I prefer not to listen to them.
I try to think of nothing; I dive deep inside myself in search of that Voice that promised me mountains and marvels when I was a disillusioned lieutenant and beginning to stink in the shadow of my own bitterness, the Voice that soothed and graced my solitude with its promises and challenges. Where has it gone? Why has it fallen silent? I visualise it curled up somewhere in the blackness that is slowly overtaking me, but I find only the echo of my prayers. The Voice has left the ship, and there is no one at the helm.
I am alone with destiny, and destiny is looking elsewhere.
Even Sirte, the city of my adolescence – the cradle of my revolution – has turned its back on me.
There was a time when its squares and stadiums teemed with people come to acclaim me. Pavements and platforms overflowed with fervour and pennants. People held up portraits of me and sang my praises until they were hoarse. It was here, in this city where memories are already being rewritten, that I took an oath to bring fate to her knees. Then it was just a quiet little medina that did not know how to sell itself or make itself desirable. Along its corniche the wealthy dreamt of the casinos that glittered on the Mediterranean’s northern shore; at its roadsides the poor dreamt of nothing, having been stripped of everything. A gulf as deep as an abyss kept the two classes so far apart that when they happened to pass each other in the street they did not even see one another; they went on their respective ways like ghosts, each in their parallel world. I remember the low-class cafés that stank of piss and privation, the souks infested with beggars and scrawny pickpockets, the kids with heads swollen with ulcers who rolled in the dust giggling as if they were possessed, their noses streaming and their pus-clogged eyes swarming with flies; I can still smell the sickening stenches that rose from the open sewers, see the women in rags chanting in doorways in voices more tragic than any funeral dirge, the stray dogs roaming the rubbish tips with their fangs bared, trying to assuage their hunger, the old people pinned to the walls like scarecrows nobody wanted, the alleys that were as narrow and dark as twisted minds. It was here, in this town, that I grabbed a police officer by the throat when I saw him slap a man in front of his children just because he asked for directions. I have never forgotten the expression on those children’s faces; nothing has ever infuriated me more. It was boom time for feudalists, for middle-class Muslims who spoke Italian, from their grand cars that did not stop when they ran pedestrians over.
And I said, ‘Enough!’
And I raised my voice and said, ‘Death to the king!’
And I founded a republic and brought justice back.
It was right here, in this city that is turning its back on its values, that I knocked down those stinking cafés, demolished the slums, put up buildings taller than towers, built hospitals equipped with ultra-modern facilities, attractive sparkling shops like aquariums, handsome esplanades and mosaic fountains; I laid out boulevards as wide as parade grounds and turned empty lots into municipal gardens where dreams and everyday joys merged.
Thanks to who?
Thanks to me, and me alone, father of the revolution, the Ghous clan’s chosen one, come from the desert to sow tranquillity in the hearts and minds of the people.
I was Moses, come down from the mountain with a green book as my tablet.
Everything I did worked.
The champions of Arab nationalism glorified me at the tops of their voices, the leaders of the Third World ate out of my hand, African presidents quenched their thirst from my lips, apprentice revolutionaries kissed my brow and were transported into ecstasy; all the children of the free world took pride in being associated with me.
Was there anyone who did not praise Muammar to the skies, scourge of kings and hunter of eagles, the Bedouin of Fezzan crowned rais at the age of twenty-seven?
I was young, handsome, proud, and such a phenomenon that I only had to pick up any old pebble for it to become the philosopher’s stone.
And what do I see today? I, the miracle-maker whose charisma bewitched women? What do I see after all my Pharaonic creations, all my crowning achievements? A town handed over to the pillage and vandalism of an army of jinn, villas with their shutters blown off, devastated squares, desecrated buildings and burnt-out cars – a city despoiled as far as the eye can see.
They have crossed out my slogans, disfigured the portraits of me that decorated the façades of buildings: I can see one on a billboard, slashed with a bayonet and smeared with excrement.
Is that how people show love for their guide? Did this people love me sincerely, or was it merely a mirror reflecting back to me my own exaggerated narcissism?
No, they could not identify with me; it was I who saw myself in them, taking their clamour at face value. Now I know: the people of Libya do not know very much about love. They lied to me, just as the profiteers and my mistresses mocked me. I was their open sesame: they sweet-talked me into holding the candle for them while they stuffed their pockets at my expense. From a pathetic rabble I made a happy and prosperous nation, and look at the thanks I get. I feared treachery inside my palaces, but it was creeping up on me unsuspected in the towns and villages. Lieutenant-Colonel Trid was not wrong: my people are a gang. Unlike me, who lived entrenched in my bunkers, Trid is a field soldier. He evolved among the people, got to know them inside out. I should have dealt with them the way I dealt with dissidents, been more severe with them, distrusted them more. Dissidents betray themselves; the people betrayed me instead. If I had my time again, I would exterminate half the nation. Lock them up in camps to show them what real work is, and watch them die in the attempt; hang the rest at the roadside to encourage the others. Stalin haunted the dreams of good and bad alike, great and small, did he not? He died in his bed, showered with laurels, and was so mourned by his people they drowned in their own tears. Stockholm syndrome is the only remedy for nations full of cheats.
How dare they knife me in the back?
Libya owes me everything. The reason it is going up in smoke today is because it is unworthy of my goodness. Go on, go up in smoke, accursed country. Your belly is barren, there will be no phoenix rising from your ashes.
If a forest is to regrow, it first has to burn, that is what fools say.
Drivel!
There are forests that never recover from their destruction. They go up in flames like those monks who set themselves alight, and no shoot ever grows from their ashes.
One day mythology will say of Libya that it was a forest born from the hairs on the head of a providential figure, himself the product of a divine dream, beneath a carnival sky, bearing a green standard that flutters in the wind and a book the same colour that contains, like holy verses, both the prayers I offered and those I granted so that my homeland, which became my child, should not suffer either the thunderbolts of demons or the flames of incendiaries.
Libya is my magic trick, my own Olympus. Here in my realm, where I have been the humblest of sovereigns, the trees have grown straight since they stood to attention at the sound of my trumpets. Here, in the land of poets and of scimitars, every flower that blooms blooms because it trusts me, every stream that bubbles up between the pebbles tries to flow to me, every baby bird that cheeps in its nest praises me.
What happened, so suddenly, to turn the ayah on its head, to make my subjects drown out my words with their own?
The sorrow of it!
I am like God. The world I made has turned against me.
15
Abu-Bakr is restless in the front seat, twisting his head, staring in the rear-view mirror and then turning to look over his shoulder. For the last ten minutes we have been driving through empty suburbs. Looted shops, houses without doors and windows, railings and shutters banging in the silence and the burnt-out shells of cars bear witness to the vandals’ ferocity. They have even torn down the few trees that line the roadside.
It feels as though we are in a town that has died.
On the façade of one building
a black flag flutters as a sign of mourning.
Farewell, Sirte. Nothing will ever be as it was for you. Your celebrations will feel like funerals and your banquets taste of ashes. But when you are asked what you did with your talents do not, I beg you, lower your head and point an accusatory finger at the barbarians who ravish you today. Above all, say nothing, because it is you yourself who have despoiled your talents.
We are driving at speed, yet I have the feeling we are running on the spot, so much does each part of town look the same as the last. On pavements strewn with debris and rubble, large dark stains show the places where tyres have been burnt, where people built barricades and were attacked and where men were lynched before being doused in petrol and set on fire. A horrible smell of cremation hangs in the air, which is laden with omens of apocalypse.
Since leaving the school we have not seen one living being, apart from dogs fleeing the fighting, and stray cats. The only human trace we have glimpsed is the body of a soldier hanged from a lamppost, his trousers around his ankles, his penis amputated.
‘What’s that cloud of dust way back there?’ the general asks the driver.
The driver adjusts his wing mirror.
‘It looks like the Shilkas, General. It must be Colonel Mutassim’s unit.’
The general sits back, relieved. As he turns to me to see if I am happy that my son is joining us at last, gunfire rings out. A rebel roadblock ahead. The leading cars in the column turn sharply southwards; the rest of the convoy follows in a thunder of machine-gun fire. A pickup sways under the impact of the bullets, swerves and crashes into a ditch. Its occupants leap out and return fire to cover each other; they are immediately shot.
Our driver floors the 4×4, heading south.
The general hands me a helmet and body armour.
‘The shit’s hitting the fan,’ Mansour groans.
An explosion suddenly slows us. Ahead vehicles are peeling off right and left. The second 4×4 of my personal bodyguard is in flames.
Lieutenant-Colonel Trid sounds his horn, his arm out of the window signalling the drivers to keep moving.
We drive past the burning 4×4. One of the rear doors is lying on the road next to a dismembered torso. Inside the cabin the occupants are on fire where they sit, killed instantly.
‘The road’s mined,’ the general shouts.
‘A mine would have destroyed the road,’ Mansour says, ‘but the 4×4 was stopped dead. That means an air strike. A drone probably.’
Lieutenant-Colonel Trid’s car draws level with the leading vehicle; I see him order the driver to accelerate before he lets two cars pass him and rejoins the convoy in front of my armoured 4×4.
Behind us part of the convoy has halted because of the crash or possibly mechanical problems; the other half is overtaking in any way it can in an effort to catch up with us.
Mansour puts his hand on my knee to comfort me.
‘Remove your hand,’ I order him. ‘Whatever you do, do not touch me. I have not forgotten the way you behaved yesterday.’
He does not take his hand away but presses my knee more firmly.
‘Muammar, my brother, master, guide, we’re going to die. What is the point of leaving each other still angry about things that don’t matter?’
‘We’re going to get out of this mess,’ the general shouts at him. ‘God is with us.’
‘God has changed sides, my poor Abu-Bakr,’ Mansour sighs. ‘He’s with our enemies now, leaving us only our eyes to weep with.’
I elbow him hard in the ribs to make him shut up.
‘Silence, bird of ill omen.’
Behind us there is disarray. Some vehicles are turning back, others are scattering down minor roads. Sporadic explosions can be heard, then longer salvoes.
‘Are we being attacked, General?’
‘I don’t think so, Rais.’
‘Our men are panicking,’ Mansour explains. ‘They’re firing at random because they don’t know what’s going on. They’ll kill each other without realising it.’
The lieutenant-colonel has also seen the chaos overtaking the second part of the convoy. He turns his car round to try to restore some order to the column, realises the situation is deteriorating, and returns to us. With a hand he invites our driver to follow him.
We negotiate a roundabout to go back the way we have come, doubling back as far as the 4×4 hit by the air strike, then turn down an avenue cratered with holes. The general signals to me that a third of the convoy has got lost. I turn round to check and can see only twenty or so vehicles weaving along behind us.
‘We have to restore some order here, General, otherwise we shall get bogged down.’
‘There is a barracks not far from here,’ he says.
‘Head for it.’
We overtake the lieutenant-colonel’s car to direct him to the barracks. But the complex is occupied by militiamen. They meet our arrival with 12.7 mm machine guns and anti-tank rockets. We retreat in indescribable chaos. A deafening roar comes from overhead. I just have time to see two fighters streak across the sky like meteorites, then two bombs hit the column right in the middle. Behind us vehicles start exploding in a chain reaction, like Chinese firecrackers. A human arm, on fire, bounces off the windscreen of my 4×4. The convoy is in utter confusion. Men abandon their vehicles and flee in all directions.
There are oil drums blocking the avenue. We turn onto a road that runs parallel.
‘They’re drawing us into a trap,’ Mansour warns us. ‘Let’s turn back.’
‘Where to?’ Abu-Bakr curses.
‘To the Hotel Mahari.’
‘It’s too risky.’
‘It’s less risky than driving like maniacs into the unknown.’
Lieutenant-Colonel Trid’s car brakes. Too late to avoid the spikes scattered across the road, his driver loses control; my 4×4 rams him. The driver and the general are stunned by the airbags. Mansour opens the door, jumps down, shooting as he goes two militiamen attracted by the collision. I grab my Kalashnikov and get out of the vehicle after him. The still groggy driver helps the general out. We start running in no particular direction. My soldiers fire blindly. The area is stiff with rebels. We are locked down. Skirmishing starts in the side streets. Shouts of ‘Allāhu Akbar’ are punctuated by interminable volleys. The convoy’s third section, commanded by my son, tries to break through to join us, but is stopped by mortar fire. Jets of fire and steel are tearing my troops to shreds. Mansour has disappeared. Lieutenant-Colonel Trid’s face is covered in blood. He gestures to me to put my head down and follow a low wall to where he is. My personal bodyguard regroups around me. Nearby, on the other side of the wall, a pickup mounted with a heavy machine gun is spraying fire. Its exhaust clouds choke the air. My throat is burning. Trid aims at the gunner and blows his head off. We attack the pickup from the rear and take it out with the second grenade. I see the driver writhing inside it as the flames consume him.
To our left, a group of about fifty soldiers is holding several groups of rebels at bay. I can see my son Mutassim directing the operation. He has seen me too, and gestures to me to stay where I am. The rebels are trying to outflank us to prevent us getting into a residential area. The exchanges of gunfire are becoming more intense. Mortar shells are targeting our position to dislodge us. One falls thirty metres from where we are sheltering, but fails to explode. Mutassim manages to crawl over to me. I am so happy to see him in the flesh that I do not spot the sniper taking aim opposite. A round whistles past my ear, forcing me to the ground.
‘We have to pull out,’ my son says. ‘I’ve sent a company to create a diversion further down. It won’t hold out for more than an hour. The rebels are constantly being reinforced. There’ll be tanks here soon and the whole sector will be surrounded. We need to fall back to the north. It’s the only gap left.’
The sniper is keeping us flat on our stomachs. We cannot lift our heads. Mutassim takes two guards with him and, hugging the wall, creeps into a garden. A grenade
detonates and the gunfire opposite stops. Mutassim comes back with one guard, the other is dead.
We run towards a building that explodes before we reach it and retreat under falling shrapnel. Some soldiers signal to us to join them in a villa. The general has sprained his ankle; a guard helps him run. The villa is fifty metres away, but it feels as if it is at the end of the earth. Mutassim pushes me ahead of him. We succeed in reaching it, losing two men on the way. The rebels have discovered us; they converge on our location, heavily armed pickups in support. Our soldiers try to cover us from the balconies; they are mown down in a single sweep of fire. We go into the villa, which is already crumbling under a hail of missiles. The windows are smashed, the walls are shredded by large-calibre rounds. Shells start to rain down on us, turning our refuge into a hell. The building is choked with dust and smoke. The screams of the wounded can be heard upstairs. A man teeters at the top of the stairs, one arm torn off, his face blackened, then collapses and crashes down the stairs to the ground floor. He rolls almost to my feet, grimaces at me and breathes his last, his eyes bulging. The rebels are very close now; some have scaled the wall of the compound and are crawling through the garden. My guards spray them with fire.
Mutassim tells me that the building will not withstand mortars or anti-aircraft guns and that we must evacuate.
‘I’m going to reconnoitre,’ he says. ‘I’ve seen some orchards at the back. Hold on till I get back.’
He calls a squad together to go with him and leaves by the service door. It is the last time I will see him. A few minutes later, just two of his men return.
‘The colonel has been wounded,’ one of them tells me.
‘And you left him there?’
‘We couldn’t do anything, sir. We lost six men trying to bring him back, but the rebels took him alive.’
I no longer feel like waiting for anything. Everything seems unnatural, perverse and pointless to me. Life or death, what’s the difference? My son’s in the hands of barbarians. I don’t dare imagine the fate that awaits him. A fathomless rage grips me. The general realises that I’m about to give up on everything, combat, resistance, escape. He clutches me by the arm and drags me behind him to the service door. I run, unaware of what I’m doing; I don’t care what might happen to me. I’m not even conscious of the shots that follow us. I can vaguely see fields ahead of me. My helmet comes unfastened and falls off; I don’t pick it up. I only know that I’m running, that my chest is burning, that my heart’s about to burst.
The Dictator's Last Night Page 11