Hearing this moral tale, I inquired, “Oh venerable sir! What will be the outcome of this battle?” He replied, “The water of the lake will become muddy.” I said, “That has already happened.” He replied, “Even muddier.” I asked, “How muddy?” He said, “So much so that the lake will become a swamp, and dust will blow through the town.”
… Full of fear, I left the deserted town. I went in search of an inhabited town. I wandered through forests and jungles. The Lord had so arranged it that I saw signs of habitation in the distance. I set out on that road. When I drew near, what did I see? A new land: a beautiful city with a pleasing atmosphere. In the gardens were all kinds and species of fruit-bearing trees, all colors of roses and flowers, sweetly singing birds on every branch, young deer as swift as the wind on every path. Sweetly scented streets, perfumed lanes. The bazaars so crowded that shoulder rubs against shoulder, water vessels clink rhythmically together. The water-carriers, draped in red garments, go along with their water-skins on their shoulders, sprinkling the streets. The bearers of drinking water serve up overflowing cups drawn from the fountain of Paradise. The shops are clean and elegant, there is one goldsmith’s shop after another. Balconies, mirror-walled rooms; a delicately beautiful woman swings in a swing, glancing at her lovely face in a tiny mirror-ring. Admiring herself, she says, Oh my, oh my Lord! One abode of beauty wears a robe of flowing-water fabric, so that the gaze travels clearly through it from one side to the other. One rose-faced woman has dark collyrium around her eyes, a dark red color-paste on her lips, a bosom in full flower, a veil slipping down from her shoulders, a belly like a tablet of sandalwood, a navel like a golden cup, below it a place like a juicy sweet. Beyond this the curtain is drawn, modesty holds sway. “Guess from my garden what my springtime is like.”* He who has Fortune for a helper, and courage by his side, let him dive in and bathe in the Ganges of accomplishment: swimming is auspicious for the courageous.
… One time I became Abul Hasan of the Thousand and One Nights. I wandered in streets and lanes, and was amazed. But gradually my eyes opened, and a strange scene was before them. I was stupefied. Whenever I looked at a head, I found it gone. The man healthy and well, the head gone. I was inwardly astonished: is this a dream, or the waking world? I rubbed my eyes and looked; still the same scene. Oh God, where have these people’s heads gone? For a long time I remained silent. Finally the hem of self-restraint slipped from my grasp. I inquired of a passerby, an old man who had a reliable face, “Oh sir, don’t men have heads in your city?” This aged man looked me over from head to foot with wonder, and said, “Oh young man! It seems that you’re a stranger in this city, that you ask such a question. So if you don’t know, be silent, and if you do know, even then be silent, for the walls have ears.” Then the old man took me to his own house, and entertained me lavishly, and said, “Oh dear friend! Hear my words: our heads have become food for our king’s serpents.” Hearing this, I was much amazed. Then the old man explained, “Oh my dear friend! Hear my words: on our king’s shoulders, right and left, two serpents are always hissing. Men’s heads are their food. Every day in this city lots are cast, every day two men are seized and their heads are cut off and fed to the Glorious King’s serpents.* And now in this city the people who still have their heads are so few that you can count them on your fingers. But for how long? If someone’s head wasn’t cut off yesterday, it will be today; and if it isn’t today, it will be tomorrow. And hear my words: tomorrow at the crack of dawn the drum will sound, and after that the lots will be cast.”
Hearing this stunning story, I was drowned in the whirlpool of amazement. As I gradually came to my senses, my inquiring curiosity awoke, and at first dawn I prepared to go to the appointed place. The old man tried to detain me: “Oh rash and shortsighted one, have pity on your youth, and abandon this intention! We are the king’s people, so we are forced to witness this scene. You are endangering yourself for nothing. The king’s men will see you, and write your name down too, and include you in the casting of lots!” At this opposition, the flames of my curiosity leaped up higher. I paid absolutely no heed to the old man’s advice. My mind was obsessed with the desire to see what events Nature would bring to fruition that day, and with whose head Death would play.
When I approached the palace, what did I see but a big crowd, including both the great and the small. Rich and poor, noble and base-born, needy and wealthy, beggars and benefactors, grain-sellers and grocers, aristocrats and vazirs all stood together and awaited the result of the casting of lots.
When the names emerged, the people were stupefied. They all stared at each other, they began to wring their hands in grief, to sigh and lament. I asked the old man, “What unfortunate ones has Death selected, that the people are grieving so much?” At which he sighed and spoke as follows: “Oh dear friend! The two upon whom the lot has fallen today are the choicest pearls of wisdom of the pearl-showering court. They are men of elevated thought and radiant intelligence, whose minds have a far reach. In knowledge and learning they are peerless. They are divers in the ocean of wisdom. The fame of their wisdom reaches from Rome to Syria. They understand the mysteries of sovereignty. They unravel the largest possible knots with the fingernail of strategy. Now when they are deprived of their heads, the lamp of knowledge will be extinguished, the city will be left without wisdom.”
Sighing and mourning were of no avail, the casting of lots was the handwriting of fate. Who could evade it? Both wise men’s heads were cut off and placed before the serpents on a platter. But the serpents struck once with their jaws, then turned away and began to hiss with rage. The king looked angrily at his retinue and asked, “Traitors! What did you mix into this delicate food, that the serpents aren’t eating it and are hissing with rage?” Those around him petitioned with folded hands, “Refuge of the World, how could we ever presume to mix anything into the food of the exalted serpents? But in fact, what is there for the serpents to dine on at all? The skulls of those choicest wise men of the age were empty of brains.”
… I feared this populous city more than the empty desolate city. Somehow or other, keeping out of sight, I managed to steal away from it. I rendered thanks to the True Provider for allowing me to bring my head safely away. Abandoning all thought of villages, cities, towns, I wandered in the wilderness. I am wandering still. Sometimes in the desert with no grass or water, sometimes in dense forests. Towns pursue me with their barking dogs. In the forest I never saw a single dog. Dogs are in towns. When dogs bark, in towns and their outskirts, it sounds at night in the forest as though all the dogs in all the towns are facing toward the forest and barking. I’m surrounded. Towns seem to have encircled the forest on all sides. The dogs’ voices come from all around, as though they have formed a giant ring and are facing me and barking. How long the nights are in the forest. How far I am from my cave — the wail of the siren, whistles, silence—
“Son! Put out the lantern, its light might be seen outside,” Ammi Jan says in a frightened whisper, so that her voice won’t reach up to the airplanes.
“Yes, all right.”
I put out the lantern. There should be perfect darkness in the cave.
DECEMBER 12
All daytime affairs have passed away with the day, now here I am and here’s the night. How long the wartime nights are! And there’s just no real end to them. As though I’m walking in the forest, as though I’ve been traveling for centuries. The silence of the forest and the stillness of centuries. Dogs in the sleeping towns, jackals in the forest. Their voices don’t disturb the world’s sleep, they make it deep. Sleeping towns, sleeping centuries, the sleeping forest can all awaken at any moment. As they’ve begun to awaken inside me—