The Elusive Fox, Page 5

  Resisting the urge to sleep, I jumped up from the sand and ran like a lunatic toward the sea. Once I had taken the plunge, I looked back to see whether anyone was paying any attention to me. In fact, someone was, but she was staring at me from far away and laughing. Her breasts were as white as wax. She too jumped up, ran towards me, and plunged in the water.

  “Terrific!” she said. “It’s so wonderful to swim with trees all around. Do you know this place? We’ve been coming here ever since we arrived at Essaouira.”

  “No, I don’t know it,” I replied. “I usually get to hear of places where people swim naked, but I came here just by chance.”

  “There’s another place,” she said, “but it’s crowded.”

  “What about the gendarmes?” I asked her. “Don’t they bother you?”

  “I’ve never seen any of them here,” she replied. “You should try swimming at night under the full moon. This place is Heaven itself. Why don’t you come with us tonight after we’ve smoked some hashish at the Danish place?”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  With that I dived into the sea and watched her moving her arms through the water. She kept diving and kicking with her legs in the air. Then her head would appear again.

  “Come over here,” she yelled. “Every time I move forward,” she added, “the weight of water on my body shifts.”

  I didn’t listen to her. Instead I decided to surrender my body to the small waves and let them push me toward the sand; and then to do it all over again. When I didn’t comply with her wishes, she came over and began doing the same thing as me. Some waves managed to make us crash into each other; at one point she managed to cling to my waist. Putting my hands on her shoulders, I pushed her down as hard as I could, but she managed to slip away with a laugh.

  “Do you want to drown me?” she asked. “I don’t want to die. I’m still young. There are lots of things I’d still like to see in this life.”

  I had no desire to kill her. Maybe she was joking, maybe not. At that particular moment at least, I could not conceive of the idea, the very notion in fact, of killing anyone, even one of my very worst enemies. I am well aware of the fact that we often feel like murdering certain people: political enemies, wives, cheating lovers, rivals, and villains. But this girl did not belong to any of those categories, so I had never thought about killing her, especially at this particular moment. I could not hurt a single soul, even though I sometimes tell myself that hurting someone is simply a reaction; and as those reactions intensify, evil consequences emerge. But this time my reaction had no evil intent; I was simply playing a joke. She laughed and plunged back into the water. I did likewise and kept my eyes open, but I could not keep it up for long. I rubbed my eyes and stood there watching as she frolicked like a seal. She kept shouting at me, but I didn’t dare join her. Getting out of the water, I sat on the wet sand. The horizon was far away, and the trees extended into the distance, leaving the sun and all-pervasive quiet. When she joined me, she threw herself down by my side.

  “Awesome!” she said. “The water’s great. Now I’m tired.”

  “You swim like a shark,” I told her.

  “Have you ever seen one?” she asked. “They scare me.”

  “Only in pictures.”

  “Have you ever eaten shark meat?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. I can’t remember.”

  She was totally naked. I tried placing my hands between my thighs to cover myself, but she did not do the same. I could feel a gentle breeze tickling the space between my thighs. I preferred to go over to where the sand was hot.

  “Now I’d like a cigarette,” she said. “After a swim, I really enjoy a good smoke.”

  “I don’t have any hashish on me,” I said.

  “Don’t worry about it,” she replied, “We have a big piece. Kristin bought it yesterday.”

  “Have you had a good breakfast?” I asked. “You need to eat something before smoking.”

  “I always eat well. Don’t worry about me.”

  She walked ahead of me. I amused myself by throwing seashells into the water, something I never used to do. For a while, I ran on the wet sand and kicked the waves with my feet. Then I decided to catch up with her. Near my clothes pile was a Moroccan girl getting undressed. I recognized her. After first she was taken aback, but after a moment’s hesitation she carried on taking her clothes off. I didn’t say anything to her. People said she was from Meknes, married, divorced, and now a drug dealer. Her looks kept pushing me away—another reaction—but I did not do the same. Her body looked bronzed and desirable. I told myself I could not do it with her even if they killed me. I had never seen her smile at a Moroccan. Only her husband might know why she never smiled at Moroccans. I lay down on the hot sand next to them, but said nothing. I kept peeping at the Moroccan woman’s body. Her pubic hair was like a coal-black bush. A sumptuous body, not moving in the sunshine, frozen in place like a statue discarded on the beach.

  “Do you smoke?” I heard a voice ask from behind me.

  I grabbed the cigarette, took two quick puffs, then gave it back to the person that handed it to me without even looking behind me. I was looking straight ahead at the statue spread-eagled on the sand, totally unable to guess what she might be thinking about. I tried but failed. I could still remember the disgust she had shown at the Café Hippy whenever any Moroccan tried to approach her. The way she used to flirt with the secret police was weird; every time they wanted her, they took her away to the police station. They all desired her body, so much so that for them she became common property. She would certainly behave the same way if we were waylaid by the gendarmes between the trees. Just then she stood up and strutted proudly toward the sea.

  “Do you like her?” I heard a voice behind me. “She has a beautiful body.”

  “No,” I replied, “She’s not my type.”

  “Even so, she’s beautiful.”

  “If only she wanted to be one of my girlfriends!” the young man said.

  “Why don’t you catch up with her?” I said. “Maybe she won’t say no.”

  As I said that, I looked at his buttocks drooping on the hot sand. As she played in the water, he kept tracking her with his eyes. As far as I could tell, not a single vein in his body was pulsing; he had been castrated long ago, and all he could do was talk—without any genuine desire. “I’m just kidding,” he said. “I don’t like sex without love.”

  “Have you ever been in love?”

  “Yes, I have,” he replied. “In fact, I still love one woman. I’ll never love anyone else.”

  “You’re a romantic,” I replied.

  “Could be,” he said. “We should give our lives a different impulse. We don’t have to do whatever other people do.”

  “That’s his viewpoint,” I told myself. “He may well be right.”

  I cannot be sure how other people used to live in the past. Books and love poems might all be that sincere. But even if they do manage to convey a picture of a specific mind-set that was current at one particular time, they cannot possibly provide any information about dead people’s hidden intentions, whether they happened to be pompous, dreamers, tyrants, oppressed folk, misers, or generous patrons. Ah, me! They are all dead. It never occurred to them that they would die . . . what an awful feeling, have such thoughts about death while life is embodied right here, among trees, close to the sea, in an empty spot. Now I will go back to that bronzed body. “Here it is,” I will say, “strutting before my very eyes. She walks with both poise and confidence, just like the wives of government officials in a public market. The only things she’s missing are clothes and servants.”

  “She’s the most beautiful woman I’ve seen here,” the young man said again.

  “You’re right,” the two girls responded in unison.

  “Poor woman,” I commented. “The police keep on needing her.”

  “Does she like that?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “If s
he’s forced to do that, then it’s dreadful, inhuman. They’ve no right to behave like that.”

  “They’re the same everywhere,” the young man replied. “You’ve no idea. Once a policeman was charged with raping a thirteen-year-old girl in Nice.”

  “How dreadful!” she said. “That’s barbaric!”

  The Moroccan woman lay down on the sand and placed her shirt over her pubic hair, leaving her breasts exposed. She did not talk to anyone, frozen once again like a statue. She might have fallen asleep. When I rested my head and closed my eyes, rainbow colors danced in front of them.

  Close by someone turned on a transistor radio, and I heard soft rock music.

  “Hey, look over there,” one of the girls said. “Are those men shepherds? They’ve been staring at us for some time from behind those bushes.”

  I raised my head. About five bedouin were laughing behind the bushes, but the hippies were ignoring them. They just continued sunbathing, swimming, and smoking. The bedouin were not laughing out loud, but their expressions showed how shocked and upset they felt. Their eyes were gleaming brightly and seemed to be rolling in their very sockets.

  “That long-haired, skinny beanpole is a Muslim like us,” I heard one of them say.

  Since there was no other Moroccan at this particular spot, I gathered that they were talking about me.

  “Why is he naked like them?” I heard another one ask. “Maybe he’s not a real man.”

  “I don’t think it’s that,” another man suggested. “He’s probably behaving like that so he can get one of those girls for himself. If he did that, he’d be a real Muslim. As you know, we Muslims are as virile as bulls.”

  I wondered what might happen. Previous experiences of mine might come into play, let alone other factors with which I was very familiar, things that these creatures spread-eagled on the sand would know nothing about.

  “They’re laughing at us like imbeciles,” one of the girls said. “Have they never seen a naked body before? Have they never been to the hammam? Have they never slept with naked women?”

  “I’ve no idea,” I replied, “They’re simple countryfolk. For them everything they see is strange.”

  “Why don’t they behave the way we do?”

  “Their traditions make that impossible. But it does not stop them doing things that are really nasty.”

  “Poor people!”

  As soon as she said that, the men turned into demons. I watched as they vaulted their way into the area. Each one of them attacked a naked body. The whole place became a blur of sand and punches, with all the males fighting each other. I decided to beat a quick retreat. As I picked up my clothes so I could put them on in the tall grass, I did my best to cover up my private parts and protect my buttocks. Muslims like these men would be capable of doing anything, even having sex with a donkey or fish. I have even heard that in the south they do it with porcupines, then eat them later. Ugh! I saw one of the bedouin fall to the ground motionless; one of the hippies had knocked him out. The girls kept screaming beneath the men’s flailing bodies. Some of them managed to get partially dressed. Two of the bedouin ran away and hid themselves somewhere, while another tried his best to fend off the kicks to his face, but without success. A group of hippies was piled up top of another of the bedouin men. I felt very anxious as I watched the whole thing, although it was exactly what I had expected to happen. The group of defeated bedouin scattered all over the area, clearly stunned by what had just happened. The last of them managed to escape toward the sea, bleeding from his neck and dragging his leg like a wounded wolf caught in a trap. I saw her there, naked and frail in the scorching sunlight. In her right hand she was holding a knife dripping with blood. As I hid in the bushes, I suddenly felt really scared.

  I told myself that she could slay me like the other man. She was looking distracted. Once I could tell for certain that the knife she was holding did not belong to the “stranger” but was European, I started running crazily across the grass and through the trees till I got back to the town . . .

  6

  THE MESSIAH SAID, John 10:27, “My sheep listen to my voice. I know them, and they follow me.” Well, I told myself, my sheep listen to my voice. I know them, but they don’t follow me. Instead they sometimes turn into ravenous wolves. That is why Christ must be killed within me and turned into a sheep, wolf, or fox. I have done that many times, both night and day. Now it is daytime, and for sure it will not be like all other days. No moment bears any resemblance to any others, so how can it be with days? People who imagine that all their moments are the same are deluding themselves. From the outside, moments may look the same, but inside the human soul everything is different from one second to the next or even much less time than that.

  I was sitting on a rock in front of the only store in the small town. Some of the customers were hippies who regularly used the store to buy the things they needed. They would greet people in their own languages or with gestures—a sort of familiarity. Perhaps they got into the habit of doing that in Amsterdam, Katmandu, or some London neighborhoods. I finished my sandwich—tuna fish from Safi on half bread. I also drank a Coke. I was still holding a chunk of bread, so I wrapped it up in a piece of newspaper and put it down on the wall I was leaning against. Immediately a bunch of ants started making their way, almost instinctively, toward it. After I had finished eating, I had the feeling that I needed something else and tried in vain to work out what it might be. In front of my eyes I could see a film playing: a woman, a glass of wine, a fight, a pipe, a cigarette, a joint. Eventually I lit a cigarette and took some deep puffs. I looked up. “Hello!” I said to a dirty little girl, but she ran away. She was walking barefoot on the hot sand and carrying a bottle of Oulmes water. Over the sea, the sky looked a clear blue. There were also a few white clouds, looking, as the text of the Qur’an has it, “like fluffed wool” (and God Almighty has spoken the truth, Qur’an 101:5).

  Brahim was at the head of a group of hippies. When he saw me, he came over. He was chewing something that turned out to be a piece of gum.

  “Teacher, what are you doing here?” he asked me. “Why haven’t you gone to the beach?”

  “I’ve just eaten,” I replied. “I was very hungry.”

  “Good for you! When you feel hungry, you need to eat so you won’t be so skinny.”

  The hippies behind him were stared at me silently. One of them put his arm on the shoulders of a blonde girl. She snuggled into his arms, and he kissed her forehead without saying a word. They kept looking at me.

  “Have they just arrived today?” I asked Brahim.

  “No,” he replied, “they’ve come from Marrakesh. They spent last night somewhere, and since early morning I’ve been looking for a place for them. Can you take some of them with you? You live alone, don’t you? They can pay the rent. You’re just a poor teacher and you don’t deal in drugs. Your paltry salary will never be enough. Beyond that, getting to know people is a treasure. Who can say, you may benefit from them. I know someone who met a hippy girl. She took him to Los Angeles, and now he’s teaching Moroccan Arabic there. Imagine that. Praise God, you’re educated and smart. If I had your cultural knowledge, I wouldn’t have stayed here in Morocco. You can get beaten up by young men here; some of their mothers are pimps and others’ sisters are whores . . .”

  “That’s something else, Brahim,” I replied, “I’m trying to save this country.”

  “Who do you think you are, Teacher?” he asked. “Save yourself first. They’re all building villas and apartment buildings, but all you have is squat.”

  “Build and build high,” I retorted, “then leave it behind . . .”

  “That’s your business.”

  He turned to the group and spoke to them in French. I stood up, walked over, and stood in the middle of a group of seven, four men and three girls.

  “It’s hard to find a place here,” one of them said.

  “It depends,” I replied. “People don’t stay here long; just
three or four days, then they leave and go somewhere else in the wide world.”

  “We’re going to Fez too in a few days. Will you come with us?”

  “No. I prefer this place. I’ll stay here for a bit longer, then go back to Casablanca.”

  “Casablanca’s huge and nasty, like any European city.”

  “Exactly.”

  We reached the house. One of them spoke French with a clear accent. I learned later that he was a German, beardless and skinny, but nice. The one who was not saying anything kept staring suspiciously at me and not smiling. He was from Belgium and looked gay; you can’t miss such types. Maybe he went out to the woods later to look for a shepherd. God forbid! When we went inside, everyone put down his things as agreed. One of the girls took out a drum and started tapping on it.

  “Have you ever smoked hashish in the bong?” the German asked me.

  I lied. “Yes,” I said.

  I knew that the bong had sent a lot of people to the Barchid hospital. The young man delved into his bag and brought out a bunch of dry leaves.

  “We want to try it,” he said, “but we don’t know how.”

  “It’s easy. I’ll show you.”

  “Will you smoke with us?”

  “Of course,” I replied.

  They kept staring at the pale leaves in amazement. One of them adjusted his spectacles and started gazing at them with palpable excitement, almost like a child looking at a new toy he is discovering for the first time.

  “Do you have a gas stove and teapot?” I asked the German.

  “Susie,” I heard another young man say, “go to the car. There’s a stove there and everything else we need.”

  The girl disappeared. One of the young men took a look at the mud-brick walls and cast an eye around the bare room. “This is a big room,” he said. “Is the rent reasonable?”