greed and nothing else."
"Or maybe a sincere desire to marry her."
The youth flew into a rage and shouted in a hurt and furious way,
"No, it's nothing but greed!"
Although it was a serious situation, al-Sayyid Ahmad could not
help noticing the sharpness of the tone with which his son had addressed
him. Given his son's condition and grief, he felt uncomfortable
simply reaffirming what he had said before. Hearing no further
objection, Yasin continued with relative composure: "What makes
him marry a woman ten years older is greed for her money and
property."
The father shrewdly saw the benefit in shifting the conversation to
this topic. It would divert the young man from dwelling on more
sensitive and painful matters. Thinking about that man might keep
him from examining his mother's motives for getting married. In addition,
he realized how well founded his son's opinion probably was
regarding this fiance. He was quickly convinced and embraced his
son's fears. Yes, Haniya, Yasin's mother, was well-to-do. Her fortune
in real estate had remained intact in spire of her experiments with
marriage and love. Although in the past she had been a beautiful
young woman with both magic and majesty, to be feared and not
feared for, now it was unlikely that she had as much control over
PALACE WALK
IO9
herself as she once did, not to mention control over others. Her fortune
might well be squandered on the battlefield of love, where she
was no longer so competitive. It would be outrageous in the extreme
if Yasin emerged from the inferno of this tragedy with both wounded
honor and empty hands.
AI-Sayyid Ahmad remarked to his son as though thinking it over
by himself, "I see you're right, son, in what you say. A woman her
age is an easy mark and could well be a temptation to greedy men.
What can we do? Should we seek to contact that man and force him
to abandon his adventure? To try to intimidate him, threatening and
menacing him, runs contrary to our ethics and what people know we
stand for. To attempt to entreat and persuade him would be a humiliation
our honor could not bear. That leaves us only the woman
herself. I'm not overlooking your break with her that she richly deserved
and still does. The truth is, I'd not be comfortable about your
reestablishing a link with her, if the new circumstances did not require
it. Necessity has its own rules. No matter how difficult it is for
you to visit her, it's your own mother you're returning to, after all.
Who knows? Perhaps your surprise appearance on her horizon will
bring her back to her right mind."
Yasin looked like a hypnotist's subject in the moments preceding
the hypnotic suggestion. He was silent and dazed. His state revealed
the profound impact his father had on him or indicated that this suggestion
had not taken him by surprise. All the same, he stammered,
"Isn't there any better solution?"
His father replied forcefully and plainly, "I think it is the best
solution."
As though addressing himself, Yasin asked, "How can I go back
to her? How can I force myself back into a past I fled and want more
than anything to erase from my life? I have no mother.., no mother
at all."
Despite what Yasin appeared to be saying, his father felt he had
succeeded in converting him to his opinion. He told him diplomatically,
"True, but I think if you appear in front of her, after this long
absence, it will have an effect. Perhaps if she sees you before her, a
full-grown man, her maternal instincts will be awakened. Then she'll
mend her ways and shy away from anything that might damage your
honor. Who knows?"
Plunged in thought, Yasin calmed his mind, heedless of his despairing,
anguished appearance. He was shuddering from fear of the
scandal awaiting him. That was possibly the most heinous thing trou
t to
Naguib Mahfou{
bling him, but his fear of losing the fortune he expected to inherit
one day was no less appalling. What could he do? No matter how he
approached the issue he could find no better solution than the one
his father had suggested. Indeed, no matter how shaky he felt, the
fact that the idea came from his father lent it, in his opinion, validity
and spared him a lot of worry. "So be it," he said to himself. Then,
addressing his father, he said, "Just as you wish, Father."
When his feet brought him to al-Gamaliya Street, he was so choked
up he felt he would die. He had not been there for eleven years,
eleven years that had passed without his heart yearning for it once.
Any memory of the area that had flashed into his mind had been
surrounded by a depressing black halo and ornamented with the stuff
from which nightmares are woven. The truth was that he had not
simply left home but, when the opportunity arose, had fled. Angry
and dejected, he had turned his back on it and avoided it completely.
It was not a place he sought out or even cut across on the way to
some other district.
Yet it remained exactly the way it had been when he was growing
up. Nothing had changed. The street was still so narrow a handcart
would almost block it when passing by. The protruding balconies
of the houses almost touched each other overhead. The small shops
resembled the cells of a beehive, they were so close together and
crowded with patrons, so noisy and humming. The street was unpaved,
with gaping holes full of mud. The boys who swarmed along
the sides of the street made footprints in the dirt with their bare
feet. There was the same never-ending stream of pedestrian traffic.
Uncle Hasan's snack shop and Uncle Sulayman's restaurant too remained
just as he had known them. If it had not been for the bitterness
of the past and his present suffering, a tender smile, which
the child in him wished to display, might well have traced itself on
his lips.
The cul-de-sac known as the Palace of Desire or Qasr al-Shawq
came into sight. His heart pounded so strongly it almost deafened his
ears. At the corner on the right could be seen baskets of oranges and
apples arranged on the ground in front of the fruit store. He bit his
lip and lowered his eyes in shame. The past was stained with dishonor
and buried in the muck of disgrace constantly emitting a lament
of shame and pain. Even so, the past as a whole was not nearly
so heavy a burden as this one store, which was a living symbol,
enduring through time. Its owner, baskets fruit, location, and memories
seemed a combination of shameless boasting and painful defeat.
Naguib Mahfou
Since the past was composed of events and memories, by its very
nature it was apt to fade away and be forgotten. This store provided
physical evidence to restore what had faded and fill in what he had
forgotten. With each step he took toward the cul-de-sac he moved
several steps away from the present, traveling back through time, in
spite of himself.
He could almost see a boy in the store looking up at the proprietor
and saying, "Mama invites you to come tonight." He saw him re- turning home with a bag of fruit, grinning happily. There he was,
pointing the man out to his mother as they walked along the street.
She was pulling him away by the arm, so he would not attract attention.
He was sobbing with tears at the man's savage assault on his
mother, which he re-created afresh with his current level of sophistication
.each time he thought about it, thus turning it into an ultimate
manifestation of horror. These searing visions began to pursue him.
He strove to flee from them, but no sooner would he escape from
the clutches of one than he would be grabbed violently by another,
stirring deep inside him a volcano of hatred and anger.
He kept on walking toward his destination but in a miserable state.
"How can I enter this dead-end street when that store's at the col
her?... And the man.., will he be in his usual spot? I won't look
that way. What devilish force is tempting me to look? Will he recognize
me if our eyes meet? If he seems to recognize me, I'll kill him.
But how could he know me? Not him, not anyone in this neighborhood..,
eleven years. I left here a boy and return a bull.., with two
horns! Don't we have the power to exterminate the poisonous vermin
that keep on stinging us?"
He headed into the cul-de-sac, hurrying a little. He imagined people
would be looking inquisitively at him and asking, "Where and
when have we seen that face?" He went along the alley, which rose
unevenly uphill, forcing himself to shake the suffocating dust from
his face and head, if only temporarily. To make it easier to carry
through with his resolve, he distanced himself from his surroundings,
which he began to study. He told himself, "Don't be impatient with
this tiresome street. When you were young you really enjoyed sliding
down it on a board." All the same, when he could see the wall of the
house, he started wondering again, "Where am I going? To my
mother!... How amazing! I don't believe it. What will I say to her?
How will she receive me?... I wish.... "
He turned right, into a subsidiary cul-de-sac, and approached the"
first door on the left. Without the slightest doubt it was the old house.
PALACE WALK 113
He crossed the street to it the way he did when he was young, without
any hesitation or reflection, as though he had only left it the day
before, but this time he stormed through the door with unaccustomed
anguish. He climbed the stairs with slow, heavy steps. Despite his
anxiety, he caught himself examining things carefully to compare
them with what he remembered. He found the stairway a little narrower.
It was worn in some places and small chips had fallen from
the edges of the treads where they protruded over the risers. His
memories quickly obscured the present entirely. In this state he
passed the two floors that were rented out and reached the top one.
He stopped for a few moments to regain his strength, his chest heaving.
Then he shook his shoulders disdainfully and knocked on the
door. After a minute or so, it was opened, revealing a middle-aged
servant. The moment she saw that he was a stranger, she hid behind
the door and asked him politely what he wanted.
Although it was unreasonable to expect the servant to recognize
him, he became agitated and resolutely made his way inside, heading
for the parlor. He said in a commanding voice, "Tell your mistress
Yasin's here."
"What do you suppose the servant thinks of me?" He turned
around and saw her hastening away inside, either because his imperious
tone had cowed her or... He bit his lip and walked into the
room. In his haste and fury he assumed unconsciously that it was the
parlor, although in different circumstances his memory would have
known every corner of the house without a guide. Then, dredging
up memories, he would have made a tour from the bath, to which he
was carried in tears, on to the enclosed balcony, where evening after
evening he had watched wedding processions, through the spaces
between the wooden spindles. Was the current furniture in the room
the same as in the distant past?
All he remembered of the old furnishings was a long mirror set on
a gilded basin with openings in the cover, from which sprouted artificial
roses of various colors. There were candelabra attached to the
edges of the mirror. Dangling from their necks were crystal crescents,
which he had frequently enjoyed playing with while he looked
through them at the room, which would shimmer in strange disguises.
He could remember their fascination even when he could not
see them. There was no reason to wonder, for today's furnishings
were different and not merely because they were newer. The decor
of a frequently married woman was subject to change and renovation,
in the same way that his mother had traded in his father, the coal
Naguib Mahfou
dealer, avd the master sergeant. Yasin felt tense and anxious. I-Iei:i
perceived that he had not only knocked on the door of his former
home but had scraped the scab off an inflamed sore and plunged into
its pus.
He did not have long to wait, perhaps even less time than he
imagined. He soon heard quick footsteps approaching and a person
talking to herself. The voice was loud, but Yasin could not make out
the words. Then he sensed she was there, although his back was
turned to the doorway. Her shoulder jarred against the second door,
which was still closed. He heard her call out breathlessly, "Yasin! My
son!... How can I believe my eyes?... My Lord.... You've become
a man.... "
Blood rushed to his beefy face. He turned toward her anxiously,
not knowing how to address her or how their meeting would turn
out, but the woman spared him from having to form any plan. She
rushed to him and put her arms around him. She embraced him nervously
and intensely. She began kissing his chest, the highest part of
his tall body her lips could reach. Then she was sobbing and her eyes
were bathed in tears. She buried her face against his breast, forgetting
herself for a while until she could catch her breath. All that time he
had not moved or spoken a word. He felt deeply and painfully the
unbearable awkwardness of his rigidity, yet no indication of life, of
any life at all, was revealed by him. He remained motionless and
dumb. He was profoundly touched, although at first it was not clear
to him what kind of emotion it was. Despite the warmth of his reception
he experienced no desire to throw himself into her arms or
kiss her. He was unable to pluck out the sad memories lodged inside
him like a chronic disease afflicting him since childhood.
Although he was resolved and determined to clear the past from
the stage of the present and retain control of his mind and his wits,
the discarded past threw dark shadows on the surface of his heart,
like a fly brushed away from the mouth which has left behind infectious
germs. He perceived at that terrifying moment, more than he
had throughout his past life, the sad truth that had clouded his heart
for a long time: he no longer felt anything for his mother. The
woman raised her head, as though beseeching him to bring his face
close to hers. He was not able to refuse and leaned over. She kissed
him on the cheeks and forehead. As they embraced, their eyes met,
and he kissed her forehead moved by his frustration at being so ill
at ease and embarrassed, not by any other sentiment.
Then he heard her murmur, "She told me Yasin was here. I said,
PALACE WALK II
,Yasin! Who could that be? But who else could he be? I only have
one Yasin, the person who deprived himself of my house and deprived
me of him. So what has happened? How come he's accepted
my invitation after such a long time?' I ran here like a madwoman,
not believing my ears. Here you are. You, not someone else, praise
to God. You left me a boy and have returned a man. I have been
dying to see you and you didn't even know I was alive."
She took him by the arm and led him to the sofa. He accompanied
her, asking himself when this tumultuous wave of affectionate welcome
would roll by so he could see the way clear to achieve his
objective. He began to look at her stealthily, with a curiosity mixed
with astonishment and anxiety. She seemed not to have changed except
that her body had filled out. She still retained her beautiful figure.
Her fair, round face and black eyes accentuated with kohl were just
as beautiful as ever. He was not comfortable with the makeup he
observed on her face and neck. He seemed to have been expecting
that the years would have changed her dedication to taking care of
herself and her passion for personal adornment even when she was
all alone.
They sat side by side while she gazed affectionately at his face for
a time and then measured his height and girth with admiring eyes.
In a trembling voice she said, "Oh, my Lord. I can hardly believe my
eyes. I'm in a dream. This is Yasin! A whole lifetime has gone up in
smoke. How often I invited you and begged you. I sent you messenger
after messenger. What can I say?... Let me ask you why you
were so hardhearted to me. How could you turn away from my loving
pleas? How could you turn a deaf ear to the cry of my grieving
heart? How?... How? How could you forget you had a mother secluded
here?"
Her final sentence caught his attention. He found it so strange that
it invited both his sarcasm and his lamentation. It might well have
slipped out because of her bewildered emotional state. Yes, there had
been something, things, to remind him morning and evening that he
had a mother, but what kind of thing or things?
He looked up anxiously without speaking, and their eyes met for
a moment. The woman jumped in, longingly, to ask: "Why don't
you speak?"
Yasin overcame his uncertainty with an audible sigh. Then he replied,
as though finding no alternative, "I thought about you a lot,
but my pain was unbearable."
Before he could complete what he was going to say, the light
1 I6
Naguib Mahfou{
sparkling in her eyes faded, and a cloud of disappointment and listlessness,
driven by a wind from the depths of the sad past, settled
over her pupils. She could not stand to look him in the eye any
longer. She glanced down and said in a mournful voice, "I thought
you were over the sorrows of the past. God knows they weren't
worth the anger you displayed, keeping you away from me for eleven
years."
He was amazed and infuriated by her criticism. He found it so
reprehensible that it felt like salt poured on his angry wound. He was
upset and would have exploded had it not been for the goal of his
visit. Did the woman really mean what she said? Did her deeds really
seem so insignificant to her? Or did she think he did not know what
had happened? Although he controlled his nerves by exerting his will,
he replied, "Are you saying my anger was unmerited? What took
place merited the utmost anger and even more."
She let her back collapse against the sofa cushion. She cast him a
look combining censure with an appeal for affection. She asked,
"What's wrong with a woman remarrying after she gets divorced?"
He felt the fires of anger flaming through his veins, but the only
apparent effect was the closing and tightening of his lips. She still
made it seem so simple when she talked, as though she was convinced
of the certainty of her innocence. She asked what was wrong
with a woman getting married after she had been divorced. Fine,
there was nothing wrong with some woman remarrying after her
divorce, but if that woman was his mother, then it was a different
story, a very different story. And to which marriage was she referring?
There had been a marriage and a divorce, a marriage and a
divorce, and then a marriage and a divorce. And there was something
even more bitter and calamitous: that fruitmonger.... Did she remember
him? Should he slap her in the face with those memories?
Should he tell her frankly that he was no longer as ignorant as she
thought? The intensity of his memories forced him to abandon his
moderation this time. With great resentment he said, "Marriage and
divorce, marriage and divorce, these are disgraceful affairs that should
not have seemed right to you. How often they have shredded my
heart, mercilessly."
She folded her arms across her chest in despondent surrender and
remarked with mournful tenderness, "It's bad luck and nothing else.
I've been unlucky, that's all there is to it."
He cut her off short, contracting his facial muscles and making his
neck swell out, saying, as though the words he uttered were
PALACE WALK
1I7
and revolted him, "Don't try to justify your actions. That only hurts
me more. It's best if we pull down the curtain on our pains and hide
them, since we're unable to wipe them out of existence."
She reluctantly took refuge in silence. Her heart was apprehensive
that stormy memories would spoil the happy reunion and the hopes
it had inspired in her. She began to observe him anxiously, as though
trying to guess what he was concealing in his chest. When she could
not stand his silence any longer she said plaintively, "Don't keep on
tormenting me. You're my only child."
These words had a strange effect on him as though revealing to
him for the first time that he truly was her son and that she was the
only mother he had. All the same, it served him as a new incentive
for outrage and anxiety. How many men! He turned his face away to
conceal from her the traces of revulsion and anger sketched on its
surface. He closed his eyes to flee from memories of vile sights.
At that moment he heard her say gently and imploringly, "Let me
believe that my present happiness is a reality and not an illusion and
that you came to me having rid your heart forever of all the sorrows
of the past."
He gave her a long, hard look that revealed the serious nature of
his thoughts, but there was nothing then that could have deterred
him from trying to achieve his objective or even postponed it for a
while. In a voice indicating that the words he spoke were far less
important than what they implied, he remarked, "This depends on
you. If you wish, you will have everything you want."
An anxious look could be seen in the woman's eyes, revealing the
reawakened fear she was suffering. She replied, "I desire your love
from the depths of my heart. How often have I yearned and striven
for it, only to have you reject me mercilessly."
He was distracted from her affectionate words by the thought disturbing
his mind. He continued: "What you crave is witfiin your
grasp. It is in your hands alone, if you take wisdom for your guide."
The woman asked with alarm, "What do you mean?"
Her feigned ignorance infuriated him and he said, "The import of
my words is plain. You should refrain from doing something which,
if the information reaching me is correct, would be a fatal blow for rne.
She opened her eyes wide and then frowned with unconcealed
despair. She muttered unwittingly, "What do you mean?"
Assuming that she was playing dumb on purpose he responded
with rage, "I mean that you should annul the plan to remarry. Don't
I 8
Naguib Mahfou
even consider doing something like this again. I'm not a child any.
more. My patience won't stand for any further insults."
She bowed her head with unmistakable sorrow. She kept it down
for some time, as though asleep. Then she raised her head slowly.
The grief visible in her expression was too profound to measure. In
a feeble voice, as though addressing herself, she said, "So you earne
because of that!"
Without considering what he was saying, he replied, "Yes!"
His answer could just as well have been a burst of gunfire, for
everything around him changed and was transformed suddenly. The
atmosphere became gloomy. Later, when he was alone, he went back
over that conversation. He was comfortable with everything he had
said until this final answer. He pondered over it, not knowing
whether he had made a mistake or said the right thing,
His mother murmured as she looked around her, "How I wish my
ears were deceiving me."
He realized only too late that he had gone too fast. He was angry
with himself, furious, and poured his wrath on everything but himself.
In an attempt to conceal his error at the expense of an even
greater one, without stopping to think, he burst out: "You do just
what you want without thinking about the consequences. I've always
been the victim who has been hurt for no fault of his own. I would
have thought that life would have taught you some lessons. So imagine
my surprise when someone tells me you're planning to get married
again. What a scandal, and it keeps recurring every few years,
without any end in sight."
Her despair was so intense that she listened to him with apparent
disinterest. Then she said sorrowfully, "You're a victim and I'm a
victim. Each of us becomes a victim when your father and that
woman who has taken you under her wing start whispering to you."
He was amazed by this shift in the course of the conversation. It
appeared ludicrous to him, but he did not laugh. If anything, he was
even angrier and said, "What bearing do my father and his wife have
on this matter? Don't try to evade responsibility for your actions by
throwing accusations in the faces of innocent people."
She protested in a voice like a groan, "I've never seen a son crueler
than you.... Is this what you have to tell me after a separation of
eleven years?"
He waved his hand in angry rejection and said sharply and furiously,
"A sinful mother is likely to give birth to a cruel son."
PALACE WALK
"I'm no sinner.... I'm not a sinner. But you are as cruel and hardhearted
as your father."
He snorted with vexation and shouted, "We're back to my father!
We have enough to discuss without him. Fear God and retreat from
this new scandal... I wish to prevent this scandal at any price."
Her despair and sorrow were so intense that her voice sounded
cold when she said, "How does it concern you?"
Astonished, he yelled back, "My mother's scandal shouldn't concern
me?"
She replied with a sorrow blended with a slight amount of sarcasm,
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