‘And ever since then,’ he concluded, ‘salt oozes from my skin when I tell stories of the sea.’ And he reached his wrinkled brown hand out to me. ‘Taste it,’ he said, smiling. I licked it carefully, and sure enough, his hand was as salty as the sea at the foot of the monastery of Christ the Redeemer.”
BOOK OF LONELINESS I
Loneliness is death’s twin brother.
THE MEDITERRANEAN COAST, 1953 — 1956
114. The Journey
Arriving as suddenly as a summer storm, a small truck with no licence plate appeared on the winding road, overtook the bus, and came to a halt right across the carriageway. The words “secret service” went back and forth among the passengers. The bus driver braked sharply and cursed under his breath. A bearded traveller and a stout woman, sitting on the front seats near the door, trod on invisible pedals in parallel with him and noisily sucked air in through their teeth. The vehicle lurched to one side, and didn’t come to rest until it reached the soft verge of the road. Gravel fell to the abyss below.
Seconds later the bus was surrounded by four armed men in civilian clothes, while two more searched the passengers. A large, handsomely ornamented dagger earned its owner a slap in the face. After taking his punishment the peasant, a figure of impressive masculinity, stared dejectedly out of the side window. The consolations offered by his neighbours didn’t get through to him; the dagger was all he had inherited from his late father.
Cameras were also frowned upon in the mountains where rebels held sway. An Egyptian tourist had to hand over his, with all the films. Smuggled goods, however, didn’t interest the inspectors. They were looking for books, newspapers and weapons.
Colonel Shaklan had hardly any allies left in Damascus in this, the fourth year of his dictatorship. The army was muttering more and more audibly. Riots and mutinies were breaking out everywhere. The secret service was the one weapon he had left. When he sent it in, death would not be far behind.
A young teacher was hauled out of the bus for hiding a French newspaper. From the angry abuse hurled at him, the other passengers gathered that the newspaper carried an article about a Syrian government in exile in Baghdad. The young man was kicked and pushed into the truck. Everyone could clearly hear his pleas.
Only after this prelude did the first lieutenant in charge of the party get into the bus himself. It was baking hot by now in the July sun. Almost politely, he demanded to see the passengers’ papers. He was charming to the children. His gaze moved back and forth between the passengers’ ID and his lists.
On coming to a bearded doctor he asked, in passing, what would cure his migraine. The doctor hesitated, fearing that the question was a trap. Everyone waited with bated breath for his answer.
“Aspirin,” he said at last, hoarsely, swallowing hard. “Don’t smoke too much, no alcohol, and get plenty of sleep.”
The officer laughed and shook his head. His laughter gave all the passengers a moment’s respite. Some heaved a sigh of relief, others cast a quick glance at the photos in their ID cards, as if they feared they might find forged papers there.
Farid felt no fear, and even enjoyed the sight of his father’s pallor. Elias kept muttering to himself, “We ought to have taken the coastal road, it’s safer.” When things went wrong he liked to use the first person plural, as if to avoid taking the blame himself. Claire had recommended the coastal road, but it meant a longer journey, and as usual his father was in a hurry. Farid had to get up at four in the morning, so that his father could be back in Damascus at eight that evening for a meeting of the confectioners’ association.
Encouraged by his undaunted passengers, the bus driver had overtaken trucks and other buses on the good blacktop road going north from Damascus. After four hours, he had turned off and taken the protesting vehicle up the endlessly winding country road, which was more detritus and potholes than asphalt.
Worse than the potholes, however, were the many checkpoints. Farid had counted four barriers guarded by soldiers along a twenty-kilometre stretch.
An elderly smith sitting on the other side of the aisle had told Farid’s father that the region was under the control of a rebel called Tanios. Whole villages and forests had once belonged to a single clan. The peasants had attacked it again and again, but they had all been butchered until this man Tanios came along. He was a Christian, although hostile tongues said he was in league with the devil. Under his influence, the young peasants suddenly became brave as lions. Even Muslims flocked to join him, crazy men who now bore arms too. What poor soldier was going to hold out against the rebels here for the ridiculous wage of fourteen lira a month?
115. Tanios and Asma
Only later did Farid learn that until Tanios’s uprising, the peasants of this mountain region had not been allowed to have lights in their houses. And every virgin had to spend her wedding night with the landowner — she couldn’t be taken home by her bridegroom until next morning. It was the custom of the droit de seigneur, entitling the master to the first night.
Tanios was a proud man, and he loved Asma. At their betrothal, he swore to her before friends that Sheikh Mustafa, the mighty owner of the whole area, would never touch her. They were to marry at Easter. Tanios bought black patent leather shoes in the nearby harbour town of Latakia, and at Asma’s wish he was going to wear them at the wedding. He spent his entire savings, for he liked nothing in the world better than seeing tears of joy in his bride’s eyes.
On the wedding day Asma stared spellbound at his patent leather shoes the whole time. What her bridegroom promised, he performed. Suddenly, in the middle of the Kyrie eleison, she longed for the touch of his hands on her naked skin.
But two birds of ill omen were waiting outside the church, Sheikh Mustafa’s black-clad guards, saying that they had come to fetch the bride and the patent leather shoes, for only great men might wear shoes like that.
Tanios roared, “Now death will taste sweet as honey!”, and that roar echoed through the mountains for weeks to come. He fell on the two messengers like a lion and killed them. Thereupon hundreds of angry peasants and serfs stormed Mustafa’s magnificent estate as if they were drunk on blood, killing him and his three sons. They drove his three wives and ten daughters away. When the peasants saw how easy it was to murder a lord, they conquered two more mountainous valleys.
Only in the valley of the Three Rivers was the onward march of the rebel peasants halted, for here they met with the troops of another rebel called Salman Sufi, who ruled the mountain chain down to the Mediterranean. The government was still partly in control of the road leading through the mountains to the sea, but no more.
The peasants who followed Tanios divided the land and money they had taken between them, and they all bought patent leather shoes to wear every Sunday. And now they also lit lamps in their houses. Asma was the first poor peasant’s wife to lose her virginity in a night of love.
When Colonel Shaklan, the son of a small farmer himself, carried out his coup and made himself president, he felt sympathy for Tanios, whose heroic story had spread like wildfire. He wrote him a letter saying that the feudal period was over, the peasants could safely place their cause in the hands of the father of their country and lay down their arms. He, President of the Republic and father of the great Syrian family, gave Tanios his word that the government wished for peace with him. All he, Shaklan, wanted was Salman Sufi’s head.