He listened to the chanting. The sound streamed sweetly through the air:
Sobh dam murghe chaman ba gole no khaste goft
Naz kam kon kah dar in baghbi chun tu shekoft.
27.
One day Khalil al-Dahshan, imam of the alley’s small mosque, hailed him with a benign smile. “There’s no harm in exchanging a few words.”
Galal looked at him coldly.
“God only tests his faithful servants,” the sheikh went on consolingly.
“Tell me something I don’t know,” retorted Galal disdainfully. “That’s what the cock shouts every morning.”
“We all have to die like our fathers before us,” the man said.
“No one dies,” declared Galal with conviction.
28.
He was walking past the bar late one night when he saw a figure staggering out. He recognized his father, and took him by the arm.
“Who’s that?” demanded Abd Rabbihi.
“It’s Galal, father.”
“Son—I’m ashamed,” said the drunk man after a brief silence.
“What of?”
“I deserve to go more than she did.”
“Why?”
“Justice would have been done.”
“There’s only one thing that’s real, father,” said Galal scornfully, “and that’s death.”
“I know I shouldn’t be drinking at this time,” said Abd Rabbihi apologetically, “but I can’t help it.”
“Enjoy your life, father,” said Galal, holding him up.
29.
Autumn passed and winter arrived, triumphant and cruel. Cold winds buffeted the walls and stung people to the bone. Galal watched the dark clouds and longed for the impossible. Once he caught sight of Madame Ulfat emerging from the graveyard. He felt a profound hatred for her, and in his imagination he spat on her swollen form. She had accepted him grudgingly, got rid of him thanks to death. For her death was a cluster of rites, and special pastries for the wake. All of them sanctified death, worshiped it, encouraged it until it became an eternal truth. She had certainly been enraged when Qamr had left him money. That was why he had taken it all, then distributed it secretly to the poor. He told himself it would be a nice token of his recovery if he were to smash the arrogant old woman’s skull.
30.
“You’re always coming and going, Galal,” called Sheikh Gibril al-Fas to him as he passed him in the street. “What are you looking for?”
“Something I can’t find, and I find what I’m not looking for,” replied Galal disparagingly.
31.
One night he sat up alone in the monastery square, not seeking benediction, but defying the dark and cold. Here was where Ashur had found solitude. Here was a void. He told himself he was no longer in love. No grieving over a lost love. I don’t love. I hate. Hate, and only hate. I hate Qamr. That’s the truth.
She’s pain, madness, disillusion. If she’d lived she would have become just like her mother, ruled by empty values, laughing with inane companions, imitating princes. Now she’s just a handful of dust. What does she look like in her grave? An empty bag of skin exhaling foul gases, floating in poisonous liquids where the worms dance. Don’t grieve over a creature so quickly destroyed. She broke her promise. Didn’t respect love. Or hang on to life. She welcomed death with open arms. We live and die by our strength of will. There’s nothing more revolting than a victim. People who invite defeat. Cry out that death is the end of life. The ultimate truth. This outlook is the product of their weakness and their illusions. We are immortal. We only die as a result of betrayal or weakness. Ashur is alive. He worried about people confronting his immortality, so he disappeared. I am immortal. I’ve found what I was looking for. The dervishes only keep their doors closed because they’re immortal. Has anyone seen them holding a funeral? They’re immortal. They sing about eternity, but nobody understands them.
He was drunk on the frosty night air.
He went off toward the archway. “Oh, Qamr,” he murmured.
32.
His frenzied thoughts took on the form of a hovering eagle, with a harsh cry that flattened buildings.
“When are you going to pay protection money to Samaka al-Allaj?” his father asked him one morning, yawning noisily.
“That’s for weaklings and cowards,” he answered brazenly.
His father stared at him in horror. “You’d defy the clan chief?” he demanded.
“I am the clan chief, father,” said Galal coldly.
33.
He walked deliberately past the café when the chief was holding court as usual. The reaction was not slow in coming. The waiter hurried up to him. “The chief asks after your health.”
Loudly and clearly, Galal answered, “Tell him it’s fine and can stand up to imbeciles.”
The answer burned the chief like a tongue of flame. Immediately Khartusha—the only one of his men who happened to be there with him—rushed toward Galal. Quick as lightning, Galal seized a chair and brought it squarely down on his head. He crashed over onto his back, unconscious. Then Galal brandished his club, and stood waiting for Samaka, who was descending on him like a wild beast. Spectators streamed in from all around and the chief’s men gathered behind their chief. The two men began to exchange blows, but it was all over in seconds. Galal’s strength was phenomenal. Samaka sunk to the ground like a slaughtered bull.
34.
Galal stood, his giant form bathed in a glow of defiance and anger. Fear invaded the hearts of Samaka’s men, for the only one fit to take over from Samaka was Khartusha, who lay prone beside him. Some of the men, who secretly hated the hard core of the gang, began hurling bricks at them, showing their support for Galal. Victory went to the one who deserved it.
Galal Abd Rabbihi, son of Zahira, took the title and it reverted to the Nagi family.
35.
“I never dreamed you’d become clan chief, in spite of your great strength,” said his father, beaming with joy.
“Nor did I,” smiled Galal.
“I was strong like you, but to be chief you need the stomach and the ambition,” said Abd Rabbihi proudly.
“You’re right, father. I was planning to be a respected member of the community, then I had a sudden notion…”
“You could be Ashur himself, you’re so strong,” laughed his father. “So be happy, and make the people of your alley happy.”
“Let’s not talk about happiness yet,” he said in measured tones.
36.
He began to act, inspired by his strength and visions of immortality. He planned out a route for himself. He challenged the chiefs of neighboring alleys to put his excess strength to use, and won Atuf, Darasa, Kafr al-Zaghari, Husayniyya, and Bulaq. Every day a piper paraded down the alley, announcing a new victory. He became chief of chiefs, all-powerful, like Ashur and Shams al-Din.
The harafish rejoiced, pinning their hopes on his reputed generosity and benevolence. The notables were uneasy, anticipating lives poisoned by restrictions and hardship.
37.
Abd Rabbihi swaggered about, proud and dignified. In the bar he announced that a new era had begun. These days he was received with admiration and respect. The drunks hung around him, sniffing out news.
“Ashur al-Nagi has returned,” he announced. He emptied the calabash down his throat. “Let the harafish rejoice. Let all who love justice rejoice. The poor will have plenty to eat. The notables will learn that God is truth!”
“Did Galal promise that?” asked Sanqar.
“It was his sole aim in wanting to become chief,” declared Abd Rabbihi confidently.
38.
Friends and enemies alike owed Galal allegiance. No power challenged him, nothing worried him. He had supremacy, status, and wealth. Feelings of boredom and inertia crept up on him. He thought seriously about himself. His life appeared to him in sharp relief, the features and colors clearly visible, right down to its ludicrous, definitive ending. His mother’s shattered h
ead, his childhood trials and humiliations, Qamr’s ironic death, his unlimited power and dominance, and Shams al-Din’s tomb awaiting one funeral procession after another. What was the point of being sad or happy? What did strength mean, or death? Why did the impossible exist?
39.
“People are wondering when justice will be done,” said his father one morning.
Galal smiled with some irritation. “What does it matter?”
“It’s everything, son,” cried his father in astonishment.
“They’re dying like flies all the time, and they don’t complain,” he said scathingly.
“Death has rights over us, but you have it in your power to eradicate poverty and indignity.”
“Damn these stupid ideas!” shouted Galal.
“Don’t you want to follow al-Nagi’s example?” asked Abd Rabbihi sorrowfully.
“Where is he now?”
“In Paradise, my son.”
“That’s meaningless.”
“God preserve us from losing our faith!”
“God preserve us from nothing at all,” he said savagely.
“I never imagined my son would go the same way as Samaka al-Allaj.”
“Samaka al-Allaj is finished, the same as Ashur.”
“Not at all. They took power and lost it in completely different ways.”
Galal sighed angrily. “Don’t make things worse for me, father. Don’t make demands on me. Don’t be deceived by my achievements. Just understand that I’m not happy.”
40.
Abd Rabbihi despaired and stopped talking about the promised utopia.
“God’s will is supreme,” he declared, completely drunk, “and we just have to accept it.”
“If we’d been more cagey about him in the past, we’d be content now,” lamented the harafish.
The notables were reassured by the relative tranquillity, paid the protection money, and showered him with gifts.
Galal went about with the winds of despondency and anguish blowing through his empty heart, although he continued to exude power, strength, and voracious ambition from his dazzling exterior. He gave the overwhelming impression of someone dominated, almost against his will, by a passion to make more money and acquire more possessions. Not only was he in partnership with his brother Radi in the cereal business, but also with the timber merchant, the coffee merchant, the spice merchant, and others. He could never have too many ventures on the go, and the other merchants were only too happy to make him one of them, to bind him firmly to their world of respectability and power. He became the most powerful clan chief, the most successful merchant, the wealthiest of the wealthy, and still did not think it was beneath him to collect protection money and accept presents. Apart from his gang members, the only people to prosper were those who were unconditionally and abjectly loyal to him. He had many tenement buildings constructed, and a dream house to the right of the fountain, aptly known as The Citadel, because it was so large and imposing. He filled it with magnificent furniture, adorned it with curios and objets d’art like a fantasy of the immortals, sailed around in rich silks, and always traveled in a carriage. Gold flashed from his teeth and gleamed on every finger.
He was uninterested in the state of the harafish or the Nagi covenant, not from egotism or weakness in the face of life’s temptations, but because he despised their concerns and found their problems trivial. The strange thing was that he was naturally inclined to asceticism, and scorned the demands of the flesh. Some blind, faceless power was behind his desire for status, money, and possessions, at the heart of which was anxiety and fear. It was as if he was fortifying himself against death, or strengthening his ties with the world, fearful it would betray him. Although he was submerged in the vast ocean of material existence, he never overlooked its capacity for treachery, was not lulled into oblivion by its smiles, nor captivated by its sweet talking. He was acutely aware of its preplanned game, the end it had in store for him. He did not drink, take drugs, have love affairs, or become addicted to the chanting from the monastery. When he was alone sometimes, he would sigh and say, “My heart, how you suffer!”
41.
“Why don’t you get married?” asked his brother Radi, who was perhaps the only friend he had.
Galal laughed and did not reply, so Radi went on, “A bachelor’s always the subject of speculation.”
“What’s the point of marriage, Radi?” he asked scathingly.
“Pleasure, fatherhood, perpetuating your name.”
Galal laughed noisily. “What a lot of lies people talk, brother.”
“Who are you gathering all this wealth for?” demanded Radi.
A good question. Would a man like him not be better off as a dervish? Death chased him all the time. Zahira’s crushed head and Qamr’s waxy face loomed before his eyes again. Neither The Citadel nor an army of clubs would be any use. The splendor would fade. The edifice of strength and pride would crumble. Other people would inherit the wealth, and make sarcastic remarks about him. The magnificent victories would be followed by everlasting defeat.
42.
He sat cross-legged on the chief’s traditional wooden sofa in the café. An image of beauty and power, dazzling eyes, inspiring hearts. No one was aware of the deepening shadows inside his skull. A ray of light penetrated this darkness in the shape of a brilliant, seductive smile of greeting, and left its glowing traces. Who was the woman? A prostitute living in a small flat above the moneylender’s, with many eminent customers. She always greeted him deferentially as she passed, and he neither turned away nor responded. He did not deny her soothing effect she had on him in his tormented state. Medium build, luscious body, attractive face. Zaynat. And because she dyed her hair gold, they called her Zaynat the Blonde. He did not deny her soothing effect but was reluctant to respond to her advances. His desires were constantly held in check by his preoccupation with fighting, putting up buildings, amassing wealth, and embracing boredom.
43.
One evening, Zaynat the Blonde asked to see him. He received her in the guest hall and let her marvel at the furniture, the objets d’art, the ornamented lamps. She removed her wrap and veil and sat on the divan, armed with all her weapons of seduction.
“How should I justify my presence here?” she asked adroitly. “Shall I say that I was trying to rent a flat in one of your new buildings?”
He found himself being pleasant, trying to put her at her ease. “No one’s going to ask you to justify yourself.”
She laughed contentedly. “I said to myself, I’ll go and visit him, since he can’t decide to come and see me!”
He sensed he had taken a step down into the abyss of temptation, but did not let it concern him. “That’s as good a reason as any. Welcome!”
“I was encouraged by the nice way you received me each afternoon.”
He smiled. Behind the smile he was wondering as he so often did what Qamr looked like now.
“Don’t you like me?” she asked with unusual boldness.
“You’re exquisite,” he replied truthfully.
“And is a man like you content to have this feeling and not act on it?”
“You’re forgetting certain things,” he said in embarrassment.
“You’re the most powerful man around. How can you sleep like the poor people?”
“The poor sleep deeply,” he said sarcastically.
“What about you?”
“Maybe I don’t sleep at all!”
She laughed sweetly. “I’ve heard from people who know that you’ve never drunk or smoked in your life, and never touched a woman. Is it true?”
He was at a loss to know how to reply, but had the feeling she would find out what she wanted.
“Love and pleasure—they’re what life’s about,” she continued, undaunted.
“Really?” he replied, feigning surprise.
“The rest we leave to others when we go!”
“We leave love and pleasure too,” he said angrily.
<
br /> “No! They’re absorbed by the body and soul, so no one else can have them!”
“What a farce!”
“I haven’t lived a single day without some loving or enjoyment,” she said passionately.
“You’re an astonishing woman!”
“I’m a woman, that’s all.”
“Aren’t you worried about death?”
“We all have to die, but I don’t like how it happens.”
Have to? Have to? “Do you know anything about the life of Shams al-Din?” he asked her abruptly.
“Of course,” she answered proudly. “He’s the one who fought old age.”
“He resisted it for all he was worth.”
“The lucky ones are really the people who enjoy a quiet old age,” she said softly.
“The lucky ones are those who never grow old.”
She was taken aback at the change in him. “This moment’s all you’ve got for sure,” she said provocatively.
He laughed. “That sounds like an appropriate homily when night’s approaching.”
She closed her eyes, listening to the wind whistling and the rain beating on the shuttered windows.
44.
Zaynat the Blonde became Galal’s lover. People were shocked but said in any case it was better than what happened to Wahid. Her former lovers stayed away from her, and he had her to himself. She taught him everything, and added a gilded calabash and ornately embellished water pipe to the other luxurious objects in the house. He had no regrets, and thought this way of life had a certain appeal. Zaynat loved him with a love that possessed her heart and soul, and was tantalized by a strange dream that one day she would be his lawful wife. To his surprise his old love for Qamr was reborn too, like an unchanging memory filled with sweetness. He realized he would never escape it. Nothing would cease to exist. Not even his love for his mother. He would remain indebted to Zahira’s shattered head and Qamr’s face for his knowledge of the tragedy of existence, the faint, recurrent melody of sorrow beneath the facade of bright lights and brilliant victories. He had no idea of Zaynat’s age. She could have been the same age as him, or older. It would remain a secret. He grew attached to her. Was he in love again? He grew attached to the calabash and the water pipe. To them he owed this inner ecstasy which gave rise to both joy and anguish, and he had no qualms about abandoning himself to the current.