A Persian Requiem (26 page)

McMahon fell silent. Zari opened her eyes. It felt as though she had just woken from a pleasant dream.

“What a story!” she said.

“Did you understand all of it?” asked Yusef.

“Whatever I didn’t understand I pieced together with my
imagination
.” Then turning to McMahon, Zari said, “Actually, at first I was expecting to hear a children’s story.”

“You see,” he explained, “your daughters planted the germ of this story in my mind … the first images I had were those of someone sweeping the sky and a sackful of stars inside a dark cupboard. But to tell you the truth, no matter how hard I tried I wasn’t able to write a story for the children themselves, to pay back my debt to them. It turned out as you heard it.”

Yusef laughed; he got up to pour some wine for McMahon and handed him the glass. McMahon took a sip and said, “It’s good wine, where can one buy it?”

“You know,” Yusef said, “now that I’ve heard your story again, it occurs to me your favourite theme is that same one you keep repeating in your poems.” McMahon didn’t say anything, so Yusef continued, “You’re trying to atone for the sins of others.”

Zari no longer understood what her husband meant. She was
about to ask him, when she heard Abol-Ghassem Khan’s voice from the parlour.

“Where’s everybody hiding?” he called out. Then he appeared in person. He blinked and said, “I heard there was a feast in this house tonight, so I got myself here on the double!”

A
s Kolu began to regain his strength, he made himself a slingshot with which he pestered the sparrows in the garden until they could have no peace on any branch. There was still room to be grateful, however, since of all the window panes in the main building, only the pantry’s had been broken. That day Zari had given Kolu a hard slap on the back of his hand, saying, “I’ve had more than enough of you!”

And Kolu had sat underneath the orange-blossom tree, crying and sobbing loudly to be taken back to his mother and brother.

Every Sunday before dawn, Kolu would get up, undress, and jump into the pool with the copper crucifix around his neck, waking Zari up with the noise. Then he would get out of the pool and, according to Gholam, dress in his new clothes, gulp down a little breakfast and rush off to see the black-robed man at the Missionary Hospital. Just before noon, he would return home and instead of his usual hello, announce, “I am a Christian.” By
lunch-time
, though, he had clean forgotten it, and reverted to swearing by Hazrate Abbas again.

That last Sunday, Kolu had come home later than usual. Zari was in the kitchen, preparing provisions for Yusef’s trip, so they could have some dinner ready when they reached Zarqan that night. Kolu came into the kitchen and eagerly preached to Zari and Khadijeh about Jesus Christ. He also mentioned Judas and asked Zari whether that ungrateful scoundrel was to be found in the Jewish quarter. Then he said with a sigh, “I am a lost Iamb of Jesus.” He clasped his hands in prayer before his lips and continued, “O Jesus who art in heaven. Let’s see if you can find me and take me home to my mother!”

Khadijeh scolded him. “You stupid boy, repent before Allah!
Go wash out your mouth!”

“Leave him alone,” said Zari quietly.

“Every night from now on I’ll talk to Mr Jesus and pester him until he comes to me. After all what kind of shepherd is he to abandon all his lambs and go and sit up in the sky? If he’s true to his word, let him come down and take me … if he takes me with him then I’ll give him my father’s flute which I’ve hidden under the bedclothes. But if he doesn’t, may Hazrate Abbas strike me down if I don’t hit him one in the middle of the forehead with my slingshot when I come across him!”

He dug a hand into his coat pocket and brought out three copper crucifixes which he showed to Zari. “The fang-toothed woman gave me these charms,” he said. “One is for my mother, one for my uncle, and the other for my uncle’s wife—I’m taking these for them as souvenirs.” He held one of the crucifixes in front of Khadijeh and said, “Kiss it!”

Khadijeh shoved his hand away. “You idiot!” she snapped. “Go back to your mother!”

Zari thought, “None of them have ever accepted him as a son in this family. Not even myself or Ameh Khanom.”

“The fang-toothed woman told me Jesus is everywhere—in our village too,” Kolu went on. “She said any child who calls out, ‘Mr Jesus!’ He immediately says, ‘Yes, my child.’ But I’m too old now so I can’t hear him.”

That evening Yusef decided to take Kolu with him to the village. Zari couldn’t help thinking, “What does the poor boy imagine now? That Jesus found him?”

Kolu couldn’t keep still for joy, so much so that he left his slingshot behind, even though he knew he wouldn’t be going straight to his family. First he was going with Yusef to Zarqan until someone could be found to take him to the lowlands. Clearly the poor lad felt that every step away from Yusef’s homestead was a step closer to his own village …

They departed, and Zari found herself alone during the long, turbulent nights, filled with nightmares. Nights so long, it seemed they would never be followed by morning. As time drew on, her thoughts became more distressed and her dreams more agitated.

Ameh was an expert at interpreting dreams. Everyone—even strangers—acknowledged this. Sometimes total strangers would telephone her and recount their dreams. She would greet them
politely, and then proceed to give her interpretation, in the hope of doing a good deed. She also had a handwritten manual of dream interpretation which she would refer to in case of difficulty. But even Ameh was unable to unravel two of Zari’s dreams. She leafed through her book carefully, but she still couldn’t find the key to those two dreams. And it was for this reason, according to Ameh, that of all Zari’s dreams, those two were constantly repeated.

Zari would dream that she stood stark naked in the middle of an unfamiliar square, surrounded by thousands of staring men and women. She also dreamt that it was exam-time at school, and a dark-skinned, scowling examiner was standing before her. Yet no matter how hard she tried, she didn’t know any of the answers. She racked her brains and sweated and her pulse raced, but still she was unable to answer the questions. In the morning, she could no longer remember what the questions were.

Ameh instructed her to beg a piece of bread from a beggar and then eat it so she would remember the questions.

One night Zari dreamt that a two-headed dragon swallowed her husband whole, as he was galloping along on his mare. When she looked closely, she realized that the two-headed dragon looked like Captain Singer, dressed in a Scottish tartan kilt with embroidery all around the edge. This particular dream Ameh interpreted easily. She said it meant that Singer would become a public
laughing-stock
, but Yusef, like Jonah, would learn patience and endurance in the whale’s stomach. The darkness inside the whale would enlighten him so that he could understand the secrets of the universe.

A few nights later Zari dreamt that the Governor had tossed Yusef into the furnace with his own hands. Yusef had burnt to a cinder, but nevertheless managed to grope his way out. Ameh interpreted the fire as the biblical one which had descended upon Abraham and then turned into a flower-garden. Yusef’s coming out of the fire meant that he had passed his ordeal. And although Ameh’s words reminded Zari of Siavush’s story, she kept quiet. Because that night, in the tent of the tribal chief … that night when Malek Sohrab took a bet with her over a Brno gun, and she had lost but never paid up … that night they had talked of Siavush the whole time, and teased Zari because she knew about John the Baptist and not about Siavush, and they had explained to her that Siavush had passed through the fire and come out vindicated …

Ameh went on with her interpretation. “The furnace is clearly the same one in which the wicked Khuli woman hid Muslim-
ibn-Aqil’s
children. Burning to a cinder signifies being purified and vindicated because, as you know, the meaning of a woman’s dream is always the reverse of the dream itself.”

Another night just before dawn, Zari dreamt that Kolu had struck Yusef right in the middle of the forehead with his slingshot. Ameh didn’t bother to interpret this one saying that dreaming just before dawn has no significance.

Ten days after Yusef’s departure, it was rumoured that Malek Sohrab had become an outlaw. Everyone who came to the house had something to say about it. Gholam told Zari that Malek Sohrab had taken to the mountains with a thousand gunmen and was hiding in an inaccessible spot.

One day Khosrow told her excitedly, “He’s close to Yasuj now, with two thousand fighting men. And he still hasn’t come down the mountain—what a man!”

A few days later, Hormoz showed up and commented, “Auntie, you know how much I admire bravery, but I think brave men should also have a sense of timing.”

Abol-Ghassem Khan often came along in a hurry to pick up Hormoz and take him off to his highness the Governor, but each time Zari would coax him into staying awhile, plying him with some of Tavuus Khanom’s oldest and best wines, and pressing delicacies on him until she managed to draw out some news.

“I hear Bibi Hamdam, Malek Sohrab’s mother, went to Army Headquarters,” Abol-Ghassem Khan told her. “She barged into the captain’s room without permission and threw herself, in those wide breeches of hers, at the major-general’s feet. She begged immunity for her son, and promised to bring him to the authorities herself. The major-general advised her to do that as soon as
possible
, at which point Bibi Hamdam pulled out a Quran from her bosom and tried to make him swear not to harm her son. But the major-general only kicked the old woman’s hand away.”

Then Sakineh, the woman who came to bake their bread, told them, “Bibi Hamdam has hired forty people to read the Quran and chant the An’am verse every day. It’s hair-raising! Oh Lord, I beg you by the purity of the saints, to spare the life of Bibi Hamdam’s
son, and meanwhile to spare this poor, sinful servant’s son from the military draft too!”

In despair, Zari took up her old addiction of reading newspapers. But she couldn’t find even the slightest mention of Malek Sohrab’s name in any newspaper. Her habit did, however, lead her to a certain news item in one of the leading local papers. She had been alone in the garden that evening when the newspaper arrived and she had taken it from the delivery-boy herself. It was two weeks since Yusef had left. The item read like this:

“In Gratitude”

“The gracious Khanom Ezzat-ud-Dowleh, one of the charitable and kind-hearted ladies of this town, has been appointed by the Women’s Society to visit and inspect the houses of the Mordestan District, as well as the women’s prison. All the houses of the above-mentioned district have been cleaned and disinfected under her supervision, and this charitable lady, out of boundless
generosity
, has bailed out and set free one inmate of the prison who, out of ignorance, had engaged in earning an illegal livelihood. The Governorship of Fars extends its gratitude to this humanitarian and benevolent lady for her services.”

Although Zari was not surprised to read this piece of news, it still depressed her. She crumpled up the newspaper and threw it away. She took refuge in the orangery, pacing about under the
orange-blossom
trees, feeling unequal to any task that might require
concentration
. She decided to go to the stables to find Gholam and ask him whether he had any more news of Malek Sohrab. But she changed her mind, knowing that the poor man might be
half-undressed
or even naked in the heat, or perhaps having a quiet smoke. For a moment, she thought of going to visit Bibi Hamdam, but decided against that too. She wasn’t in the mood for the loud chanting of Quran reciters, and she knew that the instant Bibi Hamdam set eyes on her she would begin to wail and press her for a solution to her problem. And of course, if Zari had any idea what to do, she would not be feeling so distraught. Everyone knew that Bibi Hamdam’s existence was tied to that of her son, and everyone knew too that Malek Sohrab, despite his size and stature, was nothing more than a child before his mother.

She thought of following Ameh Khanom and the children to Mehri’s house, but she realized she didn’t feel like putting on a long-sleeved dress and a head-scarf in that heat. Mehri’s second
husband, Mohsen Khan, was a very strict man.

Zari knew her restlessness and depression had much to do with sheer fatigue. Every summer she would spend at least two or three weeks at their village where a change of air, long walks and horse riding prepared her for the autumn and winter ahead. But this summer, with its disease, famine and war, and her own
unexpected
pregnancy, had made a prisoner of her, confining her to the house, the prison, and the asylum. She decided to arrange a weekly reunion with her former classmates … an afternoon reunion, perhaps … first at her house, then at Mehri’s. Of course Mehri herself would be willing, if only Mohsen Khan would allow it. Their husbands didn’t get along, otherwise she and Mehri, regardless of how often they saw each other, were still the same steadfast friends.

She went to the bedroom and searched in her drawers for knitting needles and wool in order to knit away her anxiety and depression. But neither knitting needles nor wool could be found. Her glance fell on a box full of glass beads. She picked it up, along with her sewing kit and went out on the verandah to string the glass beads. She looked out towards the garden which seemed to have lost its bloom. Dust had settled on all the trees, smothering the yellow, burnt-out leaves. For an instant she thought the trees were staring back at her. Then she saw them shiver and nod and then quieten down again. “They’re getting ready for their sleep,” she mused, “but the sparrows are awake on the branches, complaining to each other like a bunch of mother hens at the public baths!”

The sun had completely left the garden when, suddenly, she heard the neighing of a horse. It was the mare, not Sahar. Thank God! Yusef was back from the village. It was true what they said about hearts that talk to each other. Whenever she began to miss him desperately, Yusef would somehow turn up all of a sudden. She decided not to complain about how long he had been away this time, how anxious and wretched he had made her, how endlessly he had abandoned her to imaginings and nightmares and
frightening
rumours and unjust expressions of gratitude!

Gholam came out of the stables. Seyyid Mohammad, Yusef’s steward, entered riding the mare, with the roan horse in tow. Zari felt a pang. She stood up. The box of glass beads in her lap fell to the ground and broke open, scattering the beads all over the rug. Well, perhaps Yusef had got off along the way, gone somewhere on an
errand. Seyyid Mohammad dismounted and gave the horses’ bridles to Gholam, whispering something in his ear. Gholam threw his hat on the ground, and Seyyid whispered something more to him. Slowly, Gholam led the horses away to the stables. Zari ran toward Seyyid Mohammad, out of breath.

“Where’s the master?” she asked.

“He’s coming in Malek Rostam’s car. Don’t panic, nothing’s happened,” he answered.

Gholam and Seyyid started to behave mysteriously. Gholam ran out of the garden hatless, while Seyyid came to the pool to wash. He took out a comb from his pocket and combed his thick moustache. Then, taking a stone from the driveway, he washed it and placed it on the ground as he stood to pray. But Seyyid wasn’t one for praying. Besides, what kind of prayer was this? Without a proper ablution and, although the sun had set, without the evening call to prayers?