I grip him by the shoulders and wait for him to lift his head so that I can look him straight in the eye.
‘Do not let yourself go, Mansour,’ I tell him. ‘We are going to come out of this, I promise you.’
He nods his head.
‘What was that bomb just now?’
He shrugs.
I feel like slapping him.
Abu-Bakr turns away. He knows that the attitude of the commander of the People’s Guard is as intolerable to me as the machine guns rattling in the distance.
‘Any news from Mutassim?’
Mansour shakes his head, on the point of crumpling up and collapsing.
‘And Saif?’
‘He’s assembling his troops in the south,’ the general says. ‘Probably around Sabha. According to our sources, he is on the point of launching a vast counter-offensive.’
My brave Saif al-Islam! If he were at my side now, he would rid me of these defeated faces. He has learnt from me the implacable meaning of a true oath of loyalty and contempt for danger. In fact I have few worries on his account. He is cunning and fearless, and when he makes a promise he keeps his word as a matter of honour. He promised me he would reorganise my army, scattered by the NATO air strikes, then decisively halt the rebels’ advance. Saif has charisma. He is a great leader of men. He would make short work of those turncoats.
A lieutenant arrives to make a report. His appearance leaves a great deal to be desired, but his fervour is intact. He addresses the minister.
‘Our scouts signal that enemy infantry and reconnaissance units have begun withdrawing, General.’
‘They’re not withdrawing,’ Mansour objects, exasperated. ‘They’re taking cover.’
‘Meaning?’ I say.
‘They’ve started to evacuate the positions they took this afternoon. To isolate us. My bet is that we’re about to find ourselves on the wrong end of a massive bombing raid.’
I demand that he elaborate.
Mansour requests that the lieutenant leave the room and waits till the three of us are alone.
‘My signals specialist has intercepted coded comms. Everything points to coalition aviation targeting District Two. The bloody insurgents withdrawing confirms the probability.’
‘Where is Mutassim?’
‘Gone to requisition vehicles,’ Abu-Bakr says, getting to his feet. ‘We can’t stay dug in here any longer, waiting for some happy surprise to save us. We’re running out of food, ammunition and options. Our units have been knocked out or neutralised. Sirte is practically blockaded. The noose is tightening by the hour.’
‘I thought Mutassim had gone to reinforce his garrisons. Why the sudden turnaround?’
‘It was you yourself who decided to break out, Rais.’
‘What? Are you saying my memory is playing tricks on me?’
The general frowns, taken aback by my forgetfulness. He starts to explain.
‘There won’t be any reinforcement, Rais.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because Saif al-Islam is too far south of us. We need to evacuate Sirte as fast as we can. That will give us a chance to reach Sabha, which the insurgents have abandoned, to reorganise ourselves and, with Saif’s support, move up and encircle Misrata. The southern tribes are still loyal to us. We’ll take our supply lines through them.’
‘Since when have your plans changed, General?’
‘Since this morning.’
‘Without informing me?’
The general’s eyes widen as he again looks dumbfounded by my question.
‘But, Rais, I’m telling you, it was you yourself who suggested evacuating Sirte.’
I do not remember having suggested such a perilous manoeuvre. In order not to lose face, I nod.
Mansour crouches down with one hand on the floor, the other to his forehead. He looks as though he is about to puke his guts up.
‘Colonel Mutassim still has dependable men in the sector,’ the general tries to mollify me. ‘He is putting a substantial convoy together. At 4 a.m. exactly we’ll aim to break through enemy lines. The rebels’ withdrawal is a stroke of luck. It gives us a small window, at last. The militias have lifted their roadblocks at points 42, 43 and 29. Probably to take cover, as the signals operator said. We’ll retreat southwards. If Mutassim has been able to put together forty or fifty vehicles we’ll have a chance of getting through. Any skirmishes, we disperse. It’s chaos in the city. No one knows who commands who any more. We’ll exploit the confusion to get out of Sirte.’
‘Why not now?’ I say. ‘Before the bombing raids start.’
‘It will take Colonel Mutassim several hours to round up the vehicles we need.’
‘Are you in contact with him?’
‘Not by radio. We’re using runners.’
‘Where is he exactly?’
‘We’re waiting for the reconnaissance patrols to come back and tell us.’
Mansour lets himself slide down the wall to sit on the floor.
‘A little decorum,’ I shout at him. ‘Do you think you are resting on your mother’s patio?’
‘I’ve got an appalling migraine.’
‘No matter. Get a grip on yourself, and do it fast.’
Mansour gets to his feet. His face is scored with deep lines across his cheeks, giving him the look of an animal in agony. Abu-Bakr pushes a chair in his direction. He declines it.
‘Do you really believe they are about to bomb us?’ I ask him.
‘It’s obvious.’
‘Perhaps it’s a diversion,’ Abu-Bakr suggests, more to show himself on my side than from conviction.
‘They wouldn’t order their ground troops to evacuate their advance posts if they weren’t going to.’
‘You think they know where we are?’
‘No one knows where you are, Rais. They strike at random and wait for us to give ourselves away.’
‘Very well,’ I tell him. ‘I am going to rest. Let me know as soon as there is anything to report.’
Someone has cleaned my room, covered the windows with pieces of tarpaulin and cobbled together a light from a torch powered by a car battery.
Under the couch I use as a bed I found, a while ago, a slender gold bracelet that must have belonged to a little girl. It is a pretty piece of jewellery, finely worked and with an inscription engraved on the inside: ‘For Khadija, my angel and my sunshine’. I tried to put a face to Khadija and looked for a photo of her in the drawers and on the shelves. Nothing. Not one forgotten snapshot, not a trace of the family who once lived in the house, apart from the portrait of the father – or the grandfather – in the living room. I tried to imagine the life that the vanished family led within these walls. They were probably well-off people living in comfort and peace, with an attentive mother and happy children. What wrong had they done for their dreams suddenly to be wiped out? I have spared no effort in Libya to ensure that joys, celebrations and hopes are my people’s pulse, that angels and sunshine are inseparable from a child’s