by Amin Maalouf
At the mere mention of this name the atmosphere became heavy. There was no more joviality, animation or paternal reproach. Only an embarrassed look which I took to be evasive and utter silence. Then he spoke:
‘Are you a friend of Howard’s?’
‘In a manner of speaking, I am responsible for his coming to Persia.’
‘What a heavy responsibility!’
In vain I tried to make out a smile on his lips. He seemed suddenly old and worn. His shoulders drooped and he seemed almost to be entreating me.
‘I have been running this mission for fifteen years. Our school is the best in the city and I go so far as to believe that our work is useful and Christian. Those who take part in our activities have at heart this country’s progress, otherwise, believe you me, nothing would force them to come so far in order to take on an environment which is often hostile.’
I had no reason to doubt him, but this man’s eagerness to defend himself put me off him. I had only been in his office for a few minutes, I had not accused him of anything and had not asked him for anything. I merely nodded politely. He continued:
‘When a missionary displays indifference towards the difficulties facing the Persians or when a teacher no longer derives any joy from his students’ progress, I strongly advise him to go back to the United States. Sometimes enthusiasm sags, above all with the younger teachers. What could be more human?’
Having spoken this preamble, the reverend sat silent and his stubby hands nervously fingered his pipe. He seemed to be having difficulty in finding his words. I thought it my duty to make the task easier for him. I adopted my most detached tone:
‘Are you trying to say that Howard has become discouraged after these few months and that his love of the East has turned out to be a passing fancy?’
He jumped up.
‘Good Lord, no. Not Baskerville! I was trying to explain what happens occasionally with some of our recruits. With your friend it is the opposite and I am infinitely more worried by that. In one sense, he is the best teacher we have ever employed. His students are making wonderful progress, their parents swear by him and the mission has never received so many presents – sheep, chicken, halva – all in honour of Baskerville. The problem with him is that he refuses to behave like a foreigner. If he were just happy to dress like the people here, to live on pilau and to greet me in the vernacular of the country, I would have been happy to smile at all that. But Baskerville is not the sort of man who stops at appearances and he has thrown himself wholeheartedly into the political battle. In class he praises the constitution and encourages his students to criticize the Russians, the English and the Shah and the backward-looking mullahs. I even suspect him of being what they call here a ‘son of Adam’, that is to say a member of the secret societies.’
He sighed.
‘Yesterday morning a demonstration took place in front of our gate, led by two of the most eminent religious chiefs, demanding that Baskerville leave or, failing that, purely and simply that the mission close down. Three hours later another demonstration broke out in the same spot in support of Howard demanding that he be kept on. You must understand that if a conflict like this goes on we will not be able to stay in this city much longer.’
‘I suppose that you have already spoken of this with Howard.’
‘A hundred times, and a hundred different ways. He invariably replies that the reawakening of the Orient is more important than the Mission’s fate and that if the constitutional revolution fails we will be obliged to leave in any case. Naturally I can always end his contract, but such an act will not be understood and will only arouse hostility amongst that section of the population which has always supported us. The only solution is for Baskerville to cool his ardour. Perhaps you can reason with him?’
While not formally agreeing to the undertaking, I asked to see Howard. A glimmer of triumph suddenly lit up the reverend’s ginger beard. He jumped up from his seat.
‘Follow me,’ he said. ‘I shall show you Baskerville. I believe I know where he is. Watch him in silence – you will understand my reasons and share my feelings of helplessness.’
BOOK FOUR
A Poet at Sea
We are the pawns, and Heaven is the player;
This is plain truth, and not a mode of speech.
We move about the chessboard of the world.
Then drop into the casket of the void.
OMAR KHAYYAM
CHAPTER 36
In the ochre dusk of a walled garden there was a groaning crowd. How was I going to recognize Baskerville? Everyone’s face was so brown! I leant against a tree, waiting and watching. The doorway of a lighted cabin had been made into an improvised theatre. The rozeh-khawari, story-teller and mourner, was drawing out the tears of the faithful along with their shouts and their blood.
A man stepped out of the shadows, a volunteer for pain. His feet were bare, his torso naked and he had a chain wound around each hand: he threw the chains up in the air and let them fall behind his shoulders on to his back: the chains were smooth, bruising and pummelling his flesh but it did not give – it took thirty to fifty strokes for the first blood to appear as a black spot which then started pouring out in fascinating spurts. It was the theatre of suffering, the age-old game of the passion.
The beating became more vigorous as his noisy breathing was echoed by the crowd. The blows went on and the story-teller spoke louder to make his voice carry over the sound of the flagellation. Then an actor sprang up and threatened the audience with his sabre. His grimaces first attracted curses and then volleys of stones. He did not stay on the scene for long. Soon his victim appeared and the crowd gave out a roar. I myself could not hold back a shout, for the man dragging himself along the ground had been decapitated.
I turned horrified to the reverend; he reassured me with a cold smile and whispered:
‘It is an old trick. They get a child, or a very small man, and on his head they place a sheep’s head which is turned upside-down so that its bloody neck points upward. Then they wrap a white cloth around it with a hole in the appropriate place. As you can see the effect is transfixing.’
He drew on his pipe. The headless man hopped and wheeled around the stage for minutes on end, until he gave up his place to a strange person in tears.
‘Baskerville!’
I gave the reverend another questioning look. He did no more than raise his eyebrows enigmatically.
The strangest thing was that Howard was dressed as an American, even sporting a top hat which struck me as irresistibly amusing in spite of the pervading atmosphere of tragedy.
The crowd was still yelling, lamenting and, as far as I could see, no one else’s face showed the least hint of amusement except the pastor’s. Finally he deigned to enlighten me:
‘There is always a European in these funeral rites, and curiously, he is one of the “goodies”. Tradition has it that a Frankish ambassador at the Omayyad court was moved by the death of Hussein, the supreme martyr of the Shiites, and that he showed his disapproval of the crime so noisily that he himself was put to death. Naturally, there is not always a European to hand who can appear in the spectacle, so they use a Turk or a light-skinned Persian. However since Baskerville has been at Tabriz they always call upon him to play this role. He plays it splendidly – and he really cries!’
At that moment the man with the sword came back and pranced boisterously around Baskerville who stood still and then flicked his hat off, revealing his blond hair which was carefully parted to the left. Then, with the slowness of a zombie he fell to his knees and stretched out on the ground. A beam of light lit up his clean-shaven child’s face and his cheekbones which were puffed up with tears, and a nearby hand threw a cluster of petals on to his black suit.
I could not hear the crowd any longer. My eyes were riveted to my friend and I was waiting anxiously for him to get up again. The ceremony seemed to go on for ever and I was impatient to retrieve him.
An hour later we
met around bowl of pomegranate soup at the mission. The pastor left us alone and we ate amid an embarrassed silence. Baskerville’s eyes were still red.
‘It takes me a while to become a Westerner again,’ he apologized with a broken smile.
‘Take your time, the century has just begun.’
He coughed, brought the hot bowl to his lips and became lost again in silent thought.
Then haltingly he said:
‘When I arrived in this country, I could not understand how grown and bearded men could sob and work themselves up over a murder committed twelve hundred years ago. Now I have understood. If the Persians live in the past it is because the past is their homeland and the present is a foreign country where nothing belongs to them. Everything which is a symbol of modern life and greater freedom for us, for them is a symbol of foreign domination: the roads – Russia; the railways, telegraph and banking system – England; the postal service – Austria-Hungary …’
‘And the teaching of science, that’s Mr Baskerville from the American Presbyterian Mission.’
‘Exactly. What choice do the people of Tabriz have? To send their children to a traditional school where they learn by rote the same misshapen phrases that their ancestors were repeating back in the twelfth century; or to send them to my class where they receive an education which is the same as that of young Americans, but in the shadow of a cross and a star-spangled banner? My students will be the better, the more adept and the more useful for their country, but how can we prevent the others from seeing them as renegades? In the very first week of my stay I asked myself that question, and it was during a ceremony like the one you have just been watching that I found the solution.
‘I had mingled with the crowd and groans were being emitted all around me. Watching those devastated faces, bathed in tears, and gazing at those haggard, worried and entreating eyes, the whole misery of Persia appeared to me – they were tattered souls besieged by never-ending mourning. Without realizing it, my tears started to flow. Someone in the crowd noticed, they looked at me and were moved and then they pushed me toward the stage where they made me act out the role of the Frankish ambassador. The next day my students’ parents came to see me; they were happy that they could now answer the people who had been reproaching them for sending their children to the Presbyterian Mission: “I have entrusted my son to the teacher who cried for the Imam Hussein.” Some religious chiefs were irritated but their hostility toward me can be attributed to my success. They prefer foreigners to behave like foreigners.’
I understood his behaviour better, but I was still sceptical:
‘So, for you, the solution to Persia’s problem is to join in with the crowds of mourners!’
‘I did not say that. Crying is not a recipe for anything. Nor is it a skill. It is simply a naked, naive and pathetic gesture. No one should be forced to shed tears. The only important thing is not to scorn other peoples’ tragedy. When they saw me crying, when they saw that I had thrown off the sovereign indifference of a foreigner, they came to tell me confidentially that crying serves no purpose and that Persia does not need any extra mourners and that the best I could do would be to provide the children of Tabriz with an adequate education.’
‘Wise words. I was going to tell you the same thing.’
‘Except that if I had not cried, they never would have come to talk to me. If they had not seen me crying, they would never have let me tell the pupils that this Shah was rotten and that the religious chiefs of Tabriz were hardly any better!’
‘Did you say that in class?’
‘Yes, I said that. This young beardless American, this young teacher at the Presbyterian Mission denounced both the crown and the turban and my students agreed with him. So did their parents. Only the reverend was outraged.’
Seeing that I was perplexed he added:
‘I have also spoken to the boys about Khayyam. I told them that millions of Americans and Europeans had made his Rubaiyaat their bedside book and I made them learn FitzGerald’s verses by heart. The next day, a grandfather came to see me. He was very moved by what his grandson had told him and he said: ‘We too have great respect for the American poets!’ Naturally he was completely unable to name a single one, but that makes no difference. It was his way of expressing his pride and gratitude. Unfortunately not all the parents reacted in the same way. One of them came to complain to me. In the pastor’s presence he yelled at me: ‘Khayyam was a drunkard and an impious man!’ I replied: ‘By saying that you are not insulting Khayyam but praising drunkenness and ungodliness!’ The reverend almost choked on the spot.’
Howard laughed like a child. He was incorrigible and disarming.
‘So you hail everything they accuse you of! Might you also be a “son of Adam”?’
‘Did the reverend tell you that too? I have the impression that you both spoke a great deal about me.’
‘We have no one else in common.’
‘I will not hide anything from you. My conscience is as pure as that of a new-born babe. About two months ago a man came to see me. He was a huge man with a moustache, but quite timid. He asked if I could give a talk at the anjuman – the club of which he was a member and you will never guess on what subject! On Darwin’s theory! I found the matter amusing and touching, given the atmosphere of political upheaval which reigns in this country, and I accepted. I gathered together everything I could lay my hands on about Darwin. I set out the theories of his detractors. I think that my performance must have been boring, but the room was crowded and they listened to me religiously. After that I went to other meetings on more diverse subjects. There is an immense thirst for knowledge among these people. They are also the most determined Constitutionalists. Sometimes I would pass by their meeting hall to hear the latest news from Teheran. You ought to meet them, they dream of the same world as you and I.’
CHAPTER 37
In the evening few stalls stayed open in the Tabriz bazaar, but the streets were alive and men were sitting around talking at the crossroads, setting up circles of wicker chairs and of kalyan pipes whose smoke was gradually displacing the thousand smells of the day. I followed close on Howard’s heels as he turned from one alley into another without a second glance; from time to time he would stop to greet the parent of one of his students, and the street urchins everywhere stopped their games and scattered as he passed.
We finally arrived in front of a gate which was almost eaten away by rust. My companion pushed it open and we went through a small overgrown garden and up to a mud-brick house whose door, after seven raps, opened creaking on to a huge room which was lit up by a row of storm lamps hung from the ceiling and which a draught of air was swaying ceaselessly. The people present must have been used to it, but I very quickly felt as if I was on board a flimsy raft. I could no longer focus on anyone’s face and felt the need to lie down as soon as possible and close my eyes for a few moments. Baskerville was not unknown at the ‘sons of Adam’ meeting – he caused quite a stir when he walked in and as I had accompanied him I also had the right to some fraternal embraces which were duly redoubled when Howard revealed that his arrival in Persia was partly due to me.
When I thought it was time for me to sit down against a wall, a large man stood up at the end of the room. He had a long white cape draped over his shoulders which set him apart from the others as the most eminent person in the meeting. He took a step toward me:
‘Benjamin!’
I stood up again, took two steps and rubbed my eyes. ‘Fazel!’ We fell into each other’s arms with an oath of surprise.
‘Mr Lesage was a friend of Sayyid Jamaladin!’
Immediately I stopped being a distinguished visitor and became an historic monument, or even a religious relic. People came up to me with awe, which was quite embarrassing.
I presented Howard to Fazel. They knew each other only by reputation. Fazel had not been to Tabriz for more than a year, even though it was his birthplace. Moreover, there was something unusual and uns
ettling about the whole evening, together with Fazel being there within those flaking walls and under those dancing lights. Was he not one of the leaders of the democratic party in parliament, a pillar of the Constitutional Revolution? Was this the moment for him to be away from the capital? These were the questions which I put to him. He appeared embarrassed. However, I had spoken quietly in French. He looked furtively at the men next to him, and then by way of an answer he said, ‘Where are you staying?’
‘In the caravansary in the Armenian quarter.’
‘I shall come to see you during the night.’
Toward midnight we met again, six of us, in my room. There were Baskerville, myself, Fazel and three of his companions whom he introduced hurriedly for reasons of secrecy, only by their first names.
‘You asked at the anjuman why I was here and not in Teheran. Well, it is because the capital is already lost as far as the constitution goes. I could not state it in these terms to thirty people, I would have caused panic. But that is the truth.’
We were all too stunned to react. He explained:
‘Two weeks ago a journalist from St Petersberg came to see me. He was the correspondent of Ryesh. His name is Panoff but he writes under the pseudonym “Tané”.’
I had heard about him and his articles were often quoted in the London press.
‘He is a social democrat,’ Fazel continued, ‘and an enemy of Tsarism but when he arrived in Teheran some months ago he managed to hide his beliefs, worked his way into the Russian legation, and by some chance or other or even by some plan, he managed to lay his hands on some compromising documents including a project for a coup d’état which the Cossacks would carry out in order to re-impose an absolute monarchy. It was all written down in black and white. The underworld was to be given free rein in the bazaar in order to sap the merchants’ confidence in the new regime, and some religious chiefs were to address petitions to the Shah asking him to invalidate the constitution by reason of its being against Islam. Naturally Panoff was taking a risk in bringing me those documents. I thanked him for them and immediately asked for an extraordinary meeting of Parliament. Having exposed the facts in detail, I demanded that the Shah be dismissed and replaced by one of his young sons, that the Cossack brigade be broken up and the clerics incriminated in the documents be arrested. Several speakers came up to the dais to express their indignation and to support my proposals.
