Street of Thieves (6 page)

It was nine o'clock, Elena suggested we get something to eat; I thought about the few dirhams that remained in my pocket, they
could get me a sandwich, but not much else. Elena suggested we go to a little restaurant she had spotted in the old city. I must have made a funny face, Judit no doubt understood my embarrassment, she said we could go to a café instead, claiming she wasn't very hungry, the tea had cut her appetite. Her friend seemed a little annoyed, Judit said a few sentences in Catalan. Bassam whispered something in my ear, with a conspiratorial air, why not take them to the Propagation for an Arabic lesson? I had to keep from breaking out laughing; I could picture Sheikh Nureddin finding two female Infidels in his mosque and Bassam half naked, explaining the exploits of Hamza to Judit and Elena. Not today, not now, I said.

For my part, I could invite them to smoke a joint on the ramparts, I still had a little kif left from the night before, not very romantic—and what's more they might get scared, refuse, turn against us, especially Elena, who didn't seem very adventurous.

We stood in front of the bakery for a good five minutes.

Let's go to a café, I said.

Judit answered great, where should we go? Where are you taking us?

Bassam hovered round us, shifting from foot to foot.

Never had I thought so quickly.

And the idea came to me:

To Mehdi's. We'll go to Mehdi's.

Bassam opened his eyes wide, clapped his hands, of course, to Mehdi's, you're the best. He was overflowing with cheerfulness.

Judit smiled, a wide, dazzling smile, and I felt like a hero.

MEHDI'S
was the only place in Tangier where two nineteen-year-old North African darkies like us could appear with foreigners without shocking anyone or bankrupting themselves, one of the only mixed places, neither poor nor rich, neither European nor Arabic, in town. During the day, especially in summer, it was a cafeteria where college and high school students guzzled sodas under trellises and creeping vines, and at night, in winter or when it was raining, there was a small room that was welcoming enough, with benches and cushions, where young guys, Moroccans and foreigners, drank tea. As I remember it, the decor was a mélange of touristy orientalism and utilitarian modernity, a few black and white photos in aluminum frames between the Berber rugs and fake ancient musical instruments. The place had no name, just the battered plastic sign of a brand of carbonated drink, everyone knew it by the owner's first name, Mehdi—a very tall guy, thin as a reed, not very pleasant, but discreet and not meddlesome—who spent most of his time sitting on his own terrace, a Parisian-type cap on his head, smoking Gitanes. Bassam and I had gone there like everyone else, and had even once or twice bought a Pepsi for Meryem there in the summer.

It was a bit far, we had to climb up the hill west of the old city, but it had stopped raining; Judit and Elena were happy to walk a little. I walked beside Judit and Bassam just behind with the other; I heard him speaking in Arabic and as soon as Elena said she didn't
understand, which was most of the time, he would repeat exactly the same phrase, but louder; Elena would reiterate her incomprehension, apologetically; Bassam would raise his volume bit by bit, until he was bellowing like an ox, as if the louder he repeated the words, the more chance the poor Catalan had to understand him. He no doubt thought that a foreign language was a kind of nail you had to drive into the reticent ear, with big blows from a vocal hammer: just as he had taught miscreants respect for religion with a cudgel, but this time with a smile.

Life seemed beautiful to me, even with Bassam shouting in the night, and walking through these neighborhoods around the market I'd haunted a year and a half ago, this time accompanied by a girl, erased—at least for a little while—the whole series of ordeals and curses of the last two years and especially, so close and painful, the memories of last night, the faces of the bookseller and the loathsome parking lot attendant, by whom I would have liked not to be disturbed at that precise moment, I remember, I clenched my teeth, overcome by a real feeling of sickness, the power of shame, an echo almost as powerful as the previous night, the aftershock of an earthquake, so much so that my companion asked me, seeing my sudden shivering, if I was cold or if something was bothering me.

Judit was observant and attentive; we had spoken of Revolution, of the Arab Spring, of hope and democracy, and also of the crisis in Spain, where everything can't all be sweetness and light—no work, no money, beatings for anyone who had the gall to be “Indignant.” Indignation (which I had read vaguely about online) seemed a sentiment that wasn't very revolutionary, the sentiment of a proper old lady and one that was sure to get you beat, seemed a little as if a Gandhi without plans or determination had sat down one fine day on the sidewalk because he was indignant about the British occupation, outraged. That would no doubt have made the English chuckle softly. The Tunisians had set themselves on fire, the Egyptians had gotten themselves shot at on Tahrir Square, and even if there
were real chances of it ending up in the arms of Sheikh Nureddin and his friends, it still made you dream a little. I forget if we had mentioned, a few weeks later, the evacuation of the Indignant Ones who had occupied Catalonia Square in Barcelona, chased away like a flight of pigeons by a few vans of cops and their truncheons, supposedly to make room to celebrate Barça's championship win: that's what was indignant, that soccer would take precedence over politics, but apparently no one really protested, the population realizing, deep down inside, that the success of its team was, in itself, a beautiful celebration of democracy and of Catalonia, a Great Night that reduced Indignation to a negligible quantity.

Judit also asked me about Morocco, about Tangier, about the ripples of protest; my answers remained evasive. When she asked me if I was a student, I replied that I was working, I was a bookseller, but that I planned on going to school. The profession of bookseller seemed to inspire respect in her. After all it wasn't a lie. I was dying to ask one question, but kept it for later, out of shyness no doubt, or maybe more simply because I had heard Bassam asking it to Elena right behind me, in a slightly different form, however: Why had she chosen to learn Arabic, was it to convert to Islam? Fortunately, Elena hadn't understood Bassam's Koranic style, which could be translated as “do you want to come forward in Islam?,” I almost broke out laughing, but it was better not to hurt his feelings; after all, he should have been at prayers, and because of me here he was flirting with a Spanish girl; he could be forgiven his prophetic Arabic.

Once we were at Mehdi's, sitting on cushions around four teas, with no one else there except Mehdi himself, immersed in his newspaper, Bassam withdrew a little from the conversation, mainly for linguistic reasons: he was tired of shouting himself hoarse and we were speaking French, or at least something not far from it. I was showing off a little, saying I had learned the language all by myself from detective novels; Judit seemed to admire that. I'd like to be able to do that in Arabic, she said. There must be Arabic thrillers,
Egyptian probably (I don't know why, I imagined Cairo more propitious for weird stories of the lower depths). I thought maybe I could buy her a few, which reminded me of the previous night's expedition to the bookseller's; I said to myself that if I had met these girls twenty-four hours earlier I'd have found the courage not to take part in that cowardly, useless expedition. But that was probably not true.

Bassam was visibly impatient, he was tapping his feet and no longer smiled. He wanted to go back and I could sense, despite all the desire I had, that this tea couldn't last forever; Elena yawned from time to time. Judit explained to me that they were planning on staying one more day in Tangier before going on to Marrakesh. One day, that wasn't much. There are lots of things to see here, I said, before immediately regretting my sentence; I'd have had a lot of trouble making up a list.

Fortunately, neither of them demanded to know what these marvels were, and ten minutes later, when it was Bassam's turn to yawn so wide it could've dislocated his jaw, and when he seemed to have been hypnotized by the swaying of Elena's breasts to the point of closing his eyelids, Judit gave the signal for departure. I didn't insist on holding them back, I even agreed it's time, yes, I have to work tomorrow morning. I explained that the next day I was setting up a table of books in front of the neighborhood mosque, I repeated the name of the mosque and of the neighborhood twice, à la Bassam, to be sure they had understood. Come see me if you're in the neighborhood, I added for more clarity. It wasn't very likely that they'd be “in the neighborhood” given the immense touristic interest of our suburb, and when all was said and done I wasn't so sure I really wanted them to see close up the contents of my piles of books, but you have to understand that it was terribly frustrating to let them go like that, without suggesting anything to them, even indirectly. Judit and Elena were staying in a little hotel in the old city, we walked them back; I'd have liked to tell them the history of Tangier, of the citadel, the little streets, but I was absolutely incapable.

There is always a certain embarrassment in saying goodbye, especially on a silent, deserted street, next to the trashcans of an inn whose tired neon lights, on the balcony, under the sign, from time to time electrified the thin lines of rain that were beginning to fall again. It's one moment too many, when you don't know if you should draw it out or, on the contrary, shorten it and disappear. You'll get wet, Judit said. Thank you for tonight, I whispered. Bassam held out his hand to Elena without lifting his eyes to her face; better stop there, the gleaming city and the Propagation of Koranic Thought was waiting for us; the stroboscopic light that fell intermittently on Judit's face froze her eyebrows, lips, and chin. See you soon then, maybe, I said.
Ilâ-l-liqâ,
she replied, those were the first Arabic words I heard from her mouth,
Ilâ-l-liqâ,
her pronunciation was so perfect, so Arabic, that, surprised, I mechanically responded
Ilâ-l-liqâ,
and we started on our way back.

I
don't know if it was the rain that reawakened Bassam, but a hundred meters after we left the girls, he couldn't stop talking. Oh wow, oh wow, what a night, hey pal, did you see that, man, they're crazy about us, I should have pushed for giving them Arabic lessons, they definitely would have followed us, did you see how she was showing me her tits, still it's incredible, I thought your story about Carmen and Inez was a load of crap, what an amazing stroke of luck. Oh wow.

The strangest thing was that he didn't seem frustrated or disappointed about bringing them back to their hotel, he was just happy and couldn't care less about the rain. Me on the contrary, half soaked—and we still had a good forty-five minute walk to go—I felt a terrible void, a weariness, as if, by showing me Judit before taking her back, Fate had only increased my loneliness tenfold. Now, walking toward our neighborhood, it was Meryem who came back to me painfully, her tenderness and her body; the arrival of the Spanish girl revived her absence, showed me the path of my true love, I thought, and the more the reality of that single physical contact grew distant—almost two years—the more I thought I was realizing how important she was to me since Judit's presence, instead of immediately arousing new desires, had reminded me of details (smells, textures, moistures) that were manifesting in the rain: the incurable melancholy of hormones. Bassam was wound up
like a clock, going on with his oh wows which were overwhelming me. Bassam, shut it, I shouted. Just shut up, please. He stopped short, standing stock still in the middle of the boulevard without understanding. I yelled, you're right, you know what? We've got to go, leave Tangier, leave Morocco, we can't stay here anymore.

He looked at me as if I were a halfwit, a retard who has to be spoken to gently.

Be patient then, he said, because God is on the side of the patient.

He was quoting the Prophet, with irony, maybe. If Bassam was capable of irony. I felt as if I were completely drunk, all of a sudden, immensely, hugely intoxicated, with no reason whatsoever. Yesterday the expedition with the Group, tonight Judit. If all that had a meaning, it was completely obscure.

It was raining harder and harder, we ended up flagging down a passing taxi that cost me my last dirhams.

After we reached the Propagation of Koranic Thought, Bassam started praying. I smoked a joint while he stared at me wide-eyed. Sheikh Nureddin doesn't like that, you know. We have to be pure.

I held up a fragrant middle finger, which made him laugh.

The kif calmed me down a little—Judit on loop in my thoughts, I kept reliving the evening, her smiles, her thoughts about Morocco, about the Arab Spring, about Spain, I could see her hazel eyes, her lips, and teeth, up close. I rushed to the computer, looked for her on Facebook, there were lots of Judits in Catalonia, some without photos, others with, not one who looked like her.

I ended up landing on pages devoted to Barcelona, I traveled through the city, from the harbor to the hills, walked up La Rambla looked for the university, the Barça stadium, contemplated the Gaudi façades; I suddenly discovered a modern, strange skyscraper right in the middle of the city, a huge iridescent penis, a brightly colored phallus full of offices that stood facing the sea, a disproportionate organ that made me wonder for an instant if it was the obscene farce of a mad hacker or the excessive fantasy of a porn
director, how could they have built that tower in the center of such a beautiful city, an insult, a provocation, a game, and this building seemed there for me, to remind me painfully of what I had in place of a brain, an omen, perhaps, an obscure mark of Fate, Barcelona was under the sign of the penis, I turned off the computer. Bassam had fallen asleep on the rug; he was snoring a little, on his back, a half-smile on his face, calm.