The Exile Kiss

by George Alec Effinger

  "The angel picked up the evil imam and carried him in the palm of his hand, and brought him to the very heart of the Rub al-Khali. The imam knew nothing of this, because he was still fast asleep. The angel built a deep, deep well, and put the imam down at the very bottom, where there was only the most bitter and foul water. Then the angel caused the imam to awaken.

  "'Yaa Allah!' cried the evil imam. 'Where am I, and how did I come to this place?'

  " 'It is too late to call on God, O Son of Adam,' said the angel. His stern voice cracked like thunder in the air, and the walls of the well shook around the imam.

  "'Let me out,' said the imam fearfully, 'and I promise to change my ways! Have mercy on me!'

  "The angel shook his head, and his eyes loosed terrible flashes of lightning. 'It is for me neither to judge nor to have mercy. The One Judge has already condemned you to this place. Think on your deeds and repair your soul, for you have still to meet your God on the Last Day.' Then the angel departed, and left the evil imam all alone.

  "A day came when the evil imam's successor, whose name was Salim and who was the founder of our tribe, came upon the well in his travels. Salim had never known the evil imam, and he was as different from him as the sun and the moon. This young man was truly kind and generous, and well beloved of all the people of Ash-Shâm, who had appointed him to be their imam in recognition of his virtues.

  "As Salim bent forward to peer into the well, he was startled to see that a number of creatures had fallen into it and were trapped with the evil imam. The animals begged him to release them from the deep well. Salim felt so sorry for the animals that he unwound his keffiya and lowered it into the dark hole.

  "The first animal to climb up the cloth ladder to freedom was a lizard, the one the Bedu call 'Abu Qurush,' or Father of Coins, because the end of this lizard's tail is flat and round. Abu Qurush was so grateful to be rescued that he shed a piece of his skin and gave it to Salim, saying, 'If ever you need help in a desperate situation, burn this piece of skin and I will come to you.' He began to run away across the hot sands, but he called back to Salim, 'Beware the Son of Adam who is in the well! He is an evil man, and you should leave him down there!'

  "The next creature Salim pulled out was a she-wolf. The wolf was just as overjoyed as the lizard had been. She pulled out two of her whiskers and gave them to Salim, saying, 'If you should be in such a difficult place as that from which you rescued me, burn these and I will come to you.' She bounded away, but she too called back to him, 'Know, O Man, that the Son of Adam in the well is most evil.'

  "Salim finished pulling out all the rest of the animals, and he listened to their warnings. Then he began to wrap his keffiya around his head once more. His countryman, the evil imam, shouted up to him in a heartbreaking voice. 'How can you save all those creatures, yet leave me to face my death in this pit of darkness? Are we not brothers according to the holy words of the Prophet, may the blessings of Allah be on him and peace?'

  "Salim was torn between the warnings of the animals and his own good nature. He decided that he shared a bond of humanity with the unseen prisoner, and he once again lowered his keffiya down into the well. When he'd freed the evil imam, he took up his journey again, and many weeks later returned to Ash-Shâm."

  "This is a great story, Noora," I said, yawning, "but it sounds like it's going to go on forever, and I remember your uncle telling me that the Bani Salim needed to move on to the next well soon. Surely, you don't want your camels and goats to die of starvation while you spin out this wonderful Bedu folklore for me."

  Noora sighed. "I will finish it quickly," she said. I could see that she really loved telling stories. Maybe it was unkind of me to cut her off, but I had the feeling she was trying to make some special point. If she had some wisdom to impart, she could do it just as well in fifty words as five thousand.

  I knew, of course, that in the story Salim represented me, and the evil imam must be Dr. Abd ar-Razzaq. I thought I could guess what was going to happen. "So Salim gets in some kind of trouble, and it's the evil imam's fault, and he calls the lizard and the wolf."

  "Actually," she said, trying to stay ahead of me, "Salim didn't get into trouble at first. He burned the lizard's skin, and Abu Qurush appeared before him before the last lick of gray smoke faded in the air. 'What do you wish?' asked the lizard.

  " 'I'd like to be as rich as a king,' said Salim.

  " 'The solution to that is simple. You must do as I tell you. Take the basket your servant uses to fetch bread, and leave it outside the city gates tonight. Then you must get up before the sun and bring it home again.' Salim did just as he was instructed, and he left the empty basket against the walls of the king's palace, and when he went to get it in the morning, it was filled with gold."

  "Is that how Salim gets in trouble?" I asked.

  Noora patted the air impatiently. "Wait, wait. So for a few days, Salim lived well. He ate the best food in the city, he bought himself a new wardrobe, he enjoyed all the pleasures of Ash-Sham that Allah did not forbid. After a time, however, the king noticed that a part of his treasury was missing. He was outraged and furious, and he put out a decree: 'Whoever finds the robber of the king's gold shall have the king's beautiful daughter in marriage, and half the kingdom besides!'

  "With that reward being offered, many wise and clever men came to examine the king's vaults. All were bewildered, and without exception they told the king that no man could have entered the treasury and stolen the gold. Finally, the cleverest of all asked that many armloads of dry palm fronds be put in the treasury. The king asked no questions, but did as the clever man said. Then the clever man set fire to the palm fronds and led the king and his courtiers outside the building. In a few minutes, all could see a black ribbon of smoke rising from a slender breach in the foundation of the palace wall. The clever man stepped closer and examined the ground itself, where he saw tiny footprints in the dust. 'Behold, your majesty!' he said. 'The thief was no man, but a lizard!'

  "The king, who had little patience with clever men, thought this one was trying to make a fool of him, and so he ordered the clever man to be taken away and beheaded. And that was the end of the clever man."

  "Is there supposed to be a moral in that for me?" I asked.

  Noora smiled. "No, the story isn't even finished. The clever man wasn't important at all. I didn't even give him a name. Anyway, word of all this ran through the city of Ash-Shâm, until it reached the ears of the evil imam. The evil imam realized that the hand of the king's daughter and half the kingdom could be his, because he'd heard the words of Abu Qurush at the well. He ran to the king's audience chamber and cried, 'Your thief is your own imam, Salim!'

  "Well, the king doubted this was true, but he sent his soldiers to Salim's house, where they found the rest of the gold. They arrested Salim and brought him in chains to the king's deepest, foulest dungeon. Salim knew who'd betrayed him, and he cursed his foolishness in ignoring the warnings of the animals and setting the evil imam free.

  "Salim languished in his gloomy cell for a day and a night, and a day and a night, and then he remembered the words of the she-wolf. He took out the wolf's whiskers and burned them. In the blink of an eye, the she-wolf stood before him. 'What do you want of me?' she asked.

  " 'Only for you to get me out of this dreadful prison, just as I released you from the well,' said Salim.

  " 'Tonight you will be free,' said the wolf, and she squeezed beneath the door of his cell and was gone.

  "Many hours passed, until it was the darkest watch of the night. Suddenly, there came screams of terror from the bedchamber of the king's young son and heir. The king ran into the room and saw the wolf with the boy's head gripped between her long, sharp teeth. Whenever the king or one of his soldiers or advisers tried to approach, the wolf let loose a loud, fierce growl. No one could do anything to save the young prince.

  "Eventually, the news spread throughout the palace. The dungeon guards discussed it loudly, and Salim overheard the
m. 'Take me to the king,' he called, 'and I will save the life of the prince.'

  "The guards laughed at him, saying the bravest of their number could do nothing, so what could this mere preacher hope to accomplish? At last, Salim persuaded the guards to bring him before the king. They hurried up to the prince's chamber. As soon as Salim entered, the wolf began wagging her tail and making sounds like a dog pleased to see its master. 'The she-wolf will depart without harming the boy,' said Salim, 'but only if you offer it the heart of the former imam of Ash-Shâm.'

  "The king commanded his soldiers to hurry, and they ran out into the city and found the evil imam. They arrested him and dragged him back to the palace and cut off his head. Then they hacked open his chest, cut out his heart, and put it in a golden bowl. Salim placed the golden bowl before the she-wolf. The animal licked his hand, took the heart of the evil imam in her mouth, and ran from the palace to freedom.

  "The king was so pleased that he pardoned Salim, and then gave him his daughter's hand in marriage!"

  I waited a moment to be sure the story was finally over. "I'm supposed to cut Dr. Sadiq Abd ar-Razzaq's heart out?" I said.

  "Yes, and feed it to a dog," said Noora fiercely.

  "Even though we don't do that kind of thing in the city anymore? I mean, we're talking about a theologian here. Not Hitler or Xarghis Khan."

  Noora looked at me blankly. "Who are they?" she asked.

  I smiled at her. "Never mind."

  She took the empty plate and bowl from me and went out of the tent. Friedlander Bey entered almost immediately. He sat down beside me on the sand and clasped my hand. "How are you feeling, my darling?" he asked.

  I was glad to see him. "It is as Allah pleases, O Shaykh," I said.

  He nodded. "But look, your face is badly burned by the sun and the wind. And your hands and arms, from carrying me!" He shook his head. "I came to see you every day, even when you were unconscious. I saw the pain you suffered."

  I let out a deep breath. "It was necessary, my grandfather."

  Again he nodded. "I suppose I'm trying to express my gratitude. It's always—"

  I raised my free hand. "Please, O Shaykh, don't make us both uncomfortable. Don't thank me. I did what I could to save our lives. Anyone would have done the same."

  "Yet you pushed yourself beyond endurance, and you damaged your body and mind for my sake. I gave you those cursed implants, and I made you my weapon. Now you've repaid me with boundless courage. I feel shame."

  I closed my eyes for a few seconds. If this went on much longer, it would be as unendurable as the walk in the desert had been. "I don't wish to talk about that anymore," I said. "We don't have time to indulge our emotions. The only hope we have of living through this trouble and returning to the city, and then restoring ourselves to our proper place, is to keep our minds focused clearly on a plan of action."

  Papa rubbed his cheek, where his gray stubble was turning into a patchy beard. I watched him chew his lip as he thought. Evidently, he arrived at a decision, because from then on he was the old Friedlander Bey we all knew and feared back in the Budayeen. "We are in no danger from the Bani Salim," he said.

  "Good," I said, "I didn't know where they stood."

  "They've accepted responsibility for our well-being until we get to Mughshin. We'll be treated as honored guests and receive every courtesy. We must be careful not to abuse their hospitality, because they'll give us their food even if it means they themselves must go hungry. I don't want that to happen."

  "Neither do I, O Shaykh."

  "Now, I've never heard of Mughshin before, and I suppose it's just a community of huts and tents around a large well, somewhere to the south. We were wrong in thinking the sergeant in Najran arranged to have us dropped in the center of the Empty Quarter. The chopper traveled much farther than we thought, and we were thrown out in the northeastern part of the Sands." I frowned. "That's what the Bedu call this huge desert," Papa explained, "simply the Sands. They've never heard of the Rub al-Khali."

  "Where we were didn't make any difference to us," I said. "If the Bani Salim hadn't found us, we'd have died long ago."

  "We should have walked in the opposite direction, to the east. We're closer to Oman than we are to the western edge."

  "We couldn't have made it to Oman, either. But we're still going to travel south with the Bani Salim?"

  "Yes, my nephew. We can trust them. That counts for more in our situation than time or distance."

  I drew up my knees experimentally, just to see if they still worked. They did, and I was happy about it, although they felt very weak after two weeks of enforced rest. "Have you planned our future after we reach Mughshin?"

  He looked up, over my head, as if gazing into the distance toward the Budayeen and our enemies. "I do not know where Mughshin is, and even the shaykh, Hassanein, cannot show me. There are no maps or books among the Bani Salim. Several of the Bedu have assured me that beyond Mughshin, it is not a difficult journey across the mountains to a coastal town called Salala." Papa smiled briefly. "They speak of Salala as if it were the most wonderful place on earth, with every kind of luxury and pleasure."

  "Mountains," I said unhappily.

  "Yes, but not great mountains. Also, Hassanein promised to find us trustworthy guides in Mughshin to take us onward."

  "And then?"

  Papa shrugged. "Once we reach the coast, then we travel by ship to a city with a suborbital shuttle field. We must be extremely careful when we return home, because there will be spies—"

  Noora returned, this time carrying some folded garments. "These are for you, Shaykh Marîd," she said. "Would you like to put on clean clothes, and take a walk with me?"

  I wasn't in a hurry to put my aching muscles to work, but I couldn't refuse. Papa stood up and went outside the tent. Noora followed him and dropped the flaps in the front and the back, so I could dress in privacy.

  I stood up slowly, ready to quit for the day in case I experienced any severe stabs of pain. I shook out the clean garments. First, there was a threadbare loincloth that I wrapped around myself. I wasn't exactly sure how the Bani Salim men wore them, and I wasn't about to find out. Over that I pulled a long, white smock, which the Bedu called a thobe. The poor men of the city wore something very similar, and I knew that Friedlander Bey often dressed in one, betraying his origins. On top of the thobe I wore a long, white shirt that was open all the way down the front, with wide, long sleeves. For my head there was a clean cotton keffiya, but my akal had been lost somewhere; I wound the head cloth around and tucked it in as these southern Bedu wore it. Then I drew on my now-tattered and travel-stained blue robe, which the Bayt Tahiti had so admired. There were no sandals with the rest of the clothes; I figured I could go barefoot.

  It felt good again to be up and dressed and ready for action. When I stepped outside the tent, I was a little self-conscious because my outfit made me look like a wealthy shaykh from the decadent, feeble world beyond the Rub al-Khali. I was aware that the eyes of everyone in the camp were on me.

  Waiting for me were Friedlander Bey, Noora, and her uncle Hassanein. The shaykh of the Bani Salim greeted me with a broad smile. "Here," he said, "I have your belongings. I took these for safekeeping. I feared that a few of our younger men might have been tempted to borrow them." He handed me my sandals, my ceremonial dagger, and my rack of moddies and daddies. I was extremely glad to get all these things back.

  "Please, O Shaykh," I said to Hassanein, "I would be most honored if you would accept this gift. It can only begin to repay the great debt we owe." I presented him with the gorgeous jeweled dagger.

  He took it in his hands and stared at it. He did not speak for a few moments. "By the life of my eyes," he said at last, "this is not for me! This is for some noble prince, or a king."

  "My friend," said Papa, "you are as noble as any prince in the land. Accept it. This dagger has a long history, and it will do you honor."

  Hassanein did not stammer out effusive thanks. He
just nodded to me and tied the woven belt around his waist. In the Bedu manner, he wore the dagger directly in front, over his stomach. He said nothing more about it, but I could see that the gift had greatly pleased him.

  We walked slowly among the black goat-hair tents. I could see the faces of the men turn to follow us. Even the women peeked at us as we passed, while they tended to the day's work. Not far away, the young boys herded the camels and goats toward the low, scrubby salt-bushes. This wasn't the best food for the animals, but in this desolate place it would have to do. I understood immediately what Hassanein had meant about moving on. There was little sustenance here for the animals.

  The camp consisted of a dozen tents. The terrain around Bir Balagh was the same as that Papa and I had traveled through. There were no shade trees here, no date palms, no real oasis at all. All that recommended this low, flat stretch in a hollow between two chains of dunes was a single wide hole in the ground—the well. Whenever a traveler came upon one of these wells, he sometimes had to spend hours digging it out, because it didn't take the shifting sands long to fill it in.

  I realized how helpless Papa and I would've been, even if we'd stumbled across such a muddy hole. The water was often ten feet or more below the surface, and there were no buckets or ropes. Each wandering Bedu band carried its own rope for the purpose of drawing out the life-giving water. Even if Allah had granted us the good fortune to find one of these brackish trickles, we might easily have died of thirst only ten vertical feet from the water.

  That thought made me shudder, and I murmured a prayer of thanks. Then the four of us continued our walk. In one of the nearby tents, a few men were relaxing and drinking coffee from small cups little bigger than thimbles. This was the normal occupation of Bedu males in the camp. One of the men saw me and said something, throwing his coffee cup to the ground. A commotion arose among his friends, and he leaped to his feet and rushed toward me, yelling and gesturing madly.