by Неизвестный
After many hesitations, much coaxing, repeated urgings, he would berate himself into summoning up all his strength, and raise himself from a lying position. Groaning with the effort, he rested on his side, reached out a weak arm to the pitta by his head, brought it to his mouth without any pleasure, and nibbled at it with grimaces of nausea. When he forced himself to swallow the piece he had chewed and turned over many times with his tongue, he found it sticking in his throat, stifling him. His gullet had contracted and grown so narrow that it absolutely refused to obey his will, and rejected the bread in disgust. He was forced to spit it out again, coughing hard, with watering eyes.
He also suffered from sleeplessness. All night he tossed about on his hard bed, finding no rest for his heavy, tortured limbs. With the chill of dawn, when the muezzin called the faithful to the Morning Prayer, sleep would finally visit his eyelids, which burned and pricked his eyes as if sharp and hot grains of sand and gravel had been scattered under them. Nor was this sleep anything like his accustomed intoxicated slumber, that heavy, deep, luxuriant slumber that had come so frequently to him after the arousing of his senses. Now he slipped slowly into a numb stupor, as if sinking into a thick oily fluid. He would feel his body freezing and his mind remaining alert in his senseless body. When he finally drowsed off a little, at the end of his strength, his sleep was short and tormented, full of terrible dreams, interrupted at times by horrible visions from which he would awake screaming. Nor did the awful visions end when he awoke. They continued floating about in his mind, appearing before him in all their horror, and he could not escape them except when he was fully awake, and even then only by leaping in despair from his mat, getting dressed, and hastily leaving his room.
These nights of sleeplessness and nightmare were only a transition to more severe symptoms of illness. Soon his senses became marvelously acute, and he began having hallucinations even during his sober intervals between one bout of intoxication and the next. These terrible hours would begin at around midnight, when the din from the streets had ceased and silence reigned in the hostelry. Night after night, when this hour came, one could hear awful screams and wails and strange conversations coming from Nimmer’s room.
But the sight that really gripped him and completely changed his entire life appeared one night: that evening Nimmer had left the coffeehouse much earlier than usual, and headed toward his khan. Sweltering from the heat, weak in all his limbs, he swayed and stumbled as he walked, and then slowly climbed the stairs, holding on to the rail and resting to take a breath at every step. When he finally succeeded, with great effort, in finding the keyhole in his door and turning the key in it, he followed his custom in recent weeks and went straight to the nargilleh and the other equipment that lay on the window shelf, and began preparing it for smoking. He bound the cord around its head and firmly attached the tube into its neck. Then he drew from his gown a piece of hashish, weighed it in his hand, added a little more to it, and stuck it into the wet tobacco leaves, covered it on all sides, and rubbed the tobacco in his palm with his fingertips until he’d shaped it into something like a nipple. Then he placed the nargilleh near the head of the mat and squatted down next to it. But when he put the tube into his mouth and tried to take his first draw he suddenly realized that he had forgotten to pour water into the bowl. He got up quickly, put on his robe again and his shoes, picked up the clay pitcher, and rushed off to get water.
The taps from which the lodgers in this khan filled their pitchers were on the ground floor. Nimmer hurried down the long corridor and into the filthy passage next to it, where a smoking oil lamp, standing on a shelf, cast its dim light with long dancing shadows on the entire area. When he opened the low door between the passage and the slippery broken stairs leading down to the yard, three figures suddenly emerged from behind the door. They were tall men, draped in white abbayehs, with glistening white kefiyehs around their heads. With no forethought, almost in response to an inner command, Nimmer drew back and flattened himself against the wall to let them pass. As he raised his eyes to look at them he saw that they greatly resembled each other in feature and hue: all three had great black eyes that glowed and glittered like stars, long white hair that descended in manes to their shoulders and on both sides of their necks to mingle with their long beards which came down to their belts. They approached him calmly, with a solemn and dignified gait, as if they were on their way to a very important meeting and were about to pass him without even looking at him. When they became aware of his presence their faces darkened and they raised their eyebrows, and stopped their advance, standing still and unmoving as they directed their glowering and threatening glances at him.
Although Nimmer had never seen these men before and had no idea of anything they might want with him, he had an intimation of terror and sensed that he was the one they were seeking. One glance at their marvelous apparel and the glory radiating from their faces, at the way they moved across the floor without a sound of footsteps, the way they passed the oil lamp without causing even a flicker in its flame, was enough to convince him that these were no ordinary men come to lodge at the khan but superior creatures who had left Paradise and were walking abroad on the face of the earth to fulfill an essential and highly important mission. With awe and reverence, his entire frame trembling with dread, he bowed his head to them and spoke to them in submission:
“Salaam Allah aleikum! The Peace of God upon you! Behold, I am an instrument to serve you, my masters…what will you command me?” he pleaded in a hoarse and terrified voice. “What do you want of me? Why have you troubled yourselves to seek me?”
The aged men remained unspeaking and frozen, though they stared at him with even more fury in their gaze. Then the middle one, all aglow with wrath, took one step forward. With lips pursed and eyebrows arched, he raised one arm as if motioning Nimmer to stand still.
His broad sleeve rolled down and fell about his shoulder, exposing his raised arm to the armpit. To his astonishment, Nimmer saw that it was a dead man’s arm, its bones glowing in a phosphorescent white. In his long fingers the figure held a staff, from which hung a torn and bloodstained flag, frayed at the edges. He brandished the flag in front of Nimmer’s face, with the obvious intention of showing him the rips in it. Then he put it down, stuck it at his feet, leaned his head against it in sorrow, and again stared at Nimmer with eyes burning with hatred and vengeance.
Now all Nimmer’s doubts and questions were resolved. He understood that these were the Three Fathers,1 finally come to avenge the insult and sacrilege to their feast and their honor. The man with the torn flag which Abu Faris had borne was none other than the Proselyte, Ibrahim himself, there could be no mistake about it—it was him! And this was the flag with his name embroidered upon it in prominent letters…
“Mercy, my lord the Proselyte! I beg your protection!” wailed Nimmer, and flung himself to the ground. Prostrate, he squirmed at the other’s feet like a worm, kissed the ground before him and moistened it with his tears as he thrust out a hand to grasp the hem of his abbayeh. The gown flared out as if blown back by a sudden gust. Nimmer crawled on in despair toward the other two aged figures, stretched out his hands to them and pleaded, weeping as he spoke:
“Khalil the Merciful! My lord Abu Youssef the Forgiver! I have sinned! Be charitable! Speak, intercede to him for me! It was not with malice that I tore his flag… . Nothing is hidden from you, you know all, and you know the truth! It was Abu Faris’s fault! He was the one who started it all! Please! For the sake of Allah! Do you want to kill me? Go away from me! Take your eyes off me! Allah! Allah! I’ve had enough!”
He wailed some more disconnected phrases and great hot tears rolled down his cheeks to mingle with the spittle coming from his mouth. None of the three responded to his pleading and weeping. Suddenly he stopped his stream of words, and with the remains of his strength slowly raised himself, covered his face with his hands, and began shaking his head from side to side in despair, uttering a stifled groan from time
to time.
Several dreadful moments of apprehension passed, during which he did not dare to look around him or to move from the spot. He felt as if the aged figures were watching his every movement, and that the slightest attempt on his part to flee would arouse their ire even more. Finally he took courage and turned his head away from them slightly, so as not to have to face their gazes, which were striking at his eyes even through his hands.
The Fathers did not fall upon him with their fists, nor did they throttle him. He thought for a moment that he was already safe and out of danger. He started moving backward slowly. When he was several paces away, he rose quickly to his feet. Like a tortured beast that has escaped the claws of a predator, he sneaked away in haste, bending over and pressing close to the walls, shuddering in horror and drawing back in fright at every step, turning his head to look behind him, and then charging forward again.
Reaching his room completely out of breath, he flung his entire body at his door to open it, and then quickly closed it behind him. When it closed he found himself enveloped in total darkness, in which red and blue points and stars flickered and moved. Again he was filled with the terror of darkness. He remained by the door, quaking all over and breathing heavily, listening tensely for any sound. When his heartbeats and the pounding in his head had subsided a little, he put his hand into his belt, ferreted around in there for some time, until he found the box of matches stuck away among its folds. He lit one match and looked on the shelf and on the mat for the key so that he could lock the door. The match went out as he moved and he had the feeling that a wind had blown it out. The darkness grew thicker, engulfing everything. Quickly he pulled out several matches and lit them one after another, but they all fizzled out after being lit, or broke between his trembling fingers.
Finally he managed to light the lamp. The orange flame sent weird and horrifying shadows and figures scurrying across the walls and floor. In order not to give way entirely to the fear that had attacked him anew, he stubbornly started looking for the key in every corner. Finally he found that it was stuck in the keyhole on the outside. A strange tremor of horror ran through all his nerves. But he went to the door. He peeped through its cracks, bent down, placed his ear against it, and listened carefully. Neither seeing nor hearing anything suspicious, he put his hand on the door handle, firmly resolved to open the door swiftly and silently, to snatch the key out and lock the door on the inside.
Just as he began doing this, the door turned on its hinges, emitting a strange creaking sound. Nimmer’s heart leapt up to his throat. His terror mounted. Fragments of voices and footsteps came to his ears, sounding closer and louder all the time. Hastily he shut the door, pressed himself against it with his chest, his hands, and his knees. For a long time he stood like this without changing his position. When the noise passed, and the silence of a tomb had returned, an idea flashed through Nimmer’s mind a way to protect and save himself. Quietly he took off his shoes, left his place by the door for a moment, and walked on tiptoe to where the sacks of soap were stacked. He grasped one of the sacks with both arms and, struggling with all his strength, dragged it across the room and leaned it against the door. Then he dragged over another sack and stacked it on top of the first, straightening and supporting it with his head and chest. After dragging all the other sacks over, he climbed up and started pulling the sacks up one after the other, stacking them up with great effort until they blocked the entire space of the doorway.
His work completed, he turned over onto his stomach and slid down the stack, taking care lest they fall down after him. When he felt the floor under his feet and tried to stand up, he sensed a terrible weakness in his knees and had to hang on to the sacks again and lean on them to prevent himself from falling. With his sleeve he wiped away the beads of sweat that were pouring down his blazing cheeks and wetting his neck and chest, and crawled wearily to his mat. When he came to its edge he flung his body upon it, pulled his blanket up above his head, sunk his head deep into his pillow, closed his eyes and blocked off his hearing, and gave himself up to the peace of oblivion that spread over all his limbs and froze his sweat-drenched skin. This weakness also overcame his other senses, agitated his imagination, and confused his memory. Things merged and fused, and, like the colors at the rim of the western sky at sunset which combine and change to fade and melt away until they are one single hue, so all the various fragments of thought in his head combined until they turned into a single nothingness.
Minutes or hours passed while he remained in this state of paralyzed unconsciousness. Then he began to awake slowly, and a dream came, arousing him again to vain and distressing visions. In his dream, his soul had long since parted from his body and had now returned and was fluttering about nearby, except that it was very difficult for him to find its exact position. But he could clearly hear the flapping of its wings as it flew above him, and his entire body writhed and trembled in pain and fear of its coming.
“It’s hiding, it must be hiding!” he thought. “It’s hiding so as I won’t take care, so it can jump upon me all at once. But, Allah, it’s so strange! How did it get in? I blocked the door, didn’t I? It must have gone around and come in through the window.” Now he remembered that a split second earlier the window had swung open as if someone had given it a strong push from the outside.
Nimmer turned his face toward the window. He clearly saw a strange white bird knocking on the pane with its beak, scratching at it with its claws, pushing at it with its wings, pressing its entire body against it while its head wept and wailed voicelessly. The pane finally cracked and the white bird thrust its body through the opening and stood on the shelf. With its beak it pulled out the fragments and splinters of glass that were stuck in its body. Then, from under one wing it drew out a dirty rag and cleaned the open wound in its breast from which blood was pouring. Rising into the air, it flew to the window, grasped the bolt, and opened it carefully. Bending over, it looked out into the darkness, and emitted a weak and broken cry. Immediately two other birds appeared, their white feathers ruffled and tangled. The first bird waved its wings at them, blinked, and shook its head as if ordering them to approach no closer until it returned. The other birds understood, and took up crouching positions, standing still and silent as if prepared to wait and watch for a long time. Then the first bird turned about and drew away from them. Stepping gingerly forward on the points of its claws to the edge of the shelf, it spread its wings and flew into the room, which it circled several times, casting about searching glances all the while as if looking for something.
“I must go away!” Nimmer said to himself, and tried to get up off the mat, but to his amazement his body did not obey him. His arms and legs seemed to have dried up and his head seemed to be chained to the pillow. He could not move any part of his body. Just then the bird became aware of his presence. Lowering its head, it flew straight at him, with claws outstretched. Reaching the blanket, it stopped, as if deliberating what to do next. Then, appearing to have come to a decision, it flew aside and landed on its feet, walked beside the mat with slow, measured steps, and stopped at Nimmer’s head. Aiming its beak at his eyes, it leaned over him and fixed him with a gaze full of hatred and vengeful wrath.
At this point Nimmer screamed with all his might and awoke. He threw the blanket off his head and leapt up into a sitting position. As he opened his eyes to look around him he felt his heart stop still, as if it had died within him for a moment. But the next moment it began beating so fiercely that it seemed to him that the entire mat was shaking beneath him. In front of him, beside the sacks of soap stacked in a straight column that stood out clearly in the dimness, stood the three old men, consuming him with their blazing eyes, their pupils piercing his flesh like white-hot spikes.
Now he did not think of prostrating himself at the feet of the white-bearded men, nor of trying to escape. With clenched teeth and wide-open eyes he shrank up and bent over like a fetus in his mother’s womb, his arms on his knees and his chin in
his hands. From time to time a great tremor passed through his body, and he pressed himself backward against the wall, shrinking up even more and thrusting out a hand in the direction of his tormentors.
This vision of horror continued all night. When daylight appeared in the window and the room began to grow gray and then pale, the Fathers moved silently from where they had stood and slid slowly along the wall. At the window they all turned toward Nimmer, stared at him pointedly with gazes of threat and warning, and slipped through the window to vanish among the pale fragments of mist that rose above the Nile, enveloping the trunks of date palms and growing dense around their still and frozen tops.
Dawn had already risen and whitewashed the roofs and railings and walls of houses that could be seen from Nimmer’s window, but Nimmer still sat on the spot as if petrified. His staring eyes gazed into the vapors moving around the palm fronds that lay open like giant fans, and at the piles of white clouds in the fringes of the east, their red and gold edges giving them the appearance of dripping blood. Though it was quite some time since he had seen any vision, and though he knew for certain that with the coming of dawn the Fathers were obliged to return whence they had come, his temples were still pounding and the blood rushed around his arteries with a strange heat. Thoughts ran through his head like autumn leaves in a storm; fragments of notions floated up, whirling in confusion. And among all the bits and pieces that fluttered through his head without beginning or end, there recurred the tormenting question which seemed to stick like a splinter in his flesh: “What does it mean? What do they want from me? What shall I do? What shall I do?”