The Spider's House (41 page)

A cricket had installed itself somewhere in the matting, and was singing happily. Its repeated silvery note was like a tiny bell being tolled there in the darkness. The huge moon was high in the sky, and its light entered the room through the shifting screen made by the leaves of the poplars in the garden. He stood there listening and looking, wondering whether he would ever see the big room again by moonlight, as he had seen it night after night for so many years, passing through on the way to his room in the tower. Perhaps never again moonlight after this minute, he thought, as he heard the flushing of the toilet behind him, and the opening of the door. The boy came out, and in a penetrating stage-whisper began to call:
“M’sieu! M’sieu!”
“My God! I can’t have him calling me that,” he said to himself, glad for something to seize upon, to take his mind away from its melancholy speculations. Saying “Shh!” he led the way back up the stairs to his room, pushed him inside, and locked the door.

Immediately the boy seized a cushion from the seat of a chair and tossed it onto the rug in the center of the room. Then he took the spread from the foot of the bed, and wrapping it around him, lay down on the floor. “ ‘
Lah imsikh bekhir
,” he said dutifully to Stenham, whereupon he whispered a few words of prayer and was quiet.

Stenham read for a half hour or so before turning off his bed-lamp.
He was in an unpleasant frame of mind over the way the evening had turned out. It was getting mixed up with this boy that had done it all; without him there would have been a way, in spite of Lee’s coolness and candor at the café. He even suspected her motives in insisting upon bringing the boy along to the hotel: mightn’t she have guessed that he would prove useful by providing a convenient obstruction to any possible intimacy? Twice in the night he awoke and saw the shrouded form lying there in the moonlight.

The next time he opened his eyes, the sun was very bright, and the boy stood in one of the windows looking out. One thing he did not want was to get involved in talk before he had had coffee. Surreptitiously he felt around behind the pillows for the bell, pushed the button, and pretended to be sleeping. The ruse worked so well that he was actually almost asleep again by the time there was a knock at the door. As he opened his eyes, he realized that the boy was trapped, in full sight of whoever was to come into the room. He jumped out of bed and opened the large mirror door of the armoire, signaling to the boy to step behind it. The knocking was repeated with added force.

A stout Frenchman stood there with his breakfast tray. “I’ll take it,” he said nonchalantly, reaching out for it. It was not until he had the tray in his hands that he felt free to go on talking. “What’s happened to the Arabs?” he asked; no one but Rhaissa or Abdelmjid had ever brought him his breakfast. “Tous
les indigènes sont en tôle.”
The man was grinning. “The major domo has locked them all in their rooms and put the keys in the office safe. That way we’re sure of
those
natives, at least.” Changing his tone, he went on: “It’s very serious, what’s happening, you know.”

“I know,” said Stenham.

“I’m surprised you stay.”

“And you?”

The big man shrugged.
“C’est mon gagne-pain, quoi!
We all have to earn our living.”

“Ah, you see?” Stenham exclaimed. “That’s why I stay, too.”

The man nodded, making it obvious that he did not believe
this for a moment. Stenham shut the door, and the boy’s head appeared around the side of the wardrobe, his eyes large with excitement. Probably his imagination was still ablaze with images of police tortures.

“Sbalkheir
. Good morning.”

“Sbalkheir, m’sieu .”

Stenham poured half the coffee and half the hot milk into a tumbler, sweetened it, and handed it down to the foot of the bed where the boy stood. It was this gesture, together with the consciousness of exactly how many francs it represented, which made him smile at the absurdity of having this primitive youth, whose name he did not even know, sharing his room and breakfast with him. The mechanics of ridding himself of him were nothing; on the other hand, the moral responsibility involved was enormous, or so it seemed to him. And each hour that the boy spent with him would increase its weight.

Suddenly he asked the boy his name. “Of course, now I remember.” He took another swallow of coffee and finished eating a slice of toast. “What would you do, Amar, if I should put you out?” The boy focused his piercing gaze upon him. His eyes were those of a wild animal, but at the same time they were human, compelling and extraordinarily expressive.

“I am in Allah’s hands. If I go, that will be His will.”

“Then you’re not afraid?”

“Yes, I’m afraid. And I want very much to see my father and mother.” He seemed about to say more, then to think better of it.

There was a knock at the door, and the stout waiter came in. “A
h, pardon
!” he exclaimed, looking at Amar in surprise. “I thought monsieur had finished.”

“Bring the same order again, will you? I’m still hungry. I’ve shared my breakfast.” It was a moment that demanded brazenness.

The waiter smiled.
“Une petite causerie matinale?
A little morning chat over the coffee cups is always agreeable.” Still smiling, he went out.

I suppose he’s on his way down to the manager to report the
presence of the enemy in the fort, thought Stenham, but he said nothing. A few minutes later the waiter reappeared with another tray, which he set on the bed between them. “Et
voilà!”
He stepped back, flourishing his napkin. “
Votre serviteur discret!”
His pink face beaming, he stood an instant looking at them. Then he went out.

“More coffee?” Stenham held the spout of the pot over the boy’s cup. But Amar had once more fallen into a state of frightened melancholy. It took Stenham a half hour to convince him that the waiter almost certainly was not going to report his presence to the police.

Outside the window the burning sun climbed slowly to a higher position over the city. It was a cloudless day, so clear that each ravine on the distant mountain-slopes was visible in painstakingly etched detail. And the ten thousand flat rooftops below were beginning to collect the heat and to send it back up into the air, where it would gradually take on intensity and substance, and remain until long after dusk, It was about nine o’clock when the disorders began. Stenham was standing before the washbasin, shaving, and in the mirror he saw the boy move soundlessly to the window. At first there was only shouting, from one part of the town directly below, and then from a more distant quarter to the west. But shortly there came the nervous and formless phrases of gunfire, and this seemed to issue from all regions of the city, more or less at the same time. Stenham made no comment, continued to shave, imagining the conflict that must be going on inside the watching head at the window. On and off, all morning long, the shooting continued. Occasionally Stenham tried to engage the boy in conversation, but his replies were monosyllabic.

The packed valises still stood by the door. “Am I staying or leaving?” The answer seemed to be that he certainly was not leaving at the moment, in any case. Yesterday he had been ready to get out; her arrival had made him willing to stay, even without the possibility of work. There was the point at which he had gone off the track; that was clear enough, now that he
was no longer free to go, now that nearly twenty-four hours later he was still there. But this morning he did not feel that he
was
here; he could have been anywhere. The room was not the same room that it had been, nor was the hotel the place that had been his home for so many seasons. It was all vaguely like an innocuous dream whose only meaning lies in the sleeper’s awareness that at any moment it can become a nightmare. Of course there was no question of working again; the idea was ludicrous. Nor would he be able to sit and read. All he could do was to wait for the drama to play itself out, except that because he had no part in it, it would not even do that—at least, not in a way that could be satisfactory to him.

The boy did have a part in it; there he was, fingering the curtain at the window, looking out through the heat at the city where he had been born, listening to his people being murdered, feeling God only knew what emotions as he stood there. Inextricably involved, he still could do nothing which might conceivably change the smallest detail—perhaps not even within himself.

If he had any character, Stenham reflected, he would give the boy some money and turn him out, letting him take his chances in the street like the rest of his countrymen. Then he would telephone Moss and see if he wanted to leave, do the same with Lee, and just start going, with or without the other two. That would make a kind of sense that no other action could. And now he wondered why he had ever expected it to be anything but overwhelmingly depressing to watch the city being destroyed. Perhaps (he could no longer remember) he had imagined that somehow an occasion would present itself in which he could perform some positive act, could be of help. But of help to whom? The two adversaries shooting one another down there were equally hateful to him; he hoped each side would kill as many of the other as possible.

When it was about eleven, the telephone rang: Moss was speaking from his room.

“I say, John, I’m frightfully sorry about yesterday. I had some
business that needed attending to. I couldn’t let it go on any longer. You know, this thing has got quite out of hand. I think the time has come to take action.”

“What action?” Stenham’s inflection was more derisive than interrogatory.

“Could we meet shortly for a little talk?”

“That’d be fine. That’s just what I feel like, myself.”

Moss came to Stenham’s room a quarter of an hour later. Seeing Amar standing at the window, “Who’s that?” he demanded, as if he had discovered him in his own room.

“It’s a long story. I’ll tell you in a minute. Sit down.”

Moss sat in the large easy chair, folded his hands in front of him, and looked up at the ceiling. “This is all so distressing,” he said.

Stenham regarded him suspiciously. “You look very pleased with yourself,” he told him. “My guess is that you made some money yesterday.”

Moss showed astonishment; then a veiled smile spread across his face. “I made a small profit. Yes. Not nearly so much as I’d counted on, naturally. By waiting I might have doubled it, and then again it’s possible I’d have found no market at all. My personal feeling is that it’s time to move on to calmer waters. Which is what I wanted to discuss with you. Don’t you think we could organize a joint exodus between us, rent a car, I mean, this afternoon, and go?”

“Go where?” said Stenham, immediately suspicious at hearing the words: “we could rent.” If such a mode of travel was to be used, he did not intend to share in its expense.

“Practically anywhere. I’d thought of Rabat, because I have friends there” (“And probably a garage to sell,” Stenham added mentally) “but it could just as easily be Meknès or Ouezzane, if you like, I suppose. I’m very keen on not being in Fez tomorrow. It’s the Aid, and practically anything may happen. Surely you agree there’s no point in having trouble if we can avoid it.”

“Madame Veyron’s back, you know.”

“Oh, no! How really extraordinary! What on earth for?”

“I think it’s just inquisitiveness.”

“Ah, your great plot proved not to have her in it?”

Stenham frowned. “No, I’m afraid she’s innocent.” But he was thinking: Where’s the difference between innocence and guilt, in cases like hers?

“I’m delighted to hear you admit it,” Moss was saying patronizingly.

“And then there’s Amar.” He pointed to the window.

“So I see. But who is he? What’s he doing here?”

When Stenham had finished telling him, Moss exclaimed: “Oh, come! Now what’s this nonsense? I haven’t understood a word of what you’ve said. It’s all very commendable and romantic to take in a waif, but surely you don’t intend to keep him.”

“No, no, no!” Stenham cried. “Of course not! I don’t know what I intend. I don’t intend anything. I’ve just got to have time to think a little, that’s all.”

“Time! There isn’t much of that at the moment, you know. I suggest you turn the institution of oriental cupidity to your advantage for once, hand the young man a five-thousand-franc note, and then set him free. It’s astonishing what an excellent safe-conduct money can be.”

“Yes, I’ve thought of that,” Stenham replied distraughtly. “I don’t know.”

“Really, John! I can only look at you and marvel at the inscrutability of the human soul.”

He’s warming up for a round of the old game, thought Stenham. But I haven’t got the energy to play. He did not answer.

Moss was silent for a moment. Now and then, in the confusion of rifle and machine-gun fire, there came the heavier sound of a grenade bursting. “With or without waifs and Americans,” he resumed, “I have my eye set upon being far from Fez before tomorrow’s dawn. And I’m dead serious about this, John. It’s not a little fantasy of mine.”

“You think tomorrow’s the bad day, and after that it’ll be better?”

“I think tomorrow will be the climax. It’s going to be a thwarted Aïd el Kebir, don’t forget. After that I think passions
will slowly subside. Nothing can stay at fever pitch indefinitely.”

Stenham, without replying, had begun to talk with Amar.

“Oh, that accursèd dead language that refuses to die!” Moss wailed, raising his eyes heavenward. “In order to say good morning one must use eighty-three separate words, each one with more hideous sounds in it than the last. Now, John, stop being difficult and talk to me, will you, please?” For a time he sat silent, in an attitude of mock resignation, looking very sorry for himself.

Presently Stenham looked up. “I’ve found a solution,” he announced. “Amar will take us to Sidi Bou Chta.”

“Very kind of him, I’m sure. If anyone wants to go. And would you like to tell me where this place is, and why we should go there, instead of somewhere that we’ve heard of?”