Carnival (21 page)

RAIN

I LEFT MY
lantern in the trunk and drove through the town of celebration. I looked for a clown, hoping to recognize Otto among the dancing crowds. There is no better place for an exile to hide, I reasoned, than among a horde of humans in masks re-enacting the periodic cycles of life and death.

And it rained and the city’s garments danced under the rain. I left my window open as I drove. I smoked in defiance of the signs in my own car, and the water ran down the side of my face. I parked my boat a small distance from my home and walked under the deluge. I stopped and laughed at the memory of Bunzy the clown, who in every performance was showered with water from the elephant’s trunk. I wanted to peek again, from inside the tent and behind the curtain of the dressing room, at the laughter of other kids, the covering of faces with hands, the uproar of the crowd. It rained and I stood like a sad-faced clown waiting for the applause. I waited for the elephant to come and lift me up onto her back so I could stand there and tell every soul that the clown who lit the cannons was innocent, lost, distracted by the circle shape of the world, by the gestures of ancient monkeys and the dangerous swinging of women and men and their animal-like acts; that his intention was never to step on the elephant’s feet, never to sing in such a horrible voice, never to wobble in clothing that was not his own, shoes that could never be tied, flowers that spat in the crowd’s face. His real intention, ladies and gentlemen, was to bring the audience to their senses, let them realize that soon all would be coming to an end, and that all shall disappear to no return.

The rain fell and seeped into my clothing and passed through me, and I stood watching the currents of water convulsing on the peripheries of sidewalks and fleeing to nowhere. I saw an umbrella floating, and I saw a woman rushing towards me, balancing a stick of impermeable colours in the fist of her hand, to shelter me from the elephant’s waterfalls. I laughed. She covered me with her umbrella and put her arms around me and said, What are you doing, Fly? Come, let’s go inside. All seemed like a silent rehearsal without applause.

We walked back. Her arm around my shoulder felt warm, and her scent under the water brought water to my eyes. I stood in the entrance of the building and I said to her, We are capable of harm.

Why don’t you come upstairs? Zainab said. Come, Fly, come with me.

I walked, and the wetness in my shoes made me want to leap, jump, and splash the puddles like a skipping child.

Where are your keys, Fly? The keys, she repeated, practically having to shout in my face.

Somehow I found my keys and I opened the door to my apartment. Zainab followed me in. She started to undo my clothes. She ran to the bathroom, found a towel, dried my hair, wrapped my head in it, and led me to bed. I felt exhausted and weak, and the ceiling and my walls of books spun at an unimaginable speed and I must have passed out.

SALT

THE NEXT MORNING,
Zainab knocked at my door. She wanted to know how I was feeling. Now that she had seen me living inside my library, she was intrigued to come again.

I made her tea and she seemed overwhelmed by the volume of volumes and books. All I hoped was that none of the mice would stroll between her feet and scare her into leaving again.

Fly, Zainab said, you should see a doctor. I mean, someone you can talk to. You were not all there last night, if you know what I mean. You thought that I was someone else. Well, many someones. You had, I think, what could be described as an episode . . .

And then, suddenly, Zainab switched topics and asked me about the books. I proceeded to explain that my system of classification was very different from the one used in the place where she worked. My system, I informed her, was more personal and slid along an impressionistic scale.

She smiled and said, I am intrigued, Fly. Go on.

Well, well, I rejoiced, finally I have got your interest. Who knew?

You always had my interest, Fly, but I was never interested . . .

Nuances . . . indeed, nuance is the mark of a great mind . . . so, fiction books, let’s say, I began. These are arranged based on a subjective impression of the book and its main characters’ lives. Dead protagonists take priority over triumphant, happy-ending characters but are surpassed by books with open endings, books that don’t have grand moral conclusions. Novels with open endings I consider to be of a higher rank; hence they are located before novels with happy endings, which I often call religious, or “resurrection,” endings. That is why they tend to be conveniently located on the bottom shelves or facing my bathroom door over here . . . As for historical novels, they are organized based on the name of the winner of the first battle that appears in the book. For instance,
War and Peace
will be found in the N section, N in reference to Napoleon, of course. Much of the other war literature, unfortunately, tends to be filed under H, for the likes of the Carthaginian commander Hannibal and other delusional elephant herders and failed artists.

Seeing that I still had Zainab’s attention, I began to explain the most mysterious layer of my classification system, that is, how to arrange the crime novels. These clueless victims are arranged according to my first attempt at guessing the killer. Since I always suspect Winston the butler, the W section might be better placed at the beginning of the shelves . . .

But let us move on to more serious things. Dearest Zainab, let me confess to you that the most the privileged position of them all is saved for the misanthropic writers . . . for instance, the writer and dramatist Bernhard,
l’enfant terrible
of Austria, is found on a golden shelf with his fellow literary radicals, writers of conscience, revolutionaries, debauchers, and liberators . . . these kinds of writers deserve the utmost respect, though in their lifetimes they are often subjected to neglect or contempt. For instance, and to give you an example that might interest you or might not, most of the Arab writers in my collection, such as Munif, who wrote the magnificent
Cities of Salt
, can be found here under a subsection called “Parisian cafés.” This section comprises the works of exiled writers who had to leave their motherlands for France and lingered in Parisian cafés for the rest of their lives, smoking and complaining about both cultures, the French and their own. They are the true writers, because they took a stand against their own governments until their American cigarettes stained their teeth yellow and led them to shun laughter and smiles, out of embarrassment or maybe depression, and so they spent the rest of their days in a chronic state of solitary poetic existence. Please follow me, right this way, and watch your head. Here, if you look up above the toilet, you will find the feel-good apolitical literature. The main function of these complacent pages is to act as a sponge to absorb all the sticky humidity that results from my occasional showers and my daily . . . well, not to get too graphic . . . Then there is this lot. As you might well notice, they are positioned next to the window. These, if I may introduce them, are the escapist self-help books that I occasionally rescue from the back seat of my car. Naturally, their position here is in accordance with every comedy and slapstick movie that involves the escape of a naked lover through a bathroom window.

Fly, Zainab said, when and how did you amass these books?

Well, dearest Zainab, I thought you’d never ask. Allow me to explain. You see, when the bearded lady of the circus, who raised me after my mother’s death, collapsed one day on the floor of our small apartment, I lifted her up and went all over town looking for a doctor. None of those pious souls would come to our house; none wanted to touch the freak woman with a long beard, a penis, and sinful breasts, and we couldn’t afford the fees that might have changed their minds. The lady refused to go to the state hospital because, she said, we should all end in dignity. I was sixteen by then, and I was known all over town as the son of the freak. I carried the bearded lady to the poorest neighbourhood and there, finally, I found a doctor who would help us. He was extremely well-read, and one day, when we were talking about books, he gave me a Baldwin novel to read (I still have it: on the first golden shelf from the left, above all the others . . .
Giovanni’s Room
, there it is).

That good doctor took care of the bearded lady for free. She had been sick for years, and I’d left school and worked up in the hills and down in the streets until one day I landed a job as a delivery boy. I delivered food all over town. I peeked into houses with crosses hanging above televisions and on the kitchen walls alongside pots and pans. I watched workingmen rejoice over the hamburger in the box, the fries in the bag, and the soda in the bundle of ice. Until, one day, I met the professor, who ordered everything without meat but with a lot of salt. I would knock at his door and I would wait for him to open up. He was always distracted by things other than consumption, and confused by the counting of coins. And each time he would say the exact same thing: Oh, you’re already here, let me put my book down and bring you the change, I think I left it . . . And the door would close and I would wait again, and sometimes I would have to ring the bell to remind him that I was still standing there.

But once he opened the door and, without looking at me, he invited me in, ushering me to the basement, saying, The fuse box is this way. And I stood in the middle of his house, surrounded by a galaxy of books. I told him that I would not be able to fix his fuse box and reminded him that one could also eat in the dark.

Indeed, he said, smiling, there is light to be found in the darkest places. Have you eaten? he asked me.

No.

Well then, join me.

And I did. And we became friends. I would bring him food and we would talk about life, the stars, minerals, and books. His real interest was in history and literature, but he was well versed in astrology and cosmology as well. His two favourite pastimes were to read and to search for wandering planets. Such planets are known as planemos, he informed me once while we ate and talked. They are exiled bundles of matter that wander the universe aimlessly. These objects, he said, have no orbits and no host stars to orbit around. Aimless, he said, wanderers, lost. But they get to know more and reach farther places.

But then, after we became friends and because of his poor vision, whoever knocked at his door was invited in for food and called by the name of Fly. First it was an electrician who accepted the offer of some leftovers, then a taxi driver came and ate all the professor’s green jelly beans, and then a series of hobo intellectuals started to come and help themselves to things in the fridge and, if provided, a few glasses of wine. The only objection raised by all these beneficiaries was to being called Fly. You invited us, a hobo was heard saying to the professor, no need for insults and name-calling.

Many years later the absent-minded professor said to me, Fly, I have only three months to live. I shall give all my papers and personal correspondence to the university archives, but I want you to have my books.

And so it was. For weeks I carried his books back to my place. The professor who, incidentally, was named Alberto Manuel, told me that he’d always hoped that one day he would die a glorious and poetic death, in the same manner as a ninth-century Arab philosopher by the name of Al-Jahiz, who, like himself, had amassed a huge library. One day a section of the library fell on his head and killed him.

But the important question remains, my dearest Fly, which is: which section fell on his head? And in what manner was his library arranged?

All libraries must submit to a certain order, I answered.

Indeed, agreed the professor, or all will be lost. The fall of nations and empires begins with the fall of libraries.

At the professor’s funeral I walked with many of his students and colleagues. They all gave speeches about the professor’s life, his accomplishments, and his love for books, learning, and life. Some recited poems and even songs. A blond man stood up and said: I shall read a passage from the professor’s favourite poet, Abū al-
ʿ
Alā
ʾ
al-Ma
ʿ
arrī. Forgive me for mispronouncing the poet’s name, the blond man added, before reading a passage that went like this:

We laugh, but inept is our laughter;

We should weep and weep sore,

Who are shattered like glass, and thereafter

Remoulded no more.

I carried one of the books from the professor’s library,
The History of Salt
, and when my turn came to say a few words, I read a passage on the use of salt in the time of the pharaohs, in the mummification of loved ones. My selection was pedantic, but I knew that the professor’s love of salt justified my choice. Salt was never taxed by the Ottoman Empire, I read, and the word
tooz
, though it is no longer used in the modern Turkish dialect, survives in the language of a few inhabitants of the Levant now, long after the Empire’s retreat from the region. What vanishes from history and what remains, I concluded, is a mystery.

And since then, my dearest Zainab, I’ve lived with a large collection of books.

Fly, Zainab said, and she looked at me with tears in her eyes. That is wonderful. Then she extended her hands to my face and said, Fly, I can’t take care of you. You were not well last night. You should seek help. You should see someone . . .

FOG

THE NEXT DAY,
as I lay in bed under a fog of lassitude, the thought of the killing consumed me and I wondered where Otto could have gone.

To distract myself, I debated whether to rearrange the history section of my library based on the letter S, to give priority to the erotic over the monumental. Just then I heard the Romanian and the doctor shaking their bed to the tune of “The Blue Danube” so I quickly got up and waltzed my way across the hall. I knocked and knocked until finally the Romanian came and opened the door a crack.