Page 260 - The Kite Runner

The Kite Runner 249

the rockets hit the old orphanage. Which is like saving someone
from the lion’s cage and throwing them in the tiger’s.”
“Thank you, Agha,” I said. I turned to go.
“That was your first time, nay?”
“I’m sorry?”
“The first time you saw a Talib.”
I said nothing. The old beggar nodded and smiled. Revealed a
handful of remaining teeth, all crooked and yellow. “I remember
the first time I saw them rolling into Kabul. What a joyous day
that was!” he said. “An end to the killing! Wah wah! But like the
poet says: ‘How seamless seemed love and then came trouble!’”
A smile sprouted on my face. “I know that ghazal. That’s
Hafez.”
“Yes it is. Indeed,” the old man replied. “I should know. I used
to teach it at the university.”
“You did?”
The old man coughed. “From 1958 to 1996. I taught Hãfez,
Khayyám, Rumi, Beydel, Jami, Saadi. Once, I was even a guest
lecturer in Tehran, 1971 that was. I gave a lecture on the mystic
Beydel. I remember how they all stood and clapped. Ha!” He
shook his head. “But you saw those young men in the truck. What
value do you think they see in Sufism?”
“My mother taught at the university,” I said.
“And what was her name?”
“Sofia Akrami.”
His eye managed to twinkle through the veil of cataracts.
“‘The desert weed lives on, but the flower of spring blooms and
wilts.’ Such grace, such dignity, such a tragedy.”
“You knew my mother?” I asked, kneeling before the old man.
“Yes indeed,” the old beggar said. “We used to sit and talk after