Zahra’s mother came from the village and brought her daughter ghee, butter, cheese, and bread. She tried to persuade her several times to leave Magd al-Din behind and go back with her to the village since even people who had no villages to go back to were leaving, so how could she hesitate? Zahra said she would never leave Magd al-Din, but if Magd al-Din were to return she would return with him. Her mother said that the mayor had sworn that if Magd al-Din returned, he would kill him, that he could do that without any fear of retribution during the war. Zahra said that, now that he had his new job, her husband would not go back. Then she asked her mother whether the mayor had really expelled them on account of Bahi. The mother said that the mayor wanted Magd al-Dm’s first wife, the one who had died before giving him any children. But Zahra was not comfortable with that explanation, since that wife had died only one year after she had married Magd al-Din, and no one remembered her. Bahi was the only plausible reason. The mother told Zahra that Hadya, Magd al-Din’s mother, almost died when she got news of Bahi’s death and the fact that Magd al-Din could no longer return. Zahra asked her mother to tell Magd al-Din only good or ordinary news, even though Magd al-Din would not really believe anything good.
The mother’s visit did much to alleviate Zahra’s loneliness. She cried a lot the day her mother left. Sitt Maryam, Camilla, and Yvonne took her with them to Shatbi beach to watch the bathers—who were not many, mostly women and girls. Camilla and Yvonne took off their dresses and stood before Zahra in shorts and low-cut cotton blouses that revealed most of their backs. A small number of girls went into the water and so did a few women, still wearing their gallabiyas. Sitt Maryam said that she did not like to get in the water and so did Zahra, who added that she really could not. She kept watching the two girls, who ran on the beach and played in the water. Early in the afternoon Zahra asked to go home when she saw at the end of the beach a foreign-looking young woman being kissed by a foreign-looking young man, both of them almost naked.
The number of foreign soldiers in the city was on the rise. Some went to the desert and others to the beach for rest and recreation. The Italian school in Shatbi was set aside for Italian prisoners of war. As their numbers increased, they were held in a camp outside the city and in several camps outside Cairo. The land war had begun on the borders. The Allied forces began to wage offensive raids against the Italian forces in Libya, in addition to air raids. On June 14, four days after Italy declared war, the British and Commonwealth forces began to attack the Italian troops in Fort Capuzzo and Maddalena and took more than two hundred prisoners. On August 13, the Italian forces began their march against Egypt under instructions from II Duce himself. Intensive shelling began on the borders near Sallum, and when the dust settled and the smoke cleared, the Italian forces appeared, beautifully arrayed: in front were motorcyclists in formation, followed by light tanks and armored cars. The British changed their plan, and instead of retreating before the Italians, they poured cannon fire on them and caused so many casualties that Graziani had to change his frontal attack plan and instead tried to encircle the British and their allies, who retreated. The Italians could not go beyond Siddi Barraní, sixty miles behind the Egyptian border, and stayed there for a long time at the mercy of sporadic British land and air raids. In three months, Italian casualties numbered thirty-five hundred, and seven hundred were taken prisoner. The big question everyone in Alexandria was asking was, why were the Italians, normally such a peaceful people, fighting? Even their planes could be distinguished from German planes in the sky: the Italian planes did not stay over the city for a long time—they dumped their bombs haphazardly and returned to base—whereas German pilots seemed to know their targets and went straight for them. Many Italian planes were shot down quickly; German planes took evasive action in the sky. It seemed to people that the Italians really did not want the war, that they had been pushed into it, especially when people heard about the number of prisoners taken on land and who arrived in the city every day. The people were reassured that the Italians could not occupy the city. But Germany had to be defeated in order for them to be really reassured. A large segment of the population, however, wished for the defeat of the British forces in the desert and for Italy or Germany to enter Alexandria. What they wanted most was for the English to leave.
Early one morning, Zahra saw Camilla and Yvonne standing in the hallway in their beautiful school uniforms. Summer vacation was over, and the girls looked like two merry butterflies in gray skirts, white shirts, and blue neckties, lending a childlike innocence to their sweetness.
Magd al-Din had left for work a little earlier. He was the first to leave and, during those weeks that Khawaga Dimitri worked days, he would leave with him.
“Is school so wonderful, girls?”
“Of course, Zahra. Especially the first day, it’s like a holiday. We meet our classmates and teachers, and we talk about the vacation and the summer. The most beautiful thing in the world is the first day back to school, Zahra. After that, school is bad.”
They laughed like two little doves. And since Zahra could not go back in time and go to school and live in the city, she hoped to see Shawqiya, one day, as happy as they were. Yvonne had turned the radio on to the Voice of London, which was playing beautiful music that Zahra had never heard before, music that made you want to fly or swim in the air like an angel. How was it that she had never heard music without lyrics before? Can such music be so beautiful?
The girls left for school. The cool morning breeze gave Zahra a feeling of heavenly happiness. She was not going back to sleep. She lay down next to her daughter on the bed, and looked up at the white wooden ceiling. Could Alexandria be so beautiful without her realizing it? Yesterday she had gone to Anfushi again with Sitt Maryam, for the first time in a long time. On the streetcar, people were looking healthier and happier than they had the last time she had gone, in spite of the ceaseless air raids. When she saw the statue of Muhammad Ali Pasha, she did not think of complaining to him. She was afraid that the air raids would demolish the statue and laughed at the idea that he might run away on his horse. She was truly surprised by the awesome apartment buildings with decorative balconies on both sides of Manshiya Square. Why had they not looked so majestic to her before? When the streetcar approached the end of Lisan Bahari on the coast, she began to hear the peaceful melody of the waves and smell the refreshing smell of the sea. When the streetcar emerged from the long cold street into the open air, Zahra saw the endless blue sea as its froth-capped waves gently caressed the beach. Along the coast, brown nets were stretched over a long distance with pieces of heavy, silvery lead holding them in place. Next to them were boats with furled sails and little rowboats, stopped or neglected on the sand. In the distance were huge gray ships with long and short cannons and masts and flags casting shadows on the breaking waters. On land Zahra could see crowds of lively women surrounding fish vendors. She had come-here before but had not seen what she was seeing now. That was during the feast days after Ramadan. Summer here was really quite different from winter, and there she was, seeing things with new eyes, imbued with an energy she had gotten from the city whose own sons and daughters were deserting but in which she was now living and loving. True, it was crowded, but in a cheerful way. There were women swathed in long wraps that they let fall off their heads and shoulders and held under their arms, revealing rosy shoulders and soft arms, their hair showing under their head covers with red, yellow, or black edges. They got into long conversations with the vendors, and laughed spontaneously as the vendors raised their voices, and happiness showed in their eyes and faces. Many of the women were moving in a deliberate manner. One would let the body wrap slide off her head, revealing her bare shoulder. Then she would lift the wrap deliberately, raising her white, enticing arms as far up as she could so the vendor would see her armpit, plucked only the day before, silky smooth, and wake unmentionable desires in the hungry vendor. Many women, accompanied by little girls with rosy cheeks that they wanted to remain
rosy forever, drank the blood of tirsa, which the vendors sold in cups.
“Don’t be afraid, Zahra. Tirsa blood is very nourishing and fattening.”
“What’s tirsa?”
“It’s a sea turtle. The fishermen bring it in and they slaughter it, cut up its flesh, and sell it by the kilo. People also drink its blood—it’s the cheapest kind of sea food.”
Zahra saw the other kinds of fish that looked more splendid than what she’d seen on her last visit. She kept trying to remember their names and asked about the ones she did not know. She also noticed more kinds than before. She saw red shrimp; orange crabs; silver sea bream; speckled red snapper; white mullet; white and red grouper; silver sea bass; long, white swordfish; fish that looked like fat little white bananas; long, strong green eels; dark red mullet, dark gray, almost oval fish; fish that looked like sweet potatoes; and white and black and silvery-white sardines—all displayed on dozens of wooden tables with crowds of women around them. Sardines were a very cheap fish, now in season, and many women bought large quantities to salt and use during the winter. The day before, Zahra had bought crabs, shrimp, and eels, more than a kilo of every kind. She spent a whole half-pound note from the ten pounds that her mother had given her. She also bought five kilos of sardines to salt. What made her splurge so much when she knew that her husband’s salary was no more than three pounds a month? Undoubtedly it was the ten pounds that her mother had given her, but one more certain reason was that she had weaned her daughter the day before and she knew that one did not get pregnant while nursing—she knew that from her mother. Today she was going to become pregnant, she told herself. Her body shook and was shaking now, as she lay awake on the bed. Could a woman know that she was becoming pregnant as it was happening? Maybe. She felt that last night; she felt a little thing inside her attach itself to some other little thing. She felt an inner tension inside, ending in a profound calm coursing through her blood. Magd al-Din would be happy with her since she was going to bear him a son this time. He never expressed a preference of sons over daughters, but he grew up like all peasants, and perhaps like all men, preferring and hoping for male offspring. She was going to give him that, and this big white city, which accommodated all these people from all over the world without complaining, would help her.
No sooner had Magd al-Din finished his lunch, which he usually had late, after returning from work, than a loud woman’s scream was heard from downstairs.
“It was Lula, that was her voice!” exclaimed Zahra. “I know her voice.”
When another scream was heard quickly after the first one, Zahra went out of the room and met Sitt Maryam in the hallway. As the screams continued, Sitt Maryam went downstairs ahead of Zahra, who quickly followed with Camilla and Yvonne. After a moment, Sitt Maryam and Zahra were calling out to the exhausted Magd al-Din, since Khawaga Dimitri had not come home yet. Magd al-Din put on his gallabiya, to be ready for any development; he had eaten his lunch while in his underwear.
On his way downstairs, Magd al-Din saw Camilla and Yvonne coming up. They said nothing to him because they were hurrying. He heard men’s voices at the foot of the stairs and the sounds of a large crowd standing in the street in front of the house. He heard Lula in her room screaming, “Have pity! Have pity!” Sitt Maryam and Zahra were standing in front of the door.
“What’s happening?” Magd al-Din asked, and they did not answer but motioned him to enter the room. As soon as he did he closed his eyes. Lula was wearing a sheer white slip, almost naked. True, her hair was disheveled and her eyes swollen from crying, but, in the final analysis, she was an almost-naked woman. As soon as Lula saw him, she collapsed at his feet and held on to one of his legs and said, “Please, Sheikh Magd al-Din, I kiss your foot,”—and she actually did, since he was barefoot—”protect me, protect me from those sons of bitches.”
She said the last sentence in anguish. He looked at the men standing in the room: her husband, a policeman, and a thin, sickly man. Zahra and Sitt Maryam had come close to the door, and Magd al-Din asked them to bring something to cover the lady’s nakedness. But the policeman said, “No,” and the thin man added, “She must come as she is.”
“What’s the story, exactly?” Magd al-Din inquired as Lula crouched on the floor next to his feet, quietly crying now.
“This man is not her husband—this man is,” the policeman said, pointing to the thin man. Zahra had gone upstairs and brought down a white shawl that she placed on Lula’s shoulders. As soon as she heard what the policeman said, she went out, terrified, and stood shaking by Sitt Maryam.
“Is that true, Sitt ... ?” Magd al-Din asked, and he could not utter her name.
“You sons of bitches!” Lula screamed.
There were two policemen at the door of the house to prevent the angry mob from entering. The thin man rushed to Lula, trying to lift her up to go with them, while her lover stood there, his mouth agape, seemingly in total disregard of the situation. Lula got up and started to go with them. Magd al-Din yelled at the policeman to wait. He looked at Lula’s lover and asked the policeman, “Why don’t you drag this lout to the police station?’
“He’ll come with us as a witness to the crime of adultery.”
“There is no power or strength save in God,” said Magd al-Din sarcastically. “Is the crime of adultery committed by the woman alone?”
“That’s the law.”
Magd al-Din could not help moving forward and, as hard as he could, he slapped the lover, who, to everyone’s surprise, did not resist, or protest, or slap Magd al-Din back.
Lula saw the big crowd outside the door and gripped the wooden banister. “They’re going to kill me. Sheikh Magd al-Din. Please help me, may God help you!”
The thin man, her real husband, began to pull her and try to pry her hands loose from the banister, but he could not. The shawl that was covering her fell to the floor, and she left the banister and turned to the thin man and screamed at him, “It’s all your fault, you son of a bitch!”
Then she hit him in the chest as hard as she could. He reeled back, hit the wall, and fell to the floor. She turned to the policeman to hit him too, but he had pulled his gun and was aiming it at her. Frightened, she backed away and collapsed on the floor crying.
“Please, let’s wait and solve this problem calmly,” said Magd al-Din, who was thinking of the mob outside, which might actually kill her. Then he addressed Lula’s real husband, “Take your wife and divorce her before a marriage official, away from the police. If you leave it to the police, they’ll divorce her from you, but they’ll also put her in jail. What good will that do you? Leave her be.”
The man did not answer. In the meantime, Lula had rushed into her room and quickly closed the door behind her. The policeman tried to break the door down, but Magd al-Din held him back.
“Where would she go? She’ll open it up in a little while.”
Her voice came from inside, “I’m coming out, you sons of bitches!”
The door opened and Lula appeared in a beautiful dress, looking at everyone defiantly, then quickly bent down and kissed Magd al-Din’s hand, crying all the while.
“Please don’t believe them, Sheikh Magd al-Din,” she said. She looked at Zahra and Sitt Maryam and said the same thing. Zahra was now crying, while Sitt Maryam was fighting her tears.
“Let’s go—to hell, if you like,” said Lula to the policeman.
It was obvious that once she was covered, after she had put on the dress, she feared nothing. It all seemed strange to Magd al-Din. How could she, an adulterous woman, be afraid to walk in the street in her slip, but now that she was covered, she was no longer afraid, even of death? He said to himself, “Who knows? Maybe this woman is as sinless and pure as a saint.”
Even when iron is red, red is not its color;
its radiance comes from a fire that heats it up.
Jalal al-Din Rumi
14
Lunch break is from noon to 2 p.m. Workers who live in the Railro
ad Authority housing one mile away usually go home for lunch and a short rest, then come back to work. On many days Magd al-Din opted not go home for lunch even though his house was closer to work than those of his co-workers. As a peasant he was used to eating his lunch in the field. Now he was bringing lunch with him most days and staying alone at the post, whose location and wooden walls made it a comfortable place to rest in both summer and winter. The two hours gave him a chance to read from the little Quran that never left the vest pocket next to his heart. He would also nap for a few minutes, sometimes half an hour, on the long, low bench. At first, Dimyan did not like to stay during lunch break. Like most workers he liked to have lunch and relax at home. But he found the trip without Magd al-Din more tedious than it already was. So he decided to stay with him, lunching and relaxing and talking, but not for long, because of Magd al-Din’s Quran reading.
The post smelled of dust and tea. The dust of the floor was moist, since there were no windows or openings except for the open door and the narrow gaps between the planks that made up the walls. And since the structure was more than fifty meters square, it seemed that the light pouring from the open door or the thin rays of light breaking through the gaps in the walls were not enough to dispel the humidity. As for the tea, they never really stopped making it, from when they first arrived in the morning to when they came back in the afternoon and during their breaks. They made it on a wood-burning stove outside the post, then drank it and poured whatever tea and leaves were left on the floor next to where they sat, for the soil to absorb it at its own pace. Today Dimyan, who was sitting facing Magd al-Din, said, “What’s to be done, Sheikh Magd al-Din?”
No One Sleeps in Alexandria Page 16
