Giorgio Astara
Night has fallen over Zaragoza, and together with the darkness low clouds came, frayed by a wind that blew without pause throughout this autumn day. Along the narrow alleys of the Medina wind gusts whirl ceaselessly flapping the gray cloaks of the two hooded men. A silent ulema is leading them, silent and intent in the thankless task of protecting two infidels that thread on this soil, which is dearest to Allah, from the rightful wrath of the believers. The priest then knocks at a wooden door, and when from inside a clang of unlocking bolts reaches his ears steps aside and walks away silent without a parting word for the two wretched men whom he accepted escorting for the sake of Allah, praised be his name.
When the servant draws the curtain aside, a gust of cold air enters the warm stillness of the shadowy room. One of the gray-clad men, his face inscrutable, stops at the threshold, the other enters the shady room where an elderly man, wrapped in a white woolen cloak, sits in front of a low table, his face covered by a linen veil. “Is it you the man I’m waiting for?” the voice of the old man sounds still clear, despite the age.
In front of him stands a small man, his gray hair cropped short and straight after the fashion of the Latins and the Franks, bareheaded like just one of the crazy followers of the impostor Christ could dare, wearing a Frank sword at his belt and a sheep skin over his tunic. The servant shakes his head over the queer ways of his master, the elderly saintly man and mullah, whose name cannot be uttered in Zaragoza, the man who dedicated his life to the service of Allah after his eyes were blinded by the viciousness of the unfaithful Rums.
“Seu eu, t’appu scrittu eu, That’s me, I’m the man that wrote to you” the other answers, his harsh accent mellowed by the lightly mocking undertone in his voice as if there was something silly in the situation. The old man seems to get the irony when he answers:
“Oh, yes … your letter was read to me, I don’t have my eyes anymore … since a lot of time … what would I use them for anyway? I committed the Suras to memory in the long years I spent in the darkness, and I could recite them to the believers with my voice that is still so clear, a gift from Allah to make up for the loss of my eyesight. It’s since my young age that I pray in the mosque with all of the people, and in addition I call the believers to prayer at the set times.”
“You are a muezzin …” the other answers, still standing “just like the bells in the Christian lands, you call the believers to prayer.”
“Bells are a trick of Sheitan's for those who believe in the Christian deception … nothing can substitute for a man’s voice to speak to a man’s heart … isn’t your renegade rabbi Paul that talks about clanging cymbals? ”
“Our Paul says that without love man is a clanging cymbal … Well, if I were here to talk theology, I would not be here alone, but with many balentes1 from my land, armed to the teeth” the gray man replies, showing white teeth behind his bristly moustache “Do you want to leave me standing, saintly man, since I’m a Christian?”
The old man waves a hand, as if he was chasing away a fly, but he is perhaps driving away an evil thought, the sin of being inhospitable in a honorable house in Zaragoza, where all are welcome, believers, Jews and Christians.
A house servant brings on a tray a large copper jug smoking with hot water and copper cups where many brown leaves have been carefully crumbled into bits together with mint offshoots: while he sets the low table up, putting on small almond-and-honey pastries and small unleavened bread rolls, the two men remain in front of each other, silent.
At the end, after the tea from Cathay has been sipped in silence, the old man starts speaking again: “You wrote to me, and my secretary read it to me, that you have something that belongs to me … how can you have such a thing in your hands … supposing that you are telling the truth … what do you answer?”
“Answering will take some time perhaps … but it is just after sunset and I cannot sleep till just before dawn, sometimes … do you want to hear my story, revered man? I heard this story many times through the years, when I was a child with curly hairs, from the voice of my grandfather, next to the forredda2, mother of sparks, in the winter nights, or in su the cuili de su monti3 under the stars of a summer night … my mind will go back to my young days as I will go through the story … will you listen?”
“You talk … you talk like …” the old man answers as if searching for something in his memory “Tell your story then, this old man will be listening.”
When the servant draws the curtain aside, a gust of cold air enters the warm stillness of the shadowy room. One of the gray-clad men, his face inscrutable, stops at the threshold, the other enters the shady room where an elderly man, wrapped in a white woolen cloak, sits in front of a low table, his face covered by a linen veil. “Is it you the man I’m waiting for?” the voice of the old man sounds still clear, despite the age.
In front of him stands a small man, his gray hair cropped short and straight after the fashion of the Latins and the Franks, bareheaded like just one of the crazy followers of the impostor Christ could dare, wearing a Frank sword at his belt and a sheep skin over his tunic. The servant shakes his head over the queer ways of his master, the elderly saintly man and mullah, whose name cannot be uttered in Zaragoza, the man who dedicated his life to the service of Allah after his eyes were blinded by the viciousness of the unfaithful Rums.
“Seu eu, t’appu scrittu eu, That’s me, I’m the man that wrote to you” the other answers, his harsh accent mellowed by the lightly mocking undertone in his voice as if there was something silly in the situation. The old man seems to get the irony when he answers:
“Oh, yes … your letter was read to me, I don’t have my eyes anymore … since a lot of time … what would I use them for anyway? I committed the Suras to memory in the long years I spent in the darkness, and I could recite them to the believers with my voice that is still so clear, a gift from Allah to make up for the loss of my eyesight. It’s since my young age that I pray in the mosque with all of the people, and in addition I call the believers to prayer at the set times.”
“You are a muezzin …” the other answers, still standing “just like the bells in the Christian lands, you call the believers to prayer.”
“Bells are a trick of Sheitan's for those who believe in the Christian deception … nothing can substitute for a man’s voice to speak to a man’s heart … isn’t your renegade rabbi Paul that talks about clanging cymbals? ”
“Our Paul says that without love man is a clanging cymbal … Well, if I were here to talk theology, I would not be here alone, but with many balentes1 from my land, armed to the teeth” the gray man replies, showing white teeth behind his bristly moustache “Do you want to leave me standing, saintly man, since I’m a Christian?”
The old man waves a hand, as if he was chasing away a fly, but he is perhaps driving away an evil thought, the sin of being inhospitable in a honorable house in Zaragoza, where all are welcome, believers, Jews and Christians.
A house servant brings on a tray a large copper jug smoking with hot water and copper cups where many brown leaves have been carefully crumbled into bits together with mint offshoots: while he sets the low table up, putting on small almond-and-honey pastries and small unleavened bread rolls, the two men remain in front of each other, silent.
At the end, after the tea from Cathay has been sipped in silence, the old man starts speaking again: “You wrote to me, and my secretary read it to me, that you have something that belongs to me … how can you have such a thing in your hands … supposing that you are telling the truth … what do you answer?”
“Answering will take some time perhaps … but it is just after sunset and I cannot sleep till just before dawn, sometimes … do you want to hear my story, revered man? I heard this story many times through the years, when I was a child with curly hairs, from the voice of my grandfather, next to the forredda2, mother of sparks, in the winter nights, or in su the cuili de su monti3 under the stars of a summer night … my mind will go back to my young days as I will go through the story … will you listen?”
“You talk … you talk like …” the old man answers as if searching for something in his memory “Tell your story then, this old man will be listening.”
(continues)
1 balentes: valiant men
2 forredda: oven
3 su cuili de su monti: the sheep pen in the mountains
