Our orders were to follow each other at a distance, not to spread out, to speak to no one, but Emir Zaid and Abu Zoubeir looked the other way. They were walking behind, monitoring us discreetly.

At the training room, everything was ready. The Oubaida brothers had prepared the equipment meticulously. There were real explosive charges in the pockets of the vests. We’d done our initiation with bricks. That was why Emir Zaid advised us to be extremely careful. The Oubaida brothers explained to us that once the devices had been set, they were the only ones who could disconnect them. That gave me goose bumps. Abu Zoubeir hugged us one by one and we all hugged each other. I had tears in my eyes when Hamid put his arms around me. It was my turn to crack, but no one noticed. That said, all of our eyes were glistening. We kept reciting the Koran as we put on the vests, which the Oubaida brothers fastened carefully; we spat on Satan and his army of infidels and we went out to meet our destinies. Fuad, Nabil, and I were leaving first. The others would take the next bus. Emir Zaid and his friends escorted us to the wall and disappeared just as they’d come, one night in Sidi Moumen. So we were let loose in the wild like hungry wolves, ready to devour the entire planet.

17

THE DOORMAN OF the Genna Inn was wearing a handsome red uniform with a marshal’s gold stripes and a miniature fez on his head. He didn’t notice me walk in because I’d dodged between the luggage porters, who were pushing a massive gilt trolley piled high with suitcases. Tourists as white as corpses came in at the same time. Fuad and Nabil were supposed to join me a few minutes later, so as not to arouse the suspicions of the security guards. The glass door spun round and round like a carousel. And suddenly, the light. . An orgy of bulbs glittered in an immense hallway; you’d have thought you were already in the paradise Abu Zoubeir had rhapsodized about. Perched on high heels, bare-backed virgins walked this way and that over the smooth floor, which was so clean it gleamed. I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the shoes gliding all around me, of every color, polished, made exclusively for this kind of surface. And the music! A succession of light, delicate notes, so different from the racket of our tamtams and crotales, flitted through the perfumed air as if each of them was borne by a cherub. Studied laughter swelled here and there and slowly subsided, caressing my ears, almost making me forget I was about to die. So I’d entered the antechamber of that other world, which held out its arms to me, whispering so many promises. I wondered at that point if I’d already activated the device wrapped round my chest. My heart nearly stopped when a security guard came over to find out what I was up to. I replied that I was waiting for my boss and he let me be, but kept his eye on me all the same. I looked through the plate-glass window that had a view of the garden. Virgins with bare breasts, their sex hardly concealed by a triangle of cloth the size of a vine leaf, were basking in the sun on funny-looking beds, in the shade of brightly colored parasols; others swam in an expanse of water so transparently blue it looked as if the sky had tipped into it. A clump of date palms rose up from the middle of the pool, to the delight of the birds. On the right, up three steps, stretched the restaurant. Tables covered in white cloths, on which sat floral-patterned plates, round glasses, and silver cutlery. The whole display sparkled in the sun, an invitation to a feast. The grilled meat smelled so good. My heart did not stop pounding because the guard had come back and was giving me a dirty look. But I was smartly dressed and my espadrilles were spanking new. I was wearing a loose jacket and a pair of jeans, lent to me by Hamid. When I saw the guard coming toward me, I clutched at the cord, in spite of the emir’s strict orders: surround yourself with the maximum number of infidels before you pull. But the guard walked straight past me, heading for a guest who was calling to him. I took a deep breath. Fuad and Nabil were a long time coming. Those few minutes seemed an eternity. I sat down on a sofa and instantly gave a start, I was so unused to it: I felt I was being sucked into the void. A dog as small as a cat came and sat by my feet, as if I’d stepped in some dog mess. I’d never seen such a creature, with long hair, all silky curls. He was nothing like the strays at the dump. You could hardly see his face. I gave him a subtle kick under the table to get rid of him; he yelped and was off. His mistress ran to pick him up, clasped him to her large breasts, and stroked him, looking me up and down. I acted dumb and averted my eyes, but the old woman kept turning round as she walked off — there was just me on the sofa, and her dog wasn’t the type to yelp for no reason.

I was relieved to see Nabil enter the lobby. I signaled to him to walk slowly because of the slippery floor. In those clothes, with his chestnut hair and graceful walk, he could have been one of the hotel guests. He behaved normally, skirting a young woman who was sitting behind a table and seemed to be advising people. He walked past me, acting as if he didn’t know me, and paused for a moment near the restaurant, where foreigners were sitting at tables, though it was early afternoon. Maybe that was their custom. Unless in these places people were so rich they never stopped eating. I thought that as paradises go, this one would suit me just fine. There was no need to go right up in the sky to be happy. Snacking all day long and sprawling in the shade, surrounded by gorgeous sirens, would do for me. Satan had already started to undermine me, complicate my job, stop me from pulling the cord, so that he’d save the godless. Nabil was growing impatient; Fuad hadn’t showed. We were starting to worry about him. A westerner walked past my friend, eyeing up his backside. I thought to myself that even here Nabil’s ass would cause aggravation.

Behind a gleaming mahogany desk, two men dressed to the nines were greeting the tourists. Their smiles weren’t like ours. They seemed false, because it’s impossible to smile all day long, even when you’re happy. They must have had a lot of training to make their cheeks move like that, but the rest of their face remained expressionless. The tourists seemed to have no problem with these fixed grins and made a similar face themselves as they went about filling in forms. Watching their kids playing around the suitcases, I thought of the young Palestinian boy who’d died in his father’s arms. As soon as the loop started in my head, I stood up and walked toward them, advancing like a sleepwalker. I was myself and someone else at the same time. I noticed the tiniest details, as if my mind had suddenly woken up and entered a higher dimension. I looked over toward the entrance, but there was still no sign of Fuad. The doorman was still at his post and the future corpses were still pushing the revolving glass door. Time was passing and the tension was mounting. It was possible that Fuad had panicked and fled into the backstreets of Casablanca. Nabil must have been thinking the same thing because, as he came up to the desk, he nodded. That “yes” froze the blood in my veins, because it meant it was time to act. When he disappeared into the restaurant, my heart was thudding so hard I thought it would burst. Sweat ran down my forehead as I said my prayers; my trembling hand gripped the cord as if it were a lifeline. I was wrestling with Satan, who, by some diabolical trick, had turned the blond kids playing near the suitcases into the Palestinian boy who’d died in his father’s arms. I muttered a sura under my breath, then louder and louder, but the kids were still Palestinian. I squeezed the cord between my fingers but some evil force stopped me from pulling it. Then I saw the security guard approaching from a long way off with a determined look on his face; I knew he was coming for me. He was an inch from grabbing me when the explosion reverberated through the restaurant. Then I saw nothing, because I was catapulted through the air, blown away by another explosion, along with all the tourists around me. The guard, too, exploded into a thousand pieces, along with the little dog and the old bag carrying him, the guys behind the desk and their fixed grins. I’d pulled the cord inadvertently, because Satan’s cunning had almost triumphed, in spite of all my prayers. It was tough, very tough, hearing the children’s laughter, seeing their hands and their eyes and their guardian angels dangling from the thread I held. I was like a puppeteer. I had their destinies at my fingertips. Yes, it was butchery, it was hell. It was the end of the world. There was more carnage ten minutes later when the second group entered the hotel. The doorman, who tried to block their path, was stabbed by Hamid and the firework display went on, decimating survivors and rescuers, sowing desolation and chaos: smoke, flames, dust, the debris of furniture and bodies; screams, still more screams, from the wounded and the survivors, and the groans of the dying who weren’t lucky enough to die quickly; groans that echoed in many tongues, though the sobbing had no color and no country. The sobbing of human beings lying on the ground, stunned, dazed, lost. And people scrambling in all directions, terrified of another explosion.