She imagined him turning up there, in the remote and isolated village of Beni Khalaf, being met by the mother who was powerless to handle her own affairs and the uncle who was ready to pounce. How, she wondered, would Mukhtar manage things? Would he be able to wrest her mother from the claws of that vicious man?
“Please,” she said to him, “don’t do this now . . . wait at least until I tell you.”
He was taken aback. “I thought you’d be in a hurry to get married. I’m earning enough now from my drawings for the newspapers to be able to set up a household.”
But she was afraid, trembling as she mounted the stairs and made her way to where Umm Abbas awaited her. She flung herself into her embrace, and the older woman patted her back. After a moment she said, “You spent a long time with him. I noticed you went to him early in the evening. That was quite a while for the two of you to sit together without touching—at such moments your body would weaken in his presence.”
“I was in need of it,” Aisha said through her tears. “The Leader died today, and I felt desolate. And besides, Mukhtar has asked to marry me.”
“I would have killed him if he had done otherwise. Seeing as you’ve found your way to his lodgings, you’d best make haste and marry him.”
In the morning, Mukhtar was waiting for her. All night long he had turned over in his mind the idea of marrying her until he felt absolutely certain about it. He was no longer concerned about any impediments that might be placed in his way. He wanted to find out from her more details about the village and how to get to it, but Cairo was grieving. People gathered daily around al-Liwa’s headquarters, coming from all over Egypt: students from the law school, crews who worked for the tramway system, sheikhs from al-’Azhar, farmers from Upper Egypt, warehouse workers from Alexandria—they all came and stood long hours in front of al-Liwa, eyes fixed upon the closed doors and windows, as if they expected the Leader to look out from one of them at any moment. Aisha met their questioning stares every morning, and she was powerless to offer them an answer. Al-Liwa itself was reeling, with death peering over its shoulder. Each day the writers and editors made their way there, thinking this day was to be the last—death was stalking the paper. Readers would not find in its pages the impassioned articles the Leader had penned, no matter how many of his old pieces they might rerun, or how much they might draw on his sayings. The radiant glow that once emanated from his pen had vanished now, and from pole to pole darkness had begun to creep across the pages of al-Liwa.
But before the first anniversary of the Leader’s passing came Mohammad Farid who, in the pages of al-Liwa, called for the greatest demonstration Egypt had ever seen, with the goal of demanding independence and a constitution. The dream held by the late Leader was not dead—a new leader had come, bringing new ideas and calling for a different kind of action. He had lived long in Europe, had witnessed the movement of the oppressed classes, and seen the portents of the war to come. He understood that Egypt, in its delicate position, would be a helpless lamb upon the sacrificial altar of the great powers, and it was imperative that he seek out its secret reserves of strength. He looked for the first time at the dispersed proletariat masses and the servile peasants—would it be possible for them to organize, and to gain strength and a will of their own?
In spite of all the obstacles, he aspired to set up guilds and labor unions for them, but first he wanted them to go out into the streets—he wished to hear their voices, to free them from the malady of their deeply ingrained habitual silence. So he sent out his call for uprising through the medium of al-Liwa.
Three days before the time set for the demonstration, Mukhtar disappeared without saying anything to Aisha or telling her good-bye. He wasn’t waiting for her in the morning, and he didn’t escort her home in the evening. Amm Jumaa, the fava-bean seller, who was the first person in the neighborhood to awaken, told her that he had left early, carrying a small suitcase. Aisha’s heart contracted—had he done it, then? Had he gone to her distant village? Or had he gone on an ordinary holiday to his own hamlet in the center of the Delta? Had he seized the opportunity of the end of the academic term and gone to implement his plan, the one that never left her thoughts? He should have bided his time a little—then she might have overcome her fear somewhat and gone with him. Why hadn’t he told her before? Was he afraid she would hesitate, and refuse? He had left her powerless, unable to do anything but wait, pursuing thoughts that drifted in a mind half-absent. She saw the delegations assembling, the slogans being written, heard the chants being rehearsed, and tried to persuade herself that all would be well.
The night before the demonstration, Aisha didn’t sleep. She stayed sitting by the window, watching the opening to the narrow lane, thinking Mukhtar might appear at any moment. But the little shops extinguished their lights and a distant moon appeared in the sky, while clouds gathered and hung there gloomily. The old muezzin climbed up the minaret of the saint’s holy shrine and began the call to prayer.
Aisha heard the sound of Umm Abbas moving heavily about the apartment, making her ablutions. Getting up and going to her room, she found the old lady sitting there wrapped in her white veil, saying her prayers in a soft voice. She wiped tears from her eyes and turned to Aisha, saying, “I’m praying for you, Aisha, and for Mukhtar to come back safely to us.”
Aisha swallowed uneasily and sat down across from her in silence. Umm Abbas studied her for a moment. “Are you still planning to take part in this demonstration?” she asked.
“They’re counting on me to organize the female students’ faction,” Aisha replied. “There’s a special section for them in the square where the demonstration is to be held.”
The old lady sighed, perplexed. “What is the point,” she said, “of this rash adventure, of putting yourselves all at risk, as long as we’re stuck with the occupation and the sultan is asleep?”
Aisha remembered these words as she walked alone to Abdeen Square. The city lay quiet and watchful. The square, situated in front of the sultan’s palace, was empty but for the municipal cleaning staff. She leaned against a lamppost and cast her eyes about, trying to discern the places in which security officers stationed themselves. The police did not appear in uniform, but a great many secret service officers and other government men stood ready. She knew she had come too early, but she was hoping that the noise and tumult of the demonstration would quell the strained anxiety that convulsed her from within.
People began flocking to the square. As usual, students from the law school were the first to arrive. They were a small group, wearing elegant suits and brilliantly colored tarbushes, but their strident voices were raised to rouse the somnolent and demand a constitution. Then came members of the factory workers’ collective from Shoubra, in their blue work clothes; next came dockers from the warehouses, who had arrived the previous day from Alexandria and passed the night sleeping on benches at the railway station; then the first waves of schoolgirls made their appearance, dressed in black with white veils covering their faces. Aisha led them to a section of the square that was well removed from where the police were. It was her job to shield them from contact with others, and to see to it that their voices rang out resoundingly in the demonstration.
The square continued to fill up with people, with large contingents arriving en masse, carrying signs and chanting slogans. Their faces brown and gaunt, they had found their opportunity to howl their protest. Aisha looked at them as she stood amid the ranks of girls. It seemed as though there was no end to the influx of people, and that the square kept expanding to accommodate them all. Then police troops appeared in their black uniforms, as if they had been waiting for everyone to assemble before surrounding the square on all sides and blocking every exit. The demonstrators, however, were too numerous to be surrounded by any force. As was their wont, for the time being the British soldiers left matters to the Egyptian military, whose dark faces looked frightened and subdued. The square filled with the voices of revolt and rebellion, fr
om which the plaintive, pleading tone had vanished—they were fed up with all the years of begging. Aisha watched their faces as she chanted alongside them—if only the Leader could have been present to hear them as they shouted, defending their presence here, their ownership of their own country. They occupied the realm that, in all the world, belonged to them, and breathed their share of its air. It was as if those stiff figures painted upon the walls had stirred from their places, a temporary wakefulness seeping into them. No one knew how long it would last—the police forces might attack at this very moment, casting silence over everything. But the shouting went on; all these dispersed bodies had merged into one throat. Aisha wished Mukhtar were with her—this sudden animation would move him just as he was moved when life crept into the heart of a lump of stone.
By noon the police had wearied of the protesters, and strove to press them back, away from the walls of the palace, so that other groups from the city center would not join forces with them. With the help of their metal armor and their truncheons, they kept them from advancing. Sticks came down on the heads of some, and blood flowed. They had entered the fray in earnest. The British came, mounted upon chargers that whinnied furiously. Aisha was trying to round up the girls and draw them away from the trouble spots, when all at once she was startled by Mukhtar standing before her—thin and pale, his hair disheveled—amid the milling bodies. Unable to believe her eyes, she flung her arms about his neck, and he embraced her there in the middle of the crowd. The girls clapped for joy, and paused briefly in their chanting. Even as the soldiers’ clubs came down upon the front ranks, Aisha cried to Mukhtar, “I can’t believe you’ve come back to me!”
“And I got your mother’s consent to our marriage as well.”
Aisha’s heart pounded, her chest heaving with emotion. “Did you see her?” she cried, stricken. “Is she well? Is she . . .”
He put his arm about her shoulders. The people were growing more agitated, bodies massing and jostling around them. The chanting turned to shouts of rage. Mukhtar spoke up so she would hear him. “She’s fine. She has been a little unwell, but she is all right. She wants to see you—as soon as her health is restored . . .”
The local chief of the British constabulary appeared, issuing orders. He was riding his charger and wore a blood-red tarbush upon his head, his face deeply flushed as if to match it. He looked down upon them all with contempt as he cantered about on horseback. He had not foreseen that the site of the demonstration would accommodate them so well. He gave a sign to the soldiers and they raised their clubs on high. “Strike!” he shouted hoarsely. “Hit them hard!”
Aisha turned. She had wanted to remove the girls farther out of harm’s way. The crowd surged, and the girls cried out in alarm. The soldiers had managed to divide the ranks of the demonstrators, plunging in among them with their iron shields and their cudgels. Mukhtar seized Aisha’s hand and tried to pull her away, but she cried, “I can’t leave the girls on their own—they’ll be trampled!”
She herself was about to fall, as the police chief shouted an order to the soldiers to use still more force. He turned halfway about on his horse, drew a pistol, and fired above the heads of the protestors. Nobody knew whether or not the shots had struck anyone. Mukhtar spread his arms, trying to shield Aisha and the rest of the girls from the press of demonstrators and the pushback by the police. The protestors defended themselves, converting the poles on which they had mounted their signs to clubs with which to face down their antagonists, and pulling up the stones that paved the square and throwing them at the soldiers. The battled raged on all sides. People began to fall upon the ground, and no one could be sure of their identities. The girls screamed, terrified, and the soldiers rushed toward them, discovering that their circle was the weakest. Mukhtar shouted to them to move away and seized a club. Aisha tried to push the girls away, toward a place close to the palace wall. Mukhtar pointed to the entrance of the Balaqsa Quarter, but at the same moment the police chief turned his horse about, having heard the girls’ cries. All at once he made for them on his horse in a charge swift and terrifying as a bolt of lightning. Aisha shrieked in alarm as some of the girls fell to the ground. The stallion was heading for Aisha, about to run her down, when Mukhtar raised his club and brandished it in the face of the agitated horse; he didn’t know whether or not he had struck the horse, but it whinnied loudly and reared, in an effort to come to a sudden stop. The police chief lost his balance and fell from the horse, his body hitting the ground hard.
Everything came to a standstill. The hands brandishing clubs in the air went quiet, and the frenzy of the protestors subsided. The soldiers’ mouths fell open, and time stopped. There was an extraordinary moment of silence, in which the only person who moved was the police chief. He pushed himself up off the ground and staggered to his feet. Mukhtar drew back, finding himself completely surrounded by a ring of soldiers armed with truncheons, which they held up high, as if forming a wall of spears. The police chief rubbed his head, and found blood smeared on his fingertips. He gasped, and attempted to rally his strength.
“Animal!” he shouted, and then, to the soldiers, “Seize him at once!”
The soldiers came out of their reverie and set upon him. He tried to push them away, but they fell upon him with their clubs. Aisha screamed and tried to break through the ring of soldiers that encircled him, but they shoved her aside. The protestors snarled with rage, but more soldiers laid into them with their clubs. Some British officers appeared and began firing their weapons. Screaming, the girls rushed toward the entrance to the Balaqsa quarter, while the law school students withdrew until their backs were against the wall, and the dockworkers clashed with the soldiers. Aisha stumbled as she tried to reach Mukhtar, and felt a sudden sharp pain in her head as a cruel blow struck her. She staggered and fell to the ground, and everything went black.
She didn’t know how much later it was that she regained consciousness. The square was deserted except for a few remaining protestors, some wounded and some unconscious. There were some signs left behind, along with broken clubs and paving stones that had been wrenched from their places. She rose unsteadily. Al-Rafiy was bending over her, gazing worriedly at her. He looked tired and worn. He wasn’t wearing his jacket and his necktie was soiled and askew, his shirt torn and bloodstained.
“Thank God you’re all right,” he said with a sigh of relief. “I was afraid we’d lost you.”
She gave him a distracted look. “Where is Mukhtar?” she said.
“They’ve arrested him. They arrested many people. We’ll appoint lawyers from the party to go and secure their release.”
He was trying to reassure her, but she was frantic, and completely at a loss. “I want to go to him,” she said. “I want to know where he is . . .”
“They must have taken them to the police headquarters in Ataba,” al-Rafiy said. “I can use my influence as a lawyer to find out exactly where they are and let you know, if you like.”
Unconvinced, she was inconsolable, and he saw no alternative but to take her with him to Ataba. Dozens of people were gathered in front of the building, which was silent—all the detainees had been swallowed up within it, and it did not look as though any entreaties would be answered.
Night fell upon them all as they waited there, unmoving. Gas fires were lit around the walls of Azbakiya’s garden, and activity began to subside in the square, apart from that of the food vendors. The soldiers surrounding the building stared at the people anxiously assembling. Aisha had no choice but to wait. It distressed her that she had been responsible for what happened. If she had not been there in the middle of the demonstration, Mukhtar would not have gone to her, and if not for her he wouldn’t be in his present difficulties. How could she go back to Gamamiz Lane? How could she face Umm Abbas? Everything was in ruins: love, marriage, the hope of seeing her mother.
The darkness thickened, and the lights of Azbakiya began to go on. Informers circulated threateningly among the waiting crowd,
and nighttime’s chill settled over the square. In despair, many people left, as the police headquarters maintained its silence, but Aisha could not take her eyes off the building. She was waiting for some kind of miracle, for Mukhtar to look out at her and renew his promise to marry her and to take her to see her mother. The cold bored into her bones, and for the first time in a long while she picked up the scent of wolves. She cast all about her and saw no shadow of any wolf in the square, but behind the old houses, where the shadows were deepest, she heard dogs barking, as if they too sensed the wolves’ presence. Feeling a touch on her shoulder, Aisha started in alarm, but standing before her she found Nabawiyya al-Mustahiya with her heavily painted face. Aisha was amazed that she had come.
“You can’t stay here all night, love,” Nabawiyya said to her. “The square is dangerous—it’s going to fill up with drunkards and British soldiers. You need to get away from here now.”
Aisha was not upset by Nabawiyya’s coming, for she was urgently in need of someone to stand with her and keep her company in the chill of this night. Abruptly she gave way to weeping, whereupon Nabawiyya opened her arms and enfolded her. Aisha inhaled the fragrance of heavy perfume mixed with powder and sweat. “I can’t go away and leave him in this place,” she said through her tears.
“He won’t be here long,” said Nabawiyya. “Tomorrow they’ll move him to Qirrat Maidan at the Citadel, which is where the interrogations will be held.”
Aisha’s heart contracted. She had thought matters would be sorted out here, in this place, that the business would be quickly concluded, but now she awoke to the fact that there was a legal matter involved, and interrogations, and prison. Nabawiyya was speaking from long experience of running after people who had been accused of something or were considered suspect, and she knew that political cases generally took longer than other kinds. Once more, she patted Aisha and spoke calmly to her.
A Cloudy Day on the Western Shore Page 26