‘What about infidelity?’
‘If they are married they will be killed by stoning. If they are unmarried the punishment is one hundred lashes, and they must marry. If one of them is married, and it is the man, and the woman is unmarried, he must take her for his second wife. If she is married and he is unmarried, the woman will be killed and the man whipped and put in prison,’ the constable says. ‘But I sometimes look through my fingers with that too. It might be widows, who need the money. Then I try to help them. Get them on an even keel again.’
‘Yes, you’re talking about prostitutes, but what about normal people?’
‘Once we surprised a couple in a car. We, or rather the parents, forced them to marry,’ he says. ‘That was fair, don’t you think? After all, we’re not the Taliban,’ says the constable. ‘We must try to avoid stoning people. The Afghans have suffered enough.’
Mansur leaves the police station deep in thought. The chief constable gave him a three-day deadline. He can still pardon the sinner, but if it goes further, it’ll be too late. Mansur is not in a mood to return to the shop, but goes home for lunch, a very rare occurrence. He throws himself down on a mat, and thank God, for the sake of peace, food is ready.
‘Take your shoes off,’ his mother says.
‘Go to hell,’ Mansur answers.
‘Mansur, you must obey your mother,’ Sharifa continues. Mansur does not answer but lies down on the floor, one foot in the air, crossed over the other. He keeps his shoes on. His mother pinches her mouth tight.
‘We must decide what to do with the carpenter,’ Mansur says. He lights a cigarette, and his mother starts to cry. Mansur would never, ever, light up in front of his father. But as soon as his father is out of the house, he not only takes pleasure in smoking but also in irritating his mother by smoking before, during and after the meal. The little room is thick with smoke. Bibi Gul has been complaining for a long time how impolite he is to his mother. But this time desire takes over, she stretches out her hand and whispers: ‘Can I have one?’
Silence descends. Is grandmother starting to smoke?
‘Mummy,’ Leila cries and tears the cigarette out of her hand. Mansur gives her another one and Leila leaves the room in protest. Bibi Gul sits happily puffing away, laughing quietly. She even stops the rocking to and fro and holds the cigarette high up in the air, inhaling deeply. ‘I’ll eat less,’ Bibi Gul explains.
‘Release him,’ she says after having enjoyed the cigarette. ‘He’s had his punishment, his father’s beating, the shame, and anyhow he gave the postcards back.’
‘Did you see his children? How are they going to manage without their father’s income?’ Sharifa supports her.
‘We might be responsible for his children’s death,’ says Leila who has returned once her mother has stubbed out the cigarette. ‘What if they get ill and cannot afford a doctor, then they’ll die because of us, or they might die of starvation,’ she says. ‘And anyhow, the carpenter might die in prison. Many never make it through the six years. It’s riddled with infection, tuberculosis and lots of other illnesses. ’
‘Show mercy,’ says Bibi Gul.
Mansur phones Sultan in Pakistan on his newly acquired mobile phone. He asks for permission to release the carpenter. The room is silent; everyone is listening to the conversation.
They hear Sultan’s voice shouting from Pakistan: ‘He wants to ruin my business, undermine prices. I paid him well. There was no need to steal. He’s a crook. He’s guilty and the truth will have to be beaten out of him. No one, but no one will get away with destroying my business.’
‘He might get six years! His children might be dead when he gets out,’ Mansur shouts back.
‘If he gets sixty years, I couldn’t care less. He is going to suffer until he tells me who he has sold the cards to.’
‘That’s something you can say because your tummy’s full,’ Mansur yells. ‘I cry when I think of those scraggy children of his. His family are finished.’
‘How dare you contradict your father!’ Sultan screams down the line. Everyone in the room knows his voice and knows that his face is puce with anger and his whole body shaking. ‘What sort of a son are you? You are to obey me in everything, everything. What’s wrong with you? Why are you rude to your father?’
Mansur’s face shows the inner battle he is fighting. He has never done anything but what his father demands of him. That is, of the things his father knows about. He has never faced him in open confrontation; he quite simply does not dare incite his father’s wrath.
‘All right,’ he says and puts the phone down. The family is silent. Mansur swears.
‘He has a heart of stone,’ Sharifa sighs. Sonya is silent.
Every morning and every evening the carpenter’s family arrives. Sometimes it’s the grandmother, other times the mother, the aunt or the wife. One or two of the children are always with them. They get the same answer each time. Sultan decides. When he gets home all will sort itself out. But they know that is not true; Sultan has already passed his verdict.
In the end they can take it no longer. They do not open the door but sit quietly, pretending they are not at home. Mansur goes to the local police station to ask for a postponement; he wants to wait for his father’s return; he will take care of it. But the chief constable cannot wait any longer. The metre-square cell cannot house prisoners for more than a few days. Once again they ask the carpenter to admit that he took more postcards and to tell them whom he sold them to, but he refuses. Jalaluddin is handcuffed and led out of the little mud hut.
As the local police station has no car, it falls on Mansur to drive the carpenter to the central police station in Kabul.
Outside are the carpenter’s father, son and grandmother. When Mansur arrives they approach him hesitatingly. Mansur hates every moment. In Sultan’s absence he is having to act as the callous judge.
‘I am only doing as my father has told me,’ he excuses himself, puts on his sunglasses and sits in the car. The grandmother and the little son return home. The father mounts his rickety bicycle and follows Mansur’s car. He is not giving up and wants to follow his son as far as he can. They see his upright silhouette disappear behind them.
Mansur drives slower than usual. It might be many years before the carpenter sees these streets again.
They reach the central police station. During the Taliban era this was one of the most hated buildings in Kabul. Here, at the Department for the Promotion of Virtue and Extermination of Sin, better known as the ministry of morality, the religious police had their headquarters. Men were brought here whose beards or trousers were too short, women who had walked down a street with men other than their relatives, women who had walked alone, women who wore make-up under the burka. For weeks on end they might languish in the basements before being moved to other gaols, or acquitted. When the Taliban left, the remand cells were opened and the prisoners freed. Cables and canes were found which had been used as instruments of torture. The men were beaten naked; women could drape a sheet around themselves when being tortured. Before the Taliban, first the brutal Soviet intelligence service, then the chaotic police force of the Mujahedeen had occupied the building.
The carpenter mounts the massive steps to the fifth floor. He tries to walk beside Mansur and looks pleadingly at him. His eyes seem to have grown during the week he was incarcerated. The beseeching eyes seem to bulge out of his head. ‘Forgive me, forgive me. I’ll work for you for nothing for the rest of my life. Forgive me.’
Mansur looks straight ahead. He must not buckle now. Sultan has given his verdict and he cannot contradict Sultan. He might be disinherited, thrown out of the house. He feels already that his brother has become Sultan’s favourite. Eqbal can learn computing, Eqbal has been promised a bicycle. If Mansur opposes him now Sultan might sever all ties with him. However much he feels for the carpenter, he cannot risk that.