The Bottom of the Jar Read Online Free PDF

woman’s advice quite pertinent.
    â€œWell then, why don’t you bring out the sarouel?” Ghita asked, since all this talk was making her very impatient.
    â€œThere’s nothing to show,” Si Mohammed answered sheepishly.
    â€œHow can that be?” Ghita cried. “Do you want to make us into a laughingstock?”
    â€œTurn to God woman,” my father said, “let the boy explain himself.”
    Si Mohammed explained. Talking expertly, as if he actually knew something about it, he claimed that, anatomically speaking, he had found the hymen highly unusual. Stopping several times to pick up the threads of his tale, he said that though he had pushed as hard hecould, he’d only been able to force a small opening. But a few drops of blood had fallen onto the sheet.
    â€œThat’s all that God has seen fit to give me,” he concluded, without seeming too sure of himself.
    â€œYou have to go back in there immediately and finish the job!” my mother thundered.
    D ESPITE THE RISING tension, I believe it was at this time that I received a visit from the sandman.
    I must have felt quite nostalgic for our old home in the Spring of Horses, since that was the house upon which my eyes opened in my dream.
    Some will cry foul. What? Could they be so unaware of similar cases in The Arabian Nights and various cinematographic efforts? That is unless they happen to be followers of the late Bourguiba, 4 who, before being overthrown in a medical coup d’état, had been famous for his harebrained ideas. One of them being to ban filmmakers in his country from using the flashback technique, deeming that it seriously compromised the feeling of suspense and was detrimental to the intellectuals’ obligations to instruct the moviegoing masses.
    T HAT SHOULD BE taken as a warning since all it takes is the blink of an eye for a clumsy bombshell to come out of nowhere (according to Ghita) and for the narrative to slide to the earliest days of childhood. Once again, the following themes will be skipped over:
    the Qur’anic school, which I didn’t frequent for very long
    my circumcision, which didn’t unduly traumatize me
    the Festival of the Sacrifice, where the blood of sheep freely flows and spurts
    the hammam, where little boys are initiated into the great mysteries of women
    the tyranny of the paterfamilias, since I am not exaggerating when I say that my own father, Driss, was as gentle as a lamb
    I am now well within my rights to return to my dream . . . or rather my reverie – on that I will readily concede.

5

    T HE CHILD WHO opens his eyes on the house in the Spring of Horses must be around the age of six and has already been saddled with a nickname. His playmates called him Namouss (or Mosquito), not because he was smaller than the kids his age (Fezzis, people from Fez, generally have short legs) but because, aside from being rather frail, he was also a bit of a flighty creature who was unable to keep still. Bordering on recklessness, this sprightliness had earned him plenty of boo-boos (torn toenails, a head crisscrossed with scars) and was above all the reason Ghita had designated him as her emissary, charging him with relaying communications between her and Driss. Whenever the slightest problem arose – and something went wrong each God-given day – Ghita would bid him: “Namouss, go and tell your father to come daba daba ” (immediately).
    At the speed of lightning, Namouss would run straight through the Sekkatine souk, and once Driss had received the message, he wouldforget customers and merchandise, adjust his tarboosh, slip on his balghas, and head home pronto.
    As far as Namouss’s sprightliness was concerned, the apple hadn’t fallen far from the tree. In another time or place, Driss might have been a track champion. His sure-footedness made each obstacle in his path a fait accompli. Catlike, Driss snaked through the crowd, dodging the