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  “Save the questions till later,” said Hisham, interrupting him curtly. “What do you think about what it says?”

  “It’s good,” said Adnan, still agitated, “but it could lead to disaster. Where ...”

  “I told you to forget about asking questions for now: you’ll find out everything in due course. All I can tell you now is that it’s from a clandestine organisation. An organisation of freedom fighters,” he said, looking around again. “You believe in freedom, don’t you?”

  “Of course I do!” said Adnan, smiling for the first time. “Have you ever heard of an artist who didn’t? You know that.”

  “In that case the organisation calls on you to fight for what we believe in, too.”

  “Yes, but ...”

  “No buts. Belief on its own isn’t enough; it has to be backed up by action. I’m inviting you,” Hisham went on after a short pause, “to join the organisation.”

  There was another pause as Hisham looked at his friend, who had bowed his head and clasped his hands together in a futile attempt to stop them shaking.

  “Anyway,” said Hisham, breaking the silence, “there’s no need for you to give an answer now. Think it over and tell me what you decide. We’ll be late for the others,” he said, preparing to stand up. “Let’s go.”

  As Hisham got to his feet Adnan remained still for a few moments, before rising and catching up with him at the door of the mosque. The first person had arrived for the sunset prayers; Sheikh Mousa’s rich, deep voice could be heard in the distance, reciting the ‘Ta Ha’ sura of the Qur’an: “We have not sent down the Qur’an to you that you should be distressed ...”

  32

  Hisham was certain that his friend would consent to join the organisation. He understood Adnan better than anyone, and also knew just how fond of and dependent on him Adnan had always been, since they were at primary school together. Adnan always stood by him unequivocally; he would not hesitate to agree this time, either.

  Meanwhile, fear, loyalty and pride churned volcanically within Adnan for three days after Hisham’s invitation. Adnan was struggling with a mass of contradictions he had no idea how to reconcile. The thought of participating in any kind of subversive activity terrified him, especially given that one of his uncles had gone to prison after taking part in one of the marches during the famous strikes and demonstrations staged by the Aramco workers. When he was released several years later he was in a pitiful state; for a whole year afterwards, he still trembled with fear whenever night drew near, for some reason – he never told anyone why. Even now he would walk along talking to himself and laughing, and then suddenly revert to a state of supreme self-command. Adnan’s uncle had since cut off all involvement with politics for good, to the point where he would leave a gathering of people if he detected so much as a whiff of politics. Adnan’s maternal grandmother would ritually repeat her ‘famous’ saying in front of her grandsons as she observed her own son in this state: “This is the prison of the old; nothing left on the inside and like a baby on the outside.” Then she would praise God all the same. Yet, though his grandmother’s words still instilled fear in him, Adnan did not want to disappoint his friend’s hopes in him. Hisham was the only friend of his who understood him, the only one who had any regard for his art, the only one he could talk to about his feelings; if he let him down now, he might lose him forever. Just thinking about losing him made Adnan panic. He loved Hisham so much he would feel jealous if he saw him so much as talking to another person affectionately or walking with someone new. Though it rarely happened, when it did Adnan’s blood would boil and he would soon manage to get between Hisham and the new ‘threat’.

  At the same time Adnan felt proud that Hisham had invited him to join the organisation, rather than Majid or another member of the gang. It proved Hisham’s trust in, and respect, for him. He wished he could shout at his brother and father and tell them, “Look! I’m the best of all. One day I’ll liberate mankind! Majid can remain a slave of gold ...” But this feeling of pride suddenly evaporated when it occurred to him that Hisham might have already invited someone else in the gang to join, and his worst suspicions took hold. How did he know Hisham had only spoken to him on the subject? Wasn’t he allowed to talk to Abd al-Karim or Saud or Abd al-Aziz first? But Adnan soon banished these doubts and his peace of mind returned. No, there was no one else; if Hisham had spoken to anyone other than his best friend, he would have said so. Adnan went back to his brushes, feeling overjoyed, and began to paint.

  Hisham informed his cell commander Fahd of the nomination, though he did not mention his having already spoken to Adnan about it; doing so was against the organisation’s security regulations. Fahd asked him to prepare a detailed report on Adnan, covering the reasons that had prompted Hisham to nominate him: Adnan’s acquaintances; his family’s social class and other information. Hisham was angered and humiliated by this sort of request. How could he write a report on his friend? He was quite aware that reports like these were only ever written for the notorious intelligence agencies, prepared by people for whom the general public had utter contempt mixed with deepest fear. Had he become one of those people? For a while he carried this hateful feeling inside him, before telling Fahd that he would not be preparing any such report. At first Fahd was angry; Hisham told him that he would never at any price turn into an informer, and at this Fahd gave one of his resounding laughs. Lighting and dragging on a cigarette, Fahd told Hisham that he was a freedom fighter, not an informer, and that it was for the sake of the struggle that everything had to be known about new candidates as they might be Secret Police infiltrators sent to expose the organisation. However, Hisham was not convinced. He insisted that because he knew Adnan intimately, there was no need for reports. But Fahd was unmoved, explaining that these were the rules of the organisation, to be obeyed without question, and that everyone else had done the same thing and had the same thing done to them. Finally, Hisham gave in and reluctantly wrote the report, mentally spitting on himself as he did so, in self-disgust. Whatever the justifications, he felt, there was now no difference between him and the perfidious eavesdroppers. He made up his mind never to nominate anyone else, to avoid having to repeat the experience.

  In the report Hisham nominated Adnan to become a member of the Students’ Union, not the party. When Fahd asked him why, he replied that Adnan was not yet ready to join the party and take part in its activities. Though he was a true patriot, Hisham said, ideas and ideology in general were alien to him and the party itself was based on an ideology that might put him off the work of the organisation altogether. Fahd accepted these explanations and delivered the report to the leadership, whose reply promptly came back agreeing to Adnan’s joining the union and instructing Comrade Abu Huraira to carry out the necessary steps.

  In actual fact, Hisham had not been entirely honest in his justification. It was true that Adnan was not on his intellectual level, but the party’s ideas were not so complex as to require a high degree of intelligence to comprehend them; and in any case, once someone had agreed to take part in clandestine activity, there was no reason why they should not join the party from the outset and be schooled in its ideas later on. But Hisham’s reason for excluding Adnan from the party lay in his desire to maintain a distinction between them. Hisham, as a member of the party which controlled the union, would therefore carry a higher rank. For all his affection, Hisham had never once considered Adnan his equal. He regarded him as a virtual possession that he did not want anyone else to usurp. Adnan must remain his follower, even within the context of a covert organisation. (Hisham, perhaps, could not admit to himself more plainly that only with Adnan did he feel important and influential.)

  More than a week after Hisham had extended his invitation, the gang met as usual in Abd al-Karim’s house. Abd al-Karim and Abd al-Aziz were talking about a new novel, a copy of which Abd al-Aziz had got hold of from a relative just back from Beirut. They spoke with obvious excitement – especially Abd al-Kar
im, who was fidgeting a great deal and squeezing his legs together. Abd al-Aziz was holding the novel and whispering sections of it to Abd al-Karim. It was one of Alberto Moravia’s novels, The Time of Indifference; on the cover was a picture of a fair, blonde woman with dark red lips and large, green eyes, sitting back seductively with her white thighs completely exposed. She had her arm behind her head and was giving the reader a lustful, enticing look through half-closed eyes, while her open mouth revealed her brilliant white teeth. Hisham had not yet read the novel, but would come to do so several times, particularly the sections describing the character Carla’s loss of her virginity on the night she slept with her mother’s lover. For days after he first read this passage, the scene remained in his mind; time and again he would return to it in his imagination, alone on warm winter evenings and during quiet siestas on hot summer days ...

  Salim and Saud were playing Kiram in a corner while Hisham and Adnan sat next to each other in another corner, the ornate teapot in the centre. They were all listening intently to the words of Abd al-Aziz’s reading and following Abd al-Karim’s movements with mirth.

  “Abd al-Karim, why don’t you just go to the bathroom and get it over and done with?” said Saud.

  “Now I know why there’s so much soap in there,” said Salim.

  “I don’t know about Abd al-Karim, but Abd al-Aziz has other ways, really creative ones,” said Saud, and burst out laughing as he clapped his hands and nodded vigorously.

  “You lot are awful! Don’t embarrass them,” said Hisham with mock seriousness, before laughing along with the others.

  “God, there’s no one like us,” said Abd al-Karim. “Hisham’s got glasses; Saud, you’ve got a face like a knobbly old root; and you, Salim, are always dribbling. What’s the reason for all this?” By way of an answer he made an obscene gesture with his hand and wrist that sent them all into fits of laughter.

  “Get away with you, Abd al-Karim!” Salim shouted. “You’d have people turning in their graves with the things you say. Your father’s so devout, yet you’re a complete good-for-nothing!”

  The laughter continued as Salim and Saud went back to playing Kiram and Abd al-Aziz and Abd al-Karim to reading the novel. All the while Adnan had been quiet as usual, weighing in with a smile or chuckle without making any comment. Once the others had resumed what they had been doing, Adnan leaned towards Hisham and whispered in his ear, “All right.” Hisham looked at his friend and flashed him a smile, then nodded and went back to drinking his tea calmly. Adnan drew back a little and leaned his elbow on one of the cushions, gazing inscrutably at the others.

  33

  Hisham informed Fahd of Adnan’s agreement, and at the next meeting of the cell Fahd gave him a password to convey to Adnan: ‘Hauran’s a great place’. At the same time Fahd instructed Hisham to cut off all contact with Adnan. At this Hisham was taken aback. How could he do such a thing? This Fahd had no idea of the kind of relationship that bound him to Adnan, friend, comrade and faithful follower all in one; if it had not been for that relationship, Adnan would never have agreed to join. He had only invited Adnan to join the organisation because he was a friend, not for any other reason; would he really sacrifice Adnan for its sake? It was impossible, quite impossible.

  Hisham discussed the matter with Fahd to no avail. Fahd insisted that the ties between comrades came above all others, that by comparison all other relationships and sacrifices paled in significance. When Hisham in turn resisted this argument, Fahd replied angrily that ending the friendship was a party order that Hisham had to execute to the letter, or else make himself liable to punishment by the organisation, which might be of the utmost severity.

  On his way home after the meeting, Hisham turned those words over in his mind. ‘Punishment! Orders! Are we really getting away from the authority of the government and our parents? are we rebelling against the punishments inflicted by the state and the people alike, only to fall into a web of new orders and other sorts of punishment? We’ve gone from the frying pan into the fire. At least obeying the government doesn’t land you in prison, whereas obeying this lot ...! In the end it’s just another kind of obedience, just another kind of submission.’ He made up his mind to appear to give in, while disobeying them in practice, and the party and the organisation could go to hell.

  Hisham told Adnan the password and explained that everything had been arranged, that all he had to do was wait. Deep down he wished Adnan would suddenly tell him he had second thoughts and no longer wanted to join the organisation, or instead that he himself could tell Adnan to forget it, that he had only been joking; then he could tell Fahd that Adnan had changed his mind. But Adnan did not change his mind, and neither did Hisham have the courage to tell him anything contrary to what he had said before.

  Meanwhile Hisham took to observing Adnan closely at school. He wanted to know who the contact was – Goat-Face, or someone else? He did not let Adnan out of his sight for a moment, and Adnan himself was visibly pleased with the extra attention. One day during Mr Wasfi’s physics class, Hisham noticed Mansur Abd al-Ghani, sitting at a desk directly behind Adnan, pass him a little piece of paper. So, that monkey was the contact! When Adnan read the note, his jaw dropped and he looked behind him, his eyes wide and his face breaking into a sweat. He remained like that until the teacher told him off. Hisham, seething, counted the seconds until break time. Adnan put the paper inside his physics book and looked at the blackboard, wiping his face from time to time.

  At last the bell rang; Mansur got up quickly and whispered something in Adnan’s ear, and the two of them went out together while Hisham stayed seated until the last pupil left the classroom. He raced over to Adnan’s desk and opened the physics book: the note read, ‘Hauran’s a great place’. Hisham went outside quickly and caught sight of Adnan and Mansur whispering at the end of the corridor that led to the headmaster’s office. He felt something like fire spreading through him, along with an urge to strangle Mansur; but he suppressed his emotions and, feigning indifference, began looking around the courtyard without really seeing anything. Mansur soon finished speaking to Adnan, then made his exit, passing Hisham on his way to the courtyard; their eyes met for a fleeting moment. Hisham turned to look at Adnan, who came to where he was standing. Adnan stood there, still perspiring, his hands trembling visibly. They were silent for a while, looking and not looking at the crowds of pupils in the courtyard. In the distance, Mansur appeared, having got to the courtyard himself and joined a group of boys sitting near the rear exit of the school.

  “So? Everything all right? What did he want?” asked Hisham, nodding with open disgust towards the courtyard. But Adnan remained silent and wiped the side of his nose with one of his hands. “Did you agree on a meeting place?” Hisham went on, trying to push Adnan to speak by giving him the impression that he knew everything.

  Adnan glanced at Hisham, wide-eyed. “How did you know it was him?” he asked, astonished. “He told me you knew nothing and that I shouldn’t tell you anything, either.”

  Hisham smiled, full of pride, and raised his head a little. “God!” he said, looking his friend in the eyes. “Have you forgotten that I’m the one who invited you to join the project? There are lots of things I know that you don’t.” He half-smiled as he uttered the last sentence, as though to say, ‘Nothing’s changed, I’m still the same old friend you’ve always known’.

  Adnan bowed his head and leaned against the wall. “We’re meeting this afternoon in front of the municipal park,” he said, in a barely audible voice.

  “And then what?”

  “I don’t know. Mansur’s arranged everything.”

  At that moment Mansur approached on his way back from break, and Hisham fell silent. Mansur smiled briefly at Hisham before entering the classroom. All the old loathing boiled up inside Hisham again. How he despised that arrogant monkey! When the bell rang at the end of the day, Hisham and Adnan left together as usual, and walked without speaking to Hisham’s house.

>   “See you tomorrow,” Hisham said.

  “Bye,” replied Adnan. Hisham knew he would not see his friend with the gang that day.

  He went inside; the smell of fried fish filled the house. On Thursdays his mother usually made fried fish with white rice and a green salad for lunch. Other days, the main dish was normally meat stew or chicken, if his mother did not feel like making fried food with chilli and pickles. ‘Syrian rubbish’, his father used to call any dishes other than those his mother usually prepared on winter evenings: kabsa stew; jarish, crushed wheat cooked with meat and vegetables; marquq, a dish made of wheat dough cut into small pieces and cooked with meat, vegetables and tomatoes; mataziz, similar to marquq but made with thick, round pieces; and qursan, made of fine bread with meat and vegetable stock poured over it.

  Hisham went into the kitchen and greeted his mother, who was busy with her preparations; his father was not back yet. Then he had a quick shower outside, after which he lay on his bed and flicked through the latest issue of ‘Superman’ until lunch was ready. Without realising it, he nodded off; he did not know how long he had been asleep when he heard his mother’s voice in the distance as though in a dream, calling him to lunch. The table had been laid in the room with the air conditioner, and his father was sitting and rolling a lump of rice in his hand while his mother was still busy in the kitchen. Hisham greeted his father and took a seat.

  “Where have you been? You’ve kept us waiting so long you’ve made us hungry!” his father teased, through a mouthful of rice and with a smile full of unadulterated affection that Hisham reciprocated even more warmly. As his parents ate they spoke about the same old things, none of which Hisham took in. He was eating mechanically, his mind on matters other than food. When he heard the muezzin calling from the nearby mosque he jumped up as though he had been stung by a scorpion, rice flying from his right hand as his mother and father looked at him in surprise.