The Honey Thief (14 page)

Dobara came to Hazarajat not to take pictures of people but to take pictures of snow leopards for a university in his city of London. The university paid him a salary to take such pictures, something that seemed very curious to the people of the village. Dobara explained that few pictures of the snow leopard had ever been taken and that it was important to take as many as possible. He was told, ‘When you make a picture, show us,’ for no one in the village had ever seen the animal. In any case, few were interested. Dobara spent nearly all of his time in Hazarajat answering questions about the machines of England and the tall buildings of his city.

On that first visit to Hazarajat, Dobara spoke only the English of his own land and a second language spoken by the Jews. He was himself of the Jews, but the Jews of England. The strangest thing of all was that he did not have his God in his heart. He said that the world made itself. People thought he must be simple, like Jawad Behsudi of another time who said that the world was a dream. Jawad Behsudi made a journey to Bamiyan and changed his faith to that of the Buddhists, which was better than nothing.

With his English and his few words of Dari and pictures in a book, Dobara went to one person and another all over the north of Hazarajat seeking the snow leopard. In the village in which he lived in his tent, the snow leopard was a mystery, as I have said. In other places, people told him that the animal lived much higher in the mountains than the Hazara. He asked to be taken to higher places where the snow stayed on the ground for nine months of the year, or higher still, where the snow covered the mountains every day of the year. No one would take him, not even for ten thousand afghanis. It was too dangerous. Those who had been there told of winds that could lift the snow from the ground and throw it with the force of stones. Also, the aeroplanes of the Russians flew over the mountains and people were frightened of them. The Russians were said to hate Afghans, those who had no war with them and those who did. Even on foot, they never left Afghans in peace. From an aeroplane, who knows? They might drop a bomb on anyone, even those watching for a snow leopard.

It was at the end of his first visit to Hazarajat that Dobara became Dobara. He said, ‘I’ll come in the spring and try again.’ In spring, the shepherds took their animals to the mountains for the new grass. Someone had told Dobara that snow leopards came down from the high mountains in spring to eat the sheep and goats of the Hazara. Maybe the person who told him that was being kind, or maybe he was mad. A wolf might eat a sheep, or an eagle might take a lamb just born and still covered in blood. Or sometimes a ram in a bad mood will put his head down and butt the lambs away from the ewes. But Hazara who had been shepherds all their lives had no stories of snow leopards hunting their animals.

*   *   *

He came back in spring, as he said he would. His arrival brought two surprises for the people of the village. The first was that Dobara had taught himself many more words of Dari and the second was his beard, long and black. His beard and his Dari earned him even more respect than his cameras. He had changed his spectacles, too. He now saw through small, round spectacles, like those that Nadir Shah had worn many years before when he was shot by the king-killer Abdul Khaliq. Dobara brought presents as well – not for everyone in the village, but for the Chief, Sayed Ali, and for Sayed Ali’s three wives, and for Mohammad Majid the scholar who had read a book about the moon out of interest. Others in the village were pleased with the music he played for them on a machine, the same songs many had heard on the BBC station of Sayed Ali’s radio before it was destroyed by ants. More welcome than any other gifts were Dobara’s medicines, especially the aspirin for the terrible headaches of Mohammad Majid’s daughter that the apothecary’s medicines could not banish, and for Ali Hassan’s backache that came from losing one of his legs when he stood on a landmine on the road to Kabul. (Ali Hassan was also suffering from decayed teeth; he was suing a dentist for removing his good teeth and leaving the bad ones – a waste of time, the lawsuit, for the dentist had fled to Kandahar where it was not illegal to make mistakes.)

Dobara was respected, too, for showing that he was a serious man. On his first visit, his ambition had seemed foolish. A snow leopard is not an important creature in anyone’s life in Hazarajat, but if Dobara was prepared to return all the way from his city of London with his cameras, he deserved to be taken seriously. For this reason, a man who had not been in Hazarajat on Dobara’s first visit came forward on the second visit. His name was Mohammad Hussein Anwari and he lived in the ancient city of Herat in the north-west. He was a man in the middle of his years and now made his living hiring out diesel generators, but as a much younger man, he had lived further north and hunted with his father. He had heard of the Englishman from a cousin in Hazarajat, a cousin he was visiting.

The first meeting of Dobara and Mohammad Hussein Anwari was a great shock to the Englishman. He asked Mohammad Hussein if he’d seen any snow leopards with his own eyes and Mohammad Hussein said, ‘Yes, I have seen many and I have shot ten.’

‘Killed ten?’ said Dobara.

‘Yes,’ said Mohammad Hussein. ‘Bears, too. Ibex. Many red foxes.’

‘But snow leopards!’ said Dobara. It was difficult for him to master the words of Dari he needed to show his distress. ‘Why the snow leopards? There are very few!’

Mohammad Hussein was not an ignorant man. He knew that people from countries such as the England of this Ibrahim-Dobara thought highly of the leopards. Indeed, he thought highly of them himself. But at the time he was hunting, the coat of a snow leopard would bring two hundred American dollars from a merchant in Iran, and there was more money, in smaller sums, for the paws, the bones and even the teeth of the animal, prized by doctors in China. It was the coat of the snow leopard that had permitted Mohammad Hussein to start his diesel-generator business in Herat.

Mohammad Hussein said to Dobara, ‘I would not kill them now.’

Dobara told his story to Mohammad Hussein. He showed him the cameras he had brought with him from his university. He said that he would pay Mohammad Hussein ten English pounds each day to help him find a snow leopard. Ten English pounds was a good sum of money in afghanis, but not enough, for Mohammad Hussein would be away from his business for two weeks. He said he would have to ask for one hundred American dollars each day. This was more than Dobara could afford. He said he would talk to the people who controlled money at his university and come back in the late summer. But first he wanted to know if there was a good chance of finding a snow leopard.

By this time, Mohammad Hussein had come to like the Englishman, who knew so little about anything and next to nothing about snow leopards. He could see that Dobara was earnest, although foolish. And so he began the Englishman’s education, taking care with his words so that Dobara could follow him. This is what he said:

‘The snow leopard is a wild creature. He does not want to be seen by you, he does not want to be seen by me. If he could, he would kill you, because he hates you. He hates your shape, he hates your smell, he hates the sound of your voice. Nothing he sees in a whole year makes as much hate in him as you or me. But he fears you, too, and if he sees you he will hide or run. He will not attack you. Even as he runs, he is thinking, “What is this mad thing on two straight legs? Let it be struck dead by God!” Many years ago, a man came here from Turkey, where everyone is Sunni. He was a scholar, like you, but a scholar of poetry. He came for a holiday to Hazarajat because his brother-in-law was Hazara and had told him how beautiful it is in summer. He had heard of the snow leopard, too, and he hoped to see one. It was not possible, as he had only two weeks to spend amongst us. To tell you the truth, I did not want to find him a leopard at all. I could see that he wanted to show his love to the creature, and he hoped that the creature would show him love in return. No such thing is possible – not with a snow leopard, not with a bear, not with a red fox, not even with a marmot. They love freedom, Mister Ibrahim, do you understand? When they see a man like you or me, they see the opposite of freedom. That is the truth. We are not to blame – God did not give us the same freedom as the snow leopard. That is what they smell on us, the leopards, the bears, the red foxes. They smell that we are not free. It fills them with hatred and fear.’

*   *   *

The Englishman, Try Again, returned in late summer with the money to pay Mohammad Hussein Anwari, and with the equipment that the hunter had told him to bring with him. Once again Dobara thought to bring presents for the village, and medicines. This time the medicines included a special preparation for Mohammad Majid’s daughter who suffered from headaches. This medicine was taken only once each week, and left the girl free from pain. Dobara was also successful with a new medicine for Ali Hassan’s backache, and was pleased to receive a gift in return: a tin whistle, fashioned by Ali Hassan himself, on which the maker played ‘God Save the Queen.’ He had heard the tune on Sayed Ali’s radio during the Olympic Games of 1960.

Mohammad Hussein and Dobara the Englishman climbed into the high mountains on the first day of the last month of summer. They intended to be away for as long as four weeks and had to carry their food for that time, but not water; springs ran from the mountain in many places. The Englishman had purchased a sleeping bag for Mohammad Hussein and also a two-man tent of great strength.

Mohammad Hussein carried a rifle, too, not to endanger the lives of snow leopards but to shoot such small game as he could find on the return journey – hares, above all. It was a handsome weapon, greatly valued by Mohammad Hussein, a Mosin-Nagant 7.62 sniper rifle with a special sight more powerful than the Englishman’s biggest camera. It had been in his possession for only a year. On a visit to the mechanics’ market in Herat to find parts for his diesel generators, Mohammad Hussein had been approached by a Russian soldier looking for vodka, which was not for sale in Afghanistan. It happened that Mohammad Hussein knew a Kurdish Christian of the city whose brother smuggled unbottled vodka from Pakistan, and he was able to trade ten litres of the alcohol for the Mosin-Nagant. He had no use for the rifle at that time, but if the bribes he was required to pay to keep his business running should become too much for him to afford, he could join the mujaheddin of the north and earn a bounty on Russian officers above the rank of captain. The mujaheddin could fire their weapons with accuracy over short and middle distances, but long-distance sniping was beyond their skill.

‘Your Russian soldier might end up being shot with his own rifle,’ said the Englishman, but he did not mean it as a joke.

‘No, no,’ said Mohammad Hussein. ‘His captain would put him in prison for losing his rifle. Or make him guard the road in the north-east. The soldiers who guard the roads in the north-east survive only for three days.’

*   *   *

The lower slopes of the mountains were dotted with hardy trees and bushes such as highland cedars. These did not grow to any great height but held fiercely to the soil with roots like the talons of eagles. Junipers grew amongst the rocks, fighting a battle for survival against the creatures that grazed on their foliage. Wildflowers of many types grew close to channels and rivulets, and in any place where soil still remained. Mohammad Hussein called over his shoulder the names of the wildflowers in Dari, and Dobara, who had a knowledge of plants, replied with the names in English: oriental poppy; Rose of Jericho, a resurrection plant; Aaron’s Beard; Artemisia; and small yellow blooms known both in English and my language of Dari as Prophet’s Flower.

Mohammad Hussein spoke about the sky, too, and of the importance of watching it every minute. He said: ‘See the small cloud by itself over to the east, Mister Ibrahim? That cloud is a spy. It looks over the mountains to see what mischief can be made. Soon it will vanish, and then we must be careful. Storms come into the mountains with no warning. Here is some more advice, Mister Ibrahim. You must stop and put your hand on a rock every half of an hour after ten o’clock in the morning. Your hand will tell you how much heat is in the sun. If the rock is too warm at midday for your hand to stay for more than one minute, you must rest in the shade. Mister Ibrahim, when you climb a mountain in Hazarajat, it is like a battle in a war. The mountain is not your friend, it is your enemy. It wants to kill you. We are going to a place that is full of jealousy. The mountain does not want you there. So many dangers!’

After two hours of climbing, the Englishman and the hunter crossed loose shale and outcrops of rock without a tree in sight. The Englishman, Dobara, was strong and lean and knew how to climb, but he marvelled at the skill of Mohammad Hussein. He said in Dari, ‘You place your feet like a goat!’ To which the hunter replied, ‘My father was of the race of goats.’

The pack each climber carried rose high above the head. Often when he used his cameras the Englishman had to set his pack down to give himself freedom of movement. One of these times, his pack unbalanced from the boulder on which he’d left it, rolling down the mountain further than the length of a tall tree. Mohammad Hussein said, ‘Wait!’ and removed his own pack and ran down the slope to retrieve Dobara’s. Running down the slope was all very well for a man so sure-footed, but Mohammad Hussein then ran back up the slope with the pack on his shoulders. The Englishman, watching in amazement, realised that Mohammad Hussein was keeping pace with him out of courtesy, and could make much quicker progress if he wished.

Three hours of climbing took the two men into the cold zone, where the frozen air from the snowy peaks rolled down the slopes even if there was no wind to drive it. Whenever the Englishman moved out of the bright sunshine to find a path between boulders, he felt the deep chill of the air and would go from being bathed in sweat to shivers in the space of a minute. Mohammad Hussein said, ‘When you rest at this height, go into the shade but not into the hollows or you will freeze.’