by Tayeb Salih
‘The government which gave in to you was a weak one,’ they said, ‘but the position has now changed.’
To cut a long story short, we took them by the scruffs of their necks, hurled them into the water, and went off to our work. It wasn’t more than a week later when a group of soldiers came along commanded by the small-headed official with the large hat, shouting, ‘Arrest that man, and that one, and that one,’ until they’d taken off twenty of us, I among them. We spent a month in prison. Then one day the very soldiers who had put us there opened the prison gates. We asked them what it was all about but no one said anything. Outside the prison we found a great gathering of people; no sooner had we been spotted than there were shouts and cheering and we were embraced by some cleanly-dressed people, heavily scented and with gold watches gleaming on their wrists. They carried us off in a great procession, back to our own people. There we found an unbelievably immense gathering of people, carts, horses, and camels. We said to each other, ‘The din and flurry of the capital has caught up with us.’ They made us twenty men stand in a row and the people passed along it shaking us by the hand: the Prime Minister — the President of the Parliament — the President of the Senate — the member for such and such constituency — the member for such and such other constituency.
We looked at each other without understanding a thing of what was going on around us except that our arms were aching with all the handshakes we had been receiving from those Presidents and Members of Parliament.
Then they took us off in a great mass to the place where the doum tree and the tomb stand. The Prime Minister laid the foundation stone for the monument you’ve seen, and for the dome you’ve seen, and for the railing you’ve seen. Like a tornado blowing up for a while and then passing over, so that mighty host disappeared as suddenly as it had come without spending a night in the village — no doubt because of the horseflies which, that particular year, were as large and fat and buzzed and whirred as much as during the year the preacher came to us.
One of those strangers who were occasionally cast upon us in the village later told us the story of all this fuss and bother.
‘The people,’ he said, ‘hadn’t been happy about this government since it had come to power, for they knew that it had got there by bribing a number of the Members of Parliament. They therefore bided their time and waited for the right opportunities to present themselves, while the opposition looked around for something to spark things off. When the doum tree incident occurred and they marched you all off and slung you into prison, the newspapers took this up and the leader of the government which had resigned made a fiery speech in Parliament in which he said:
‘To such tyranny has this government come that it has begun to interfere in the beliefs of the people, in those holy things held most sacred by them.’ Then, taking a most imposing stance and in a voice choked with emotion, he said: ‘Ask our worthy Prime Minister about the doum tree of Wad Hamid. Ask him how it was that he permitted himself to send his troops and henchmen to desecrate that pure and holy place!’
‘The people took up the cry and throughout the country their hearts responded to the incident of the doum tree as to nothing before. Perhaps the reason is that in every village in this country there is some monument like the doum tree of Wad Hamid which people see in their dreams. After a month of fuss and shouting and inflamed feelings, fifty members of the government were forced to withdraw their support, their constituencies having warned them that unless they did so they would wash their hands of them. And so the government fell, the first government returned to power and the leading paper in the country wrote: “The doum tree of Wad Hamid has become the symbol of the nation’s awakening,” ’
Since that day we have been unaware of the existence of the new government and not one of those great giants of men who visited us has put in an appearance; we thank God that He has spared us the trouble of having to shake them by the hand. Our life returned to what it had been: no water-pump, no agricultural scheme, no stopping-place for the steamer. But we kept our doum tree which casts its shadow over the southern bank in the afternoon and, in the morning, spreads its shadow over the fields and houses right up to the cemetery, with the river flowing below it like some sacred legendary snake. And our village has acquired a marble monument, an iron railing, and a dome with gilded crescents.
When the man had finished what he had to say he looked at me with an enigmatic smile playing at the corners of his mouth like the faint flickerings of a lamp.
‘And when,’ I asked, ‘will they set up the water-pump, and put through the agricultural scheme and the stopping-place for the steamer?’
He lowered his head and paused before answering me, ‘When people go to sleep and don’t see the doum tree in their dreams.’
‘And when will that be?’ I said.
‘I mentioned to you that my son is in the town studying at school,’ he replied. ‘It wasn’t I who put him there; he ran away and went there on his own, and it is my hope that he will stay where he is and not return. When my son’s son passes out of school and the number of young men with souls foreign to our own increases, then perhaps the water-pump will be set up and the agricultural scheme put into being — maybe then the steamer will stop at our village — under the doum tree of Wad Hamid.’
‘And do you think,’ I said to him, ‘that the doum tree will one day be cut down?’ He looked at me for a long while as though wishing to project, through his tired, misty eyes, something which he was incapable of doing by word.
‘There will not be the least necessity for cutting down the doum tree. There is not the slightest reason for the tomb to be removed. What all these people have overlooked is that there’s plenty of room for all these things: the doum tree, the tomb, the water-pump, and the steamer’s stopping-place.’
When he had been silent for a time he gave me a look which I don’t know how to describe, though it stirred within me a feeling of sadness, sadness for some obscure thing which I was unable to define. Then he said: ‘Tomorrow, without doubt, you will be leaving us. When you arrive at your destination, think well of us and judge us not too harshly.’
A Handful of Dates
I must have been very young at the time. While I don’t remember exactly how old I was, I do remember that when people saw me with my grandfather they would pat me on the head and give my cheek a pinch—things they didn’t do to my grandfather. The strange thing was that I never used to go out with my father, rather it was my grandfather who would take me with him wherever he went, except for the mornings when I would go to the mosque to learn the Koran. The mosque, the river and the fields—these were the landmarks in our life. While most of the children of my age grumbled at having to go to the mosque to learn the Koran, I used to love it. The reason was, no doubt, that I was quick at learning by heart and the Sheikh always asked me to stand up and recite the Chapter of the Merciful whenever we had visitors, who would pat me on my head and cheek just as people did when they saw me with my grandfather.
Yes, I used to love the mosque, and I loved the river too. Directly we finished our Koran reading in the morning I would throw down my wooden slate and dart off, quick as a genie, to my mother, hurriedly swallow down my breakfast, and run off for a plunge in the river. When tired of swimming about I would sit on the bank and gaze at the strip of water that wound away eastwards and hid behind a thick wood of acacia trees. I loved to give rein to my imagination and picture to myself a tribe of giants living behind that wood, a people tall and thin with white beards and sharp noses, like my grandfather. Before my grandfather ever replied to my many questions he would rub the tip of his nose with his forefinger; as for his beard, it was soft and luxuriant and as white as cotton-wool—never in my life have I seen anything of a purer whiteness or greater beauty. My grandfather must also have been extremely tall, for I never saw anyone in the whole area address him without having to look up at him, nor did I see him enter a house without having to bend so low that I was put in mind of the way t
he river wound round behind the wood of acacia trees. I loved him and would imagine myself, when I grew to be a man, tall and slender like him, walking along with great strides.
I believe I was his favourite grandchild: no wonder, for my cousins were a stupid bunch and I—so they say—was an intelligent child. I used to know when my grandfather wanted me to laugh, when to be silent; also I would remember the times for his prayers and would bring him his prayer-rug and fill the ewer for his ablutions without his having to ask me. When he had nothing else to do he enjoyed listening to me reciting to him from the Koran in a lilting voice, and I could tell from his face that he was moved.
One day I asked him about our neighbour Masood. I said to my grandfather: ‘I fancy you don’t like our neighbour Masood?’
To which he answered, having rubbed the tip of his nose: ‘He’s an indolent man and I don’t like such people.’
I said to him: ‘What’s an indolent man?’
My grandfather lowered his head for a moment, then looking across at the wide expanse of field, he said: ‘Do you see it stretching out from the edge of the desert up to the Nile bank? A hundred feddans. Do you see all those date palms? And those trees—sant, acacia, and sayal? All this fell into Masood’s lap, was inherited by him from his father.’
Taking advantage of the silence that had descended upon my grandfather, I turned my gaze from him to the vast area defined by his words. ‘I don’t care,’ I told myself, ‘who owns those date palms, those trees or this black, cracked earth—all I know is that it’s the arena for my dreams and my playground.’
My grandfather then continued: ‘Yes, my boy, forty years ago all this belonged to Masood—two-thirds of it is now mine.’
This was news to me for I had imagined that the land had belonged to my grandfather ever since God’s Creation.
‘I didn’t own a single feddan when I first set foot in this village. Masood was then the owner of all these riches. The position has changed now, though, and I think that before Allah calls me to Him I shall have bought the remaining third as well.’
I do not know why it was I felt fear at my grandfather’s words—and pity for our neighbour Masood. How I wished my grandfather wouldn’t do what he’d said! I remembered Masood’s singing, his beautiful voice and powerful laugh that resembled the gurgling of water. My grandfather never used to laugh.
I asked my grandfather why Masood had sold his land.
‘Women,’ and from the way my grandfather pronounced the word I felt that ‘women’ was something terrible. ‘Masood, my boy, was a much-married man. Each time he married he sold me a feddan or two.’ I made the quick calculation that Masood must have married some ninety women. Then I remembered his three wives, his shabby appearance, his lame donkey and its dilapidated saddle, his galabia with the torn sleeves. I had all but rid my mind of the thoughts that jostled in it when I saw the man approaching us, and my grandfather and I exchanged glances.
‘We’ll be harvesting the dates today,’ said Masood. ‘Don’t you want to be there?’
I felt, though, that he did not really want my grandfather to attend. My grandfather, however, jumped to his feet and I saw that his eyes sparkled momentarily with an intense brightness. He pulled me by the hand and we went off to the harvesting of Masood’s dates.
Someone brought my grandfather a stool covered with an ox-hide, while I remained standing. There was a vast number of people there, but though I knew them all, I found myself for some reason, watching Masood: aloof from that great gathering of people he stood as though it were no concern of his, despite the fact that the date palms to be harvested were his own. Sometimes his attention would be caught by the sound of a huge clump of dates crashing down from on high. Once he shouted up at the boy perched on the very summit of the date palm who had begun hacking at a clump with his long, sharp sickle: ‘Be careful you don’t cut the heart of the palm.’
No one paid any attention to what he said and the boy seated at the very summit of the date palm continued, quickly and energetically, to work away at the branch with his sickle till the clump of dates began to drop like something descending from the heavens.
I, however, had begun to think about Masood’s phrase ‘the heart of the palm.’ I pictured the palm tree as something with feeling, something possessed of a heart that throbbed. I remembered Masood’s remark to me when he had once seen me playing about with the branch of a young palm tree: ‘Palm trees, my boy, like humans, experience joy and suffering.’ And I had felt an inward and unreasoned embarrassment.
When I again looked at the expanse of ground stretching before me I saw my young companions swarming like ants around the trunks of the palm trees, gathering up dates and eating most of them. The dates were collected into high mounds. I saw people coming along and weighing them into measuring bins and pouring them into sacks, of which I counted thirty. The crowd of people broke up, except for Hussein the merchant, Mousa the owner of the field next to ours on the east, and two men I’d never seen before.
I heard a low whistling sound and saw that my grandfather had fallen asleep. Then I noticed that Masood had not changed his stance, except that he had placed a stalk in his mouth and was munching at it like someone surfeited with food who doesn’t know what to do with the mouthful he still has.
Suddenly my grandfather woke up, jumped to his feet and walked towards the sacks of dates. He was followed by Hussein the merchant, Mousa the owner of the field next to ours, and the two strangers. I glanced at Masood and saw that he was making his way towards us with extreme slowness, like a man who wants to retreat but whose feet insist on going forward. They formed a circle round the sacks of dates and began examining them, some taking a date or two to eat. My grandfather gave me a fistful, which I began munching. I saw Masood filling the palms of both hands with dates and bringing them up close to his nose, then returning them.
Then I saw them dividing up the sacks between them. Hussein the merchant took ten; each of the strangers took five. Mousa the owner of the field next to ours on the eastern side took five, and my grandfather took five. Understanding nothing, I looked at Masood and saw that his eyes were darting about to left and right like two mice that have lost their way home.
‘You’re still fifty pounds in debt to me,’ said my grandfather to Masood. ‘We’ll talk about it later.’
Hussein called his assistants and they brought along donkeys, the two strangers produced camels, and the sacks of dates were loaded on to them. One of the donkeys let out a braying which set the camels frothing at the mouth and complaining noisily. I felt myself drawing close to Masood, felt my hand stretch out towards him as though I wanted to touch the hem of his garment. I heard him make a noise in his throat like the rasping of a lamb being slaughtered. For some unknown reason, I experienced a sharp sensation of pain in my chest.
I ran off into the distance. Hearing my grandfather call after me, I hesitated a little, then continued on my way. I felt at that moment that I hated him. Quickening my pace, it was as though I carried within me a secret I wanted to rid myself of. I reached the river bank near the bend it made behind the wood of acacia trees. Then, without knowing why, I put my finger into my throat and spewed up the dates I’d eaten.
The Wedding of Zein
‘Have you heard the news? Zein is getting married,’ said Haleema, the seller of milk, to Amna, who had as usual called before sunrise, as she measured her out a piastre’s worth.
The jug all but fell from Amna’s hands and Haleema, profiting by her preoccupation, gave her short measure.
At noon the courtyard of the Intermediate School was quiet and deserted, the students having gone to their classes. From afar there appeared a young boy hurrying along breathlessly, the end of his outer garment tucked under his arm, till he came to a stop in front of the door of ‘the second year,’ the Headmaster’s form.
‘You ass of a boy, what’s made you so late?’
A look of cunning flashed momentarily in Tureifi’s eyes,
‘Sir, have you heard the news?’
‘News about what, you animal of a boy?’
The Headmaster’s anger, however, did not shake the boy’s composure. Checking his laughter, he said: ‘They’re marrying off Zein the day after tomorrow.’
The Headmaster’s lower jaw dropped in astonishment and Tureifi escaped punishment.
And in the market Abdul Samad advanced towards Sheikh Ali’s shop, his face flushed, leaving it in no doubt that he was in an angry frame of mind. There was a debt owing to him from Sheikh Ali, the tobacco dealer, which the latter had put off paying for a whole month. He was determined to have it settled that very day by hook or by crook.
‘Ali, do you really think you’ll do me out of my money, or what is it you’ve got in mind?’
‘Hajj Abdul Samad, just put your trust in God and sit down and have a cup of coffee with us.’
‘To hell with your coffee. Get up and open this safe of yours and give me my money. If you’re determined not to pay, just say so.’
Sheikh Ali spat the quid of tobacco from his mouth.
‘Come along and sit down and I’ll tell you a bit of news.’
‘I’ve not got the time, neither for you nor for your bit of news. I know well enough that you’re trying to fool me and talk me out of my money.’
‘I swear your money’s here safe and sound. Come along and sit down and I’ll tell you the story of Zein’s marriage.’
‘Whose marriage did you say?’
‘Zein’s marriage.’
Abdul Samad seated himself and, placing both hands on top of his head, remainded silent for a while. Sheikh Ali regarded him, elated at the effect he had produced. Eventually Abdul Samad found his tongue.
‘Ah, there’s no god but God and Mohammed is the Prophet of God. By the Prophet himself, Sheikh Ali, what sort of story’s that?’