Chapter 7 · Chapter 7

The clasp's click does not close the hall. It only gives the room somewhere to begin.

My uncle sets his finjan down without drinking from it. Porcelain meeting wood is his way of asking for attention, and he has never in his life needed to raise his voice to get it.

"The lining," he says. "A bag does not carry weight in its lining for nothing."

I keep my hands folded in my lap beneath the abaya and let my face stay as it has been since the car came through the gates. "The bag is on the table, Ammi. It has been looked at all evening."

He takes that as leave, because in this house a woman's calm sentence is heard as a door left ajar. He turns the leather over. His thumb finds the interior corners, presses the seam, walks the stitching as though reading with his hands. The majlis watches the way a majlis watches — without turning its head.

Then he shakes it.

Silver falls out. Small coins, the kind that live at the bottom of every bag in this city and are never counted. They ring across the table, scatter, settle.