Page 57 - And the Mountains Echoed (novel)

Four

In the Name of Allah the Most Beneficent, the Most Merciful, I know that I will
be gone when you read this letter, Mr. Markos, for when I gave it to you I
requested that you not open it until after my death. Let me state now what a
pleasure it has been to know you over the last seven years, Mr. Markos. As I
write this, I think fondly of our yearly ritual of planting tomatoes in the garden,

your morning visits to my small quarters for tea and pleasantry, our impromptu
trading of Farsi and English lessons. I thank you for your friendship, your
thoughtfulness, and for the work that you have undertaken in this country, and I
trust that you will extend my gratitude to your kindhearted colleagues as well,
especially to my friend Ms. Amra Ademovic, who has such capacity for
compassion, and to her brave and lovely daughter, Roshi.
I should say that I intend this letter not just for you, Mr. Markos, but for
another as well, to whom I hope you will pass it on, as I shall explain later.
Forgive me, then, if I repeat a few things you may already know. I include them
out of necessity, for her benefit. As you will see, this letter contains more than an

element of confession, Mr. Markos, but there are also pragmatic matters that
prompt this writing. For those, I fear I will call upon your assistance, my friend.
I have thought long on where to begin this story. No easy task, this, for a man
who must be in his mid-eighties. My exact age is a mystery to me, as it is to
many Afghans of my generation, but I am confident in my approximation
because I recall quite vividly a fist-fight with my friend, and later to be brother-
in-law, Saboor, on the day we heard that Nāder Shah had been shot and killed,
and that Nāder Shah’s son, young Zahir, had ascended to the throne. That was
1933. I could begin there, I suppose. Or somewhere else. A story is like a
moving train: no matter where you hop onboard, you are bound to reach your
destination sooner or later. But I suppose I ought to begin this tale with the same
thing that ends it. Yes, I think it stands to reason that I bookend this account with
Nila Wahdati.

I met her in 1949, the year she married Mr. Wahdati. At the time, I