Nadeem Aslam: The Blind Man's Garden

When he arrived to assume control of the school yesterday the older pupils were preparing to depart for the fight in Afghanistan, many in tears at the news of the destruction and slaughter. One million new refugees have entered Pakistan and eight million will require aid. Some of the teachers and the older children were telling stories of rescue and heroism from Islam’s past, of populations in distress saved by pious gallants, and the listeners, becoming impassioned, were letting out cries of ‘Fear not! Help is on its way from Heer!’ Hoping to be heard across thousands of years.

In a quarter to the east of the city there is a charity and madrasa which was operated by Ahmed the Moth but is owned by the ISI. The charity is a facade: boys and young men are transformed into jihadi warriors behind it. And yesterday he was brought a stack of papers by one of the people there — Kyra had wished to understand in detail how Ahmed had managed his day-to-day affairs.

The man had selected a sheet covered with names and handed it to him. ‘The name at the top of the third column.’

To Kyra the name Jeo hadn’t meant anything, but a sound of surprise escaped his mouth when he saw ‘Rohan’ written in the box provided for Father’s Name .

‘He wants to go to a medical centre near one of the battlefields in Afghanistan,’ the man said, ‘without telling his family.’

Kyra had stared at the paper. ‘Why is he joined with a red line to this other name further down? Mikal.’

‘That is Rohan’s foster son. A mud-child and drifter. A disappearer. I have thought about telling Rohan. I am wondering whether we do not owe him that much because of his former links with Ardent Spirit.’

Kyra’s fury had surprised even him. The lack of sleep. The manner of his brother’s death less than two weeks ago. ‘This is not the time to be tempted by sympathy and forgiveness,’ he said. ‘Let me say this as plainly as possible. I would like this boy to be sent to the very heart of the war, or bring one of the battles to where he is. Do this in Ahmed’s memory. You owe him before you owe Rohan. Do you know where precisely he is going?’

‘Of course. We are the ones who are sending him. We not only know the location, we more or less know the route he will take.’

‘Then do it.’

A bomb had exploded in a market in Kashmir, killing bystanders as well as two Indian soldiers. Simultaneously, in another part of Kashmir, a device went off ahead of time and killed the boy who was planting it. When both of these incidents were traced back to Ardent Spirit, Rohan had confronted Ahmed, and Ahmed had let Rohan know that he had long had doubts about the soundness of his faith.

‘You promised me again and again that nothing to do with jihad would occur at this school,’ Rohan said. ‘You gave me your word.’

‘I gave it to an infidel.’

‘It was your word.’

‘It’s who you give it to.’

And then Rohan had proceeded to sicken and enrage everyone by saying that he was glad the second boy had died while installing the explosive device, pleased and thankful that he had been spared the act of killing his fellow men. ‘Allah took pity on the misguided child before he could shed innocent blood.’

It was then that he was forced out of Ardent Spirit.

Major Kyra — he must learn to think of himself as just Kyra — descends the stairs into Baghdad House, the saluki bounding ahead of him and turning from the lowest step to climb back all in one smooth motion. As he lights a lamp he catches a glimpse of himself in a windowpane, the face scarred by an explosion during the war with India two years ago.

He thinks of the train carrying Rohan and the two boys to Peshawar at this very moment, and opening the Koran he begins to read. By the charging stallions of war, snorting! Which strike sparks with their hooves, as they gallop to the raid at dawn, and with a trail of dust penetrate and split apart a massed army! Verily, man is ungrateful to his Lord. To this he himself shall bear witness …

Three hours into the train journey Mikal gets out of his seat. Jeo has given him the number of the cabin he and Rohan have reserved for themselves. Four carriages along from where he is. The other passengers don’t stir as he moves down the aisles, the noise of the train unable to disturb them behind the thick door of sleep.

Jeo undoes the latch and comes out on his first knock, a tenderness in Mikal on catching a glimpse of Rohan’s sleeping form, thin and frail under a blanket on the lower bunk. Rohan doesn’t know about Mikal coming to Peshawar. They haven’t told him to keep away needless questions, fearing something in an answer might lead to suspicion.

Jeo has the maps with him. Going down the long narrow passageway, they sit side by side against the Formica-lined carriage wall and examine them with a torch, the night sliding by in the window above their heads. The bright circle of torchlight moves on the terrain making it look as though the sun has drawn very close to the earth, as the Koran says it will on Judgement Day, the height of a spear and a half. Mikal reads the English words on the maps extremely slowly, syllable by syllable. Sometimes letter by letter. The language was the greatest difficulty of his school days. Let alone read, write or speak it, he couldn’t remember some of the alphabet the last time he tried.

‘I worked with a group of men panning for gold up there last year,’ he says, pointing to a mountain.

‘There is gold in the mountains of Pakistan?’

‘In places. And when I was here, this slope, the snow was so heavy on the peaks it drove the wolves down into the village.’

‘When we come back from Afghanistan we’ll go. Have you brought a gun with you, Mikal?’

‘It can be so quiet up there you can hear the snowflakes land. I’ll take you.’

‘Naheed will love it.’

Mikal stands up and turns to face the window, looking out as the train passes through a station with the bone-coloured lights of houses scattered in the far distance, and the moon like a single luminous music note in the wires beside the tracks, its reflection being creased by the flow of the water in a flat braided river, and the nighthawks are hunting high among the stars.

‘Around here is where we’ll be.’ Jeo too has risen to his feet and is pointing to an area on the map just inside Afghanistan. The territory of clans and tribes. Where along with jewellery and land, children inherit missiles.

‘It looks like a web made out of rock.’ Mikal holds the map at arm’s length.

Jeo smiles. ‘If I get lost you’ll find me.’ Mikal knows the names and locations of all fifty-seven navigational stars.

They look out at the darkness.

‘What were you doing up in the mountains?’

‘Sometimes when I sang, I almost knew. For about half a second, but then it would be gone.’

‘Your singing told you what you were searching for?’

‘Sometimes. Mostly I kept saying to myself, “You’ll know it when you see it.” But I didn’t.’

Jeo folds the map into a square and takes another from the sheaf and opens it. ‘You didn’t see it, or you saw it but didn’t realise that that was what you were searching for?’

‘Isn’t it the same thing?’

‘This is giving me a headache.’

‘Me too.’

Jeo returns to the map. ‘They are saying the war won’t be quick. If Kabul falls, it won’t be for at least a year or eighteen months. I don’t think the real fighting will start until the spring thaw next year. Western soldiers will just sit on the hills and mountains, eating boiled goat and keeping their heads down around dung fires, battered by winter blizzards.’ He looks at his watch. ‘I think I should get back in there soon, Father might wake up.’