by Bina Shah
“Wake up, my brothers! This country faces great dangers. This is your country. My country! We have to save it.”
The men roared as if they had received an electric shock. To his astonishment, Ali found himself clapping, nodding his head. Even Rasool had put down his camera and was raising his fist in the air.
Benazir continued: “We have to have hope, no matter what. And never surrender.”
The passion was irresistible. The crowd erupted in chants. Jiye, Bhutto! Jiye Bhutto! She surveyed the crowd, with an expression that Ali could not begin to recognize, filled with elation, fury, confidence, power. And yet he could see the sadness, like a dab of paint dropped into the clear water that slowly changed it from neutral to a different hue, start to wash from her eyes and color the other emotions struggling on her face.
The speech had ended. She was accepting congratulations from the party workers that surrounded her on the stage. Her smile chased away the clouds on her face, and Ali thought that he had only imagined the wistful look. She began to climb down from the stage, and Rasool was prodding him with his microphone, which he had unknowingly dropped on the ground.
“Ali? Ali, let’s go. Let’s finish up here. Come on. Let’s go!”
“No. No, wait.” Ali rubbed his forehead with his hand. The moments were passing; he might never have this opportunity again. “Let’s follow her. Come on, let’s just get a shot of her leaving.”
“But …” Rasool was looking at him strangely, but Ali had already climbed down from his chair and begun walking toward the gates to the park, where Benazir and her entourage were pushing through, the security men and police officers keeping the crowds a good distance away from them.
Ali somehow managed to squeeze by and now he stood outside the park, blinking at the crush of people around Benazir’s vehicle: a big white Land Cruiser, a ship waiting to ferry her through the crowds and back to the safety of her house in Islamabad. He wondered whether or not he should turn back, but then he caught a glimpse of Benazir’s white veil, and it beckoned him on like a flag to come closer.
“Ali, Ali!” shouted Rasool. “I’m right here behind you!”
But Ali heard nothing he said. Benazir was in the Land Cruiser, standing in the front seat, her body halfway through the sunroof. She was smiling and waving, and people all around cheered and reached out to her.
Ali took slow, deep breaths to try to still the erratic drumbeat of his heart, but another, more primal part of him wanted to run straight to her, to tell her he had been wrong about her before, that he agreed with everything she was saying. She deserved a second chance, and a third, and a fourth, just like he did, just like everyone else did. Her whole life had been about struggle and about perseverance, and who could have gotten things right the first time round? Just by standing here today, she had done more than most leaders had achieved after a lifetime of power. But more than that, he longed to tell her his story: that he knew what it was like to lose a father, to be lost and adrift and struggling at sea, and then, finally, to see the shore and begin swimming toward it with all one’s might.
He began to walk; then he broke into a run, until he reached the side of her vehicle. She was standing tall above him, smiling and waving. In a moment she would turn his way, and he would be able to call out her name. He was not nervous or afraid, even in the presence of this woman who had seen all that power had to offer.
All he could think of was how much he wanted to tell her that not only had he found his beloved, but his beloved had also found him. Of all the people in the world at that moment, he knew, as he stepped forward to reach for her hand, that she was the one person in the world who would really understand.
Acknowledgments
In order to write this book I had to fall into a trancelike state, somewhere halfway between a dream and a long hallucination into the past of this beautiful province. While dreams have their place, though, there are many people I need to thank, because without their help, the dream would never have become a reality.
Sincere thanks to my very first readers. My father, Shafqat Ali Shah, and my brother, Reza Ali Shah, encouraged me every step of the way, provided invaluable advice about the workings of the agricultural system in Sindh, and shared tales and myths from its rich history and the annals of our own family. Aamer Hussein, who believed in this novel from the very start and nicknamed it GSN, or “The Great Sindhi Novel,” gave me a critical, writer’s opinion as well as a more emotional reaction as someone with rich Sindhi heritage himself.
Dr. Javaid Leghari told me many stories about Benazir Bhutto’s abilities and qualities as a leader—the two were close friends and he ran the Shaheed Zulfikar Ali Bhutto Institute of Science and Technology with excellence and professionalism, earning Bhutto’s respect, and later mine, when I taught writing there for four years. Thanks to him, I was able to see a precious copy of the PPP manifesto with Bhutto’s handwritten notes on it, in green ink, as written in my story. And it was with his permission that I used Benazir Bhutto’s own poetry in the chapter titled “Signs.” A big thank-you to my students and colleagues at SZABIST: they provided me with inspiration and educated me as much as I educated them. I must also thank Tariq Islam, who shared with me the tale of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto’s trial and other insights into Benazir Bhutto’s personality and character.
Sabeen Mahmud and Awab Alvi helped me immensely in writing the chapters on Ali’s involvement with “smart protesting.” Thank you to Sabeen for allowing me to put the Second Floor in the novel, a real-life establishment where many of the People’s Resistance meetings actually did take place, and where the Constitution was actually “suspended” from the rafters. Awab Alvi shared information about the resistance movement with me and explained the organization’s aims to me. I salute their courage and their principles: today’s Sindh is a stronger place because of them.
This book would not have been written without the groundbreaking research and writing done by others before me, and so I must acknowledge these authors and their works here. Professor Sarah F. D. Ansari wrote Sufi Saints and State Power, which helped me to understand how the descendants of the saints became power brokers in Sindh. Her book was the inspiration for the chapters “The Gift,” “Outlaws,” and “The Game of Kings,” providing the historical framework over which I was able to layer the freely imagined, fictional events in those sections. The books of H. T. Lambrick, including The Terrorist and The History of Sindh in Two Volumes, also provided background material and history. Khadim Hussain Soomro’s Freedom at the Gallows: The Life and Times of Sayed Sibghatullah Shah Pir Pagaro, The British in Sindh: Immoral Entry and Exit, and The Path Not Taken: G.M. Sayed: Vision and Valour in Politics, were three more fantastic resources. The Races That Inhabit the Valley of the Indus, by Richard F. Burton, and A Voyage on the Indus: Travels into Bokhara, by Sir Alexander Burnes, helped me fill in historical details in “The Gift,” “Outlaws,” and “The Game of Kings.” Articles that helped me a great deal: Griff Witte and Emily Wax, “Bhutto’s Last Day, in Keeping with Her Driven Life,” from the Washington Post; David Pinault, “Fortune-Telling Parrots of Pakistan and Singapore,” in the Pakistan Studies News; and Ananda K. Coomaraswamy, “Khwaja Khadir and the Fountain of Life in the Tradition of Persian and Mughal Art,” in What Is Civilization and Other Essays.
The poetry of Shah Abdul Latif Bhitai plays a central role in this novel, and I must acknowledge the translators of these verses: the late Annemarie Schimmel and Elsa Kazi, two German scholars who showed their great love of Sindh and of the Sufi poet by devoting themselves to his work and creating such beautiful English versions. H. T. Sorely’s Shah Abdul Latif of Bhit: His Poetry, Life, and Times provided the historical background I needed to envision the poet’s life in Bhit Shah. I owe a great debt to the poet himself, as he is my ancestor and the great guiding spirit of this novel.
Many thanks to Anne-Marie Doulton at the Ampersand Agency and Rosie Buckman
at the Buckman Agency for all their work on the Italian edition. I’m very grateful to Hannah Ferguson and Jessica Woollard at the Marsh Agency for their encouragement and help in bringing this, the original English-language version, into being. I owe my biggest debt to Joseph Olshan, my editor at Delphinium Books, who read the book when it was in a far more confused shape, and fell in love with it despite its weaknesses and flaws. His insight, instincts, and brilliance as both an editor and a writer as well as his generosity as a reader have proven him to be a true champion of this book.
Finally, thank you to my friends and family for all their support and encouragement. It isn’t easy living with a writer and the concomitant mood swings, grouchiness, absentmindedness, and temporary insanity that take over when a book’s on the way. I’m sorry you had to hear me going on and on about the novel, and I appreciate your patience, your sense of humor, and the occasional kick in the ass I needed to remain grounded. I can’t do any of this without you, and I promise I’ll be better next time.
Thank you to Alina Hasanain Shah for her excellent reading of the manuscript.
The poems of Benazir Bhutto, which are included in “Signs,” come from Benazir’s book of poems From Marvi of Malir and Shah Latif. They are reproduced with permission from SZABIST University Press.
The poem about Pir Pagaro in “Game of Kings” comes from Sarah Ansari’s Sufi Saints and State Power and is reproduced with permission from Cambridge University Press.
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All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2014 by Bina Shah
Cover design by Greg Mortimer
ISBN: 978-1-4976-9751-5
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