Tahar Ben Jelloun - A Palace in the Old Village

The shadow disappeared. Mohammed was trembling, bone tired. What should he do? Believe the spectre or laugh at it? He made his ablutions and prayed again for God’s help and support. Feeling almost at peace, he went off to his old house to sleep. His night was long and painful, cruelly upset by insomnia. Unable to lie still, he would get up, walk around, then collapse back in a bed that creaked and moved as if shaken by invisible hands. He felt that everything was slipping from his grasp, that he had nothing to hold on to. When his Koran fell from the table where it sat covered by material from the paternal shroud, a few pages fluttered loose and were carried away in the air. In a panic, Mohammed would have liked to know which sura had flown away, he would have liked to read it over and over, but that was impossible. He prayed until the sun rose. He tried to find where the missing pages had landed, but there was no trace of them, and when he opened the Koran, he was stunned to see that every page was blank. The verses had been wiped away, swallowed by something unseen. Wrapping the Koran in its piece of shroud, he clutched it to his breast, and fell asleep like that on the floor, on his little prayer rug, huddled up with an expression of agony on his face. Now and then he awoke shivering. It was midsummer, and he was cold, sweating; he could feel a fever rising.

The house mirrored the confusion of his thoughts and in particular the illusions he still harboured. The bathrooms were on the first floor, with Turkish toilets, as in hammams. His children would never use them. They had never seen toilets without a commode, not even in a movie. Mohammed climbed up to the terrace and studied the horizon. Blue, mauve, orange, white: he saw the sky — or imagined it — in his favorite colours. The air was pure, without the slightest breath of wind. A great silence enveloped this world, his world. Gradually he began to feel better there, as if reconciled with himself and this outside world; he had settled in there and no longer heard the distant sounds of the road or the words of the black-clothed shadow. Looking around, he could see that he was the only man to possess such a big house, and that didn’t worry him at all. On the contrary, he felt proud: he, at least, had thought of his family, unlike those immigrants who abandoned wife and children and came home to work in their fields while waiting to marry a little shepherdess.

Mohammed went from floor to floor, counting the rooms, losing track and starting over. He spent the evening floundering in calculations, trying in vain to find out how much all this had cost him. At bedtime, he realised there was no water to perform his ablutions before the last prayer of the day. He went to his old house, washed quickly, and returned to the new house, determined to get it ready for his long-cherished goal, his dream, his passion: to welcome his children as the real head of a family, like a lord, a responsible father. He reflected that other men have the drive and aspiration to amass a fortune, or to become a government minister or a stationmaster, whereas his ambition was of the utmost simplicity: to gather his children around him. That was not too much to ask of God, of LaFrance, of the vicissitudes of life — to bring his children here, to this dry countryside, and that unparalleled house, at his age, in this year when his life had changed rhythm and direction.

He considered each of his children in turn. Mourad, the eldest: he’s kind, obedient, and eager for my blessing; he’ll come, even though he’s married to a Christian. Rachid, who calls himself Richard, is uncomfortable in his own skin; he got away from me early on, spending more time playing in our building’s courtyard than doing his homework. But he’ll come if his big brother insists. Othmane is a good boy; he’ll do what his wife tells him, though. A Moroccan woman from Casablanca, she has never liked us and thinks herself better than all of us put together, simply because her parents weren’t emigrants, so I’m not sure they’ll come. Jamila will, however, because it would provide a chance for our reconciliation, yet I’m doubtful about her as well because she holds a grudge and is as stubborn as I am. As for Nabile, he’ll be so happy to be here, with me. And my last little girl, Rekya, she’ll obey me without question. At least I think so.

One Friday evening, ignoring the threats of the black thing, Mohammed summoned the readers of the Koran. Among them he noticed a very tall, slender man all in white, to whom he mentioned the black shadow, which made the other man smile. During the reading, a butcher cut the throat of a calf on the threshold while Mohammed’s wife burned incense within the house and poured a few drops of milk in all the corners. The house was blessed but uninhabitable. Prayers recited in a droning voice echoed within the walls in a strange, disturbing way, and when a few thin fissures appeared on those walls, one reader rose and ran off, convinced that jinns were at work.*

Out on the patio, the men ate in silence (and rather quickly) from a large platter of couscous. The tall man took Mohammed aside to tell him confidentially that his house needed more protection, that a single evening of reading would not be enough. The demon’s resistance must be overcome, he told him.

I believe that the people of the house, the owners, the ones you have disturbed, are demanding reparation, and only the word of God is effective against these beings who emerge from the stones in a black dust that swells into a menacing presence. You must double the number of readers, even if you have to bring them in from Bouya Omar — you know, the saint who cures madmen: they will know how to address the wicked creatures that swarm under the earth, waiting to find you alone and tear you to pieces.* Do you remember what happened some ten years ago, when Bouchta defied them? No, you don’t remember, or you weren’t there; well, the poor man fell into a hole that quickly filled up with dirt — and he was gone! And yet he’d been warned, told that the property, bought for a mouthful of bread, was inhabited by the invisible people — you know who I mean — but he wouldn’t listen to anyone, didn’t want to know. One evening, even before he’d begun to build, while he was out walking around the property, the earth just swallowed him up without a trace, so he never even had a proper funeral, since the body had vanished. It’s a serious matter; perhaps you think I’m merely telling stories, but the facts are there. In any case, as a good Muslim you have nothing to fear. Don’t forget: next Friday, an entire night of reading.

After everyone was gone, Mohammed and his wife found themselves staring at a headless calf soaked in blood. All they could do was stand there. They looked at each other, then left the house in the middle of a moonless night filled with clouds in the shape of calves’ heads. Early the next morning the butcher took the animal away to cut it up. Each family received its share of meat. The portions were fair, so the villagers’ comments were more or less polite.

WITH THE LAST OF HIS SAVINGS, Mohammed bought furnishings for part of the house, including a sprung leather armchair he delivered to a spot outside his front door in a rented Honda. Taking advantage of the long shopping trip to Marrakech, he’d phoned all his children to invite them to join him and had even forced himself to call Jamila, whom he had expelled from his life when she’d married a European. He’d had to leave messages on everyone else’s answering machines; Jamila had been the only one home.

It’s your father, yes I’m fine, in fact, things are going very well: the house is finished and I’m expecting you, so come, my daughter, you’ll see how big and beautiful it is, the loveliest house in the whole village…. What do you mean you can’t? You’re saying no to your father, who spent months building a little palace for you? No, my daughter, you’ll come for Eid al-Kebir. Arrange things with your brothers and come as a group: drive carefully, no speeding, I bless you, my daughter, may God keep you and give you health and happiness, see you soon, my daughter. As he was about to hang up, he heard her shout, But, Papa, are you crazy? What’s this business about a house? Do you think I can just leave work, abandon my husband, and come prance around out in the sticks in your dinky little dump? Papa, please, wake up! The world has changed, and I’m not the little girl you used to shower with candies anymore. That’s over —give up, move on, forget this house and this idea of bringing us all back together as if we didn’t have our own lives to live…. Come on, Papa, don’t wear yourself out. Bye-bye, hugs and kisses….