Death and the Dervish (Writings From An Unbound Europe) (42 page)

He smiled. Not quite victoriously, but not faintheartedly, either:

“Well, not exactly everything ended well. The villagers welcomed the help for the children. They began to drink, and drank up her money and then even their own. Their wives felt that as well, because their drunken peasants’ hands became harder and quicker to strike, and so the village women cursed the widow. And the village men cursed her as well, because she’d taken the children from the cattle and work in the fields. The children rarely went to the mekteb, and the teacher wasn’t one of the best, so they barely learned anything. And what they did learn they’d forget after a year or two, so that everyone in the village asked: What kind of school is this? You work your butt off studying, and forget everything in a year. The widow had lived for twenty years waiting for death, and died in the spring three years after we met, waiting for me in the wind and sleet, because I was held up on my trip and had to stay longer than I planned.”

“So everything turned out badly?”

“No. Why? She died waiting for a friend of her son, don’t you understand? Full of pretty words, eager to speak about her love; she wasn’t thinking of death. The villagers ended up where they began, without liquor or assistance, since her heirs divided the estate. And there were only nice memories of the widow in the village; everything else was forgotten. There remained a story: in this house there once lived a strange and good woman. No one, of course, is the better for it, but it’s nice.”

I was disturbed by that story: it was harsh and unusual, like life, and elusive, like life. And by Hassan’s scornful acceptance, or calm rejection of the painful swirling of life, to which man must adapt if he is not to go crazy.

I laughed, to alleviate any possible bitterness, and any awkwardness in his moral: “Stick to something, for God’s sake, define who you are, find some solid ground. You’re unsure in everything you do.”

“You’re right, I’m unsure in many things. Is that bad?”

“It isn’t good.”

“So, it’s not good, and it’s not bad, either. And to be sure is good. Can it also be bad?”

“I don’t understand.”

“Is there anything you’re completely sure about?”

“I’m sure that God exists.”

“But you see, even those who don’t believe in God are also sure. And it might be better if they weren’t.”

“Yes. But what then?”

“Nothing.”

But I already regretted that I had asked, without noticing the trap of his treacherously shrewd logic. What a clever and dangerous idea that was! And he had led me to it playfully.

He was well versed in his uncertainty.

I was not bothered because he was like that. Nothing about him bothered me anymore. I had come to love him so much that I admitted that he was right even when we disagreed. He was dear to me, even when I thought he was wrong.

A single day without him seemed empty and long to me. I ripened in his shadow peacefully.

His father was waiting, without fear, for everything that might befall him, obsessed with his newly revived love.

For the two of us Hassan was the most important man in the world.

That was why I was saddened to hear that he was going away.

I went to his house. I had not seen him for a whole day and night. He was playing backgammon with his father, sitting beside his bed.

The old man was getting angry, throwing the dice on the black and white triangles:

“Ugh, curse you, just look at how you roll! Fazli,” he complained to the servant, “it seems I’m not having any luck.”

“Did you blow on the dice, Aga?”

“I did, but it didn’t help. Is Zeyna here? If she could only put them between her breasts for a bit.”

“How shameful, father!”

“What can I do that’s shameful anymore? Is it shameful, Fazli?”

“No, Aga. God forbid.”

“Father, it’d be better to rub them against the dervish’s sleeve.”

“Really? You won’t mind, Ahmed-effendi? By God, it helps.”

“I’m glad you’ve come,” said Hassan to me, laughing.

“I haven’t seen you since yesterday.”

“Wait with that conversation,” said the old man grumpily, “until I win. My luck is picking up.”

“My father has recovered.”

“Do you mean to say I’m in a bad mood?”

He really did win, and was tired and beaming with happiness. He resembled a child. He resembled Hassan.

“I’m going away, to Dubrovnik,” Hassan informed me, smiling at his father as if he had done something wrong.

“Why are you going?”

“On business. My friends are going, too, so we’ll go together.”

“That Catholic woman is going, so he’ll go, too. And he’s just making up the part about business.”

“I’m not making it up.”

“You are. If it were because of business, I could talk you out of it. But I can’t because of her; she’s more important.”

“My father is imagining all sorts of things.”

“Am I? If I’ve grown old, I haven’t forgotten everything. And if I can’t figure out some things, that’s another matter.”

“Is there really anything you can’t figure out?”

"There is.”

The old man was speaking to me, as if he were angry at Hassan.

“There is. I can’t figure out why he’s going on a trip with
the woman and her husband together. Who’s the fool here? My son or that Catholic man?”

“Or both,” Hassan said with a laugh, not offended in the least. “It seems you don’t acknowledge friendship.”

“Friendship? With women? My thirty-year-old child, where have you been living? Only pederasts can be friends with women.”

I intervened in this awkward conversation, which only made Hassan laugh:

“Maybe he’s friends with her husband.”

“Ahmed-effendi, we can’t hold it against you—you can’t know about these things. With them a husband always accepts his wife’s friends, never the other way around.”

“Father, you’ll have an attack of asthma.”

“Unfortunately for you I won’t. It’s a clear day today, and the air is fresh. You can’t scare me. I told him: if you don’t care about her, don’t waste your time; if she doesn’t want you, find another. If you love her and if she loves you, take her away from him.”

“With my father everything is simple.”

“And why is he going with them? What the hell is he going to do with them? Who knows? All I know is that he’s taking armed men with him, so his friends won’t be attacked by highwaymen. But can’t he himself be attacked by highwaymen? And with me everything is simple! It’s simple with you, my wayward son: you don’t understand anything.”

“How true is what you’ve just said, father! From time immemorial sons have been less reasonable than fathers, and so reason should have completely disappeared. But luckily, sons become reasonable as soon as they become fathers.”

“Will you ever become reasonable?”

“Father, sons are a bother.”

“Don’t mock me, I know. How long will you be away?”

“Fifteen days or so.”

“Why so long, my unfortunate son? Do you know how long fifteen days is?”

“Maybe even longer.”

“Fine, go. If you don’t care, neither do I. In fifteen days you might have to come to my grave. No matter, go.”

“You told me that you’re feeling better.”

“At my age better and worse stand side by side and alternate, like day and night. Even a candle is brighter when it’s burning out.”

“Do you want me to stay then?”

“To stay? First, you’re lying. Second, I’d pay dearly if you did stay. It’s too late now, go. Don’t stay away any longer. Fifteen days, it’s a lot for me and enough for you. And take more men; I’ll pay for them. I’ll feel better if I know you’re safe.”

“Sheikh-Ahmed will come visit you while I’m gone.”

“The best gift that God could give you is this good and sensible man. But it’s not bad for him to take a little rest from you. And for the next fifteen days we won’t say a single word about you.”

And we spent the entire fifteen days talking about him.

His departure left both of us with a feeling of emptiness. We made up for it with his name. It was harder for the old man because he regretted every day that he lost his newly regained son, who had chased away his thoughts of death. His nagging was love, grumpy and passionate, but it was also a turning away from the approaching shadow. A black bird was circling above him. Now he knew it, and was afraid. Had he felt better before, without love?

I was also sorry about his departure, because he had accustomed me to his being around, and I really needed him now.

At that time my life was divided into what had already happened and what was going to happen, which was unknown to me. I was lying in wait, like a hunter, alert and patient; but I was not sure that someone else was not also lying in wait for me, that I would not be caught as well. Having a friend beside me would have soothed my shudders at the silent steps that fate was sending me. I was horrified
by the feeling that darkness and mystery were behind everything I could not see, a mystery that would be revealed to me. But I was also quietly jubilant, because what I had been waiting for was going to happen, because I had been chosen to carry out a will stronger than my own. Yet I was not only a tool or someone else’s hand, and I was not a stone or a tree. I was a man, and sometimes I feared that my soul could be weaker than my desires, or that my swollen hatred might tear me apart, like a ripe seed tears the membrane in which it grows. If Hassan had been there I could have waited calmly; if Hassan had been there I could have calmly matured into action, so that the green banner of the faith would be unfurled above the kasaba, and not a shroud over me.

We waited for the return of the only man we cared about. Ali-aga did not hide that he was restless. He began to scold his son. His old, aggressive nobility had apparently not slackened, but this awkwardly concealed tenderness soon turned into a helpless lament.

“To hell with him and that Dalmatian woman. She means more to him than his own father. And if she were only good-looking—she’s just skin and bones! But let him be, let her drag him all over the wide world with those shifty eyes of hers, if he’s that stupid. Fifteen days, my unfortunate son! Rainstorms might move in, cold weather might hit them, highwaymen might attack them. It’s no use talking to a fool. Father, you just sit over there in your corner, leaning against the wall like a chibouk, and wait. Let your heart skip a few beats every time the door opens or someone comes up the stairs a little quicker, be jarred out of your sleep by black dreams and bad feelings. It’ll cost me a year of my life even if I survive. And he promised he wouldn’t go anywhere; he promised but couldn’t keep his word. Have a son to your own detriment, to make things harder for yourself. Oh, forgive me, God, for talking nonsense.”

Fazli offered to invite the old man’s friends for a game of backgammon or to talk. He wanted to take the stallion out
in the yard, under the windows, and asked Ali-aga if he wanted him to go to the mountains for spring water, which cleanses and strengthens the blood. The old man refused everything, and only requested that he put his pillows on the divan by the window, and kept looking at the gates, as if Hassan might come back earlier. Or maybe it was easier for him to imagine his return that way.

How had he spent so many years without his son? I wondered, surprised by this love and grief at their parting. And I remembered Hassan’s strange explanation, that it was precisely their stubborn feud that justified that love and made it what it was. If it had existed forever and always, it would have worn itself out and slackened. But had there not been any desire for it, either, it would have withered away. I was not moved by this love in the beginning; I was cool toward it, even ill-disposed. What do you want, old man? I asked myself angrily. Does the whole world have to see this love of yours? And is showing it as you do really so difficult? It’s easier to sigh and whine than to keep silent. What is your love, anyway? Senile tenderness, fear of death, the desire to keep your lineage alive, selfishness that feeds on someone else’s strength, the authority of parental blood. And why? For the pleasure of petty tyranny and helpless appeals for his son’s arms when everything else is gone.

But there was no use trying to defend myself with attacks and disdain. That love stunned me. I would catch myself thinking about my own father and trying to bring him closer to myself. Would it have been possible for me to await his words with joy, to be worried about his illnesses, to renounce everything that was dear to me for him? Father, I whispered, growing accustomed to my role, trying to wring all the pain of life from myself, to induce the need for love with compassion; father, papa. But I could not find any other words. There was no tenderness between us. Maybe I was even impoverished because of this: the attachment to another is nevertheless the sunny side of human nature.
Maybe I embraced Hassan’s friendship with such eagerness only to satisfy that human need, stronger than reason.

At first the old man received me with suspicion. He tried to make small talk, but he choked on unnecessary words; he was not able to lie. I was surprised how much Hassan resembled him, only he was polished, refined, softened.

“You’re a strange man,” he told me. “You don’t say very much, you’re secretive.”

I hurried to explain that it was probably an inborn trait that I had developed further in my order. And if I appeared strange, it was probably a consequence of everything that had happened to me.

“You’re hiding behind words. I can’t see what’s inside you. So tragedy has struck you. They couldn’t have hit you any harder, but I didn’t hear a word of either condemnation or grief from you. And you were talking about your own brother.”

“What happened is too hard for me to speak about. I can only tell it to someone who’s like a brother to me.”

“Have you found someone like that?”

“Yes.”

“Sorry, I’m not asking for myself.”

“I know. We’re both attached to him; you more closely, by blood and fatherhood, I by friendship, which is stronger than anything a man can feel without sin.”

Had it been necessary, I could have tricked him easily, because his son’s name lulled his cunning and experienced caution to sleep. But I had no need to, that was really how I thought. As for my solemn words, I spoke them for the old man, to make things nicer and to soothe his fears of people who hide themselves.