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The Will of Allah 1
There had been a clear moon. Now the night was dark. Dogo
glanced up at the night sky. He saw that scudding black clouds
had obscured the moon. He cleared his throat. 'Rain tonight,'
he observed to his companion. Sule, his companion, did not
reply immediately. He was a tall powerfully-built man. His
face, as well as his companion's, was a stupid mask of ignorance. He lived by thieving as did Dogo, and just now he
walked with an unaccustomed limp. 'It is wrong to say that,'
Sule said after a while, fingering the long, curved sheath-knife
he always wore on his upper left arm when, in his own words,
he was 'on duty'. A similar cruel-looking object adorned the
arm of his comrade. 'How can you be sure?' 'Sure?' said Dogo,
annoyance and impatience in his voice. Dogo is the local word
for tall. This man was thickset, short and squat, anything but
tall. He pointed one hand up at the scurrying clouds. 'You only
want to look up there. A lot of rain has fallen in my life: those
up there are rain clouds.'
They walked on in silence for a while. The dull red lights of
the big town glowed in crooked lines behind them. Few people
were abroad, for it was already past midnight. About half a
mile ahead of them the native town, their destination,
sprawled in the night. Not a single electric light bulb glowed
on its crooked streets. This regrettable fact suited the books of
the two men perfectly. 'You are not Allah,' said Sule at last.
'You may not assert.'
Sule was a hardened criminal. Crime was his livelihood, he
had told the judge this during his last trial that had earned him
a short stretch in jail. 'Society must be protected from characters like you,' he could still hear the stern judge intoning in the
hushed courtroom. Sule had stood in the dock, erect, unashamed, unimpressed; he'd heard it all before. 'You and your
type constitute a threat to life and property and this court will always see to it that you get your just deserts, according to the
Law.' The judge had then fixed him with a stern gaze, which
Sule coolly returned: he had stared into too many so-called
judges' eyes to be easily intimidated. Besides, he feared no-thing and no one except Allah. The judge thrust his legal chin
forward. 'Do you never pause to consider that the road of
crime leads only to frustration, punishment and suffering?
You look fit enough for anything. Why don't you try your
hand at earning an honest living for a change?' Sule had
shrugged his broad shoulders. 'I earn my living the only way I
know,' he said. 'The only way I've chosen.' The judge had sat
back, dismayed. Then he leaned forward to try again. 'Is it
beyond you to see anything wrong in thieving, burglary,
crime?' Again Sule had shrugged. 'The way I earn my living I
find quite satisfactory. Satisfactory' exclaimed the judge,
and a wave of whispering swept over the court. The judge
stopped this with a rap of his gavel. 'Do you find it satisfactory
to break the law?' 'I've no choice,' said Sule. 'The law is a
nuisance. It keeps getting in one's way.' 'Constant arrest and
imprisonment -- do you find it satisfactory to be a jailbird?'
queried the judge, frowning most severely. 'Every calling has
its hazards,' replied Sule philosophically. The judge mopped
his face. 'Well, my man, you cannot break the law. You can
only attempt to break it. And you will only end up by getting
broken.' Sule nodded. 'We have a saying like that,' he remarked conversationally. 'He who attempts to shake a stump
only shakes himself.' He glanced up at the frowning judge.
'Something like a thick stump -- the law, eh?' The judge had
given him three months. Sule had shrugged. 'The will of Allah
be done. . .
A darting tongue of lightning lit up the overcast sky for a
second. Sule glanced up. 'Sure it looks like rain. But you do not
say: It will rain. You are only a mortal. You only say: If it is the
will of Allah, it will rain.' Sule was a deeply religious man,
according to his lights. His religion forbade being dogmatic or
prophetic about the future, about anything. His fear of Allah
was quite genuine. It was his firm conviction that Allah left the
question of a means of livelihood for each man to decide for
himself. Allah, he was sure, gives some people more than they
need so that others with too little could help themselves to
some of it. It could certainly not be the intention of Allah that
some stomachs remain empty while others are overstuffed.
Dogo snorted.
To be continued |
