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Back The Black Earth Save as PDF
Chapters (56)
  1. Cover
  2. THE BLACK EARTH
  3. Dedication
  4. Contents
  5. BOOK I
  6. CHAPTER ONE
  7. CHAPTER TWO
  8. CHAPTER THREE
  9. CHAPTER FOUR
  10. CHAPTER FIVE
  11. CHAPTER SIX
  12. CHAPTER SEVEN
  13. BOOK II
  14. CHAPTER EIGHT
  15. CHAPTER NINE
  16. CHAPTER TEN
  17. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  18. CHAPTER TWELVE
  19. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  20. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  21. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  22. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  23. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  24. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  25. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  26. CHAPTER TWENTY
  27. BOOK III
  28. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  29. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  30. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  31. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  32. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  33. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  34. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  35. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  36. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  37. CHAPTER THIRTY
  38. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  39. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  40. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  41. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  42. BOOK IV
  43. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  44. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  45. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
  46. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
  47. CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
  48. CHAPTER FORTY
  49. CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
  50. CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
  51. CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
  52. CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
  53. CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
  54. About the Author
  55. By Philip Kazan
  56. Copyright

Her roommates are huddled together on the sofa when she comes in. Voula, Marika and Efi, shivering under one of the quilts. There is no fuel to burn in the stove, no gas for the kitchen. Voula was a weaver at the Madras Carpet Factory, but the Germans have taken all the looms. Marika has lost her job at a local bakery: there is no flour, no fuel. Efi is a nurse at the local hospital, but no one has paid her for months, though there are opportunities to steal food, the meagre rations of dead patients. The four decided to band together in the autumn. The idea was that Zoë would get some sort of rent, but there is no money. Instead they split what they have, and Zoë, as the mistress of the house, gets to sleep in the closet that was once her bedroom.

‘Any food?’ asks Marika. Zoë doesn’t answer but staggers into the kitchen. She stands, staring at the cold gas ring, and imagines it burning with its jolly little blue and orange flame, sees the copper briki steaming, feels a man’s strong arms slide around her waist. Would you come back to bed, please? She is clutching her bag to her chest, and she has to force herself to open it, take out the greasy square of paper, get a knife, divide the bobóta into four equal squares. Two inches by two inches of anaemic, gritty cornbread. She puts them on a plate and carries them, almost sobbing with disappointment, out to the others. If they hadn’t asked me, she thinks, I would have locked myself inside the lavatory and eaten it all, every repellent crumb. Surely I will go to hell … though there is no hell, because there is no God, even though I crossed myself when that old man fell down dead … Her thoughts tend to fly around like this. One day they will just fly away out of the window and up into the drizzle, and then they will take her bones outside and leave them for the horse and cart.

‘Here,’ she says, and when they all grab for the pieces with their skeleton fingers, skeletons with painted nails, she feels a tear stinging the chapped skin of her cheek. There is silence as they eat, and chase every sandy crumb around their clothing, picking them off and licking their fingers like grooming monkeys. When the bobóta is gone, Zoë crawls under the quilt and falls asleep straight away in the meagre human warmth.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Cairo, January 1942

Dearest Zoë,