The Thief and the Dogs

by Naguib Mahfouz

  "Yes. I thought to myself: let him sleep.

  God presents His gifts as His will alone decides."

  Said was suddenly troubled. He wondered if anybody had seen him asleep there all day.

  "I was aware of many people coming in," he lied, "while I was asleep."

  "You were aware of nothing. But one man brought me my lunch, another came to sweep the place, water the cactus, tend the palm tree, and get the courtyard ready for God's loving worshippers."

  "What time are they coming?" he said, a little worried.

  "At sunset. When did you arrive?"

  "At dawn."

  The Sheikh sat silent for a while, stroking his beard, then said, "You are very wretched, my son!"

  "Why?" said Said, anxious to know the answer.

  "You've had a long sleep, but you know no rest. Just like a child laid under the fire of the blazing sun. Your burning heart yearns for shade, yet continues forward under the fire of the sun. Haven't you learnt to walk yet?"

  Said rubbed his blood-shot, almond-shaped eyes. "It's a disturbing thought, to be seen asleep by others."

  "The world is unaware of him who is unaware of it," the Sheikh replied, showing no concern.

  Said's hand passed lightly over the pocket where he kept the revolver. He wondered what the Sheikh would do if he were to point his gun at him.

  Would his maddening composure be shaken?

  "Are you hungry?" the Sheikh asked.

  "No."

  "If it is true that man can be poor in God, so is it true man can be rich in Him," the Sheikh went on, his eyes almost smiling.

  If, that is, the first proposition is indeed true! thought Said. "Well then, Master," he said lightly, "what would you have done if you'd been afflicted with a wife like mine and if your daughter had rejected you as mine has me?"

  A look of pity appeared in the old man's clear eyes: "God's slave is owned by God alone!"

  Cut off your tongue before it betrays you and confesses your crime! You wish to tell him everything. He probably doesn't need to be told. He may even have seen you fire the gun.

  And he may be able to see much more than that.

  A voice outside the window hawked The Sphinx. Said got up at once, walked to the window, called the newspaper boy, handed him a small coin and returned with the paper to where he'd been sitting, forgetting all about the Sheikh, his eyes riveted to a huge black headline: "Dastardly Murder in the Citadel Quarter!" He devoured the lines beneath in a flash, not understanding anything. Was this another murder?

  His own picture was there and so were pictures of Nabawiyya and Ilish Sidra, but who was that bloodstained man? His own life story was staring at him, too, sensational doings blown in every direction like dust in a whirlwind — the story of a man who came out of prison to find his wife married to one of his underlings. But who was the bloodstained man? How had his bullet entered this stranger's chest? This victim was someone else, and Said was seeing him for the first time in his life.

  You'd better start reading again.

  The same day he'd visited them with the detective and Ilish's friends, Ilish Sidra and Nabawiyya had moved out of their flat and another family had moved in, so the voice he'd heard had not been Ilish Sidra's nor had the screams been Nabawiyya's. The body was that of one Shaban Husayn, the new tenant who'd worked in a haberdashery in Sharia Muhammad Ali. Said Mahran had come to murder his wife and old friend, but had killed the new tenant instead. A neighbor testified that he'd seen Said Mahran leaving the house after the murder and that he'd shouted for the police, but that his voice had been lost in the din that had filled the entire street.

  A failure. It was insane. And pointless.

  The rope would be after him now, while Ilish sat safe and secure. The truth was as clear as the bottom of an open tomb.

  He tore his eyes away from the paper and found the Sheikh staring through the window at the sky, smiling. The smile for some reason or other, frightened Said: he wished he could stand at the window and look at exactly the same bit of sky the Sheikh was looking at so he could see what it was that made him smile. But the wish was unfulfilled.

  Let the Sheikh smile and keep his secret, he thought. Before long the disciples would be here and some of them who'd seen the picture in the paper might recognize him; thousands and thousands would be gaping at his picture now, in a mixture of terror and titillation. Said's life was finished, spent to no purpose; he was a hunted man and would be to the end of his days; he was alone, and would have to beware even of his own reflection in a mirror — alive but without real life. Like a mummy. He'd have to flee like a rat from one hole to another, threatened by poison, cats and the clubs of disgusted human beings, suffering all this while his enemies kicked up their heels.

  The Sheikh turned to him, saying gently, "You are tired. Go and wash your face."

  "Yes," Said said irritably, folding up the paper. "I'll go — and relieve you of the sight of my face."

  With even greater gentleness, the Sheikh said, "This is your home."

  "True, but why shouldn't I have another place to shelter?"

  The Sheikh bowed his head, replying, "If you had another you would never have come to me."

  You must go up the hill and stay there until dark. Avoid the light. Shelter in the dark.

  Hell, it's all a waste of time. You've killed Shaban Husayn; I wonder who you are, Shaban. We never knew each other. Did you have children? Did you ever imagine that one day you would be killed for no reason — that you'd be killed because Nabawiyya Sulayman married Ilish Sidra? That you'd be killed in error, but that Ilish, Nabawiyya, and Rauf would not be killed in justice? I, the murderer, understand nothing. Not even Sheikh al-Junaydi himself can understand anything. I've tried to solve part of the riddle, but have only succeeded in unearthing an even greater one. He sighed aloud.

  "How tired you are," said the Sheikh.

  "And it is your world that makes me tired!"

  "That is what we sing of, sometimes," the Sheikh said placidly.

  Said rose, then said, as he was about to go, "Farewell, my Master."

  "Utterly meaningless words, whatever you intend by them," the Sheikh remonstrated. "Say rather: until we meet again."

  NINE

  God, it's dark! I'd be better off as a bat. Why is that smell of hot fat seeping out from under some door at this hour of night? When will Nur be back? Will she come alone? And can I stay in her flat long enough to be forgotten? You might perhaps be thinking you've got rid of me forever now, Rauf! But with this revolver, if I have any luck, I can do wonderful things. With this revolver I can awake those who are asleep. They're the root of the trouble: They're the ones who've made creatures like Nabawiyya, Ilish and Rauf Ilwan possible.

  Something sounded like footsteps climbing the stairs. When he was sure he heard someone coming, he crouched and looked down through the banisters. A faint light was moving slowly along the wall. The light of a match, he thought. The footsteps came higher, heavy and slow. To let her know he was there and to avoid surprising her, he cleared his throat with a loud rasp.

  "Who is it?" she said apprehensively.

  Said leaned his head out between the banisters as far as he could and replied in a whisper, "Said Mahran."

  She ran the rest of the way up and stopped in front of him out of breath. The match was almost dead.

  "It's you!" she said, breathless and happy, seizing his arm. "I'm sorry. Have you been waiting long?"

  Opening the door to the flat, she led him in by the arm, switched on the light in a bare rectangular hall, then drew him into a reception room, square and somewhat larger, where she rushed to the window and flung it open wide to release the stifling air.

  "It was midnight when I got here," he said, flinging himself down on one of two sofas, that stood face to face. "I've waited for ages."

  She sat down opposite, moving a pile of scraps of cloth and dress cuttings. "You know what?" she said, "I'd given up hope. I didn't think you'd really come.
"

  Their tired eyes met. "Even after my definite promise?" he said, hiding his frozen feelings with a smile. She smiled back faintly, without answering. Then she said, "Yesterday they kept questioning me at the police station over and over. They nearly killed me.

  Where's the car?"

  "I thought I'd better dump it somewhere, even though I need it." He took off his jacket and tossed it down on the sofa next to him. His brown shirt was caked with sweat and dust: "They'll find it and give it back to its owner, as you'd expect of a government that favors some thieves more than others."

  "What did you do with it yesterday?"

  "Nothing whatever, in fact. Anyway, you'll know everything at the proper time." He gazed at the open window, took a deep breath, and said, "It must face north. Really fresh air."

  "It's open country from here to Bab al Noor. All around here is the cemetery."

  "That's why the air isn't polluted," he said with a grin. She's looking at you as if she could eat you up, but you only feel bored, annoyed. Why can't you stop brooding over your wounded pride and enjoy her?

  "I'm terribly sorry you had to wait so long on the landing."

  "Well, I'm going to be your guest for quite some time," he said, giving her a strange, scrutinizing look.

  She lifted her head, raised her chin and said happily, "Stay here all your life, if you like."

  "Until I move over to the neighbors!" he said with another grin, pointing through the window. She seemed preoccupied. She didn't seem to hear his joke. "Won't your people ask about you?" she said.

  "I have no people," he replied, looking down at his gym shoes.

  "I mean your wife."

  She means pain and fury and wasted bullets!

  What she wants is to hear a humiliating confession; she'll only find that a locked heart becomes increasingly difficult to unlock. But what is the point of lying when newsprint pages are screaming with sensation?

  "I said I have no people." Now you're wondering what my words mean. Your face is beaming with happiness. But I hate this joy. And I can see now that your face has lost whatever bloom it had, particularly under the eyes.

  "Divorced?" she asked.

  "Yes. When I was in jail. But let's close the subject," he said, waving his hand impatiently.

  "The bitch!" she said angrily. "A man like you deserves to be waited for, even if he's been sent up for life!"

  How sly she is! But a man like me doesn't like to be pitied. Beware of sympathy! "The truth is that I neglected her far too much." What a waste for bullets to strike the innocent!

  "Anyway, she isn't the kind of woman who deserves you."

  True. Neither is any other woman. But Nabawiyya's still full of vitality, while you're hovering on the brink: one puff of wind would be enough to blow you out. You only arouse pity in me.

  "No one must know I am here."

  Laughing, as if sure she possessed him for ever, she said, "Don't worry; I'll keep you hidden all right." Then, hopefully, she added, "But you've not done anything really serious, have you?"

  He dismissed the question by shrugging nonchalantly.

  She stood up and said, "I'll get some food for you. I do have food and drink. Do you remember how cold you used to be to me?"

  "I had no time for love then."

  She eyed him reproachfully. "Is anything more important than love? I often wondered if your heart wasn't made of stone. When you went to jail, no one grieved as much as I did."

  "That's why I came to you instead of anybody else."

  "But you only ran into me by chance," she said with a pout. "You might even have forgotten all about me!"

  "Do you think I can't find anywhere else?" he said, framing his face into a scowl.

  As if to head off an outburst, she came up close to him and took his cheeks between the palms of her hands. "The guards at the zoo won't let visitors tease the lion. I'd forgotten that.

  Please forgive me. But your face is burning and your beard is bristly. Why not have a cold shower?" His smile showed her he welcomed the idea. "Off you go to the bathroom then! When you come out you'll find some food ready. We'll eat in the bedroom, it's much nicer than this room. It looks out over the cemetery, too."

  TEN

  What a lot of graves there are, laid out as far as the eye can see. Their headstones are like hands raised in surrender, though they are beyond being threatened by anything. A city of silence and truth, where success and failure, murderer and victim come together, where thieves and policemen lie side by side in peace for the first and last time.

  Nur's snoring seemed likely to end only when she awoke in late afternoon.

  You'll stay in this prison until the police forget you. And will they ever really forget?

  The graves remind you that death cheats the living.

  They speak of betrayal; and thus they make you remember Nabawiyya, Ilish and Rauf, telling you that you yourself are dead, ever since that unseeing bullet was fired.

  But you still have bullets of fire.

  At the sound of Nur's yawning, loud, like a groan, he turned away from the window shutters towards the bed. Nur was sitting up, naked, her hair dishevelled, looking unrested and run down. But she smiled as she said, "I dreamed you were far away and I was going out of my mind waiting for you."

  "That was a dream," he observed grimly.

  "In fact you're the one who's going out and I'm the one who'll wait."

  She went into the bathroom, emerged again drying her hair; and he followed her hands as they recreated her face in a new form, happy and young. She was, like himself, thirty years old, but she lied outright hoping to appear younger, adding to the multitude of sins and sillinesses which are openly committed. But theft unfortunately was not one of them.

  "Don't forget the papers," he reminded her at the door.

  When she'd gone he moved into the reception room and flung himself down on one of the sofas.

  Now he was alone in the full sense of the word, without even his books which he'd left with Sheikh Ali.

  He stared up at the cracked white ceiling, a dull echo of the threadbare carpet, killing time.

  The setting sun flashed through the open window, like a jewel being carried by a flight of doves from one point in time to the next.

  Your coldness, Sana, was very disquieting. Like seeing these graves. I don't know if we'll meet again, where or when. You'll certainly never love me now. Not in this life, so full of badly-aimed bullets, desires gone astray.

  What's left behind is a dangling chain of regrets. The first link was the students' hostel on the road to Giza. Ilish didn't matter much, but Nabawiyya — she'd shaken him, torn him up by the roots. If only a deceit could be as plainly read in the face as fever or an infectious disease! Then beauty would never be false and many a man would be spared the ravages of deception.

  That grocery near the students' hostel, where Nabawiyya used to come shopping, gripping her bowl. She was always so nicely dressed, much more neatly than the other servant girls, which was why she'd been known as the "Turkish Lady's maid,": The rich, proud old Turkish woman, who lived alone, at the end of the road, in a house at the center of a big garden, insisted that everyone who had to do with her should be good-looking, clean, and well-dressed. So Nabawiyya always appeared with her hair neatly combed and plaited in a long pigtail, wearing slippers. Her peasant's gown flowed around a sprightly and nimble body, and even those not bewitched by her agreed that she was a fine example of country beauty with her dark complexion, her round, full face, her brown eyes, her small chubby nose, and her lips moist with the juices of life.

  There was a small green tattoo mark on her chin like a beauty spot.

  You used to stand at the entrance to the students' hostel and wait for her after work, staring up the street until her fine form with her adorable gait appeared in the distance. As she stepped closer and closer, you'd glow with anticipation. She was like some lovely melody, welcomed wherever she went. As she slipped in among the dozens
of women standing at the grocer's your eyes would follow her drunk with ecstasy. She'd disappear and reemerge again, your desire and curiosity increasing all the time — so did your impulse to do something, no matter what, by word, gesture or invocation — and she'd move off on her way home, to disappear for the rest of the day and another whole night. And you'd let out a long, bitter sigh and your elation would subside, the birds on the roadside trees would cease their song and a cold autumn breeze would suddenly spring up from nowhere.

  But then you notice that her form is reacting to your stare, that she's swaying coquettishly as she walks and you stand there no longer, but, with your natural impetuosity, hurry after her along the road. Then at the lone palm tree at the edge of the fields you bar her way. She's dumbfounded by your audacity, or pretends to be, and asks you indignantly who you might be. You reply in feigned surprise, "Who might I be? You really ask who I am? Don't you know? I'm known to every inch of your being!"

  "I don't like ill-mannered people!" she snaps.

  "Neither do I. I'm like you, I hate ill-mannered people. Oh, no. On the contrary, I admire good manners, beauty, and gentleness. And all of those things are you! You still don't know who I am? I must carry that basket for you and see you to the door of your house."

  "I don't need your help," she says, "and don't ever stand in my way again!" With that she walks away, but with you at her side, encouraged by the faint smile slipping through her pretence of indignation, which you receive like the first cool breeze on a hot and sultry night. Then she had said: "Go back; you must! My mistress sits at the window and if you come one step more she'll see you."

  "But I'm a very determined fellow," you reply, "and if you want me to go back, you'll have to come along with me. Just a few steps. Back to the palm tree. You see, I've got to talk to you.

  And why shouldn't I? Aren't I respectable enough?"

  She shakes her head vigorously, but she does slow down. Murmuring an angry protest, she does slow down, her neck arched like an angry cat's. She did slow down and I no longer doubt I've won, that Nabawiyya is not indifferent and knows very well how I stand sighing there at the students' hostel. You know that casual stares in the street will become something big in your life, in hers, and in the world at large too, which would grow larger as a result.