The doctor shook his head. “Believe me,” he said, “peace is won by peace and nothing else. So forgive me if I don’t get excited over your plans. Besides, if we’re going to go to war, why not be smart about it? Why must we fumble everything? The plans we now have to save the country will most likely backfire on us.”
Basim glanced at Yousif as if to check if he were as weird as his father. Yousif was noncommittal. He wanted to hear the rest of the argument.
“The only sensible suggestion I heard regarding military action,” the doctor said, pushing down the tobacco of his pipe with his finger, “came from King Abdel Aziz of Saudi Arabia. He believed in containing the problem and warned against letting it get out of hand. Instead of letting six or seven armies march on Palestine to save it from the enemy, he thought the Arab governments should satisfy themselves with supplying the Palestinians with arms and money the same way the West is supplying the Jews with arms and money. Then it will be a fight the world could understand—a local fight between two, small, relatively-equal groups. But when you march in six Arab armies against the Jews who had just been mauled by Hitler, the world is going to be horrified. The world doesn’t know that these puffed-up Arab armies are made up of tin soldiers—all it could envision is another holocaust. You can imagine where their sympathy is going to be. I can hear them howling, ‘Poor Jews! Poor Jews!’”
For a change, Basim nodded in agreement with his uncle. “We’re going to look like the aggressors.”
“Of course,” the doctor said, blowing his match in anguish.
“The armies haven’t arrived yet,” Yousif said. “Couldn’t the Arab governments start sending us supplies instead?”
“Too late now,” Basim answered, shaking his head. “We should’ve been doing that over the years, not overnight. On the other hand, the British wouldn’t have sat still and let us get armed. Now we have to face the situation head on.” He dug deep into one of his trenchcoat pockets and took out a small bundle wrapped in a linen napkin. Slowly he began to unwrap it in his lap.
“What’s that?” Yousif asked, curious.
Basim did not answer. He just laid the contents on the coffee table. It was a collection of jewelry: rings, bracelets, necklaces, and a watch. Most of it was in gold, except the diamond wedding ring, which Yousif immediately recognized. Now Yousif could see why Basim had not taken off his trenchcoat.
“You can have all of it for the price of a gun,” Basim said, looking at his uncle straight in the eye. Everything about him was cold and firm.
Yousif was stunned.
“Is it that bad?” the doctor asked, lowering the pipe to his lap.
Basim’s reply came in the form of a stare.
“Does Maha know you’re doing this?” Yousif wanted to know.
“I told her what it was for and she understood.”
The doctor’s face was grim. “She gave you her wedding ring to sell for the price of a gun?”
“Other women have done it before her. Guns are being sold at black market prices. Very few could afford to buy them without selling or pawning some of what they have.”
“You could’ve asked to borrow the money without all this.”
“I wanted you to see the seriousness of the situation.”
Gloom descended on them.
“Who’s selling the arms?” Yousif asked, heaping warm ashes around the chestnuts.
“British soldiers who pretend they were robbed,” Basim explained. “Mostly smugglers. Their guns, though, come from North Africa. They’re rusty, broken guns which were dumped in the desert by the armies of World War II. Some of them are defective. Last week the British caught a smuggler selling weapons to some Arabs in Gaza and they hanged him the same day. Without even a hearing.”
“The bastards!” Yousif said.
Yasmin returned with her knitting bag.
The three stared at her, then her eyes caught the sparkle of the jewelry.
“All for the price of a gun,” her husband told her.
She almost dropped what she was carrying. “Basim!” she exclaimed. “You want to sell the gold your mother saved to give your wife? The bracelet which was a gift from her father? You want to sell your own wedding band? Take them back before I think you’re crazy.”
“Maha knows,” Yousif informed her.
She looked at Basim quizzically. “What did you do to make her give them to you?”
“Nothing,” Basim assured her. “She’s not as sentimental as you. Besides, what’s a piece of gold at a time like this?”
A pause lingered.
“How much money do you need?” his uncle asked, rising reluctantly.
“Two hundred and fifty pounds,” Basim replied, lighting another cigarette.
“That much?”
“If you don’t have it I’ll get it somewhere else.”
“That’s not what I meant,” his uncle told him, buttoning his pants and buckling his belt.
“Then let me have it, please.”
The doctor left the room. The rest sat down in silence. Yasmin did not touch her knitting. Yousif pulled some of the roasted chestnuts out of the kanoon. Outside, the trees began to whistle and there was thunder and lightning.
“I think we’re going to have a storm,” Yasmin said, crossing herself.
“More than one,” Basim replied, getting up and stretching his legs. “Wait until he hears about the hospital money.”
“What about it?” Yousif asked.
Basim looked at him and then at his mother. “Because we Palestinians have no army,” he explained, “each town from now on is going to take care of itself. Some people think Uncle ought to use his hospital money to buy arms.”
“Good luck,” Yasmin huffed, reaching for her knitting.
“You think he’d refuse?”
“I know he would.”
Within a minute the doctor returned carrying a check in his hand. “The additional hundred is for you to live on,” he said, handing it to him.
“In the name of the cause I thank you,” Basim said, accepting the check and slipping it quickly into his wallet. “One day I’ll repay you.”
“Come back alive and you don’t have to repay me,” the doctor said, taking back his seat. “I’ll keep the jewelry, though, so you won’t squander it.”
The coffee boiled over. Some of it spilled on the charcoal, making a loud hiss and causing ashes to rise. Quickly, Yasmin raised the pot and then wiped its outside with an orange peel. She let the coffee settle for a few seconds and then poured it into small, ornate demitasse cups. Yousif picked up the tray and served.
Basim sat at the edge of a sofa, holding the tiny cup like a small bird. “Soon,” he said, “we’re going to start a big fund-raising campaign for arms. Some people think you ought to put up the hospital money . . .”
His uncle shot him a horrified look.
“. . . to build watch towers and buy arms.”
Nothing Basim could have said would have angered the doctor as much. “Don’t make me regret giving you that check.”
Basim chuckled. “It’s not my idea,” he said.
“But you go along with it?” the doctor wanted to know.
“We’ve lived long enough without a hospital, we can live without it a few more years.”
“You are all insane,” the doctor glared.
“Without arms we might all be dead.”
“Tell them not to try. Because if they do they’re going to be awfully disappointed.”
Basim took a deep breath. “I have already told them that, but they were not convinced. Someone will approach you.”
“Who will dare?”
“It’s not a matter of daring. There are priorities. Don’t be shocked if those who gave you the money to start with, come back and ask for it to protect themselves. That’s all.”
The doctor looked around, and Yousif knew that he wanted a cigarette to calm his nerves. Once he had seen him finish a whole pack in one sitting. The doctor now loo
ked as upset as he had ever been that day—if not more. He seemed equally irritated with the message and the messenger. Even when Basim offered him a cigarette, he hesitated.
“Ever since I was a boy, I’ve been haunted by the idea of a hospital,” the doctor said. “I used to see Dr. Mitri galloping on a horse from one house to another all day and all night, winter and summer, year in and year out. He was the only doctor in town and had more patients than he was able to take care of. Even today there are many rural areas that don’t even have a doctor to look after them. There are thirty villages around Ardallah but not a single hospital. Even Ramallah—our finest summer resort—doesn’t have one. We need clinics, we need health centers, we need hospitals, we need schools. That’s what we need, not arms—not guns and ammunition.”
Basim’s look at his uncle was full of pity. “But we need arms to protect the land you want to build these things on. We need arms to save the people you love so much.”
“Then get the money from someone else,” the doctor insisted, looking truly worried that someone might try to wrestle the money out of him.
“We need arms,” Basim repeated.
“I’m telling you,” the doctor interrupted, “don’t expect it from me.”
The doctor rose, agitated. He walked to the window, pulled the ecru curtain aside, wiped the frosty glass with the tips of his fingers, and gazed into the night.
Basim emptied his coffee cup, put it down, and stood up to leave, picking up his blue scarf.
Dr. Safi turned and faced Basim, his face suffused with anger.
“Two months ago,” he said, “Amin lost his arm because some old fool set it for him without washing his hands. Today a baby died because his parents burned holes in his flesh to treat pneumonia. Such conditions are intolerable. We need hospitals to take care of people.”
“No one can argue with that,” Yousif said. “But when I suggested a peaceful solution, you and Moshe laughed at me.”
Father and son looked at each other as if no one else were in the room.
“You know better than that,” the doctor said, consoling. “I never laugh at you or at anything you say. Maybe it was the way you said it. Maybe the timing was wrong.”
“In any case,” Yousif said, “if diplomacy is out of the question now, what’s wrong with protecting ourselves?”
“Nothing . . .” his father began.
“Well,” Yousif jumped in, “we can’t depend on Egypt’s playboy King Farouk. Nor on Jordan’s Glubb Pasha.”
“Sir John Glubb,” Basim corrected with a smirk. He seemed pleased with Yousif’s apparent inclination.
The doctor pouted. “Are you suggesting that I should give up the hospital money to buy arms?”
Yousif was not intimidated. “All I’m saying is that should a demand be made—”
“Demand?” his father asked, offended.
“Sorry, request. Should a request be made, one has to be realistic.”
His father’s face turned purple. “Listen, son, don’t talk above your head. If these are dangerous times, and if you want me to be realistic, then answer two questions: what the hell is fifteen thousand pounds going to do? And, how long will it last? In terms of wars, this is kid stuff. If you want to fight a war, you need millions. Do you understand? Millions. There’s no sense asking a country doctor like me for a small fund he raised over the years for a humanitarian purpose to blow it in a day or two. It’s madness.”
Standing by the window, the doctor looked pathetically alone. When he took off his glasses he seemed to have aged five years.
“Good night, Uncle,” Basim said, his expression severe.
The doctor simply nodded, the muscles of his jaws tightening.
Yousif saw Basim to the door, but before he opened it Basim signaled that he had something to tell him.
“Let’s talk on the balcony,” Basim suggested.
Yousif opened the door. Both stepped outside and stood in the dark. The weather was terrible. Trees swayed and the rain blew erratically.
“I’m glad you said we need to protect ourselves,” Basim said, tightening his belt. “But tell me, what are you going to do when the war starts?”
Salwa’s same question echoed in Yousif’s ears. “I don’t know,” he wavered. “Actually I was thinking of finishing my education.”
Basim’s forehead became creased. “We have no Arab universities here,” he said. “That means . . . Oh, I see. You wouldn’t be going away because you’re afraid, now would you?”
“Afraid? I’m not afraid.”
“Then who’s going to do the protecting? You’re going to leave it up to others.”
“I didn’t say that.”
“Then why would you want to go? Could you live with yourself if we lost the war and you hadn’t done your share?”
Suddenly, Basim turned and was descending the stairs, walking on the long tree-lined driveway. But before he reached the wrought-iron gate, the rain got heavier. Lightning seemed to split the sky, painting the whole scene with silver. Yousif stood in awe. The lightning bolts looked like arrows intent on pinning Basim to the ground. But Basim walked on, his head high. Standing still, Yousif watched him disappear into total darkness.
12
Despite the new worries of the night before, Yousif spent the morning trying to be a good student: listening to lectures and taking notes. But he couldn’t concentrate.
At the ten o’clock recess he listened to Amin’s worries about money. Winter was very hard on Amin’s father. Home construction virtually ceased, and stonecutters did not work. And if Amin’s father did not work, the whole family, which depended entirely on his wages from week to week, was left deprived.
“What I can’t understand,” Amin grumbled, “is why a grown man would settle for a seasonal job for all these years. He might as well be temporary help.”
Isaac, who had stopped to talk to some fellow students, joined them. “What are you talking about?” he asked.
“I’m talking about my father,” Amin replied, shaking his head. “For nearly forty years he’s sat in people’s yards chiseling rocks and inhaling dust so they would have fine homes. And every time it rains or snows he doesn’t work and our whole family has a hard time coping.”
Never before had Yousif heard Amin complain so openly about poverty. With the war looming on the horizon, construction would come to a virtual halt and Amin’s worries would be compounded. Yousif saw that Amin was already feeling the burden of having to help care for his family.
“Sometimes I feel so angry with him that I want to shake him by the shoulders,” Amin confessed. “But when I see him looking so helpless I feel ashamed of myself because I know he’s tried his best.”
They strolled by several teachers. The tall thin mathematics ustaz from Acre looked comical with his long hook nose. Yousif did not know whether the ustaz seemed pinched because of the cold or because he was smelling disaster.
“I wish money were our only problem,” Isaac said, throwing the end of his blue wool scarf around his neck. “Ever since the night of shooting we haven’t been the same. Our house looks more and more like a morgue.”
It was cold, though the December sun was shining. They were supposed to be enjoying a ten-minute break, but Amin and Isaac sounded so morbid. Yousif felt sorry for both of them. On the school ground, just off the street, dozens of students were swarming around a vendor selling crusty sesame rings and hard boiled eggs. Yousif had a taste for what the man was selling but knew there was no chance he could buy any of it today. Instead, he walked around the football field, carrying a brass bell by the ball-on-chain to stop it from ringing.
Yousif himself was not in the best of spirits. The question of the hospital money still gnawed at him. He felt caught between his father and his cousin. Each one had a point. But he was uncertain how far he could go in opposing his father. Ardallah needed to be protected, no doubt. If the hospital money could buy arms that could save one family or even one child it woul
d be worth it. On the other hand, wouldn’t it be awful to lose the war and the money at the same time, especially if you knew in advance that the money would have absolutely no bearing on the outcome?
But Yousif could not tell his friends of these concerns that morning. The argument in his house the night before had to be kept a secret. A more pressing concern was his possible separation from Salwa. Weren’t wars unpredictable? Couldn’t the most unlikely occur?
“I guess each of us has something to gripe about,” Yousif said, swinging the bell without letting it ring.
“You too?” Isaac said, not believing him. “At least people are not shooting at your house. Your parents are rich. You have a girl.”
“That’s just it,” Yousif said. “I’m worried about Salwa.”
“Worried how?” Amin asked, sarcastic.
“What if the Zionists invade Ardallah?” Yousif asked. “What if they drive us out to make room for the Jews in Europe? Will she and I end up in the same place? Will I be able to find her?”
Isaac rolled his eyes upward and Amin shook his head.
“Okay,” Yousif said. “What if her parents pack up and leave for Lebanon until the war is over? What then? Don’t tell me that can’t happen.”
“You’re breaking my heart,” Amin said.
“I’m serious. I wish I could marry her now and avoid taking that risk.”
“Why can’t you?” Isaac said, wiping his glasses. “You’re smart and some people think you’re good looking. You come from a good family with money and status. I’m sure Salwa’s father would love to have a doctor’s son as a son-in-law. Don’t you think so, Amin?”
“I suppose so,” Amin said, again looking withdrawn.
“They’d say I was too young for marriage,” Yousif argued. “Boys don’t marry at seventeen. We have a lot of growing up and settling down to do first. Both of our parents would agree on that.”
Isaac didn’t seem convinced. “But this is an emergency. If it weren’t for the war you’d be glad to wait.”
Amin nodded, his face grim. “What would Salwa say if you were to ask?”
On the Hills of God Page 18