Yasmina Khadra - What the day owes the nigth

‘Nobody in Río Salado said anything about me escaping from prison?’

‘I didn’t hear anything.’

‘It was a miracle. They sent me to the guillotine but my head grew back. Do you believe in destiny, Jonas?’

‘I don’t feel as though I have one.’

‘I do. I was being transferred from Orléansville prison when one of the tyres blew and the van went head first into a ditch. When I came to, I was lying in a bush. I got up and walked away, and when no one came after me, I kept on walking. I had to pinch myself to make sure I wasn’t dreaming. You don’t think that’s a sign from heaven?’

He pushed his plate away and went to see what was happening in the living room, deliberately leaving his machine gun on the table. When he came back he said:

‘He’s in a bad way, but he’s strong . . . he’ll pull through. He has to pull through, otherwise . . .’ He did not finish the sentence, but looked me up and down and changed his tone. ‘I keep the faith. After our clash with the police when my senior officer was injured, I didn’t know what to do. That’s when your name popped into my head. I swear I heard it. I even turned around, but there was no one there. I didn’t try to understand, I just set off. Two nights we spent, cutting through the woods; even the dogs didn’t bark when we went past. Isn’t that amazing?’

He pushed the machine gun to one side, pretending to be distracted.

‘I’ve run into dozens of ambushes, but they never caught me, never hit me; eventually I became fatalistic. My time will come when God decides. I’m not afraid of men or thunderbolts any more . . . But what are you afraid of? The revolution is going well, we’re winning on all fronts, even abroad; we have the support of our own people and the international community. The great day is coming soon. What are you waiting for? Why don’t you join us?’

‘Are you going to kill us?’

‘I’m not a killer, Jonas, I’m a soldier. I am prepared to lay down my life for my country – what are you prepared to do for it?’

‘My mother doesn’t know much about surgery.’

‘Neither do I, but someone’s got to do it. You know who my commander is? It’s Sy Rachid – “the elusive Sy Rachid” they talk about in the newspapers. I’ve seen a lot of fire-brands, but no one with the personality of this man. A lot of times we’ve been cornered and he’s managed to get us out just by clicking his fingers. He’s extraordinary. I won’t let him die. The revolution needs him.’

‘Okay, but what happens if he does die? What are you going to do to us?’

‘Coward – all you can think about is saving your own skin. There’s a war on out there – hundreds, thousands of people are dying every day, but you don’t care. I’d kill you like a dog if I didn’t owe you . . . By the way, why is it that I still can’t bring myself to call you Younes?’

He didn’t shout, he didn’t thump the table; he spoke quietly, reluctantly, scornfully. He was too tired to exert himself. But the contempt he felt for me was infinite, and it reawakened in me a fury I had not felt since Jean-Christophe rejected me.

The nurse knocked at the kitchen door before coming in; he was sweating.

‘She did it.’

‘God be praised,’ Jelloul said with an air of detachment. He nodded at me. ‘You see? Even fate is on our side.’

He ordered the nurse to guard me and hurried off to see his commander. The nurse asked if there was anything to eat. I pointed him to the fridge and the larder. He told me to move back to the window and not to try anything clever. He was a scrawny kid, still in his teens, his face pink and downy. He was wearing a thick sweater much too big for him, baggy trousers held up by a length of rope, and a pair of grotesquely large boots that made him look ridiculous. He ignored the fridge and the larder and ate what was left on the table.

Jelloul called me. The nurse nodded for me to leave the kitchen and watched me as I walked down the hall. Slumped in a chair, Germaine was trying to regain her composure. I could see her heart beating; she was bathed in sweat. The wounded man still lay on the table, his bare chest wrapped in bandages. The sound of his rasping breath filled the room. Jelloul dipped a compress in a bowl of water and mopped his commander’s face, his every movement charged with reverence.

‘We’re going to stay here for a few days while the captain builds up his strength,’ he announced. ‘Tomorrow morning you’ll open the pharmacy just like any other day. Madame will stay up here with us. If there are any messages to be done, you’ll do them. You can come and go as you please, but if I notice anything out of the ordinary – well, I don’t need to paint a picture. All we’re asking for is a little hospitality. I’m offering you the opportunity to serve your people. Try not to let me down.

‘I’ll look after the pharmacy and do the shopping,’ Germaine interrupted.

‘I’d prefer him to do it . . . is that all right, Jonas?’

‘How do I know you won’t kill us before you leave?’

‘You’re pathetic, Jonas.’

‘I trust you,’ Germaine said.

Jelloul smiled. It was the same smile he had once given me in that little douar of squalid shacks behind the marabout’s hill, a mixture of scorn and pity. He took a small revolver from the pocket of his trousers and handed it to me.

‘It’s loaded. All you have to do is press the trigger.’

The feel of cold metal made my hair stand on end.

Germaine turned pale, her hands, white-knuckled, clutching her dress.

‘You want me to tell you something, Jonas? You break my heart. What kind of pathetic loser turns away from a chance to fulfil his destiny?’

He took the gun back and slipped it into his pocket.

The wounded man groaned and began to stir. He was about my age, perhaps a year or two older. He was tall, blonde, with well-defined muscles. A reddish beard hid much of his face, he had bushy eyebrows and his nose, slightly curved, was thin and sharp as a razor blade. He stirred again, reached out and tried to turn on to his side, but the movement sent a shooting pain through him that brought him round. It was then that I recognised him, in spite of what the years had taken out of him. It was Ouari, my partner in crime years ago in Jenane Jato, the boy who had taught me the art of camouflage and how to trap goldfinches. He looked prematurely old, but the eyes were still the same: dark, metallic, impenetrable – I would never forget those eyes.

Ouari was clearly coming out of a deep coma, because, not recognising me, his first reaction was one of self-defence. He grabbed me by the throat and hauled himself to his feet.

‘It’s all right, Sy Rachid,’ Jelloul whispered. ‘You’re safe here.’

Ouari did not seem to understand. He stared vacantly at his fellow soldier and went on choking me. Germaine rushed to try and help me, but Jelloul ordered her to go back and in a soft voice tried to explain the situation to his commanding officer. The hands around my throat still did not relax. I was having trouble breathing but had to wait until the wounded man came to his senses. By the time he let me go, my face was numb. Ouari collapsed on to the table, arms hanging limply by his sides; he shuddered for a moment and then lay still.

‘Step back,’ barked the nurse, who had come back into the room to see what the noise was.

He examined the injured man, took his pulse.

‘It’s all right, he just fainted. We have to get him into bed; he needs rest.’

The rebels stayed with us for almost two weeks. I went about my daily business as though nothing had happened. Worried that someone might show up unexpectedly, Germaine phoned her family in Oran and told them she was going out into the desert, to Colo-Béchar, and would call them when she got back. Laoufi, the nurse, put the captain in my room and sat by his bed day and night. I slept on the old sofa in my uncle’s study. Jelloul constantly came in to lecture me. He was angry and disgusted at my indifference to our people’s war of independence. I knew if I said anything it would simply make him angrier, so I said nothing. One evening, having tried to engage me in conversation while I sat reading a book, he said: