would stop immigration for a year. That was in June.”
Darwish’s face remained blank.
“Are you sure?” said Hani.
“Yes, I’m sure.”
“He said they would stop immigration for a year,” said Hani.
“He said they would be willing to consider it.”
“All right, there’s the difference,” said Darwish. “Willing to consider.”
“Look,” said Nuri, leaning forward in his chair. “You are going to have to end the violence at some point. It can’t go on forever. I know, I know, that the harvest is soon. And I think the Brits have enough of your critical people here now to make supplying the rebels difficult. Listen, Hani, listen to me.”
Hani’s jaw throbbed.
“They will win,” said Nuri. “One way or another they will win. Don’t you see? Your little armed force getting ready around Nablus is not an army. It’s not a real army. But if you get out now, if you announce an end to the strike willingly, without being forced, then you can tell your men, you can tell Palestine, that you have won something—a stop to immigration before the Commission arrives—and then you’ll be heroes.”
Darwish’s face was tightening into a scowl.
“If we call off the strike,” said Hani, “and they do not stop immigration, the rebels will actually kill us. I have no doubt.” He held his jaw. “We cannot give in, Nuri.”
“Are you all right?”
“It’s nothing. My tooth, I have a toothache.”
“Salamtak. They must have a doctor here.”
Hani waved his hand.
“The people are suffering,” said Darwish suddenly. “This is the truth.”
Hani looked at him in surprise.
“What?” he said.
Darwish raised his eyes to Hani, with an almost apologetic expression. Delicately, he said: “A full strike for six months. No activity at all …” He raised his hands. “Nuri does have a point. It will not be sustainable for much longer. Perhaps we should—take advantage of the circumstances. And twist them to suit the struggle, as best we can.”
In an instant, Hani revised his understanding of Darwish’s scowl. He had assumed his colleague was unconvinced, angered, but in fact the opposite was true. He had never heard Darwish express doubts like these before; he thought rather that everyone in Sarafand understood that they were all sacrificing for the larger project, and they would never back down, they must preserve their solidarity. It was for that very reason that Hani had decided not to see a dentist. But looking at his colleague now he experienced an upwelling of energy, not anger precisely, but something like alarm, and it crossed his mind that, of course, since they were all in different barracks, varying reactions and revisions and objectives would be burgeoning between those other beds. Divide and conquer: that was the design. A cord snapped in his chest as he realised both Nuri and Darwish were waiting for his assent. He wondered whether Darwish had already agreed to Nuri’s plan before he arrived.
“What’s in it for you?” he said to Nuri, allowing some spite into his tone.
Nuri blinked. “It is my duty, my sense of duty, my Arab—but what do you mean, what’s in it for me?”
Hani raised an eyebrow, preparing his verbal weapons. Even if he must eventually accept this plan to end the strike, he would not capitulate without at least probing Nuri’s virtue, which now seemed to him to be very much in question. But as he was opening his mouth to deliver his accusation, an unbearable pain shot through his lower jaw, and he bent forward, holding his cheek.
“Salamtak,” said Darwish again.
“I’ll tell you what,” said Nuri. Hani could tell from his voice that he was smiling. “Come to the meeting in Jerusalem. Next week. We’ll get you out of here, Hani Bey. We’ll get you home to your wife. And we’ll get you to a dentist.”
When Midhat saw Abu Jamil and Jamil standing at the foot of his bed, both wearing suits and ties, he assumed he was hallucinating.
He had been downgraded to the acute ward since the incident with Henryk, and here, in addition to enduring the noises, he was keeping a constant vigil against hallucinations. He had deduced that the pocket watch in Henryk’s hand was illusory—though less because of its own logic than because, using the internal logic of a dream, he understood that the vision of Jeannette could not have been real. And if that was not real, then that was not real either. At the sight of his uncle and cousin, therefore, his heart sank: he had been so sure he was improving. Then he noticed that Abu