Nuruddin Farah - Links

“What do you want?” Jeebleh asked.

“I want to know which group you’d join.”

“I’ve never killed or harmed anyone,” Jeebleh said.

“So you say!”

“What about you? Which would you join?”

“The murderers, of course,” Kaahin said, and guffawed.

Jeebleh saw now that the man’s eyes wandered away, toward two men who were standing apart, smoking. Like him, they were military types, but too old to be part of a fighting force. If they were no longer in active service, Jeebleh guessed, they would be acting as consultants to security firms, or as deputies to a warlord, or as well-paid bodyguards to a VIP or to foreign dignitaries visiting the country. To a man, their postures gave them away.

The man calling himself Kaahin said, “Where are you when it comes to brothers and blood?”

“Have you ever heard of Hesiod?” Jeebleh replied.

“Who’s he?”

“A poet who lived in the eighth century B.C.” Jeebleh didn’t like the amused look on Kaahin’s face, but he continued, trying to appear unbothered: “Hesiod advises that you take along a witness when you’re in a dispute with your brother or one of your intimates over matters of great importance.”

“Well, perhaps I could be of some use to you, then.”

“In what way?”

“In leading you to someone you want to see.”

“I’m not with you.”

“I’m offering to be in your service,” Kaahin said.

“What will you do for me?”

“I’ll come along as your witness.”

“Pray, who will I be meeting, and why do I need a witness?” Jeebleh started to walk away, pretending he had no idea what the man was talking about.

“I’ll take you to Caloosha,” Kaahin said.

One of the military men led the way, the other walked behind. Jeebleh was sure that several others were shadowing them from a distance, even if they were invisible to him. They moved forward, in the direction of what he hoped was Caloosha’s house.

JEEBLEH ENTERED A LIVING ROOM OVERCROWDED WITH FURNITURE AND immediately sensed the dark movements of a few figures, and then heard the sound of curtains being closed or opened. Likewise he could not determine whether the footsteps he heard on the staircase were gingerly going up or coming down.

In a corner of the room, a cat was trailing a spool wound with thread, which it pushed around so coquettishly that Jeebleh was quite taken with the acrobatic performance. This was when Caloosha made his staged entry. By the time Jeebleh became aware of his presence, Caloosha was already seated in the singularly placed high chair. Reduced to a sideshow, the cat pawed at the spool for a few more seconds, and then lost interest. Eventually, it walked out of the room altogether. Kaahin and his men spread out, one of them approaching Jeebleh where he stood.

“So here you are at last, my long-lost junior brother!” Caloosha said.

Jeebleh fought shy of applauding sarcastically, aware that Caloosha had worked very hard on his rehearsed delivery; he enunciated the phrase “long-lost junior brother” to give a sharp, cutting quality. He might as well have said, “Now, what have you got to say for yourself?” That Caloosha was upset was also obvious, but not why.

Jeebleh took his time, comparing his memory of Caloosha when he had seen him last with the specimen in the high chair. He was looking at a man with a more prominent nose than he remembered, a much fatter man, with so distended a paunch it spilled over his belt and lay flat in his lap. His face was puffy, the hair was thin on his skull, patchy, and peppered with gray at the sides. He could easily have done a send-up of a Buddha, only he had no wisdom to impart. Alas, the years had not humbled the fool in the least.

“It’s been naughty of you to come to my city and to stay in a hotel,” Caloosha said, his double chin trembling, his breathing uncomfortable. “You could’ve stayed here. I’ll tell it to your face, it’s been very naughty of you, very, very naughty. Yes, that’s how I feel, that’s how I feel, and I’ll speak about it.”

Ever since childhood they had been at loggerheads, and the memory of how Caloosha had again and again hurt him returned with a vengeance, causing Jeebleh to display his rage right away, and violently. The question now uppermost in his mind was how to keep from losing his cool.

“Is this a way to welcome a long-lost junior brother?” he said.

“Admit it, you’ve been naughty!”

“Maybe you could be nice to me for a change.”

“How do I do that?”

“Humor me, but don’t shout at me.”

“Cut the crap,” Caloosha said, “and explain how you ask to be taken to a hotel in my part of the city. I have this big villa all to myself.”

“Af-Laawe suggested that I put up there.”

“Because you asked him to!”

“Let’s talk about something else.”

“I’ve heard all about you and what you’ve been up to since your arrival,” Caloosha said, wagging a finger in mock threat.

This gave Jeebleh a tremor of unredeemed guilt. Might Caloosha have any idea what murderous thoughts were actually brewing in his mind? “I don’t like it that we’re fighting on our first meeting after so many years,” he said. “Can we allow peace to reign, at least for the time being? You can see that I’ve come to pay my respects to you, I’ve come to make amends, not to quarrel.”

They stared at each other with the fierceness of unresolved conflict. After a long silence, Jeebleh stammered, “Unfortunately, I had no way of reaching you.”

“You’re a liar!”

Jeebleh was at a loss for words, and he looked about the room as if he might find there the expressions that were eluding him. He saw Kaahin and his two sidekicks, and thought that even though he didn’t like what was being done to him, he wasn’t a fool and wouldn’t be misled into believing that he could gain anything by reacting violently. In the two days he had spent here, he had seen nothing but destruction, because none of the men at each other’s throats was prepared to compromise, and none showed humility. Where would arrogance lead him? It would create further rifts, cause more deaths, and spill more bad blood! He considered the possibility too that Caloosha was playing to the gallery, showing off for his buddies. Now he said, “I’m not a liar, and you know it.”

“Lying at your age. Shame on you!”

Jeebleh took a step to the right, and from the corner of his eye, he could see that Kaahin was moving watchfully closer to him. This was a badly acted piece of theater all around, and so he said, “This isn’t getting us anywhere.”

Then he made to leave. He didn’t want to go — well aware that his departure would not bring him any nearer to learning how much Caloosha knew about where Raasta and her playmate were being held hostage, or who their captors were — and he suspected that Caloosha wouldn’t let him walk out like this.

“Af-Laawe has been to see me,” Caloosha blurted, “and he told me about your message to Bile, that you wanted to meet up with him. Why didn’t you send word to me too, unless you’re fibbing?”

“Maybe he forgot to deliver it?”

“He wouldn’t dare! It was I who alerted him to your arrival and sent him to greet you at the airport.”

“Truth-telling” sits awkwardly on evil men, Jeebleh thought. Caloosha’s distended belly was filled with sentiments of war and wickedness, which was why he looked so ugly, and so unhealthy. Attrition retarded his brain, evil dulled his imagination, did not sharpen it.

“How did you know what flight I was coming on?” Jeebleh asked.

“Because I know everything that happens hereabouts.”