Part
Three
Jihan
“Mother, don’t you want to join us outside? Auntie Najla’s in rare form. Mother?” “I’d rather sit here, child. I’m tired.” “You can sit outside. Come have some tea. It’s a beautiful day.”
In the end, Jihan let Amira coax her out to the shaded arcade, but the other women’s faces, their eyes, their sudden silence breaking into oversolicitude, told that they all saw the dream on her.
She no longer kept the diary, for the dream came nearly every night now, so that she dreaded sleep. Worse, it haunted her waking hours, as well. It was as if the whole familiar world—the house, the garden, the faces of everyone she knew—were only a shimmering, gossamer veil that might lift at any moment to reveal the sand pit snarling like a black jackal beyond.
She knew that something was wrong—wrong with her, wrong with the way she was acting. It was sinful. First and second wives did not always get along— although quite often they did—but both women were expected to keep any dis- sonance between them from intruding on their husband’s happiness. Jihan had failed in this, even denying Omar her body for many months now. Certainly, that was a sin, and she dreaded having to account for it in the time to come.
But weren’t there reasons?
You’ll be the only one, always, the only star in my sky. It was another diary entry, from another time. She had been fourteen when she wrote it, on the morning after her wedding night. Omar, who was eighteen years older, had said it to her. In those days, he often spoke to her in words that sounded like poetry—in those days, and for months and years afterward. And it was more than words. They had had an understanding. They had had a happy marriage. Perhaps that was why he did not divorce her despite the thing, all the things, wrong with her now. The only one. She shook her head and, in her mind, gave a bitter little laugh.
Instantly, from the women’s eyes, she knew that she had made the sound aloud.
“Your throat is dry, Um Malik,” said Um Yusef, gracefully covering the moment. “Let me bring you some tea.” She hurried to the task as a good second wife should. Jihan watched her narrowly. It was well enough, she was thinking, for Um Yusef to make a show for the others, but the truth was that this pretty, pretty, young, young, young woman not only occupied the place of second wife but had usurped that of first wife, as well. Ever since Yusef ’s birth, all of Omar’s attentions had centered on the baby and its mother. Where was the respect, the veneration, that was due to the first wife, the mother of the firstborn son?
But it was her own fault, Jihan knew, only hers.
O
Is it my fault? Amira wondered, watching her mother nod as if she were having a conversation with herself. Is it something I did? Is it because I was a bad daughter, that one night, that my mother and father have become strangers? Is that why my mother has changed so much, so quickly?
She hardly recognized Jihan these days—the dull eyes, clouded as if with frost, that once had sparkled; the tight, pursed mouth that had charmed with its smile, its laugh, its quick jokes, and compliments and kisses; the sunken, defeated body that had never been able to sit still for five minutes, so full of life it was, yet, now lay motionless for hours in a darkened room. Her mother was an Egyptian, a Cairene, a sophisticate from the capital of the Arab world, exciting and even deliciously scandalizing to the conservative Remali women around her: “Movies? Well, of course, they’re against the law here, but in Cairo, we saw them every week. Yes, women, too. Even American movies. Do you know the story of Scar- lett O’Hara, who fell in love with a rich sheik and then with a handsome smuggler? Be serious, you’ve never heard of her? Well, let me tell you …”
Now that same woman hunched in a chair in the corner, looking like some- one’s crazy great-aunt who might, at any moment, start muttering darkly about how things were better under the old king.
O
“The king was very handsome, very elegant, wasn’t he, Mother?” “What? The king? Farouk, do you mean?”
They were in Jihan’s room, the curtains drawn, twilight in the middle of the day. Jihan lay with a cooling damp cloth on her forehead.
“Yes. Farouk.”
Jihan sighed. The Cairo Horseback Riding Club. A day in spring. Herself as a girl. The king passing by with his entourage, a glance at her, a greeting to her father. “When he was young, there was no man more handsome than Farouk,” she said. “People forget, because of the grotesquerie he became.”
“When he asked about you,” Amira prompted, “your father said you were already promised, didn’t he?” It was a story her mother cherished, she knew.
Jihan only nodded. Who knew what was true? Her father might have made it all up to please her.
“What if you’d married the king? What then?” Anything to keep Jihan talking, to break the shell she had grown that was slowly crushing her.
“Only God could tell you that.” Jihan smiled thinly. “But if it had happened, where would you and Malik be? Let me rest a little, my heart. I’m tired.” Suddenly, for no reason at all, she thought of the Muntaza, the royal palace at Alexandria. On the grounds was a pool with water lilies. It was said that Farouk liked to watch very young women, as many as a dozen at a time, swim naked among the lilies. Thinking of that, she drifted to sleep, and before her dreaming eyes, the lily pond was replaced by the shining desert …
O
“I know you have responsibilities there, and that it may be difficult, but if you can possibly come home, even for a few days, please, Brother, come soon.” Amira signed the letter and gave it to Bahia to mail. She hoped she had conveyed the urgency of the situation without sounding hysterical. It was as if their mother was slipping away a piece at a time. In the last few days, Jihan’s mind had begun to wander, like that of an old woman on her deathbed. Just yesterday, she had stared into empty space and said, “Why, Malik! Where have you been? How did you get so dirty?”
Amira was frightened. “Malik’s not here, Mother. You know he’s in France.”
Jihan’s smile faded. “Of course. I must have been daydreaming. But I saw him so clearly, just as he used to be.”
Perhaps Malik could help. Nothing else seemed to.
When had it all started? How? Was it that night when Amira had shamed her parents? Was she to blame?
It was two years ago, just after Omar had announced his intention to take another wife, a few months before the horror of Laila’s execution. Amira had just moved into a room of her own, and she was awake late, trying to finish one more chapter in a history book Malik had sent her. From her mother’s room came muffled sounds—she recognized her father’s deep rumble but could not make out his words. Then Jihan’s voice was raised in a pleading tone Amira had never heard her use: “Please, Omar, you know how I feel. Please just leave me alone!”
Amira did not know why she did it, she knew it was wrong, but she slipped from her bed and went down the hall. Jihan’s door stood slightly ajar.
“You know that this is sinful,” Omar was saying. He sounded half bewildered, half angry. “You live under my roof. You accept my protection. You are my wife, and you will be my wife.”
“No! Please!”
As if she were someone else watching from a distance, Amira saw herself open the door.
Jihan was huddled on the bed, Omar leaning over her. Amira had never entered on such a scene. She knew immediately that she had made a terrible mistake. Yet, she could not turn away.
Jihan saw her first, then Omar turned. Both of them had horror and guilt on their faces, but her father’s expression quickly turned fierce.
“What are you doing here?”
Amira wanted to sink into the stones of the floor, but she had to say something. What came out was, “Why don’t you just … leave her alone.” She had never been so terrified.
For a moment, she thought that Omar would strike her—he raised his arm. But then he pointed to the door and, his voice trembling, commanded, “To your room! Never dare again!�
��
She ran like an animal freed from a trap. Seconds after she had burrowed into her bed, she heard his heavy footsteps passing in the hall.
For days, she did not see her father and hardly dared to look at her mother. Yet, Jihan acted as if nothing had happened, or as if she had more important matters on her mind. Amira had the heady feeling of reprieve that children experience when, caught in some misbehavior, they find that their parents are too distracted by the adult world to exact punishment.
Then one morning, she woke to another sound from her mother’s room—a blood-chilling wail, hardly human. She rushed into the hall but, frozen by what had happened a few nights before, could not bring herself to open the door. Bahia, appearing out of nowhere, pushed past her and into the room. Jihan was standing by the bed, staring at it. It was covered with blood. So was the lower half of her nightgown.
“Allah! What is it? Is she cut?”
“No, little miss. Nothing like that. But go and have someone send for the midwife.” Bahia had her arms around Jihan, comforting her as if she were a child.
“But what’s the matter?” Amira had never seen such despair as on her mother’s face.
“She has miscarried. Undoubtedly, something was wrong with the fetus. It is God’s will.”
O
For Jihan, the pregnancy had been a miracle and a desperate hope. The conception must have occurred on the last night she and Omar made love. After their years together, he did not come to her bed often, and when he did, the act lacked ardor. She enjoyed it in a mechanical way—Omar had always been a proficient and unselfish lover—but that was all.
This night was different. He did not press his desire directly or soon but sat beside her, stroked her hand for a moment, and said, “Let us talk for a while, beauty. It seems we never have a moment alone together these days.”
“Is something wrong, Omar?” His words were so unexpected. “Wrong? Nothing at all. I was just … thinking. And remembering.” “Thinking and remembering what?”
He smiled a small, shy smile that she had not seen in years that made him look youthful, almost boyish, behind his graying beard. “Remembering the time when your voice was to me like the sound of splashing water to a man burning with thirst. And thinking that it is still that way.”
“Why, I hardly know what to say,” she laughed, flushing with pleasure, even as she wondered what brought all this on. “You’ve found a trick that will make you a hero to every husband in al-Remal—how to strike a wife speechless.”
Omar laughed, too. Then an awkward little silence followed.
“Did I mention that I had a letter from Malik yesterday?” Jihan finally ventured.
“Yes.”
“He sends you his deepest respect and regards.” “Yes, you told me. And he is well, you said?” “Yes, thank God. And doing better in his studies.”
“Mmm. That’s interesting, because I received a letter from his headmaster today. It seems Malik held a rather expensive party for the other boys in his dormitory—all of the other boys.” “Is that against the rules?”
“Apparently. God and the English know why.”
Omar had never expressed anything but sternness at Malik’s lapses. It amazed Jihan that he now seemed to be taking the boy’s side against the school authorities.
“He’s missed some classes, too,” Omar said, “but I already knew about that. Do you know what he was doing? Calling on merchants. I have two new clients in Cairo thanks to him—good clients. Still just a boy! Naturally, I gave him a commission, just as I would anyone. I imagine that’s where the money for the party came from. Still, I’ll give him a serious talking-to the next time he’s home. Generosity is blessed by God, but there’s a line between generosity and waste.”
Jihan couldn’t help smiling at her husband’s attempt to disguise pride with gruffness. “His father’s son,” she said.
“Well … I’m sorry to bother you with business matters, my dear. Besides, it was your voice I wanted to hear, not mine.”
He was in an exceptionally good mood, Jihan decided. After waiting to be sure he had finished speaking, she said, “God has blessed us in both our children.”
“Hm? Amira? Yes, she’s growing fast. It won’t be long before we’ll have to find someone for her.”
“Did you know that she speaks French like a little Parisienne?” Jihan asked, turning from a subject she did not want to discuss.
“French? The foreign woman teaches her French?”
“Yes. She’s a good teacher, apparently. And very devout. We’re lucky to have her, God be thanked.”
“French.” For a moment, Omar’s expression darkened. Then he waved a palm dismissively. “So be it. Who knows, she may marry a diplomat. Yet, certainly, times are changing.”
“When I was a girl, I knew a little French.”
“Yes,” Omar chuckled, “and it’s well you’ve forgotten it, you were so prideful of it, my little Cairene.” Again, he smiled the shy smile. “Listen, my beauty, I know it’s no special occasion, but it occurs to me that I don’t often tell you what you’ve meant to me—as a wife, as the mother of my children. Perhaps this will help make up for the poverty of my words.” He held out a small box of kid leather with gilt trim.
“For me? But, my husband, I’ve done nothing to deserve a gift—”
“Open it.”
She did and gasped. It was an emerald necklace, the flawless, flashing green gems set in gold with clusters of small diamonds around them. Even for Omar, it was an extravagance.
“It’s too much. Oh, Omar!”
“Not enough, not nearly enough. I love you, Jihan. You will always be my wife.”
“But … thank you.” She kissed him. “May I put it on?”
“By all means. I know how women are. Try it with whatever clothes you wish, to your heart’s content. Then leave it on and come to me wearing nothing else.”
That night, Omar was like a young bridegroom, rising to his desire for her three times. Some women would have let it be known to the others the very next day, but Jihan, for all her liveliness, was too demure for bawdy bragging. Besides, showing off the necklace was more than enough.
Three weeks later, her husband informed her that he had decided to take a second wife, the daughter of one of his cousins.
She should have known, Jihan told herself. She should have suspected the shy smile, the sweet words, the ridiculous gift. After a day of tears and hate, she had a shrieking confrontation with Omar in the hall, demanding a divorce, throwing the necklace in his face. Most men would have summoned a witness and divorced her on the spot, but Omar said with dignity, “I told you that you would always be my wife,” and walked away. Only then did she realize the bitter ambiguity of his promise: always his wife, but not his only wife. She ran screaming back to her room.
Bahia retrieved the necklace. “When she is calmer,” she told the other women, so that there should be no misunderstanding, “I will return it to her jewelry box. The day will come, God willing, when she will wear it proudly.”
She replaced the necklace the day her mistress told her she was pregnant.
Jihan locked on to the idea that her pregnancy would change everything. If she could give Omar another child, certainly another son, he would forget his fantasy of taking another wife. Surely, that was his only motivation—to have a woman by whom he could father more children.
She did not know why she had failed to conceive after Amira. Clearly, it was God’s will, but as for other reasons, she had none. Now, after thirteen futile years, she was again with child. It was a miracle. She staked all her hopes on it. At the same time, she could not forgive Omar for his betrayal. She turned him away, that dreadful night when their daughter walked in on them. Yet, even then, she was only waiting for the right moment to tell him the wonderful news.
Then, at the end of the third month, came the morning of blood. The midwife had nothing more to say than the obvious; it was a miscarriage. But the bleeding cont
inued, and a doctor was summoned. There were only five in the kingdom, three attending on the royal family. This man, a short, balding Turk, was one of the three. Like all Remali women who needed a full physical examination, she wore a veil while the physician probed her nakedness.
“Madam,” he said when it was over, “your last delivery must have been very difficult.”
“It was,” she answered. “I’m told I could have died.”
“I was sure of it. Internally, there is a great deal of damage. Scars. Adhesions. Have you had pain?”
“Some.”
“The surprising thing is that you conceived at all. I’m very sorry to say, madam, that you will have no more children. I would even recommend, for your health, that you consult a specialist in Europe, a surgeon. I’ll tell your husband this and give him the names of two or three men on whom you can rely absolutely.”
“It’s kind of you, sir, but I doubt that it will come to that.”
“Probably not,” the doctor said with a trace of anger. “In al-Remal we are certain that everything follows the will of God, and that is certainly true. But what makes us think that the will of God is not expressed in the healing hand of modern medicine?”
“I don’t know, doctor,” Jihan replied. “I’m only a woman.”
O
That was the beginning. Until then, the dream had been only a coincidence, a diary entry. Now it came more and more often, until it was a constant torment, like the presence of the new wife herself.
Then out of nowhere came the real-life nightmare of Laila Sibai, a girl she regarded almost as a daughter. She dared not protest, dared not say a word against the sentence and execution, not only because her whole world demanded acquiescence but because she was terrified by a mother’s intuition that Malik was involved. She thanked God when he left for Europe. Yet, now he was truly lost to her, not merely a boy gone off to school, but a man gone out into the world. And soon, Amira would be lost, as well, lost to a husband who would take her away like a camel bought in the market.
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