The Boy Who The Set Fire and Other Stories (18 page)

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MERICAN WOMAN CAME
from New York to Tangier on a visit. On her arrival, she went to a hotel in the Zoco Chico. After she had stayed there for a month or so, she began to look for a certain Englishman who lived just outside the city. She got his address, took a taxi to his house, and knocked. The Englishman opened the door. She gave him her name and he gave her his.

Come in, he said, and she went in. He had no idea who she might be.

Sit down, please. She sat down.

What can I give you to drink? he asked her.

Cognac, she said.

There’s no alcohol in the house, he told her. I can give you tea or Nescafé.

Well. Tea with lemon, she said.

He brought her tea. While she drank it she talked about herself. The time passed, and evening came. Soon a young Riffian who worked in the house arrived to prepare dinner. The Englishman stood up and said to the American woman: This is my friend El Rifi who helps me. They shook hands, but since he said nothing more to her, they did not speak again.

They had dinner and talked until one o’clock in the morning. Then the American woman said she must be going. She wondered how she would get to Tangier at that hour.

I’m sorry. I have no telephone, said the Englishman. So I can’t call a taxi for you. I did have a telephone, but it was such a bother I couldn’t go on with it, and in the end I ripped it out of the wall.

Really? she said.

El Rifi turned to her: I have a car. I’ll take you home. The American woman put on her coat and went with him to the car in the driveway, and he drove her directly into the Zoco Chico. She got out. Good night. See you soon. And she went into her hotel.

When El Rifi got back to the house the Englishman said: Did you take her all the way to the hotel? Where did you let her off?

In the Zoco Chico. After midnight you can drive in from the port. She’s in a hotel that’s full of Nazarenes, the kind that wear Moroccan clothes and take drogas. Do you know that woman?

It’s the first time I ever saw her.

Where’s she from?

New York, said the Englishman.

Does everybody in New York dress like a beggar?

The Englishman laughed. No. They like to live that way. Even when they have money, they like their own sort of life better.

You mean they like to live in dirt? I don’t understand them. They start out healthy and clean, and they always end up sick and dirty.

El Rifi had a tape-recorder which he carried with him everywhere. He knew several other young men who worked for the English and the Americans, and they all had tape-recorders. The next morning he packed up his machine and took it with him to the beach. He carried some sandwiches along with him, and sat on top of the rocks looking out to sea. Soon he began to talk into the microphone. He wanted to tell everything he knew about the ocean. He was in the habit of smoking a great amount of kif, and the kif made him feel like talking.

That afternoon when he went to work at the Englishman’s house, he found the American woman sitting in the salon. He set his tape-recorder down and asked her: Do you want something to drink?

I’ll have some tea, please.

El Rifi made tea and served it to them. Then he took out his kif-knife, his board and his sifter, and began to cut several sheaves of kif on the floor in front of them. Presently the Englishman said: I’m going to the city. I’ve got something to do.

Buy some mutton, and I’ll make a tajine tonight, El Rifi told him.

The Englishman went to the post office to get his mail, and the woman was with him. From there he went to the Fez Market. The woman was still with him. He bought the meat and some prunes and salad, and a loaf of whole wheat bread at Pino’s Bakery. And later he stopped at the Soussi’s and bought a liter bottle of Gris de Boulaouane. Then both he and the woman carried the things back to the house.

The woman went into the salon and sat down, and the Englishman went to the kitchen with the wine and the food. El Rifi took out the meat and washed it thoroughly. Then he cut it in pieces and put it on to stew. He was a good cook because he enjoyed cooking. That night he made a tajine of mutton and prunes with cinnamon, a very light purée of potatoes, and a green salad. And they began to eat. The woman drank the entire bottle of wine. Then she smoked some kif. When they had finished eating, she began to talk about the man who had been her husband, but she had nothing good to say about him. My family never thought he was the right husband for me, she said.

El Rifi looked at her while she talked, and he thought to himself: She probably comes from a very backward family, the kind of people you wouldn’t even spit on. He did not want to say anything, so whenever she spoke to him he smiled and said: Yes.

After a while the woman remarked to the Englishman that she had very little money. I hate living in hotels, she said. It’s so expensive. I’d like to find something very cheap and rent it, so I could stay in Tangier as long as I liked.

The Englishman said: I have a furnished apartment you might use for a while if you like.

Oh, no. I couldn’t do that, she told him.

Then El Rifi said to the woman: If you want to go home now, I’ll take you. He said to himself that he was doing this favor not for her, but for the Englishman. He could not let the man’s guest go out drunk into the night and meet drunken Moslems in the street on the way to the hotel.

He drove her to the Zoco Chico, and she tried to kiss him on the cheek as she got out. He ducked and gave her his hand. Sleep well, he told her.

Good night. She went into the hotel. When El Rifi got back to the house, he said to the Englishman: You know something?

What’s that?

That woman’s no good.

Why do you say that?

She’s going to make trouble. For you and for me too. I know from the way she talked about her husband, and the things she said about her own mother and father. She’ll talk the same way about us with other people.

Oh, I don’t think so, said the Englishman.

A month or so passed. The woman went nearly every day to the Englishman’s house. She would stay until it was time to eat, and the Englishman would invite her to have dinner with him. Afterward she would sit talking until very late. One evening, however, she left soon after dinner, and El Rifi took her in his car. As they were driving along the road, she turned to him. Why don’t you speak to him about his apartment? She said. Do you think he wants me to have it? Do you think I should take it? Ask him about it. We’d be neighbors, and it would be fun.

You’ll have to excuse me, he said. It’s got nothing to do with me. If you want to live in his apartment you’ll have to ask him yourself. Suppose something happened.

What could happen? Nothing’s going to happen.

I don’t even trust my own shadow, El Rifi told her. You’re a Nazarene and he’s a Nazarene, and you both speak English. You don’t have any trouble talking to each other. I’m a Moroccan. There’s a big difference between me and you.

Yes, there certainly is, she said. Then she said: Why don’t we go and sit a while at the Café
de Paris?

They drove to the café. El Rifi ordered a Coca Cola, and the woman a Fundador. Then she asked for another, and another. At the Englishman’s house she had just drunk a whole bottle of wine. She began to talk. First she spoke badly of her family. I hate my mother, she said. After a time she grew sad.

Don’t you want me to take you home? he asked her. I’ve got to go. I have a lot of work to do.

What work do you have to do at this time of night? she asked him.

I make tapes, he said. She began to laugh, and he saw that she did not believe him. He called the waiter and paid the bill, because she had told him when they went into the café that she had no money.

He drove down to the Zoco Chico and parked the car in front of a leather bazaar. Come and see what it’s like where I live, she said.

El Rifi walked with her to the entrance of the hotel. Then he said: Sleep well. Good night.

Don’t you want to come up and see my room?

But El Rifi said: I’m sorry. We Moroccans have a special custom. A man can’t go by himself to a woman’s room. Not in a hotel, anyway.

She stared at him. And why not?

It’s a custom.

She bent forward to kiss him on his lips, but he turned quickly and said: Good night.

You don’t want me to kiss you on the mouth. Is that it?

No. That doesn’t matter, he said. But many Moroccans don’t go with Nazarene women. They’re not interested.

Her face grew red. She went into the hotel. El Rifi got into his car and drove back to the Englishman’s house.

What happened? You were gone for two hours and a half.

They were very interesting to me, said El Rifi. I learned something. These American women who come here to Morocco sell themselves very cheap. A woman comes to Tangier and a chauffer drives her to her hotel and she asks him to her room. What does that mean?

You’d have to go up and find out, said the Englishman. You’d have sat down and talked, probably.

El Rifi laughed. He took out his sebsi and smoked. That woman told me to ask you if she can live in your furnished apartment, and I said it was none of my business, that she had to ask you herself and you’d tell her. Myself, I don’t like her. And if you like her and want her to live there, it’s your mahal, not mine. And excuse me.

A few weeks went by. The Englishman gave the apartment to the woman from New York, and she brought a valise with a few old clothes in it. She spent every afternoon in the Englishman’s house, sitting in the salon, and when El Rifi came he could not work there as he always had done. He was angry, but she was a guest of the Englishman.

One day the woman asked the Englishman why he allowed El Rifi to have the keys to his house. I shouldn’t think you’d want him coming in here at any hour he pleases, she said.

It’s nothing new. He’s had the keys for years. I trust him.

I know what I’d do, said the woman. I’d change the lock. Then at least he’d have to ring the bell.

The Englishman did not answer.

He’s a hoodlum, she said. I’ve asked about him. He’s well-known all over Tangier.

If he is, I don’t know about it, said the Englishman.

Perhaps the woman supposed that the Englishman would say nothing to El Rifi about this, but she was wrong. When he told him, El Rifi said: That’s nothing. Any time you want your keys back, here they are. He threw them on the table. And if you don’t want me to work here any longer, we can arrange it so I won’t come back. I’m not a slave. I’m free to look for another place to work.

No! said the Englishman. I didn’t ask for the keys, and I don’t want you to leave. What are you so excited about? Finish your work.

The next day as El Rifi and the Englishman were having tea the doorbell rang. El Rifi got up and opened the door. There stood the woman from New York. How are you? he said. She walked into the salon, and he followed her. Which do you want, coffee or tea?

I’ll have a cup of coffee this time, she told him. After she had drunk it, he offered her a pipe of kif.

No, no! I can’t! she said.

El Rifi turned to the Englishman. Why don’t we go out to Achaqar?

Why not? he said. There’s a little café there in the sand where we can sit.

At Achaqar they got out of the car and stood looking at the ocean. The qahouaji came and shook hands with them and took them into the café. They sat down beside the window and ordered tea. Several Nazarene men with long hair sat nearby. Some Nazarene girls were squatting on the floor as they cooked something. The woman from New York went and began to talk with them.

El Rifi looked at the Nazarenes. The men had dandruff in their hair, and their skin was grey with dirt. Some of them had lice crawling in their beards. The girls had pimples and smelled stale, and their clothes needed to be washed and mended. A Moroccan had been cutting kif in the café that day, and they were smoking what he had thrown away.

El Rifi went to sit with the qahouaji. Those Nazarenes, I never saw anything like them, said the qahouaji. One day I looked down and saw them all running around on the beach without their bathing suits.

That’s because they eat drogas, said El Rifi.

What do you mean? What’s drogas?

It’s some kind of majoun they make, stronger than ours, stronger than everything. They eat it and then they go crazy. And after that they take off their clothes and run around. If the government finds them here, they’re going to put you in jail.

I know, said the qahouaji. I got a stick and ran down to the beach. I told them: You can’t go naked here. Put on your clothes. Or put your bathing suits on. And they were very quiet and they all went and put on their clothes.

El Rifi looked at them again. They were passing around small boxes with pills in them, and taking them with their tea. Some of them talked with their eyes shut. They sat there in Achaqar by the ocean, but they did not know where they were.

Let’s go outside, said the Englishman. The three went out and sat on a bench in the sun. After a few minutes the Englishman got up and said he was going to walk out to the top of the cliff. When he had walked away El Rifi turned to the woman from New York. Are all Americans like the ones inside there?

No, she said. Of course not.

But most of them are. I see hundreds of Americans every day in Tangier, and they look like these. I feel sorry for them. They’ve all got some disease, like tuberculosis or syphilis. If you live with filth you catch filthy diseases. And you die soon.

Oh, they like their life, said the woman from New York.

Yes, the way you like yours. You have the same ideas they have.

Who? Me?

Look at those old bluejeans you’re wearing. You’ve had them on since the day you came from New York. You don’t want to wash them or change them. You’re living in a nice apartment and you don’t have to pay any rent. You have enough money to keep clean.

She was very angry. And you! she cried. Who are you?

It’s got nothing to do with me. I’m a Moslem. The poorest Moslem is cleaner than most Americans. He doesn’t have to have hot water. All he needs is clean water. For instance, I think I’m better than you because I wash five times a day.