“Tell me what you’re up to, for the love of God,” he whispered.
“Wait,” scolded Darwish. “Can’t you be patient?”
He leaned toward him and went on, “I’m not asking you to do anything. I’ll do it all. Just cover my back if you need to.”
“But I don’t know what you’re going to do.”
“Shut up. Nobody’s forcing you to stay.”
A sound floated up from the desert. The scent of a living creature was carried on the breeze and an old man’s voice apparently encouraging an animal.
Soon they could make him out, sitting astride a donkey. As he drew level with them Darwish jumped on him. Ashur was astonished. His worst fears were realized. He could see nothing clearly, but he heard Darwish’s voice threatening, “Hand over your money.”
“Have mercy. You’re hurting me,” said a voice trembling with old age and terror.
Ashur rushed forward without stopping to think. “Let him go!” he shouted.
“Shut your mouth!” screamed Darwish.
“I said let him go.”
He wrapped his arms around Darwish’s waist and hoisted him off his feet. Darwish elbowed him frantically in the chest and cursed loudly. Ashur immobilized him so that only his tongue still moved, then turned to the old man. “Go in peace,” he said.
Only when he was sure the man had escaped did he release Darwish. “I’m sorry if I was rough,” he said apologetically.
“Ungrateful bastard!”
“But I saved you from doing something you’d regret.”
“You miserable idiot! Begging’s all you’re fit for!”
“God forgive you.”
“Dirty bastard!”
Saddened, Ashur fell silent.
“You’re a bastard. Don’t you understand? It’s the truth.”
“Don’t let your anger get the better of you. The sheikh told me where I came from.”
“I’m telling you the truth. He found you on the path where your whore mother left you,” said Darwish venomously.
“God rest them all.”
“On my honor and my brother’s soul, you’re just a bastard. Why else would they have got rid of a newborn baby in the middle of the night?”
Offended, Ashur said nothing.
“You’ve wasted my good work. Thrown away an opportunity to make some money. You might be strong, but you’re a coward. You’ve just proved it.”
He landed a punch full in Ashur’s face. Ashur, stunned by his first direct experience of physical violence, did nothing.
“Coward! Weakling!” shouted Darwish in a fury.
A wave of anger swept over Ashur, its violence shattering the sanctuary of night. With the flat of his great hand he struck his master on the head. Darwish sank to the floor, unconscious. Ashur struggled with his anger, forcing himself to calm down, and realized the gravity of what he had done.
“Forgive me, Sheikh Afra,” he muttered.
He lifted Darwish in his arms and made his way among the graves to the house, where he laid him down on the sofa, lit the lamp, and stood watching him, full of anxiety and remorse. The minutes dragged by. At last Darwish opened his eyes and moved his head feebly.
Rage flickered in his eyes, showing that he remembered. The two men looked at one another in silence. Ashur felt as if Afra and Sakina were there, watching them sorrowfully.
He left the house. “God knows what’s going to happen to me now,” he murmured.
8.
Ashur wandered here and there. He slept on the ground, which is father and mother to the homeless, getting food where he could. On warm nights he slept below the wall of the monastery and on cold nights under the archway. He finally believed what Darwish had told him about his origins. The bitter truth hounded him and closed around him. A few nights in Darwish’s company had taught him more about the realities of the world than twenty years spent under the wing of the good sheikh Afra. The wicked are harsh but honest teachers. He was a child of sin. The sinners had vanished, leaving him to face the world alone. Maybe he lived on as a painful memory in some restless heart.
His grief made him listen to the songs from the monastery more eagerly than ever. The meanings of their sweetly intoned cadences were hidden from him behind a veil of Persian, just as he imagined his mother and father were hidden behind the faces of strangers. One day he might find his mother, or his father, or discover the meanings of the words. Perhaps some of the riddles would be solved, he would cry tears of happiness, find cherished desires realized in the person of someone he loved. He spent hours gazing at the monastery garden, with its graceful, arching trees, grassy lawns, and trilling birds, and at the dervishes moving nimbly in their flowing robes and tall felt hats.
“Why do they do menial tasks like the poor?” he mused one day. “They sweep, lay the dust, water the plants. Perhaps they need a reliable servant.”
The great door was calling him, whispering to him to knock and enter. The joy and serenity of the place scared him. He was in the garden, a fruit swollen with sweet juices, leaves yielding silk. A pure hand will come to pluck you in ecstasy.
The soft whisper won him over. He approached the door and called out modestly, politely to the men of God.
He called again and again, to no avail. They were hiding. No one answered. Even the birds regarded him suspiciously. The men of God didn’t know his language, nor he theirs. The stream stopped flowing; the grass and flowers stopped dancing. Nothing needed him.
His enthusiasm waned. His inspiration was stifled. He was covered in confusion. He reproached himself for the strength of his feelings and struggled to control his will.
“Don’t let yourself become the talk of the neighborhood,” he told himself, tugging on his splendid mustache. “Forget about people who refuse your help and look for someone who needs you.”
After this he earned his living any way he could, helping at weddings and funerals, acting as a porter or an errand boy, grateful for the odd coin or loaf of bread, or even a kind word.
One day an ugly man with a rat face accosted him: “Hey, boy!”
Ashur went up to him politely, ready to help.
“Don’t you know me?” asked the man.
“Forgive me. I’m a stranger,” answered Ashur, embarrassed.
“But you come from this alley?”
“I’ve only lived in it a short time.”
“Kulayb al-Samani. I’m one of the clan chief’s men.”
“Pleased to meet you, master.”
The man stared hard at him, then asked, “Will you join us?”
“I haven’t the stomach for it,” replied Ashur, without hesitation.
Kulayb laughed scornfully. “The body of an ox and the heart of a bird,” he said, turning to go.
Ashur used to see Zayn al-Naturi’s donkey tied up in the stable after a hard day’s work. He took to brushing her, feeding her, sweeping the yard and sprinkling it with fresh water, never asking anything in return.
One day Zayn called him over. “You’re Sheikh Afra’s boy, aren’t you?” he inquired.
“Yes. God rest his soul,” answered Ashur humbly.
“I heard you refused to join Qanswa’s clan?”
“There’s nothing in it for me.”
Zayn smiled and offered him a job as a donkey boy. Ashur accepted on the spot, his heart dancing for joy.
He led the donkey to work with energy and enthusiasm. As each day passed Zayn grew more sure of his good conduct and his piety, while Ashur for his part was glad to prove that he was trustworthy.
While he was working in the courtyard of Zayn’s house, he carefully avoided looking anywhere he might catch a glimpse of his master’s wife. But he saw his daughter Zaynab going out one day. He glanced for a few brief moments, and regretted it immediately. His remorse grew as a hot flame burned through his chest and innards and settled in his groin, blazing with unbridled desire.
“God save me,” he murmured, intoxicated by a rich, wild craving.
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For the first time he had mentioned God’s name while his thoughts were somewhere quite different. This sexual experience, limited and basic as it was, sent through him a shudder of embarrassment, anxiety, and strangeness.
Zayn al-Naturi decided he would make a dependable watchman. “Where do you live, Ashur?” he asked.
“By the monastery wall or under the archway.”
“Wouldn’t you like to sleep in the stable here?”
“Thank you, master,” answered Ashur happily.
9.
He used to wake at dawn. He liked the darkness streaked with smiling light, the hum of activity from the pious and the dissolute, the pure breathing of existence still wrapped in dreams. He would push aside Zaynab’s provocative image, say his prayers, swallow a flat loaf with pickled olives and onions, pat the donkey affectionately, then drive it ahead of him to the main square, looking forward to earning his daily bread. He was overflowing with vitality and full of boundless confidence in his ability, his powers of endurance, his control over the unknown. At the same time he was caught up in a vortex of feelings which threatened to uproot him: Zaynab was always ahead of him, triumphantly drawing him with her secret call. She had a pale face with a prominent nose and thick lips, and a small, solid body, but she had a bewitching effect on him. A fire burned constantly in his entrails. Sometimes he was oblivious to the donkey and its rider.
When he broke for a rest he would stand in front of the house, watching the stream of passersby: market traders, barrow boys, hawkers and peddlers, vagrants and tradesmen in search of work. Were his father and mother there somewhere? Were they still alive? Did they know him? Who had bequeathed him the giant frame, filled out by the benevolence of Sheikh Afra Zaydan? He chased away these futile thoughts and was immediately accosted by Zaynab al-Naturi’s secret call.
“Nothing stays the same,” he said to himself. “Something must happen. Let God be on my side as a reward for my pure intentions.”
The furious voice of Zayn al-Naturi broke in on his thoughts. He saw him in the yard, locked in a verbal confrontation with a customer.
“You’re nothing but a thief,” he shouted.
“Watch your tongue!”
Zayn slapped him around the face and grabbed his collar. Ashur rushed up to them, shouting at them to stop, and threw himself between them. Swearing viciously, the customer kicked out. Ashur held him pinned until he screamed in pain. Relaxing his grip, he said, “On your way, or you’ll regret it.”
He took to his heels as the women crowded to the window and Zaynab’s mother shouted, “Next we’ll be raped in our beds!”
Zayn al-Naturi fixed grateful eyes on Ashur. “God bless you, son,” he murmured, doing his best to hide his embarrassment.
He went indoors. Only Zaynab was left at the window. Ashur returned to his place by the door, thinking that it was only a matter of time before their eyes met.
He leaned back against the wall and noticed a cat preparing to terrorize a black dog. The dog turned aside to avoid a fight.
“Take care, Ashur,” he said to himself. “This is a warning from your parents!”
Then he abandoned himself to the caresses of pleasant dreams until the sun’s rays burned him.
10.
“Are you sure he can be trusted?” said Adlat to her husband, Zayn al-Naturi.
“Of course. He’s become like a son to me.”
“Fine. Marry him to Zaynab,” she said impatiently.
Zayn al-Naturi frowned thoughtfully. “I’d hoped for someone better.”
“We’ve waited too long. Every time someone comes asking to marry one of her half sisters, you refuse because Zaynab’s the oldest.”
“If she was your own flesh and blood you wouldn’t say that.”
“She’s spoiling my daughters’ prospects. She’s twenty-five years old, she’s ugly, and she’s getting more ill-natured from day to day.”
“If she was your own flesh and blood you wouldn’t say that,” he repeated morosely.
“Isn’t it enough that you trust him? You need someone you can trust in your old age.”
“What about Zaynab?”
“She’ll be delighted. Save her from her desperation!”
11.
Ashur heard Zayn calling him from his sitting room. He made room for him on a wooden sofa covered with a sheepskin rug. After a moment’s hesitation Ashur sat down.
“Isn’t it time you thought of getting married, Ashur?” his master asked him gently.
12.
Light and joy: when the dream becomes a blessing, a song in the ear and the heart, and the faces of men shine with tolerance, and even insects no longer sting.
Ashur went to the Sultan baths and shaved and washed away the sweat, combed his hair, trimmed his mustache, sprinkled himself with rose water, and cleaned his teeth with a polished walnut twig. Then he strolled out in a flowing white robe and red leather slippers made especially for his huge feet.
The wedding was celebrated in the normal way in the al-Naturi house, and afterward the bride and groom set up home in a basement flat across the alley, composed of one room and an entrance hall. Ashur was overflowing with love, and some degenerate citizens, leaving the smoking dens well after midnight, would crouch in the darkness close to the basement window, listening and dreaming.
As time passed Hasballah, Rizqallah, and Hibatallah were born, Zayn and his wife died, and their daughters married.
Ashur was happy in his married life. He continued to work as a donkey boy with the animal al-Naturi had given him as a wedding present. Zaynab learned how to raise chickens and sold the eggs in the market. Life became easier and the hallway smelled of garlic, coriander, and cooking butter.
As the boys grew up they all learned different trades: Hasballah was apprenticed to a joiner, Rizqallah to a tinsmith, and Hibatallah to a laundryman. None of them was endowed with the giant stature of his father, but they were strong enough to win respect in the neighborhood. Ashur himself was known to be slow to anger and gentle, but none of Qanswa’s men dared pick a quarrel with him. Zaynab did not share his pleasant nature: she was tense, suspicious, and sharp-tongued, but always hardworking and faithful.
She was five years older than he and while he preserved his youth and vitality she changed rapidly and faded before her time. But he only had eyes for her and never stopped loving her.
The years went by. With the money they had both earned Ashur bought a cart and progressed from donkey boy to driver. Zaynab remarked wryly, “Your customers were always men. From now on they’ll all be women!”
“I hope they won’t all be visiting the cemetery,” he laughed.
“I’ll know if you’re up to anything,” she warned.
It saddened him that he had begun to forget the Quran and remembered only the little bits he recited in his prayers. But his love of what was good had never wavered. He knew that Darwish Zaydan was not the only evil person in the world; that life was full of deceit and violence and villains like him. In spite of this, he persisted in trying to lead a decent life and judged himself harshly whenever he was involved in any wrongdoing. He never forgot that he had appropriated all Zaynab’s savings and some of his sons’ wages to buy the cart, and had made life hard for them sometimes and flown into violent rages.
He noticed some of his neighbors were having trouble from the clan chief and his men. He suppressed his anger, consoling the victims with futile words and calling for restraint. At last someone said to him, “It’s true you’re strong, Ashur, but what good is it to us?”
What were they blaming him for? What did they want him to do? He’d refused to join the oppressors. He’d only used his strength to help people. Wasn’t that enough for them?
But his conscience troubled him like flies on a hot summer’s day. People didn’t understand him, he thought, and asked himself sadly how he would ever be at peace.
13.
He squatted in the little square in front of the monastery, wat
ching the last of the daylight disappear, greeting the evening and waiting for the anthems to fill the air. A chill autumn breeze, smelling of sorrow, slipped over the ancient wall, dragging the phantoms of night in its wake. Ashur appeared completely calm. There was not a single white hair on his head. He bore the burden of forty years of existence but these years seemed to have given him the grace of the immortals.
A vague premonition made him look toward the graveyard path and he saw a man turning out of it with an indolent gait. He stared harder and in the fading light recognized who it was. His heart thumped and his pleasure ebbed away. The man came toward him and stopped in front of him, blocking out the monastery, smiling.
“Darwish Zaydan!” mumbled Ashur.
“Aren’t you going to say hello? Good evening, Ashur!” said Darwish reprovingly.
Ashur stood up, extending his hand. “Hello, Darwish,” he said in an expressionless voice.
“I don’t think I’ve changed that much.”
The resemblance to Afra was painful, but his features had grown coarser and harder.
“No.”
Darwish stared at him meaningfully and said, “Although everything else is changing.”
Ashur ignored this remark. “Where have you been all this time?” he asked.
“In prison,” he said casually.
“In prison!” exclaimed Ashur, although he was not surprised.
“I was just unlucky.”
“God is forgiving.”
“I hear things are going well for you?”
“I get by.”
“I need cash,” Darwish said laconically.
Ashur felt annoyed. He stuck a hand in his breast pocket and brought out a coin. “It’s not much, but it’s all I can afford.”
Darwish took it with a sullen expression, then said seriously, “Let’s say a prayer for my brother’s soul.”
They recited the prayer.
“I visit his grave regularly,” murmured Ashur.
“Can I stay with you until I get back on my feet?” asked Darwish boldly.
“I don’t have room for a stranger,” Ashur snapped back.
“A stranger!”
“I only shook hands with you for Sheikh Afra’s sake,” Ashur said stubbornly.