God Dies by the Nile and Other Novels

by Nawal El Saadawi

  But Metwalli had lived among the dead year after year, like any worm. Every day he would squat in his usual place at the far end of the village, on the river bank, waiting until the sun had dropped into some deep recess. Then he stood up, descended the slope of the river bank with his limping gait, and walked slowly in the direction of the cemetery to seek his bed among the dead. But once arrived there, before lying down to rest, he wandered between the rows of graves, bending down every now and then to pick up a piece of pastry or bread left by some relative of one of the dead. Even after he had eaten, he remained awake for some time, as though turning something over in his mind before he slept. Then suddenly he stood up again, and walked straight to one of the graves, guided in the dark by a certain smell which he knew so well that he could distinguish it even at a distance, and even if surrounded by other smells. It was the smell of new buried flesh, of warm blood and cells which still lived although the body was dead.

  He dug the ground feverishly with his strong wiry fingers, as sharp and as cutting as those of a cat, searching for a piece of meat buried in the ground. With hands trained by this oft-repeated exercise he tore away the shroud of white cloth, rolled it up tightly into a spherical mass, and buried it in a hole dug in the ground. He covered it with earth and left it until he would return to dig it up in the early hours of the next morning while people still slept.

  Once over with this task, he turned his attention to the still warm body of the dead. If it was that of a female, he would crawl over it until his face was near the chin. But if the body was male, he turned it over on its face, then crawled over it until the lower part of his belly pressed down on the buttocks from behind.

  In the morning Metwalli would disappear from Kafr El Teen. No one troubled to look for him, or to wonder where he could be. But some distance away at Ramla or Bauhout he sat on the pavement of a crowded street, right in the middle of the weekly market bargaining over the sale of some yards of dusty white sheeting which no one knew had served a few hours earlier as a shroud for some dead body buried quite recently in the cemetery of Kafr El Teen.

  _________

  * Eid: Festival following the Ramadan fast. Hejaz: Mecca.

  VIII

  The car entered the village preceded by its high-pitched horn, and followed by a storm of dust, a swarm of children and some stray dogs. Out of it stepped some gentlemen, one of whom was followed by a male nurse carrying a bag, and the second by a policeman holding back a dog which kept tugging at its leash. A group of men were busy walking up and down trying to push the people standing around as far back as they could, or lashing out at the buttocks of the children with their canes.

  The whole village of Kafr El Teen had gathered on the bank of the river. The men wore galabeyas and each held a stick. The women had wrapped themselves in black shawls. The children were surrounded by clouds of flies, and exhibited bare buttocks and running noses. Everyone was there. Only three people were missing. Zakeya sat squatting as usual in the dusty entrance to her house, with Zeinab beside her. Both were silent, their angry, almost defiant eyes gazing into the lane.

  Kafrawi also sat squatting but much further away on the outskirts of the village trying to hide between the maize stalks in a field. From his hiding place he could hear voices coming closer, preceded by the yapping, barking and whining of the dog. He realized that they must have found out where he was hiding, so he stepped out of the maize field and clambered up the bank of the river. Some of the children spotted him and cried out, ‘Kafrawi, Kafrawi!’, then started to run after him but he ran faster and arrived at the edge of the river. Before the dog tugging furiously at its leash with the policeman running behind it, had time to pounce on him he had thrown himself into the water. He did not know why he was running away, or where he was going.

  He was just putting as much distance as he could between himself and something he feared, just going without knowing where to go. He did not know what had happened to him since the moment when he had been lying with the buffalo, until the moment when his body struck cold water.

  He heard a splashing in the water and realized that someone was swimming rapidly towards him, getting closer and closer. He lunged out with his arms and legs, straining his sight to see the other shore as though there he would find safety and security. He had forgotten that on the other shore were the orange orchards owned by the Mayor of Kafr El Teen.

  On the river bank were gathered the inhabitants of Kafr El Teen. They stood slightly in the background, and in front of them was a group composed of the officer with his dog, the Chief of the Village Guard, some of the village guards, and a few district policemen. Their eyes followed the two bodies swimming in the river, with the zeal of spectators watching a race, and wondering who of the two would be the winner. When the distance between the two swimmers increased the villagers would experience a secret feeling of joy, for they were hoping that Kafrawi would manage to escape, and that the policeman would fail to catch up with him. Instinctively they felt Kafrawi was not a killer, or a criminal. They hated the policeman and his dogs, hated all policemen, all officers, all representatives of authority and the government. It was the hidden ancient hatred of peasants for their government. They knew that in some way or another they had always been the victims, always been exploited, even if most of the time they could not understand how it was happening.

  The officer was watching the scene with a cold detachment, looking at his wrist watch every now and then as though he had an important appointment, and wanted to be over with this mission as quickly as possible. The dog also did not seem to care much about what was happening. It was lying on the river bank enjoying the sunshine, the green fields and the expanses of water as though long deprived of a chance to enjoy such natural beauty. The only person who seemed nervous was the Chief of the Village Guard. Every time the distance between the two swimmers decreased, he would shout out encouragingly, ‘Well done, Bayumi!’

  His voice echoed in the ears of Bayumi like a clarion call, making him lunge out with his arms and legs more vigorously. Why this was so he could not himself understand. He had been assigned the task of capturing this animal, and that was all. Further than that his mind refused to go. From the moment when the order ‘Arrest him’ had resounded in his ears, he had launched himself in pursuit of the man like a projectile fired from a gun.

  Kafrawi’s naked body stepped out of the water and leapt on to the shore threading its way through the trees of the orchard. Bayumi followed close behind, his body also naked except for the pair of baggy singlets which he still wore. He was tall, with wiry muscles, and his face, too, looked hard and narrow with sharp features which remained as rigid as cardboard. It was the face of a policeman expressing neither joy nor sadness, fear nor hope, a face without feeling carrying an expressionless expression which says nothing at all. A face without features like the palm of a hand from which you can glean no feeling or thought, because they have been suppressed for so long that nothing is left any more, or a face made of bronze, or copper like the knocker which hangs on doors, and is used to alert people in the house that there is someone outside who wants to intrude just when they feel most cosy and warm. His body too was hard and copper-like, with arms and legs which ran or swam or walked with a steady, swinging, untiring movement, so unchanging, so enduring that it could hardly be human, hardly come from a body of flesh and blood and bone, but only from a robot with metal limbs and joints.

  Kafrawi saw him as he hid behind a tree. His body shook with a strange fear as though he had seen something which was neither man nor devil, neither live nor dead, some evil spirit which was not human despite its human form.

  He felt this fear sweep over him like a wave of icy cold water. He could no longer follow his body, understand what it was doing, know whether it was hiding behind the orange trees or threading its way between them. For tracking him down was the frightening shadow, moving at a machine-like pace neither fast nor slow, like the hands of a clock moving steadily toward
s the hour of execution, so that when the steely fingers closed around his arm he felt his time had come and quietly whispered, ‘Verily I do witness that there is no other God than Allah.’ Then everything went black and he could no longer hear or see anything. The dark was so stock still that it seemed as though his life had come to a sudden end, and now was the moment ordained for him to go.

  When he came to again, and began to hear and see once more, his eyes looked around him in great astonishment. He was squatting in a huge room crowded with people, and they kept throwing glances towards him. In front of him were three men sitting behind something high which looked like a table.

  One of the three men was gesturing with his hand angrily, and fixing him with his eyes, in a menacing way. He looked around again trying to understand what was happening. Suddenly he felt a pointed finger jab into his shoulder like a nail, and a thin sharp voice pierced his ear. ‘Have you not heard? Why don’t you answer?’

  Kafrawi opened his mouth and asked, ‘Is someone speaking to me?’

  The thin, sharp voice cut through the air again. ‘Yes, are you asleep? Wake up, and answer His Excellency’s questions.’

  Kafrawi could not figure out who His Excellency could be, nor could he understand where he now was. He was certainly no longer in Kafr El Teen. He could be in another village, or even in another world. He wondered how they had carried him to this place, and how he had got here.

  Suddenly he heard an angry voice say to him, ‘What’s your name?’

  He answered, ‘Kafrawi.’

  The angry voice came back at him. ‘Your age?’

  He hesitated for a moment before saying, ‘Forty or fifty.’

  He heard people laugh and could not understand why they did so.

  The angry voice resumed. ‘You are accused of having murdered Elwau and it’s better for you to admit to your crime, instead of beating about the bush.’

  ‘Admit to what?’ he asked.

  ‘Admit to killing Elwau.’

  ‘I did not kill him. Elwau was a good man.’

  The voice said, ‘Did you not hear that he was the man who assaulted your daughter, Nefissa?’

  ‘I heard them say it was Elwau.’

  ‘After you heard that, did you not think of killing him?’

  ‘No.’

  The voice asked, ‘Why?’

  ‘I did not think of it.’

  ‘Is that normal for a man whose honour has been sullied?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Kafrawi answered.

  The voice sounded very angry. ‘Is that natural?’

  ‘What does natural mean?’

  He heard laughter again. He looked around in surprise. He could not understand why people kept laughing. It occurred to him that they might be laughing about something which had nothing to do with him.

  The voice resumed its questioning. ‘On that Friday, why did you stay in the fields instead of going to the mosque for prayer like all the men of the village?’

  ‘I’ve stopped praying since Nefissa left.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Nefissa used to look after the buffalo while I went to pray.’

  ‘Did you not know that, unlike the other men in the village, Elwau did not go to the mosque on Fridays?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Did you or did you not know?’

  ‘I knew. Everybody knew that Elwau did not go to the mosque.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I don’t know why. People say that his mother’s grandfather was a Copt, but Allah alone knows the reason.’

  The voice asked insinuatingly, ‘Did you dislike Elwau?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Was it not your conviction that a man like him should have carried out the religious rites which Allah has ordained?’

  Kafrawi said, ‘Elwau was a good man.’

  ‘Do you not know that prayer is a protection against sin?’

  ‘Yes, that’s what Sheikh Hamzawi used to say to us.’

  ‘So Elwau assaulted your daughter and committed a grievous sin.’

  ‘That’s what was said.’

  ‘And after all that happened, you insist you didn’t think of killing him?’

  ‘No, I didn’t.’

  ‘Why did you not think of killing him?’ ‘Elwau was a good man,’ Kafrawi repeated.

  The voice came back, insistent. ‘Don’t you care about honour? Don’t you care about your honour and that of your family?’

  Kafrawi was silent for a moment and then replied, ‘Yes, I do.’

  The voice said with a note of triumph barely veiled, ‘That’s why you killed Elwau.’

  ‘But I did not kill him.’

  The voice was very angry again. ‘Then why were you found near the body?’

  Kafrawi was silent, trying to remember, but his memory failed him. He said nothing.

  The voice still sounded angry. ‘Why did you run away and try to escape?’

  ‘I was afraid of the dog.’

  ‘Do you know why the dog picked you out from all the men in the village?’

  ‘No. It’s the dog who knows.’

  He heard laughter in the room and looked around in great surprise. Why were people laughing again?

  The voice was furious this time. ‘Don’t try to deceive me. You had better confess. Do you know what’s awaiting you?’

  ‘No,’ he said.

  Laughter echoed in his ears once more. His eyes expressed a puzzled amazement. After a moment he felt the steely fingers close round his arm as they led him away into a long, dark passage. He closed his eyes and muttered, ‘I do testify that there is no God but Allah.’

  IX

  Zakeya still sat on the dusty threshold with Zeinab by her side. Both of them were plunged in silence, and their eyes continued to watch the lane with an expression of angry defiance. In front of them there still rose the huge door with its iron bars. It seemed to stand there blocking the way, shutting out the bank of the river and the water which flowed beside it. From time to time the Mayor walked out, tall, broad-shouldered, surrounded by men on all sides. He walked ahead of them with his slow steady stride. In his eyes was the haughty, blue look which he raised to the skies. He never bent his head to look at the ground over which he walked, nor noticed Zakeya and Zeinab sitting on the dusty threshold of their house, thinking over something in silence, their eyes staring in front of them steadily.

  Zakeya’s hands rested on her lap, over her wide, black galabeya. They were big, and the skin on them was coarse and cracked. In her palm lay the deep imprint of the hoe which she held firmly in her clasp whenever she dug into the soil. Her nails were black, and they smelt of manure and of mud. Now and again she would lift them from her lap to hold her head, or wipe the sticky sweat, or chase away a mosquito or a gnat. Zeinab sat by her side, her hands busy sifting the corn from the chaff, or kneading the dung with straw, and cutting it into round cakes like a loaf of bread. Sometimes she would stand up, lift the earthenware jar to her head and walk to the river bank. Her body was tall and slender, her big, dark eyes faced straight ahead. She did not look at passers-by, or houses on the way, or shops or sheds. Nor did she smile at anyone, or greet a friend as the other girls or women did. When she passed in front of Haj Ismail’s shop she would hasten her pace. She could almost feel the blue eyes singe her back. They gazed at her fixedly, inflexibly, cruelly cutting through her dress, feeding on the beauty of her legs, on the curving flesh, on the fullness of her thighs and belly, on the petal-like skin and the waist narrow and slender above her hips, on her back rising up like a powerful stem.

  She would lift her shawl to hide her face and cover her breast. But the sharp, inflexible eyes which knew no rest, no quiet, no tenderness, pierced through her robe as she climbed the river bank, or descended its sloping flank, slid over her back, and round her uncovered body to the pointed breasts which moved up and down with every step, with the beat of her heart and the rhythm of her breath. She advanced quickly, her eyes fixed straight ahead, cheeks f
lushed with health, full lips trembling, her lithe form wafted through the open spaces as though on air.

  When she got home she would lift the earthenware jar of water from her head, and put it on the ground, then sit down by the side of her Aunt Zakeya still out of breath. Her heart continued to beat fast under her ribs, her chest heaved up and down, and the drops of sweat stood out on her forehead, for they had not yet dried, nor had they dripped down over her face to disappear over her neck.

  Zakeya would stare at her silently for some time. Then her parched lips would part and in a low, tense whisper she would ask, ‘What’s wrong with you, my child?’

  But Zeinab never answered, so Zakeya would drop into silence again for a long while before her lips opened again with the oft repeated lament.

  ‘I wonder where you are, Galal my son. I wonder whether you are alive or dead. O God, if I knew he was dead my mind would be put at rest. And now Kafrawi has also been taken away. Who knows if he’ll ever come back. O God, were not Galal and Nefissa enough? Did you have to take Kafrawi also? We no longer have anyone left, and the house is empty. Zeinab is still young and I am old. Who is going to look after the buffalo and the crops?’

  Zeinab dried her sweat on her shawl and then she said, ‘I have grown up now, and I will look after the buffalo, and the crops, and the house and everything else until my father comes back. Father will come back, and so will Galal, and Nefissa as well.’

  ‘Those that go never come back, my child.’

  ‘God knows what difficult straits we’re in and He won’t abandon us.’

  Zakeya muttered in a low tone as though speaking to herself. ‘No one is going to come back. Those who go never come back. Kafrawi too. He will not return.’

  ‘My father will come back. You will see. He’ll come back,’ Zeinab said vehemently. ‘He will tell them that he did not kill anyone and they will believe him. Everybody knows my father is a kind man, and could never kill anybody.’