Beirut Hellfire Society

by Rawi Hage

  Once, I was asleep in his home. He woke me up and asked me to come with him to an apartment down the street. He said there were important men in town, men he loved and wanted to honour. They were workers who had just arrived from the south of Algeria, from his mother’s village. They were illiterate and looking for someone to read the Quran for them before prayers. They had asked him to read, but he was too embarrassed to confess that he couldn’t. So he asked me to do it. I said: But I am a woman.

  He cut my hair, dressed me in baggy clothes and called me Bilal. We went to the apartment. There were five old men sitting on the floor, drinking tea. I greeted them, and Idris introduced me as Bilal and told them I was a good reader. He said that we would sit outside, in the hallway, and read aloud to them. He said there was not enough space in the living room and that I needed to concentrate and that the acoustics in the hallway were more suitable for the reading.

  One of the old men stood up to offer me his chair, but Idris insisted the hallway was best. The men were a bit suspicious, and they must have found it odd, but I moved quickly to the corridor and started to recite in a loud, singing voice, similar to those I had heard in the Eastern churches of my youth.

  I read the sura they requested, I sang it with strength and beauty, and I heard the men’s pious replies. When it was over, I walked to the door as if to smoke a cigarette. Once outside, I ran. I ran to the metro and disappeared from Idris’ life forever. I came back to Beirut where Idris wouldn’t dare to follow me.

  Everyone loves Beirut and everyone is scared of Beirut, Chantal told me. But I misunderstood her, El-Marquis said. Now his face looked older and less celebratory.

  I encouraged her to sexually experience anything and everyone, he continued. But I failed to see that it wasn’t sexuality that was imprisoning her, that sexual defiance wasn’t her problem. It was her identity. She was alienated by a deep resentment of her surroundings, yes. Arab and Muslim culture was a part of her, but she was estranged from it too, and then there was the isolation of the war…Once, before she left me in the little studio, she told me, We no longer belong here, we are mutants, and our only choice is to become even more mutant so that we eventually leave and disappear from this region. We are nothing now but the residue of a defeated, conquered past and we are stubbornly holding on to old creeds, a few archaic rituals and the facade of Western modernity. But fuck the Arabs, she said, contradicting herself. The more I fucked them, the more I surrendered my body to them, the more I resented them and the more they resented me. I hate them, I hate their cigarettes, I hate their jokes, their essentialist chauvinistic religion. I hate the way they want to fuck me and leave me. I hate the way they want to buy me everything even when they can’t afford it…and I hate that they are always asking to marry me when they mean to fuck me, to convert me. I hate the way they admire me, and the way they hate me. I also hate my parents’ obliviousness, their passivity, their surrender, and how they live in their past glories, as if they will rule this place forever, as if they are superior to everyone. And then she closed the door and left.

  Dear Pavlov, one last drink, please, and then I will leave you. This is taking longer than I anticipated.

  Six months ago, on a rainy Beirut winter’s day, Chantal called me and asked me to meet her in the little room where we had reunited over the years. After all these years, she had kept the keys to the door. I raced to the studio under the falling bombs, jubilant to see her again. I rushed up the stairs and opened the door…I saw her body dangling from the ceiling. She had hanged herself in that room with the window, above the bed. I noticed her cigarettes and her glass of wine on the windowsill, still full. Her feet pointed to the book she had left open on the white sheets. For the rest of my days, I will never make sense of it.

  And now, my dear man, I am sick. Sometimes I think that I deserve death by hanging myself. I am no longer sure if I have corrupted youth for my own entertainment or as an attempt to liberate this society from its clutches on our bodies. I guess I tried to liberate my students, but in the process I must have confused some of them…Nevertheless, I hold on to my beliefs and I am more convinced now than ever that this world should be undermined. I do not have the courage to hang myself, so I guess I must still love myself after all. Or maybe I still cling to the conviction that I did the right thing. In any case, repentance will never be a choice for me, regardless of the tragedies I may have caused. I believe that it is through vice alone that we can undermine this world—but with age, one realizes that Nature has perfected indifference and immorality. The world always defeats us. All we can do is mimic it, not undermine it. Or maybe we can refuse it, and convince ourselves that we are constructing or imagining an alternative, like your pious father did. But we in the Society, dear Pavlov, have no illusions, no aspirations to flatter some God. Bodily urges are part of our nature, and we should never think of resisting them. In any case, I am sick…My death is very near and if you agree to take your father’s place and help us, here is what I would like to do. And have no fear, I will send two of our members to facilitate things.

  Pavlov again nodded silently.

  Dear Pavlov, I am very happy that you agree. We will now consider you part of our society.

  These are my wishes: I would like my body to be dressed in a woman’s gown, a long gown that falls below my feet, and for my body to be hanged in the middle of my house. High up, near the ceiling. After my death, the house shall witness one last grand gathering and debauchery. Great acts of licentiousness shall take place without the knowledge or permission of the authorities. But, most importantly, I want my body to hang there while Society members enjoy lavish food and drink, and then dance beneath me and have free and wild encounters—nothing is off-limits. At the end of the party, your role is to complete my wish: I wish to be burned to ashes, placed in a sealed plastic bag, not an urn, and for my dust to be given to Florence. She has agreed to take my remains to Paris on a tour of my favourite cemeteries—Père Lachaise, Montparnasse, Montmartre—and to sprinkle me on the graves of my favourite poets, with a larger portion on Oscar Wilde’s and Rimbaud’s graves. Did I mention that we will pay you handsomely? Of course, Florence’s fat businessman husband does not know of our plan. As a matter of fact, I suggested that she drop a pinch of me in his food, which might cause him either a little indigestion or a good deal of enlightenment, and either case will be fine by me. And now, my dear man, since you have so kindly agreed, I will leave you to attend to your own matters.

  Thank you in advance. My two associates, Hanneh and Manneh, will be in touch concerning various logistics and arrangements.

  With this, El-Marquis turned to leave, then turned back.

  And, oh yes—occasionally, members of the Society or an acquaintance might get in touch with you, dear Pavlov. I’ll refer them to you and you will be paid accordingly. I hope you will enjoy my farewell party. I’ve chosen a truly fantastic dress for the event. I’ve already tried it, and it fits like a glove.

  ANTIQUE DEALER

  Pavlov called the local antique dealer and asked him to pay a visit to the family home. The dealer, who was French, was the husband of a neighbourhood woman named, not surprisingly, Marie (popular in this ancient Christian enclave). Marie had years ago befriended Pavlov’s mother, Josephine, and had regularly visited when Josephine was alive to covertly assess the latest acquisitions from dead loners. In short, Marie was one of those few people who visited the undertakers. Josephine would scrub the floor on her two knees, her palms parallel, before Marie came over. This meek behaviour of his mother in front of a snooty lady married to a Frenchman who claimed to have lived in Nice and Paris made Pavlov sick.

  He recalled how, when he was a kid, his mother would send him to get Marie the brand of cigarettes she preferred. Josephine would then offer Marie cigarettes and coffee, and sweets that she produced from nowhere. These sweets were hidden from the kids, covered in sugar, and in Pavlov’s eyes, coated in treachery and repulsion. Marie, round-ankled Marie, w
ould take one, moaning, Que c’est bon Josephine, t’a fait toi même? His mother would display all the china that his father had collected from the dead, parade the loot of the cadavers and lay it on the table, on the chair, stretching it towards the watchful ceiling.

  Pavlov knew that the Frenchman, Monsieur Daniel, dealt in all kinds of lost and found, including stolen war loot. When Pavlov telephoned, the antique dealer rushed over, pushing through a procession for a dead child who was being drawn down the street in a small white coffin. As Pavlov stood at his window, watching the agony of the trail of mourners, he spotted the dealer. The Frenchman looked frantic, both apologetic and insincere as he crossed through the middle of the crowd, oblivious to the weeping, the beating of chests, the mother’s sorrow and tears. Pavlov saw him sweep a hand across his mouth in anticipation, walking in haste, aiming straight for the entrance to Pavlov’s home. In no time, he was knocking at the door. Pavlov did not bother to change his clothes and comb his hair. Monsieur Daniel was an arriviste, an opportunistic parasite who for many years had tried to buy the unclaimed possessions of the dead from Pavlov’s father. But his father had always refused to sell the relics of the dead for fear they might reclaim them in his dreams.

  Upon entering, the dealer asked Pavlov about a small Persian carpet that his mother, Josephine, had used to beat and dust every fall up on the roof. He confessed to Pavlov that during the carpet-slapping season, his love for good carpets made him take to the roofs and watch the beauty of every carpet’s pattern, every lotus and branch exhaling soil, and every peacock figure coughing up the winter’s filth carried by the shoes on all the visitors to a big house like Pavlov’s. He claimed to have a record of every tapestry and rug that existed in the neighbourhood, in the hope that one day the legacy of every carpet would be honoured for eternity. But the possessive people of this land are attached to their carpets, Monsieur Daniel said, and they will keep them in their families for generations, until the very last one dies. Only death will free these carpets from their oppressors. Carpets move, travel, fly and migrate…but after the parents die, the dealer said, almost in tears, the children of the deceased would rather cut up the carpet and divide it into pieces out of spite during their disagreements over their inheritance. They prefer to each take a cut piece home than to sell it whole to a connoisseur, a lover of art. This happened once! I followed an intact carpet that I loved from one house to another, and I would visit its owner, pretending to be a friend of the family, or a man from outside with news from a distant cousin, just to have the pleasure of a walk upon it. I would even insist on taking off my shoes, even though nobody does that in this neighbourhood! Just so my toes could feel the exquisite stitching. Once, I even faked a heart attack to be closer to the carpet and lay my face on it! To sniff it and brush my cheeks against its threads of magnificent wool.

  But I digress. Do you have anything that you want to sell, monsieur? I buy vases, certainly carpets, gold and silver ancient Phoenician tear cups, Roman busts, Greek vases, Mongols’ archery bows, Islamic manuscripts, Syrian monks’ translations of Aristotle’s work from Syriac to Arabic, monks’ filthy robes, Byzantine mosaics, golden crosses and communion cups silver or gold, precious stones, jewellery, crusaders’ relics. The richness and historical layers of this city are its wealth and downfall. Let me help you liberate your people! Get rid of it all, all these artifacts that contribute to and justify tribal and religious affiliations! All these relics are an emblem of past disputes and contested land. Hand them to an expert outsider and watch how peace will prevail! Bombs shall cease and flowers shall bloom once all these historical artifacts are sold and shipped to France, la Republique! History is a curse, mon ami. My clients love to acquire all these objects and please, do not be fooled, we are not just merchants here, we take what has been buried and we reveal its beauty to the world. Le partage, monsieur! Le partage universel.

  Pavlov escorted Monsieur Daniel into his parents’ bedroom and the dealer half-fainted onto the bed. He rolled his eyes, then rolled himself onto the floor, touching everything and anything he could lay his fingers upon. He offered Pavlov a large sum of money to be free of it all.

  Pavlov agreed on the amount. On one condition, he said.

  I am listening, the dealer said.

  I want your wife, Marie, to come over with the payment, a pack of my favourite cigarettes and a tray of coffee in her hand.

  Bewildered, the Frenchman acquiesced. I will send her in the company of my son.

  No, Pavlov objected. I want her to come alone.

  C’est impossible! She is the same age as your mother, said Monsieur Daniel.

  But Pavlov stood his ground until the Frenchman puffed and gesticulated, and then agreed to send his wife over with an amount that would sustain Pavlov’s ascetic existence for many years to come.

  And I will come back at night with my two sons to pack it all up, monsieur. As I said, my buyers hail from all over the world…You should be proud! he said, and chuckled. This country, this universe, will be a happier place. I believe in sharing…in heritage, the Frenchman declared as he glided towards the door, smelling of old objects with a hint of rust and mould.

  L’heritage appartient à nous tous, he shouted up the stairs as he grabbed an Ottoman vase and made his way out.

  * * *

  That afternoon, Pavlov stood on his balcony and watched Madame Daniel making her way through the mud of the cemetery road with a tray in hand, a pot of coffee and two small cups. The chain of her handbag had slipped from her shoulder and swung from her hand. It must be the burden of the many cigarettes inside it, Pavlov thought.

  Marie knocked, and climbed the stairs. Pavlov opened the door and instructed her to put the coffee on the table. He asked for the cigarettes, and she pulled her purse back onto her shoulder, opened it and slammed the pack down. Then she withdrew a large amount of money, handed it to him and said, The rest my husband and sons will bring tonight. I never liked you, Pavlov. Your mother would be ashamed of the way you treat her friends.

  Pavlov, undeterred, asked her to howl like a dog if she and her husband wished to seal the deal. Marie obliged with two short, feeble barks and ran back down the stairs.

  Pavlov walked to the window, faced his father’s grave and proclaimed: I have sold it all. The dead won’t be needing carpets to walk on, nice landscape paintings to imagine strolling in woods and across prairies, vases to revive cut flowers in, clothes to display on their decomposed bodies.

  * * *

  At midnight, there was a knock at Pavlov’s door. It was the antique dealer and his two sons. The shorter rounder son was holding a candle and his shadow was not thin—it covered the stairwell behind him with the bleak totality of an astronomical eclipse.

  Monsieur, the Frenchman whispered, we have to move in the dark and transport everything quickly. You know how people interfere and inquire in this neighbourhood. They have long noses and are always suspicious…

  He and his sons tiptoed through Pavlov’s home and quietly carried everything away, the thinner elder son, perhaps resentful about his mother’s treatment, eyeing Pavlov with disgust.

  But Monsieur Daniel seemed entirely happy, enthusiastic even, and before leaving he offered Pavlov a bottle of wine that he claimed to have found on one of his trips to the ruins of Baalbek.

  It is a thousand years old, but I want you to have it. Because soon we are returning to France…And as much as we would like to carry it, wine is hard to transport. Some of our goods, he said candidly, will cross the Syrian border. We know people we can trust. Then we shall fly the stock to Corsica and finally Europe. Collectors and museums shall acquire them, date them, catalogue them, dust them off and eventually display them. One day you should come to France. We will give you the tour, le tour de France! he said and his fat younger son laughed quietly and pedalled his hands, one leg up in the air.

  A family joke, the dealer said. Monsieur, je suis le sauveur des valeurs humaines et vous aussi, he added.

 
; The younger son placed his hand on Pavlov’s shoulder and repeated, Et vous aussi.

  Yes, Pavlov said. Now hurry up and take it all. And do not forget the shoes and the clothes.

  The dealer bowed his head. Yes, we will go now and enjoy these splendid oeuvres I have acquired from all the beautiful houses here. As for l’heritage, consider this my gift to humanity!

  Au revoir, the Frenchman said, and his two sons repeated his words, Au revoir, au revoir.

  THE DEATH OF TARIQ THE DOG OWNER

  Pavlov extended his ears to listen to a group of men who were standing under his balcony. They were talking about a local young fighter by the name of Tariq who would soon be buried. This fighter, at the age of seventeen, had joined the militia and, after a battle in a once-fancy hotel downtown that lasted two days, he and five of his friends, having run out of ammunition, threw themselves from the twenty-fourth floor. Their enemies had managed to surround them from the upper and the lower floors. The men on Pavlov’s street claimed that, in fact, the fighters were captured and thrown from the window of the hotel.

  But Pavlov was convinced that Tariq had jumped of his own will. Tariq owned a dog named Rex, and Pavlov used to watch him from the window walking his dog every morning. The dog was fond of bones and graves, and often squeezed between the bars of the locked gate and ran inside the cemetery. Pavlov had often seen the young fighter climb over the stone wall to chase the dog out, and then climb back onto the wall and jump with a sublime drop, arms stretched out, eyes open, hair flowing above his head, until the soles of his shoes landed on firm grass, his knees bent and head held upright with pride and dignity. Oh, how fearless and good-looking, Pavlov had thought. He and I are lovers of heights and admirers of gravity.