King Baybars destroyed Askalan, and to this day, the city by the sea remains in ruins. He crushed the walls and led his army to Jaffa, where he received a missive from Othman. “The lettering is delicate,” said the king, “and the parchment is sweetly perfumed. He says the three kings are inside the city and advises us to approach the gate at nightfall and knock.”
“What kind of silly names are those?” asked Lou’ai. “Franjeel, Brigitte, and Diafil?”
When the sun had set in the Mediterranean, the king of Islam stood outside Jaffa’s gate with his hushed army, and knocked, and the gate opened to let him in. In the morning, Diafil’s soldiers woke to find Jaffa overwhelmed, swords upon their necks, and the city restored to its rightful ruler, King Baybars, who liberated the lands from foreigners.
Two days after my father noticed my mother and decided she was the woman he wanted to marry, she fell in love. Yes, it was love at first sight. His name was Khoury as well, Nicholas Khoury, though he wasn’t from the same family, not even Maronite, but Greek Orthodox. My mother was pleased that she wouldn’t have to change her name. They saw each other at a political youth meeting at the university, she a freshman, he a medical student. He dominated the gathering. He wanted to change the world. He wanted the new republic to be a beacon of liberty and justice to the rest of the Arabs. He wanted to spread literacy throughout Lebanon and the Middle East. He considered improving the plight of women the most important undertaking for a Lebanese man, and in keeping with that credo, he would specialize as a gynecologist.
My mother was impressed with his dedication, his earnest moral stance, and his height. In her, he saw an audience, a fan, and a pretty one at that. He was pleased to be the first man, other than her father, whom she looked up to. He believed she would be his perfect partner; she would help him soar. They began dating in earnest three weeks after they met. Within four months, he had formally proposed and she’d accepted. He wrote to her father for his blessing and introduced her to his family, and in the summer they flew to Europe together and visited her family in Brussels. They agreed on a long engagement, three years at least, until both graduated.
He couldn’t suffer being away from her, and involved her in all his social and civic activities. She attended political lectures, activist meetings, and long-winded café discussions. She volunteered once for a Palestinian relief organization but gave it up after about ten minutes and made him promise to stop working with organizations that dealt with suffering hands-on.
My poor father was crushed. Even though he had never spoken to my mother and she had yet to notice him, he firmly believed that she was to be his wife. He had already claimed her. But here was this other man who never left her side, who breathed her air, invaded her intimate space, and clamored for her attention. Although my father wouldn’t see her alone for a few years, he didn’t surrender. He formulated bigger plans.
Laylat al-Qadr, the Night of Fate, is better than a thousand months. It is said that the Holy Koran was sent down on the Night of Fate and was revealed to the Prophet Muhammad over a period of twenty-three years. During the Night of Fate, God listens to sincere supplicants, grants prayers, and forgives sins. The Night falls during Ramadan, the holiest of months, but God has not revealed its exact date, because He wants believers to worship Him during the entire month. Some say it falls on the night when the moon’s horns refill the circle, yet it is also said that the Prophet hinted that believers should seek it on the odd nights of the last ten days of Ramadan.
On an evening in 1953, Jalal Arisseddine had a dinner party—casual, forty guests or so. A few politicians were invited, some writers, friends. Nicholas Khoury had been begging a common acquaintance to introduce him to my well-known great-uncle and had finagled an invitation. And of course my great-uncle invited his brother Maan and his two nephews. Few of the guests were Muslim, and those that were wouldn’t have been considered observant. It was an evening in Ramadan, and none of the guests had been fasting or celebrating or praying. Still, considering the events that sprouted, we can safely assume it was an odd night.
It was undoubtedly the Night of Fate, because God heard my father’s pleas.
That evening, my mother met the man who would sweep her off her feet, dazzle her, bewitch and charm her. She met the man who would love her and adore her, who would become her steadfast partner. A man whose wit and light would dim her fiancé’s star, stub and extinguish it by the time dessert was served. Love at first barb. That night, my mother met Uncle Jihad.
A Swiss man with a ponytail who claimed to be Jean-Paul Sartre’s good friend offended almost everyone at the dinner party. The ponytail alone was shocking enough, but because of Sartre-said-this, Sartre-would-have-done-that, the party broke up into smaller groups to avoid him. Uncle Jihad inched slowly from group to group until he sat next to the bewitching girl who had been pretending not to notice his advance. Looking at the Swiss, whose audience had been systematically reduced to her earnest fiancé, she leaned toward my uncle and whispered, “I wonder why that braggart has to wear his hair like that.”
“So they can pull his head out of Sartre’s ass,” Uncle Jihad said.
My mother had found her soulmate.
He had no idea she was my father’s infatuation, and, surprisingly, they hadn’t met before, although they attended the same university, were in the same department, and were the same age. They had similar interests but took classes at different times. Uncle Jihad didn’t mix in her social circle. He wouldn’t have had the time in any case, since he still managed both his and Ali’s pigeon coops. My mother and uncle talked and talked, and grew so engrossed that my father’s heart filled with hope and her fiancé’s filled with panic. Nick sidled to my mother, put his arm around her. My mother closed her eyes for a moment so as not to show her frustration. When she opened them, she noticed Uncle Jihad’s face momentarily and impolitically express shock.
“This is my fiancé,” my mother said.
“I figured,” Uncle Jihad replied.
My mother, knowing that his smile belied his disapproval, shuddered. She tried to banish the color of embarrassment from her cheeks.
That was one story my mother loved to tell, but her version of the events of the evening was slightly different from Uncle Jihad’s. According to Uncle Jihad, my mother fell in love with him, but he knew instantly that she would be a wonderful wife for his brother. My mother would smile and shake her head when the story was told in her presence. She said that she adored him that evening but she wasn’t in love. She didn’t believe in love at first sight.
The last time the subject came up, I was with my mother during a healthy respite about six months before she died. She lay propped against her pillows, and I was sitting on her bed. She had been quite ill for a week, but suddenly she looked rejuvenated. Gauntness and pallor had temporarily departed, and the wrinkles of strain had been filled with new flesh. Hope, the great deceiver, seduced her that morning. “I remember that evening as if it were yesterday,” she said. “The candles, the guests, the foreigner with a horrible ponytail. Can you imagine how appalling that was in those days? How insufferable that man was, and how embarrassing that the only one who fell for his asinine chatter was poor Nick. That evening, I was horrified that I didn’t know who this man I was supposed to marry was. The scrim that had been hanging before my eyes was raised. The look on Jihad’s face when he realized that I was with Nick rattled me. He probably would’ve been less surprised had I told him I was engaged to the water closet. He disapproved of my choice, and I realized I did as well. What was even more terrifying was that I didn’t have the courage to admit my mistake. I knew that night that I’d never go through with the marriage, but I couldn’t bring myself to admit it to anyone, not even poor Nick. But my epiphany had nothing to do with being in love. Do you think for a moment that Jihad fell in love with me or I fell in love with him? Please. No matter what Farid and Jihad might have ardently wished to believe, no one was ever fooled. I recognized—oh, wha
t shall we call it?—his special ability to be best friends with women, the instant I saw his impish grin from across the room. My God, how could I not, given the way he crossed his legs or what he did with his hands? No one would talk about it, but that didn’t mean anyone was fooled.”
• • •
Nick wouldn’t leave my mother’s side for the rest of the evening, and the Swiss was forced to follow his remaining audience across the room. The two men’s discussion bored my mother and uncle until the Swiss asked a question: “Will there ever be an Arab Sartre?” My mother rolled her eyes, and Uncle Jihad tried to control his chuckling. Nick commenced a monologue explaining the impossibility of such a phenomenon: the subordination of content to the aesthetics of language in Arabic literature, the dominance of panegyrics and eulogies as an art form, etc. “All you have to look at,” said Nick, “is the deification of a loser like al-Mutanabbi. Writers try to emulate him, penning pretty little verses that mean nothing and affect nothing. He sold his services to the highest bidder, and his poems ended up being paeans to corrupt rulers. Things haven’t changed much. Until the day arrives when we’re no longer dazzled by glitter, we’re stuck with the banal beauty of al-Mutanabbi.”
My mother’s groan startled her fiancé. Confounded, he stared at her, mouth agape.
“Beauty is never banal,” my mother said.
“Al-Mutanabbi is one of my heroes,” Uncle Jihad said. “Such a romantic fool.”
“Romantic?” my mother said. “Are you sure you’re not thinking of Antar? I’ve never heard of a love story associated with al-Mutanabbi.”
“No, no. It isn’t a love story. It’s a death story. A glorious death story.”
“Do tell,” my mother exhorted.
“You want me to tell you the story? Here? Now? I’m not sure I can.” My mother arched her eyebrows. “You must ask again.” My uncle cracked a grin. “Please, make me feel important.”
My mother’s hand went to her chest. She batted her eyelashes. “Please, sahib. Tell me a story and enliven my evening.” She smiled. “How was that?”
“Just the right touch,” Uncle Jihad said. “Let’s see. In the glorious days when poets were heroes and men were valiant, when the sun shone brighter and lies were never spoken, there lived, and died, the greatest of all poets. I’ll leave the stories of his tragic life for another sitting, for tonight I’ll relay the story of his death. Al-Mutanabbi died on his way to Baghdad, but he didn’t die alone. He wasn’t what one would call a well-adjusted individual. He knew he was a genius and was obsessed with his immortality. Few put anything down on paper in those days. All poems were memorized, all stories, even the Koran. Well, al-Mutanabbi would have none of that. He wasn’t going to rely on others’ memories when it came to his work. He wrote everything down, every single word, leaving nothing to chance. We’re talking papyrus, large rolls of papyrus. He rode to Baghdad with his son, two slaves, and eight camels loaded with his life’s work. Of course, you cross the desert with laden camels and you’ll attract the attention of brigands. Thieves attacked the convoy thinking they were about to strike the mother lode and would soon be in possession of treasures. The poet died defending his work, and with his last breath begged his killers not to destroy it. The only one who escaped was the poet’s son. He saw his father expire and rode away, but he didn’t get far. Guilt over abandoning his father’s poetry overpowered him, and he returned to the scene to fight. But the robbers were enraged at finding nothing of value, and they tortured the son and killed him.”
“Ah,” my mother sighed. “To die for banal beauty. What happened to the manuscripts?”
“Funny you should ask. Al-Mutanabbi was of course a penniless poet.”
“Is there any other kind?” My mother clapped her hands once and laughed.
“They unloaded the camels and discarded the valueless poetry, but, as it happened, one of the nasty brigands had an unexplored sensitive nature.”
“And he just happened to be able to read?”
“Of course. He read and was entranced and bewitched. He repacked the poems and kept them for years, had them copied and distributed. One would hope he was able to repack all the poems without losing any to the harsh desert winds.”
“But what if he wasn’t able to,” my mother said, “and some of the papyrus flew away?”
“Imagine. Poetry still hovering over the skies of Baghdad.”
“Or buried under the desert sands,” my mother said. “Someone drills a well in Iraq, and out gushes poetry instead of oil.”
“But will the discoverers understand Arabic or appreciate poetry, for that matter?”
“Al-Mutanabbi’s basic problem to begin with.”
Nick shook his head. “I know that sounds romantic, but what was the point of al-Mutanabbi’s death? Has his poetry saved a single life?”
My mother sank into a chair, closed her eyes, and sighed softly.
“Let me introduce you to my brother,” Uncle Jihad said.
So what happened to Nick, and how did my mother end up not marrying him if she was unable to say no? My sister, who had met Nicholas Khoury, believed that he and my mother didn’t marry because a voice inside her must have been issuing warnings, if not outright curses, the whole time. Lina couldn’t imagine my mother ever caring for anything political. That my mother would have committed herself to a man who believed that opposing Zionism was not just a worthy goal but a way of life, a prerequisite for being human, was unthinkable to Lina. My mother, who had transformed being apolitical into an art form, could never have completely submerged who she was for the sake of a man. “I know that a discussion about art and poetry was the puff that brought down the house of cards,” Lina once told me, “but how could the house have stood for so long, given his views? This was a man who believed in didactic art, for heaven’s sake. Novels should uplift the people and guide them to a better understanding of how persecuted they were. He saw Trotsky, Sartre, Lenin, Orwell, and Huxley as models to emulate and wasn’t bright enough to perceive a contradiction. Mother was getting a degree in liberal arts while she was with him. This was a woman who wore mourning black for forty days when Calvino died. Everyone kept asking her which member of the family had passed away. She went to her deathbed sincerely believing Anna Karenina was mankind’s greatest achievement. That idiot told her that Tolstoy was the epitome of the spoiled bourgeoisie. He told her not to listen to violin concertos because the best violinists were Jews and therefore probably supporters of the terrible policies of Israel. Told that to my mother? She mentioned it to me in passing, and I practically fainted. She may have agreed to marry him, but even if he hadn’t spun right into disaster head-on, she wouldn’t have. She knew he was a tragedy.”
The disaster occurred on the day of Nick’s commencement. My mother attended his ceremony, sat in the audience with his family. Nick’s mother couldn’t contain her pride. His father had desperately wanted to see his son’s graduation but was unable to leave his sickbed. At the end of the ceremony, my mother faked a headache and left the happy party to be on her own. She didn’t want to discuss the future.
Nick, wearing his cap and gown, returned home to check on his father, who felt such pride that he volunteered to be Nick’s first patient. Nick’s father had been complaining that day of dizziness, lethargy, and digestive problems. Nick treated him by setting up a glucose intravenous tube. His father died before he had a chance to sneeze, a tragedy and a scandal. Nick locked himself in his room for two weeks after the funeral. His entire family grieved.
The human soul is resilient; Nick did recover emotionally and psychologically.
Human societies are less resilient; the dishonor would not be easily forgotten.
Two months after he had killed his first patient, Nick understood that he wouldn’t be able to work in Beirut. No one would consent to be his second patient. He would have to go far away, to a place where no one had heard of his misdeed. Nick asked my mother to go with him to Kirkuk. She refused, of course
. And my father began his wooing in earnest.
My father set out to make himself someone else, someone better, someone important. He persuaded his brother to give up his pigeons so they could set up a business. To do that, they needed money. Following their mother’s footsteps of long ago, my father and Uncle Jihad walked the same hill to the mansion of the bey, who was always claiming to be our family’s benefactor. The bey greeted my father and uncle warmly and called for coffee to be served, but he also called his servant, my grandfather. What insidious thought could have been going through the bey’s head no one knew, and this was one story that neither my grandfather nor my uncle nor my father wished to provide theories for or elaborate on.
Before his own father, my father had to ask the bey for financial help. The bey said, “Isn’t that too grand a project for you? You don’t know the first thing about automobiles. How can you sell cars when you don’t even have one of your own?”
Dispirited, my father returned to a rainy Beirut, and for the first time it was Uncle Jihad who had to remind him of the dream. “You’ll see,” Uncle Jihad said. “In every story, when things are at their most dire, an angel comes and helps the hero.”
“But this is no story,” replied my father.
“Of course it isn’t. This is life. In real life you get more than one angel. You get two or three. Hell, you get an army of angels.”
My grandfather quit that day. He was so embarrassed for his sons he told the bey he could no longer work for him. The bey asked how he would survive without his entertainment, and my grandfather said, “All you have to do is ask, my lord, and I will come running to entertain you. Yet I’ve worked for you for so long that my stories have become aged and corroded. I cannot in good faith take your money and pretend I’m offering anything in return.”
The Hakawati Page 49