A Curse on Dostoevsky

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ANOTHER CRY, the same as before, but louder; then groans, more anguished. They rip through the silence of the room, bursting into Rassoul’s sleep. He jolts awake and sits up in bed, holding his breath the better to hear. Where do the cries come from? Who is making them? He does his best to stand, but he is weak. Such pain in his ankle! It’s as if his feet are tied. He drags himself over to the window, pulls himself up and peers out at the courtyard. The first thing he sees is Yarmohamad’s two daughters standing on the terrace, each holding a storm lamp; they are staring with a strange sort of serenity at the dead tree, just outside Rassoul’s field of vision. He heaves himself up a little further. What he sees takes his breath away: Yarmohamad bursting out of the passage with a huge knife in his hand. He rushes over to the naked figure of a woman, her ankles tied by the skipping rope to one of the branches of the tree. Rassoul’s horrified gaze swings over to a window, behind which he can make out Rona, also holding a storm lamp. But she is not looking at her husband, or the tree, or her two daughters. She is blowing discreet kisses to Rassoul. Dazed, he moves a little closer to the window. Yarmohamad spins the woman’s body around so that her face appears. It is Sophia. Rassoul screams. A stifled scream, dead in his chest. Yarmohamad starts to slice off the young woman’s breasts. Her cries become shrieks. Rassoul, unable to stand, bangs furiously on the window. Unperturbed, Yarmohamad continues butchering Sophia’s breasts. Gradually, she stops moaning and crying. Rassoul bashes the window until the pane shatters.

Suddenly, the sound of the door opening, the blinding light of two torches shining in his eyes, and the terrifying shouts of bearded, Kalashnikov-wielding men raiding the room. Rassoul, collapsed amid the shattered glass beneath the window, struggles to get to his feet. One of the intruders rushes over and hits him over the head with his own lamp. The other is rummaging through his piles of books. “Evil communist, you’ve been hiding like a rat!” Rassoul closes his eyes and reopens them, hoping the nightmarish visions will disappear. But it is no good—they’re still here. And you are no longer dreaming, Rassoul. Defend yourself! Do something!

What?

Reassure them, tell them you’re not a communist, that these Russian books are not communist propaganda but the works of Dostoevsky. Shout!

“The Russians fucked your mother!” yells one of the armed men as he splits Rassoul’s lip with a book. Blood streams.

Forget Dostoevsky! Try something else, beg, swear in the name of Allah.

He tries, but the name of Allah will no longer sing in his throat.

One of the men smacks him even harder, and shoves him to the ground. Rassoul notices then that Yarmohamad is standing in the doorway, watching the scene with a degree of pleasure. One of the men demands: “How long has he been hiding?” Yarmohamad moves closer to reply obsequiously: “Over a year… I swear I only rented him the room out of friendship for his cousin, the pious and upright mujahideen Razmodin. I swear to Allah he’s been hiding these books from his cousin, too. Razmodin isn’t the sort of person to act as guarantor for an ungodly communist, not even his own brother…” Sickened, Rassoul tries to protest; he stands up to throw himself on Yarmohamad, grab him by the throat, thump him, bring him back to his senses. Have some self-respect, Yarmohamad! But a sudden kick in the groin crumples him in two. “Trying to escape?”

Escape? No… “Why did you break the window?” The window? No, it’s… Confused, Rassoul clambers painfully to his feet to look out at the courtyard, where everything is dark and silent. He is completely bewildered. His distraught gaze returns to Yarmohamad, to his clean, empty hands.

“Right, you’re coming to the police station with us!” They take him, along with a few Russian books as evidence.

As he passes Yarmohamad, Rassoul stares at him, to indicate that he will be paying dearly for this cowardice. He hears him mutter: “Razmodin’s going to fuck you up too, for these damned books!”

There’s no way these two guys have come round to my place at this time of night to beat me up on account of my books. Someone must have tipped them off about the murder of the old woman. It’s all over! The woman in the sky-blue chador, that’s who it was. She’s finished me. But I’m going to tell, too. I’m going to turn her in as my accomplice. She has no right to live in peace, not sharing my crime and my punishment!