The Last of the Angels

by Fadhil al-Azzawi

  Faruq Shamil answered anxiously, “You certainly have taken me by surprise, Hameed. Let me think about the matter. I’ll pass by you this afternoon. It’s a great idea but needs some mulling over. You know that revolutionary adventures can lead to back-breaking disasters.”

  As Hameed Nylon left, he said, “It’s a sure thing. Since the people are against the government, they will certainly follow us. You know that.”

  Faruq Shamil did not know that or at least was not certain of it. Indeed the thought of Hameed Nylon leading a revolution made him want to laugh, but he said in a serious tone, “You’re the only one to have thought of a revolution. Where did you get this idea?”

  Hameed Nylon answered in a way that embarrassed Faruq Shamil: “Thoughts don’t come to a man. He goes to them.”

  Hameed Nylon departed, leaving Faruq Shamil contemplating with relish this phrase, which Hameed Nylon had heard once from Dervish Bahlul. It had stuck in his mind.

  That evening Faruq Shamil led Hameed Nylon through dark alleys that he had definitely never visited before, past young Kurdish men whose faces were barely discernible. They were wearing the baggy shorts that Turkmen derisively called balloons. The men leaned against the wall, staring into the void, waiting for nothing, day after day. Faruq Shamil whispered to Hameed Nylon, “These are the Wall Men. Perhaps you’ve heard about them. They’re all unemployed and have nothing to do. They stand leaning against the wall all day long and part of the night, saying nothing. They return home only to sleep. There, brothers, sisters, father, mother, grandfather, and grandmother are crammed into a single room. They are trying to escape from life itself.”

  Hameed Nylon and Faruq Shamil traversed other narrow alleys filled with muck and stinking water. All that a person heard there was the barking of dogs that chased around aimlessly and the meowing of cats that leapt from wall to wall.

  Faruq Shamil had notified the Communist leadership in the city of Hameed Nylon’s suggestion, asking their opinion and advice. This action had prompted the Communists, who considered themselves experts on making revolutions, despite the fact that they had never organized a single revolution during their entire history, to request a meeting with Hameed Nylon that same day in order to discuss armed revolution with him. Hameed Nylon was not a Communist but had demonstrated his leadership abilities in the Battle of Gawirbaghi and had agreed to represent the Communists, although he had never told anyone, in the delegation that headed to Baghdad and met with the king. He had also attended the memorial service the Communists had held in one of the mosques of Qara-Teppa when Joseph Stalin died. He had recited the opening prayer of the Qur’an for this pure spirit while tears welled up in his eyes. He had noticed that others were shedding tears too. Despite his friendship with the Communists, he had remained outside the Party because he believed that the Communists were all talk and no action and that they hid more than they disclosed. The Communists, who were awed by his magical influence on the people, considered him an exemplary and spontaneous rabble-rouser. This was a type that was hard to squeeze into their mold, which relied first and foremost on the principles and theoretical laws that the great Marxist scholars had devised. Hameed Nylon, to whom the idea of the revolution had suddenly come, needed them now. If they truly were revolutionaries, they should join him or at least grant workers in the union the right to choose. The Communists were eager to learn the truth about this affair, which was new to them. They had spent so many of the previous years in cellars that some had forgotten there was another world beyond the basements where they lived.

  Truth be told, however, Hameed Nylon—like many other people—had only a murky idea about the cellars that the leaders customarily inhabited. Faruq Shamil had told Hameed Nylon, “It seems that the idea of a revolution has created quite a stir among the leaders. That’s why they want to meet you today, if there’s nothing to prevent that.” Hameed Nylon had replied, “That suits me fine, for there’s not much time for us to waste on trivialities.”

  In the darkness that a pale moon overhead was beginning to affect, down one of the alleys, Hameed Nylon and Faruq Shamil approached a ruined house that not even the devil would have suspected. Faruq Shamil whispered, “We’ve finally arrived.” Hameed Nylon stared at the ancient wooden door covered by cobwebs, beneath which a dove was sitting on her eggs. Over the screen door stretched a gray viper of terrifying size.

  Hameed Nylon was unnerved and felt afraid: “This house is abandoned, Faruq. There can’t be anyone here.”

  Faruq Shamil smiled, “Don’t be deceived by appearances, Hameed. Wait a minute.”

  He walked up to the door and said in a rather loud voice, “Open, sesame.” The viper raised its long, heavy head and gazed for some moments at Faruq Shamil’s eyes. Then it lowered its head and slipped into a large crevice above the door. Faruq Shamil looked at Hameed Nylon and explained, “The viper has gone inside to inform the comrades of our arrival. A perfect camouflage. One of our comrades is a snake charmer with amazing ideas about clandestine work.”

  The door creaked open and Faruq Shamil and Hameed Nylon entered quietly, for fear of disturbing the dove, which was sleeping on her nest on the doorstep. A young woman whose features Hameed Nylon could not make out greeted them in the dark and then led them inside a deserted house that smelled of neglect. She cautioned them that the area was infested with scorpions and mice, “But you needn’t fear them. They’re all very well trained.” Then looking at Hameed, she said, “I hope the viper at the door didn’t upset you. She’s very gentle but occasionally likes to tease. As a matter of fact, she’s the angel who guards all of us.” The girl pushed on a door, which opened onto an illuminated stairway descending into a deep cellar. Hameed Nylon had a chance to get a glance at the woman who was leading the way. A pretty girl, she wore a short black skirt, a red blouse, and black high-heeled shoes. Hameed Nylon wondered, “Where do Communists get pretty girls like this?”

  Inside the cellar, everything was the opposite from the exterior. It really was not a cellar, although it was below ground. It was an elegant new construction, which reminded him of the offices of the English oil company. There was a long hallway with beautiful crystal chandeliers hanging from its ceiling. On each side was a row of rooms with handsome doors. Above each of these was a small bronze plaque. These clearly were offices. The girl pushed on one of the doors. It opened to reveal a man seated behind a table. The man, who was staring at the girl through his glasses, said, “The comrade must have arrived. I must record this in the arrivals’ register.” Then, opening the large ledger in front of him, he turned to Hameed Nylon, who was standing in front of the door, “Your Party name, please.”

  Hameed Nylon was surprised by this question, which he did not understand. He thought he was being asked his nickname. He tried to mask his discomfort with a laugh: “The whole world knows me as Hameed Nylon. If you wish to give me another, better name, I’ll have no special objection.” Then he turned to the girl who was standing beside him, “I don’t know how you can receive a person whose name you don’t know.”

  The girl shook her head flirtatiously enough for Hameed Nylon to forget his objection: “Hameed, there has to be a bit of bureaucracy. That’s life.” Then she turned to the man who was sitting perplexed behind his ledger: “Write down any name. You know your work better than we do.” Then she grasped the hand of Hameed Nylon, who thought she was flirting with him and squeezed back.

  She led him to the end of the hallway, on the walls of which were hung white cloth banners with gleaming red lettering: “A Free Nation and a Happy People,” “Long Live the Iraqi Working Class,” “Long Live the People’s Struggle under the Leadership of the Great Soviet Union,” and “Taiwan Is an Inseparable Part of the Chinese Homeland.” At the end of the hallway, the girl pushed on a door that opened onto a spacious chamber with a huge, circular table at the center and many elegant chairs. In the corners were piled many bundles of pamphlets and booklets—obviously prepared for transport elsewhere. The wal
ls were decorated with pictures of strange faces, which Hameed Nylon had never seen before, except for the portrait of Stalin, whose stern peasant’s face and bushy mustache anyone would recognize. He almost asked the girl about the other bald man and the two awe-inspiring old men—who resembled Dervish Bahlul—with beards that came down to their chests, but felt embarrassed, fearful of displaying his ignorance to the young woman, whose attention he was wondering how to attract.

  Another side door opened and two men entered. One was plainly Kurdish and the other Arab. They shook hands with him first and then embraced him, kissed him, and invited him to have a seat. The girl, who had also taken a seat, placing before her a pen and a stack of onion-skin paper, which they used for recording reports to make it easier to conceal them, introduced them to Hameed Nylon, who kept looking back and forth from the bald young Kurd to the elderly Arab, who was so fat he could scarcely move his legs. The young Kurd thanked the girl, whom he referred to as “Comrade Intisar,” asking her to take comprehensive minutes for the meeting. Then he turned to Hameed Nylon, saying, “I’ve heard a lot about you and have thought more than once about inviting you to visit me in this cellar of mine. But I was afraid you might be someone who is uncomfortable in cellars.”

  Hameed Nylon smiled, focusing his eyes on him: “Your cellar’s not as bad as you think. It’s better even than the governor’s office itself: this beautiful construction, these enchanting chandeliers, and this elegant office.”

  The elderly man interjected, “This demonstrates the force of Communist ideas. Everything you see here is a gift from the people. The design of the cellar was undertaken by the great patriotic, democratic engineer Rif‘at Chadirchi, whose design won the first prize in the Berlin competition for young architects. The crystal chandeliers that you see were given to us by the great Czechoslovak people. As you know, crystal in Prague is as cheap as dirt, and for that reason the central committee has proposed in the five-year plan a program to pave all the roads with it. The wood products were donated to the headquarters, as you know, by a famous furniture-making establishment in the city.”

  The young Kurd volunteered, “It’s a gift from the shop of Shukr the woodworker.”

  Hameed Nylon said, “I know him. He built a bedroom for me when I got married.”

  The elderly man interjected again, “We must affirm to the bourgeoisie that Communists have a right to a decent life too. Do you know about the vicious torture to which our comrade Salim was subjected in the Ba‘quba prison? He has a right to enjoy life now that he’s escaped.”

  Hameed Nylon said, “I’ve heard that. People refer to him as the hero of the torture chamber.”

  These emotional words deeply affected the young man, who removed the shirt he had been wearing without any undershirt to show Hameed Nylon his chest and back, where the scars of beatings with sticks, whips, and electric cords, as well as cigarette burns were clearly visible. Hameed Nylon took out his pack of cigarettes and offered each of them one, but they declined.

  The young Kurd observed, “Anyone who’s imprisoned is forced to give up smoking. This is actually one of the benefits of imprisonment.”

  Intisar raised her head to look at Hameed, “But you could offer me a cigarette. I haven’t been to prison yet.”

  Hameed Nylon apologized as he offered her one, which she lit herself. Then she started blowing smoke rings in the air. Hameed Nylon’s heart was pounding vigorously and he almost forgot why he had come. The old man interrupted his tender dream: “Comrades have informed us that you are thinking of organizing an armed revolution in the countryside. What makes you think that such a dangerous operation will succeed?”

  Hameed Nylon noticed for the first time that Faruq Shamil had not entered the room with him, but did not ask where he was. It was obvious that the two men wanted to discuss the matter with him, in person. Hameed Nylon replied with the calmness he had learned from Khidir Musa, “Success hinges on the people themselves. The question concerns rights. Do we have the right to revolt or not?”

  The young Kurd raised his hand as he said, “Look. I know the Kurds very well. The time has not come to start a Kurdish revolution. You know that General Mulla Mustafa al-Barzani headed for the Soviet Union many years ago to train in guerrilla war tactics. It seems that he has not yet completed his training. The Kurds are waiting for him and will not accept a revolution he does not lead.”

  Hameed Nylon, who found this logic absurd, was exasperated: “It never occurred to me to undertake a Kurdish revolution. As you know I am half Arab and half Turkmen. I certainly would not object if my daughter wished to marry a Kurd. I’m an Iraqi, first and foremost. The revolution will be Iraqi.”

  The young Kurd shook his head disapprovingly: “These are fantasies. The revolution can only be Kurdish. Nationalist sentiments trump class sentiments. This means recruiting the shaykhs of the Kurdish tribes and the Democratic Party of Kurdistan for our side. But who can accept that?”

  Hameed Nylon observed, “It seems that our goals differ. I don’t believe that the Arabs or Turkmen are any less patriotic than the Kurds. All that Iraq needs now is for someone to fire the first shot of the revolution.”

  Pushing for a compromise, the elderly man interjected, “Our comrade’s intention was consideration of the practical side of the revolution. No revolution that is detached from a nationalist movement can succeed. Comrade Fahd said, ‘Strengthen the organization of your party. Strengthen the organization of the nationalist movement. For this reason I ask you to join the Patriotic Democratic Party or the Democratic Party of Kurdistan, if you don’t have enough class consciousness to join the Communist Party.’”

  Angry, Hameed Nylon lit another cigarette: “What are these strange parties that you ask people to join? I’m not here to join any party. I have come to ask you a single question: Can I count on your support if I begin the armed revolution in the countryside?”

  Attempting to sweeten the bitter tone of the discussion, the elderly man replied, “The matter’s not as easy as you believe. We’ve investigated the matter more than once in the central committee after seeing that the idea of revolution was spreading even to Arab countries. Indeed, we even sent one of our comrades to our brothers in China and the Soviet Union to obtain their consent for a revolution, in tandem with other nationalist forces. Do you know what they told him? You won’t believe this. They said the world situation does not permit the occurrence of any revolution inside the Baghdad Pact because the Pact might use this revolution as a pretext for a nuclear attack on the mighty Soviet Union. And they’re right.”

  Hameed Nylon shook his head scornfully, “Such convoluted matters don’t concern me. I don’t believe, however, that Mao Tse-tung would ask us to refrain from revolution, especially if he knew that the revolution would burst forth from the countryside—just like the Chinese Revolution that he himself led.”

  The young Kurd intervened: “A revolution requires rifles and money. Where are you going to get those?”

  Hameed Nylon, who was assailed by doubts about the two men’s intentions, replied, “God is generous. Iraq is filled with good things. We’ll eat dirt if we must.”

  “These vague phrases mean nothing,” said the Kurdish youth.

  Hameed Nylon was disconcerted by the way the two men spoke: “If you’re not thinking about the revolution, then why do you lead people along to the point that they lose their jobs and go to prison? These sacrifices are meaningless then.”

  The young Kurd replied, “We are faced with historical necessity. Only the petite bourgeoisie hesitates to make sacrifices.”

  Hameed Nylon felt obliged to tell the two men, “You use words without knowing the people. The important question is: Are you with the revolution or against it?”

  The old man looked at empty space for a time before saying, “Comrade Stalin said, ‘Dialectics require a person to be for a thing and against it at the same time.’ This is our position regarding any revolution that might flare up in Iraq.”

>   Hameed Nylon was not able to comprehend what the man had said but got the gist of it. “Does this mean that I should love Nuri al-Sa‘id and hate him at the same time?”

  The old man laughed. “You’re trying to embarrass me. Dialectics do not apply to traitors. How can a man think of revolution without memorizing the greatest number of Marxist texts possible, especially those important text digests published by Novosti Agency? How can a person consider revolution without first learning by heart the poems of the great Turkish poet Nazim Hikmat, who divorced his Turkish wife and married a Russian woman because he loved the Russian revolution so much? Have you read anything by our new nationally known poet Comrade Abd al-Rahman al-Qalqali? Do you know that his poems have been translated into Korean and American as part of a campaign of solidarity with the poor people of the world? This is the real revolution, Comrade Hameed. As you can see, we don’t waste our time in the cellars for nothing, contrary to the rumor that our classist adversaries spread.”

  It was difficult for Hameed Nylon to follow this way of speaking. For this reason, he felt obliged to object, “I believe that there’s not a poet in the whole world who can compare with Dada Hijri. It’s not a good thing for a man to praise himself, and you Communists do that night and day. As a matter of fact, I like love poetry better than anything else. By the way, what do you think of the poetry of Burhan Abdallah? In my opinion, he’s more important than any of the poets you’ve mentioned.”

  The old man asked, “Burhan Abdallah? I’ve never even heard his name.”

  Hameed Nylon replied with the calmness of a victor, “Of course you don’t know him. He’s my relative and publishes his poems under pseudonyms to avoid angering his mother, who considers poets beggars who lack self-respect. As a matter of fact he disguises his identity by using many different pennames, like Nizar Qabbani, Badr Shaker al-Sayyab, Muhammad Mahdi al-Jawahiri, and Husayn Mardan. He’s even published many poems in English, naturally under assumed names. He shares all his secrets with me; I’m family, after all.”