An old tomcat grew hungry, yet all his efforts to catch any of his cautious mouse neighbors, entrenched in a hole in the opposite wall, had failed him. He loved watching television: Syrian TV with its Damascene drama series, and the news on Lebanon’s Al-Manar TV. From those Damascene series, he had fallen in love with the dusty, roasted chickpeas that a chorus of Damascene women inevitably sang about in every series (a motif as obligatory as the nostalgic prelude in pre-Islamic poetry, or like the praise of poppy anemone flowers in any modern Jordanian poem). From Al-Manar, he had heard about “strategic patience,” a concept he only grasped after considerable effort.
Then a catty idea flashed in his mind. He went to the market and bought a prayer bead string of one hundred and one beads, two meters of plain green cloth, and then stopped by a nut seller to purchase an ounce of roasted chickpeas.
When he returned home, he wrapped the cloth around his head, fashioning a turban pleasing to the eye. He then sat facing the mice’s hole and began loudly praising the name of God. The mice heard his devout supplications, his tearful prayers, and his pleas for forgiveness for the sins he had committed against his helpless neighbors, the clan of mice.
The mice were astonished by the tomcat’s behavior and convened an emergency meeting to discuss this extraordinary turn of events. The debate among them was long and intense, some skeptical, others convinced. Finally, a graceful, well-formed mouse said, “I shall go to the tomcat myself. If he eats me, I will have sacrificed myself for my people, just as Joan of Arc sacrificed herself for her people, the Gauls, and you will take your precautions. But if he spares me, then we shall be certain that he has truly repented.”
The elegant mouse, one whose beauty and graceful figure would make any tomcat in the world drool, regardless of his circumstances, approached him. But the repentant tomcat ignored her, remaining absorbed in his devotions and supplications. She came closer still, and he kept chanting, averting his gaze. When she touched his prayer beads, he said, “May God forgive me, my dear. Leave me to my devotions, please. God has granted me repentance, and as you see, I am absorbed in prayer and praise.”
She asked him, “You are no longer tempted by the delicious flesh of mice?”
“God forbid, my daughter. I have become a vegetarian. This ounce of dusty chickpeas will sustain me for several days.”
Then he offered her a chickpea. She nibbled it and found it delicious. The other mice watched the scene cautiously from afar, their mouths watering as they saw their own mousy Joan of Arc enjoying the Damascene delicacy alone, without her clansmen. They grew bold and emerged from their hole, inching forward little by little.
The repentant tomcat remained engrossed in his supplications. Then he opened the bag of seeds and gestured toward it as if to say, “Come, dear guests, and forgive the modest hospitality!” Inch by inch, he kept pushing the bag farther away from the hole.
When the last mouse had emerged from hiding and they were all busily feasting on their repentant neighbor’s offering, the tomcat threw aside his prayer beads, removed his turban, then leapt to the hole and blocked it. The mice squealed in despair. He first pounced upon their mousy Joan of Arc and, with a single strike of his claws, snapped her neck, muttering, “Dusty chickpeas, indeed!”
Note: Translated from the Arabic original by the author.
