The Harafish by Naguib Mahfouz
“If I hadn’t thought that I wouldn’t have come back. And we wouldn’t have met like this.”
A wary look came into her beautiful eyes. “Did you really come about buying the house?” she demanded.
A feeling of confusion threatened him for a moment. Suppressing it, he answered, “Of course.”
“But you know it still belongs to Bikr!”
He flushed and said, “We can find a way around that.”
She shook her head doubtfully.
“Let me help you at least,” he pleaded.
“There are enough precious objects in the two houses to guarantee us a very comfortable life,” she said haughtily.
“But I’m responsible for you too.”
“I don’t need any help, thanks,” she said with an unfathomable look in her eyes.
He looked down, acquiescing, and made a gesture to imply that it was time the meeting ended.
“Did you have another aim in mind?” she asked anxiously.
He stared at her in astonishment and she said boldly, “I mean did you come to tell me off or punish me?”
“God forbid! Such an idea never entered my head,” he protested.
She said nothing and he went on heatedly, “I’ve been honest with you the whole time.”
The tension around her mouth disappeared and she looked peaceful all at once. Changing the subject abruptly she said, “You prospered in exile.”
“Yes. I took all my savings with me and put them to good use.”
“We’re all pleased for you.”
He paused, then said, “Success doesn’t always make you happy.”
“I know that only too well. But what’s to stop you being happy?”
There was a heavy silence, then she said in some confusion, “We stopped being happy too.”
“There’s a curse…” he muttered.
“Saniyya was always saying that we were cursed.”
She realized from the way he avoided asking about his mother that he knew what had happened to her, and regretted mentioning her. But Khidr said, “Perhaps she was right.”
“She thought I was the curse,” sighed Radwana.
“We always exaggerate when we’re upset,” he said in a low voice.
“I admit I was wicked. I really treated you badly.”
“What’s done is done,” he grunted.
“Nobody takes proper account of what their feelings tell them,” she asserted defiantly. He could think of nothing to reply, so she went on, “Even if they’re sincere.”
This was the moment he’d been desperately hoping for. The reason why he’d come. Perhaps the reason why he’d returned to the alley. Why he’d never been happy elsewhere.
He let the feeling of pleasure wash over him. “Sometimes people deny their feelings on purpose,” he said.
Her face lit up. Thoughtfulness and eager curiosity shone in her luminous blue eyes. “What do you mean?” she demanded.
He was silent, tormented by guilt.
“What do you mean?” she repeated.
“What did I say?” he asked in confusion.
“That people sometimes deny their own feelings deliberately. Don’t try to get out of it now.”
He was silent.
Intoxicated with sudden joy, she said, “I didn’t deny mine.”
Still he said nothing and she continued passionately, “Speak! Why did you come?”
He said brokenly, “I’ve told you.”
“I mean the last thing you said.”
“I talked more than I ought to have done,” he said, as if making a confession.
“Ought to have done! Ought to have done!” she shouted, out of her mind. “Why did you come? You know very well it was purely to say that.”
He was sinking rapidly. “First it was a curse, now it’s madness,” he said.
Her beauty reasserted itself, sweeping away her distress. “Tell me honestly and plainly.”
“You know it all.”
“That doesn’t matter. I want to hear you saying it.”
He looked at her softly, confessing, acknowledging. Her heart sang and her beauty blazed out suddenly, superb in its moment of triumph.
“So it wasn’t you who said no?”
“Part of me did.”
“What about the other part?”
Very seriously he declared, “I loved you. I still do. But we have to think carefully.”
In the dignity of the night silence fell. Both of them wanted it this time. The sound of their hearts beating drummed in their ears.
45.
If permanence were possible, why would the seasons change?
46.
Waiting is an ordeal: it tears the soul apart; time dies, aware of its own dying. The future is based on clear premises but may turn out to be full of contradictions. Let anybody desperately waiting for something to happen wallow in anxiety to his heart’s content.
She was married, unmarried, and in love as well. She called upon holy men, consulted lawyers, driven crazy by thinking about what she should do next.
In the grain merchant’s he conducted his business efficiently, debated passionately with his feelings, hid his desires, fought violently against temptation, and bombarded heaven with prayers.
People watched, remembered, counted the sidelong glances and the veiled intentions, misinterpreted what they thought they saw, anticipated the confirmation of doubts—all in the guise of piety and innocence.
“Respectability is a mask,” Sheikh Said would say. “The dissolute man is more ingenious than the devil himself.”
“Why hasn’t Khidr married yet?” Uthman al-Darzi would ask his customers in the bar.
47.
The creeping sorrow enfolded Ibrahim, Radwana’s brother and Khidr’s agent, in its tentacles. Rumors hit him like sparks from a fire. He had lost his status and now he was losing his honor. The days slowly passing contrived to give him a sense of impending disaster.
One day, unable to bear it any longer, he interrogated Khidr. “Wouldn’t you be within your rights if you claimed the Shubakshi and Samari houses in repayment: for the debts you soaked up?”
“The thought never crossed my mind,” answered Khidr in astonishment.
“It’s nice of you to look after Bikr’s responsibilities even when he’s turned his back on them,” Ibrahim remarked slyly.
“His children are my children,” said Khidr innocently.
Fine words, but what was behind them?
48.
Ibrahim found himself in a diabolical situation. There were no obstacles ahead; life looked promising and trouble-free, but some anonymous impulse was thrusting him toward difficult terrain. He advanced with his eyes open, his mind as sharp as a knife blade, and he realized he was fast approaching some unnamed terror.
One evening he went to visit his sister Radwana. They had always been loving and protective to one another, but he felt compelled to tell her what was being said about her. She was plainly annoyed. “That’s how people are. They won’t change.”
“It’s our duty to put a stop to these rumors,” protested Ibrahim.
“I’d like to cut their tongues out,” she said savagely.
“It’s all we can expect when your husband vanishes like this,” said Ibrahim schemingly. “He’s a bastard.”
“True,” she slipped in quickly, while he paused for breath, “and I shouldn’t put up with it.”
“What do you mean?” asked Ibrahim, his apprehensions rekindled.
“I’m perfectly entitled to ask for a divorce.”
“A divorce!” he cried angrily.
“That’s right. Why are you getting so cross?”
“Respectable women don’t do things like that.”
“Only respectable women do things like that!”
“What grounds have you got?”
“He left me without any means of support.”
“And will divorcing him give you an income?” he asked slyly.
“Put it off for a little while, please,” he begged. “It’s a complicated procedure that we know nothing about.”
“Not at all, according to the lawyer!”
“You’ve consulted a lawyer already?” he asked in surprise.
There was an awkward silence.
“You should be ashamed!” he shouted. “Behind my back too!”
“I was simply asking for advice. There’s no harm in that.”
“So people are justified in saying that you’re trying to get a divorce so you can marry Khidr!”
“To hell with them!”
“But it’s very damaging to our reputation.”
“I’ve done nothing wrong.”
He stared savagely into her face. “It’ll look to them—not without reason—as if you were his partner in crime.”
“They’ll always find something to say.”
“But it’s very damaging. Our reputation will be blown to pieces.”
“I’m not a child, Ibrahim,” she protested angrily.
“A woman is a child all her life.”
Startled by his wrath she said, “Let’s postpone this conversation till another time.”
“Out of the question,” he said obstinately.
“Leave me alone!” she cried irritably.
“Now I’m sure you’re in league with him.”
“Have you forgotten what happened?”
“And I also know the story of Joseph and Potiphar’s wife.”
“As far as I’m concerned, I’ve got nothing to be ashamed of.”
He stood up, pale-faced, and asked, “Answer me honestly, do you intend to marry Khidr?”
“I won’t be interrogated and accused of things I didn’t do.”
“It’s one catastrophe after another!”
Now it was her turn to stand up and demand, “Isn’t marriage a lawful relationship?”
“Sometimes it can be as bad as adultery.”
“I haven’t heard that before.”
Suddenly calm, he said, “So you do intend to marry Khidr?”
She was silent. Her limbs were trembling.
“You’re going to marry Khidr. It’s true, people have an unerring instinct for such things.”
“You needn’t have anything more to do with me, Ibrahim. We can go our separate ways.”
“We will, Radwana.”
He threw himself at her in a frenzy and grabbed her by the throat and squeezed with all his might. Intoxicated by the violence of his feelings, he squeezed harder, bent on destruction. Radwana fought helplessly for her life, lashing out blindly, emitting soundless screams, inaudible cries for help, prayers that went unheeded. Her despair scattered the light into a million particles and strewed objects around the room.
She went limp, submitted, weakened, and grew still as she slid into nothingness.
The fourth tale in the epic of the harafish
1.
The sun rose, the sun set, daylight came, darkness fell, the anthems sounded in the dead of the night. Radwana had vanished into the bowels of the earth, Ibrahim into prison, Bikr into the unknown.
Nobody lamented the murdered woman, but there was plenty of sympathy, even respect, for Ibrahim. Khidr nursed his sorrows privately, sharing them with nobody. People exchanged all the old sayings about woman’s corrupt nature, quoted proverbs on the treachery of brothers, and agreed sanctimoniously that a curse must have fallen on the Nagi family.
The office of clan chief had passed out of their hands; Atris continued to hold it with pride until he died and was succeeded by al-Fulali, the most powerful of his followers. Ashur, Shams al-Din, and Sulayman became figures of legend.
Their elder statesman, Khidr, sat in the grain merchant’s, growing richer day by day, paying taxes to the clan chief when required, cut off from all notions of heroic valor.
He had a new house built, devoted himself to bringing up Radwan, Safiyya, and Samaha, remained single until he was approaching forty, buried Fathiyya, his father’s first wife, and attended the funerals of Tulba al-Qadi, the imam of the mosque, Sheikh Said al-Faqi, and Uthman al-Darzi, owner of the bar.
In the end Khidr married Diya al-Shubakshi, Radwana’s youngest sister. She bore some resemblance to Radwana, and her beauty was comfortingly familiar. He soon discovered that she was unusually good-hearted, with a simplicity and candor verging on stupidity. She made little contribution to the running of the house and had no children. Elegant clothes and makeup were alien to her and she left her looks to nature. Khidr was satisfied with his lot and never thought of taking a second wife. He began to favor a more pious and devout way of life and often spent his evenings in the square at the monastery gate, like Ashur before him.
Safiyya married Bakri, owner of the timber yard. Radwan worked as his uncle’s assistant in the grain merchant’s, taking Ibrahim’s place. He soon showed that he was steady and reliable, with a flair for business, and his future looked bright.
Samaha, on the other hand, seemed as if he was going to be a problem.
2.
Samaha was of medium height and powerful build, overflowing with life and energy. He had the typical local features of his grandfather Sulayman and the fine head and clear skin of his mother Radwana.
He was educated at the Quran school, and from that virtuous world acquired decency, kindliness, and some basic piety, but he was ablaze with the recklessness of youth, and adulated the world of heroes. He found the work in the grain merchant’s uncongenial and appeared to have no talent for it. He made friends with some of al-Fulali’s gang and sat up with them in the hashish dens or even wandered through the bar sometimes.
This worried Khidr. He would often say to him, “You need a lot of willpower and concentration.”
Samaha would look curiously over to his brother Radwan and say, “I wasn’t made for business, uncle.”
“What do you think you were made for, Samaha?” his uncle would ask apprehensively.
His eyes would waver uncomfortably and Khidr would say, “Roaming around with the gangs having fun won’t get you anywhere.”
“What did our ancestors do?” he retorted.
“They were true chiefs, not thugs,” said Khidr seriously. “Our only hope is to gain prestige in society through business.”
He wanted to give him guidance, point him in the right direction, out of love for Radwana; he had focused his thwarted paternal instincts on her three children. True, she was only a memory, but one that refused to die.
3.
Khidr learned eventually that Samaha had joined al-Fulali’s gang. The chief was delighted that a descendant of al-Nagi had declared his allegiance to him, and considered it his greatest triumph in his own alley. The harafish, on the other hand, thought of it as a new phase in the tragedy which was slowly grinding them down. Trying to explain it to themselves, they said that God was sometimes capable of producing worthless scoundrels from the loins of heroes, and that Ashur who had dreamed a dream, escaped miraculously, and returned to rule with perfect justice was an extraordinary phenomenon that would never recur.
Khidr was deeply distressed and suffered from a bitter sense of failure and disgrace.
“You’re dragging the memories of Nagi, Samari, and Shubakshi through the dust,” he said to his nephew.
“I’ve got a head full of dreams, uncle,” said Samaha.
“What do you mean?”
“One day the Nagis will reign again in all their glory!”
“Are you tempted by the idea of becoming chief?” asked Khidr uneasily.
“Why not?” replied Samaha, full of confidence.
“You don’t have the strength for it.”
“That’s what they thought about Shams al-Din,” said Samaha vehemently.
“You’re not him.”
“Wait till the fight for the succession
“Watch out for al-Fulali,” Khidr interrupted. “He’s a cunning devil. Your exploits will disgrace us and finish us off for good if you’re not careful.”
“Forget about your ambitions,” advised his brother Radwan. “Al-Fulali’s got eyes everywhere. He’s taken you under his wing so that you can’t make a move without him knowing about it.”
Samaha smiled, and his dreams glowed in his eyes like the rosy red of a sunset sky.
4.
That night Khidr sat in the monastery square. He hid his fears and anxiety in the blessed darkness, contemplated the stars, gazed in reverence at the dim outline of the ancient wall, and prayed to the monastery’s imposing door. He looked sadly along the path to the graveyard, then greeted the vague forms of the mulberry trees, remembering with emotion the dead at rest in their graves and those lost in the unknown. Burning passions which had never tasted the nectar of life. Vanished hopes. Dreams released from the valleys of silence like meteors. The throne of love poised above the uncertainties of good and evil.
What did the future hold? Why was Ashur the only one to have visions to guide him?
The melodies rose in the air like the cries of hoopoes.
Ananke khaq ra benazar kimya konand
Aya bovad keh koshahe cheshmi bema konand.
5.
Khidr thought he should find Samaha a suitable girl to marry. He was convinced he was going through a reckless, dangerous period and should be made to listen to reason. If he married into a respectable family he would have to reconsider his way of life. Living in a luxurious house, fathering a handful of fine children, acquiring kinship with people of a superior class would create a new world around him and make him see things differently. He thought he had found what he was looking for in Unsiyya, the daughter of Muhammad al-Basyuni the herbalist. He went to test the water, and found an even friendlier welcome than he had anticipated.
“I’ve found a nice girl for you to marry,” he said to Samaha.
“Shouldn’t we start with Radwan? He’s older,” said Samaha in surprise.
“We’ll start with the headstrong one!” retorted his uncle.
“The fact is that I beat you to it,” said Samaha in unruffled tones.
“Really?” He bowed his head, seemingly unmoved, but asked in some trepidation, “Who’s the lucky girl?”