Free Shanghai by David Rotenberg Page B

Yiddish, often popped into his head. Although he had not seen his father for almost twenty years, he remembered exactly when his father had said those words to him.
    â€œThey’re trying to starve us into leaving, Papa.”
    â€œThat they are.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œBecause they don’t want us here, boychick. ”
    â€œYou mean the dung-eating new caliph doesn’t want us in Baghdad any more? Because he claims some stupid book said we are monkeys?”
    â€œDogs and monkeys, actually, Richard. Important to remember that. Not just monkeys, but dogs and monkeys. In fact, the progeny of dogs and monkeys,” his father said. The deep cut on his forehead opened slightly when he laughed. The man could find humour in anything.
    â€œWe should just rip off the old idiot’s beard and shove it down his stupid throat.”
    â€œThis from a fourteen-year-old? A fourteen-year-old wants violence? Violence! It is my decision to leave Baghdad. Mine. It’s a good time.”
    â€œA good time? A good time to leave our home?”
    â€œRichard!”
    Richard stared for a moment at the fool of a man in front of him, but he chose not to speak. His father might be willing to leave their ancestral home like a beaten mule, but Richard and Maxi were not so inclined. Even as children they had been unafraid. The Baghdadi boys’stones and taunts had never frightened him, and for Maxi they were just an excuse to attack.
    There had been fires in the Jewish quarter two Friday nights before—naturally, on a Friday night. The Hordoons had escaped harm because they didn’t live in ostentation like the Vrassoons and the Kadooris. The rich had been the first to feel the new caliph’s wrath—or rather the rage of the countless Baghdadi poor, ignorant, and gullible. But last Monday while Richard was at school, his father’s small leather tanning stall in the bazaar had been set afire—with the old man in it. Luckily Maxi had been nearby. He’d dragged their father to safety and then stood his ground as three grown men tried to loot the stall. Maxi was small in stature, but he was a giant in a brawl. Every ounce of him was muscle and sinew, and he loved a fight. When he balled his surprisingly small fists his eyes would go glassy hard, and the smile that the Moslem boys had learned to fear curled his lips. He could take more punishment than any man Richard had ever met, and he was only twelve years old—and extremely pale white, white-skinned and red-haired like their Russian mother. When Richard finally found them, his father had the large gash across his forehead and Maxi was covered in blood—other men’s blood. Maxi smiled, his large white teeth showing through his parted, swollen lips. He pointed to the ground, to the three grown men moaning in the dirt—one with an arm bone showing sickly white through his swarthy skin, another with an eye missing, and the third with a reddened crotch that did not bode well for his contribution to future generations.
    Remembering, Richard smiled and nodded.
    â€œWhy are you nodding? What are you agreeing with, boychick? ”
    â€œNothing—everything.”
    â€œGood. Agreeing is good,” his father said, and grinned.
    Richard took a deep breath, then asked, “So when have you decided that we leave Baghdad?”
    â€œTonight—late—after moonset.”
    So they were going on foot. No trains ran that late. “Where?”
    â€œWhere what, boychick? ”
    â€œWhere are we going, Papa?”
    â€œSouth.”
    South! Not west to Europe but south! He felt his muscles cramp with anger. Then he thought of Maxi—the wild one—and he knew how they’d spend their last night in old Baghdad.
    * * *
    THE TWO-STOREY COURTYARD was centred on an ancient well. The gate in front was made of sturdy metal bars with sharpened tips, but they posed no problem for the Hordoon boys.
    Once over the