Читать книгу Prayer for the Living - Ben Okri - Страница 9

Boko Haram (1)

They strapped the bomb around his chest and buttoned up his shirt. His father was with them. When the boy looked up at him, his father smiled. Together they recited the words of the prophet.

The father stood there and watched as they led the boy away. He prayed that the boy would be brave and would do what he had been told. He knew the rewards in paradise were great. He could see the rewards already.

At the marketplace they let the boy go. He wandered a few steps and looked back. They stared at him brightly. Then he walked unsteadily past the fish sellers and the cloth merchants and the women who sold provisions on a cloth on the floor. Some of them knew him and called out to him. But he went on walking. He looked steadily ahead. Sweat formed in beads on his forehead.

He went to the center of the marketplace, where it was busiest. As he walked he recited the words they had taught him. They were not words from the Koran. They were words given to him by the men from the sect. He recited the words in the heat and noise of the market. Then he stood in the center and waited.

He did not know what he was waiting for. They had only told him that when he was in the center of the marketplace he was to wait. He was not to look at anyone. He was not to speak to anyone. He was only to recite under his breath the words he had been given.

He did not know about the scattered fragments of limbs and the ripped earth as the bomb tore up the marketplace. He did not know about it because he was still saying the words he had been given when it exploded.