"Where? How? Describe exactly."
"It was evening. A convoy of Jordanian jeeps came into the camp, six of them. They grabbed Khalil and Michel--Salim--and ordered Michel to go and cut some branches from a pomegranate tree"--she held out her hands, just as Michel had done that night in Delphi--"six young branches, one metre each. They made Khalil take his shoes off and Salim kneel down and hold Khalil's feet while they beat them with the pomegranate branches. Then they had to change over. Khalil holds Salim. Their feet aren't feet any more, they're unrecognisable. But the Jordanians make them run all the same, by shooting behind them into the ground."
"So?" said Tayeh impatiently.
"So what?"
"So why is Fatmeh so important in this matter?"
"She nursed them. Day and night, bathing their feet. She gave them courage. Read to them from the great Arab writers. Made them plan new attacks. ‘Fatmeh is our heart,' he said. ‘She is our Palestine. I must learn from her courage and her strength.' He said that."
"He even wrote it, the fool," said Tayeh, hanging his walking stick over the back of a chair with an angry clank. He lit himself another cigarette.
Staring stiffly towards the blank wall as if there were a mirror on it, leaning backward on his ash stick, Tayeh was drying off his face with a handkerchief. Fatmeh rose and went silently to the basin and fetched a glass of water for him. From his pocket, Tayeh pulled a flat half-bottle of Scotch and poured some in. Not for the first time it occurred to Charlie that they knew each other very well, in the manner of close colleagues, even lovers. They talked together a moment; then Fatmeh turned and faced her again, while Tayeh put her last question.
"What is this in his letter: ‘The plan we agreed over the grave of my father'--explain this also. What plan?"
She started to describe the manner of his death, but Tayeh impatiently cut her short.
"We know how he died. He died of despair. Tell us about the funeral."
"He asked to be buried in Hebron--in El Khalil--so they took him to the Allenby Bridge. The Zionists wouldn't let him cross. So Michel and Fatmeh and two friends carried the coffin up a high hill, and when evening came they dug a grave at a place where he could look down into the land the Zionists stole from him."
"Where is Khalil while they are doing this?"
"Absent. He's been away for years. Out of touch. Fighting. But that night, while they were filling in the grave, he suddenly showed up."
"And?"
"He helped fill in the grave. Then he told Michel to come and fight."
"Come and fight?" Tayeh repeated.
"He said it was time to attack the Jewish entity. Everywhere. There was to be no distinction any more between Jew and Israeli. He said the whole Jewish race was a Zionist power base and that the Zionists would never rest until they had destroyed our people. Our only chance was to lift the world up by the ears and make it listen. Again and again. If innocent life was to be wasted, why should it always be Palestinian? The Palestinians were not going to imitate the Jews and wait two thousand years to get back their homeland."
"So what was the plan?" Tayeh insisted, unimpressed.
"Michel should come to Europe. Khalil would arrange it. Become a student, but also a fighter."
Fatmeh spoke. Not for very long.
"She says her small brother had a big mouth, and that God was wise to close it when he did," said Tayeh and, beckoning to the boys, he limped quickly ahead of her down the stairs. But Fatmeh put a hand on Charlie's arm and held her back, then yet again stared at her with a frank but friendly curiosity. Side by side, the two women returned along the corridor. At the door to the clinic, Fatmeh again stared at her, this time with undisguised bewilderment. Then she kissed Charlie on the cheek. The last Charlie saw of her, she had recovered the baby and was once more swabbing its eyes, and if Tayeh hadn't been calling to her to make haste, she would have stayed and helped Fatmeh for the rest of her life.
"You must wait," Tayeh told her as he drove her up to the camp. "We were not expecting you, after all. We did not invite you."
She thought at first sight that he had brought her to a village, for the terraces of white huts that clambered down the hillside looked quite attractive enough in the headlights. But as the drive continued, the scale of the place began to reveal itself, and by the time they had reached the hilltop, she was in a makeshift town built for thousands, not hundreds. A grizzled, dignified man received them, but it was Tayeh on whom he lavished his warmth. He wore polished black shoes and a khaki uniform pressed into razor-sharp creases, and she guessed he had put on his best clothes for Tayeh's coming.
"He is our headman here," Tayeh said simply, introducing him. "He knows you are English, otherwise nothing. He will not ask."
They followed him to a sparse room lined with sporting cups in glass cases. On a coffee table at the centre lay a plate piled high with packets of cigarettes of different brands. A' very tall young woman brought sweet tea and cakes, but no one spoke to her. She wore a headscarf, a traditional full skirt, and flat shoes. Wife? Sister? Charlie could not make her out. She had bruises of grief beneath her eyes and seemed to move in a realm of private sadness. When she had gone, the headman fixed Charlie with a ferocious stare and delivered a sombre speech with a distinct Scottish accent. He explained without smiling that during the Mandate years he had served in the Palestinian police, and still drew a British pension. The spirit of his people, he said, had been greatly strengthened by its suffering. He supplied statistics. In the last twelve years, the camp had been bombed seven hundred times. He gave the casualty figures and dwelt upon the proportion of dead women and children. The most effective weapons were American-built cluster bombs; the Zionists also dropped booby traps disguised as children's toys. He gave an order and a boy disappeared and returned with a battered toy racing-car. He lifted off the casing and revealed wiring and explosive inside. Maybe, thought Charlie. Maybe not. He referred to the variety of political theory among Palestinians, but earnestly assured her that, in the fight against Zionism, such distinctions disappeared.
"They bomb us all," he said.
He addressed her as "Comrade Leila," which was how Tayeh had announced her, and when he had finished, he declared her welcome and handed her gratefully to the tall sad woman.
"For justice," he said, by way of good night.
"For justice," Charlie replied.
Tayeh watched her go.
The narrow streets had a candlelit darkness. Open drains ran down the centre; a three-quarter moon drifted above the hills. The tall girl led the way; the boys followed with machine guns and Charlie's shoulder bag. They passed a mud playing-field and low huts that could have been a school. Charlie remembered Michel's football, and wondered too late whether he had won any silver cups for the headman's shelves. Pale blue lights burned over the rusted doors of the air-raid shelters. The noise was the night noise of exiles. Rock and patriotic music mingled with the timeless murmur of old men. Somewhere a young couple was feuding. Their voices welled into an explosion of pent-up fury.
"My father apologises for the sparseness of the accommodation. It is a rule of the camp that buildings should not be permanent, lest we forget where our true home is. If there is an air raid, please do not wait for the sirens, but follow the direction in which everybody is running. After a raid, please be sure to touch nothing that is lying on the ground. Pens, bottles, radios--nothing. "
Her name was Salma, she said with her sad smile, and her father was the headman.
Charlie allowed herself to be ushered forward. The hut was tiny, and clean as a hospital ward. It had a handbasin and a lavatory and a rear courtyard the size of a pocket handkerchief.
"What do you do here, Salma?"