Chivalry, p.1
Chivalry, page 1
Copyright © 2024 by Patrick Girondi
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file.
Cover artwork: “Chivalry” by Megan Euker
Cover design by APOTH Creative
Photo of front cover art and author by Jon-Patric Nelson
Photo of back cover art by Jay Knickerbocker
ISBN: 978-1-5107-7832-0
Ebook ISBN: 978-1-5107-7871-9
Printed in the United States of America
Dedications
In today’s reality, where selfishness has been deemed virtuous and decency a crime, I dedicate this book to the chivalrous beings of humanity, our last hope.
Contents
Part I
Chapter 1: Oromo
Chapter 2: New York
Chapter 3: Iraq, We Must Change Our Situation
Part II
Chapter 4: It Could Be a Bestseller
Chapter 5: Just Technicalities
Chapter 6: Find of the Century
Chapter 7: Gambling Guarantees
Chapter 8: Author, Meet the Author
Chapter 9: From Stars to Cut
Part III
Chapter 10: Locker 117
Chapter 11: Abby Gael
Chapter 12: Tables Turned
Chapter 13: Tables Spun Again
Chivalry: A Screenplay
Plates
Character and Terms List
Aakil
Sa’eeda’s husband
Abbaa gudaa
Grandfather
Abby
Classmate of Ahmed
Adeera (Uncle Caleb)
Father’s brother
Ahmed Selassie (Isa)
Ethiopian main character
Angela
Italian girl that frequented Koss
Arnie Schuman
Sixtyish man with white kinky hair; Bob Herman’s manager
Bob Herman
Blonde man in his 30’s, special projects manager; finds brown bag with manuscript on bus
Bobby “Bones” Calabrese
Classmate of Ahmed
Captain Ginsel
Attorney representing a US officer who made a fortune selling US equipment to the other side
Captain Kosel
Ginsel’s client
Chuck
Guy at the race track
Colonel Drummond
Colonel to Ahmed
Corporal Clark (later Detective Clark)
Soldier with Ahmed
Corporal Gallo
Short, bald man with a hooked nose
Corporal Harms (later Detective Harms)
Short, thin, black soldier with glasses
Corporal Hurt
Drummond’s assistant
Corporal Kamar
Arab soldier who refers to Ahmed as “Isa”
Corporal Kennedy (later Detective Jack Kennedy)
Soldier with Ahmed; a blonde-haired man with a US flag tattooed on his right forearm
Donny
Guard at GAM
Fatima
Ahmed’s sister
Gaadha
Mother
Gael Veenstra
41-year old redhead, works at GAM
Gent America Media (GAM)
Media company Bob Herman works for
Halliburton
One of the world’s largest providers of products and services for the ever-evolving needs of the energy industry
Hessna
Ahmed’s favorite sister
Holt
Lanky, dark-skinned soldier with a thin mustache
Hussein
Ahmed’s father (Abbaa)
Jafaar
Ahmed’s cousin
Jennifer
Young blonde woman at GAM
Kamar
Arab soldier
KBR
Private defense and intelligence company
Larry
Large, dark-skinned guy, answers door for Sister Brenda
Lou Mell
Works with Bob Herman
Lucia
Petite, mixed-race beauty
Mark Koss
70-year old man, owner of Gent America Media
Mengistu Haile Mariam
Ethiopian chairman
Mr. Thomas
Ahmed’s school teacher
Muhammad
Ahmed’s brother
Nadine
Heroine addict that Koss frequented
nama goota
A chivalrous man
Phillips
Head of corporate sales at GAM
Sa’eeda
Ahmed’s cousin in Ethiopia
Saa and Sabira
Sa’eeda and Aakil’s daughters
Selton
Bestselling author at Gent America Media
Senator Feinvine
Senator
Shelby Warren
Attorney
Sister Brenda
Nun
tahajjud
Evening prayer
Ted Basle
60ish, works for Gent America Media as the “utility man” who gets the job done
Teru
Light-skinned Ethiopian woman in NY who taught Ahmed English
Tommy
Sister Brenda’s brother
Tony Baroni
Classmate of Ahmed
Tony Russo
Lucia’s former boxer boyfriend
Van
Guy at the race track
Wako (Eessuma)
Mother’s brother
PART I
Chapter 1
Oromo
Ahmed Selassie had dark brown eyes and light brown hair and was the youngest of four. Muhammad, Fatima, and then before Ahmed came his favorite sister, Hessna. His family lived in Harar, an ancient, walled, Ethiopian city of 150,000, five hundred kilometers from the capital, Addis Ababa, in the state of Oromia. At 1,885 meters above sea level, Harar is titled the “City of Saints” and is the fourth holiest place of Islam. Prophets assuredly enjoyed the climate; the average high temperatures are in the upper seventies and low temperatures in the mid-fifties, throughout the year.
Ahmed’s Abbaa (father), Hussein, was a wise, knowledgeable, and trusted merchant who spoke eleven languages. The state of Oromia produces cotton, every type of grain, potato, mango, avocado, banana, lemon, pineapple, peach, onion, garlic, coriander, ginger, okra, and many other varieties of vegetables. The region exports coffee, oil seeds, hides, and skins. Ninety percent of the inhabitants work in agriculture.
Ethiopia also has vast amounts of gold, silver, platinum, uranium, nickel, marble, and natural gas, but Ahmed’s family concentrated on marketing agricultural products.
Ahmed was five years old. His family was leaving on vacation to visit Lake Basaka in Metehara. Haadha (mother) said that Lake Basaka was paradise on earth. Metehara is full of beautiful, rugged mountains and streams and wildlife, including hippopotamuses, crocodiles, lions, leopards, rhinoceros, buffalo, giraffes, wild ass, zebras, and elephants.
The area is also home to the nyala, ibex deer, the colobus monkey, and the red fox, Ethiopia’s rodent-eating wolf. These animals are found nowhere else in the world but Oromia.
It was quickly becoming a family ritual, and in midsummer; Haadha and Abbaa prepared for days. Haadha boiled jars of fresh fruits and vegetables. Abbaa worked on the tents, bows and arrows, and fishing equipment. Unfortunately, Ahmed was sick with the flu.
Hoping that Ahmed would recover, the family postponed the trip a day. However, harvest would soon arrive and the family could wait no longer. They sadly departed without him. Ahmed was disappointed, but he also loved being with Abbaa Gudaa (grandfather), his father’s father and a proud, patriotic man from Harar. Everyone seemed to love Abbaa Gudaa. Ahmed believed that Abbaa Gudaa was the most important man in Oromia.
Ahmed was different from any child Abbaa Gudaa had ever known. He was curious about everything. Ethiopia, with over one hundred million inhabitants and eighty distinct people and languages, was the perfect home for such a mind. The Ethiopians are a fascinating mixture of Arab, Asiatic, and African, with skin tones from very light to very dark.
Ethiopia, the second-most-populous nation in Africa, is a mysterious country, where all religions and races are tolerant of one another. Oromia, Ethiopia’s largest region, is larger than Belgium, France, Italy, the Netherlands, and Switzerland combined.
Abbaa Gudaa, too, was secretly happy that his grandson would miss the family vacation. In the past, together, they had visited many of the hundreds of beautiful shrines and mosques that speckled Harar. Once Abbaa Gudaa brought Ahmed to the Harar Beer Bottling company. The owner loved Abbaa Gudaa and gave him tickets to the soccer game at the Harrar Birra Stadium.
The morning after the family left on vacation, Ahmed sat on Abbaa Gudaa’s lap and listened to an old Harar story. His grandfather spoke with heart and expression, stopping along the way to make sure that Ahmed digested every word. Abbaa Gudaa told Ahmed that stories like this one would help mold Ahmed into a fine man.
Once upon a time, there was a very holy man. He lived in the city Addis Ababa, and every day he went to the mosque five times to pray. But the city was big, and there were many people in the streets. “This place is very noisy,” the holy man thought. “I can’t pray to God here. I must go to a quiet place, far away from the city.” So the holy man went out of the city. He walked for a long time.
At last, he came to a high wall. There was an orchard of fruit trees on the other side of the wall. “This is a fine orchard, with many fruit trees,” thought the holy man. “Those guavas and bananas look delicious, and I am very hungry.” A stream of water was running out of the orchard. The holy man looked at it. “What’s that yellow thing in the water?” he thought. “Oh, it’s a guava. It’s outside the orchard, and no one can see me. I will eat it.” So the holy man took the guava out of the stream and ate it.
Soon it was time to pray, and the holy man began to wash himself in the stream. But then he began to think. “Why did I eat that guava?” he asked himself. “It wasn’t mine. It belonged to the owner of the orchard. I did a bad thing. I must go to the owner of the orchard, and I must tell him I am sorry.” So the holy man found the gate of the orchard, and he went inside. The orchard was very big, with many guava and banana trees. In the middle of the orchard there was a big house.
The owner of the orchard was coming out of the house. The holy man went up to him. “Excuse me, sir. I want to tell you something,” he said. “I found a guava in the stream outside your orchard. I was hungry and I ate it. But it was your guava. I was stealing it from you. Please forgive me.” The owner of the orchard looked at him. “No,” he said. “I can’t forgive you. You did a bad thing. Now you must do something for me.” “What must I do?” the holy man asked. “You must marry my daughter,” said the owner of the orchard. “My daughter has no eyes and she cannot walk. But if you marry her, I will forgive you. If you do not marry her, I will not forgive you.” The holy man was sad.
“This is a big price to pay for a small mistake,” he thought, but he said to the owner, “Yes, I agree. I will marry your daughter. Let me see her now.” “No,” said the owner of the orchard. “First you must marry her. Then you can see her.” So the holy man married the orchard owner’s daughter. She was covered with a veil, and he could not see her. “Now,” said the orchard owner. “My daughter is your wife. Take off the veil and look at her.” The holy man took off his wife’s veil. “Oh!” he said. “But—but you are beautiful! Are you blind? No, you can see! Are you lame? No, you can walk! But your father said, ‘My daughter has no eyes and no legs.’”
The owner of the orchard smiled at him. “You did not understand me,” he said. “This was my meaning. My daughter has no eyes for wicked things. She never looks at them. And she cannot walk in evil places. She always follows the path of goodness. I was looking for a holy man to be her husband, and now, my dear son-in-law, I have found one.”
And from that day, the holy man lived with his wife and her father, and they were very happy.
Abbaa Gudaa finished the story, and they ate injera bread with vegetables. Ahmed fell fast asleep in Abbaa Gudaa’s bed, which was in the room next to Ahmed’s parents’ room.
Ahmed woke to hear his Eessuma (mother’s brother), Wako, and Abbaa Gudaa crying and screaming in an ancient Oromo dialect.
Ahmed understood only that darkness had the family in its grip. Soon the house was full of women, screaming, ripping their gowns, and pulling their hair out.
Ahmed lightly sauntered into the front room of the house. Women were washing the bodies of his mother and two sisters.
Ahmed ran to his sister Hessna. She had a gash on her head and her eyes were frozen open. Rigor mortis had set in on his mother’s body, and an old woman was sitting on her arm forcing it to lie flat with the rest of her.
Two other packages were wrapped in white. Ahmed cried, sure that the wrapped bundles were his father and his brother Hussein. Abbaa Gudaa arrived from behind and carried Ahmed into the yard where men were singing verses of the Koran.
Abbaa Gudaa looked into Ahmed’s face and cried. Ahmed hugged him with all his might, hoping that doing so would wake him from this horrible nightmare. His family’s car had gone off a cliff on the way home from their vacation.
After a few moments hugging and kissing, Abbaa Gudaa placed Ahmed on the ground. The man next to Ahmed took his hand. Abbaa Gudaa took Ahmed’s other hand and began singing. Ahmed did not know the words. But his babbling mixed with tears created depth and substance.
Ahmed understood that the men were singing to distract themselves from the pain. He sang with all his soul.
For six days of mourning the house was filled with friends and relatives.
At the end of the week, a huge ox was slaughtered, and the family and their friends had a great festival.
Women took turns raising Ahmed in the air. They sang to the salvation of his dead family. They sang for his rebirth without them.
At noon, lunch was served. After lunch, the women cleaned the house. The men distributed the Holy Koran. With passion and persistence, they completed the entire book. Around sundown, everyone ate a series of dishes made of local vegetables and spices, then drank tea. The women tidied the abode, and the banquet was over.
Ahmed’s aunt and cousins came over each day to care for him and Abbaa Gudaa. Abbaa Gudaa wished that he had been on the trip. He no longer uttered a word. Ahmed understood; the loss was too much to pronounce. Ahmed, also, did not speak.
After a week, Abbaa Gudaa died.
It was 1981. Ahmed was six years old. He moved in with his aunt and uncle’s family. One night while it was still dark, his aunt packed him a small suitcase. The women cried and hugged Ahmed. They then walked him to the bus stop in the center of Harar.
The bus arrived, and his relatives cried and kissed him again. Ahmed boarded the bus with his fifteen-year-old cousin Jafaar. Jafaar was light skinned with hazel eyes and jet-black hair.
The trip between Harar and Addis Ababa was exciting. Ahmed watched out the windows. He saw waterfalls, lakes, mountains, zebras, giraffes, monkeys, and elephants. Every hour or so, the bus stopped at another town. Some passengers would get off and some would get on.
Ahmed and Jafaar ate the injera and vegetables that his aunts had prepared. There was an elderly man seated behind them who didn’t bring food. Jafaar explained to Ahmed that it was their duty to share with him. Ahmed was certain that Jafaar would someday become a good man like their Abbaa Gudaa had been.
The bus erupted into applause as the tall buildings of Addis Ababa came into sight.
Everyone disembarked in the center of town. Ahmed and Jafaar had never seen anything like Addis Ababa. They walked about for a few hours. Finally, they took the train to the Bole International Airport, finding it incredibly difficult to believe how smooth and fast the railed bus traveled.
On the plane, Jafaar let Ahmed have his seat by the window. The takeoff was an experience Ahmed never wanted to forget.
Ahmed looked down. He tried to see if he could spot his house from the sky. He missed his family terribly, but the adventure that he was living numbed the pain. They landed in Frankfurt and then boarded another plane for New York.
At New York’s JFK Airport, Ahmed’s adeera (father’s brother), Uncle Caleb, met them and took them into New York City by cab. Ahmed looked out the windows at the tall buildings, bridges, garbage, water, and people, all the time wondering what he was doing there.
