Muhammad Read online

  The slave thought he was playing to my nature, but I showed no reaction. He went on.

  “Master Muhammad’s trips to the cave started coming more often. One day I couldn’t help myself. I fell asleep in the sun, and when I opened my eyes, Muhammad was standing over me. He smiled a secret smile, but spoke not a word. We two made our way down the mountain together. That didn’t stop my master. He insisted I keep watch even if Muhammad had caught on.”

  “Listen carefully,” I said. “Did you see any signs?”

  “Of madness? No, great sir.”

  “Signs of anything unusual?”

  I put my question cautiously. It seemed impossible that Muhammad was casting spells or trying to lure jinns to help him with some dark business. He wasn’t capable of such things (although I know more than a few who are).

  The Syrian thought for a moment before replying. “He had moods. Of that I’m sure.”

  “What kind of moods? I thought you hung back, hiding from him?” I queried.

  “At first. But once he caught on to me, we kept company. He wanted to talk.” The slave’s voice was hesitant. People of quality share their lives with servants. There’s no other choice. We’re surrounded by them day and night, but there’s a barrier between us. The slave would be doing Muhammad no good by saying that he had lowered that barrier.

  Do you want proof of how anxious I was? I went into the pantry and brought out the best bread and cold lamb. Without a word I spread the victuals out on the table. The slave watched warily. I tore off a piece of flatbread, wrapped it around a morsel of meat, and handed it to him. I was willing to lower the barrier that far to get more news, but the look in my eyes warned the Syrian not to push me. I knew I should have called the slave by his name, but I forgot to ask. I doubted that I would ever see him again.

  “It’s dry,” he mumbled as he chewed. The cheeky bastard wanted me to bring out some wine. I ignored him. When he had swallowed, I told him to finish his story.

  He said, “Muhammad and me talked almost every day coming down the mountain. He liked to ask me questions.”

  I couldn’t hide my surprise. “What kind of questions?”

  “It depended on his mood. That’s what I’m trying to tell you.” The slave eyed the lamb. I gave a curt nod, and he took another chunk, holding it in his fist until he satisfied what I wanted to know. “One day we saw a dead kid goat in a ditch. It had fallen in and broken its leg. The dogs got to it before anyone heard it. Muhammad stood a long time staring at the gnawed carcass. ‘Where is that goat now?’ he muttered. I assumed he was talking to himself, so I didn’t respond. He looked over at me and said, ‘I lost two sons before they even knew they had a father. I lost my father before he knew he had a son. Where are they now?’

  “I was nervous, but I spoke up. ‘Wherever they were,’ I said, ‘it was different from where dead goats go.’ He laughed and said, ‘A good answer, but it wriggles out of the question.’ After that he was quiet all the rest of the way home.”

  I held up my hand for him to stop talking. I needed a moment to think. Muhammad never mourned his lost sons properly before the gods. Word started going around that he was a secret unbeliever. Because the Hashim clan was too weak, Abu Talib, my father, couldn’t send anyone out to punish those who talked against Muhammad. We had to swallow our pride and take it. But if this Syrian was to be believed, the thought of those two dead babies preyed on him. Jinns sniff out weakness of mind; they know how to twist the knot of self-torment inside a man.

  “Did he talk about his dead sons again?” I asked. The slave shook his head. “Did he ever bring his new son to the cave?” The slave shook his head again.

  This new son was another piece of strange business. Muhammad is forty this year, but his wife, who is fifteen years older, cannot give him more children. He gave no sign that this was a grief for him. Then one day he came home and said, “I want you to buy me a son.”

  Khadijah was all but speechless. “Who?” she asked, keeping her wits about her.

  Muhammad explained that he was wandering through the bazaar when his eyes fell upon a young boy being sold as a slave. A raiding party had just returned to town, with captives taken on the trading routes. These raiders have only one thought in mind, to grab their prey and get away without being killed. They never think to take care of their prizes, so that they can be fit to be sold. Like the others, this boy was starving and gaunt. His eyes were sunken, but when Muhammad stared at him, the boy stared back defiantly. As if he had any power to do anything. But Muhammad was impressed, and he thought of the future.

  A woman of Khadijah’s age doesn’t usually want to discuss what might happen in the future. She agreed to buy the boy for Muhammad. When he was brought to the house, she was just as impressed by him as her husband was. They changed his name from “Zayd, son of who knows what” to “Zayd, son of Muhammad.” So now the wealth of a lifetime may be passed on to a foreign captive. One day I may have to fight him for my share.

  The Syrian was waiting impatiently for my next question. The only one left was the obvious. “What happened to drive Muhammad mad?”

  “Jinns,” said the slave quickly.

  I frowned. “Don’t repeat what everyone else is saying. You were there. What did you see?”

  The slave trusted me enough to tell the truth. “I saw a man running away from something he can never understand. We were on the mountain, but Master Muhammad didn’t come out of the cave at sunset. I didn’t know what to do. He has stayed all night before, when it’s warm enough. I could run home and sleep in a warm bed, then go back at dawn, and nobody would be the wiser. But I stayed. Ramadan is a strange month, they say. I didn’t know what might happen. So I wrapped myself on the ground and tried to sleep. The next thing I knew, Master Muhammad stepped right over me. His heel brushed my shoulder, and I looked up to see him. He was as white as the dead. He acted as if he didn’t see me lying there, but just kept walking, at a fast pace. Like I said, he was running from something. I gathered myself and ran after him. He didn’t look like a man who was in this world. No matter how loud I called, he wouldn’t look back or answer me. We went like that until we got to town. Muhammad stopped in his tracks and stared at the sky. He wasn’t staring like some ordinary lunatic, but as if he expected someone to fly down. If we had been inside the walls, people would have gawked, I can tell you. Then he shuddered so hard I could see his body quiver under his thick robes. A few minutes later we went through the gates, and I followed him home until he shut himself up inside.”

  So, there you are. The worse had come to the worst. I turned my face away. I didn’t want the slave to get the satisfaction of seeing the effect his tale had on me. With a wave of the hand I signaled for him to leave. He and the other slaves wasted no time bolting out the door. Abu Bakr would surmise that his trusted Syrian was selling information. I sighed. Tomorrow he would find another rich house and another one willing to fling some coins at him. Muhammad’s reputation was dashed. Our enemies were already laughing with glee.

  Which is worse, the wickedness of the world or the curse of demons? I sat there pondering the question until the night robbed the room of all light. Muhammad didn’t deserve this fate. Or maybe he did. Ill luck befalls any man who thinks he can pry the gods’ secrets out of their fists.

  10

  RUQAYAH, MUHAMMAD’S THIRD DAUGHTER

  His first fear was for himself. For his soul, I mean. My father knew that something must have gone horribly wrong. Only later did we discover that he had run from the cave to the top of the mountain to hurl himself onto the rocks below. He never suspected God’s wrath. Yet when he summoned the light, it shattered him. Allah can drive someone as mad as any demon.

  I was showing my littlest sister, Fatimah, who was barely five, how to pick flowers in the courtyard when he staggered home. “My child!” he cried, clasping Fatimah so hard to his breast that she could hardly breathe. His agitation made me tremble. After a long, deep stare into Fatimah’s ey
es, he ran to his room and bolted the door. I don’t think he even recognized me.

  We will never forget the seventeenth day of Ramadan. The brunt of it fell on my mother. I watched her pace the floor, growing paler and paler. That first day we lived in dreadful silence. My father allowed no one to approach him. Leaning at his door, we girls heard weeping and loud, tormented cries. I tell you, I had heard the words “gnashing of teeth,” but the actual sound, like stones grinding together, is horrifying.

  On the second day he allowed my mother into the room. When she emerged again, her face was set and grim. I thought my father must be dying. When I asked her, my mother said, “Some things are worse than dying. There is also death in life.”

  She wouldn’t let me ask any more questions, but sent me to fetch the servants. When they were assembled, my mother put on a face of incredible calm.

  “I won’t lie to you. The worst may not have happened, but if not, God save us from the worst,” she said.

  My mother couldn’t stop the anxious cries her words caused, but she quickly moved on to allay them. “None of you will have to leave. You are safe with me. You’ve heard the sounds of your master in torment. If you love him and trust me, listen to my orders.”

  With that she told the servants to run to our relatives among the Hashim and bring them to her.” Don’t give out any details. It’s not for you to suggest anything, not with a certain tone of voice or a rolling of the eyes. This is no idle moment. It’s a crisis that will tell me everything about who you are from this day forward.”

  What could they say? My mother’s will subdued the servants as long as they were behind our walls. As they ran off to gather the clan, some may have panicked or indulged in wild fantasies. We all did. As soon as the house was empty, my mother took me aside into a private corner with my two older sisters. Fatimah could be distracted by giving her a doll to play with in the next room.

  “Your father isn’t mad. He has been overwhelmed,” she said. “We will nurse him. We will watch over him. Those things go without saying. I know they are the desires of your heart. But only waiting will tell the tale.”

  “What has overwhelmed him?” asked Zaynab. As the oldest, she had the right to speak first. Later as events unfolded, she was not so faithful to my father. Zaynab’s mind was occupied every waking hour with getting a husband. Even at that critical moment, her thoughts lived halfway in another man’s house.

  “He doesn’t have enough of his wits back to make sense,” said my mother, who was always candid with us. “He mumbles the word ‘power’ over and over.”

  In Arabic she said qadr. The only way for me to explain the word to strangers is “power.” For us there are hints and shadows in this word. It signifies a mystery, a holy presence that has descended to shatter one’s body and mind.

  My second sister, Umm Kulthum, stole a glance in my direction. She didn’t want to understand anything at first. Her instinct was to protect the young ones. Besides Fatimah, there was the slave boy Zayd. He was new, and we had not learned to think of him as our brother yet. He was some years older than Fatimah, but too young to understand how a grown man in the space of a single night could turn into a quivering heap.

  The Hashim men came quickly, demanding in loud voices to set eyes on Muhammad for themselves. My mother refused. “You will see him when he’s himself again. What lies in that room is not Muhammad.”

  An unfortunate choice of words. Mutterings about jinns arose. My mother knew they would, but something else was on her mind. She had to keep Muhammad’s name from being ruined. Instead of fighting with rumors, she went on the offensive.

  “When was the Kaaba in ruins? When was it rebuilt? Let any man step forward who did more to rebuild it than my Muhammad.”

  The rumbling began to die down. You see, the Hashim were so poor and trampled on that they had little left but their honor. My father was the most honorable among them. He earned that title five years before. The Kaaba had become a shambles. A wag said that it was a good thing pilgrims came for the Hajj to run around the Kaaba, because if they dared to touch it the walls would fall down. As things stood, no one was willing to repair the sagging roof and the cracks that ran from top to bottom. Fate then stepped in. A flash flood stormed through the center of town. The waters dug a course straight for the Kaaba, almost submerging it.

  In a panic people ran to save the idols. My mother laughed at that. “They can’t wait to rescue the very gods that caused this,” she muttered. By the time the waters receded, the roof had collapsed. There was no choice now. A certain faction was still too superstitious to intervene, holding that the walls were sacred, even though they were on the verge of falling down. To touch them risked angering the gods even more.

  Others grew disgusted with this attitude. The issue was settled when Al-Mugirah, a rough, sensible type, walked up to the Kaaba in front of everyone with a sledgehammer. He took a swing and knocked a huge gap in one of the walls.

  “If the gods want to kill me, let them do it now,” he shouted.

  Nothing happened, so it was decided to start over and build a shrine that would last forever. All at once the very clans that wanted to kill each other to keep the Kaaba intact vied to make a new one. That too proved futile, for when they got down to the foundations, a layer of green stone was exposed that could not be broken, no matter how many burly slaves knocked at it. The Quraysh declared that the foundation was laid by Abraham and must not be touched.

  My father watched quietly off to one side. He came home one night and said, “A fellow brought a bowl of blood to the work site today. He held it up in the air, screaming that his clan was entitled to finish the work, no one else. He was backed up by twenty toughs with knives drawn. Who knows where he got so much blood? It spilled over the edge of the bowl and streaked his face while he screamed.”

  Yet this bizarre incident made my father’s fortune in a strange way. There was one stone set in the eastern wall of the Kaaba that my father told us to hold in reverence. It was black and polished and about the width of a large man’s hand. “We are the people of Abraham, and when he built this shrine, he laid in place a single stone from the time of Adam and Eve. In that stone is our hope,” he said. I didn’t know what my father meant by “our hope,” but I can’t remember a time when the Black Stone was not touched and bowed before by every pilgrim.

  When it came time to set the Black Stone back in place, a feud broke out among the clans. Nobody wanted to grant the privilege to anyone else. At the same time, no one wanted to risk the wrath of the gods by not claiming it for himself. Fights broke out daily at the site, until it was decided that only one man, Muhammad, was trusted enough by all the clans to settle the dispute.

  Muhammad wasn’t eager to go. I found him lingering by the gate with his best robe on, washing his hands in a basin, then calling for fresh water so he could wash them again.

  “It’s a sly tactic to call on me,” he said. “There is no one who deserves the privilege over anybody else. Whoever I choose, the rest will be furious with me. They will fall on each other’s necks, and when the dust clears, our family will be blamed. We will be weaker than ever, which is the whole point.”

  You wouldn’t think that the same man would have returned home two hours later wreathed in smiles. “I did it,” he said with quiet exultation. He called for the best sweet wine and even diluted it three times with water so we girls could drink.

  “What did you do?” my mother asked, as baffled as anyone.

  “I stared solemnly at the rock for a long time, as if it was going to deliver an answer. In fact, I was scouring my brain in mounting desperation. Then the simplest idea occurred to me. I ordered that someone bring a large sheet of cloth. I had the Black Stone placed in the center and signaled for the elders of the four major clans to each take a corner of the sheet. ‘Now lift it together to the height where the stone will be placed,’ I said. ‘Then you will all share in the honor and reap the same reward from the gods.’”


  From that moment on my father earned a respectful nod and a raised beaker at the inns. But he insisted to us, his family, that he wasn’t wise. “I am only a man among men. The point was to give these hotheads an escape route, so they wouldn’t lose face. Nothing more. If the gods noticed, they were as amused as I was.”

  My mother’s efforts to remind the clan of their debt to my father worked to hold off the spiral of ruin momentarily.

  Several days later my father appeared at the door of his room. He still looked pale and stunned, but he held his arms out, and one by one his daughters ran into them. When I embraced him, it felt as if half his body had wasted away. The last to be embraced was Fatimah, who was frightened by the deep black circles around my father’s eyes.

  You could see that he was hurt when Fatimah backed away. “What’s wrong, my child?”

  “I want my papa back,” she blurted out and burst into tears.

  My father swept her into his arms, calming Fatimah’s fears. Even as he did this, he looked around at the rest of us. His eyes said, “And do you think your papa is not here?”

  You must understand, during that terrible week we held the family together by not speaking our deepest fears out loud. I asked to be taken to the Kaaba to pray. I’m sure my sisters did as well. We avoided looking at one another during meals. Some of the servants weakened and began to spread rumors; my mother wasn’t above taking a stick to them.

  Then as quickly as we lost him, my father became himself again. Like a patient whose fever has broken, he mastered his crisis. I don’t know how he did it. Yet one day I found him sitting alone on the floor of the pantry eating one flatbread after another between gobbets of lamb and beakers of well water. When he saw me, he burst out laughing.