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After the first days Chamcha no longer noticed Gibreel’s bad breath, because nobody in that world of sweat and apprehension was smelling any better. But his face was impossible to ignore, as the great purple welts of his wakefulness spread outwards like oil—slicks from his eyes. Then at last his resistance ended and he collapsed on to Saladin’s shoulder and slept for four days without waking once.

When he returned to his senses he found that Chamcha, with the help of the mouse-like, goateed hostage, a certain Jalandri, had moved him to an empty row of seats in the centre block. He went to the toilet to urinate for eleven minutes and returned with a look of real terror in his eyes. He sat down by Chamcha again, but wouldn’t say a word. Two nights later, Chamcha heard him fighting, once again, against the onset of sleep. Or, as it turned out: of dreams.

“Tenth highest peak in the world,” Chamcha heard him mutter, “is Xixabangma Feng, eight oh one three metres. Annapurna ninth, eighty seventy-eight.” Or he would begin at the other end: “One, Chomolungma, eight eight four eight. Two, K2, eighty-six eleven. Kanchenjunga, eighty-five ninety-eight, Makalu, Dhaulagiri, Manaslu. Nanga Parbat, metres eight thousand one hundred and twenty-six.”

“You count eight thousand metre peaks to fall asleep?” Chamcha asked him. Bigger than sheep, but not so numerous.

Gibreel Farishta glared at him; then bowed his head; came to a decision. “Not to sleep, my friend. To stay awake.”

That was when Saladin Chamcha found out why Gibreel Farishta had begun to fear sleep. Everybody needs somebody to talk to and Gibreel had spoken to nobody about what had happened after he ate the unclean pigs. The dreams had begun that very night. In these visions he was always present, not as himself but as his namesake, and I don’t mean interpreting a role, Spoono, I am him, he is me, I am the bloody archangel, Gibreel himself, large as bloody life.

Spoono . Like Zeenat Vakil, Gibreel had reacted with mirth to Saladin’s abbreviated name. “Bhai, wow. I’m tickled, truly. Tickled pink. So if you are an English chamcha these days, let it be. Mr. Sally Spoon. It will be our little joke.” Gibreel Farishta had a way of failing to notice when he made people angry. Spoon, Spoono, my old Chumch : Saladin hated them all. But could do nothing. Except hate.

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