by Frank Wynne
The Cabuliwallah looked a little staggered at the apparition. He could not revive their old friendship. At last he smiled and said: “Little one, are you going to your father-in-law’s house?”
But Mini now understood the meaning of the word “father-in-law,” and she could not reply to him as of old. She flushed up at the question, and stood before him with her bride-like face turned down.
I remembered the day when the Cabuliwallah and my Mini had first met, and I felt sad. When she had gone, Rahmun heaved a deep sigh, and sat down on the floor. The idea had suddenly come to him that his daughter too must have grown in this long time, and that he would have to make friends with her anew. Assuredly he would not find her, as he used to know her. And besides, what might not have happened to her in these eight years?
The marriage-pipes sounded, and the mild autumn sun streamed round us. But Rahmun sat in the little Calcutta lane, and saw before him the barren mountains of Afghanistan.
I took out a bank-note, and gave it to him, saying: “Go back to your own daughter, Rahmun, in your own country, and may the happiness of your meeting bring good fortune to my child!”
Having made this present, I had to curtail some of the festivities. I could not have the electric lights I had intended, nor the military band, and the ladies of the house were despondent at it. But to me the wedding feast was all the brighter for the thought that in a distant land a long-lost father met again with his only child.
IN THE LIGHT OF DAY
Constantine P. Cavafy
Translated from the Greek by Victoria Hislop
Constantine P. Cavafy (1863–1933). The foremost Egyptian Greek poet of his generation. Born in Alexandria, Egypt, to Greek parents. After the death of his father, upheaval in Egypt saw his spending much of his childhood in Liverpool and a later period Constantinople. Cavafy permanently returned to Alexandria in 1885. Though one of the major literary figures writing in Greek, Cavafy completed only 150 poems (many others exist as fragments), and refused to have his work published in his lifetime except as broadsheets only for his close friends. He earned his living as a journalist before taking a post at the Egyptian Ministry of Public Works where he worked for thirty years during the British protectorate. The first publication of his work in book form was “Ποιήματα” (“Poems”), published posthumously in Alexandria, 1935.
One evening, after dinner, I was sitting at the Agios Stefanos Casino in Ramleh. My friend Alexander A, who lived nearby, had invited me and another young man from our circle to dine with him. Since there were no musicians that evening, there were few patrons, and my two friends and I had the place virtually to ourselves.
We talked about various topics and, since none of us was particularly rich, conversation naturally turned to money, to the independence and the pleasures that it brings.
One of my friends said that he would like to have three million francs and set about describing what he would do, and, above all, what he would no longer do if he had such a vast sum.
I, being more modest, said I could manage on an income of twenty thousand a year.
“Had I wanted,” Alexander A said, “I could have had heaven knows how many millions. But I did not have the courage.”
These words seemed strange. We were intimately familiar with the life of our friend Alexander and did not remember him ever being presented with the opportunity to become a millionaire many times over. We assumed he was not talking seriously and that some kind of joke would follow but his face was very serious. We asked him to explain his enigmatic remark.
He hesitated a moment, but then said:
“Were I in different company, amongst those who think themselves ‘intellectuals’, I would not explain myself for fear of being mocked. But we three are a little above that. Even if we are simpler than them in some ways, it doesn’t make us ignorant. In a spiritual sense, perhaps we are more developed than they are.”
These words came as no surprise to us. We each held the others in the highest regard.
“Yes,” repeated Alexander, “Had I dared, I would be a millionaire many times over, but I was afraid.”
“The tale I am about to relate happened some ten years ago. Then, as now, I did not have much money. In fact, I had no money at all. But one way or another I survived and lived tolerably well. I was staying on the Serif Pasa Road in a house that belonged to an Italian widow. I had three well-furnished rooms and a personal servant, in addition to which the landlady’s maid was at my disposal.
“One evening I had gone to Rossini’s and, having listened to enough nonsense, decided to go home and sleep since I had to rise early the following day, having been invited on an outing to Aboukir.
“I went into my room and, as was my wont, began to pace up and down, brooding over the events of the day. But since nothing interesting had happened, I went to bed.
“I must have been in a dreamless sleep for an hour and a half or two hours. I remember that around an hour after midnight, I was woken by a noise in the road and I did not recall having dreamt.
“I must have fallen asleep again at about one-thirty, at which point it seemed to me that a man had entered my room. He was of average height, some forty years old and was dressed in rather frayed black clothes and a straw hat. On his right hand, there was a ring set with a huge emerald which seemed to me out of keeping with the rest of his attire. He had a black moustache with lots of white hairs and there was something strange in his eyes – a look at once sardonic and melancholy. On the whole, however, he looked unremarkable. The sort of man one might encounter anywhere.
“I asked him what he wanted of me. He did not answer immediately but gazed at me for a few moments as though suspicious or ensuring he had not made a mistake. Then he spoke. His tone was servile.
“You are poor. I know this. I have come to tell you a way to become rich.
“Near where Pompey’s pillar stands, I know a place where a vast treasure is hidden. Personally, I want no part of it, but for a small metal box you will find at the bottom. This I will take, all the rest shall be yours.
“And what is this great treasure?” I inquired.
“In part, gold coins,” he said, “but in the main, precious stones. There are ten or twelve gold chests full of diamonds and pearls. And I think …,” (he paused, as though straining to remember ) “… sapphires.”
I wondered at that moment why he did not simply take what he wanted. Why he needed me? He did not wait for me to ask.
“‘I know what you are thinking,’ he said. ‘Why, you wonder, do I not take what I want myself. There is a reason that prevents me, but one I cannot tell you. There are some things that even I cannot do.’
“As he said ‘even I’, there came a gleam in his eye that, for a second, transformed him, shrouding him in great nobility. An instant later, however, his humble demeanour returned.
“‘So you would do me a great favour if you came with me. I truly need someone and I chose you because I want the best for you. Come and meet me tomorrow. I shall be waiting for you from midday until four on the Petite Place, at the kafenion near the blacksmiths’ shops.’
“With these words, he vanished.
“The following morning, the dream did not come to my mind when I first woke. But after I had washed and sat down to breakfast, it came back to me and seemed quite strange.
“If only it had been true,” I said to myself, then put it from my mind.
“I went on the country outing and enjoyed myself hugely. We were quite a big group, around thirty men and women, and we had an unusually good time. I will not go into detail since it is not really part of this story.”
Here, my friend Dimitris remarked:
“You scarcely need to, since I, at least, know them. If I am not mistaken, I was on that excursion.”
“Maybe. I don’t recall you being there.”
“Wasn’t this the outing that Markos G. came on before he permanently relocated to England …?”
“Yes,
that’s right. Then you will remember what a wonderful time we had. So, to get back to this story, I returned from the outing quite tired and rather late. I scarcely had time to change clothes and eat before visiting a friend’s family to play cards, where I stayed until two thirty in the morning.
“I won one hundred and fifty francs, returned home extremely pleased with myself, lay down with a light heart and immediately fell asleep, exhausted from my day.
“As soon as sleep overcame me, a strange thing happened. I saw a light in the room and wondered why I had not put it out before going to bed. Then I saw, emerging from the back of the bedroom near the door (it was quite a large room), a man I immediately recognised. He was wearing the same black clothes and the same battered straw hat. He looked displeased and said: ‘I waited for you in the kafenion from midday until four this afternoon. Why did you not come? I offer you a chance to make your fortune and you do not seize it. I will wait for you again today from midday until four. And you will come, without fail.’”
“Then, as before, he disappeared.
“I woke up in terror. The room was dark and I lit the lamp. The dream had been so real, so vivid that I was both amazed and shocked. I could not resist checking to see whether the door was locked.
“It was locked, as always. I looked at the clock: it was half past three. I had gone to bed at three.
“I will not hide from you, nor am I ashamed to admit, that I was very scared. I was afraid to close my eyes in case I drifted off to sleep again and saw my phantom visitor. I sat in a chair, my nerves on edge.
“At about five o’clock, day broke. I threw open a window and watched as the street slowly came to life. Some doors were open and a few very early milkmen and the first bakers’ carts were passing. The light somehow calmed me down and I lay down again and slept until nine.
“When I woke, the memory of the nocturnal horror came to me, but began to lose much of its power. I wondered why I had got myself into such a state. Everyone sees nightmares and I had had many in my life. In any case, this was hardly a nightmare, but rather a dream that I had had before.
“But had I dreamed the same dream twice? Perhaps I had merely dreamed that I had seen that man before. I examined my memory thoroughly and dismissed the idea. I had definitely had the dream two nights earlier. So why then was it strange? The first dream had seemed very vivid and left such a profound impression that I dreamed it again. Here, though, my logic faltered a little, because I did not recall the first dream making an impression. In the course of the following day, I had not thought of it even once. During the excursion and at the party that evening, almost everything else went through my mind, except the dream. So what did that mean?
“Surely it is commonplace that we dream about people whom we have not seen for many years and about whom we have not even thought of for many years? It seems that the memory of them lingers somewhere in the consciousness and they suddenly appear in a dream. So what’s so strange about dreaming something twice in the space of only twenty-four hours, even though I hadn’t thought of it at all during the entire day?
“Then I wondered whether perhaps I had read somewhere about a hidden treasure and this had worked on my memory. But, though I racked my brain, I didn’t think this had happened.
“Finally, tired of thinking about it, I began to dress. I had to attend a wedding and the urgent need to decide what I would wear meant that I almost entirely forgot about the dream.
“I then sat down to breakfast and to pass the time, read a magazine published in Germany. The Hesperides, I think it was called.
“I went to the wedding where all of the high society of the city were gathered. At that time I had a large number of acquaintances and so had to repeat countless times that the bride was very beautiful (if a little pale) and that the groom WAS an excellent young man, not to say as rich and blah, blah, blah”
“The wedding finished around eleven thirty and afterwards I went to Voulklis Station to see a big house that had been recommended to me, one I was intending to rent on behalf of a German family from Cairo. They planned to spend the summer in Alexandria. The house was very light and airy and well laid out but not as large as I had been told. Nonetheless, I promised the owner I would recommend the house as suitable. The owner thanked me profusely and, tugging at my heartstrings, told me all her past problems, when and where her late husband had died, how he had travelled to Europe, how she was not the sort of woman to rent out her house, how her father was the doctor to a Pasha (I cannot recall which one). I brought an end to this obligation and returned to the centre of town.
“I arrived home at about one in the afternoon, ate with great appetite and, having sated my hunger and drunk my coffee, I left to visit a friend who was living in a hotel near the Paradiso Kafenion, in order to organise something for the afternoon. It was August, and the sun was sweltering. I was walking slowly down Serif Pasha Road so as not to break out in a sweat and the road, as always at that hour, was deserted. The only person I met was a lawyer with whom I had worked on the documents of sale for a small place in Moharam Bek. It was the last piece of a fairly large plot of land that I had been selling off piecemeal to cover some of my expenses. The lawyer was an honourable man, which was why I had chosen him, but he was garrulous. I would rather he had cheated me of a piece of my land than made my head dizzy with his nonsense. The smallest thing would set him off on a verbal torrent. He rambled on about commercial law, Roman law, brought up Codex Justinianus, previous lawsuits on which he had worked in Smyrna, he sang his own praises, threw in a thousand irrelevancies, and, gripping my lapels (something I hate). I had to put up with his idiot jabbering, because every now and then, when he interrupted his flow, I attempted to learn something about the sale, which for me was of genuine interest.
“These efforts took me off my path, but I went with him. We followed the pavement past the Stock Exchange in the Place des Consuls and turned into the little street leading to the Petite Place. By the time we arrived, I had all the information that I wanted. The lawyer took his leave, remembering that he had to visit a client who lived nearby. I stood for a moment and watched him walk away, cursing the blathering that had taken me far out of my way in the heat of the sun.
“I was about to turn back towards the Paradiso Kafenion when suddenly the fact that I was in the Petite Place seemed strange. I wondered why, and then remembered the dream.
“It’s here that the infamous treasure hunter told me to meet him,” I said to myself grinning, mechanically turning my head towards the place where the blacksmiths’ shops were situated.
“To my horror … there was a little coffee shop. And there he sat.
“I felt dizzy and thought I might collapse. I leaned against a small building and looked at him again: the same black clothes, the same straw hat, the same features, the same look in his eyes. He observed me, staring at me hard. I felt absolutely rigid, as though molten iron had been poured inside me. It was mid-day and people were passing by, obliviously, as if nothing out of the ordinary were happening. I alone knew that the most horrifying thing was taking place: that there was a phantom sitting there, possessed of who knew what powers, sprung from what unknown sphere, from which Hell, from which Chaos? All of this paralysed me and I began to tremble. The spectre did not take his gaze from me and I was seized with a dread that he might get up and come towards me, talk to me, take me with him. What human power could help me against him? I threw myself into a carriage and gave the driver a distant address, one I cannot remember.
“When I had recovered somewhat, I saw that I had arrived almost at Sidi Gaber. I was calmer now and began to think about what had happened. I ordered the coachman to return to town. I am mad, I thought. Surely I had made a mistake. It must have been someone who resembled the man in my dream. I must return to make certain. It’s possible he has left and that would be proof that he is not the same person, since he told me he would wait for me until four.
“With these thoughts, I had
reached the Zizinia Theatre and there, summoning all my courage, I ordered the driver to take me to the Petite Place. My heart was pounding as we approached the kafenion. I felt as if it were about to burst. A short distance away, I made the driver stop, grabbing his arm so fiercely that he almost fell from his seat.
“The phantom was still there …
“I began to study him, looking for differences between him and the man in the dream. This in itself was evidence that they were one and the same, since anyone else would have demanded that I explain my scrutiny.
“He, on the contrary, simply returned my stare with one filled with anxiety about what I was going to do. It seemed that, as in the dream, he could read my mind, and to dispel any doubt about his identity he turned towards me so that I could clearly see his left hand. He showed me the emerald ring that had made such an impression on me in the first dream, and he did this so deliberately I feared the driver might notice.
“I cried out in terror and asked the driver – who by now was beginning to fear for his passenger’s health – to go to Ramleh Avenue. My only aim was to get away. When we arrived there I gave him an address in Agios Stefanos, but seeing him hesitate and muttering to himself, I got down and paid him. I hailed another carriage and ordered it to take me there instead.
“I arrived in a terrible state. I entered the main room in the casino and was horrified when I saw myself in the mirror. I was pale as a corpse. Fortunately the room was empty and I threw myself onto a settee and began to consider what I should do. To return home was impossible for me. To go back to that room where a phantom who appeared by night like a supernatural shadow was the same I had just seen sitting in an ordinary kafenion looking like an ordinary man, was unthinkable. I was not thinking logically because, of course, he had the power to find me anywhere. I had not been thinking logically for some time.
“Then I made a decision. I would run to my friend G.V. who lived at that time in Moharam Bek.
