The Automobile Club of Egypt

by Alaa Al Aswany

  A few months into their marriage, Said announced his wife’s pregnancy. Umm Said was truly thrilled at the thought that Fayeqa was carrying her and the late Abd el-Aziz’s first grandchild. Forgetting Fayeqa’s mischief, she was overcome by a feeling of tenderness and started telephoning her a few times a week to check on her condition and to advise her against sudden movements or carrying heavy loads because the first pregnancy was always delicate, especially during the first months. She was surprised, then, to hear Said telling her that he would visit her with his wife on Friday. Naturally, she welcomed the visit but added with a hint of worry, “How is it Fayeqa is able to take the train in her condition? It could be risky.”

  Said, however, assured his mother that the matter was important and could not be put off and that he would like his wife to be present. When the call was over, Umm Said wondered what was behind this visit. Had the doctor not warned Fayeqa against excessive exertions and needless jostling like the bone-shaking train from Tanta to Cairo? And what was so important that Said could not come alone? Umm Said discussed the matter at great length with Saleha, but neither of them could come up with a convincing explanation.

  On the Friday, Said and his wife turned up just before noon, as usual. Said went to say Friday prayers at the Sayyida Zeinab mosque, and when he came back, they all sat around the dining table. They ate duck stuffed with onion prepared by Umm Said, and after lunch, they drank their way through three pots of tea. Then Said did his ablutions and returned to the mosque to say the evening prayers. When he came back again, his mother led him by the hand to the sitting room, shutting the door behind them, and their conversation became louder and louder until it echoed throughout the apartment. Kamel rushed to the sitting room. Fayeqa dragged herself slowly toward the sitting room as if she already knew what was going on.

  24

  The door opened, and Madame Khashab appeared. The moment she saw Mahmud her face froze.

  “Is everything all right? Do you want something?” she asked warily.

  Mahmud was bewildered and confused by her tone, but then he pulled himself together and stuttered, “I’m sorry, Madame.”

  She turned her face away and asked him coldly, “Sorry for what?”

  “I’m sorry for upsetting you,” he said quickly with some warmth in his voice. “By God Almighty, I’m so angry that my mother made me return your present. Please forgive me.”

  Madame Khashab was about to say something, but she stopped herself. Mahmud then took a step toward her and held out the flowers.

  “I have brought you these,” he said imploringly, “to apologize.”

  There was a moment of silence, and then Mahmud continued, “Please accept the flowers. By the life of the Prophet, don’t embarrass me, Madame.”

  After a little hesitation, Madame Khashab took the bouquet. “Thank you, Mahmud,” she said and smiled.

  “Are you still angry with me?”

  When she did not answer, Mahmud continued. “Madame,” he said in a voice full of sincerity, “you told me that you have a good heart and that you like to forgive.”

  Madame Khashab started examining the flowers, held them up so she could smell them and then said, “The flowers are beautiful. I love carnations.”

  Mahmud smiled, showing his glistening teeth, as if to say that was the least he could do.

  “So have you forgiven me?” he asked again.

  She nodded and looked at him affectionately.

  “Mahmud,” she said. “I consider you my son. I could never be angry with you. When you returned the present, I was upset because I had just been trying to be helpful.”

  “Thank you, Madame.”

  Madame Khashab’s smile broadened. She pushed the door open wide with her hand and took a step backward.

  “Come in, Mahmud.”

  “Thank you.”

  “You can’t stand there at the door. Come and have something to drink.”

  Mahmud let himself be invited in as three thoughts occurred to him: first, that Mustafa had been completely right about the effect of flowers on the temperament of foreigners; second, that this was his day off and he could stay there a little; and third, that he had to be careful not to upset Madame Khashab again.

  The three thoughts preoccupied Mahmud’s brain, making him incapable of resisting when Madame Khashab held out her hand and led him to the sitting room. Then she took the paper off the flowers and arranged them in a vase on the table by the window. She admired the flowers and sat down on the sofa. Mahmud, for the first time, noticed a bottle of whiskey, a glass and an ice bucket on the table and realized that she had been drinking. She reached out for her glass and with a sudden laugh said, “So how are you, Mahmud?”

  “Thank God, I’m fine.”

  He continued watching as she emptied her glass in one go and then leaned over to pour herself another. Mahmud sat there with his hands on his knees, not knowing what to say, when Madame Khashab asked him affectionately, “Should I pour you a glass of whiskey?”

  “No, thank you.”

  “Just one glass.”

  “Madame, I am a Muslim. We’re not allowed alcohol.”

  Madame Khashab laughed and took a sip of her whiskey.

  “Do you pray?” she asked.

  “Not regularly, unfortunately. Sometimes I forget and sometimes I don’t get around to it.”

  She seemed to be thinking of something, to be looking for the right words.

  “How old are you Mahmud?” she asked him.

  “Nineteen.”

  “All right. And don’t you know more now than when you were ten?”

  “Of course I do.”

  “Good. And as a person gets a little older, he understands more about the world, doesn’t he?”

  “Of course.”

  “Good. And it is God who created the whole world and everyone in it, so he must understand more than all of us.”

  “Naturally.”

  “And if God knows more than all of us, then he must forgive us?”

  “Does he forgive us even if we do stupid things?” he asked naively.

  “God has to punish us for big sins,” she said laughing. “He punishes us if we hurt people. If we lie or steal or murder. But if we drink a glass or two to drown our sorrows, I don’t think God would punish us for such a small thing.”

  That was rather complicated logic for Mahmud, who nodded, a smile frozen on his face.

  “So what do you say?” Madame Khashab asked him again. “Shall I pour you a glass?”

  “No, thank you.”

  “All right, as you like. Would you like a glass of chocolate milk?”

  He hesitated a little and then answered quietly, “That would be lovely.”

  “How much sugar?”

  “Four teaspoons.”

  Madame Khashab laughed as she started to understand his character. She nodded, finished off her glass in one gulp and went to the kitchen. Mahmud sat there, looking around. To his left in the sitting room, he could see a large wooden radio set and an aquarium, illuminated from the inside, with colored fish swimming around. In front of him was the dining room with its balcony overlooking the Zamalek corniche. On the wall hung a wedding portrait of Madame Khashab and her handsome husband, Sami Khashab. There was also a large photograph of him some years later, his hair now white, hanging with pride of place in the sitting room, a black ribbon draped down the side. A few moments later, Madame Khashab came back and placed the glass of chocolate milk in front of him and then poured herself another whiskey.

  “Do you know what, Mahmud? Your mother was both right and wrong to refuse the gift. She was right because you have to keep your dignity, but she was wrong because I love you like a son.”

  Mahmud felt uncomfortable, because she had brought the conversation back to the problem which he thought had been solved. The drink was making Madame Khashab maudlin. She sat back in her armchair and stretched out her legs, taking another sip of whiskey.

  “I want people
to like me,” she said softly.

  Mahmud said nothing.

  She looked at him and continued, “I need people, Mahmud. Do you understand? God did not give me children. I really wanted to have a child. And the only man I loved, the man for whom I left England and came to Egypt, he died and left me alone.”

  The conversation was progressing at such a speed that it confused Mahmud. He thought Madame Khashab was, to some extent, like those drinkers whom Suleyman would help out to their cars at the end of the night.

  “Do you know,” she asked him, “what is the worst thing in the world?”

  He was incapable of giving an answer. At that moment he was preoccupied with trying to drink the last drops of the chocolate. It was wonderful.

  “The worst thing in the world,” she continued, “is to be left alone. Look, I’ve got everything I need, a nice apartment in Zamalek and one in Alexandria near the sea. I’m well off, but I’m alone. Do you understand? Completely alone.”

  “But don’t you have friends, Madame?”

  “I do. But I always feel that I need them more than they need me. All my women friends have children and grandchildren. But I’m alone.”

  Mahmud was moved by her words, but he made no comment.

  “Do you know, Mahmud?” she whispered as if speaking to herself, “I am afraid sometimes that I’ll die all alone in the apartment, and no one will know.”

  “God forbid, Madame!”

  “If one day I don’t feel well, I have to tell the doorman in case something happens to me during the night, and he needs to call the doctor. Imagine, Mahmud, that you are so alone that the doorman is the only living soul who can help you in an emergency. It’s so depressing.”

  “May God grant you good health,” Mahmud said with feeling.

  “I’m not very well, Mahmud,” Madame Khashab sighed. “I have lots of problems. Drinking relaxes me. After I’ve had two glasses, I can sleep and not think about everything.”

  Mahmud finished his glass of chocolate and wiped his mouth with the handkerchief that his mother had carefully put in his right pocket. He took a sip of ice water to rinse the chocolate flavor from his mouth.

  “Thank you, Madame,” he said. “The chocolate was delicious.”

  “Shall I make you another one?”

  He hesitated a moment and then smiled and replied, “Oh, that would be lovely.”

  Madame Khashab went back to the kitchen, and a few minutes later Mahmud was savoring a second glass.

  “And are you happy,” she asked him, “in your job at the Automobile Club?”

  “Yes, thank God!”

  “Do you earn enough?”

  “I hand my salary over to my mother.”

  “All of it?”

  “She gives me a little pocket money from it.”

  “Congratulations. You’re a decent man. If I had had a son, I’d like him to have turned out like you.”

  As Mahmud was taking the last sip from his second glass of chocolate, Madame Khashab commented, “You really do like chocolate!”

  “I love it!”

  She got up and went over to the sideboard next to the dining table. She bent over, opened one of the drawers and then went over to Mahmud, holding out her hand.

  “Please take it, Mahmud,” she said gently. “It’s white chocolate from Switzerland.”

  “White chocolate?”

  “Taste it,” she laughed. “I’m sure you’ll like it.”

  Mahmud took the chocolate as carefully as a jewel and put it in his pocket. Then he stood up.

  “I’ll be off now. Thank you so much, Madame Khashab.”

  “I’d be happy if you would visit me again.”

  “Please God.”

  She walked him to the door, and he felt delighted that everything had turned out so well. She was no longer upset with him, and they were friends again. Moreover, he could hardly wait to rip open the white chocolate and taste it.

  “Mahmud,” she said at the door as he was about to go. “Can I ask you something?”

  “Anything!”

  “Please stop calling me Madame Khashab.”

  “Then what should I call you, Madame?”

  “And don’t say Madame either! My name is Rosa. Call me Rosa.”

  “Rosa…,” he repeated slowly.

  “Give my best wishes to your mother,” she said with a laugh. “Okay? Tell her that Rosa loves you just as she does.”

  Mahmud nodded, and Rosa drew near to give him a kiss. She had already kissed him on the cheek two or three times in the past, and just behind the smell of whiskey on her breath, he could recognize her delicate perfume, reminding him of the perfumed soap and the aroma of clean clothes that lingered on his mother. He let Rosa kiss him on the cheeks, but she suddenly put her arms around him. Then he felt her hot breath searing his face.

  25

  His Majesty looked bewildered. He started at Mitsy and asked her anxiously, “Are you really ill?”

  “Three doctors,” she told him softly, “have concurred in the diagnosis.”

  “Isn’t there a treatment for it?”

  “I’m taking some tablets and slowly getting better. But they have all confirmed that the microbes in my throat will be contagious for quite some time.”

  The king looked at her with incredulity, as if to say, “Why didn’t you tell me about this from the start?”

  After a short period of silence, the king stood up, followed by Mitsy. He held out his hand and, as if afraid of catching something, shook Mitsy’s hand by the tip of her fingers. Before leaving, he ordered Alku to have her driven home. The moment she reached her bedroom, she got undressed and ran into the bathroom to take a shower. She was a little tipsy from the wine, and as the hot water ran down over her naked body, she closed her eyes and relished the moment. She was pleased with herself. She had created a moment of truth. This was her greatest delight: to uncover lies and show scheming for what it was. She had made a fool of the king of Egypt and the Sudan, treating him as he deserved. She had accepted his invitation and led him on to within a stone’s throw of his bed. He had been salivating at the thought of ravishing her, almost snorting like a bull in rut, as she was being cornered. Then, out of the blue, she had this brilliant inspiration and started weaving a skillful lie. When she thought back to how confused the king had looked, she could not help laughing out loud as she stood under the shower.

  “Oh, your great Majesty, how I would have loved to have the honor of going to bed with Your Majesty, but I am so afraid that you will catch the bacteria ravaging my throat. What is the matter, Your Majesty? Why do you shudder? Didn’t you want me just a moment ago? Were you not just standing there like a ravenous animal? Why have you turned and fled as one possessed?”

  Mitsy came out of the bathroom wonderfully relaxed. She slept well, going to university the next morning and getting on with her life. She thought that any question of her involvement with the king was now at an end.

  That evening, her father sat silently at the dining table. When she got up and went to her bedroom, she was surprised to find him following her across the hallway. She stopped and turned to face him.

  “Mitsy,” he asked her. “Come to my study. We need to have a talk.”

  “Can’t it wait until tomorrow?”

  “No, now,” he said resolutely and stepped aside to let her pass. Mitsy walked ahead of him into his study. The light was on. She sank down into the leather armchair, and Wright sat at his desk, leaning forward on his elbows.

  “How did you get on with the king?”

  “I think you know.”

  “I want to hear it from you.”

  Mitsy sat up straight and answered, “The king wanted to go to bed with me, but I told him that I have a contagious disease.”

  “Did you have to lie?”

  “It was the only way.”

  “But you went to see the king of your own accord…”

  “I only went to make you happy.”

  “
Nonsense. Are you stupid or just mad?”

  “If you’re just going to insult me, I’ll go!”

  Wright was breathing heavily, as if trying to control his feelings.

  “As usual,” he said, “you never think of the consequence of your actions. You have put us all in a tricky situation. Botticelli called to ask about your health. The king is not stupid, and if he discovers that you lied, both you and I will pay a heavy price. Don’t you realize that the king has stalked women so tenaciously they’ve had to flee the country with their husbands…?”

  “Just because he is the king, it means he can do whatever he likes?”

  “Have you never heard of an oriental despot? He is not a constitutional monarch as we have in Britain. He is a potentate in the Turkish mold. He owns the country and everyone in it. He can crush anyone who opposes his will.”

  “But you are English. The king cannot harm you.”

  “He can make it impossible for me to stay in Egypt.”

  His visible anguish only provoked her more.

  “Well, how do you suggest we calm the situation down?” she asked him. “Should I sleep with him?”

  “Don’t be so vulgar.”

  “Well, if the only way to make the king happy is for me to sleep with him, wouldn’t that be the clever thing to do?”

  “Shut up!” Wright shouted angrily, taking a large drag on his pipe.

  “Mitsy,” he continued, “what happened, happened. We have to think calmly and proceed prudently. I suggest that you talk to Botticelli.”

  “I’m not going to see that pimp again,” she retorted.

  “I can organize a meeting in my office. I just want you to explain to him all about the infection and reassure him that you are on the mend.”

  “I don’t owe anybody any explanations.”