The day of the circumcision ceremony rolled up from the hot, dry, parched east, rainless, with no hope of rain. All night long the frogs, field-brown against field-green, had croaked war-chants, hurled deep insults across the drying water-course. With war in the air, few men had been able to sleep. Dignitaries had tossed and dozed in the houses specially built for them up near the Astana (ninety thousand bucks a house, bonus of ten thousand to the contractors for completing the work on time. Perhaps the contractors alone had had a good night's rest.) In the morning, medals, accolades — the Star of Dunia, first class, to the Sultan of Dahaga; the Most Holy Order of the Embattled Oceans to the Regent of Anchok; to the Crown Prince of Lapar a second-class Bearded Lion; long service and good conduct medals to several shifty-eyed rogues, rulers of villages. A procession through the town of the honoured, sweating in slow cars.
Looking up to the tip of the ithyphallic minaret, the people of the town found something missing. Its voice had been silenced now; that tiny presence had been removed. The beards were quick to talk about injustice. Sea-lawyers spoke of habeas corpus. There were crowds round the jail. That symbol of revolt against the tyrannical father-state had been hauled down, like a red flag. Now, in his place, a muezzin tuned up for tomorrow (the key to the door still missing, the latch clicked to ever-open). The muezzin practised the retroflex divided consonants that made up the name of God, an emblem of stasis, of the old order never to be changed — Allah and the white man, Surahs and official circulars. Soon banners were on the streets, some saying "Freedom", others "Italy".
"Italy," said a Middle East oil-king in Bedouin robes. He spoke to a Sultan who chewed clear gums, spoke in the accents of an English public school. "It is the name of a country, of course, but it is also a gnomic cypher used on the backs of love-letters. Love-letters of the British lower classes, that is. I remember I had a liaison with a young girl in Oxford, a tobacconist's daughter who lived near Carfax. She wrote me letters, even after I had returned to my kingdom, and she often put 'Italy' on the back. Also 'Boltop' and 'Holland' and 'Swalk'. The Caliph should be pleased that they say, 'I Trust And Love You'."
Paolo was in the Casa Tasca, tending his father. His father had strained his old fatherly heart climbing those many stairs. He lay exhausted, fed with beer by his son. His son was happy — soon, in Italy, he would be rolling in the hay with Bice and Violetta, Leonora and Grazia, drinking cheap wine and eating peaches. It was the time of the year for peaches. Peach-juice in thin golden wine. And, before that, adventures in Aden, on the ship. Rich married women. Aaaaah. He shaved off his beard with a new blade, his father groaning on the bed. Little did he know that he had made his mark in Moslem Africa. An emblem of a goat would soon be the banner of the Party; missionary pictures of the Prophet Jesus would rouse a memory, a recognition. And Italy, for others as well as himself, would mean freedom. "I am dying," said his father from the bed. "You have killed me."
"You drink more beer," said his son. "As you see, they brought me many, many bottles. Somebody," he said solemnly, "somebody down there loved me."
"Yes," said his father, "I will have some more beer. It does some good." He had given up speaking English to his son. At the thought of what Paolo would be returning to, he felt better. "I am getting up now," he said. "Soon we must be going to the airport."
"How do we get there? There are no taxis."
"That is true. And the Airways office has no bus. You must go and look for a taxi."
It took a long time. Paolo, shaven, clean, in the trousers of his father's best suit, striped-shirted, neck-tied for a great occasion, looked in wonder at the crawling stream of cars. At length he saw one he knew. The youth who drove, happy in sun-glasses, a bemused Sultan at his back, said, "You." And then, "That not good lectric iron. Not get hot."
"It cost," said Paolo, "twenty bucks. You take me to airport. Scusa,"he said, bowing to the Sultan. The Sultan stared with old, bewildered eyes.
"All right," said the youth. "I get tired go so slow. I come to house."
And so Paolo's one small bag was brought downstairs, and also his groaning father. Nando Tasca sat, breathing hard, next to His Highness the Sultan of Lanchap, saying,
"E not a good a boy. E nearly kill a is poor old a father. Today e go. I not a see im no a more. Ow many children you a ave?"
"Twenty-three," said the Sultan. "Or twenty-five. I know it is an odd number."
"It a too a many," said Nando Tasca. "I ave a one a daughter. She a good a girl. I ave a one a son. E a bad boy. But," he added, brightening, thinking of Paolo out of his life for ever, "it a no a good be a sorry. A man must a get a married. A man must ave a children. That a life," he said philosophically. "Marriage," he added.
Paolo was pleased to see banners with "Italy" painted on them. He bowed to the crowds, smiling with a goat's clean-shaven face. It was a royal send-off. They sped along the airport road, Paolo saying "Aaaah" with satisfaction. He had been appreciated. He had been loved, if not by his father. The bowing Moslems confirmed him in his conviction that, despite everything, he was a good boy.
There were many people at the airport. Raging at the Dunia Airways desk was Lydgate. Raging, crying. The effects of living in Africa too long, thought Paolo. A good thing he himself was going. He shook hands with his father. His father said, "You be a good a boy." He shook hands with the Sultan of Lanchap. Officials bowed to him, awed by the company he kept. He was bowed on to the aircraft. A very pretty Creole air-hostess brought him sweets on a dish. He winked at her. Later, after take-off, when most of the passengers had become somnolent, he would pinch her bottom. Life was beginning again. He sang, in bups and bops, "Stardust" against the engines.
That night the circumcision ceremony took place at the Astana. The guests drank warm champagne and picked at cold curry while, behind closed doors, the modin or official circumciser did his work. The two young princes sat on a banana-leaf. Solemnly, the modin pulled a prepuce with special forceps, with a razor-knife solemnly lopped. Two lops: the boys had become men. Afterwards, pale, they sat on thrones, were sprinkled with rose-water by hand-maidens. Old synagogue jokes went about among the heartier Europeans. Few, even the least squeamish, could touch the kebabs that were passed round, served with a fiery sauce. More warm champagne was poured; pale and dignified, the princes kept their thrones.
Again, two men were missing. Nando Tasca lay on his bed, aching, lost without his son. There was no longer anybody to blame for anything. He had hardly the heart to reach for the warm beer that stood, in shiny black ranks, by his bed, an old man, a good man, alone in an alien land. At eight in the evening there was a gentle tap at his door. Eileen Forbes came in, smiling, black shoulders shining under the naked bulb. "You want, darling?" she said.
"You like?"
Nando Tasca tried to rise from the bed. It was hopeless: he ached so, he felt so tired. Just his luck. "I an old man," he said, and then corrected himself: "No, not a old. Not a very well."
"You like, darling?" smirked Eileen. "I love you, darling." In Aden, perhaps, she would learn more words.
"Where a you husband?" asked Nando Tasca. Anger at his son, now, he hoped, chained up in the Italian colony of Aden, anger at his son's, even in absence, power to thwart, to shame, anger sent adrenalin swishing through his old man's body. He thought he might, if he could only move. But it was no good.
"Other a time," he said. "Not a now. A very ill a man."
"My husband," said Eileen carefully, "drink with Austrylians. In Kool Kaffi Bar and Restaurant. You like, darling?"
"Other time. When I a better. You a go a now." He waved her off. Eileen pouted. A new perm glowed above her Tudor brow, her lips were rich red. Undismayed, she said, throatily erotically, "Good-niiiight, darliiing." Then she clattered down the stairs, the evening short, perhaps her last chance to work this district, off to see the two drunken Sudus.
Nando Tasca, left alone, heard loud Bengali from next door, unbelievably rapid, wind broken under water. Children cried, there was a clatter of tin mugs, a slap of fat brown flesh, screams. It was different in Lydgate's day. A very quiet a man.
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