T. Bunn - Drummer in the Dark

“Mother loved to come here,” Sybel prompted. When he said nothing, she reached over, squeezed his hand, said, “Let’s go see why.”

Sandstone walls the color of desert turned the corner with them and began to close in, tighter and tighter, until the lanes grew so narrow they were ever in the shade. The air was tainted by dust and heat and the deposits of horse-drawn carts. The only life Wynn saw was an old woman in black, sunken into her doorway until she seemed only partially drawn from the shadows.

Sybel halted before a door from another era, when stout oak was bonded by great leaves of metal to repel barbarians and swords and metal-tipped staves. Overhead protruded a mashrabiya , the harem balcony whose wooden slats were woven too tightly to permit passers-by any glimpse within. The muezzin’s cry rose then, at home in this harsh and empty realm.

Beyond the portal, a garden bloomed. Impossible colors. Hundreds of flowers, their beauty almost obscene after the dry arid nothingness without. “We’re in the forecourt of St. Mark’s church, one of the oldest in Cairo. Momma loved it here,” she said. “Do you remember any of this?”

“Nothing,” he lied.

“She brought me when I was very good. And you, once or twice. Usually you waited out in the plaza with Daddy. For me these visits were more than a reward. It was Momma’s way of welcoming me into the secrets she would only share with another adult.” They descended stairs made slick by centuries of feet, left their shoes at a second, grander set of doors, and entered the cool chamber. “This place spoke to her of faith’s primitive beginnings.”

Benches ringed the grand hall, as tall as it was long and beamed by smoke-blackened planks thick as five men. The reed mats were soft and gave gently beneath his feet. The art was so ancient as to appear alien, done by another race of souls entirely. A supplicant chanted over prayer beads. A trio of women sat at the far wall and chatted softly with a black-robed priest. Four couples prayed in a side alcove, one wearing the white shawl of coming marriage.

“Momma called this a comforting place, yet one that offers no false hopes.” Sybel’s voice was soft enough to rise swiftly and be enveloped by the incense and the centuries of echoes. “The first time we came here, I will never forget, a woman entered wearing a black, tassled prayer shawl. I watched her kneel where we are standing now, crawl toward the altar, then prostrate herself. She covered her head and lay as one dead. Momma pointed out to me how her feet were blackened and callused, her heels and ankles tattooed in a tribal pattern. All the stories hidden beneath that black shawl, all the sorrows in those immobile feet. She just lay there, using her prayer mantle as a shroud, giving herself over to the grief of hopeless prayer. Asking not for answers. Only peace. Immeasurable, beyond understanding. Peace now and forever.”

Wynn turned and walked back into the sunlight. He slipped on his shoes, crossed the garden, passed through the outer portal, and walked back down the cobblestone lane. Cairo was filled with the crumbling relics of many empires. Four thousand years of invaders had left many prizes and exacted heavy tolls. Hyssops, Romans, Vandals, Ottomans. . The list was endless. Their legacies were everywhere, from the fading glory found upon almost every street, to the stoic tragedy on virtually every face. Wynn stopped by the car and waited for Sybel to join him. Leaning against just another wall.

She rounded the corner with shoulders hunched, her expression lost behind sunglasses. Just the tightly compressed lips were visible. Wynn pushed himself from the wall and demanded, “What possible good did you expect to come from all this?”

“What possible good are you accomplishing now? What joy have I deprived you of by bringing you here?” The words sprayed like hot pellets. “Wynn, we need you. Graham’s illness has left a gaping void at the heart of our cause.”

“So I’m expected-”

“No. Not at all. Nothing is expected. Nobody would dream of expecting you to do anything except exactly what pleases you at the moment.”

He surveyed Sybel’s stance, hands cocked on her hips like dual triggers, chin jutting as she readied herself for whatever objection he levied. “Nobody can tell you anything, can they. You know what’s best, and no matter what anybody else thinks, you’re going to push and prod until they do what you say they should be doing.”

She flushed the color of taut fury. “For years people have been pressing Congress and other governments to do something about third-world debt. So they pass laws, then let the forces ruling the financial trade come in and strip away everything but the words. Most politicians don’t care about what’s happening in another country. Those foreigners can’t vote. If it’s so important to the banking lobby to keep milking this third-world cow, fine. Then Graham comes along. He’s on fire over another scandal within the financial world. Same war, different battle. Graham is desperate for allies. We meet, I put him in contact with Sant’Egidio. Graham fits right in. He’s not after glory. He’s not after the next fun thing. He wants to serve his people and his God. He views this battle as having a divine purpose-”

“All right, Sybel. I get the picture.”

“You shut up and listen . Graham claims it was Father Libretto who suggested a way to make our two causes one. Father Libretto says all he did was listen and let Graham hear God speak. All I know is, suddenly there is a link. Something so totally enticing Graham can take this new idea of his to friends in Congress. They sat up and said, yes, here is something that just might work. So Father Libretto and his movement brought in allies from other countries. Very quiet, just laying the groundwork. But the idea caught fire. It turns out there are a lot of people very worried about the dragon of international finance.”

“So you bring me to Egypt, thinking I’ll find something that rocks my boat enough to make me take on Graham’s work. Is that it?” He watched his dark and distorted reflection in the lenses of Sybel’s sunglasses. “Only you didn’t figure Grant into the equation, did you. How he’d find the leverage to turn this to his advantage.”

“I don’t know what I thought, only what I hoped.” She waved to someone behind him. “Here comes Nabil and his father.”

The Egyptian was groomed as always, every hair in place, suit immaculate, no sign of feeling the heat. Wynn stared at the old man leaning on Nabil’s arm but felt no flicker of recognition. For the old man it was an entirely different story. He left the safety of his son’s arm and tottered forward, leaking Arabic and tears. First to Sybel, kissing her hand, then both cheeks, switching to English, saying merely, “So good. So good.”

“You are looking fine, Uncle.”

“Yes. On this day, of course. Fine.” He then moved to Wynn, bowed and salaamed with the regal gestures of one long denied this moment. “My heart soars. The son stands and casts the father’s shadow.”

Nabil spoke. “Abu, this is Congressman Wynn-”

“I am not knowing this man? From so high I am knowing him.” He lowered a trembling hand to the ground. “Your father was a great man. A friend to all Egypt, your father. And now you are here.”

Wynn endured the words and the embrace, relieved when Sybel glanced at her watch and said, “We need to be going.”

They set their pace to match the old man’s, rounded the far corner, then waited for a funeral to pass. Wynn watched as men bunched about the coffin, jostling in ill-mannered grief for the chance to help carry the body. The women paraded more sedately behind, a long flowing line of black and gray, piercing the heat with their wails. Wynn followed them through high peaked gates, and only then did he understand. But the old man had him in an iron grip, Sybel was at his other side, and they were already moving forward. Into the city of the dead.