Once upon a time there lived a man and his wife who were very unhappy because they had no children. These good people had a little window at the back of their house, which looked over a crack- house but the garden was patrolled by Doberman dogs, and no one dared to enter it, for it belonged to a Local Baron of great power, who was feared by the whole housing estate. One day the woman stood at the window overlooking the garden, and saw there was a bale of the finest Khat lying in the back garden. The leaves looked so fresh and green that she longed to eat them. The desire grew day by day, and just because she knew she couldn't possibly get any, she pined away and became quite pale and wretched. Then her husband grew alarmed and said:
`What's Up with you?'
`Oh,' she answered, `if I don't get some Khat to eat out of the garden behind the house, I know I shall die.'
The man, who loved her dearly, thought to himself, `rather than let her die I shall fetch her some Khat, no matter the cost.' So that night he clambered over the wall into the Drug-Barons garden, and, quickly grabbing a sack-full of Khat, he took it back to his wife. She mixed the leaves in with her salad and it was so good that she craved even more.
If the husband was to get any peace, there was nothing for it but he should climb over the garden wall again, and get her more. But when he reached the other side he stopped in terror. There, standing before him, was the Baron with his dogs straining at the leash.
.
`What the 'ell do ye think you're doing,' the Baron said, with an evil grin, ` ye come in my garden and steal my Khat like a common thief? You'll pay for that with your life.
`Oh please!' he cried, `I'm sorry; but I had no choice. The wife saw the Khat from our window, and got such a craving for it that she would have gone mad if she didn't get any.' The Baron's anger knew no bounds, and he shouted:
`If it's as bad as that, I'll do you a deal. You can have as much Khat to take away with you as you can fit in that sack, but on one condition. That you give me your daughter --which your wife will soon have -- to work in my business. I will look after her as if she was my own daughter.'
The man who did not want his balls cut off agreed to what the Baron asked. As the baron said, his wife soon got pregnant after a heavy night on the Khat and they named the daughter she had Khatunzel. As soon as his daughter was sixteen the Baron turned up, and having given the girl the name of Khatunzel, which is the same as Khat, he took her away in his big shiny car.
Khatunzel
was the prettiest girl on the estate When she was seventeen years old
the Baron put her to work in his brothel, on the ninth floor of a
tower-block, in the centre of an area earmarked for urban renewal. In
this tower the lifts never worked and people were scared to use the
stairs because of all the addicts and muggers who lay in wait. So with
no stairs or lift the only way in and out was over the roof and in the
skylight.
When the Baron needed to get in he stood at the bottom of the rubbish chute and shouted:
` Khatunzel, Khatunzel, Let down your golden hair.'
For Khatunzel had very long hair, and it was as wiry and strong as steel. Whenever Khatunzel heard the Baron's voice she loosened her braids, and let her hair fall down out of the window about sixty feet below, and the Baron climbed up it.
After they had lived here for two years, it happened that Prince was giving a concert in the area. And one night on the way back from the gig, he passed by the tower. As he got near it he heard someone singing and rapping so sweetly that he was gob-smacked, and stayed there listening all night. It was Khatunzel in her sadness trying to pass time by letting her songs play over a karaoke machine so it sounded all over the estate. Prince was looking for backing singers, and he longed to see who was singing, but he could not find a door into the tower block. He went home in his chauffeur driven stretch limo, but was so haunted by the voice he had heard that he returned every night to the estate and listened. One night, when he was hiding in the bike-shed, he saw the Baron come home pissed and heard him shout out, ` Khatunzel, Khatunzel, Let down your golden hair.'
Then Khatunzel let down her braids, and the Baron climbed up them.
`So that's the way up?' said Prince. `I will climb it and try my luck, maybe I'll get my leg over'
So the following night, at dusk, after his gig, he went to the tower and cried:
` Khatunzel, Khatunzel, Let down your golden hair,'
And as soon as she let it down Prince climbed up.
Khatunzel was scared when this weird looking, and even weirder dressed guy came in, for she had never seen a pop star before; but Prince spoke to her so nicely, and said that he had been so impressed by her singing, that he wanted to offer her a job, and a ten record contract deal.
Khatunzel forgot her fear, and near tore his arm off in her haste to sign the contract. `Because, he is young and rich, and he'll be my meal ticket out of here and away from the wicked Baron.'
So she said, `Yes, I will gladly sign up for your record company and you can be my manager, and gave him a blow-job. Only how am I to get down from the tower?
Every time you come and see me you must bring a clothes line with you, and I will make a ladder, and when it is finished I will climb down by it, and you will take me away in your limo.'
They agreed that till the ladder was ready, he was to come every night, because the Barons dealers were with her during the day. The baron, of course, knew nothing of what was going on, till one day Khatunzel, not thinking, turned to the Baron and said: `How come, that you are so much harder to pull up than Prince? He always comes in a jiffy.'
`Shit! You thankless bitch,' cried the Baron. `What is this I hear? I thought I had you well hid from everyone, and in spite of it you have managed to **** me over.'
He lost it then, and grabbing a fistful of Khatunzel's hair, wound it round and round his fist, and then with a flick knife, slice, slice, off it came, and the long braids lay on the ground. Worse than this, he was such a bastard he took Khatunzel to Chigwell, and there left her to live in loneliness and on the social.
But on the night of the day when he had driven poor Khatunzel away, the wicked Baron tied the plaits on to a nail in the window, and when Prince came and called out: ` Khatunzel, Khatunzel, Let down your golden hair,'
He let them down, and Prince climbed up as normal, but instead of his new diva Khatunzel he found the Baron, who fixed his evil, smack-crazed eyes on him, and screamed,
`You thought to find your own true love, you bastard, but the canary has flown and its song is dead; the cat caught it, and will scratch out your eyes too.
Khatunzel is gone from you for ever--you will never see her again.'
Prince was beside himself with anguish, and in his sadness he threw himself off the roof of the tower, and, though he escaped with his life, the discarded hypodermics among which he fell pierced his eyes out. Then he wandered, blind and miserable, and now with hepatitis, through the estate, eating nothing but carry out remains from skips and dustbins, and gnashing and gnawing his teeth over the loss of his new lead singer. So he wandered about for many years, unhappy and as miserable as he could well be, and at last he came to Chigwell where Khatunzel was living.
All off a sudden he heard a voice that seemed strangely familiar to him, coming from the local club where there was a rave on. He ran in the direction of the sound, and when he got close, Khatunzel spotted him and jumped on him and cried. Two of her tears touched his eyes, and run into his mouth and in a moment his eyes became quite clear again, and he saw as well as he had ever done. And he now found that he could sing. Which was a miracle, for he couldn't before. He then flew her in his private jet to the US of A where to his horror the homeland security crowd would not let either of them in, so they now wander the earth, gigging for food, but moving from refugee camp to settlement centres.
