Khan Al-Khalili by Naguib Mahfouz
“Curse her!” said Aliyat in a bitter, censorious tone. “Too bad you wasted the best days of your life on her. Listen to me, Boss. Show her the way things really are by marrying someone else!”
The man gave a nod, as something resembling a smile crossed his lips. “Is there enough of life left?” he muttered.
“Heaven forbid, Boss,” she replied immediately. “You’re still in the prime of life!”
Now Boss Nunu was warming to the idea. “People who claim that nothing trains a woman better than having her husband marry another wife have it right! Our Lord instructed us to marry four of them.”
“God forbid! God never ordained any such thing. What He did do was to make it legal as long as all four are treated equally.”
“Any other constraints to share with us?”
“Bless the Prophet! I’m an old man. Nothing’s to be gained from this kind of talk.”
“You should get married, using those new pills Sayyid Arif is taking as a blessing!”
At this point Boss Zifta resumed the conversation he had been having before Boss Shimbaki interrupted with his family problems.
“You should try buying Persian rugs in particular. Gold can go down in price, and so can copper. But the value of Persian rugs always increases over time. An old woman isn’t worth a solitary penny, but a rug.…”
Aliyat slapped him on the chest.
“Oh God,” he yelled, “the only molar I have left just fell out.…”
“Listen, you crazy pot-head,” she told him, “we’re talking about marriage. What are you going on about rugs for?”
“Don’t get mad. Patience is the gateway to solutions. As long as you’re determined to get Boss Shimbaki married off again, I’m going to tell him a joke that’ll make him want to do it.”
With that he turned toward Shimbaki.
“A shaykh came home after a long evening out,” he went on, “and saw his wife asleep on the bed. She’d been bragging to him about how beautiful she still was, to such an extent that he felt harassed. Passing by her on his way to bed, he muttered, ‘The siren’s asleep!’ when suddenly, she grabbed the edge of her nightgown, saying. ‘And God curse whoever woke her up!’ ”
Ahmad felt as though he were suffocating. He could not stand the atmosphere in the room any longer. His patience had worn thin, so he staggered to his feet. Everyone stared at him.
“Where are you going?” Boss Nunu asked.
“I’ve had enough,” he replied almost inaudibly.
“This is just the end of the beginning! We still have time ahead of us for punning, singing, and real intoxication.”
But Ahmad insisted on taking his leave, and he did so with slow and heavy steps.
“Have the pills worked for you as well?” Boss Zifta joked as he left.
He left the apartment, clasped the banister, and went slowly, very slowly, down the stairs until he saw the steps leading to the street. Once on the street, he staggered his way home to his room. It was the riskiest journey he had ever taken in his entire life, the time being almost two o’clock in the morning. He undressed wearily, turned out the light, and fell onto his bed. He did not fall asleep as quickly as he expected. He realized that, while his eyes might be closed, he was still wide awake in a peculiar and alarming way and his heart was thumping fast, almost as though to lift the covers off the bed and throw them down. Images kept crowding his imagination, then dissolving and vanishing. Only one image lingered, that incredible woman. Did he want to have sex with her just as much as did all the others? But slowly now … what would he do with her? If she embraced him, he would feel small and puny, like a flea in an elephant’s armpit. No, she was no real woman, but rather a symbol of the world of steaming passions, on which shore his feet had sunk and on whose horizon his eyes had gazed. His heartbeat doubled and his throat felt dry, and he imagined himself falling from a great height into a bottomless abyss. Terrified, he sat up in bed. Fear and despair gripped him and for what remained of the night until daybreak he endured incredible pain, both physical and psychological.
33
Ahmad made up his mind not to repeat this adventure. Boss Nunu did his best to reassure him and convince him his reactions that night were due to the fact that he hadn’t eaten something sweet directly after smoking hashish. Ahmad refused to accept these explanations, tempting though they were.
“It’s very clear,” he told himself in his normal tone of self-pity, “that the intellectual mind is simply not equipped to enjoy these types of pleasure.”
Even so, he told himself that he would not need these drugs in order to forget his miseries. If his younger brother married to the girl fairly soon, he would be free to forget. However, the problem was that Rushdi continued his reckless ways and refused to put an end to his irresponsible behavior. He had not even fully recovered his health; in fact, it had deteriorated. No one could ignore any more how thin he looked, added to which was the fact that his paleness had now turned a sickly yellow color. He began to cough violently and lost his appetite. Ahmad was horrified by his condition.
“It sounds to me,” he told his brother in a tone that brooked no argument, “as though the way you’re neglecting your health has put a monkey wrench into your hopes and plans. Why don’t you straighten out so you can get your health back? That’s why you haven’t recovered from your first illness, and now you’ve got this violent cough. From now on, you should give up going out regularly at night and drinking. What on earth are you doing to yourself?”
For a change Rushdi did not object since the coughing fits were already weighing him down. “Okay,” he said, “I agree.”
“You’ll need to get well, Rushdi,” said his brother who was used to self-torture, “before you can fulfill your promise to Nawal’s family.”
The sick young man now started to display some genuine resolve. He stopped going to the Ghamra Casino and only left the house in the afternoon in order to give his private lessons to his two pupils, that being an obligation that was dear to his heart and a source of much pleasure. For the first time since he had left his childhood behind, he made a point of going to bed at ten o’clock, something that aroused in Ahmad a sense of total amazement at the magical workings of love. However, Rushdi refused to give up his morning walk out to the hills even though it exposed him to bone-chilling cold; after all, it, too, was something dear to his heart and nourishment for his fondest dreams. For several days he endured this utterly respectable way of life, but there were no signs of any improvement in his state of health; in fact, the cough went down into his larynx, and his voice turned hoarse. As a result he could no longer sing his favorite songs.
The celebration of the Eid al-Adha was about to happen, and, as usual, the family was busy making preparations. The sacrificial sheep was brought in, and, since there was nowhere else to put it, they tied it to the kitchen window by the neck. Sitt Dawlat, the mother of the family, busied herself making the bread loaves. As usual Ahmad had complained about the rise in the cost of a sheep and suggested that they might well not be able to afford one next year, a thought that appalled his mother.
“I spit on the very notion!” she laughed. “Don’t even mention such dire thoughts.”
The feast arrived during the very first days of January 1942. The family, indeed the whole neighborhood, gave the occasion a joyful welcome. The table was piled high with meats of various types and sizes. What was amazing was that Rushdi stuck to his new regime even for the feast; truth to tell, he would not have had the strength to match his desires even if he had wished to do so. Ahmad spent most of the holiday at the Zahra Café, but he did not succumb to the temptations that Boss Nunu put in his way, namely cajoling him bit by bit into paying a return visit to Aliyat al-Faiza’s house. How could he ever forget the way that hellish night had ended?
The fourth morning of the feast came, and something happened that Ahmad would never forget. He had woken up at eight-thirty and made his way to the bathroom as usual. There he fou
“O my God!” he exclaimed, his voice quavering.
He stared at his brother in a panic. Rushdi had stopped coughing, but he still seemed in a daze; his chest was moving up and down, he had trouble breathing, and his eyes were red.
Ahmad waited until his brother had recovered his breath somewhat.
“What’s that, Rushdi?” he asked, pointing at the red smudge in the sink.
Rushdi gave him a desolate look. “It’s blood,” he replied in his hoarse voice.
“O my God!”
Rushdi looked utterly depressed. Totally losing control, he burst into tears. “I’m ill,” he said in a barely audible voice, “and now it’s all over!”
“Don’t say such a thing!” replied Ahmad pleadingly.
“That’s the bitter truth, brother,” Rushdi said despondently.
Ahmad turned on the faucet to wash away the blood, grabbed his brother by the arm, and took him back to his—that is, Rushdi’s—room. He went over to the window and shut it. Rushdi sat down on the bed, and his brother brought over a chair and sat directly facing him.
“What can you tell me, Rushdi?” he asked, swallowing hard. “Tell me the absolute truth!”
“Finally I went to see the doctor,” he replied softly. “He told me that I have incipient tuberculosis in my left lung!”
34
The truth of the matter was that, even since the middle of December, Rushdi had been feeling a pain that boded ill. One day at the bank he had had a terrible fit of coughing. He had taken out his handkerchief in order to spit into it, and had been terrified to see that it was bloody. The whole thing had sent him into a panic, and he had hurriedly put the handkerchief into his pocket in case anyone else found out. Leaving the bank, he had gone to a specialist on chest diseases. He had sat in the waiting room, absolutely terrified, staring at all the wan faces with their thin bodies hacking away. Had he fallen victim to that dire disease, the very mention of which made anyone shiver in fear? He had heard a friend of his once say that tuberculosis was a disease with no cure, and his heart pounded as he recalled the occasion. He had never had any serious illness before, and it worried him that this fatal disease might be the first really bad experience he would have. His panic only intensified as he sat there waiting to go into the consulting room, but he was patient until his turn came.
As he went in, he was making a mighty effort to control his terror. He took a quick look around at all the equipment and machinery and lastly at the doctor himself, who was leaning over a small sink washing his hands. He stood there waiting, while the doctor dried his hands and then turned toward him. He was short and thin, and fine featured; his head, however, was large and bald. His eyes bulged, and he had a sharp stare. Rushdi greeted him by raising his hand to his head.
“Welcome,” said the doctor in a loud voice, “please be seated.”
Rushdi sat down on a large chair. The doctor walked round to his neat desk and sat down behind it. He took out a large notebook, opened it, and started asking questions: Rushdi’s name, profession, and age. Rushdi responded to all of them and then gave the doctor a traditional, inquiring look.
“I need you to check my chest,” he said.
No sooner had he said this than he had a violent coughing fit. The doctor waited until he had stopped and could breathe properly again.
“Have you had a cold?” he asked. “When?”
“I had influenza over two weeks ago. It was a bad case. I obviously went back to work before I’d fully recovered. I’m still feeling tired. Then I started coughing violently like this, and my health’s gone downhill ever since.”
Rushdi described how much the coughing hurt and how much weight he had lost.
The doctor interrupted him. “When did your voice go hoarse?”
“At least a week ago.”
The doctor told him to strip to the waist. The young man stood up, took off his tie, then his jacket, shirt, and undershirt. He looked lean and emaciated. The doctor put his stethoscope to his ears and started placing it at the spots on Rushdi’s chest and back where he was tapping with his finger. Rushdi noticed that he went back several times to one particular spot at the top of his chest on the left. The doctor now told him to get dressed again.
“Have you been spitting blood?” he asked.
Rushdi’s heart leapt, and he paused for a moment. “Yes,” he replied in a lowered voice, “I’ve noticed it two or three times.”
The doctor brought over a blue vial and told him to cough heavily and spit into it. A short time went by as Rushdi stood there breathing heavily, like a defendant awaiting the verdict to be delivered.
“I suspect that there is something wrong with your left lung,” the doctor said. “There’s no point in stating anything definite at this stage. But you need to go and see Dr. So-and-so immediately so he can take some X-rays and you can bring me back the results.”
The doctor warned him not to do anything that required effort. Rushdi stood where he was with a frown on his face. He was feeling utterly miserable.
“I may be wrong,” the doctor went on. “But, even if I’m right, it’s not serious.”
He went to the other doctor to have X-rays taken, then waited in agony for days, worried out of his mind in addition to all the pains of the coughing. Normally he was not by nature someone to give in to fears and anxieties, but now he suddenly found himself at the mercy of a deadly illness. The very word “illness” had a very bad effect on him.
Taking the X-rays he went back to visit the first doctor. The latter looked at them carefully and then turned to his patient. “Just as I thought,” he said. “You can call it a slight lesion or a surface infection, if you like.”
His hopes began to fade, and his honey-colored eyes had a desperate look about them. He stared blankly at the X-rays, not understanding what it was he was looking at—“a slight lesion or a surface infection”! Was his entire life now going to be hostage to such apparent trifles?
“So let’s call it what you want,” he told the doctor. “My question to you is: does this mean that it is a case of incurable tuberculosis?”
The doctor gave him a disapproving look. “Don’t let the word ‘tuberculosis’ alarm you,” he said. “Forget about all those kinds of fear. They have no basis in truth or science. You’ll certainly recover if you follow the instructions I’m about to give you.”
The doctor paused for a moment of reflection.
“People say,” Rushdi said anxiously, “that there’s no cure for tuberculosis.”
The doctor shrugged his shoulders in contempt. “I reject such ideas,” he said. “You should know that I had the disease at one point. Even so, you must only eat the very best food, take a complete rest, and live in clean, dry air. All those things you can find at the sanitorium. Get to Helwan as soon as you can.”
“How long will the cure take, do you think?”
“I’d say, six months at the most.”
Rushdi’s heart sank. He was sure that a period as long as that would mean that he would lose his job. If this piece of news got out tomorrow and reached “the neighbors,” he would lose his girl as well. For both these reasons the idea of the sanitorium did not appeal to him at all.
“What if these conditions were also available at home?” he asked.
“Where do you live?”
“In Khan al-Khalili.”
“As far as I know, that’s a very damp area. The sanitorium is by far the best place for you to be. And don’t forget that you’ll need the very best care as well.”
He began to warm to the idea of a home-cure system; that way, no one would find out his secret. He would be able to keep his job and his girl.
?
The doctor shrugged his shoulders again. “In that case you’d have to take extra special care in the house, particularly where rest and food are concerned. You’d have to stay in bed, of course. I’ll describe the medical process to you.…”
While the doctor was busy writing out the medical protocol for him, Rushdi suddenly thought of a crucially important question. “I’ve just thought of another issue,” he said after a brief pause. “Can I … I mean, when can I get married if I have this kind of disease?”
For the first time the doctor smiled. “I would hope that, with the necessary care, you’ll be cured in about six months,” he said. “You’ll have to stay under observation for a full year after that. Then it would be a good idea to wait another six months.…”
Once again, he advised Rushdi to go to the sanitorium if it was at all feasible and then recommended that, if he could not do so, he should certainly come to see him from time to time. Rushdi went home bearing with him the entire weight of his misery. To him, everything now seemed like a terrible dream; his ears, in fact his entire world, were filled with that dreadful word—tuberculosis. Should he believe what everyone said about it, or believe what the doctor had told him? Had the doctor decided to tell him the truth, or was he trying to allay his fears? He had told him quite frankly that he had suffered from the disease himself, so Rushdi saw no reason to disbelieve him. Yes indeed, six months was a long time, but he would have to put his trust in God and endure it patiently. Had he been free to do what he wanted, he would certainly have preferred going to the sanitorium, but two things stood in the way: his job and his beloved. What was he supposed to do?
His health, which he had never even bothered about until now, was in imminent danger. Before today he had never had occasion to look back with nostalgic regret on his health. It had never occurred to him that health might be something that could vanish or change drastically. But what was the point of being healthy if he lost his job? What purpose did it serve if it placed a roadblock between him and the girl with whom he was so in love? The best thing would be to stay at home, get accustomed to looking after himself, and take his medicine without anyone finding out about his secret. That way, he could get better without having to give away his secret or lose both his job and his beloved.