Free Ollie's Cloud by Gary Lindberg Page B

gatekeeper will say that the only travelers to leave the village were going to Mashhad.
    But Gordon’s course is set for Tabbas, then on to Kirman and finally Bushire, the port city on the Persian Gulf. In Bushire they will board a steamer and begin a civilized journey to Bombay, where Gordon will collect the belongings he had left at the missionary station there, and then travel on to England. His home. The home of Anisa’s family.
    Both he and Anisa are returning home at last.
    Only Ali is leaving.
     

PART 2
    London 1823

Chapter 1
    Standing on the rough deck, Ali can make out a dark scuff that mars the otherwise featureless fog into which the Prince Regent sails. From the pointing fingers of passengers all around him, and the excited cries of England! England! , he knows that his voyage is almost over. Dressed in English clothes purchased for him in Bombay, he looks like an English child with a tan. His mother stands behind him, her frail arms wrapped snugly around his chest to protect him from the damp air.
    His stomach groans and cramps. Anxiety of the unknown. Another encounter with strangeness. What is this gray streak that stains the horizon just ahead? Where is the sun? He feels as if he is descending into the first level of hell. The other stops on this journey were temporary interruptions in the flow of his life, but he is told that London is to be his permanent home. Here he will likely spend the rest of his life. Ali looks around, astonished at the expressions of joy on many of the passengers.
    Ali remembers the Bushruyih sun and heat, his proud Arabian stallion, the dry desert wind in his face, his friend Jalal. His heart swells with loneliness and regret. He has abandoned everything—his life and dreams, his father, even his God—and he has done so willingly, a full partner in the crime. Weeks ago his life had been filled with purpose. But now there is no madrisih in his future. Never will he be revered by the pious and called mulla or mujtahid . Praying to Allah will bring only scorn from those who love him.
    On each previous day of this tiresome trip, as the m u’a dhdh in had called to prayer the Muslims on board, Ali had felt pulled to prostrate himself, plead for forgiveness, offer his life as a sacrifice for the unfoldment of the great plan of Muhammad. But each time such thoughts had intruded, the prayer that tortured him would mercifully end, its faint echo would finally dissolve into the sea, and with it Ali’s passion would fade, only to be replaced by feelings of guilt. How could he harbor such an attachment to the Prophet? After all, had not the Christians staked an earlier claim to God? Was not Muhammad an immoral and murderous power-monger who invented a counterfeit rival to the Christian God as false authority for his worldly aims?
    Gordon’s daily English lessons had fully burdened Ali with the sin of Adam, condemned him to eternal damnation, then washed him in the saving blood of Christ. Ali could neither wholly discard his previous beliefs nor completely accept these new teachings. For Ali, the absolutes of Christian and Islamic Truth eventually have merged into a new reality in which there are two deities, God and Allah, siblings who refuse to acknowledge each other. God is the older brother but has grown tired and feeble after leading his people into many battles over thousands of years. Allah possesses the strength and vigor of youth but lacks the authority of His firstborn brother. God is angry; Allah is strict. God loves the Jews; Allah loves the Arabs and Persians. Jesus was God disguised as a man; Muhammad was the Word of God—the Qu’ran—disguised as a man. Jesus died to save mankind; Muhammad lived to lead mankind.
    For Ali, the main difference between those who favor God and those who follow Allah seems to be dietary. Christians drink blood and eat small uncooked pieces of God, calling it “communion”; Muslims neither eat God nor pork. Whichever menu one chooses, the