Gandhi told Alice they were a strange bunch of people.
He told her the Reverend’s followers were a bunch of idiots, smiling all the time.
“They always want to prove how happy they are.”
Gandhi was pleased with them. A never-ending supply of shoes and smiles. He’d smile back at them, but always with some hesitancy. He didn’t quite know what to do in order not to spoil their happiness for them. Should he smile, or listen, or pretend he was completely wrapped up in his work?
They’d come, stand with their shoes on his shoe-shine box, and talk incessantly. They’d ask him about his work and his children and he’d answer them as best he could. Gandhi spoke about that blond bearded man in particular, who never stopped asking questions. He’d ask him about his village, his father, his grandfather, his opinion about Beirut.
“I don’t know anything,” Gandhi would answer.
“This is exactly what I’m interested in,” the man said. “I’m very interested in simplicity; philosophy these days is all about discovering simplicity.”
He started visiting Gandhi at his humble house and eating with him. He’d sit on the wooden bench inside his small house, talking and asking questions.
“I look for life wherever I can find it.”
The blond bearded man told everyone he had discovered the simple life through Gandhi, that Gandhi was like Jesus, and that the poor were the salt of the earth.
Once Gandhi was in church.
Gandhi didn’t know why he agreed with the Reverend Amin to go to church. He was a “son of a gun,” as he said, but that wasn’t enough justification for going. Maybe this young bearded man attracted him with his simplicity and his womanlike tenderness; or maybe it was that he wanted to see how they prayed; or because he thought there couldn’t be any danger in the matter; or because he couldn’t find a good reason not to.
“No problem,” he said to the Reverend Amin.
“Sunday, nine o’clock,” the Reverend said.
“Sunday,” Gandhi answered.
Gandhi sat in the back and didn’t understand a thing. He watched while they chanted and shook their heads and bodies. “It’s like watching TV,” he said to Alice. And suddenly the show ended. They all sat down as the Reverend Amin closed his eyes and began to pray. Soon afterward, the bearded fellow climbed up to the pulpit and spoke about simplicity. The Reverend Amin was sitting in an aisle seat and the bearded man stood, giving his sermon and pointing up with his index finger. His sermon was in perfect classical Arabic, half of which was lost on Gandhi. His voice was shaking and you could see the veins in his neck popping out. His hand went up and down as he said, “Blessed are the meek.” Everyone sat in their seats muttering “hmmm” as if they understood.
“Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. / Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. / Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. / Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled. / Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. / Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God. / Blessed are …”
He’d say “blessed” and point with his finger, and the heads would turn to the back where Gandhi was sitting. Gandhi felt like a dog and soon found himself leaving the church. Their glances pierced through his face, and so he got scared and went out of the church, leaving the bearded young man on the pulpit caught up in his own words.
Gandhi told the Reverend Amin he had gotten scared.
The Reverend laughed. “Don’t worry about it,” he said, putting his foot up on the shoe-shine box. “That young man is very zealous. He doesn’t know how he should speak. God forgive him.”
“God forgive everyone, but tell him to get off my back.”
“Be patient, man,” the Reverend said.
“God grant you a long life, Reverend. You all speak English. I don’t understand a word. What’s-his-name starts speaking Arabic like he’s speaking English. I don’t understand a word, I …”
Gandhi laughed and his hands finished the sentence for him.
The Reverend Amin agreed. He wanted Gandhi, but he hated this sort of simplicity the Americans are good at putting on. He hated simplicity when it came to his wife, Eugenie, for she always spoke cautiously, twisting her jaws in order to prevent the letter alef from sounding mellow the way everyone in Beirut pronounced it. She’d lower her voice and put her hand over her mouth to hide her smile. Yet, in spite of her meekness and simplicity, she hated the poor, despised them. As for the Reverend Amin, he hadn’t visited his brothers and sisters for some time. His mother had died, and his cobbler brother had immigrated to Saudi Arabia. His second brother fled from Tiberias when Palestine fell and lived in the family house. Madame Eugenie, however, didn’t care for him or his wife and children, because they were like poor people’s children.
Amin agreed, for he no longer knew how to talk to his brother, or any of his relatives for that matter. He’d become like his wife’s family, raising the alef and speaking English and forgetting.
Gandhi told the Reverend Amin to forget it. “Forget the whole thing. If you don’t want me, I’ll pick up my shoe-shine box and go. God’s world is a big place, you know.”
The Reverend Amin didn’t say anything. He told him not to go and explained about the bearded young man and why the people got mad at him.
“This guy had just come from America. He studied philosophy and wanted to prove how smart he was.”
“But I can’t,” Gandhi said.
“You’re right, my son. I can’t either. Don’t be upset.”
Gandhi agreed to forgive the bearded young man and forgive him his sins, and to stop spitting on the ground whenever he saw him walking in the streets.
The bearded young man was a spy. That’s what Madame Nuha Aoun told him as she gave him her black-and-white shoe with the perforations; the one Gandhi had such a hard time polishing and would save for the end so he could take his time with it.
“He’s a spy, Mr. Gandhi,” Nuha said. “They’re all spies. But their days are numbered. Soon France will come to our rescue and save us from all this garbage.”
Gandhi wasn’t sure if she was talking about the Reverend Amin and his friends or the Americans who were all over Bliss Street with their shorts and their dogs.
All of that was over. Time passed by all of them like the blinking of an eye. The Americans left and the Reverend Amin started wetting his pants, and his church had been transformed into a warehouse for al-Munla and his gang. Zaylaa was the one who made the decision. After everything was stolen from the church immediately after an armed battle between the various organizations in the area on the fifth and sixth of June 1980, which led to a lot of destruction, misfortune, and looting, Zaylaa, who was king of the hill, decided the church could be used for a number of purposes. He gave it to al-Munla to use as a storage space for clothes Abu Saeed was importing from Hong Kong and Taiwan and selling as European goods.
Alice said the Reverend’s condition had deteriorated strangely. She said she saw him the previous Sunday — that was Sunday, the seventh of July, 1980. The Reverend Amin walked aimlessly in the streets. His pants were dirty and nearly falling off of him. He walked, carrying a black book. I saw him, she said. I saw him open the door of the church with his long key and go in. He left the door open and walked over the piles of pants and shirts. He stopped in front of the pulpit, opened his book, and started reading things about Jerusalem and the prophets.