The woman lay on her bed. Hisham tried to imagine the details of the body stretched out before him in the dark, but two dogs snapped at each other in the street below, their loud barking destroying the night’s silence. Then the fighting suddenly stopped. The two dogs began to chase a third, and the barking moved further away.
He turned his attention back to the rooftop opposite. Nothing had changed, but after a while another shadow appeared and climbed onto the bed … the man from last night. He was wearing a white tob and a white skullcap. He took off the tob but left the skullcap. Still wearing his underclothes (long white pants and a white short-sleeved vest) he slipped in beside the woman. Hisham’s imagination filled in what happened next.
When he slept that night, his dreams featured naked men and women in a parched desert. They were laughing and chasing each other about under the burning rays of the sun. But somehow the men and women never touched.
13
One afternoon Hisham was sitting in the canteen munching a sandwich of boiled eggs with tomatoes and hot peppers. He was looking quickly through his notes on legal principles – he was going to be tested on them in less than an hour. He was engrossed in his revision, but deep down he was extremely agitated: spying on the house opposite had become a nightly habit that distracted him from revising as he ought to have. He started when he felt a hand patting his shoulder. ‘Hisham,’ said a voice. He stopped chewing and turned round. What a surprise! It was Adnan al-Ali, looking just the same, his face as pale as a mummy’s and wreathed in smiles. Hisham leapt up and embraced his childhood friend warmly, his mind full of memories. His stomach shrank as he remembered the organisation. He invited Adnan to sit down, and examined him closely. He hadn’t changed much, though he had got thinner, and he had left the downy hair on his chin to grow as it pleased. Hisham quizzed him about Dammam and Adama and everything else. Then, as if the question had just occurred to him, he asked, ‘What brings you to Riyadh? How long have you been here? And how did you know where I was –?’
‘Slowly! Slowly, my brother!’ said Adnan, stopping him with a wave of his hand and smiling. ‘Slowly!’
‘I’ve been here for five days,’ he said quietly, once he had caught his breath.
‘Five days? Five days, and you only looked for me today! You’re a fine friend!’
‘Didn’t I say “take it easy”, my brother?’ Adnan caught his breath again and continued. ‘I’ve been here for five days. I gave my papers in to the College of Agriculture. They only accepted me after a lot of pleading and beard-kissing – and the intervention of some high-up people. They’re right, of course – I am very late. The important thing is, I’ve been staying with some relatives who are students, and here I am … that’s all there is to it.’
‘But what about Rome and the arts? Why are you entering the College of Agriculture when you loathe applied sciences?’
Adnan smiled and crossed his hands in his lap. ‘Father was right,’ he said. ‘Art is a waste of time. Working in a secondary school has no real future and my marks won’t qualify me to enter medicine or engineering. So there you have it.’ Adnan spoke in his usual calm, quiet voice, but with a strange new confidence Hisham didn’t recognise. Could people change in less than two months? He couldn’t stop himself from objecting.
‘But you are talented, Adnan. God forbid that you should waste your talent!’
Adnan smiled and said nonchalantly, with no obvious emotion, ‘No talent, no nothing. Everyone will find his own destiny. God’s choice is best.’
‘Anyway,’ he added, after an interval of silence, ‘I’ve thought seriously about this question of art. What’s the point of art, really? It’s a waste of time God doesn’t approve of. And I don’t want to waste time that I shall be held accountable for on the Day of Judgment.’
Hisham was so staggered he was struck dumb. Was this the same Adnan he had left less than two months ago? Adnan, who had once found his only refuge in drawing, now refused to draw! Almost everything about him seemed changed, except for his pale face and that expression of his that was more like the expression of the dead, even if his eyes sparkled more than before. Then again, what was this constant talk about God and the Day of Judgment? Even their friend Salim, the most religious of them all, didn’t mention these things much.
‘That’s not true,’ said Hisham, trying to escape his questionings. ‘Art isn’t a waste of time. It’s an expression of all that is sublime in our lives and our souls; a philosophical expression, if you want. Art is an expression of the absolute in us: the poet in his poem; the artist on his canvas; the musician in his composition. All of these are expressing the sublime aspect of human existence, far removed from the details of deadly mundanity. You yourself only discovered your true nature with brush and paints when life was choking you. Why? Because that is where you found yourself. And I believe,’ he added, after a short pause, ‘that you are still like that, but I don’t know what has happened to you. I haven’t been away for more than a couple of months, but, I don’t know …’ He tailed off hopelessly.
Adnan seemed confused but tried to smile, while looking into the distance. ‘You haven’t changed, Hisham,’ he said. ‘All your life you have liked to argue and keep certainty at arm’s length. As for me, I’ve settled things.’ He was silent for a little as he gazed straight ahead. ‘Yes,’ he continued firmly. ‘I’ve left things to the Master to do as He wishes. We are only weak creatures, and this world is only a passing station. We have forgotten God. We have forgotten Him.’
He stopped speaking. Hisham’s eyes nearly started from their sockets. This wasn’t Adnan, even if it looked like Adnan. His face took on the expression of a simpleton.
‘My God, how you have changed, Adnan! I don’t recognise you!’ Adnan gave a short laugh.
‘No, my friend,’ he said. ‘I haven’t changed, but I’ve reached the sort of stability from which there can be no future change.’ There was another short silence. The two friends gazed at each other. Then Hisham looked at his watch and began to gather his books together.
‘You must excuse me,’ he said. ‘I’ve got an exam in less than five minutes. Tell me … where do you live?’
‘In Halla,’ came the answer.
Adnan described the place to him as they walked towards the college building, where they parted as Hisham prepared for the cold bath in which Doctor Najar al-Shatartun would soon be drowning him.
14
Later that afternoon, Hisham went to Halla for the first time since coming to Riyadh. It wasn’t far from al-Batha Street, but he got lost in some alleys before arriving at Adnan’s house. He knocked on the narrow, pale-green iron door for some time without anyone answering, and was just on the point of leaving when a voice came from inside indicating that someone was there. The door opened and a man wearing a pair of long flowing white trousers, a short-sleeved shirt and a white skullcap peered out. He was rather similar to Adnan, but taller and plumper, with a light beard that covered his chin and cheeks.
‘Good evening,’ said Hisham. ‘Is brother Adnan around?’
‘Peace be upon you, and the mercy and blessings of God. Yes, come on in.’ The young man opened the door as far as it would go, and Hisham entered. The man closed the door, looked at Hisham, smiled, and then led him to a room on the right of the entrance. ‘Come in,’ he said again with a smile. ‘I’ll tell Adnan you’re here. Your name, sir?’
‘Hisham … Hisham al-Abir.’
‘Pleased to meet you.’
‘And you.’
The young man disappeared into the interior of the house. The room Hisham waited in was clean and simple. A green carpet covered the floor. Yellow armchairs and sofas lined the walls. He sat in the first chair he found. A smell of damp filled the place – a dampness you wouldn’t find in the Nejd air, but which reminded him of Dammam.
He didn’t have to wait long. Adnan appeared quickly, echoing Hisham’s greeting and looking the spitting image of his housemate. The two sat down beside
each other. Then the person who had opened the door came in, carrying a tea tray with a small silver pot on it and two glasses, which he set in front of Adnan. ‘Please excuse me, brother Adnan,’ he said, the smile never leaving his face. ‘I have some work that has to be done.’ He added, ‘Blessings be upon you, brother Adnan,’ looking at Adnan and smiling, then quietly walked off.
They drank the tea in silence, then Adnan suddenly leapt up as if a snake had bitten him. ‘I’ve forgotten something!’ He rushed out, and came back with a wad of banknotes in his hand, which he thrust at Hisham. ‘God curse forgetfulness,’ he said. ‘This is some money that my father gave me to give you. It’s from your father.’ Hisham smiled, took the money and slipped it quietly into his pocket. He went back to the glass of tea he was sipping, thinking of the money. It was clearly a large sum: not less than two hundred riyals – he’d spotted several ‘tenners’. After a short silence Hisham spoke, screwing his eyes up nervously, ‘What’s the news about the arrests?’
This was a crafty question on Hisham’s part. He was looking for further reassurance, on top of the comfort he derived from all the time that had passed. He also wanted to frighten Adnan. But Adnan continued to sip his tea.
‘Nothing new,’ he said quietly, looking at the wooden ceiling. ‘Some defectors in Qatif and Ahsa … Anyway, I don’t care any more.’
‘Some defectors?’ This was a new expression Hisham hadn’t heard before. But the biggest surprise was that Adnan no longer cared. ‘You don’t care any more? How come?’
‘I told you earlier, I’ve left everything to the Almighty.’
There was a short silence, then Adnan said, as if performing a duty, ‘Would you like to see the house?’ Without waiting for an answer, he got up. ‘You’ll love it,’ he said. ‘It’s better than our house in Dammam, and my housemates are a great improvement on Majid and his brothers … Yusuf’s brothers ….’ He gave a short laugh. Hisham got up slowly and followed Adnan, who walked with a firm step Hisham had never noticed before.
‘This is the courtyard … we don’t use it much although it’s very spacious.’ Around the courtyard were three rooms spread out along the sides, as well as a bathroom and the entrance to a stairway. Adnan led him to the first room on the left of the entrance, a smile covering his face. ‘This is my room …’ He took a deep breath. ‘Come in,’ he said. ‘Make yourself at home.’ He gave a short, abrupt laugh, then quickly entered the room. There was a carpet striped with yellow and green covering the length of the room, and an orange blanket on the floor in the far corner, under the only window to the left of the door. There was also a metal clothes rack, like the one Hisham had, and a black bag thrown down carelessly beside the door, as well as some books scattered on the floor beside the blanket.
‘So. What do you think of my room?’
‘Not bad, not bad.’
Hisham went over to examine the books. The Fatwas of Ibn Taymiyya, Signposts on the Way, My Journey from Doubt to Certainty, God Reveals Himself in the Scientific Age, Rescuing the Sorrowful from Satan’s Snares, The Revival of the Religious Sciences, The Steps of the Travellers, The Future of This Religion. He finished flicking through the books and said, ‘Indeed, art is a waste of time.’ His tone was sarcastic, although he had intended it to sound funny. Adnan, however, reacted in a way he hadn’t anticipated.
‘This is useful knowledge. I regret all those years that I spent on useless things. Drawing, and sterile debate.’ Hisham saw what Adnan meant and was cut to the quick, but he only said, ‘Steady on, my friend … I meant it as a joke.’ But Adnan was extremely angry.
‘No jokes, no rubbish,’ he said. ‘You shouldn’t joke about such matters.’
‘Too much joking and laughter kills the heart and weakens one’s manhood,’ he continued, resuming his composure. ‘As the Prophet, on whom be peace, said.’ For the first time in his life, Hisham felt disconcerted by Adnan.
‘On Him be blessings and peace,’ said Hisham, trying to be diplomatic. ‘Anyway, these are all useful books. They cultivate goodness and increase the sublime.’ Adnan relaxed and the calm returned to his eyes.
‘What a crafty old dodger you are. You have an extraordinary gift. I wish you could be part of Islam and its people.’
‘What am I, a Buddhist?’ replied Hisham, open-mouthed. ‘Am I Muhammad’s opponent?’
‘No, you are worse than all of those,’ replied Adnan calmly. ‘Aren’t you a Marxist? A Baathist? I know you better than yourself. That’s enough to expel you from the community.’ Expel? Community? Was this Adnan?
‘But I believe in God and his Prophet and –’
‘Stop talking rubbish. I know you. Faith is a matter of words and deeds. You have neither. I am sorry, I don’t mean to insult you, but this is the truth. God is not ashamed of the truth, so why should we, his servants, be ashamed of it or pretend not to know it?’
Hisham was livid. I’m neither words nor deeds. It made him sick. But he stifled his anger, pulled himself together and got up, saying, ‘You must excuse me, I have to leave.’
Adnan tried to stop him, but it was obviously out of politeness and Hisham insisted on going. Adnan accompanied him to the outer door. Before he left, Adnan asked him to wait for a moment, then disappeared inside and returned with a little book that he pushed towards Hisham. ‘I am sure that you will like it,’ he said smiling. ‘And perhaps God will help you and guide you.’ Hisham reluctantly took the book, gave his friend a quick look, then went off hearing the door close behind him.
15
All the way from the station to al-Batha Street, where he could board the local bus, he thought about Adnan and the extraordinary change in his life and personality. In the bus heading towards Usarat Street, by way of al-Khazzan Street, he flipped through the book Adnan had given him: al-Ghazali’s Al-Munqidh min al-Dalal (‘Deliverance from Error’). He loathed this sort of book, but he was determined to read it, in the hope of finding some explanation for the revolution in Adnan’s life; until now Adnan had always been so predictable.
When he shut the door of his room that evening, he was delighted by the sum his father had sent him: two hundred and fifty riyals. He slipped them into a book in his little study, made himself some tea, leaned back against the wall and began to read Al-Munqidh min al-Dalal. It really was an amazing book, despite its diminutive size – very thought-provoking, even though its ending didn’t satisfy Hisham. It concluded that faith was nothing but light which God poured into the heart, and that the intellect and will had nothing to do with it. Its conclusion was pure fatalism, though perhaps it was this fatalism that had affected Adnan so quickly and powerfully. Hisham compared it with historical materialism. Wasn’t that also a sort of fate? But he rejected the idea, and returned to the topic of Adnan again.
The Adnan Hisham knew was almost pacifist in nature – so mild-mannered it could be seen as a flaw in his character. He was sensitive, with extremely refined feelings. It would never have occurred to Hisham that he could have been turned head-over-heels so quickly. Finding an explanation was really bugging him. He had always dealt with Adnan on the basis that he was just a friend; he had never before tried to make him the object of serious contemplation. But when he started to look at the full picture of Adnan’s life, certain things stood out which hadn’t seemed significant before.
A person like Adnan could only thrive in an atmosphere of certainty and security; protected by an environment that constantly shielded and directed him. Because he was a person of sensitive feelings, he was often anxious and was easily upset. The intricate details of life that his brother Majid could deal with so well worried and upset Adnan because he couldn’t handle them. So for Adnan, drawing had become a sort of retreat from these annoying details; a solitary refuge in which he could find a way of proving himself superior to his brother and his brother’s success in the eyes of his father and people in general. Hisham smiled wryly at this idea, thinking of Jean-Paul Sartre’s remark – he couldn’t remember where h
e had read or heard it – that people were their own worst enemies.
Drawing was an expression of anxiety and a search for absolute certainty at the same time. Adnan resorted to it when he was upset, finding in it the security that his soul craved. But it was only a temporary solace, which ended as soon as he emerged from his studio. Adnan wanted perfect security and never-ending certainty. He wanted someone to be responsible for him the whole time so that he would never suffer the tormenting anxiety of having to deal with choice. Even opting for the Agricultural College had not been a choice so much as a submission to his father’s will … so as to make his father responsible for it.
It was at this point that Hisham remembered how Adnan’s artistic efforts had lessened considerably once he became involved in the organisation. The organisation had become a substitute father-figure, taking decisions for him in the absence of his own father. And now, today, here he was handing all responsibility for his life to the True Father.
Memories and forgotten details crowded Hisham’s mind; things he had paid no attention to, but which were now proving to be remarkably significant. He realised that his relationship with Adnan had been very one-sided. Although the two friends were both fond of peace and quiet, Adnan was so meek and mild about everything that it sometimes got on Hisham’s nerves, even though in other ways it suited him for his friend to be like this. Adnan made him feel powerful, and even though he was his best friend, that was a pleasant sensation. Then an old incident leapt into Hisham’s mind. He had no idea why at this precise moment he should remember something that had happened such a long time ago.
They had been in the fourth grade of elementary school. The Qur’an and Qur’anic recitation were the two most difficult and unpopular subjects with the pupils. Both were taught by the school director, Abd al-Salam al-Faq‘awi, who was very strict with the pupils, and never let the stick leave his right hand. This stick would descend on their tender bodies whenever they stumbled over a word when reciting a verse, or when they failed to apply the principles of tajwid to their recitation. They trembled at the mere mention of idgham and ghanna and iqlab.* That meant being beaten with the stick, and being kept at school at the end of the day. They couldn’t appeal to anyone. Al-Faq‘awi was the director, and their families approved of this harsh treatment, which they hoped would make men of them in the end. But it was inevitable that they would make mistakes, because the teacher stood right in front of them as they recited, amusing himself by striking his left hand gently with the stick in a way that struck terror into their hearts.
Shumaisi Page 5