“You call yourself a director?” Farid said.Zaman dropped his hands. “I haven’t been paid in over six months. I’m broke because I’ve spent my life’s savings on this orphanage. Everything I ever owned or inherited I sold to run this godforsaken place. You think I don’t have family in Pakistan and Iran? I could have run like everyone else. But I didn’t. I stayed. I stayed because of them.” He pointed to the door. “If I deny him one child, he takes ten. So I let him take one and leave the judging to Allah. I swallow my pride and take his goddamn filthy... dirty money. Then I go to the bazaar and buy food for the children.”Farid dropped his eyes.
“What happens to the children he takes?” I asked.Zaman rubbed his eyes with his forefinger and thumb. “Some times they come back.”“Who is he? How do we find him?” I said.“Go to Ghazi Stadium tomorrow. You’ll see him at halftime. He’ll be the one wearing black sunglasses.” He picked up his broken glasses and turned them in his hands. “I want you to go now. The children are frightened.”He escorted us out.As the truck pulled away, I saw Zaman in the side-view mirror, standing in the doorway. A group of children surrounded him, clutching the hem of his loose shirt. I saw he had put on his broken glasses.
We crossed the river and drove north through the crowded Pashtunistan Square. Baba used to take me to Khyber Restaurant there for kabob. The building was still standing, but its doors were padlocked, the windows shattered, and the letters K and R missing from its name.
I saw a dead body near the restaurant. There had been a hanging. A young man dangled from the end of a rope tied to a beam, his face puffy and blue, the clothes he’d worn on the last day of his life shredded, bloody. Hardly anyone seemed to notice him.
We rode silently through the square and headed toward the WazirAkbar Khan district. Everywhere I looked, a haze of dust covered the city and its sun-dried brick buildings. A few blocks north of Pashtunistan Square, Farid pointed to two men talking animatedly at a busy street corner. One of them was hobbling on one leg, his other leg amputated below the knee. He cradled an artificial leg in his arms. “You know what they’re doing? Haggling over the leg.”
“He’s selling his leg?”
“你还说自己是负责人？”察曼放下手：“我已经有六个月没有收入了。我破产了，因为我毕生的积蓄，都投在这个恤孤院。我卖掉一切财产和遗产，来维持这个凄凉的地方。你以为我没有家人在巴基斯坦和伊朗吗？我完全可以像其他人那样一走了之。但我没有，我留下。我留下来，全是为了他们。”他指着门，“如果我拒绝给他一个孩子，他会带走十个。所以我让他带走，让安拉来作决定。我忍气吞声，拿过他那些该死的、肮脏的臭钱，然后到市场去，给孩子买食物。”法里德垂下眼睛。
“被他带走的孩子会怎样？”我问。察曼用食指和拇指揉揉眼睛：“有时他们会回来。”“他是谁？我们怎样才能找到他？”“明天到伽兹体育馆去，中场休息的时候你会看到他，他就是那个戴着黑色太阳镜的人。”他捡起他的破眼镜，在手里翻转，“我要你们现在就离开，孩子吓坏了。”他送我们出去。车开走的时候，我从侧视镜看到察曼，他站在门口，一群孩子围在他身边，拉着他松开的衬衣下摆。我看见他戴上那副破眼镜。
我们过河，向北驶去，穿过拥挤的普什图广场，从前爸爸常带我到那儿的开伯尔餐馆吃烤肉。那屋宇依然挺立，只是大门上了挂锁，窗户破裂，招牌上不见了“ K”和“ R”两个字母。
在餐馆附近，我见到一具尸体。那儿行过绞刑，有个年轻人被吊起来，绳索末端绑在横梁上，他脸庞青肿，寿终那日，他穿着残破的衣服，染着血迹。人们对他视而不见。
我们默默驶过广场，直奔瓦兹尔?阿克巴?汗区。我目光所及，见到的总是一座尘雾笼罩的城市，还有生砖垒成的建筑。在普什图广场往北几条街，法里德指着两个男人，他们在繁忙的街角相谈甚欢。其中有个金鸡独立，他另外那条腿从膝盖以下不见了，怀里抱着一根义肢。“你知道他们在干什么吗？就那条腿讨价还价呢。”
“他要卖掉他的腿？”