Boualem Sansal - The German Mujahid

I went to Rachel’s old neighbourhood to look at the house. My mates had told me someone had bought it. It hurts, seeing strangers living in his house. I kept my hands behind my back and strolled around like I was just out for a walk. I had no reason to be round here anymore. In Rachel’s house the lights were all on. There were new curtains in the windows, a dog barking, the TV turned up full blast, an electric drill whining, a hammer banging away, children laughing. The garage was wide open, full of boxes and furniture. The new family was busy moving in, wiping away every trace of us, stamping their own mark on the place. It hurts to see yourself wiped away like that. Do they know that some guy committed suicide in the house? I doubt it, estate agents don’t get paid to tell their clients the truth. If they’re hammering and drilling away like that, they must be happy, which means they don’t know. They’ll find out once they’ve settled in, when the neighbours pop round to bring them up to speed. Then they’ll find out that the parents of the guy who used to live there had their throats cut in Algeria. That should shake them up. I hope they take it well. Rachel was a great guy, a good citizen, he never let anyone down, his ghost wouldn’t hurt a fly. But I can see how it might spook them. Rachel’s house — like our house back in Aïn Deb — is haunted by a terrible secret, by the greatest crime in history, and in the end that sort of shit seeps through the walls, gnaws at your guts, it does your head in, drives you mad. It killed Rachel, and it will kill anyone who gets too close. All the time I lived in that house, I was constantly worrying, crying, trembling, panicking, and the more I tried to block it out, the more clearly I could see the ghosts on the horizon, marching towards me, staring at me with their hollow eyes. Every time I ran off into the night, I could hear their cries following me, only to disappear when the sun came up and the tears dried on my face.

I went to the cemetery like I promised back in Aïn Deb. I sat on Rachel’s grave and talked to him for a long time. I knew he could hear me. “Hey, bro” I said. “You know what? I just got back from Aïn Deb. It was all thanks to Ophélie, really, she gave me the cash for the trip. She told me: ‘Rachel would be happy to see you taking an interest in your family.’ See? I’m not a complete fuckup, and I’m getting better fast. Everything back in the bled is fine, apart from the weather, but it’s winter so I suppose it’s normal that it’s freezing and pissing down all the time. The people are really cool. They took care of me, especially Mimed, the shoemaker’s son. You probably don’t know him, he wasn’t even born when you left for France. Actually, you might remember him — that time you came back to bring me to France, he was bawling his eyes out because I was leaving and he blamed you, he was screaming at you. He’s a good looking guy these days with lots of happy kids. I didn’t tell them you killed yourself, they were so excited to hear about you, I just couldn’t bring myself to tell them. I did what you did, I went to papa and maman’s graves. It was nice: their last resting place is so peaceful. Your cemetery is nice too, it’s beautiful, it’s quiet, full of flowers with people coming and going, birds singing, couples whispering to each other. You’re lucky. . And I wanted to tell you, I read your diary. Com’Dad gave it to me after you. . after the investigation. He said, ‘Your brother was a great guy.’ It’s not like he was telling me anything new, I’ve always known that. All that stuff about papa’s past, it’s awful. We’d have been better off not knowing, you’d still be here, still be with Ophélie, things would be fine. At first I thought you were too hard on papa, but thinking about it, I realised you were right. What I read in your diary and what I found out from the books you left sent shivers down my spine. I aged, like, twenty years. I mean, could something like that happen again? I tell myself it couldn’t but when I see what the jihadists are doing on the estate and everywhere else, I think they’d outdo the Nazis if they ever came to power. They’re too full of hate and pride to just gas everyone. I’ve been trying to think how we can stop them, the people on the estate don’t say anything and the cops are keeping an eye, but from a safe distance. My mates and me, we stand up to them as best we can, but we’re just kids, people are more afraid of us than they are of the Islamists. And I wanted to tell you that I’m going to try to publish your diary and mine, I hope you think it’s the right thing to do, I hope I can find a publisher. Like that poet Primo Levi said, you have to tell kids everything. Me and the guys are thinking of setting up a club to teach them all the stuff people have been hiding from them, they need to know, they’re the ones who’ll take after their parents, the good and the bad. If you’re okay with the idea, I’d like to ask your old teacher, Madame Dominique G.H. to go over it, make it into a proper book. She won’t say no, she had a lot of time for you. Anyway, that’s what I wanted to say, bro. Momo and the guys say hello, and aunt Sakina sends her love. I suppose you know poor uncle Ali is a bit gone in the head these days. I love you, I owe you a lot. I’ll come back and visit. Get some rest.”

Never in our lives had we been so close.

Then I went to visit the imam in his basement. They’ve turned it into a bunker, steel-plated door, bars on the window and there’s a wall of Kapos standing guard outside. They body-searched me and brought me to the imam like a prisoner of war. So there he was in the flesh, the one-eyed fucker, he was fifty-something, his hair was completely white, he was wearing a green gandurah, a black jacket, he had a beard that comes down to his belly button and one piercing eye. He was sitting cross-legged on the floor with his back against the wall. In front of him, on a low table, were the tools of his trade, the Qur’an, a pile of blank fatwas, a seal, a phone and fax machine. Flicha, the new emir, was next to him, a young guy with a beard, built like a brick shithouse, carrying a gun under his jacket, the butt deliberately sticking out to make sure any visitors didn’t try anything. The imam said: “Come here, my son, come here. Sit opposite me. I believe you know Mujahid Si Omar — the ignorant young thugs on the estate call him Flicha. Talk to me, tell me about yourself, tell me what you thought of our beloved Algeria, an Islamic country suffering under the yoke of a heathen government.”

I said, “What do you want?”

“Your happiness, my son, your happiness and that of our faith. When I heard that your parents had been savagely murdered, it grieved me, truly. I immediately got in touch with our brothers in Algeria, who are fighting for Allah, for His religion.”

“I didn’t ask you for anything.”

“I did it for Allah, and for truth, that is my duty as a Muslim, as an imam. I need to tell you that your parents were murdered by the Algerian government, not by the holy warriors of Allah. It is their way, to kill people and put the blame on us.”

“Them, you, what’s the difference?”

“There is a great difference. Had this been done by our soldiers, I would have told you so regardless of how you might feel, we proclaim our jihad before the world. They are the guilty ones, you must avenge your parents, Allah provides for Qisas— for exact and equivalent retribution.”

“I don’t need you, I don’t need anybody.”

“Pride is a virtue, but now you need Islam to strengthen your heart and your hand.”

“I don’t need anything.”

“What you says is blasphemous, but you will think better of it and join us, we can give you solace, we can help you and your adoptive parents financially, and we can find some useful work for your friends who hang around all day in defiance of the law.”