Nuruddin Farah - Crossbones

Too embarrassed to admit to his own fear, he walks away, sorry for the Ethiopian, killed in a war in a country about which he probably remained ignorant until the moment of his death. He feels sorry, too, for the Somali youths kicking the dead Ethiopian, an ill-educated, ill-informed lot, as unfamiliar with the concept of respect for the dead as they are with Islam. Blame it on decades of civil war, in which these youths haven’t gone to schools, haven’t lived in homes where there is the semblance of harmony and functionality. Blame it, too, on the current Somali political class, who are equally ill educated and equally self-centered, and who behave inhumanely toward others. Malik’s sickened heart sicker than ever, he feels as if he is complicit in these terrible doings, because he cannot find a way to stop them.

Just before they leave the Bakhaaraha, there is a heavy exchange of gunfire, RPG rounds from the general direction of the presidential villa falling within a hundred yards from where Qasiir parked the car. The geography of the Bakhaaraha and the casbah make sense only to a native, he thinks. A stranger wouldn’t know which alleys end in dead ends and which would lead them to safety.

They get into the car and miraculously find their way through the back streets and onto one of the city’s arteries.

Malik’s phone rings. Fee-Jigan is on the line, informing him that earlier, maybe two and a half hours ago, a radio journalist, whose name Malik recognizes from his impressive commentaries on HornAfrik, has been shot inside the Bakhaaraha.

“What was he doing when he was killed?” Malik asks.

“He was interviewing an insurgent.”

“Where are you now?”

Fee-Jigan says he is on his way to join the funeral cortege, which is departing in half an hour from in front of Bank Tewfik. He asks Malik to put Qasiir on so that he can know how to get there.

Malik is the first to spot the cortege, and Qasiir pulls up at the rear. Malik then rings Fee-Jigan, who eventually joins them, and they stand beside the car, chatting. Other journalists make their appearance, and Fee-Jigan introduces them to Malik. He recognizes the names of the authors of some of the pieces he has read. Not one of the articles impressed him, he remembers, either because they lacked depth or because the author hadn’t done sufficient background research before committing to a point of view. It is apparent that a number of the reporters have had no training, at least not enough to be taken seriously. Even so, he has remained in awe of their courage, their indomitable behavior.

They tell Malik more about the killing, which occurred in the Bakhaaraha market complex. Shire, the deceased journalist, was waiting for his interviewee, a top insurgent, in the back room of the computer shop. Known for his lack of fear and his outspokenness, Shire put his name to his editorials even when he knew they would upset all parties to the conflict. He had often spoken of his “foretold” death at the hands of assassins, although he couldn’t predict, and didn’t seem to care, whether the Ethiopians or the insurgents would get him first.

He was struck by balaclava-wearing men in the shop’s back room, which was adjacent to the manager’s cubicle. Three men gained access to the room, where he was waiting for the interview, and one of them shot him, using a silencer. “They emerged, waved salaam to the manager and the staff, and departed, having accomplished their mission,” Fee-Jigan says.

“Who found the corpse?”

“The young tea boy, delivering tea to the room.”

Malik thinks, What a sad way to die!

“That’s the story,” Fee-Jigan says, his eyebrows raised. His expression seems to suggest that there is something not right here.

“And what explanations do the manager and the staff of the shop proffer so far?” asks Malik. He thinks this must have been an inside job, and vaguely recalls an incident in Afghanistan, when a warlord was killed by Arab men posing as journalists.

Fee-Jigan replies, “Everyone in the shop claims to have been in the dark about the arrangements, because Shire had insisted that his interviewee and his escorts, who would come into the shop wearing balaclavas, be granted entry to the room in the back, where he would be waiting.”

“Where is the corpse now?” Malik asks.

“At a mosque near his home.”

“Are we going to the mosque or his home?”

“First the mosque, then the cemetery.”

It takes the convoy of vehicles a long time to turn into a procession and get into a proper line. Malik thinks that someone with authority, in a uniform, like a traffic cop, is needed to clear the way if twenty or so cars wish to form an orderly file in a city enjoying peace. Organizing a column of cars into a well-ordered cavalcade during a civil war, however, is an impossible task.

But eventually they are under way, and Malik, while making no direct reference to their last encounter in Ma-Gabadeh’s company, asks how the book Fee-Jigan has been writing is coming along.

Fee-Jigan says, “I’ve put it on a back burner.”

“So what are you working on at present?”

“I’ve been working on matters closer to home.”

“Such as what?”

“I’ve been writing pieces of great topical interest in the international media,” says Fee-Jigan. “There is nothing more important these days than the targeting and killing of journalists, one dead every two days.”

“Who do you think is behind the killings?”

Fee-Jigan seems unduly worried about Qasiir, whom he stares at. Malik assures him that Qasiir is trustworthy not by speaking but by nodding his head in Qasiir’s direction.

Fee-Jigan says, “There are freelancing fifth columnists comprising former senior army officers, many of whom are allied to the Courts. These do the killings.”

“But why would they kill Shire, who, from what I understand, was interviewing an insurgent presumably sympathetic to the Courts?”

“They kill to confuse the issue.”

Malik can’t follow his logic. He asks, “What issue?”

“Shire favored the truth,” Fee-Jigan says. “He dared speak his mind, unafraid. At times, his hard-hitting commentaries upset Shabaab and their allies. The freelancing fifth columnists do anyone’s dirty work as long as it confuses the issue.”

Malik appreciates that Qasiir is doing what he can under confusing circumstances to make sure they are not left far behind, now slowing down, now going fast, and now communicating with a couple of the drivers with whom he exchanged mobile numbers before the convoy set off. They’ll keep in touch in the event of a problem. When they get to the mosque and discover they are late for the funeral service, there is disagreement over where to go, some suggesting they head for Shire’s family home, from which the bier will be carried on foot to the cemetery, a kilometer and a half away, others insisting they drive straight to the grave site and wait there. Malik concurs with Fee-Jigan that it is best to go to the family home and to help carry the bier.

They arrive in time to witness the bier already being carried out of the house. The street fills up with a crowd of well-wishers, passersby stopping to say, “ Allahu akbar ,” and the entire place reverberating with brief prayers of supplication addressed to the Almighty. Everyone hereabouts cuts a forlorn figure, head down in sorrow, mourning for the untimely death of a man who did no one harm and was loved by many.

The pace of the procession is quick, and a number of the journalists who arrived at the same time as Malik hurry to catch up with the coffin and help carry it, even briefly. In Islam, burial is quick, in hope that the dead will arrive at his resting place in a more contented state, with Allah’s blessing.