Page 264 - The Kite Runner

The Kite Runner 253

narrow face reappeared in the crack. He looked from me to Farid
and back. “You were wrong about one thing.”
“What?”
“He’s great with the slingshot.”
I smiled.
“He’s inseparable from that thing. He tucks it in the waist of
his pants everywhere he goes.”

The man who let us in introduced himself as Zaman, the
director of the orphanage. “I’ll take you to my office,” he said.
We followed him through dim, grimy hallways where barefoot
children dressed in frayed sweaters ambled around. We walked
past rooms with no floor covering but matted carpets and win-
dows shuttered with sheets of plastic. Skeleton frames of steel
beds, most with no mattress, filled the rooms.
“How many orphans live here?” Farid asked.
“More than we have room for. About two hundred and fifty,”
Zaman said over his shoulder. “But they’re not all yateem. Many
of them have lost their fathers in the war, and their mothers
can’t feed them because the Taliban don’t allow them to work.
So they bring their children here.” He made a sweeping gesture
with his hand and added ruefully, “This place is better than the
street, but not that much better. This building was never meant
to be lived in—it used to be a storage warehouse for a carpet
manufacturer. So there’s no water heater and they’ve let the well
go dry.” He dropped his voice. “I’ve asked the Taliban for money
to dig a new well more times than I remember and they just twirl
their rosaries and tell me there is no money. No money.” He
snickered.
He pointed to a row of beds along the wall. “We don’t have