Boualem Sansal - Harraga

‘If you take into account the fact that those who resort to clandestine emigration do so in secret via underground networks often linked to multinational terrorist groups — which, by the way, are not necessarily the groups our friends in the West are quick to blame — and furthermore that as often as not they die in secret, then perhaps you might begin to understand just how difficult our work here is,’ she said, suddenly pedantic.

I don’t know whether she’s planning to bore me for the whole evening or masturbate in front of me until cock crow. I need to wake her up.

‘What I understand is that young people are leaving because everything in this country, right down to the taps, is closed to them. Do you know many young people who enjoy captivity? And another thing, why do you refer to it as “clandestine emigration”, when a better phrase might be “mass exodus”… though “collective suicide” also has a ring to it.’

‘And what about you?’ she squawks, twin harpoons darting from the eyes of this foul-mouthed goose. ‘What did you ever do to stop your brother from leaving the country?’

‘So you’re saying that it’s up to us, the prisoners, to free the young, to provide schools to emancipate them, work to give them some self-esteem, some goal in life beyond reciting poems for the hard of hearing, some hobbies other than the vicious, bloody pastime of enlisting with the army, the Islamic Salvation Front or — God forbid! — the Defenders of Truth?’

‘What are… you’re talking gibberish!’

‘Well, I know what I mean.’

‘…’

This, then, was my first visit to the Association. Later visits were not what you might call a success. Whenever they saw me coming, they all ran away screaming, they all suddenly remembered some urgent meeting. My attitude was absurd, it was counterproductive. These minions don’t need much excuse to bury a case file and yet there I was naively thinking that I simply had to motivate them efficiently. I took a different tack. To best a hypocrite, become a hypocrite. I tried to reinvent myself as the arch-defender of dignity and responsibility, as a woman proud of her new-found friends.

But to no avail: my mind refuses to play along, I still can’t stand the sight of them. I thought about Chérifa. It drives me insane to think that she too might end up abandoned in this accursed country or wandering the streets of some port out in the wide world. The mere sight of these stout matrons sitting on their arses, these government lackeys licking their lips in the sunshine, this bloody farce plain for all to see, has me choking with rage. All in all, this was likely to be a grim encounter. I arrived with a solemn smile on my face and Chérifa on my arm looking every inch a queen.

‘So nice to see you again, my dears. How are you all? I feel confident that today you will be able to reassure me, to finally give me some news of my idiot brother.’

‘Sadly not, my dear friend.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘We have been a little behind schedule lately, you understand… We’re expecting a delegation from the European Union… We’re counting on their financial support… we’re working on the files…’

‘What files?’

‘You know, the budget, the development plan, the meeting schedule, the press releases…’

‘And where does Sofiane come into all this?’

‘Set your mind at rest, he’s in the database.’

‘The database?’

‘Yes, the database.’

‘The database. Well, you learn something new every day.’

‘Absolutely, the database of our dear disappeared. We will give a copy to the EU delegation who will integrate it into their own database. It’s networking… you understand?’

‘Absolutely, people can disappear with a clear conscience as long as they are entered into the Great Database.’

‘Are you mocking me?’

‘I’ll go one better, if someone doesn’t stop me, I’ll slap you.’

‘…’

I was beside myself. I honestly believe that some crimes are to be encouraged. If every petty king and princeling in this country was broken on the wheel together with all their miserable jesters, our young people might finally see the light. This is what I was thinking as I stomped back, eager to get home and smash some crockery. Crowds parted as I passed, frightened or shocked. Wimps and weaklings who feel women have no right to be angry, to be out of control, pitiful excuses for men. I tugged Chérifa by the sleeve, jostling her along. The poor thing’s whimpers were heartbreaking.

I’ve decided that I’m done with the Association. I’ll do my own search. I don’t know how but I’ll find a way. I’ll hire some neighbourhood kid, some other harraga, encourage him to ‘burn a path’ and find that idiot Sofiane and then… no, that’s a stupid idea, I might as well pay for his trip, maybe he’ll send me a postcard from Tangiers, from Marbella, from the great beyond. No, there’s a better solution, I’ll hire a retired cop, they’re wily as foxes and some of them are honest. Late in life, they tend to recover some scraps of their lost humanity. I’d need to find one with a son who disappeared on the harragas ’ road, that way we can make common cause. I’ll talk to Mourad, see if he knows anyone who might fit the bill. I… No, forget that, Mourad is no help, he gets me all muddled, with him it’s always one dead end to another. I’m not about to forget that thing about bus stations in a hurry. I could put a classified ad in various newspapers, here, in Morocco, in Spain, wherever. ‘Missing Persons’, I wonder whether the category still exists? I remember Papa used to read it avidly, he had a lot of old friends he hadn’t heard from in ages. It’s strange how, even in more peaceful times, people could easily disappear. Back then, it was a routine matter: Missing Persons were classified as casualties of colonialism, harkis who died in an ambush somewhere, case closed. What was even stranger was that some reappeared, alive, roaming the streets, badly injured and unable to explain why, only to find themselves arrested for petit-bourgeois vagrancy, thrown into the back of a truck and tossed out again three villages farther down the road. These days, you have to work hard just to keep track of your own whereabouts. And missing relatives are a dangerous business; you find yourself being interrogated about the shady dealings they were involved in, who was financing it, who was pulling strings, whether the International Organisations are aware of it. It turns into a huge rigmarole. You go to the police station to complain about the police or another branch of the civil service and come away charged with some cold case pulled at random from the Criminal Records Office.

‘You see what will happen if you don’t keep a careful eye on the company your baby keeps?’ I said, twisting Chérifa’s arm.

‘Ow! Why would you wish something like that on us?’

‘What about you? You abandoned your parents, just like that idiot Sofiane, like all those morons who disappear, who run away instead of… of…’

Damn it! Suddenly I’m blubbing like a baby.

‘Instead of what?’ asked Chérifa, overcome.

‘Instead of dying here, at home, with their families!’

‘Why do you always refer to him as “that idiot Sofiane”?’

‘Because to die far from your grave is pathetic, you stupid girl!’

The cold closed around me like the grave around a dead man. There is nothing to be said, nothing to be done, nothing to hope for. Evil goes about its business. In a hundred years, a thousand years, ten thousand years, when we are all dead and forgotten, life will reassert itself. Inexorably. Women and children will have their part. Right now, there are too many sermonisers, as many more Defenders of Truth, and so many cowards we haven’t room enough to put them. Why do they have beards and warts on their heads when their heads serve no purpose? The question haunts me.