Yasmina Khadra: What the day owes the nigth

‘I’ll get by.’

‘I don’t doubt it, Issa, not for a second. But good intentions require means. No matter how hard you believe, belief isn’t enough.’

‘What are you insinuating, Mahi?’

My uncle wrung his hands nervously, searching for words, turning them over in his mind, then he took a deep breath and said:

‘You have a wife and two children. It’s a heavy burden for a man with no work. It ties your hands, it clips your wings . . .’

‘They’re my family.’

‘I am your family too.’

‘It’s not the same thing.’

‘It is the same thing, Issa. Your son is my nephew, flesh of my flesh. Leave him with me. What can he do if he follows in your footsteps? What were you hoping he might be – a labourer, a shoeshine boy, a donkey driver? You need to face facts. If he stays with you he will never amount to much. The boy needs to go to school, to learn to read and write, to grow up properly. I know – Arab boys aren’t supposed to go to school, they’re supposed to work in the fields, look after the livestock. But I can send him to school, I can turn him into an educated man . . . Please, don’t take this the wrong way. Think for a minute. The boy has no future with you.’

My father thought for a long while about what his brother had said, eyes down, teeth clenched. When at last he looked up, his own face had disappeared, replaced by a mask of ashen impassiveness, and with a heavy heart he said:

‘Clearly, you will never understand anything, my brother.’

‘Don’t take it like that, Issa.’

‘Shut up. Don’t say another word. Perhaps I am not educated like you, but if being educated means belittling others, I want nothing to do with it.’

My uncle tried to say something; my father stopped him with a wave. He took the banknote from his pocket and set it on the counter.

‘And I want nothing to do with your money, either.’

With that, he grabbed me by the arm so roughly that he almost tore it from its socket, and pushed me out into the street. My uncle wanted to come after us, but didn’t dare. He stood outside his shop, knowing this mistake would never be forgiven.

My father did not walk, he thundered down the hill like a boulder. I had never seen him so angry. He seemed about to implode. His lips quivered, his eyes stared fiercely at the world as though wishing the ground would open up and swallow everything. He said nothing, but his seething silence made me fear the worst.

When we had gone some distance, he grabbed me and slammed me against a wall, staring hard into my terrified eyes; a blast of buckshot could not have terrified me more.

‘Do you think I’m a failure?’ he asked, choking out the words. ‘Do you think I brought a child into the world to watch him die slowly? Well, you’re wrong, and your sneering uncle is wrong, and destiny itself is wrong if it thinks I will allow myself be humiliated. Do you know why? Because though I was forced to abandon my lands, I still have my soul. I’m still alive, I’m strong, I’ve got my health. I have the power enough to move mountains. Because I have pride.’

His fingers digging into my shoulders were hurting me. He didn’t realise it. His eyes rolled in his head like white-hot ball bearings.

‘I wasn’t able to save our land, I know that, but I got it to produce a harvest, don’t forget that . . . What happened afterwards was not my fault. Sometime hard work and prayer come to grief in the face of man’s greed. I was naïve. I’m not naïve now. I won’t be stabbed in the back again . . . I may be starting from scratch, but I’m starting off a wiser man. I’ll work harder than any man has ever worked, I’ll face down the evil eye and I’ll prove to you that your father is a worthy man. I’ll drag us out of this pit that’s swallowed us up, I swear it. You do believe me, son, don’t you?’

‘Yes, Papa.’

‘Look me in the eye and tell me you believe me.’

He had no eyes now, only two gaping chasms of tears and blood that threatened to engulf us both.

‘Look at me!’

He grabbed my chin and jerked my head up.

‘You don’t believe me, do you?’

I felt a lump in my throat. I couldn’t speak, I couldn’t meet his eyes. The hand gripping my chin was the only thing that held me up.

Suddenly I felt his other hand lash my cheek.

‘You think I’m crazy, that’s why you won’t say anything. You little shit. What right have you to doubt me? No one has the right to doubt me. If that bastard of an uncle of yours thinks I’m washed up, then he’s no better.’

This was the first time my father had ever raised his hand to me. I didn’t understand what was going on, what I had done wrong, why he was so angry with me. I felt ashamed that I had made him angry, terrified that he might disown me, this man who mattered more to me than anything in the world.

My father raised his hand again and it hovered in the air, fingers trembling. His face was swollen and distorted. Then he howled like a wounded animal and hugged me to his chest, sobbing, crushing me against him so hard, for so long, I thought I might die.

THE WOMEN were sitting around a low table in a corner of the courtyard, drinking tea and basking in the sun. My mother, sitting with them, slightly aloof, held Zahra in her arms. She had finally joined the group but she took no part in their conversations. She was shy, and often, when Badra started in on one of her dirty stories, she would flush and choke on her tea with embarrassment. As usual, the conversation shifted from one subject to another, anything to take their minds off the stifling heat of the courtyard. Yezza, the redhead, had a black eye; her husband had come home drunk again the night before. Out of a sense of propriety, the other women pretended not to notice. Yezza was proud of her black eye; she endured her husband’s cowardly attacks with dignity.

‘The past few nights, I’ve had a strange dream,’ Mama said to Batoul, the clairvoyant. ‘It’s always the same: it’s dark, I’m lying on my belly and someone sticks a knife in my back.’

The women all turned towards Batoul, waiting for her interpretation. The psychic looked hesitant and scratched her head; she had no vision.

‘It’s always the same?’

‘Exactly the same.’

‘You’re lying on your belly in the dark and someone stabs you in the back?’ asked Badra.

‘Exactly.’

‘Are you sure it’s a knife?’ Badra quipped, rolling her eyes lewdly.

It took the women a moment to realise what she was hinting at, then they burst out laughing. Mama clearly had no idea what the joke was, so Badra nudged her. ‘You should tell your husband to be more gentle!’

‘Badra! Don’t you ever think about anything else?’ Mama was angry, ‘Can’t you see I’m being serious?’

‘Well, so am I . . .’

The women fell about, mouths hanging open as they brayed with laughter. Mama sat sullenly for a minute, shocked by their lack of restraint, but then she too began to smile and then to giggle.

Only Hadda did not join in the laughter. Her small, slender frame was drawn up. She was extraordinarily beautiful, with high cheekbones and great dark eyes, but she looked distraught. She had not said a word since she sat down. Suddenly she reached across the table and offered her palm for Batoul to read.

‘Tell me what you can see . . .’

Batoul hesitated, but seeing the distress in the girl’s face, she gently took the small hand in her own, her fingernail tracing the lines that criss-crossed the palm.

‘You have the hands of a princess, Hadda.’

‘Tell me what you see, Batoul. I need to know. I can’t go on like this.’

Batoul studied the girl’s palm in silence for a long time.