Salman Rushdie - The Satanic Verses

A curtained litter passes by; some fine lady of the city, out to see the fair, borne on the shoulders of eight Anatolian slaves. Abu Simbel takes the young Baal by the elbow, under the pretext of steering him out of the road; murmurs, ‘I hoped to find you; if you will, a word.’ Baal marvels at the skill of the Grandee. Searching for a man, he can make his quarry think he has hunted the hunter. Abu Simbel's grip tightens; by the elbow, he steers his companion towards the holy of holies at the centre of the town.

‘I have a commission for you,’ the Grandee says. ‘A literary matter. I know my limitations; the skills of rhymed malice, the arts of metrical slander, are quite beyond my powers. You understand.’

But Baal, the proud, arrogant fellow, stiffens, stands on his dignity. ‘It isn't right for the artist to become the servant of the state.’ Simbel's voice falls lower, acquires silkier rhythms. ‘Ah, yes. Whereas to place yourself at the disposal of assassins is an entirely honourable thing.’ A cult of the dead has been raging in Jahilia. When a man dies, paid mourners beat themselves, scratch their breasts, tear hair. A hamstrung camel is left on the grave to die. And if the man has been murdered his closest relative takes ascetic vows and pursues the murderer until the blood has been avenged by blood; whereupon it is customary to compose a poem of celebration, but few revengers are gifted in rhyme. Many poets make a living by writing assassination songs, and there is general agreement that the finest of these blood-praising versifiers is the precocious polemicist, Baal. Whose professional pride prevents him from being bruised, now, by the Grandee's little taunt. ‘That is a cultural matter,’ he replies Abu Simbel sinks deeper still into silkiness. ‘Maybe so,’ he whispers at the gates of the House of the Black Stone, ‘but, Baal, concede: don't I have some small claim upon you? We both serve, or so I thought, the same mistress.’

Now the blood leaves Baal's cheeks; his confidence cracks, falls from him like a shell. The Grandee, seemingly oblivious to the alteration, sweeps the satirist forward into the House.

They say in Jahilia that this valley is the navel of the earth; that the planet, when it was being made, went spinning round this point. Adam came here and saw a miracle: four emerald pillars bearing aloft a giant glowing ruby, and beneath this canopy a huge white stone, also glowing with its own light, like a vision of his soul. He built strong walls around the vision to bind it forever to the earth. This was the first House. It was rebuilt many times – once by Ibrahim, after Hagar's and Ismail's angel-assisted survival – and gradually the countless touchings of the white stone by the pilgrims of the centuries darkened its colour to black. Then the time of the idols began; by the time of Mahound, three hundred and sixty stone gods clustered around God's own stone.

What would old Adam have thought? His own sons are here now: the colossus of Hubal, sent by the Amalekites from Hit, stands above the treasury well, Hubal the shepherd, the waxing crescent moon; also, glowering, dangerous Kain. He is the waning crescent, blacksmith and musician; he, too, has his devotees.

Hubal and Kain look down on Grandee and poet as they stroll. And the Nabataean proto-Dionysus, He-Of-Shara; the morning star, Astarte, and saturnine Nakruh. Here is the sun god, Manaf! Look, there flaps the giant Nasr, the god in eagle-form! See Quzah, who holds the rainbow ... is this not a glut of gods, a stone flood, to feed the glutton hunger of the pilgrims, to quench their unholy thirst. The deities, to entice the travellers, come – like the pilgrims – from far and wide. The idols, too, are delegates to a kind of international fair.

There is a god here called Allah (means simply, the god). Ask the Jahilians and they'll acknowledge that this fellow has some sort of overall authority, but he isn't very popular: an all-rounder in an age of specialist statues.

Abu Simbel and newly perspiring Baal have arrived at the shrines, placed side by side, of the three best-beloved goddesses in Jahilia. They bow before all three: Uzza of the radiant visage, goddess of beauty and love; dark, obscure Manat, her face averted, her purposes mysterious, sifting sand between her fingers – she's in charge of destiny – she's Fate; and lastly the highest of the three, the mother-goddess, whom the Greeks called Lato. Llat, they call her here, or, more frequently, Al-Lat. The goddess . Even her name makes her Allah's opposite and equal. Lat the omnipotent. His face showing sudden relief, Baal flings himself to the ground and prostrates himself before her. Abu Simbel stays on his feet.

The family of the Grandee, Abu Simbel – or, to be more precise, of his wife Hind – controls the famous temple of Lat at the city's southern gate. (They also draw the revenues from the Manat temple at the east gate, and the temple of Uzza in the north.) These concessions arc the foundations of the Grandee's wealth, so he is of course, Baal understands, the servant of Lat. And the satirist's devotion to this goddess is well known throughout Jahilia. So that was all he meant! Trembling with relief, Baal remains prostrate, giving thanks to his patron Lady. Who looks upon him benignly; but a goddess's expresson is not to be relied upon. Baal has made a serious mistake.

Without warning, the Grandee kicks the poet in the kidney. Attacked just when he has decided he's safe, Baal squeals, rolls over, and Abu Simbel follows him, continuing to kick. There is the sound of a cracking rib. ‘Runt,’ the Grandee remarks, his voice remaining low and good natured. ‘High-voiced pimp with small testicles. Did you think that the master of Lat's temple would claim comradeship with you just because of your adolescent passion for her?’ And more kicks, regular, methodical. Baal weeps at Abu Simbel's feet. The House of the Black Stone is far from empty, but who would come between the Grandee and his wrath? Abruptly, Baal's tormentor squats down, grabs the poet by the hair, jerks his head up, whispers into his ear: ‘Baal, she wasn't the mistress I meant,’ and then Baal lets out a howl of hideous self-pity, because he knows his life is about to end, to end when he has so much still to achieve, the poor guy. The Grandee's lips brush his car. ‘Shit of a frightened camel,’ Abu Simbel breathes, ‘I know you fuck my wife.’ He observes, with interest, that Baal has acquired a prominent erection, an ironic monument to his fear.

Abu Simbel, the cuckolded Grandee, stands up, commands, ‘On your feet’, and Baal, bewildered, follows him outside.

The graves of Ismail and his mother Hagar the Egyptian lie by the north-west face of the House of the Black Stone, in an enclosure surrounded by a low wall. Abu Simbel approaches this area, halts a little way off. In the enclosure is a small group of men. The water-carrier Khalid is there, and some sort of bum from Persia by the outlandish name of Salman, and to complete this trinity of scum there is the slave Bilal, the one Mahound freed, an enormous black monster, this one, with a voice to match his size. The three idlers sit on the enclosure wall. ‘That bunch of riff-raff,’ Abu Simbel says. ‘Those are your targets. Write about them; and their leader, too.’ Baal, for all his terror, cannot conceal his disbelief. ‘Grandee, those goons – those fucking clowns ? You don't have to worry about them. What do you think? That Mahound's one God will bankrupt your temples? Three-sixty versus one, and the one wins? Can't happen.’ He giggles, close to hysteria. Abu Simbel remains calm: ‘Keep your insults for your verses.’ Giggling Baal can't stop. ‘A revolution of water-carriers, immigrants and slaves... wow, Grandee. I'm really scared.’ Abu Simbel looks carefully at the tittering poet. ‘Yes,’ he answers, ‘that's right, you should be afraid. Get writing, please, and I expect these verses to be your masterpieces.’ Baal crumples, whines. ‘But they are a waste of my, my small talent...’ He sees that he has said too much.