The Beggar, the Thief and the Dogs, Autumn Quail by Naguib Mahfouz
“The crisis?”
“I mean my illness.”
She smiled, looking at the ground.
“Don’t you believe me?”
“I always believe you.”
Her words cut him, but he said, “You must believe me, in spite of that one lie. It was a necessary lie, but it will never be repeated. My illness is real.”
“You haven’t yet discovered what it is?”
He thought a moment, then said, “Suffering—the only cure is patience.”
She said compassionately, “Which you don’t find with us?”
He stated quietly, “I’m living alone.”
She looked at him with astonishment.
“Alone, believe me.”
“But…”
“Alone now.”
She responded with an urgency which gratified him. “Why haven’t you come back, Papa?”
He kissed her flushed cheek. “Maybe it’s best to remain this way.”
“No.” She held his hand and repeated, “No.”
Aliyyat returned to tell him he could see Zeinab. As he entered the room, he saw her lying in bed covered from the neck down with a white sheet. Her face was very pale, drained of vitality, and her eyes were half closed. He felt sympathy, respect, and a certain regret. Here she is, able to create, while all his efforts have failed. He murmured in embarrassment, “Thank God, it all went well.”
She smiled faintly.
“Congratulations. You’ve produced a crown prince.”
He sat there, feeling awkward, until rescued by the arrival of Aliyyat and Buthayna. Aliyyat helped relieve the tension with her jokes and anecdotes, and after a while the baby was wheeled in on his cot. They uncovered his face, a red ball of flesh with rubbery features. It was hard to believe it would ever fall into shape, let alone an acceptable one. But he was reassured by his previous experiences of fatherhood—indeed, the subject of one of them was leaning over the cot right now, her green eyes peering at the baby with amazement and tenderness. He felt nothing in particular toward the baby but knew that he would grow to love him as he should. The child’s neutral, rather startled look was enough for the moment. If you’d been able to express yourself, I would have asked you about your feelings, and your memories of the world from which you’ve just come.
“Have you chosen a name for him?” asked Aliyyat.
“Samir,” Buthayna answered.
Samir, the companion and entertainer. May his name protect him from grief.
Aliyyat said pointedly, “Let’s hope his upbringing will be in the hands of both parents.”
He’d glided along the brink of creation, yet there was no intimation of change. He felt as alienated as ever. The newborn child had not bridged the gap between Zeinab and himself. He began wondering how long he’d have to sit there, the object of their glances and curiosity.
As lunchtime approached, he took his leave. Buthayna followed him outside, and her usual openness with him was apparent as she said, “Papa, you won’t remain alone…”
He really didn’t need the empty flat anymore now that he was dreaming of a new kind of solitude. “What do you want?” he asked submissively.
“I want you to come back.”
Kissing her cheek, he said, “On condition that you won’t get fed up with me.”
Her face beaming, she took his arm and walked with him to the outer door.
FIFTEEN
He returned home, unchanged, feeling neither love nor hatred for Zeinab. But the disappearance of hatred signified the disappearance of Zeinab herself, the victory of his advancing exile over her world.
“We must accept this ordeal courageously,” he told her.
And indeed she appeared brave, even deserting his bed. Touched by her attitude, he commended her. “You’re a model of patience.”
He refrained from his futile night adventures, and was able to find pleasure in his children. But as he watched the Nile flowing incessantly under the balcony, he yearned for the peace of that desert dawn. He spent his nights in his room, reading and meditating, then at daybreak he would return to the balcony, look at the horizon, and wonder: Where is peace? The poems of the Arabs, the Persians, and the Indians are full of secrets, but where is happiness? Why do you feel so depressed within these patient walls, why this uneasy feeling that you’re only a guest, soon to depart?
“Thank God,” Mustapha said. “Everything is back to normal.”
He replied angrily, “Nothing is back to normal.”
Mustapha avoided arguing out of kindness, but Omar would not let up. “I have not returned home; I have not returned to work.”
“But my dear friend…”
“And no one knows what changes the next hour has in store.”
One afternoon the door of his office opened suddenly and a man entered. He was of medium stature, with a shaved head and a large, pale face. His nose and hands were strong, and his amber eyes had a sharp glint. Omar looked at him incredulously for a moment, then stood up and exclaimed in a trembling voice, “Othman Khalil!”
They embraced and then sat down facing each other on the two chairs in front of the desk. Unable to control his excitement, Omar kept on repeating his greetings, congratulations, and blessings, while Othman smiled, as though he didn’t know what to say. Then there was a short pause and they exchanged glances. Fantasies mingled with memory, but in the depths of his being Omar felt a certain misgiving, a certain premonition of fear. So often he’d envisioned the meeting and had dealt with it in his imagination, yet it had now come as a surprise. He’d lost track of time and everything else recently—he knew that the prison term would not have ended yet, but hadn’t realized that three-quarters of it had already passed. In his present psychological state, he was not ready for the meeting. A man reenters this world from prison; another man leaves this world for an unknown universe.
“It’s been such a long time.”
Othman smiled.
“You were never absent for an hour from our minds. And here you are, determined to live a normal life again.”
He said in a rich, guttural voice, “You haven’t changed in appearance, but your health is not up to par.”
Omar was pleased that he’d noticed. “Yes, I’ve suffered a strange crisis. But, please, let’s not talk about me. I want to listen to what you have to say.”
Othman waited until the servant had brought in a Coca-Cola and a coffee, then said, “Years and years have passed. The day is as detestable as the year; the year as trivial as the day. But I’m not going to reminisce about prison life.”
“I understand, I’m sorry…but when did you get out?”
“Two weeks ago.”
“Why haven’t you come before now?”
“I went straight to the village, where I came down with influenza. When I recovered, I returned to Cairo.”
There’s no use in trying to escape. Your sense of guilt increases by the moment. “It tortured us that we couldn’t visit you.”
Othman said with an expressionless face, “Any visitors other than family members would have been arrested.”
“We longed for reassurance about you.”
“We were badly treated in the beginning, but after the Revolution, of course, things changed.”
Omar winced.
“If we were thrown into hell, I believe we’d get used to it eventually and to its fiery minions.”
He yielded to his sense of guilt. “It would have been more just if we’d gone with you to jail.”
Othman was sarcastically, “It was the law, not justice, which threw me in jail.”
He murmured submissively, “In any case, we owe you our freedom, perhaps even our lives.”
“Wouldn’t you have done the same thing if you’d been arrested and I’d gotten away?”
Embarrassed and ashamed, Omar remained silent.
Othman continued bitterly. “Here I am, back in the world again in my mid-fifties.”
Omar tried to console him
“And behind me an experience more bitter than despair.”
He said sadly, “We lived outside the bars without, I’m afraid, accomplishing anything important.”
Othman protested, “Don’t say that. Don’t rob me of my only consolation.”
The sense of dread returned, and a feeling that he was a corpse, lying forgotten on the earth’s surface.
“We practiced our professions, married, had children, but I feel I have nothing to reap but dust. You must excuse me, I have no right to talk about myself.”
“But we are two integral halves.”
The past is over, and the reckoning is hard. Othman had boasted in the basement of Mustapha al-Minyawi’s house, “Our cell is an unbreakable fist of iron. We work for humanity as a whole, not for one country alone. We propose a human nation, a world of tomorrow founded on revolution and science.”
After he’d been chosen by lot, he’d said, “I’m glad. Mustapha’s nervous and you’re a newlywed. Tomorrow a bomb will be thrown on those pigs. They’ve sucked our blood long enough.”
“The planning was perfect. If a stray bullet hadn’t hit your leg, they’d never have caught you.”
“True. What did you do, you and Mustapha?”
“We stayed up till morning, feeling miserable.”
He laughed briefly. “Weren’t you afraid that I’d confess?”
“Mustapha urged me to flee with him; then we thought of hiding. We went through a few miserable days. But you proved to be superhuman. We were and remain nothing.”
As a man gets used to hell, he gets used to the sacrifice of others. However disgusting the rat is, the sight of him in his cage is pitiable.
Othman alluded to the assistance his parents had received from Omar before their death. Omar seemed not to want to listen, so he went on. “I don’t want to lament the past, for I chose my fate, fully conscious of what I was doing. But now you must tell me what’s been happening in the world.”
Omar said enigmatically, looking for an escape, “Let the future be our main concern.”
“The future?…Yes, I’ll have to dust off my law degree.”
“My office is at your disposal.”
“Excellent. The authorities have no objection to my practicing.”
“Then why not start right away?”
“Many thanks…but tell me what’s been happening.”
He doesn’t want to budge. How strange, it’s as though you’d never been associated with him, as though you’d never wanted this meeting at all. You share nothing but a dead history, and he arouses in you only feelings of guilt, fear, and self-contempt. He hasn’t yet discovered that philosophical works have replaced the socialist tracts in your library. Here he sits obstructing you like fate while you try to flee from your people and from the world.
Tiring of the silence, Othman coaxed, “Tell me about our friends.”
“Oh, they’re all gone their own ways. I haven’t kept up with any of them except Mustapha al-Minyawi.”
“And what have you all done?”
How distasteful is this calling to account.
“Actually the years that followed your arrest were characterized by so much violence and terrorism that we had to resort to silence. Then each of us became involved in his work, we grew older, the Revolution broke out, and the old world collapsed.”
Othman rested his broad chin on his hand, and his eyes gleamed coldly. Perhaps he was lamenting the lost years. What an unpleasant situation! How often the thought of it had disturbed his sleep like a nightmare. He said, “I often asked myself why, yes why, and it seemed to me that life was a revolting swindle. The feet that kicked in my head belonged to the very people for whose sake I went to prison. Were cowardice and folly, then, what life was all about? But this wasn’t true of the ants and other creatures. I won’t prolong the speech. In the end I regained my faith.”
“How unfortunate.”
“I rediscovered my faith hewing rocks under the sun. I affirmed to myself that my life had not been wasted, that millions of unknown victims since the time of our forebears, the apes, have raised man to a lofty position.”
Omar bowed his head in respectful agreement, as Othman continued in an agitated voice. “It’s stupid to get caught up in a sick past while the future rises before us, a million times stronger than our cowardice.”
He looked for some means of escape from the onrush. “In any case, the corrupt world of the past has been destroyed by a genuine revolution, so one of your dreams has been realized.”
How morose and sullen his face has grown. Here you are, swallowing defeat in an area which doesn’t interest you at all. Doesn’t he realize you no longer care about anything?
Othman said ruefully, “If you hadn’t rushed into hiding, you wouldn’t have lost the field.”
“We had neither power nor any followers among the people to speak of. If, by some miracle, we’d succeeded, continents would have risen to destroy us.”
“It’s unfortunate that the ill only think of disease.”
“Do you think it is reasonable for them it ignore it?”
“No, it’s mad, not reasonable, but haven’t you realized how much the world owes to madness?”
He said mildly, “In any case, the Revolution has occurred, and is going in the direction of genuine socialism.” Othman scrutinized him closely, and Omar didn’t like what he saw in his expression. “Though it didn’t touch the heads of capitalists like me, it imposed a just tax.” He concluded lamely. “Believe me, I’m not a slave of anything. Let them all go to hell.”
Othman smiled. “Be frank with me, my dear friend. Are you a true believer as you once were?”
Put on the spot, Omar thought for a while. “I was until the Revolution broke out, then I felt reassured, began losing interest in politics, and turned in another direction.”
“Another direction?”
He said hesitantly, “Mustapha is fond of describing it as an irrepressible nostalgia for my artistic past.”
Othman asked impatiently, “And is there any contradiction between art and principle?”
Annoyed and perplexed, he answered, “It’s not that simple.”
Othman despaired. “I understand only that you’re not what you were.”
So Zeinab and Warda have remarked. “I admit you shouldn’t concern yourself with me.” Then he said more positively, “What’s important now is to start a new life, in compensation for the past.”
“I’m afraid I won’t find anything that can really compensate for the past.”
“My office is at your disposal, with all that you need to get started.”
“I don’t know how to thank you.”
“It’s far less than you deserve. I will always be indebted to you.” Then in a voice quite free of constraint, he suggested, “No doubt you’re longing to see Zeinab, the family, and Mustapha. Let’s all have dinner at home tonight.”
SIXTEEN
The dinner party was as rich in memories as it was in food and drink. Zeinab pressed his hand in welcome, her eyes brimming with tears, and Mustapha gave him a warm hug. It was the first time he’d seen Aliyyat. As he sat next to Buthayna at the table, he remarked with surprise that she was the picture of her mother as a girl.
“I can’t possibly taste all of them!” he said as the appetizers were offered. Then he turned to Buthayna. “They told you I was an old friend, but that is only a partial truth. Actually, I’m an old friend who’s just gotten out of prison.”
She smiled, taking it as a joke.
“It’s true. I’m an old friend and a veteran prisoner.”
At this point, Zeinab intervened. “Then she should know that you’re a political hero, not merely a prisoner.”
Buthayna looked at him with astonishment.
“Hero. Criminal. The words are interchangeable.”
Omar said to her, “Othman is an old friend, and now a colleague in the
“Did the King imprison you?” Buthayna asked.
As the houseboy was placing a slice of turkey and some peas on his plate, he said, “No, the whole society did.”
“What had you done?”
When he didn’t answer, Mustapha laughed. “He was a socialist prematurely.” Then he added with a wink, “And he was fond of playing with bombs.”
The green eyes widened, and Zeinab stepped in again, trying tactfully to change the subject. “Buthayna is a poet.”
Othman looked at Omar and smiled. “Poetry is hereditary in this family.”
Mustapha warned him, “Her poems are paeans of praise to the Divine Spirit!”
Restraining the urge to say something sarcastic, he commented politely, “I hope to have the good fortune to hear some of your poems.”
Omar managed to hide his restlessness and maintain the appearance of calm. He took a stuffed pigeon, reflecting that if it had flown better, it wouldn’t have been eaten, and followed with pleasure the conversation between Buthayna and Othman. Suddenly the girl asked, “How could you endure prison life?”
“I endured it because I had no choice, and I came to be known for my good conduct. It seems that we only misbehave in society.” He laughed. “Actually, prisons are not without their advantages. Life among prisoners is classless, something we’d like to achieve in the world outside.”
“I don’t understand a thing!”
“You’ll understand my words if I’m able to understand your poetry.”
“Have you read Papa’s poems?”
“Of course.”
“Did you like them?”
Omar protested. “For God’s sake, you’ll never finish dinner if you don’t stop talking.”
But Othman continued, obviously enjoying her conversation. “Will you study literature in the university?”
“Science.”
“Bravo, but why science when writing poetry is your main interest?”
Zeinab said proudly. “She excels in science.”
Buthayna explained, “Papa’s enthusiastic about studying science.”