his mother, communicated with him in a simple sign language. A language that consisted of about a hundred signs. A language that worked best at home, with the family, though the neighbors also understood it to some extent. But the power of that language manifested itself most in the communication between Mother and Aga, and later between Aga and Ishmael.
Aga Akbar knew nothing of the world at large, though he did understand simple concepts. He knew that the sun shone and made him feel warm, but he didn’t know, for example, that the sun was a ball of fire. Nor did he realise that without the sun there would be no life. Or that the sun would one day go out forever, like a lamp that had run out of oil.
He didn’t understand why the moon was small, then gradually got bigger. He knew nothing about gravity, had never heard of Archimedes. He had no way of knowing that the Persian language consists of thirty-two letters: alef, beh, peh, teh, seh, jeem, cheh, heh, kheh, daal, zaal, reh, zeh, zheh, seen, sheen, sad, zad, taa, zaa, eyn, gheyn, faa, qaf, kaf, gaf, lam, meen, noon, vaav, haa, and ye. The peh as in perestow (swallow), the kheh as in khorma (date), the taa as in talebi (melon), and the eyn as in eshq (love).
His world was the world of his past, of things that had happened to him, of things he had learned, of his memories.
Weeks, months, and years were a mystery to him. When, for example, had he first seen that strange object in the sky? Time meant nothing to him.
• • •
Aga Akbar’s village was remote. Very little went on in Jirya. There wasn’t a trace of the modern world: no bicycles, no sewing machines.
One day, when Aga Akbar was a little boy, he was standing in a grassy meadow helping his brother, who was a shepherd, tend a flock of sheep. Suddenly their dog leapt onto a rock and stared upwards.
It was the first time a plane had flown over the village. It may, in fact, have been the very first plane to fly over Persian airspace.
Later those silver objects appeared above the village often. The children then raced up to the roofs and chanted in unison:
Hey, odd-looking iron bird,
come sit in our almond tree
and perch in our village square.
“What are they chanting?” young Aga Akbar asked his mother.
“They’re asking the iron bird to come sit in the tree.”
“But it can’t.”
“Yes, they know that, but they’re imagining it can.”
“What does ‘imagining’ mean?”
“Just thinking. In their minds they see the iron bird sitting in the tree.”
Aga Akbar knew that when his mother couldn’t explain something, he should stop asking questions and simply accept it.
One day, when he was six or seven, his mother hid behind a tree and pointed to a man on a horse—a nobleman with a rifle slung over his shoulder.
“That’s your father.”
“Him?”
“Yes. He’s your father.”
“Then why doesn’t he come home?”
Using their simple sign language, she placed a crown on her head, stuck out her chest, and said, “He’s an aristocrat, a man of noble birth. A scholar. He has many books and a quill pen. He writes.”
Aga Akbar’s mother, Hajar, had been a servant in the nobleman’s palace, where he lived with his wife and eleven children. He could see that Hajar was different, however, so he took her to his house on Lalehzar Mountain, where he kept his books and worked in his study.
She was the one who tidied the study, dusted the books, filled the inkpot and cleaned the quills. She cooked his lunch and made sure he had enough tobacco. She washed his coat and suit, and polished his shoes. When he had to go out, she handed him his hat and held the horse’s reins until he was in the saddle.
“Hajar!” he called one day from his desk in the study, where he was writing.
“Yes, sire?”
“Bring me a glass of tea. I’d like to have a word with you.”
She brought him a glass of tea on a silver tray. (That very same tray can still be seen on the mantel in the house of Aga Akbar’s wife.)
“Sit down, Hajar,” he said.
She continued to stand.
“Come now, Hajar, I’ve given you permission to sit, so take a seat.”
She sat on the edge of a chair.
“I have a question for you, Hajar. Is there a man in your life?”
She didn’t reply.
“Answer me. I asked you if there was a man in your life.”
“No, sire.”
“I’d like you to be my sigeh wife. Would you like that?”
It was an unexpected question.
“That’s not for me to say, sire,” she replied. “You’ll have to ask my father.”
“I’ll ask your father in due course. But first I’d like to know what you think of the idea.”
She thought for a moment, with her head bowed. Then she said clearly, “Yes, sire, I would.”
That same evening, Hajar’s father was taken to the nobleman’s study by the village imam, who recited a short sura from the Holy Book and said, “Ankahtu wa zawagtu,” declaring Hajar to be the wife of Aga Hadi Mahmud Ghaznavi Khorasani.
Next the imam explained to her that she was allowed to have children, but that they couldn’t have their father’s name. Nor would they be able to inherit anything. Hajar’s father was given an almond grove, the profits of which were to be shared with Hajar: one half for him, the other half for Hajar and any children she might bear. When her father died, the entire grove would belong to Hajar and her children.
Ten minutes later her father and the imam left. Hajar stayed.
She was wearing a blue-green dress that she’d inherited from her mother.
Early in the morning she’d gone to the village bathhouse and furtively removed her body hair. Then she’d dipped her toes in henna and her fingertips in the sap of the runas—a wild, reddish-purple flower—until it had dyed her fingers red.
“I’ll be spending the night here, Hajar,” the nobleman announced.
She made up the bed.
Then Aga Hadi Khorasani slipped into the bed beside her, and she
