Ali Bader - Papa Sartre

Sadeq couldn’t restrain himself. He jumped nervously from his seat, grabbed me by the neck with one hand, and held a gun to my head with the other. Fuming, he growled, “You wrote the biography of the philosopher because we paid you to do so, but who asked you to write about Ismail Hadoub? What obscene person induced you to do it? Tell me!”

I defended myself, “No one told me to do it, but I found that Ismail was important for understanding the personality of the philosopher, believe me.”

Nunu Behar tried to calm him down. “Leave him, Ismail. Let him be.” Until this second I had not realized that Sadeq was Ismail Hadoub. I hadn’t written about him to expose him, and if he had told me the truth I would have embellished his image. If only to spare myself his wrath and to get my money I would have avoided reporting the information in the documents literally. I freed myself from his grip and ran headlong without looking back. Two bullets whistled through the air.

I didn’t go back to my apartment, but I inquired about Hanna Yusif’s new address — the coward had changed lodging. Someone I knew told me that he was living in a small place called Hotel Hamameh at the end of al-Rashid Street. When I arrived there I found it to be a miserable one-star hotel with a small reception hall and an aged Egyptian receptionist guarding a bunch of keys. Hanna was in room thirteen, on the second floor. I climbed the stairs, two steps at a time, ignoring the receptionist’s protests, “Sir! If you please. Sir!”

I arrived in front of Hanna’s room determined to enter without knocking, to force my way in if need be. The door was broken however, and I had no trouble opening it, and pulled off the door handle in the process. Hanna was just coming out of the restroom and buttoning his trousers, a cigarette between his lips. He could see in my eyes how upset and angry I was. He squeezed the cigarette between his teeth and said in a low voice, “How wonderful it is to be able to answer the call of nature, it is such a relief!” I jumped at him, grabbed him by his necktie, pushed him to the floor with my left hand, and fell onto him. He managed to wriggle out of my grasp like a louse, but I held him down by putting my knee on his belly and throttling him by the neck with my hand. I held my shoe in my other hand and whacked him on the head and face, “Son of a bitch, where’s the money? I’ll smash your head with this shoe”

He was pleading with me, his mouth foaming, lips turning blue, neck stiffening, eyes white. I hit him and threatened him further, “I’ll kill you, you son of a bitch!” He smiled when he heard those words, then began laughing loudly and tried to free his neck. I couldn’t understand why he was laughing as I was still threatening to pound him with my shoe. Unable to control himself, he said “I’m laughing at your curses. I have never heard those words before, ibn al-‘arida.”

I started laughing too and gradually released my grip. We sat on the floor and laughed. He jockeyed to gain the advantage, but I threatened again to kill him and said, “You won’t walk through this door without paying me.” He kept repeating, “I will, I will, just calm down.” I repeated, “I won’t calm down. You conned me, you didn’t tell me that Ismail Hadoub was Sadeq Zadeh.”

“I thought you knew,” he said.

“How could I?” I said.

He found more excuses, “You’re an intelligent man. You could have found out. You uncovered many secrets.”

But I insisted, “What about the money? Are you trying to get out of paying me?” Finally, he told the truth, “I don’t have the money.” The blood rushed to my head.

I stood up and advised him, “I am going to cut off your nose and hand it over to you, do you understand? If you don’t pay me right now, I’ll stick each piece of furniture in this room up you know where.” He chortled loudly. The arms holding his torso relaxed suddenly, and he jerked backward and hit his head on the floor. Hanna was pleading, “Oh, God, don’t make me laugh. You’re so funny. Just looking at you amuses me. When I hear those swear words I can’t control myself.”

I replied angrily, “My curses are not meant for your amusement, you rotten shoe. Do you understand?”

I searched his pockets for money. He helped me go through his clothes, showing me the secret pockets in his suit. There was nothing in them but a few Iraqi banknotes, two sexually explicit pictures, a small notebook, and a lighter. I noticed a small briefcase on the bed. I opened it and dumped out its contents: an old worn-out book, a fake Yves Saint Laurent perfume box, and a counterfeit identity card issued by Yaacub Saleh Yaacub’s travel agency.

“Take this book as security until I bring you the money tomorrow at ten o’clock. Wait for me here at this hotel,” said Hanna.

“Which book?” I asked.

“This book. It is an original manuscript that dates back to the tenth century.” I examined the book and could see that its well-worn cover and its paper resembled old manuscripts, but I was still suspicious.

“You’re lying, this is not an authentic ancient manuscript, it’s a counterfeit.”

He was adamant, “By Christ, it’s not a counterfeit! Look, there’s even the stamp of Hajji Khalifeh. I went to Father Anastas al-Karmali, and he helped me buy it from a priest who works in the convent. I paid a very high price for it.” I was not convinced and told him so but he swore again by Christ.

I finally said, “I’ll break your neck if it’s not authentic.” He reconfirmed the time and the place to deliver my money, “I’ll wait for you here tomorrow. You should know that no amount of money can compensate me for the value of this book, in case you decide to take it and ran away with it.”

I defended myself. “I’m not a thief like you.” His face expressed his disapproval.

I took the manuscript as Hanna was repacking his case. I left still wondering whether the manuscript was really worth the amount he had agreed to give me for writing the al-Sadriya philosopher’s biography. I decided to confirm its authenticity before Hanna ran off completely. I went directly to the Iraqi Manuscript Center across the Tigris, an old house built in the thirties. It was a cold and windy day despite the shining sun. I knocked nervously at the door and waited for a few minutes, but no one came. I started banging very hard and shook the door, shouting loudly, “Open the door! Open the door.”

Now I realized my mistake. In my haste to verify the authenticity of the manuscript, I had behaved in a way that made the people of the house suspicious. They looked at me distrustfully from an upper-floor window. I begged them to check the manuscript right away. Two guards took hold of me and led me inside. They snatched away the manuscript and passed it to a thin, graying man who looked like Pasteur. He examined it with the help of a magnifying glass and said, smiling, “It’s a counterfeit.”

I went back to the hotel immediately, but the Egyptian receptionist told me that Hanna had checked out. I looked for him everywhere but found no trace of him. A few days later I learned that he had gone to Jordan. He blackmailed Sadeq Zadeh with the manuscript he had taken from my apartment and received a significant sum of money. He was cooling his heels in Amman waiting for an immigration visa to Canada. And that’s where it all ended. I couldn’t ask Sadeq Zadeh or Nunu Behar for money; my stupidities could have destroyed them.

All my efforts went to naught. I started looking for a job but soon realized that I was too lazy for any work that required physical effort. The only job that really suited me was writing. One day with a friend I went to a concert by the Iraqi National Symphony Orchestra at the Abbasid Palace overlooking the river. Men and women were dressed in their best clothes, and the place was bustling. It was a cosmopolitan crowd.