The Seduction
The Collector arrives in the village of Akoub one morning and spends a few hours at the small Bureau office – not more than a cabinet, really – with the village records. The recordkeeper, an old man with a silver white beard and piercing blue eyes, hates this monthly ritual but must show him the revenue books regardless. They’re performing better than expected, the saffron crop harvested well in time before the khareef season, when the monsoon comes. The birth records are still unsatisfactory: three babies born in the last three months, none of them girls.
