday when he had endured the policemen’s brutality, he had not merely been Abdul Wahab, their Principal. He had been the representative of decency and justice; these were qualities worth striking for. That they had been embodied in him was incidental.

  ‘Thank you, boys,’ he cried, and then let his enthusiasm run away with him again. ‘You and I have given each other strength and courage. I am now engaged in translating into Persian an English textbook. It is the first, but in a year or two there will be many others; and in less than ten years you will see in our land the most up-to-date achievements of science, not for destructive purposes, but to create wealth and happiness for all.’

  Though they remained cheerful and well-disposed, many were openly sceptical. Even as they pressed forward to shake his hand they were shaking their heads too, in amusement at what they evidently considered his ingenuousness.

  What, he wondered, is going to happen to a country whose youth are merry and cynical?

  Ten minutes later they had all gone from the landing. His hand was numbed with shaking theirs. He could hear them laughing below in the hall and out in the playground. Some let out occasional cries, as of agony. He thought he knew why; like his own, their ideals were starving.

  He spent a few minutes in arranging the flowers in the water jar. Then, after further hesitation, he lifted the telephone and dialled Moffatt’s number.

  Luckily it was Moffatt himself who answered. Had it not been he had been going to pretend he was someone else, with the wrong number.

  ‘Mr Moffatt, this is Abdul Wahab.’

  ‘Oh, good morning.’

  ‘Please do not let anyone know it is I.’

  ‘I’ll do my best, but you know what wo
men are.’

  Wahab smiled sadly. ‘I have a favour to ask of you, Mr Moffatt.’

  ‘If I can, I’ll be pleased to oblige.’

  ‘Some boys have just brought flowers for Laura. I do not know how they found out about her; certainly I did not tell them. The flowers are very beautiful.’ As he glanced at them he had the feeling that Moffatt must be smelling their fragrance, too. ‘But, of course, as you know, it is all ended between Laura and me, owing to my bestiality.’ He imagined he heard Moffatt chuckle, but decided he must have been mistaken. ‘Nevertheless, I would like to send her these flowers. Because the boys gave them they represent something important to me. What I want you to tell me – please, be frank – is whether in your opinion I ought to send them to her. I do not with to make matters worse. Even flowers cannot remedy insult.’

  ‘Send them. She’ll be delighted.’

  ‘Ah, you are just saying so to cheer me up.’

  This time Moffatt did laugh. ‘No, I mean it. I don’t think she’s as much insulted as you fear.’

  ‘But she must be.’ Wahab felt indignant. Surely any respectable woman would have been grievously insulted by what he had done to Laura. True enough, afterwards she had asked him to kiss her, but that must have been nervous reaction.

  ‘As a matter of fact, Wahab, I’ve been going to ring you and suggest that you pay us a surprise visit.’

  ‘To your house, do you mean?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Is Laura still with you?’

  ‘Yes. She’s out at the moment, visiting the bazaars with Lan.’

  ‘Is she well enough?’

  ‘Very well. In fact, remarkably well.’

  Wahab frowned, distrusting Moffatt’s chuckle. ‘But she was ill yesterday.’

  ‘She’s quite recovered. Yes, come along, and bring the flowers.’

  ‘You guarantee it will be all right?’

  ‘I can hardly do that. Would you expect me to where a woman in love’s concerned?’

  ‘You think she is in love?’

  ‘Formidably.’

  ‘Formidably?’

  Moffatt laughed. ‘You know what I mean.’

  ‘I’m afraid I do not. You meant she is in love with me?’

  ‘Who else?’

  Wahab was about to consider possible rivals, when he realized its folly. ‘But I do not understand why you should say formidably.’

  ‘Well, you know Laura.’

  ‘Yes, I think I can say I do know her.’

  ‘Well then!’ Again Moffatt laughed. ‘I’m sorry, Wahab. I’m joking. But be sure to come.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘As soon as you can. Today, sometime.’

  ‘I have an appointment at four.’

  ‘Come at five then.’

  ‘It is with Dr Habbibullah, the Minister of Justice.’

  ‘In that case you’d better come at three. I’ve heard that people sometimes disappear after interviews with that gentleman.’

  ‘You must not believe all you hear, Mr Moffatt. We may not be advanced industrially, but we are not quite in the Dark Ages legally.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘I shall be pleased to come at five o’clock. I shall bring the flowers.’ He had been working it out: he could hire a taxi to take him to Habbibullah’s office; it could wait for him there, and afterwards take him to Moffatt’s house. ‘You are quite sure Laura is willing to see me?’

  ‘Much more than willing.’

  ‘I do not understand.’ Two things really he didn’t understand: first, why Laura should be willing to see him, and secondly, why Moffatt should be so eager to bring them together again. Before her arrival had not the fat Englishman been bitterly determined to keep them apart? Could it be that, after meeting her, he had decided that that was all she was worth, to marry an Afghan? Wahab found his tongue stumbling as he said: ‘I assure you, I deserve only her displeasure. How can she forgive me when I find it impossible to forgive myself?’

  There was a pause. ‘Apparently that’s a trick that can be done,’ said Moffatt, with the banter gone from his voice. Next moment it was back again, but not so lightheartedly. ‘She’s been telling everybody she’s got only one doubt in her mind.’

  Of course, Wahab remembered, he too insulted his wife. Is that why he now sounds so strangely like a man under sentence of forgiveness? He has hinted that my Laura is a strong-willed woman; so she is, but not any more so, I fancy, than his own sweetly smiling small-breasted wife.

  ‘And what doubt is that, Mr Moffatt?’ he asked.

  ‘She feels she may not be worthy of you.’

  Wahab’s eyes, bright for a moment, suddenly clouded. It had occurred to him that Moffatt, with Laura its instigator, was taking part in a plot to entice him to the house, there to be submitted to a punishment considered appropriate. Other men of the British community, such as Howard Winfield and Gillie the Consul and Langford the gin-drinker would be there too, lying in wait. He recalled stories he had read of American Negroes being castrated for having had intercourse with white women. Well, painfully susceptible though he was at present, owing to his bruised and swollen groin, he would courageously walk into their trap.

  ‘I shall bring the flowers,’ he said.

  ‘By all means.’

  ‘And the card. The English on it is rather quaint.’

  ‘The quainter the better.’

  Yet would Laura in the present circumstances see the humour of a card on which Rasouf, or someone with as little English, had written: ‘nice gretings to or principul’s wiv toby’?

  ‘I know over a telephone’s a cowardly way of apologizing,’ said Moffatt.

  Wahab frowned. ‘I may be a coward,’ he said. ‘But I am not apologizing at the moment.’

  ‘No, I am. I don’t think I’ve ever properly apologized for throwing the whisky at you.’

  Wahab felt his eyes smart and water. But was not self-pity the Afghans’ whisky, that rotted their self-respect?

  ‘You did apologize,’ he said stiffly.

  ‘Yes, but it was a bloody insult, the way I did it.’

  ‘I do not expect a man to drop on his knees before me, Mr Moffatt. If your previous apology was sincere, then let us hear no more about it.’

  ‘But it wasn’t. So I’m trying again. Other things happened that night that I’ll never forgive myself for.’

  Wahab’s heart went warm. His suspicion of a plot to capture and castrate him was madness. Moffatt’s invitation, like his present apology, was sincere. Human life was short, and so much in it was inadequate, why therefore belittle what was good, such as friendship? Besides, he and Moffatt were in a way the victims of women.

  ‘Let us be friends,’ he said.

  ‘Why not?’ replied the Englishman.

  ‘Some day I shall tell you something,’ said Wahab, with a chuckle. He meant his having had Moffatt’s expulsion in his pocket.

  ‘Fine. In the meantime I’ll not tell Laura you’re coming. We’ll keep it as a surprise.’

  Suspicion wriggled again. ‘Is there any special reason why she should not be told?’

  ‘None. I just thought she’d prefer it that way.’

  ‘Ah, of course,’ cried Wahab, with enthusiasm. ‘By all means let us keep it as a surprise. There I shall be, with the flowers. What will she say? What will she do?’ He could not speak for laughing.

  At the other end Moffatt was laughing, too. ‘Good. Till five then.’

  ‘Good-bye, Mr Moffatt, and thank you very much.’

  Still laughing Wahab put down the telephone. In front of him the mathematical symbols which he had written were beautiful, and when he turned his head there were the flowers, beautiful too. He remembered the afternoon in the Prince’s garden when he had picked flowers for Laura and then had let them drop to the green grass because their very loveliness had convinced him that she was not as far away as England merely, but as death. Now she was not only in Kabul, but in life, waiting to be surprised by him.


  He was interrupted by a knock on the door. In poked Sadruddin’s shaven head and gray corpse-like face, looking as if he’d just come from a vigil without food and water in a holy man’s tomb among the dusty mountains. Thus he had looked when protecting his microscopes and maps, or when some boy had lost a jotter.

  ‘Abdul Wahab,’ he croaked, scratching at his bony chest as if about to rip out his heart and throw it into the world’s face.

  ‘Yes, Sadruddin. What is it?’

  ‘There is someone downstairs to see you.’

  ‘A woman?’ Wahab almost leaped to his feet. Had Laura come to surprise him?

  ‘Worse than a woman. An American.’

  ‘I don’t know any Americans.’ That was not quite true, but certainly he knew none likely to come visiting him here in the school.

  ‘We should have dogs to drive off such people.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous, Sadruddin.’

  ‘An American!’ Into the word Sadruddin squeezed years of envy, wonder, suspicion, hate, and scorn. ‘They come here and live like rich men, with large cars. It is our money they spend. They say here is help for Afghanistan, and put it back into their own pockets.’

  ‘This is silly bazaar gossip, Sadruddin. The Americans are the most generous people in the world.’

  ‘This one’s in disguise, Abdul Wahab. Take care. He did not come in a large car; he came on a ghoddy. And he has not shaved for three days.’

  ‘Please go down and tell the gentleman to come up.’

  ‘I think he has a gun in his pocket. They are saying in the bazaar that the Americans are willing to pay a million afghanis to anyone who will shoot Voroshilov the Russian.’

  ‘What nonsense!’

  ‘They are saying too that at the Jeshan parade tomorrow there will be hundreds hoping to win the prize. I know a man with a gun; he says he may try.’

  Then behind Sadruddin was heard a voice, apologetic and a little hoarse, but unmistakeably American: ‘Sorry if I’m butting in, but I thought maybe I’d be forgotten again. That’s been tried on me so often this past week I guess you’ll overlook my suspiciousness.’