On this new day there’s a light tap on the door. No one ever comes to see me, so I leap up to see who is knocking. There is a devout shaykh whose general appearance and demeanor remind me of the imam at a small mosque downtown. Rumor has it that he was fired from his position for unknown reasons. Once I had greeted him and invited him inside to share my breakfast, he confirmed my impression, then proceeded to give me a few terse details about himself. He told me that he was now working in Noah’s profession and owned a thriving carpenter’s workshop. He had lots of customers because he was willing to make do with reasonable charges and refused to cheat people. He then launched into an amazing story, some of which was so disturbing that it left me with my mouth agape and my tongue paralyzed:
“Listen, my boy,” he said. “I’m going to tell you some really serious things. Once you’ve taken them all in and thought about it, you’ll want to consider the situation you’re in now and protect yourself from all kinds of nasty outcomes. I have to begin with two pieces of bad news, in fact two deaths. Your mother — God have mercy on her soul! — died in a series of floods caused by torrential downpours of rain, leading to several landslides and the collapse of a number of houses. Her resting-place in Ouad-Zem is in a communal grave for those people who were swallowed up by the earth; the sheer quantity of mud and debris made it impossible to locate anyone. The second death involves your cousin, al-Husayn al-Masmudi. He had been fighting the jihad in Afghanistan and Iraq, then came back to the Awras Mountains two years ago. He joined some fighting groups there, but was killed in the region near Bumirdas. Your mother was convinced that you had perished in the sea along with all the other people who risk their lives trying to get to Europe; that’s what happened to some of her neighbors’ children. However, your late cousin, al-Husayn, who used to visit me regularly under cover, assured me that you had been rushed away somewhere, and he had no idea where. He made me promise to look after you if you ever came back, and I promised to do so.”
As I listened to Shaykh Hamdan al-Mizati’s shattering news, I shed a few dry tears and was struck dumb.
“So I can help you, my boy,” he went on, “you’re going to have to reassure me that the terrible years you’ve spent in prison which have so damaged your body and general health have not affected your mind or faculties. The first thing you need to do in order to reassure me is to take off immediately that helmet and the bulging jacket that some people assume is booby-trapped. This paranoia you have, that someone is spying on you all the time, is simply a devilish illusion on your part. The belt you’re wearing is another piece of fantasy, child’s play in fact. These little foibles of yours keep bothering the police; they smell a rat. Will you promise me to get rid of them?”
I handed them over on the spot and gave him a crowbar so he could break the belt.
“Take them by all means,” I told him, doing my best to control my emotions. “Bury them wherever you like.”
“Fine!” he replied, putting everything into a bag. “You’ve convinced me that your mind’s still working. Now tell me what you’d like me to do, God willing.”
“My dearest wish, Sir,” I replied, “is to make a record of a truly horrendous period of imprisonment, one that lasted more than six years. If I were to tell part of it out loud, the people listening would laugh in my face; they’d be convinced that I was a raving paranoiac, completely insane. I urgently need some medical tests, but I’m postponing them in case they provide me with disturbing information that may depress me and thus prevent me from writing down my story. Once I’ve finished my work, then let happen whatever fate decrees. I want my testimony to be in written form, so that, once I’m dead, some cognizant reader who is both aware and sympathetic may get hold of it. So that’s my dearest wish, but I can’t possibly achieve it in this cramped space where I’m losing all hope and my spirit is almost completely crushed. It feels just as bad as those long and bitterly destructive days I spent in prison.”
The shaykh thought for a while, then suggested something that offered me a blessed release.
“Between today’s prayer times collect everything you need. The late al-Husayn has assigned ownership of this place to you by way of a contract. Tomorrow just after dawn you’ll accompany me in my truck to a farm that I own south of Oujda on the Angad Plain. God willing, you’ll be able to settle down there and complete your project. The shepherdess who runs the farm and her daughter will take care of you. So we’ve agreed then.”
With that the shaykh stood up and grabbed the bag of stuff. I escorted him to the door, kissed his shoulder, and offered him my profuse thanks.
And that is exactly what happened. That devout believer kept his promise. I spent the entire night in prayer, thinking all the while about what the shaykh had told me, beginning with the two deaths, then offering advice, and finally providing me with a truly blessed means of escape.
Once we reached the farm, my benefactor introduced me to the shepherdess, an energetic and strongly built widow and her middle-aged daughter whose Bedouin garb was quite incapable of concealing her wonderful buxom figure and radiant face.
We had a rich and filling breakfast together, and then the shaykh informed the two women that I needed privacy and quiet. He asked them both to look after me. He then embraced me, wished me luck and success in my project, and said farewell. He promised to come back for a visit when time allowed and to serve as my very first reader.
Now I was left on my own in this large house which opened up on to fields, trees, crops and animals. I began to prepare myself for the project I had been contemplating. I was fully aware, needless to say, that the things I was going to record were merely the tip of an iceberg; I would have to allow for lapses of fact or memory and acknowledge that it would be utterly impossible to cover everything. I now started spending the whole day writing, although for part of the time I would go for walks and contemplate or else have brief, innocuous conversations with the widow. I intentionally kept my relationship with her daughter chaste and proper so that I could retain the respect of her mother and the shaykh as well.
My Torturess
1. The Shock and Terror Cellar
I have no real memory of what happened or how I came to find myself in this detention center where I have been squeezed into a solitary cell for three whole years. All I can recall is that three masked men who said they were from the secret police dragged me out of my bookstore — where I lived, put a lock on it, and then led me to a grimy car with dirty number-plates. Shoving me inside, they blindfolded me, then gave me an injection of some kind that made me lose consciousness very quickly. When I came round, I could sense that there were other people around me along with a loud noise that may well have been the sound of a helicopter.
Through my drugged haze I could make out a man, but not well enough to recognize him. He hurriedly gave me another injection, and the next thing I remember is having photographs taken of me naked from every angle. I was then given a blue prisoner’s uniform and put it on when told to do so by an orderly. In the reception hall I had to hand over to him my suit, shirt, watch, wallet, card, and leather shoes, all of which were duly recorded in a register that I had to sign. He asked me to tell him what one plus one equaled.