Deborah's Pain

7

Deborah's Residence, London

“I hope I’ll get some time to prepare some notes before I leave for the supper.

Thomas said, breaking the silence.

“The supper is ready reverend. Have it here!” Deborah said with a mild smile.

“Thanks. That would be so kind of you.” Thomas answered.

“Great, I’ll be back.” Deborah replied with as she disappeared into the kitchen.

 She was back in a short while with the supper. “Its modest reverend - Shepherd’s Pie with bread and port wine from Portugal.”

“That’s excellent Deborah.” Thomas replied.

Both of them sat for the supper and talked about anything under the sun, or above it till Deborah mentioned:

“The last supper.”

Thomas stopped for a moment.

“Bread and wine.” Deborah mentioned.

“Shepherd’s pie.” Thomas said, and both laughed.

They finished the supper. Thomas sat on the sofa with his notebook to make some notes about the cases. Deborah went in the kitchen

There was a shriek.

“Deborah!”

“Deborah is it you?”

Thomas heard a swooshing as if it were a sound of a whip hitting the skin. There were more shrieks and moans. The sounds were clearly from the kitchen. He rushed there.

The skin of Deborah’s back was torn in tiny shreds – white fascia showing underneath it. Drops of blood were running down her back. Thomas ran towards her, shouting – “Deborah!”

There was a thud – he saw himself pushed away by an invisible force. There was a sound of an invisible whip and as the whip touched Deborah’s back. He saw a mark of nine lashes, and soon shreds of flesh came out of her back, and then there was more blood.

Thomas ran out towards the door calling the police. As the officer in-charge entered, he could hear a multitude of loud moans from the kitchen – in voices of both men and women. The lashes continued.

Thomas called the ambulance. He went to the kitchen again. He saw the officer lying unconscious and Deborah lying in a pool of blood. She tried to stand up, and again there was a lash and she fell down.

“Oh God! The Devil!” Thomas cried and ran to the living room where the cross was kept. He took the cross and holy water from this bag and ran towards Deborah.

Deborah was standing bent forward with her hands up like she was carrying some invisible load on her back. She started moving – tears of blood coming out of her eyes.

In the Name of the Father, 

and of the Son, 

and of the Holy Ghost. 

Amen. 

Thomas started praying.

Most glorious Prince of the Heavenly Armies, 

Saint Michael the Archangel, 

defend us in "our battle against principalities and powers, 

against the rulers of this world of darkness, 

against the spirits of wickedness in the high places"

Come to the assistance of men whom God has created to His likeness 

and whom He has redeemed at a great price from the tyranny of the devil. 

The Holy Church venerates you as her guardian and protector; 

to you, the Lord has entrusted the souls of the redeemed to be led into heaven. 

Pray therefore the God of Peace to crush Satan beneath our feet, 

that he may no longer retain men captive and do injury to the Church. 

Offer our prayers to the Most High, 

that without delay they may draw His mercy down upon us; 

take hold of "the dragon, the old serpent, which is the devil and Satan," 

bind him and cast him into the bottomless pit 

"that he may no longer seduce the nations.

In the Name of Jesus Christ, 

our God and Lord, 

strengthened by the intercession of the Immaculate Virgin Mary, 

Mother of God, 

of Blessed Michael the Archangel, 

of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul and all the Saints. 

and powerful in the holy authority of our ministry,

we confidently undertake to repulse the attacks and deceits of the devil. 

He sprinkled holy water on Deborah.

Out of great astonishment, he saw that where the water touched the skin – the wounds healed immediately. It wasn’t the devil!

 As Deborah moved out of the kitchen – Thomas could well understand that Deborah was not possessed by the Devil, she was possessed by the God! She was carrying the cross on her back.

Thomas switched on his chip set on recording mode as she went to the living room. She fell down. Thomas knew that he couldn’t help her. He just sprinkled some holy water in the name of the god. 

Deborah fell down on the floor. She turned – as though picked up by someone. There was a sound of clinking of iron as if someone had stuck iron nail with a hammer – and then a loud cry and shivering in great pain. Blood flowed from Deborah’s right palm – as though someone nailed her palm.

The Ambulance was at the door.

Deborah's Past

6

London

The past month had witnessed an unexpected turn of events in Dawson murder case. Thomas Edwards, from the Anglican Church, strangely, decided to represent Deborah in the court. Deborah accepted it despite her being a catholic. 

Participation of a high ranking church official in a murder case, as advocate for the suspect ,increased the controversy surrounding the case. The Archbishop himself was under a heavy stress regarding his decision. Every time he thought on reversing the decision, he somehow opened the same page on the bible instructing him to go on.

The first day of the hearing was rather uneventful. 

The persecutor dominated the scene throughout the hearing. Thomas had picked up the wrong thread, He tried to prove that Deborah could not have had sex with his uncle, and the idea of her being involved in the murder was far fetched. It made a weak point, naturally.

The second argument that Thomas gave was that Deborah was at his friend Cicely’s home all the night. This was a considerably strong point, but lacked enough proof; as Cicely had traveled that night to her boyfriend's home after leaving Deborah.

By the end of the first hearing itself, both Deborah and Thomas saw darkness at the end of the tunnel. It had become a difficult case to tackle.

Thomas usually took the bus to Harrow after supper and discussed the case with Deborah. He usually stayed there longer to make notes and study the case in greater detail before taking the bus back.

As the case had become rather difficult to handle, he missed the supper and reached at Deborah’s place a little early.

Thomas asked Deborah as he sat in her living room, recording into his chip-set, the proceedings of the day:

  “Deborah, could you relate to me when, exactly, can you say, that your relations with your uncle were ‘not fine’? I remember you saying that your relations were good except a couple of minor episodes that are always there in all relations.”

“Reverend, why do you want to ask about this? You know these episodes are not worth remembering, especially for a deceased individual.” Deborah was mild in her words.

“Deborah, this has no longer remained Dawson murder case. The reputation of the church is at stake. This is the most talked about thing in Britain these days. I don’t know what the God wants, but the things are getting really complicated and you have to be as clear to me as possible.” Thomas explained.

“Reverend, do we really have to talk about this? It is a really uncomfortable topic.” Deborah said.

“Yes, I would insist.” Thomas replied.

Deborah started, “It was when I was fourteen years old, before I went to Portugal that..”

“Was your trip to Portugal an important turn of your life?” Thomas interrupted.

“It wasn’t a trip reverend. I stayed there for five years.” Deborah answered.

“Lisbon?” Thomas asked.

“Fatima, at Sanctuario de Fatima. Basilica de Nossa Senhora do Rosario.” Deborah said.

“You stayed at Fatima for five years and you didn’t tell me?” Thomas appeared annoyed.

“I thought you knew when you knew of other things.” Deborah replied.

 “This is amazing!” Thomas sounded a bit irritated. “Anyhow, continue with what you were saying.”

Deborah resumed, “After father died, I lived with uncle. Everything was fine. He was really caring. I cried sometimes, but now that I reflect on my past, I realize that he never actually let the void seem so big. With aunt it was a different story. I used to share my friends, my problems and my joys with her."

She continued, "One day, things changed. I was a young girl. Like all others, I was curious about the changes in my body. After bath I often used to watch myself in the mirror - my newly grown womanhood. I had left the room door unbolted by chance.” Deborah stopped. There was an uncomfortable silence in the room.

After some time Thomas cleared his throat and tried to break the silence. “Was it your uncle?”

Deborah answered, “It was my aunt.”

“Oh…” Thomas said. “Did it occur again?”

Deborah nodded. “Every day.”

“You felt guilty about it?”

“No.” Deborah answered. “I feel sorry for her.”

“One day, when we were in……uncle dropped in. 

The problems for my aunt stared from that day. The relationship between him and aunt deteriorated. He would not talk to her, neither to me. He would often rebuke her and shame her. Aunt started becoming more and more miserable day by day. She would cry alone. There was no doubt that she was a good wife. She loved uncle. I tried to approach her and talk to her, but all I could get from her was tears. She just stared at me whenever I went to her. All I could feel was hatred.

One day, I went to uncle, and I told him that he was wrong. He remained silent for sometime and then said – ‘I know little girl. The mistake is not yours.’ I burst in tears and hugged him. He patted my head.

After a few days, he told me that we are going to Portugal. We went to Lisbon and then took a cab to Fatima. He handed me over to Sister Clara at Fatima. This was to be my home for next five years and Sr. Clara, my mentor. Uncle mailed me often and talked to me. I never talked to my aunt, nor about her.

It was when I returned to Britain that I came to know that the relationship between both of them had become really turbulent. One day, she went to the riverbanks; or so goes the story – and committed suicide. She was never seen again.”

There was silence. It was broken again by her sighs and sobs – tears rolled down her cheeks. Thomas came around and held his hands gently.

“It’s alright Deborah. It’s ok. The god is with you.” He said.

He waited for her to stop. As she normalized, he spoke to her softly – “Don’t worry Deborah, lets pray to the god. He held her hands and closed his eyes. She followed Thomas. He spoke:

Our Father, who art in heaven.

She followed in Latin:

Pater noster, qui es in caelis:

Hallowed be thy Name.

sanctificetur Nomen Tuum;

Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, On earth as it is in heaven.

adveniat Regnum Tuum;

fiat voluntas Tua,

sicut in caelo, et in terra.

Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, As we forgive those who trespass against us.

Panem nostrum cotidianum da nobis hodie;

et dimitte nobis debita nostra,

sicut et nos dimittimus debitoribus nostris;

And lead us not into temptation, But deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever and ever.

    et ne nos inducas in tentationem;

    sed libera nos a Malo.

Amen.

Amen.

They opened their eyes. There was peace.

The Turkish Sufi

5

Jerusalem, Isreal

Burak Asker had donned on the Ihram. His past was now another life. The small Turkish village of Durak in Adana was far away now. Burak had wandered. He had lived outside the cities for 20 years now. He would just stand up and walk or sit down and meditate. He would eat outside the mosques.

When he was young, he just left Durak, his family and his life there. He had been in a spiritual quest since early age, but he needed answers. Did these answers lie in the world? If so, where did they lay? He asked his village maulwi. He told him that the answers were in the Koran. He read the Koran – his eyes stopped at Al-Ankaboot:

Say: "travel through the earth and see how Allah did originate creation; so will Allah produce a later creation: for Allah has power over all things.

He walked west to Diyabakir. He stayed for 6 months near Kozan. He would pray five times a day and read the Koran. Slowly, people started coming to him, though cautiously. He would avoid talking to most of them, except an old man. Some would come to him carrying their requests so that he could endorse the god to mediate. He wouldn’t say anything. Just keep reading the Koran again and again. Some people sought on constructing a small house near the place where he stayed. The government agreed and a small home was constructed. He never entered the home. People came to him. They might have felt some peace. One day he just went off. Some people followed him for some distance, but he never turned back.

He stopped at Karahan on the banks of Van Golu. Here he stayed for three years. Thereafter, he traveled on. He stayed at Tsovinar near Sevan Lake in Armenia, near Khanbulan reservoir in Azerbaijan, Bandar Anzali on the Caspian sea, Sulemaniyah in Kurdistan. From Iraq, he went on to Latakia and into the Mediterranean Sea into Cyprus and then to Jerusalem. He stayed near the temple mount for 3 years and prayed at al Asqa five times a day. When at Jerusalem, he had a dream one night.In the dream, he traveled south into the Arabian Peninsula to Medina and was now at the hajj in Mecca.   

He walked unto the Masjid-al-haram towards the holy kabaa doing the talbiyah and repeating the verses aloud:

    

Here we come,
O Allah, here we come !
Here we come.
No partners have you.
Here we come!
Praise indeed, and blessings, is yours---
the Kingdom too!
No partners have you!

As he entered through Bab-as-Salam, he prayed to the Allah and put his right feet forward into the mosque. In front of him lay the holy Ka’abah . With his feet firm on the ground and eyes fixed at the Baitullah, he started reciting:

Allahu Akbar –God is great

There is no god except one God.

He repeated it and then paid his respects to the prophet. He moved on towards Hajar-e-Aswad and as he kissed it, he felt a vibration overtake his heart and a cooing sound dominated his mind. All other sounds dimmed off. As he started Tawaf, he felt getting farther and farther from the world, going into a wormhole.

He started repeating aloud, the Arabic chants:

"Subhan-Allah wal-hamdu-lillahi wa la ilaha ill-Allah wa-Allahu Akbar wa la haula wa la quwwata illa-billah."

He suddenly found himself somewhere else. He was among the mountains. There was sweet smelling air all around and trees and birds. There were streams of clear water and soft grass beneath his feet. He saw himself entering the dome of the rock and as he entered it, it melted away into thin air. He heard Arabic chants. A group of people passed by him led by an extraordinarily gracious man – all chanting the holy Arabic chants. Suddenly the chants drowned into the din of some other chants. At Jerusalem he had heard these chants near the church of the holy Sepulcher. These could be Christian. The chants changed to Hebrew and then into completely unknown languages as people passed him by on his sides. Soon all the chants mixed and there was just one single sound – an echo. At last seven graciously grey haired men of amazing grace passed by him. He saw that all of them entered a light in front of him, and soon as he entered the light, he suddenly found himself at Masjid –al-Haram once again – performing Tawaf. He completed the Qudum. Burak went ahead to perform Sa’ey by running between Safa and Marwah on the footsteps of Hagar in search of water. The Hajj was to start tomorrow.

As if it were a reality, the dream continued next night too.

Mount Arafat, Arabia

9^th of Dhu’l-Hijjah

Burak reached Arafat in the first batch from Mina. His fellow countrymen at the tent were all excited. He was thankful. At Arafat, he took a place high up on the mount. From the brown mountain, he saw around at the vast expanse of the Arabian Desert.

He raised his hands and slowly began praying to the almighty. Slowly, his life played on the curtain of his mind, slowly as he was in the prayer. He recollected his childhood, his travels, his stays – everything. He visualized the agony that his parents and those who loved him might have felt when he left them alone. His heart cried. There was water in his eyes. His sobs in time turned into loud cries in agony of those he had agonized – those whom he remembered got blessed while he himself got cleansed of his sins. His mind felt peace.

 He felt a cool moist wind on his face. He opened his eyes. He saw the desert underneath change into green pastures. Where had all the people gone? They were no longer there. He saw a flock of grazing sheep. A shepherd was controlling the herd. Suddenly, it was dark – a huge cloud descended down on the pastures. There was an excitement in the herd. It went dark. There were voices of howling of wolves and the distress cry of the lambs. It continued. Then there was silence. Sharp rain belated against the earth. Suddenly there was a cry:

"Eloi, Eloi, lama sabacthani?"

There was a thunderous thud and a lightening. Burak closed his eyes tight and shut his ears with his hands. He kept his eyes and ears closed for sometime. He felt warmth. His nose felt a fragrance of wet soil. He slowly lifted the hands off his ears. There was a sound of water, of tinkling of bells. He opened his eyes and found himself in a beautiful garden where streams flowed and there were fruit laden trees, flowers and butterflies.

There was a herd of cows and a beautiful cowherd boy. The dark colored boy was the most beautiful creature he had ever seen on the earth. He was playing flute while the calves were grazing near him on green grass. There was a call from far away. “Come on O child! We need to thank the rain god.”

The guy turned around and answered. “Why thank someone else when the true god is the one who has given us everything? From today we would just thank him and no one else.”

Suddenly there was a huge storm, and then it rained – like he had never seen before, the streams started flooding. The cows ran haywire to seek shelter. People cried – help me help me! The child ran toward the mountain and called out to all – “Come, the god would provide you shelter.”

With one hand he lifted the mountain – just like umbrella and people gathered from all around under it. The rain did not affect them anymore. The rain intensified and then stopped. There was sunshine once again.

Burak looked beside him. He was on the Jabal-an-noor. He looked toward the cave of Hira. There was a gentleman in meditation with his hands open toward the sky. Suddenly a man in white linen appeared before him. He had beautiful white wings on his back. He asked him to recite. He repeated and the third time when he said the gentleman opened his lips:

Proclaim! (or read!) in the name of thy Lord and Cherisher, Who created-

Slowly, the spiritual being approached Burak. There was a chanting of the Holy Quran in the background. He approached him and stood in front of him.

“I am Gabriel – the Archangel. Go east to the mountains where the holy men live. The father needs you.”

He heard the sound of azan in the background. He has just woken up. It was dawn.

In Afghanistan

Afghanistan

“Father, you look relieved.” Zaheer sat with a cup of tea in his hands opposite to his father. Zaheer was Wazir Khan’s only son. Twenty five years old, strong and handsome. He had the long nose of his father and gait of an aristocrat. True to his upbringing – he was humble and intelligent. He had just post graduated in political science from the Bamiyan University.

Wazir Khan smiled, “Yes, son. I am. When you are on the chair, you always have a responsibility on your shoulders. You have to act for the chair. Sometimes that is in conflict with your true self.”

“True, father. But I always thought that you acted like yourself.” Zaheer said.

Wazir straightened his back and then relaxed it again on the chair, leaning back as he rested his hands on the armrest. He was in some deep thought.

Zaheer tried to change the subject. “So father, what are you planning to do now?”

“Let me give you the answer to your first question first. I tried to act the best I could in the situation, but still I cold not control many things.” Wazir Khan said.

“What things father?”

“Hakim Baksh.”

“What about him father?”

“You would be shocked to know that your father owns a secret agency.”

“What?” Zaheer was in a state of shock. The tea almost spilled off his hands. “Why?”

“The Indian agencies told me that there might be a constant threat on Bamiyan and Afghanistan – especially from the western quarters. I found that the Indian agencies were very much true.”

“How?”

“The western agencies were spying Hakim Baksh.”

“Why?”

“The wing was started by Nilofar Khanam.”

“Father, you are confusing me. The foreign secretary in your government is being spied, and his daughter is the one who is spying on him.”

“I’ll tell you about that later, but another thing I found was even more suspicious.”

“What was it father?”

“Nilofer has contacts with the KGB. She is continuously in touch with them.”

“Hell! How do you know this?” Zaheer was hysterical by now.

“R&AW”

“Can they be trusted?”

Wazir nodded his head. “That’s why I built a small spy agency of my own. It was a difficult, and task it took years. All of them know that I have some spies, but they still don’t know who they are?”

“But how did you go upon building the thing?” Zaheer asked, seemingly astonished.

“Oghab2”

“Iran helped you?”

“Yes, and the love of tradition in Bamiyan helped me.”

“How?”

“The pomp loving assembly loves its people to put up requests for personal attention to their grievances to the convener. These, they have to give in writing on a piece of paper which is available free of cost at the assembly itself and then drop it in an old style request box to be taken out by the convener’s personal reader and read aloud to him weekly.” Wazir Khan explained.

“I know that father. It seems a stupid tradition, but the things get done surprisingly.” Zaheer said.

Wazir smiled. “Yes, they do; but it forms a foolproof way for passage of information directly to the convener.”

“Oh!” Zaheer gave a startled look.

“Everyone has a secret.” Wazir continued. “I found that Rahim Khan, the reader had an extramarital affair. If it was made public, his family and his social life would have been destroyed. He was blackmailed into submission. His affair was used as a messenger to the spies. No one knew what is happening.”

“That’s excellent.” Zaheer smiled. “But I don’t completely approve of it being morally correct.”

“That’s another thing, entirely. But, it’s a wrong for the right end.” Wazir said.

“As for your second question on what I have planned. The family is going to the Hajj next month.”