Nuruddin Farah - Crossbones

“He isn’t someone with whom secrets are safe.”

Malik’s phone rings. Dajaal is on his way; he will pick them up momentarily if they want to purchase a new computer and a printer.

Qasiir wants to have a word with Dajaal, so Malik puts the phone on speakerphone. “Grandpa,” Qasiir asks, “have you by any chance spoken to Gumaad today?”

“No, I haven’t spoken to Gumaad today. Why?”

“Because he says he has spoken to you,” Qasiir says, “and that was why he knew that Malik was alone in the apartment.”

“He is lying,” Dajaal says, clearly agitated. “I haven’t seen or talked to him today. But why? What is the problem? Are you and Malik okay?”

Malik reclaims his mobile phone to reassure Dajaal. He says, “See you shortly.”

When he rejoins them, Dajaal is in an awful mood. He curses, mumbles imprecations, and, naming no names, showers all manner of damnations on men who have never fought a war and who are now having recourse to war, mistaken in their belief that God is on their side and will help them prevail. Inarticulate in his rage, Dajaal speaks of the harsh war of words exchanged between the Ethiopian premier, who announced “imminent retaliation for the provocation against the integrity of our country’s borders and the sanctity of its security,” and the provocative rebuttal from the Courts, whose executive director has said, “I trust to Providence that invaders of Muslim lands will be defeated.”

Dajaal goes on, “The entire city has the jitters, many people are going to the mosques to pray, or preparing to go away; many more are buying a week’s provisions, just in case. Now, tell me, one of you. Did Gumaad say he is leaving the city? Could he have been calling on you on his way out?”

“He said he would return later, if he is able.”

Dajaal says, “I wonder what he was up to.”

Qasiir volunteers, “Someone else was with him.”

“Who?”

Qasiir shrugs his shoulders in silence.

Malik has had enough of their speculations. He says, “Shall we go and buy the computer?”

He goes into his bedroom to organize the funds. He counts out several hundred U.S. dollars in easy-to-carry, high denominations and throws in an extra, just-in-case hundred. Malik knows that there are money changers in the markets who sit at low tables, wads and wads of highly devalued Somali shillings on one side, and on the other, heaps of cash in several other currencies, including U.S. and Canadian dollars, euros, Saudi dirhams. Unlike many other countries, where movement of money is tightly controlled, in today’s Somalia buying any currency you fancy is as easy as buying groceries.

When Malik reemerges from his room with the cash counted, he and Qasiir wait in apparent deference to Dajaal, who is still psyched up, not yet done with his tirade.

“I’ve known what it means to go to war and lose,” he says. “I fought in the Ethiopia — Somalia war of 1977, as a major in the National Army. Somalia was much stronger then — we had an army, one of the strongest on the continent — and we lost the war, and were run out of the Ogaden. We haven’t recovered from that debacle, and it resulted in the current strife.”

“Grandpa, we are ready to go, if you are.”

Dajaal remains fired up and says, “Men like Gumaad and the so-called defense spokesman of the Courts who have never held a gun in their lives have no right to invoke Allah’s name in support for an ill-planned cause.”

Qasiir drags Dajaal by the hand, and they make it to the car in silence. Qasiir asks if he should drive, to which Dajaal retorts, “I am not mad in the sense of being dangerous. I am mad in the sense of being angry with what these men from the Courts are doing to our nation, endangering its continued existence.”

He sits at the wheel and sobers up fast as he prepares his mind for the next task. He reverses into the vehicle parked behind him as he drives out of his parking spot. It is unlike Dajaal to be so careless, and not to stop and check the damage he has caused to someone else’s car. But that is what he does: the world is not what it used to be; Dajaal is not the man he was an hour before.

They have barely rounded a corner when they come upon a familiar scene, of men and women fleeing their homes, carrying their worldly belongings on their heads. Antlike, people are escaping ahead of the coming fire, not wanting to burn in it. At one point, Dajaal barely avoids colliding with a heavily laden donkey that resists the commands of the young girl attempting to pull it forward by the rope tied around its neck.

The columns of those in flight lengthen and shorten, like the long and short shadows that define the various hours of the day. As they approach the market, Malik taking notes furiously, they notice that people are streaming out of it, carrying what looks like days’ worth of food. Some of the women, wearing expensive body tents, climb into the backs of SUVs. Qasiir observes that these are the people who are not likely to leave the city, out of concern that squatters might move into their properties and vandalize them.

Malik looks up from his notebook and stops scribbling as Dajaal brings the car to a stop, and they prepare to enter the market.

AHL SITS UP FRONT. WARSAME IS DRIVING, AND FIDNO IS IN THEback. Warsame speeds across an intersection and swerves to avoid a goat crossing the road, but catches her with the edge of the fender regardless. The goat sways this side and that, as if deciding whether to remain on her feet, her hips and ribs exposed, her breathing labored. Then she regains her balance and straightens up, takes a step, and halts again. Warsame has pulled over, and Ahl suggests they wait a minute or so. Even so, Warsame puts the car in gear, ready to move if the crowd milling on either side of the road looks likely to form into a mob. Ahl has his door ajar, preparing to get out and check on how the beast is faring, but at that very moment Warsame puts the vehicle in motion, and Ahl pulls the car door shut.

“I wish we had stopped,” Ahl says.

“Hereabouts,” Fidno says, “we’re all fearful of making fatal mistakes. More than ever, one must be wary of the unruliness of crowds, living in a place where there is a total breakdown of law and order. You can get yourself into sticky situations if you aren’t careful. I am speaking of crowds waiting at the behest of their unreasonable greed, a crowd turning into a mob.”

Warsame, seemingly bemused, stays out of it.

Ahl challenges, “Crowd, what crowd? There was no crowd to speak of. There were people milling about, minding their own business, from what I could tell. Men and women selling or buying, young men standing in groups and bantering. I saw no crowd that was likely to turn into a mob.”

“Do you know what would have happened if the car had run over the goat and killed it?” Fidno asks.

“We would pay what is due to the owner of the dead goat,” Ahl says. “I see no problem there. Recompense the owner. What else is there to do?”

“How do you determine who to pay if as many as a dozen claimants present themselves, each saying he is the rightful owner of the goat, and several others, challenging these claimants, inform you that the goat’s owner is a clansman and you should pay them?”

Ahl says, “That’s altogether another matter.”

“A goat is other than itself,” Fidno says.

“I hadn’t realized,” Ahl agrees.

They come to a busy junction with throngs swarming around stalls, and Warsame stops. This moves Ahl to ask, “Where are we, and why are we here, stopping?”

Ahl is clearly wary of crowds.