Vertigo

by Ahmed Mourad

  Ahmed was overwhelmed by a wild exhilaration at what he had done to Galal. He felt like the medieval folk hero Ali el-Zibaq in his tussles with the police chief Sanqar el-Kalbi. A strange kind of calm crept over him, erasing all trace of what had taken place the previous night: karmic compensation in the form of a moral victory over a character who owed Ahmed a considerable apology for all his dishonesty and disdain. For the first time in his life he felt a positive force driving him forward; like he had shattered the barriers of indolence and resignation. Raising his hand, he saluted the emptiness.

  He was hailing Hossam, his friend. He saw him by the door; no, he just imagined him there, smiling and waving before he vanished.

  But he still had an itch of another kind and it began to get worse. Gouda. Where was that man? He just wanted to make sure that he had forgiven him, forgotten everything that Ahmed had vomited out last night. Was it fair to have confronted him with the fact that he was a liar and wasted other people’s time with his fantasies? Just like someone who shoots a bullet into his friend while cleaning his revolver; a discharge of pent-up anger that wiped him out. But never mind: Ahmed was also possessed of an ability to persuade and make peace.

  Where was he though? He tried his phone again and this time it was answered, but it wasn’t Gouda who picked up.

  ‘Gouda?’

  ‘Are you a relative?’

  Ahmed’s skin crawled.

  ‘Yes. What’s going on? Where is he? Did you find this phone? Where are you speaking from?’

  ‘This is El-Hussein University Hospital. Brother Gouda arrived here about two hours ago and …’

  The voice in Ahmed’s ear grew suddenly muted. He did not want to hear what came next, and when he did, it cut through his eardrum like a knife through butter.

  It was an hour before the taxi stopped in front of El-Hussein Hospital. Out stepped the pale, lost figure with a face like thunder, who, having first paid the driver, sprinted up the steps to the main entrance and almost fell. In deference to unsavoury custom, the driver complained about his fare and spat abuse.

  Ahmed ran into the reception and asked about Gouda. With the weary air of a breastfeeding mother the nurse indicated that he should go up to the second floor. He raced up the stairs until he came to a sign on which, in an execrable hand, was written the word ‘Morgue’.

  His eyes filled with tears as he went inside with the medical orderly who, when he saw his identity card and realised he wasn’t a member of the immediate family, had snatched eight pounds off him to let him enter without the doctor’s permission.

  The morgue was cramped and stifling and it reeked of the formaldehyde that was trying and failing to prevent decomposition. Instead of brightening the place the flickering light from the single neon strip only made it gloomier. The refrigerators sat in a row, their inner walls full of rust, their handles eroded and their pale blue paint peeling.

  The orderly walked along, reading the signs and closing those refrigerator doors that had been left ajar to justify the pounds he had received from Ahmed. He passed a half-open refrigerator in which could be seen the calves of what looked like a young woman and next to them a bottle of water. The man picked up the water and shut the door on her youthfulness. The door gave off a muffled creak. Opening the bottle he had been chilling the man took a gulp and came to a halt in front of another fridge.

  ‘Oh God …’

  The door protested with a high-pitched squeak before giving in and opening to reveal a bare and sorry-looking foot from which a yellow tag was suspended. On it was written, ‘Gouda el-Sayyid Ragab. Date admitted: 13th May, 9.30 a.m.’ And in the comments box: ‘Vertical incision in the right frontal lobe leading to internal bleeding and a drop in blood pressure.’

  The refrigerator’s shelf was full, and the orderly slid it out bearing Gouda, who had turned blue and was lying on his back. A large wound had appeared on his head, which was unable to hide the lake of clotted blood beneath it.

  Tears and more tears; he was doubled up and panting, every glance sending the blood pumping through his veins. His glasses misted over, his nose ran and his chest constricted. He squatted next to the body that had once carried Gouda.

  ‘May you live long and remember,’ said the orderly. ‘You can tell he was a good man. Doesn’t he have any close family?’

  Ahmed was incapable of replying.

  ‘He had a blessed end, that one. Know where the microbus hit him? Right outside El-Hussein Mosque. He was crossing the road coming from the mosque, so God willing he’ll be in paradise. That’s a good death, may God write it for us.’

  His expression changed. It was as though the eight pounds, like the credit on a mobile phone, had now run out.

  ‘Let’s get going now, mister. If the doctor comes he’ll make trouble for us. My condolences.’

  The orderly closed the refrigerator, but not before Ahmed had bid Gouda farewell with a final look. He went temporarily mute as he grasped the cold hand and squeezed, then Gouda was packed away in the recesses of the fridge.

  ‘Would you like to see the things he had on him?’ asked the orderly, winking to signal the start of fresh negotiations.

  Ahmed made to leave. A search through Gouda’s possessions had never been his intention. Then again, he was the only person Gouda had in the world. He may have been carrying something that would lead him to a relative.

  ‘How much do you want?’

  ‘A caretta,’ replied the orderly, in reference to the twenty-pound note with its picture of Ramses II riding a war chariot, or caretta, as it was popularly referred to.

  ‘You never know, there could be something valuable.’

  Ahmed had no more than fifteen pounds in his pocket and he handed him ten.

  ‘I don’t have any more cash. I need the rest to get home.’

  The orderly grinned fatuously at the red note and took it.

  ‘That’ll do, ya bashmuhandis.’

  Opening a drawer in an old metal filing cabinet, he rifled through the contents and came up carrying a tatty leather wallet, a large handkerchief, a keychain with three keys attached and a mobile phone.

  Ahmed opened the wallet and discovered it was as bare as the day it had been born save for a few scattered bits of paper that Gouda was in the habit of collecting: telephone numbers, addresses, bus tickets and an obsolete old ID card with a picture of Gouda taken about forty years ago. He was smiling, holding his head high with the haughty pride of a Field Marshal. He also found his new ID. Here, his face looked like a puckered doughy disc: wan, his eyes invisible behind the reflections of the light on his glasses, and smiling like a corpse recovered from sea ten days after drowning.

  Naturally, his money had been ‘nationalised’, along with his lighter, cigarettes and watch, but Ahmed was in no condition to set up a committee of investigation. The orderly had begun gathering up Gouda’s possessions when an old rusty key caught Ahmed’s eye. It was brass and bore the image of a sparrow. It didn’t require much thought: he reached out his hand to the keychain and removed the brass key.

  ‘No!’ shouted the orderly. ‘We didn’t agree to that!’

  Ahmed held him hard by the elbow. ‘That man had a watch and a lighter, and he never left home without cash. His wallet is empty. He’s been picked clean. Now, you’ve got “one keychain” written down there. Couldn’t there have been only two keys? The rest is yours, OK?’

  The orderly gave no reply, merely fixing him with a cutting look and turning away to shut the door to the morgue. ‘Fine, my friend,’ he said at last. ‘Go with God. Have a nice day.’

  Ahmed walked and walked without knowing where his feet were leading him, until he found himself in Sayyida Zeinab. He passed by his flat and thought of going up but couldn’t bring himself to do so.

  His thoughts jostled together like hens in the presence of a fox. The casino! What would he tell them? Would he carry on there? Impossible. He cried a lot and an oppressive sense of guilt assailed him. Had Gouda died bea
ring him a grudge, or had he forgiven him? He needed to call his friend Omar. Now. No, not now. Who was going to take the body? Was he going to abandon him like this?

  A fortnight later the weeping began to wane as the effects of time and distance started to course through his veins. The pain, however, remained with him and would not leave.

  The two weeks that followed were marked by many developments. The casino found out about Gouda’s sudden death and some of the employees did a whip around for the cost of the funeral, including a derisory sum from the owner that was unworthy of their long acquaintance.

  Gouda was buried in the Bab el-Nasr cemetery. Not many turned up to the funeral. There was a small group from his neighbourhood, a few employees from the casino and a friend or two. No more than the hairs on Gouda’s head, and he was bald. This was all he had managed to gather around him in the course of a life that had lasted more than sixty years.

  Ahmed’s own malignant tumour of a man from the casino was also in attendance. He appeared from nowhere, as though Count Dracula had decided to work the morning shift in Bab el-Nasr. With the self-same sombre elegance and carefully rolled cigarette, he stood at a distance, sunglasses over his eyes. Taking out a handkerchief and wiping away what seemed to be a genuine tear, he signalled to Ahmed with his fingers and that provocative smile, which Ahmed chose to ignore, turning his face to the workmen who had started heaping soil into the grave and sprinkling water to tamp down the dust. When Ahmed looked back over at the place where the man with the strange ring had been standing, he could not find him. It was as though he had evaporated.

  Could he have been a friend of Gouda’s? Why not? After all, Gouda had studied with Gandhi at the Indian Secondary School for Boys, had been a personal friend of President Gamal Abdel Nasser, a muse to Abdel Halim Hafez, a critic of Umm Kulthoum, a mentor to Raafat el-Hagan, an emancipator of slaves and a blood brother of Spartacus himself.

  He was going to miss him a lot.

  Two days went by in which Ahmed did not come to work at the casino. He spent most of his time with Omar, sorting out his new job and the biggest problem of all: where he would live. They hunted around until they stumbled on a small flat of sixty square metres on the third floor of a decrepit old building. It would have made an ideal tomb. The monthly rent was 130 pounds but he didn’t have the luxury of choice.

  He notified the casino’s manager of his decision to resign and the manager asked him to wait two days until he had found someone to replace him. Ahmed welcomed the new arrival and got him acquainted with the place and its rules. It wasn’t too difficult as the man had learned and honed his craft in another casino.

  He had started to pack up his possessions to transport them to his new accommodation when his hand knocked against something metal in his pocket. It was Gouda’s key. He remembered the cabinet; the Alice in Wonderland cabinet with its military secrets. He entered the room and was on the point of opening it when the new tenant came in.

  ‘Can I carry anything for you, Ahmed?’

  ‘Yes, you could. I nearly forgot this little cabinet. Help me carry it, would you?’

  The new photographer’s face lit up and he almost made sacrificial offerings to Ahmed, who lifted one side of the heavy load and took a little of the weight from him. The storeroom full of rubbish that he had inherited from Gouda was quite enough.

  Ahmed got into the van having loaded his possessions: a computer, a camera, an iron, a mattress, all his cares and Gouda’s cabinet. He stacked them inside the flat and turned the key in the lock, then he washed himself and lay on his mattress in his new room. Deep down he was certain of only one thing: he was on the brink of something big, something that would alter the course of his life. His gaze was drawn to a spider walking across the ceiling, arranging its silk threads as it fashioned itself a home – or a trap.

  9

  Two weeks went by. Ahmed spent the time getting himself together. The flat was small, but it was perfect for a young man who had nothing to lose.

  He spent a couple of nights sleepless from the sinister noises emitted by the ancient ceiling fan, the heavily cracked windows, the branches of a tree that tapped at night and the flat’s dilapidated furniture that held nightly discussions about the new tenant. The plumber paid a couple of official visits and there were extensive negotiations concerning the state of the bathroom and the damp floors. Burnt out lightbulbs were changed and an expedition was mounted to scout for a new restaurant, though the dire need for such a trip was allayed by food aid that came from Omar’s mother. Omar himself had begun spending more time in the flat than Ahmed himself, a blubbery, sweaty, dedicated creature who never failed to fill Ahmed with joy. Ahmed was genuinely fond of him.

  Omar upgraded his computer, feeding it with all that was good and delicious: programmes, films and a few salacious flicks from his personal collection, which contained pornographic films dating back to the birth of cinema. Vital to defeat boredom and ease the burden of bachelorhood, Omar had an unshakeable faith in their ability to cure any ill.

  In various ways he tried to extricate Ahmed from the state of apathy and stagnation that had overcome him. Gags, wisecracks, even staying the night if needed, with his steady snore and feet whose stench could have been used to break up a student demonstration, all in an effort to help Ahmed adjust to his new circumstances.

  Ahmed started his new job, working as a photographer at the studio in Manial and occasionally going out to supplement his income at various weddings: hotels and clubs; an engagement party at home and a wedding procession in the street; posing on University Bridge; taking a felucca ride; and last but not least the famous fountain shot in University Square outside the Orman Gardens.

  He had completely forgotten about the small cabinet, Gouda’s cabinet, mainly because of Omar’s junk, which had occupied nearly half the room. All things considered, he was in no state to dredge up anything that might remind him of Gouda, and especially not what had taken place the night before his death. While he knew that our fate is already written, he was still unable to accept that he had left him to die with something weighing on his chest. Had Gouda forgiven him? God’s curse on Habib Amin! Were it not for him the world would not have been turned so irrevocably upside down.

  Then the day came when Ahmed found himself standing before the cabinet. It was ancient, dark brown and heavily scored, and Gouda had plastered it with stickers of old film brands that had long since died out, never to return, like Sakura and Tudor, and a faded photograph of a Japanese girl carrying a parasol. Dragging the cabinet out, he sat cross-legged on the floor of the room and inserted the key, which he had placed on a chain with the key to the flat.

  He opened it.

  Aside from dried out pieces of food and small nails the first drawer contained a file full of yellowing papers. These included Gouda’s birth certificate (born in Amariya on 30 October 1940), his old identity papers, his wife’s death certificate and medical reports, the deeds to his flat, an old woman’s watch, an antique engagement ring, a few pictures of his wife that looked as if they had been taken in the sixties and some more of the two of them together in black-and-white and colour.

  The second and third drawers were crammed with black and clear containers for film cartridges, a small label stuck on each one. ‘Sally’ was written on more than one, and two more bore the name of Karim Abbas, her manager and broad-minded husband. Galal Mursi had six containers, while Fathi el-Assal and Habib had more than eight between them. Deep inside the third drawer were four containers labelled Hisham Fathi, the yellow suit whose fall he’d recorded during the incident at the hotel and about whose corrupt past he had heard so much. Then other names, most of them unknown to him, some that he had heard whispered and others that occupied large tracts of the front pages; mainly actors and actresses, plus a few politicians and two or three with military ranks, none higher than a colonel. There were more containers without names and then, at the back of the drawer, a single container wrapped in white paper an
d carefully sealed on which was written ‘The Wedding’.

  The cabinet contained Gouda’s life: his archive, and his wife, colleagues and clients. Naturally enough, it was the negatives of Galal Mursi that claimed Ahmed’s attention. He opened a container and unrolled the film. Unable to make out the details in the dim yellow light of the room, he illuminated the screen of his mobile phone and placed it behind the strip. Perhaps he might be able to see something by its faint glow.

  The film contained pictures of individuals at a table in the casino, among whom Ahmed recognised Galal Mursi. There were pictures of him with men and women, their features indistinct.

  He opened a container belonging to Sally. Pictures of her dancing and others of her sitting at a table with another person.

  He did the same with Karim Abbas. His pictures looked seedy: a considerable number showed girls on their own, bending themselves into provocative poses.

  Hisham Fathi: a chronological record of visits to the casino.

  The negatives were in poor condition and visibility was inadequate. Ahmed had seen enough, and set about arranging all the films in the drawers until he heard the sound of a key turning in the door and a belch, which let him know that it was Omar.

  ‘Your good health, you animal. The Michelin man’s come to visit!’

  ‘Hamou’a,’ replied Omar, using the slang nickname for Ahmed. ‘You’re up?’

  ‘No, I’m asleep.’

  ‘Well, shake a leg and come and help me carry some stuff.’

  Ahmed got to his feet and went to the door to find Omar carrying a computer monitor.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘My computer.’

  Ahmed helped him carry the monitor, then Omar went out to get the rest of the machine.

  ‘Hey, did your mother throw you out or catch you watching something romantic?’

  ‘Neither one nor the other, my friend. We’re setting up a network. I’m going to make you live in the present, man. We’ll take a cable from that kid Koko’s net café next to the building and we’ll play games until the morning.’