Nuruddin Farah - Knots

Cambara scowls, then says, “I want to know what has unsettled Dajaal: seeing you carve the masks, or is he just raising a storm about other matters? I am not clear what exactly is forbidden in Islam and what is not.”

“It is forbidden to create a likeness of Allah’s living creation,” replies Seamus. “You will know that the Arabic sawara , used for ‘creation of likenesses,’ is the same word that is used nowadays for photography.”

She pauses to reflect on his remarks, and then looks at him as if intending to challenge his certainity, asking, “Don’t tell me that photography is forbidden?”

Seamus, grinning, reads from his notes, and, cautious like a septuagenarian treading on slippery ground, replies, “According to the late Sheikh Muhammad Bakheet, a former Mufti of Egypt, photography is not forbidden, because, he says, ‘this art is no more than captivating a shade or a reflection by special technique, similar to what we see in mirrors.’ What is not allowed is to ‘create a likeness which has no previous existence,’ a likeness that might be construed as competing with Allah’s creation. Statues, sculptures — these are forbidden. Unless they are meant to serve as toys.”

She gives serious thought to what he has just said, and then asks, “What are we to make of Dajaal’s response?”

“He’s organized a posse of men to stab Gudcur, who is a clansman of his and Bile’s,” Seamus replies. “Why he has chosen to act in this contradictory way when it comes to the masks is beyond me.”

“We need Dajaal on our side,” Cambara says.

“If you want to know, Dajaal’s hostility to the idea of my carving the eagles and chickens has, in part, precipitated my moving here from the apartment I share with Bile last night. And that is saying something.”

“Will talking to Dajaal be of any use?” she asks. “Has Dajaal bothered to quote an authority on the basis of which a Muslim is forbidden to carve, say, a mask in the likeness of an eagle or a chicken?”

“I doubt that he knows any authority to quote,” says Seamus.

“He does not even pray with any regularity.”

She takes a sip of her espresso, cold and bitter.

Seamus goes on, “I’ve never seen him say his devotions even once in all the time we’ve spent together, and we’ve spent many a sunup and many a sundown together. I’ve known him to be disciplined enough to keep his opinions about many matters to himself. He is so private, Bile and I do not know what he does after work.” A despairing look spreads itself on his face as he says, “Now this!”

“Just a thought.”

He looks for a long while at his fingers, stained, most likely with Superglue and other adhesives. He applies a clear liquid with an odor reminiscent of linseed oil, and then he rubs his hands together.

“I owe him thanks for all this,” she says, her hands gesticulating. “It can’t have been easy to achieve what Dajaal has done. Such a strategist, especially if he has had a hand in staging the attack on Gudcur’s redoubt, that drew him out of the property.”

“Now that I think of it,” Seamus says, his face lighting up with the flames of memory, “I remember Dajaal being in a state a few days ago after he and Bile had a long talk, in camera, so to speak. In all the years I’ve known the two of them and I’ve known them for donkey’s years, neither of them wanted me in on their discussion. Then I didn’t see Dajaal for a whole day, and when next he turned up, he was not alone. He had Kaahin, a former fellow officer in the now defunct National Army, in tow. Another in-camera huddle. I knew then that some sort of secret operation that would require renting one or two battlewagons and as many as a dozen highly trained fighters was being mounted. Later, I learned how much it would cost to pull it off. I only know of all this because I was the one who went to our money changer to pay off the men, none of whom I had ever seen.”

“Where did the funds come from?”

“Some benefactor from abroad. Otherwise, it is all hush-hush. Kiin is in the picture somewhere. It’s all unclear to me.”

Cambara suspects that Arda, with help from Raxma, is up to her old tricks, funneling the funds in through an intermediary. Her head pounds with pain, as if the drilling coming from another room were boring into her, reducing her to someone with a brain needing to be overhauled.

“It distresses me that it has come to this.”

“Let’s not despair. Talk to Bile. About Dajaal.”

“Let’s find a way of somehow involving Dajaal in the production.”

“Talk to Bile; he’ll know what to suggest better than I.”

“Do you think that having Bile talk to him may persuade him to come to our side of the fence? Or if he were to read the text, he would like it?”

“No idea.”

They fall silent, neither able to find anything to say. Gacal comes in to announce that Dajaal is waiting in the car for Cambara to join him, and when she does, she discovers that the engine is on, idling. She gets in, puts on her seat belt, and he reverses, then drives off speedily without a single word.

No sooner has Cambara fastened her seat belt and readied to start engaging Dajaal in a conversation about the masks in the play than he whips out his mobile phone and, calling some man by name, tells him that he and a guest are on their way and that he should meet the vehicle at the usual entrance; he won’t have time to go to the apartment himself.

It is then that her itinerant eyes fall on two items with religious significance: a rosary and the word “Allah,” in Arabic, both hanging down prominently behind the rearview mirror. She stares at them, as though in a hypnotic state. At first she looks alternately bemused and baffled, and then she reasons with calmness that she is being facile in inferring Dajaal’s religious inclination or lack thereof from two artifacts that may have come with the car whenever it was imported as a reconditioned vehicle from the Arabian Gulf, as many of the cars plying the roads in Mogadiscio are. Nor does she need reminding that she too has donned a body tent, the type of veil associated in the minds of Muslims with the most devout women, something she is not, yet she has worn it anyway.

It won’t do her or her cause any good if she broaches the subject head-on when he appears not to be well disposed toward her. Who knows if he may relent in a day or so, perhaps after he has had a chance to read the text. She will have a word with Bile, who may agree to intercede with him. Moreover, is it not possible that Seamus may have got the wrong end of the stick? It is feasible to interpret Dajaal’s position as that of making a theological point to an Irishman, something he does not need to do when speaking with her, a fellow Muslim, albeit secular leaning. In any case, she must try her utmost and without prejudice to get on the right side of Dajaal’s goodwill. To bring this about, it is unwise to discuss the subject with him now, much less pick a quarrel with him over his objections to her use of the masks later. Dajaal deserves a heartfelt thank-you from her.

As she embarks on speaking his praises, she realizes how much pluck it will take to find the words with which to express not only her genuine intentions but also her ambiguities. Her mixed emotions stiffen her features, and she senses that whatever she has to say will not pass muster and that whatever phrases she lights on will sound either inadequate or too formal. Silence being no alternative, she settles on speaking and does so only after her attempt to make eye contact with him has failed.

She says, “I’ve meant to thank you for all your help, Dajaal. You’ve put your life and the lives of others on the line. Thank you.”