ONCE BACK TO HIS TENT, Abou lay on his pallet and looked up the smoke hole at the stars. He wondered what the next day would bring.
Cohen sat on the chest, his usual perch, and examined his nails, which were always dirty, or so they appeared to Abou. Cohen was wearing his white suit again, but it looked a bit cleaner. “A bad day, old friend?” It was really a rhetorical question.
“It was,” Abou agreed.
“That was very decent of you to tell those two that you wanted to talk it over with me, but I noticed you didn’t identify me. Are you uncomfortable with my name?” Cohen grinned slyly.
“You know they wouldn’t understand.” Abou sighed. “In fact, I’m not sure I do. But that doesn’t solve my problem. Yasser told abominable stories about me, and evidently everyone thinks them true, and no one knows he beat my daughter.”
“Yes, he’s a brute,” Cohen agreed readily. “But he certainly knows how to manipulate language. We listened to him today and he never once said directly that you were corrupting Akbar. Subtle use of language. A long way from those screaming sounds made by your ancestors to alert the band to impending danger. You know velvet monkeys do the same thing today . . . use different sounds to identify different dangers?”
“And Yasser is my little velvet monkey screeching about what a danger I am?” Abou replied bitterly.
“No, no, you know that isn’t what I mean,” Cohen replied. “Your forebears have been talking for a couple million years, and even Yasser has learned the sophisticated use of speech as a weapon, as well as a mode of communication. It’s like everything else you people do—the upside is you couldn’t have survived without being able to speak to each other, or so it seems to us; on the downside, you’ve learned to use language for other reasons than simple communication, and that has become hurtful at times.”
“What can I do?”
Cohen considered this for a moment. “Why did you ask Absollah how much money you had in his bank?”
“I was thinking of paying the taxes and casting Yasser out into the street, but my daughter, ever dutiful, would probably leave with him. I would have a place to stay, but she and the children wouldn’t.”
“There is little a father can do in your society.” Cohen was talking slowly, as if thinking the matter through. “I think I mentioned to you that this male-domination thing is a rather late development. Not that humans haven’t always been somewhat skewed toward males. I mean, it was the honcho who decided who got the best cut of meat, but it was fair in a way. Other hunters got their share, and they divided it between their women and children, so the most able and his kin got the most.”
“But?”
“Well, once the men took over procuring the whole food supply, meat and veggies, so to speak, they became unbearable. They got other animals to do all the work. I mean, the ox and the buffalo really helped these guys out, but the men strutted around like they put food in the pot.”
“You mentioned that before, but it doesn’t help me.”
“Did I?” Cohen thought for a moment. “Well, I had some point to make.”
“Yasser has destroyed me with his vile words, and what can I say? That I love my grandchildren and would never do anything to harm them? That I find men being intimate with other men alien to my temperament? That I am too old to be a pedophile?”
“Ironic, isn’t it,” Cohen said with a slight nod. “So much damage done with words, and almost nothing to offset it.”
“I wish we were all mute,” Abou said bitterly. “Yasser used words to destroy me.”
“Hey, you threatened him,” Cohen said, opening his hands in an expansive gesture. “What can you expect?”
“Me? What could a seventy-odd-year-old man do to him?”
“Well, you could make him feel inadequate. He can’t feed and house your daughter or their kids. He’s scared, and you’ve got to admit it, you’re a formidable old codger.”
“Me?”
“You read a lot. You know a lot. He doesn’t. You make him feel puny in front of his wife and children.”
“I have been careful to avoid any unpleasantness,” Abou replied.
“Yes, and you’ve done wonderfully, and if you were on the same level as he, there would be no problem. He had only one weapon and that was to slander you. He may not be bright, but he is a clever, malicious villain.”
Abou looked down. He saw the teapot. Putting some kindling under the vessel, he lit it.
“Tea?”
“Yes, that would be nice. That delicious green tea, if you still have some.”
Abou found his small supply of Japanese tea and carefully spooned it into the heating water. He never let the water boil. It gave the tea a bitter taste.
“Sugar?”
Cohen held up his hand. “No. No. I really must cut down. This weight problem is making getting about difficult.”
“Is there nothing for me to do?” Abou asked, as they waited for the tea to steep.
Cohen nodded sagely. “Look, humans have free will, except for your genes, which are working all the time and trying to control your every action. But generally, you humans can do what you please, if you put your mind to it. Conflicts are developing, of course. Look at the dispute over abortion and contraception. Reproductive genes, if they had minds, would want to outlaw abortion and ban contraception, whereas many women want to choose the number of children they have. Free will versus genes. It’s really quite a flap!”
“I wish Salah and I could have had more children,” Abou replied wistfully.
“Of course you do! That’s normal. You’re supposed to want as many as you can have. Ten, twelve, eighteen. That’s the way you were designed by good old nature, if you want to use that word. But remember, old buddy, you first had to go off and work in foreign lands to support your wife and children. You were concerned about how they were going to be fed.”
“Sophia should have brothers to protect her,” Abou added.
Cohen wasn’t really listening. He was on a verbal binge. “And these people who blather on about the sanctity of life! As if life were sacred! It’s like saying breathing is sacred, or death is sacred.”
“I find the idea of killing babies repugnant,” Abou replied in his sternest voice. He didn’t like it when Cohen made these outrageous remarks.
“You’re supposed to. Life, more life! That’s your genes talking.”
“Sophia is the dearest thing in the world to me, and the grandchildren are next.” Abou was finding the angel suddenly annoying. He even considered waking up.
Cohen raised his arm in protest, ready to respond caustically, and then suddenly let it drop. “I’m sorry, Abou. Of course you do, and you provided for your daughter and you’re trying to provide for your grandchildren. You can’t do better than that.”
The old man shrugged. For some reason, he didn’t want to admit being offended by Cohen’s last statements. “It is nothing. And I know what you are saying. It is detestable to see starving children, friendless children, children wandering the streets of cities stealing for food.”
“Yes, you understand, don’t you?” Cohen replied, his voice lower. “You have no idea how distressing it is to see what you have just described. You have enough sadness around here, but look at the rest of Africa, cities in South America, the slums in Manila. It’s just so pitiful.”
Abou was struck by Cohen’s compassion, and he suddenly understood that Cohen’s outrageous statements came from his detestation of the inhuman conditions that afflicted so many. “Are your associates so tenderhearted?”
“Oh, yes,” Cohen replied. “Especially Gabe. He is very sensitive. It’s so hard to explain. We have been privileged to witness this fantastic development over millions of years with so many interesting twists and turns, and now we see such extraordinary self-induced privations and sadness, at least in part. We would weep if we could.”
“You can’t weep?”
“For what purpose? We took our human form so as not to frighten you people, but there is no point in cluttering up our existence with superfluous accouterments. We have the shape we need and the faculties we must have to communicate. The rest isn’t really de rigueur, as you can see.”
“But if you can feel pity and compassion, shouldn’t you have an outlet?” Abou insisted.
Cohen considered this carefully. “You know, you may have something there. I’m going to bring it up at our next staff meeting. But would you poor humans enjoy a multitude of blubbering angels?”
Abou was beginning to weary. “What about my problem? What can I do?”
Cohen shrugged. “Repressive society. I mean, if you attack Yasser, it will look like you’re defending yourself. If you let his lies slide, most will think what he has said is true. A real pickle.”
“That isn’t very helpful, Cohen,” Abou replied, using the angel’s name for the first time. But oddly, the frailty of his advice made Abou feel closer to the celestial being.
“I know. I know. We’re good at handing out simple advice. I mean, you shouldn’t kill anybody, especially during their reproductive years, or unless they’re about to do you in during your reproducing years. That is really simple stuff, but this false witness stuff is bad news.”
Abou frowned. “What are older people to do? Kill themselves?”
“Well, to be frank, for the good of the species, recycling would be best. I can see why you might not like the idea, but protein is in short supply already. If you humans don’t slow down your reproduction, you are going to have to consider using cadavers as an alternative food source. That, or have more of those starving children we were talking about.”
Abou didn’t care for the drift of the conversation. “I thought you liked me.”
“Of course I like you. We all do,” Cohen insisted, trying to understand. “Oh, there’s nothing personal in this, Abou. When you die, we will miss you terribly.”
“I see,” Abou replied, hardly mollified.
“Look, Jonathan Swift alluded to the subject of starvation almost three hundred years ago,” Cohen ruminated. “If I remember, he recommended eating babies because they were tender and succulent.”
“This hardly helps me with my problem,” Abou complained.
“That’s true, and I’m sorry about that. I don’t know what’s going to happen about all these goings-on, as we can’t see the future, but it doesn’t look good, Abou. It just doesn’t look good. Yasser, as despicable as he is, has all the cards just now.”
“Then I am going for undisturbed sleep for the remainder of the night,” Abou replied and pulled his robe over his head. He heard Cohen mutter, “I don’t blame you,” and then there was silence.