The Fifth Mountain Page 0,58

at organization."

"The old ones have lost the will to live."

"Ask them to come anyway."

The woman was making ready to leave when Elijah stopped her.

"Do you know how to write, using letters?"

"No."

"I have learned, and I can teach you. You'll need this skill to help me administer the city."

"But the Assyrians will return."

"When they arrive, they'll need our help to manage the affairs of the city."

"Why should we do this for the enemy?"

"So that each of us can give a name to his life. The enemy is only a pretext to test our strength."

AS ELIJAH HAD FORESEEN, the old people came.

"Akbar needs your help," he told them. "Because of that, you don't have the luxury of being old; we need the youth that you once had and have lost."

"We do not know where to find it," one of them replied. "It vanished among the wrinkles and the disillusion."

"That's not true. You never had illusions, and it is that which caused your youth to hide itself away. Now is the moment to find it again, for we have a dream in common: to rebuild Akbar."

"How can we do the impossible?"

"With ardor."

Eyes veiled behind sorrow and discouragement made an effort to shine again. They were no longer the useless citizens who attended judgments searching for something to talk about later in the day; now they had an important mission before them. They were needed.

The stronger among them separated the usable materials from the damaged houses and utilized them to repair those that were still standing. The older ones helped spread in the fields the ashes of the incinerated bodies, so that the city's dead might be remembered at the next harvest; others took on the task of separating the grains stocked haphazardly throughout the city, making bread, and raising water from the well.

TWO NIGHTS LATER, ELIJAH GATHERED ALL THE INHABITANTS in the square, now cleared of most of the debris. Torches were lit, and he began to speak.

"We have no choice," he said. "We can leave this work for the foreigner to do; but that means giving away the only chance that a tragedy offers us: that of rebuilding our lives.

"The ashes of the dead that we burned some days ago will become the plants that are reborn in the spring. The son who was lost the night of the invasion will become the many children running freely through the ruined streets and amusing themselves by invading forbidden places and houses they had never known. Until now only the children have been able to overcome what took place, because they have no past - for them, everything that matters is the present moment. So we shall try to act as they do."

"Can a man cast from his heart the pain of a loss?" asked a woman.

"No. But he can find joy in something won."

Elijah turned, pointed to the top of the Fifth Mountain, forever covered in clouds. The destruction of the walls had made it visible from the middle of the square.

"I believe in One God, though you think that the gods dwell in those clouds on the Fifth Mountain. I don't want to argue whether my God is stronger or more powerful; I would speak not of our differences but of our similarities. Tragedy has united us in a single sentiment: despair. Why has that come to pass? Because we thought that everything was answered and decided in our souls, and we could accept no changes.

"Both you and I belong to trading nations, but we also know how to act as warriors," he continued. "And a warrior is always aware of what is worth fighting for. He does not go into combat over things that do not concern him, and he never wastes his time over provocations.

"A warrior accepts defeat. He does not treat it as a matter of indifference, nor does he attempt to transform it into a victory. The pain of defeat is bitter to him; he suffers at indifference and becomes desperate with loneliness. After all this has passed, he licks his wounds and begins everything anew. A warrior knows that war is made of many battles; he goes on.

"Tragedies do happen. We can discover the reason, blame others, imagine how different our lives would be had they not occurred. But none of that is important: they did occur, and so be it. From there onward we must put aside the fear that they awoke in us and begin to rebuild.

"Each of you will give yourselves a new name,