ما يحج إلا قوي أو صاحب حِيْلَه

The village harvested the wheat, and they spread the bundles over shared areas around the threshing floor. At night, they covered the grain with sails and tarps, and in the morning, they uncovered it to sunbathe and strengthen the grain. The tenth of Dhu al-Hijjah arrived, the sun rose, and the village was still in slumber, with only the crowing of roosters heard.

The headman opened the door and wrapped himself in his cloak, leaning the wooden ladder against a stone wall that separated his house from his neighbor, the truck driver (Shamsan). When he climbed onto the roof, he secured the ladder behind him so that the children wouldn’t climb it and risk falling, as there was no place to descend from. He reached for a conical-shaped step and turned left before the opening that sloped down to the courtyard of the mosque. He knocked on the door, and the homeowner answered; he said: “Shaddad, the one with two ropes.” She had wrapped a white scarf around her head and covered her face with its edge, calling to her husband: “Get up; get up; the headman is at the door.” He replied in a Makawi accent: “I’ll go soak the drum for him, to open the door to the upper room, so I can hide my bucket and fold my rope; your headman is a critic.”

She pulled the latch and opened the door, and the lady welcomed him warmly. The headman was observant and bold, saying: “Whoever welcomes me, I will treat.” She replied: “You’ll be treated to boiled eggs, mixed millet, and blended milk.” He took a sip from the milk bowl, but he didn’t like the taste, and she said: “It’s goat and sheep milk.” He nodded and said to her: “Your face shines as if it’s smeared with the hump of a camel, and if I’m the son of my father, then the father of the Iraqi is the one who rode yesterday.” She smiled and lowered her head.

Shamsan approached with a towel on his head; his cloth wrapped around his waist, and his silver ring gleamed. He had a hidden dagger in a box adorned with velvet fabric, and he fixed his gaze on it, saying: “I knew about you, O headman, since I saw the (Qarma) twisted and gnawed. You’ve been wandering and roaming with the young she-camel.” He added: “Is it far that you parted ways yesterday?” He replied with a grin: “I’m shy of you, O headman, from the modesty of your mother, who is my father’s sister. Don’t accuse me of something I didn’t do.” He commented: “So what about that noise until nightfall? I didn’t sleep. You’ve got a dance next to my head like the dance of donkeys.” And to cut off the heavy response, he asked his wife to pour him a cup from the burnt kettle to moisten his throat, until he succeeds in his fortune. Shamsan said: “It doesn’t suit you to have more sweetness;” he took the cup with two gulps and handed it back to her, saying: “Add one more.” Shamsan replied: “It will fill you up from the fortune.” He said: “Let it fill me up,” and he didn’t let go of the cup until he had gulped three times, trying to remember why he came to his neighbor, but the attempt failed.

He returned home and said to his wife: “Bring the bulls; let’s trample our summer until midday.” She replied: “The grain hasn’t dried; let it sunbathe on the flat surface, and we’ll turn it for two or three days until it softens and breaks.” He insisted, taking her by her arms, saying: “By God, I will dry it and break it; otherwise, I’m not the son of two ropes.” He freed the bulls from their tether, and his wife denied him, and he set the threshing counter, and from the threshing in her sister’s yard, the grain mixed with the fodder, and he didn’t stop with the bulls until she deceived him.

The mistress set her meal, but he didn’t extend his hand; he lay on his back and glanced up, and he realized that the roof of the house was slanted toward the courtyard. He quickly moved the date bags and the grain heap to the opposite side, and he returned to his work, and if the tilt was on the other side, he continued through the night, not resting until the next morning after he had fed the calves, harvested the clover and the alfalfa, fed the bulls, chopped wood, and plastered the walls of the granary and the storage with mud and straw, and he carried the broom over his shoulder as if it were a staff, and he set it at the barn door and climbed to the upper room.

He slept for three days, and whenever the group gathered around him to consult him about their travel plans for Hajj, they found him like a dead man, with only his breath visible to them. Whenever they sat him down and urged him; the headman would reply: “Your headman is not your headman;” and he would lean back on the cushion. They blamed Shamsan, and they scolded him, swearing that if anything happened to their headman, they would take action against him. He smoked a cigarette and laughed until his bulging eyes sank into their sockets, repeating: “May God reveal his condition;” I said, “O son of two ropes, tea and sucking the gourd don’t suit you; let him deserve it. Once he was the son of two ropes, today he became the son of one rope, and tomorrow he will be the son of a daughter,” and the group laughed, while some criticized him; and the onlookers were pleased with the situation their headman was in.

The headman regained his vitality, not remembering what had happened to him; and after the afternoon prayer, he gathered them at the mosque, asking them: “Who intends to accompany us to perform the ritual of our Lord, so we can tie the promise with the truck driver and give him a down payment?” While they were in the process of taking and giving, the (scholar) withdrew, repeating that only the strong or the cunning can perform Hajj. The one who followed him said: “No one is stronger than you, O our scholar.” He replied: “Nor more cunning than you, O rooster,” and they exchanged jibes. The headman stood up and said: “Upon you, God is the Greatest, and upon the people, be pleased;” he turned to the scholar, saying: “You can’t escape the call to Hajj unless you have a companion, O Talhan; you’ll sit sewing and cleaning and applying oil to the gourd.” He replied: “How can I perform Hajj, O headman, with my poverty?” He added: “People are tribal and seasonal in autumn, and everyone needs their homeland, and something is more important than something else; I’ll sit and mark my homeland for my departure.” They shouted in the shade, and those inside the mosque disagreed about the division: some said: “We’ll pay one riyal each, and each one will take care of their own share,” and others said: “We’ll divide from five, and the share will be communal.” The headman said: “You know; from one to another, from here to the next night until the living one lives, we’ll gather and then we’ll gather at the House of God.”