Virgins of Paradise

by Wood, Barbara

  Connor said, "I'll go get the car. You two can wait here."

  While they waited, Jasmine offered the elderly pilgrim her seat on the ram statue, which Tayeb accepted graciously, spreading his white galabeya about himself. He squinted up at the sky, which was rapidly growing dark. "I do not like being in this place after the sun is gone," he said. Then he placed his hand on his chest.

  "Are you all right?" Jasmine asked.

  "I am an old man, God keep me."

  When Declan returned and found Tayeb complaining of weakness, he brought the medical kit from the car and was about to open it when the old man lifted his head and said, "What's that sound?"

  "It is the wind, Hadj Tayeb," Connor replied.

  "Sounds like a jinni to me. By God, we had better leave this place, Sayyid. The ghosts come out at night, and look, the sun is gone."

  "Wait a minute," Jasmine said. "I heard something, too."

  The three stood motionless and listened to the wind whistle mournfully through the ruins. And then another sound joined the wind—a long, low moan.

  "Someone is here!" said Jasmine.

  They turned in the direction the sound had come from and listened again. This time it was more distinct.

  "You're right," said Declan. "There is someone here. The sound is coming from that small structure."

  The sanctuary, where the goddess of the shrine had once been housed, was the height of a man, and about ten feet square. They had to climb over rocks and debris to reach it, sometimes slipping in the gravel and loose shale; Declan took Jasmine's hand. The doorway was open to the east, where the sky was darkest, and so it was impossible to see inside. They bent down to listen.

  There was another moan. "Allah!" said Hadj Tayeb, making a sign to ward off the evil eye.

  Connor stepped inside and found a man reclining against an ancient altar, his eyes shut, breathing with difficulty. He wore the robe and turban of a Sufi mystic, and had a long gray beard down to his chest. There were bloodstains on his robe.

  Declan knelt beside him and, saying quietly, "It's all right, old man, we've come to help," opened the medical kit to bring out a stethoscope and blood-pressure cuff.

  While Connor monitored the man's vital signs, Jasmine lifted the hem of the coarse wool robe, and found a lower leg bone protruding through gangrenous flesh.

  "He must have fallen and crawled in here for shelter," she said, reaching into the medical bag. In the dim light of the sanctuary, she quickly filled a syringe from an ampule of morphine. "This will ease your pain," she said to the man, although she wasn't sure he was even aware of their presence.

  Declan listened through the stethoscope, then sat back and said, "Pulse is weak and thready. He's severely dehydrated and probably in a lot of pain. I'll start an IV and then we'll transport him to the district hospital."

  But they were startled when the man suddenly said in a hoarse whisper, "No! Do not take me from here."

  "We are going to take care of you, Abu," Jasmine said, using the respectful term meaning "father." "We are doctors."

  He looked at her and she was surprised to see clear green eyes. When he grimaced with pain, and she saw strong teeth, she said to Declan, "This man is not old."

  "No, but he's in a bad way," he said, signaling to Hadja Tayeb who hovered by the entrance. "Can you fetch the metal box from the back of the car, Hadj?" and the old man hurried off. Declan gently wrapped the blood pressure cuff around a shockingly emaciated upper arm. "His pressure's low," he said, "we have to rehydrate him right away."

  While they waited for Tayeb to return with the IV setup, Jasmine laid her hand on the hermit's forehead. His skin was dry and crackly, as if he were a hundred years old, and yet she guessed that he was not much older than herself. Then she and Declan examined the wound and arrived at the same unspoken conclusion: amputation above the knee.

  When Hadj Tayeb returned, struggling with the aluminum medical kit, Declan worked quickly to find a vein and get a drip started, wedging the bottle of dextrose solution on the altar stone above the man. Then he said, "Listen to me, Abu. We are going to splint your leg and carry you back—"

  But the hermit said, "No," again, with a little more strength this time. "You must not take me away."

  "What happened to you?"

  "I was outside, on the escarpment, praying. I lost my balance in the wind. I managed to crawl down here."

  "How long have you been like this?" Jasmine asked him.

  "Hours, days ..."

  Because of the dirt he had crawled through, the blood had been able to coagulate so that he hadn't bled to death. But flies had had time to feast on the torn flesh. She wondered when his food and water had run out while he had lain in agony, waiting for help.

  They had brought a canteen with them; she unscrewed it and, sliding an arm beneath bony shoulders, brought the water to his lips. He was able to take a few sips.

  Finally the morphine started to work, and as he was able to drink more water, he slowly became coherent.

  "There were some kind people here ... Bedouins, on their way to Cairo. They fed me and gave me water. Praise God in His mercy."

  "You're going to be all right," Declan said. "Just as soon as we have you in the hospital."

  But the hermit seemed not to have heard, because he was suddenly staring at Jasmine.

  He looked at her for a long time, his eyebrows coming together in a frown. And then he reached up a skeletal hand and pushed her turban back, revealing blond hair. A look of astonishment swept across his fleshless face. "Mishmish?" he whispered.

  "What?" she said. "What did you say?"

  "Is that you, Mishmish?"

  She gasped. "What? What are you saying?"

  "I thought I was dreaming. It is you, Mishmish."

  "Zachariah? Oh, God, Zakki!" She looked at Declan. "He's my brother! This man is my brother!"

  "What?"

  "My brother. Oh, God—"

  "I searched for her, you know," Zachariah said. "I searched for Sahra but I never found her."

  "What's he talking about?" asked Declan.

  "I went from village to village, Mishmish," he said in a failing voice. "I asked for her ... but she vanished. It was not my destiny to find her."

  "Don't talk, Zakki," Jasmine said, tears rising in her eyes. "We are going to make you well."

  But he smiled and shook his head. "Mishmish ..." he said, with a sigh that rattled in his chest. "After all these years, here you are. Praise His name, the Almighty granted me my final prayer that I might see you before I joined Him."

  "Yes," she said, "praise His name. But, Zakki, I can't believe this! What are you doing here? How did you come so far from home?"

  He gazed at her with unfocused eyes. "Do you remember, Mishmish ... the fountain in the garden?"

  "I remember it. Please save your strength."

  "I need no strength for where I am going. Mishmish, have you seen the family since ..." He suddenly grimaced. "Since Father sent you away? I was in such despair, Mishmish, after you left."

  Her tears fell onto his hands. "Don't talk, Zakki. We're going to take care of you."

  "God is with you, Yasmina. I can see His hand upon your shoulder. It rests there very lightly, but it is there."

  "Oh, Zakki," she sobbed. "I can't believe I've found you. How awful it must have been for you, being alone like this."

  "God was with me ..." He heaved another sigh.

  Declan said., "We have to move him now or it will be too late."

  "Mishmish ... the pain is going away."

  "I gave you something for it."

  "Bless you for that, sister of my heart," he said. Then he looked at Declan and said, "But you are in pain, my friend. I can see it in the aura surrounding you."

  "Don't talk now, Abu, save your strength."

  But Zachariah reached for Declan's hand and taking it, said, "Yes, you are in pain." He searched Declan's face, and seemed to read something there. He slowly shook his head. "You are no
t to blame. It wasn't your fault."

  "What?"

  "She says she is at peace, and she wants you to be at peace also."

  Declan stared at him for a moment, then shot to his feet.

  Zachariah turned to Jasmine. "Let me go to God now. It is my hour." He raised a hand and touched the golden hair that, freed from its turban, spilled over her shoulder. "God has brought you home, Mishmish. Your days of wandering in strange lands are over." Then he smiled and said, "Tell Tahia that I love her and will await her in paradise."

  He closed his eyes and died.

  Jasmine held him in her arms and, rocking his lifeless body, murmured, "In the name of God the Compassionate, the Merciful. There is no god but God, and Mohammed is His Messenger."

  She held him for a long time, sitting in the desert silence as night shadows crept into the sanctuary, and a lone jackal howled in the surrounding hills. Hadj Tayeb wept openly. Finally Declan said, "We have to bury him, Jasmine."

  But she said, "My mother wrote to me a long time ago and told me that Zachariah had had a mystical experience in the Sinai, during the Six-Day War. He died, she said, he actually died on the battlefield, and then he came back to life. She said he was different after that. He claimed to have seen paradise. He became very religious and Umma said he was chosen by God. And then he went in search of Sahra, our cook, although I don't know why."

  "Jasmine," Declan said, "it's getting dark out. We have to bury him. Go and sit in the Land Cruiser with Tayeb. I will dig the grave."

  "No. It's my duty to bury my brother. I want to be the one to lay him in the ground."

  Night had fallen by the time they heaped stones on the grave so that scavengers wouldn't steal the body, and Jasmine had scratched the name of Allah into the rock that covered Zachariah's head. Hadj Tayeb ran his sleeve under his nose and said, "Praise God, Sayyida, your brother will rest in two heavens, for this place is also sacred to the ancient gods."

  Jasmine started to cry, and Declan took her into his arms, holding her for a very long time.

  FORTY-TWO

  W

  HEN AMIRA EMERGED FROM THE CAR, EVERYONE FELL INTO a shocked silence.

  The noisy Rasheed clan had just arrived in a convoy of automobiles and were milling happily about the dock with the rest of the holiday crowd, drinking in the bracing air of the sea and letting the hot sun soak into their bones. Back in Cairo, the khamsins held the city in a pall of hot sand and grit, but here at Port Suez, where the family had come to see Amira off—finally—on her pilgrimage to Mecca, the sun shed its golden blessings from a clear blue sky, and the water of the Gulf of Suez was such a brilliant turquoise that it hurt the eyes.

  But it was Amira who now captured their attention, emerging from the Cadillac into the brilliant sunshine dressed in her pilgrim's robes. And she was such a vision of blinding whiteness that everyone gasped.

  No one could recall having ever seen her in anything but black, and the white flowing robes and gossamer veil, which had lain in her drawer for countless, hope-filled years, had produced a curious transformation. Amira looked strangely young and virginal, as if the white had purified her years and bleached out all age and infirmity. She seemed to walk with a lighter step, her joints free from pain and stiffness, as if the robes were magic and could somehow bring back youth.

  But it wasn't the traditional garments that had transformed Amira, it was the knowledge that she was going to holy Mecca at last, to the birthplace of the Prophet, where, today and for the past fourteen hundred years, only Believers were permitted to enter. She had spent the past weeks in prayer and fasting in order to enter Ihram, the state of purity, removing all makeup and jewelry, all symbols of her earthly and secular life, clearing all mortal thoughts from her mind in order to concentrate solely upon God.

  As Ibrahim assisted his mother toward Hadj Terminal, where ferries waited to take pilgrims down the Red Sea to the western coast of Saudi Arabia, the Rasheeds joined the throng of other embarking passengers and their families and merrily escorted Umma to the boat. They were all present except Nefissa, who had twisted her ankle and had had to remain in Cairo, and her grandson Mohammed, who had stayed to take care of her and keep her company. But Nefissa's daughter Tahia was there, holding the sticky hands of two little nieces.

  Tahia, who had just turned forty-three, looked with pride at her daughter, Asmahan, whose birthday was tomorrow: she was going to be twenty-one and already she was pregnant with her second child. Tahia then looked over at Zeinab, who was also going to be twenty-one soon, but there were no prospects of marriage or babies for Camelia's daughter. Still, God worked His wondrous miracles. Hadn't the family once been told that Camelia herself would never be able to bear children because of the infection she had had as a teenager? And yet look at her son, Najib, a fine dark-haired, amber-eyed little boy of six. So who was to say what fate was written for Zeinab in God's book? Belief in God's compassion and mercy was what made life bearable, otherwise how could one survive? How many times had Tahia herself been tempted to leave her family and go off in search of Zachariah? But trust in God sustained her. When Zakki had fulfilled God's purpose, he would return. And they would be free at last to love and to marry.

  Ibrahim's wife Huda walked behind Tahia with their five children— pretty girls with the distinctive Rasheed leaf-eyes, ranging from fourteen years to seven, and the center of Huda's universe. Ever since Ibrahim had rescued her from a life of drudgery, employing her as a nurse in his office and then taking care of her sandwich-seller father and lazy brothers, she had devoted herself to the producing and nurturing of these angels. She hadn't minded when Ibrahim had brought home a second wife, quiet little Atiya, because it had released Huda from the tedious bedroom duty. If anyone had asked, Huda would have said that she enjoyed lovemaking with Ibrahim, but in her heart she detested the act, and had suffered it only to produce children. Although she had hinted at times to Ibrahim that a rest from sex might be healthy, he had kept at it with prodigious determination. Especially as he had neared his seventieth birthday and still had no son as proof of his virility. Well, that was Atiya's burden now, and she was welcome to it.

  As Ibrahim helped his mother into the noisy terminal, he looked over at Atiya, whose summer coat was pressed against her body by the wind, revealing the generous swell of her abdomen. She just had to give him a son. Seven daughters—nine, counting the little one that died in the summer of 1952, and the one Alice miscarried in 1963. But he drew comfort from the knowledge that God is merciful. Having no son was more punishment than any man deserved. Was his father, Ali, still watching from paradise, still waiting for the grandson from his son? What did years mean to a soul in heaven? Perhaps a lifetime seemed but a wink, and so Ali's impatience and disapproval of Ibrahim had not diminished. But now there was that promising mound beneath Atiya's coat.

  As they followed the family into the terminal, Dahiba leaned on Hakim for support. Although Ibrahim had reported that they had been able to get all of the cancer during surgery, she had nonetheless been put on chemotherapy and radiation, which weakened her. But if Dahiba's physical strength was sapped, her spirit remained strong. These past four weeks had injected new meaning, new determination into her life, and into her husband's as well. For Hakim and Dahiba, life was going to go on even though the future lay behind a veil. They had accepted God's will, and would submit to His higher judgment; in the meantime, however, having tasted their own mortality and knowing that every person's hours were numbered, they had decided to dedicate their remaining days to leaving behind a significant legacy. For Hakim, it was to make the most important film of his career, a movie which, although not yet finished, was already creating a stir in Cairo, in that it dealt frankly and realistically with the true story of a woman who had been so profoundly brutalized by her husband, and then by a legal system that condoned his monstrous behavior, that she had been driven to murder. Hakim had no doubt that the film would be banned in Egypt, but he envisioned female audiences in the res
t of the world cheering his heroine when she first fired the gun at the husband's groin, and then at his heart. Dahiba's project had been to submit once again the manuscript of a novel she had written ten years ago but which had been rejected. Bahithat Al-Badiyya (Seeker in the Desert) had been dismissed by publishers as autobiographical, a tool commonly used to belittle a woman's literary accomplishment in that it meant she had only one story, her own, to tell. But the manuscript had finally been bought, and, in President Mubarak's more liberal climate, was to be published in Egypt, and therefore throughout the Arab world. And so, despite her pain and weakness, Dahiba had come to Umma's seeing-off in high spirits.

  But the family kept an eye on Dahiba. Although Camelia pretended to be enjoying the fresh sea air, the fabulous expanse of brilliant water, the tankers and cruise ships gliding past a backdrop of mauve coastline that was Sinai, she was worried about her aunt. Camelia knew the strain the chemotherapy was putting on her, and that the yellow scarf on Dahiba's head was meant to hide hair that had been lost through radiation. It was for these reasons that Camelia had come up with her wonderful surprise, a conspiracy the whole family was aware of, except for Dahiba and Hakim; and she trusted everyone to keep quiet. If there was one thing she could count on, it was her family's skill at keeping a secret.

  The time came to say good-bye. As other pilgrims made their way onto the ferryboat, with families and friends seeing them off, Zeinab and two female cousins in their twenties took their places next to Amira. They, too, were dressed all in white, because they were also going to Arabia on the pilgrimage.

  Amira embraced Dahiba and then Hakim, saying, "I go to Mecca to pray for my daughter's recovery. God is compassionate." And when she hugged Camelia, Amira murmured, "Do not worry, we will be back in time, inshallah," and gave her a conspiratorial wink.