Nabilah idolised her mother. She believed that she was less beautiful than Qadriyyah, though this was not true. She believed that her mother had the best clothes sense, the best hairstyle and that her cooking was superior. Nothing was good or real without her mother’s acknowledgement. That was exactly why Nabilah’s marriage had taken place and lasted for nine years. Her mother’s faith in Mahmoud Bey transmuted itself to the daughter and Qadriyyah Hanim had wholeheartedly, and with utter conviction, engineered her daughter into this marriage. She had brushed aside Nabilah’s protests: the twenty years age gap, his foreignness, his first wife and grown-up children.
‘You don’t want to marry an inexperienced youngster,’ Qadriyyah had argued, ‘who will wear you out and drag you around until he stands on his own two feet. You want someone established, mature, someone able to look after you and guide you. Mahmoud Bey will humour and indulge you; he will pamper and protect you. Wait and see, isn’t Mama always right?’
Yes, Mama was always right. Nabilah waited and Nabilah saw. But there were other things, like this exile from the one she loved most. Nabilah’s dissatisfaction, her low-grade unhappiness, was not entirely caused by this mismatched marriage, by this second-wife status or by this backward place. It was the banishment from her mother that was so hard to get used to.
IV
Usually, after a massage, he slept deeply, but tonight he was restless. It had been years since Waheeba massaged his back – he couldn’t remember the last time, but it must have been before his second marriage. She was good at it, heavy-handed but effective. She might even have bruised him, and he would feel sore tomorrow, but after that the benefits of her treatment would be felt, significant and lasting. He shifted his weight and tried to find a more comfortable position. The room was airy because the windowpanes and shutters to the terrace were wide open. Without a full moon, the starlight was soft and untroubling and there was no reason for him not to sleep. He was not in pain; neither was he hungry or thirsty, nor was he lonely. His elder sons were spending the night in his room. Nassir, after his journey from Medani, was lying on his back, his hands folded on his belly, snoring loudly. Nur, on an extra angharaib, was lying on his side, the sheet as was his habit, pulled over his face. Mahmoud felt a surge of simultaneous fondness and grudge towards them. He was pleased that they were near him, but at the same time he envied how deeply they were sleeping. What were they dreaming of? He was not really interested, nor would he understand their generation’s concerns. His children were an extension of him and he had hopes and plans for them, which he expected them to obey, but his core, his inner depth, was independent of them.
This sleeplessness, he realised, getting out of bed and walking out onto the terrace, was a good sign, a sign that his illness was coming to an end. Perhaps in a day or two he could go back to work. He had been going over things with Idris, but not everything could be done from home. It would be good to be back in the office again. the office. This word meant a great deal to him. He was not a merchant in the Souq Al-Arabi, as his grandfather had been. He was not the head of an agency, as his father had been. He was the director of Abuzeid Trading, a private limited liability company, one of the leading firms in the Sudanese private sector. There were British companies, of course – Gellaty and Hankey, Sear and Colley, Mitchell Cotts and Sudan Mercantile; there were the fabulous long-established Syrian-Christian families the Haggars and the Bittars but he, Sayyid Mahmoud Abuzeid, was indigenous. Let no one call him an immigrant! The immigrants came fifty-five years ago with the Anglo-Egyptian force, sent to avenge Gordon’s death and recover the Sudan. Those newcomers were adventurers and opportunists who knew that the defeat of the Mahdiyyah and the new British administration would herald an era of prosperity. Instead, Mahmoud Abuzeid’s grandfather had come in the early 1800s, fleeing conscription in the Egyptian army.
The Abuzeids had risen by a combination of financial sharpness and the drive to modernise. Unlike the Mahdi and the Mirghani family firms, who were supported by the British in order to distract them from politics and play them one against the other, the Abuzeids were independent. Mahmoud was proud of that. And he wanted to do more. He wanted to steer his family firm through the uncertainties of self-determination and stake a place in the new, independent country, whenever and whatever form this independence took. This was why he loved his office. The other burgeoning family businesses did not put so much emphasis on form. He, though, had an office, just like a British company, with secretaries, filing cabinets, qualified accountants, telegram operators, and everything was written down, filed in order. He needed to get back to work. A number of important meetings had been postponed because of his illness and too many things were now on hold.
Walking on the terrace tired him and he sat back on one of the large metal chairs that made up the outdoor seating arrangement. The cushions were soft and cool underneath him, but by now he was bored with comfort. He wanted to be strong and energetic again. The doctor had assured him of a slow but complete recovery and Mahmoud wanted to forget these past days. He had not only been physically ill, but frightened, too, chastened in some way. Good health was a blessing, anything else a constraint. Being bedridden had made him feel morbid. Was he meant to think that death was around the corner? Should he start to put his affairs in order? He had seen the concern in his family’s eyes. His death would affect their lives. Nabilah and the children would return to Cairo – she would have no place here, he was sure, but Farouk and Ferial would be deprived of their country and their Sudanese family. It was an unhappy thought, and though he trusted that Idris would not deprive them of their inheritance, his young, half-Sudanese family, would bear the brunt of being orphaned more than their elder brothers, Nassir and Nur. He listened to the breeze from the Nile and the sounds that came from the fields on the riverbank. A donkey brayed and pigeons cooed, even though dawn was a long way off.
His mind turned to the names and faces of the friends and business acquaintances who had visited him. He challenged himself to remember them all, knowing that he would be able to check the accuracy of his memory by looking at the list Nur had been writing. Some had come more than once, and those who esteemed him most had come immediately on hearing that he was ill. Their concern was gratifying. It filled him with affection for them and a desire to reciprocate. He, too, if Allah continued to give him life, would visit them in sickness, commiserate with them in death and celebrate their happy occasions.
And how had his family responded to his illness? Idris had risen to the occasion and could not be faulted. Nassir, on the other hand, had taken too long to arrive from Medani. People would talk of this – it was embarrassing. The boy resembled him physically, but was lazy and irresponsible, unlike Nur, who looked like his mother and yet held his father’s sense of duty inside him. Mahmoud always compared the brothers and always found Nur to be superior. Even though he was not the eldest, Nur would be the next chairman of the Abuzeid group of companies, the next head of the family. But what to do about Nassir? Years ago, on the night of his wedding to Fatma, Nassir had been too drunk to consummate the marriage. Mahmoud had laughed along with everyone else at the story of the groom, henna on his hands and kohl in his eyes, passing out fully dressed on his marital bed, but Nassir’s drinking was no longer a laughing matter. The reports that reached Mahmoud were damning. Nassir was never at the Medani office before eleven o’clock on any day of the week. It was clerks and employees who were running the Abuzeid Medani office, not the landowner’s son. Cotton was yielding millions these days because the English couldn’t get enough of it now that the war was over, but that was no excuse for Nassir to take things easy. It was the time to be aggressive, to develop and expand. Mahmoud resolved to confront him before his return to Medani, and if he didn’t pull himself together, he would summon him back to Umdurman to keep a close watch over him.
As for Nur, the boy needed to complete his education. This evening’s poetry episode was a phase he would get over. He was brilliant in
his studies, outstanding in sports, especially football. An all-rounder, the English headmaster said, and how proud Mahmoud felt that his son was excelling at Victoria College. Every penny spent on the fees was worth this joy. It was especially gratifying to visit him in Alexandria. Mahmoud would park his car and visit the headmaster, Mr Waverley, in his office. With amazement – and a certain degree of alertness needed to follow English – he would listen to his son being praised. Such magical moments, sitting across the desk from the English gentleman who spoke loudly, slowly and clearly. Nur, his son was an all-rounder! After a few minutes – not long, for the English did not like to waste time – Nur would arrive at the office wearing his navy school blazer with the letters V and C embroidered in gold on the pocket, the C underneath the letter V. Nur’s eyes would shine when he saw his father. He would rush forward and bend to kiss his hand before Mahmoud enveloped him in a brief hug. Then, obtaining special permission, Mahmoud would take Nur and his friends out for lunch. How those boys attacked their plates of kebab and kofta! As if they had been starving for weeks. They were not allowed such food in the dorms and they had to bribe the cleaning staff to buy them ful and falafel from outside. Poor boys, forced to eat English food every day: boiled potatoes, roast beef, and more tasteless boiled vegetables. Mahmoud chuckled.
Lulled by these pleasant images, he felt sleepy enough to go back to bed. As he stretched out, a niggling thought imposed itself. Something had happened this evening that he didn’t approve of. Not only Nur’s poem, but something else. What was it? Yes, it was the women, Waheeba and Nabilah. His two wives in the same room! It was a sight he had never seen before and never wished to see again. They belonged to different sides of the saraya, to different sides of him. He was the only one to negotiate between these two worlds, to glide between them, to come back and forth at will. It was his prerogative. This wretched illness had made him passive and given the two women space to bicker and make snide remarks at each other, without any respect for his presence. He remembered Idris’s sneer. But this irritation would drive sleep out of his eyes. He pushed the image of his wives away and made himself ponder more pleasant thoughts. The concern and love in his friends’ eyes, their good wishes and prayers for his recovery. In a few days, he would go back to the office and, after a full morning of work, drive to the site of his new building to see how the work was progressing.
Sheep were slaughtered to celebrate his recovery, and an ox, too. Their woolly, matted skins lay in piles on the floor of the hoash and the early-morning air smelt of fresh blood. The poor of Umdurman gathered at the door of the saraya. They were not given raw meat but instead chunks of boiled mutton, the fat soaking the kisra they were placed on. The household sighed with relief. The scorch and burden of ill health had been lifted and a feeling of renewal and purification filled both the hoash and the modern wing of the mansion. After days in bed, Mahmoud Abuzeid re-entered the world and fell in love with it again. The clean morning breeze, the fresh smell of other men’s cologne, the thrust and satisfaction of business accomplished and the anticipation of more success to come. His laugh boomed again. He felt rejuvenated, touched by a miracle. It was good to bellow orders and send his staff scurrying. They had all gone lax while he was recuperating and it was time for them to be on their toes again. Not only in the office, but at home, too. He challenged Nabilah with a seated dinner party for thirty guests; that should keep her occupied and silence her complaints. And it was high time too, to deal with the problem of Nassir.
On his second day back at the office, he passed by Waheeba on his way home. At this time in the afternoon she was under the shade of the veranda having her siesta. His unexpected visit stirred the sleepy hoash. Waheeba’s girls, Batool and the others, rose to greet him with smiles and hugs. They were the daughters of distant relatives sent to Umdurman for schooling and it was their voices that woke Waheeba. She sat up with difficulty, drawing her to be around her and pulling down the edges of her dress. He sat on the angharaib perpendicular to hers while she coughed, wiped her face with her hands and settled herself upright. Her two legs stretched out straight from the bed, the calves pressed hard against the edge. She asked about his health and he asked her about the previous day’s slaughter which had coincided with Nur’s farewell. His friends and other members of the family had come to bid him farewell and today he was on his way to Alexandria, making the journey to Cairo by airplane for the first time instead of by train.
Batool brought him coffee and water.
‘Shall I put sugar for you, Uncle?’ she said, smiling. ‘For Allah’s sake, stay and have lunch with us.’
She was a pretty girl with smooth black skin and perfect teeth. Her father was poor and the girl had attached herself to Waheeba even though she had finished school. She was loyal and hardworking, entertaining and caring. Even though Batool was not his daughter, Mahmoud would spare no expense in getting her married and settled.
Waheeba did not repeat her girl’s invitation. She knew that he would be having lunch and siesta with Nabilah. His days of lunching with her were over. Today, seeing the hoash quiet after what must have been the bustle of the past days, Mahmoud felt a faint pity for his wife. His illness had given her a role to play but now that he was better, she would recede to the background. In his mind, he associated her with decay and ignorance. He would never regret marrying Nabilah. It was not a difficult choice between the stagnant past and the glitter of the future, between crudeness and sophistication.
As if to confirm his thoughts, she asked now, ‘Has Nur arrived safely?’
Stupid woman, ignorant of concepts of distance and time. He chuckled and said, ‘No, Hajjah. It will be still a long time before his trip is over. I will let you know when I have news. the office in Cairo will send me a telegram as soon as Nur arrives.’
‘Why does he have to travel so far away to study? Why couldn’t he attend Comboni College like Nassir did?’ It was a constant refrain.
He took a sip of his coffee.
‘Because Victoria College is superior to any school we have here. It is based on the English public school system. And besides, next year when he finishes, I want him to continue his studies in Cambridge.’
‘Is that in Egypt also?’
He sighed. ‘No. In England.’
‘Even further?’
‘Yes, it is even further and I don’t want any grumbling from you. I have already made a decision.’
She listened to him intently, her eyes never leaving his face. Behind the formality of respect and diffidence, he glimpsed a certain expression. She was looking at him as if he was a precocious child and she was curious to see what he would do or say next. She was only older than him by a few years but in their youth, this age difference had seemed like a decade. He had been shocked when his father ordered him to marry her. Waheeba was a distant relative, the only daughter of an established Umdurman merchant who had become wealthy by trading in Gum Arabic.
Waheeba came into the Abuzeid family with money and business connections. At twenty-one, she was considered a spinster and her family had no hesitation in marrying her off and financing a lavish wedding. Mahmoud, a youth of eighteen, his mind taken up with a fascination for commerce, had hated Waheeba at first sight; hated her because of her dullness and lack of beauty and, most of all, because she was forced on him. Their wedding night was a disaster, a humiliation he had buried deep and did not talk to his friends about. It was almost a miracle that Nassir and Nur were conceived, but their arrival, and the force of the years, eroded his distaste for her, so that on such an afternoon, after he had found fulfilment and success in another marriage, he could share with her the wish that Nur would arrive safely in Alexandria after a good trip. Nassir, though, was the reason he had come to visit her. Nassir, who had not yet returned to Medani.
‘I am reducing his allowance,’ he said to her, ‘until he mends his ways.’
‘But he has his house in Medani to support,’ she protested. ‘And he receives lots of gue
sts. And Fatma will have more children. He said to me—’
Mahmoud didn’t allow her to go further.
‘He has to learn. He is my employee. He works for me, and he is not doing his job. And you know as well as I do how your son is squandering my money!’
She pulled her chin in so that the curves of fat were more pronounced.
‘He is still young. He needs to learn.’
‘No, he is not too young. Don’t defend him. He is the reason I came here today, to tell you that while I am reducing his allowance on one side, I don’t want you giving him money on the other side.’
She shrugged and looked down at her feet.
‘Am I clear in what I am saying? You are not to give Nassir any money, either directly or through his wife or through anyone else. He gets nothing except what I give him and he gets nothing from you. Am I clear?’
Waheeba nodded and said faintly, ‘Fine.’
‘People are beginning to talk,’ he confided in her. ‘It’s shameful. The family’s good name will be affected by Nassir’s delinquency!’ This distressed him to the core. His position in society mattered to him.
Waheeba remained unmoved. She shifted her weight on the angharaib.
‘Allow me just to pay for his daughter’s circumcision. I want to celebrate it in style.’
‘What?’ he bellowed. ‘I will not have such barbarity in this house. I forbid it.’
‘Aji!’ Waheeba slapped her hand on her chest and her voice rose. ‘What kind of talk is this?’
Lyrics Alley: A Novel Page 5