Читать книгу When The Stars Fall To Earth - Rebecca BSL Tinsley - Страница 11

Sheik Muhammad’s village, Darfur

At five forty the following morning Zara awoke with a jolt, gripping her blanket tightly with both hands. She sat up, awake and alert, even though the grey dawn light was only just seeping into her hut. Her two half-sisters, with whom she shared the hut, were also emerging from sleep, startled and asking what was going on. Then, at the same moment, each girl realized what had woken them—the deep drumming of horses’ hooves. They scrambled from their beds, heading for the door, pulling their blankets around their shoulders like robes.

The air in their compound was already filled with dust, stirred up by the horses, as if a sandstorm had swept across the valley, engulfing their village. Through the dirty, swirling cloud came guttural, rasping, Arabic shouts: “Get up, you lazy slaves! Get out of here!”

There was a whooshing noise frighteningly close to her right ear, and something landed on the roof with a thump. Zara’s knees went weak, and she thought she was about to faint from fear. But instead she ran faster than she knew possible, followed by her half-sisters, all of them too terrified to look back.

Zara’s father appeared at the door of his hut, scanning the compound, confused. Seeing the flaming torch on the roof of his daughters’ hut, he rushed to the girls, hugging them. An instant later her mother and her grandfather were there too, comforting them, stroking their hair.

“They’re brave girls,” her father commented, blinking tears from his hazel eyes. “And quick too, thank God.”

They stood watching trails of smoke rising from the thatch roof of Zara’s hut. Hundreds of insects that made their home in the densely-packed dried grass stirred, emerging like a hazy layer that hovered uncertainly above. Then suddenly the flames crept across it in a smooth blue and yellow wave. No one rushed to fetch buckets of water because they knew it was too late. Within three minutes the thatch had been consumed by a roaring, snapping fire. Ten minutes after the torch was thrown, the hut was a sizzling, blackened shell.

“What about Cloudy?” asked Zara, recalling that her half-brother had spent the night minding the recently purchased livestock in their field beyond the village. She felt her heart lurch as she wondered how well concealed he had been.

Zara’s older brother, Abdelatif, turned to their grandfather. “I’m going to check on Cloudy. We should warn him what’s going on.”

Zara’s pulse began to race at the prospect of her tall, skinny brother confronting the Janjaweed. Although she had never told him, she thought of Abdelatif as an egret, a long-limbed, graceful bird with a small head, thin neck and angular features, not as a fighter or a tough guy. Was her father really going to allow eighteen-year-old Abdelatif to put himself in danger? She wished everything would slow down for a moment. Most of all, she wanted to rewind time and stop the creeping fear flooding her veins. She squeezed her eyes closed and hung on to her father.

“Is it safe to leave the village yet?” Zara asked.

“It’s over,” remarked Sheikh Muhammad. “They’ve delivered their message, loud and clear.”

Zara noticed her grandfather’s voice sounded strained, as she had never heard it before. She was even more alarmed when her beloved Abdelatif walked out of the compound, his head held high. She prayed her grandfather would have second thoughts and stop him, but the sheikh was already talking to the villagers who had gathered at the gate.

“God is merciful, and thankfully no one was hurt,” Muhammad told the local men, his voice suddenly calm and reassuring once more. “The Janjaweed won’t come back today. Go home and be with your families.”

A moment ago, Zara thought, her grandfather had been shaking with fury, but he now had himself under control. Even if he was doubtful and afraid, she knew he would be strong in the presence of the others. Slowly the crowd shook itself out of its collective shock and people wandered off to get on with their day.

Her hands were still quivering as she ate her breakfast of porridge from the communal bowl. She felt a further tremor of dread as she realized that everyone in their village had been living in a happy bubble in which Janjaweed attacks happened to other Darfuris, but not to them.

We’re all blind fools, she thought. We’ll have to leave our village, just like millions of others across Darfur; just like the caravans of people we’ve seen passing by our village, on their way to the refugee camps. This is it, she realized, terrified and yet too stunned to cry or express her fears. The time had come to be strong like her grandfather. She carried the porridge bowl to the kitchen hut, resolving to wash it, and do all her other tasks and errands, before her mother asked her to.

* * *

Cloudy was already awake and eating breakfast when the Janjaweed appeared. He had slept badly, unaccustomed to bedding down with just a blanket, outdoors. Nevertheless he was in a cheerful mood, humming an Egyptian pop song he had heard on the radio the previous day.

He was planning to return home to the village as soon as one of his brothers came out to take over goat-minding duties. When he heard the crack of branches behind him he assumed one of his family had arrived. He turned, a smile on his lips, only to find a horse before him. A teenaged boy was in the saddle, a rifle resting awkwardly at his hip. Although the rider wore a scarf pulled up over his nose, Cloudy recognized his eyes. He was an Arab boy from the next village. Cloudy couldn’t recall his name but they had played on opposite sides in several soccer games recently. They greeted each other but the rider’s friendliness was rapidly replaced by a fearful expression. He raised his hand, as if motioning Cloudy away, but at that moment three more men on horseback crashed through the brush, coming to a halt at the Arab boy’s side. Then suddenly the air around them was filled with the noise of shouting, snapping branches, and horses hooves.

“What are you waiting for?” demanded one of the older riders who had drawn up at one side of the young horseman.

“I know him,” the young rider replied quietly. “He’s my friend.”

The older rider spat on the ground in disgust. “Don’t be so feeble,” he grumbled, raising his rifle in one smooth, practiced motion and shooting Cloudy without a moment’s hesitation. “Don’t let me see you do that again,” he warned the young man. “Now help us get these goats together, boy!”

* * *

An hour and a half later, Abdelatif returned to his grandfather’s compound, his long white robe filthy.

“What took you so long? Are the animals okay?” Muhammad asked. “What happened? Speak!”

“They’re gone,” Abdelatif explained, avoiding the sheikh’s eyes. “The Janjaweed stole them all.”

Sheikh Muhammad turned away, shaking his head. His fists gripped by his sides, he started to walk away in anger. “Grandfather,” Abdelatif called after him. “There’s more?”

“It’s Cloudy.”

The sheikh’s eyes widened. “What?”

“He’s dead. They killed him.” Abdelatif shook his head, glancing away, his eyes filling.

“Oh no,” Sheikh Muhammad wailed, his hands covering his face. After a moment he glanced toward the hut of his third wife, Cloudy’s mother, bracing himself for the heartbreaking task ahead of him.

Zara felt a slight push in the small of her back. She looked around and her father gave her a single nod of encouragement. She stepped forward and into her grandfather’s arms, grasping him tightly, her eyes closed, her head against his chest, listening to him mutter his prayers to God. She joined in, praying for her half-brother Cloudy. And she prayed for her grandfather and his third wife, who must now endure such pain. I’m so scared, she thought. Please God, help me to be brave.

Zara’s mother turned to her husband. She was a short woman, whose arched eyebrows and high forehead gave her the appearance of being permanently surprised. This morning, Zara noticed, she looked ten years older. “How did they know to look there for the goats? I thought they were hidden.”

“Only our people knew where they were.” He indicated the village around them with a nod. “And Uthman’s family,” he added.

Sheikh Muhammad patted Zara’s shoulders and pulled away. “Look what they’ve done to our family,” he said, his lower lip trembling. Then he studied the smoking remains of Zara’s hut. “We’re citizens of Sudan, and the authorities should be protecting us,” he announced, his voice suddenly clear.

Zara’s father snorted with astonishment. “We’d do better joining the rebels and killing these dogs, just like they kill us.”

“I shall go and see these rulers of ours and demand they intervene.”

Zara stared at her grandfather in disbelief. The vast majority of Sudanese, be they Arab or African, nomad or farmer, town dweller or villager, young or old, avoided armed representatives of the Khartoum regime at all costs. In each district there were much-feared agents of the National Security and Intelligence Services, either in uniform or mingling with the locals, reporting back conversations and activities that were interpreted as unhelpful to the paranoid and suspicious military dictatorship. When people spoke of “the security” they meant the National Security and Intelligence Services’ armed officers and their spies, supported by the army and the police: they all worked together, the long arm of the ever-present Khartoum regime.

“Right after the burial ceremony we’ll go talk to them,” the sheikh continued.

Abdelatif cleared his throat. “Grandfather, I’ve already buried him, to stop the vultures,” he added. Seeing Sheikh Muhammad’s astonished expression he continued, “And it’s not safe out there anymore.”

“But this is our land,” the sheikh thundered, his hands gripped in tight fists. “And we bury people with dignity, just as we have for centuries.”

Zara felt as if the earth was shifting beneath her feet: the man she relied on for wisdom, above all others, had abruptly lost his sure touch. Even she, a fourteen-year-old, had grasped that the war was about to alter everything. Customs such as burial ceremonies would be sacrificed on the altar of self-preservation. And going to see the very security services waging war against them was not a wise move.

The sheikh shook his head, slowly retreating to the home of Cloudy’s mother. A moment later Zara’s blood ran cold as she heard a wail of disbelief from within the hut. She busied herself, helping her mother shell some beans, but the sound of anguished sobbing filled her mind.

Fifteen minutes later, Muhammad emerged, his eyes sunken and bloodshot, his demeanor suddenly that of an old man. Zara watched as he glanced around the compound, and then pulled himself upright once more, willing himself into his role as their leader.

“Are you coming with me?” he asked Zara’s father.

“They’ll laugh at us.”

“It’s my duty to demand that our security forces protect us. It’ll be a matter of record that we asked for help. I’ll warn them that if they don’t protect us we’ll have no choice but to take up arms and kill the Janjaweed when they return.”

“But the Janjaweed, the Sudanese army and police, the security services—they’re one and the same. You said so yourself.”

“Then let them tell me that to my face.”

Zara saw her father’s eyes go glassy, a sure sign he disagreed, but accepted that it was not his place to argue further.

Zara stood at her mother’s side, watching her grandfather and father ride off on their donkeys, heading toward the district headquarters of the Sudanese army.

“Bye,” she called out after them. Inside she was shaking with fear and uncertainty.

Zara’s mother made no comment on the expedition, but, as usual, she disguised her concern by tackling domestic chores. “Let’s make your father his favorite dish,” she began in a cheerful tone that was so strained, Zara thought her mother might scream at any moment. “You go and get some lentils.”

Zara did as she was told, praying frantically that her father and grandfather would return in time to enjoy the evening meal.