The Map of Love

by Ahdaf Soueif

  Sharif Basha’s eyes are moist as he presses his mother’s hand to his lips. When he releases her she picks up his coffee cup and turns it upside down on its saucer, tilting it slightly to allow the excess liquid to trickle away.

  ‘Back to the old superstitions?’ Sharif Basha says, but he smiles at his mother.

  ‘Mabrouka!’ Zeinab Hanim calls, and when her old Ethiopian maid appears she motions her to sit. ‘Come and read the cup for the Basha!’

  Mabrouka settles cross-legged on the floor. She tilts the cup and peeps into it, then closes it down again. ‘Not yet,’ she says and smiles up. ‘It’s been a long time, ya Sharif Basha.’

  ‘I shall let you do it this once only for my mother’s sake.’ He smiles back. Mabrouka had been a gift to al-Ghamrawi Bey and he had given her to his daughter. She had been with Zeinab Hanim since they were both girls. She had been married twice but had never had children and when the anti-slavery laws came in she had shrugged them off and stayed just the same. She wore all her savings in gold on her arms and her neck and when he was small she had always matched his mother piastre for piastre in his tips for the Eid. Now she righted the cup and held it thoughtfully in her hand.

  ‘Kheir ya Mabrouka,’ Zeinab Hanim says.

  ‘I see a path. A narrow path. It goes up and it goes down. A difficult path. I see a figure — it’s a man, with a slight, slender body, and he is wearing a hat. Not a tarbush or a ‘imma; a hat. But his intentions are sound. And he is waiting for you, ya Basha. You have got something he wants —’ Zeinab Hanim smiles at her son and he raises his eyebrows. ‘I see the path ending in a clear space. A clear space with a lot of light. Allah! A lot of light and joy. And I see a small — a child, it is a child coming towards you. Look!’ She holds out the cup to Sharif Basha who glances at it and starts straightening his jacket and reaching for his tarbush.

  ‘Do you see the child?’ Mabrouka insists.

  ‘The truth is I do not,’ he says.

  ‘There!’ She turns the cup towards Zeinab Hanim. ‘There! A child running towards the Basha.’

  ‘And then?’ Zeinab Hanim says.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Mabrouka says. ‘I can’t see after that. It is all white. You didn’t swirl the cup properly, ya Setti, before you upturned it.’

  1 May, 1901

  ‘Ya Abeih, I will always be your little sister, but now I am asking your permission to speak to you frankly.’ Layla stands in his study. She has thrown off her cloak and is dressed in a beautiful costume of dark pink and blue.

  ‘Good, you may speak. But do you have to remain standing in the middle of the room like this?’ Sharif Basha motions towards the sofa.

  ‘No.’ Layla shakes her head. ‘I prefer to stand. I want to talk to you about Lady Anna.’

  ‘What about Lady Anna?’ Lady Anna with whom he had talked in the moonlight as he had never talked before with a woman other than his mother and Layla. And with them he had to be careful, for they loved him too dearly to be allowed to think of him as other than strong and if not happy then at least contented — or resigned. He keeps his voice light:

  ‘Has she been kidnapped again?’

  Layla looks at him with reproach: ‘She is leaving.’

  ‘Leaving?’

  ‘She is going home. To England.’

  He turns away. Walks to the window. What had he expected? That she should stay for ever? Of course she would go back to her country. It was natural. He turns back to Layla.

  ‘So? And then?’

  ‘Abeih. She has been waiting for five weeks. Waiting for a word from you.’

  ‘Ah. And how do you know that?’

  ‘Because I am a woman.’ Layla moves forward and puts her hand on his arm. ‘I know. From the way she mentions you, as though in passing, I know that her mind is occupied with you. I would have said it is better that she goes home, except that I know that you too are thinking of her —’

  ‘And how do you know that?’

  ‘I know it for myself — and Mama told me that you had spoken with her.’

  ‘You women! A bean does not have time to get wet in your mouths.’ Sharif Basha moves away from his sister. ‘And did my mother tell you her objections? Did she tell you of the picture she painted of the lady’s life if she — if she lived here?’

  ‘Yes. She did. And of course it will not be easy for her, and if it had been anyone else I would say she would not be able to do it. But Anna is different. She has a big mind. And her life has not been happy. And … you want her. Abeih, put your trust in her and let her decide for herself. She is not a child.’

  ‘Layla.’ Sharif Basha looks into his sister’s eyes. ‘Do you think I can make her happy? Do you think I could make up for what she will lose? Not for the space of a month or two but for all that is left of life?’

  ‘Yes, ya Abeih.’ Layla’s eyes are shining with unshed tears. ‘Yes. I know that you will make her happy. And she too will bring you happiness and blessing.’

  THAT WAS WHAT I SAID to him that day. I was sure of what I said, sure that I was doing the right thing, otherwise I would never have been able to gather my courage to go and speak to him like that. I know that I looked at the matter from the perspective of my own happy marriage. I know also that I did not wish to lose this new friend who had made the ordinary things of my life new to me by sharing them. But my true and overriding motive was my love for him, and my conviction that were he to allow Lady Anna to leave the country, he would remain alone for the rest of his life, his solitude adding to his bitterness day by day. And I spoke truly when I said that I believed he would make her happy. How could he not, this brother in whose love and kindness I had spent all the years of my life?

  ‘I had thought — in the garden of St Catherine’s — that you liked me.’

  ‘It took every atom of strength that I had not to pull you into my arms.’

  ‘Was that why you kept your hands behind your back all the time?’

  ‘I had to. If I had let them they would have just reached out for you — like this.’

  In the circle of his arms, Anna places three kisses on the line of his jaw.

  ‘Look what I have found,’ he says, ‘a button. And here’s another. And here’s treasure —’ His fingers brushing her skin, he opens the locket at her throat.

  ‘My mama.’

  ‘It could be you. If you crimp your hair and let it loose — so pretty …’

  Anna raises her arms. She reaches behind her neck and unfastens the locket. She holds out her hand: ‘Take it.’

  ‘What? Why?’

  ‘Because you admired it. It says in all the guidebooks if someone admires something you have to give it to them.’

  ‘No, it does not. It says if you admire something they will give it to you —’

  ‘Then it works the other way round too.’

  ‘No.’ He looks at her, catching the laughter in the violet eyes. ‘Anna, you are teasing.’

  ‘Please take it. I should like you to have it. Then I can be with you all the time: at work, and when you are having your manly gatherings —’

  ‘I cannot wear it, dearest. And it shall get lost if I just carry it.’

  ‘Why can you not wear it?’

  ‘Because it is gold, and look at this tiny chain —’

  ‘Then I shall change it so you can wear it —’

  ‘Anna, Anna, I do not need it. I have you. Look: this is what I want. And this

  But Anna catches hold of his hand, will not let go. ‘So why did you not let yourself reach out for me? You must have known I wanted you to.’

  ‘Not that you wanted me to. I just thought you would probably let me.’

  ‘So why didn’t you?’

  ‘Because I thought it would not be fair. There’s an English answer for you.’

  ‘Why would it not be fair?’ Still holding on to the hand.

  ‘The desert … the stars …’

  ‘You think they turned my head?’

  ‘Well
, listen. This is what I thought — do you want a cigarette? No?’ He puts her out of his arms. He reaches for his cigarettes, gets one out and lights it. ‘If we had met on a boat, say, crossing the Mediterranean —’

  ‘Why particularly on a boat?’

  ‘I am trying to think of a situation where we would have naturally spent time in each other’s company. It is not easy.’

  ‘Very well. On a boat then.’

  ‘Or somewhere in Europe, somewhere that was ordinary to you, familiar, Paris, say, would you have stood in front of me like that, willing for me to touch you?’

  ‘Yes. If I had got to know you the way I did here.’

  ‘You could not have.’

  ‘I know. So you see, it had to be here, mon amour. And the desert and the stars are all part of it.’

  ‘Merci le desert, merci les étoiles. Anna, stand up. There. I want to look at you. Now, undo those buttons. Slowly.’

  Later, resting her back against his chest, feeling his breath in her hair, Anna asks:

  ‘Do you think it was meant?’

  ‘Our meeting?’ he asks softly, holding her close, marvelling that life could be so altered by nothing more than the presence of this one woman here, in his arms.

  ‘Yes. Do you think Fate has been trying to throw us together? At the Costanzi, at Abdin Palace —’

  ‘And then Fate grew desperate and had you kidnapped —’

  ‘And delivered me to your house, so you had to pay attention.’

  ‘Mabrouka saw you in my coffee cup.’ Anna can hear the smile in his voice.

  ‘That settles it,’ she says as she snuggles into him contentedly. ‘Mabrouka knows all about Fate.’

  A Beginning of an End

  But from these create he can

  Forms more real than living man.

  P. B. Shelley

  Is it Fate? Or the pull of the past? Is the empty, unchanging house easier on the mind than the voices, the points of view, the hope and the despair? Or is it merely a conscientious application to a project?

  A bend in the dark stairway. A thin strip of light betraying a door not fully closed.

  Two days after her evening at the Atelier, Isabel paid her extra five-pound charge for the camera and slipped through the old doorway and into the cool, echoing courtyard. She shook off her guide with a small gift of money and wandered about the empty house, trying to imagine it as it must have been a hundred years ago with evidence of daily life strewn about the rooms: a ruffled newspaper by the window, a book lying open, a glass of water half drunk, a set of keys on a table, on the floor a pair of slippers left empty when their owner had settled on the divan, tucking her feet comfortably underneath her. Isabel wandered round the house. With her mind she put curtains up on the bare windows and watched them move gently with the breeze. She crumbled incense into the hanging burners and it filled the air with its sweet smell. She turned on the fountains and heard the soft patter of water on the tiles. And above it came the sounds of children playing and women’s voices calling out to them when their play got too rough. From the kitchen below the smell of frying spices and freshly baked bread came wafting into the room. She sat behind the mashrabiyya and watched Sharif Pasha once again stride the great entrance hall, his hands locked behind his back, Anna’s dejected young abductors waiting silently for him to speak. Time and time again she framed a scene in her viewer, adjusted her focus on the empty halls and clicked. She would surprise him with these photographs. She would surprise him with how much she knew.

  And now she makes her way down the dark back staircase with its steep steps and as she arrives at the bottom she sees the streak of light. Isabel pushes the door. It opens and she steps out into blinding sunlight. Shading her eyes, screwing them against the glare, she sees that she is in yet another courtyard. Two plain walls enclose it on the right and the left. Straight ahead, it is bounded by a low building crowned with a dusty green dome. A door opens and a woman comes forward. There is something vaguely familiar about the welcoming face, about the loose blue and white garments, about the woman’s posture as she stretches out her arms.

  ‘Marhab,’ she calls out in a sweet, low-pitched voice. ‘Welcome! We have been waiting for you.’

  She stands to one side to let Isabel through the door. A cool room bathed in shadows. To the right, and separated from the room by a wrought-iron screen, stands a high tomb surrounded by lit candles; some have been burning for so long that they are reduced to flickers in pools of wax, others are tall and straight with ripples of varying length hardening down their sides. The flames illuminate the rich greens and reds and golds which pattern the cloth covering the tomb and falling on three sides to the marble floor. Near the tomb, a door stands ajar, seeming to lead out to the street. To the left, a large space opens out until it is curtained off by an arrangement of straw mats, while more straw mats cover portions of the stone-flagged floor. There are two cushioned settles and a wooden coffee table. The only light comes from the small windows set high up in the stone walls and the distant flames of the candles. Under one of the windows stands a tall wooden loom, a length of shiny fabric rolled up beneath it. Near the loom Isabel sees an old man sitting on a straight-backed chair. He wears the gibba, the quftan and the white turban of a sheikh. His head is bent and he seems lost in thought. The noises from the street are faint and far away. Isabel turns, but the woman in blue is no longer by the door.

  Isabel takes two steps forward. The sheikh does not stir.

  ‘As-salamu alaykum,’ she says in a hesitant voice.

  ‘Wa alaykum as-salam,’ comes the response, ‘and the mercy of God and His blessings.’ The sheikh lifts his head and turns towards her. The weakened beams of light coming through the door behind her fall upon an open, youthful face.

  ‘Come closer,’ the sheikh says.

  Isabel moves forward to what she considers a seemly distance and stops. The sheikh looks up and into her face. He speaks, and it seems to Isabel that she hears the wistful eagerness in his voice before she hears the words:

  ‘Have you come to marry me?’ he asks.

  ‘I …’ Isabel falters.

  ‘Salamu aleikum,’ a voice rings out in the courtyard and a woman hurries in through the door. She wears the usual loose black smock of the working-class woman, over the usual plump figure, topped by a cheery, round face wrapped loosely in a black tarha.

  ‘Salamu aleikum ya Sheikh Isa,’ she cries again as she hurries up to Isabel. ‘Marhab ya Sett, welcome!’ Isabel scents a whiff of orange blossom as she is folded against the woman’s warm, substantial breast. ‘Welcome and a hundred times welcome,’ she cries again. ‘Sit down, my darling, sit down, lady of them all, why are you standing like this? Shouldn’t you ask your guest to sit down, ya Sheikh Isa? Never mind, my darling, don’t hold it against him. We don’t get many visitors. Apart from those who come to visit Sidi Haroun —’ waving at the tomb — ‘they come in nations. Of course they don’t come in here, but they bring light for us too as you see. But you have brought us light and honour. Welcome, welcome! Shall I make you some tea, or what would you like? Will you drink tea, ya Sheikh Isa?’

  ‘No,’ Sheikh Isa says, ‘I want something cold. I want Seven-Up.’

  ‘Very well, my love. I’ll get you a bottle of Seven-Up. And the lady? We’ve not been honoured with your name?’

  ‘Isabel,’ says Isabel.

  ‘May the name live long. Your servant Ummu Aya. Well, Sett Isabel — that’s right, sit down, sister, sit down and be comfortable. You see this cloth —’ smoothing out the cover on the settle cushion — ‘it’s full of barakah. Sheikh Isa himself made it. Will you drink hot or cold, my darling?’

  ‘Whatever you’ve got,’ Isabel murmurs as she sits down, placing the holdall with her camera, open, on the bench beside her.

  ‘Everything we’ve got,’ cries Umm Aya, unwinding her tarha from round her head to reveal the white kerchief beneath. She folds the tarha into an untidy bundle and tucks it under her arm
. ‘Hot and cold, in a second they’ll be with you. I’ll tell you what: I’ll bring you something cold first, and the tea in a little while. Welcome, welcome. Talk to your guest, Sheikh Isa. Don’t let her sit and be bored.’

  She hurries out and the room is once more silent. The sheikh stares at Isabel.

  ‘Are you a foreigner?’ he says.

  ‘Yes,’ she answers.

  ‘Your hair is yellow,’ he says.

  ‘My father’s hair was this colour.’

  ‘And your mother?’

  ‘My mother’s hair is — was — dark, almost black.’

  ‘Do you love your mother?’ he asks.

  ‘Yes,’ says Isabel. ‘Yes, I love my mother.’

  ‘Paradise,’ the sheikh says, ‘is at the feet of mothers. Remember that.’

  Isabel fingers the fabric she is sitting on. In this light she cannot quite make out the colours, but she sees strips of varying dark and, at irregular intervals, a gleaming strip of gold.

  ‘So, you made this?’ she asks.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What else did you make?’

  ‘Oh. Many things,’ he says, and his voice is sad. ‘I can only work when my hands are well,’ he says.

  ‘What is the matter with your hands?’ Isabel asks.

  ‘Sometimes they hurt,’ he says, ‘sometimes they are wounded.’

  He spreads his hands out and looks at them. In the dim light Isabel can just make out a faint mark in the centre of each hand before they are covered by the long, white hands of the woman in the blue robe. She kneels at his feet and in the face looking up at the sheikh Isabel sees a look of melting tenderness.

  ‘Are they hurting?’ the woman asks.

  ‘No,’ he answers. ‘No.’

  The woman bends her head and places one kiss in the palm of each hand. Then she folds them together and places them in his lap.

  Umm Aya hurries in carrying two green bottles on a small brass tray. ‘Salamu aleikum, Our Lady,’ she says. She puts the tray down on the table and, as the woman rises to her feet, Umm Aya catches her hand and kisses it.