Respected Sir, Wedding Song, the Search

by Naguib Mahfouz

  He laughed coldly and said, “And thirty years later you send me to look for him.”

  “Despair drives us to do even stranger things. You’ll have the marriage certificate to help you. Also the wedding photograph. You’ll see the striking resemblance.”

  “Strange that you kept the certificate and photograph.”

  “I was thinking of the picture. I was a poor girl living with a hustler, and when I became successful my intentions of avenging you were realized.”

  “And yet you never got rid of the rest of your memories.”

  She wiped her face and neck impatiently and said, “I intended to many times but changed my mind, as though I had a premonition of what would happen.”

  He paced back and forth, then stopped in front of her bed. “What if after all my efforts he denies me?”

  “Who can deny you after seeing the photograph?”

  “Cairo is a big city, and I’ve never been there before.”

  “Who says he’s in Cairo? He might be in Alexandria, Assiut, or Damanhour. I have no idea. Where is he today? What is he doing? Is he married or single? God only knows.”

  He waved his arm angrily. “And how am I supposed to find him?”

  “I know it won’t be easy. But it’s also not impossible. You know some police officers and lawyers. No prominent personality is unknown in Cairo.”

  “I’m afraid that my money might run out before I find him.”

  “That is why you must start at once.”

  He thought for a moment, then asked, “Is he worth all that effort?”

  “Without the least doubt. You will find the life you want with him. You won’t suffer the indignities of work or be forced to lead a life of crime.”

  “And if I find him poor? Weren’t you extremely rich?”

  “I assure you that money is only one of his assets. It’s true that I was rich, but I never provided you an honorable life, and all you did was go about using your fists to defend your mother’s and your own honor.”

  I must be dreaming, he thought. “Do you really believe that I’ll find him?”

  “Something tells me that he is alive, and that if you don’t despair, you’ll find him.”

  He shook his head, torn between bewilderment and hopelessness. “Should I really start searching for him? If my enemies know of this, won’t they treat me as an insane freak?”

  “And what will they say if they find you pimping? You have no alternative but to look for him.” She closed her eyes, muttering about how exhausted she was, so he begged her to sleep, saying that they would resume their talk tomorrow. He took off her shoes and covered her, but she tossed off the cover with a nervous gesture and fell into a deep sleep punctuated by light snoring.

  He awoke at nine o’clock next morning after a restless, sleepless night. He went to her room to wake her, and found his mother dead. Had she passed away in her sleep, or did she cry out in the night? An unheeded cry. No matter. Here she was, dead, in the same clothes as those in which she had left prison the day before. He looked closely at the wedding photograph. The only evidence of the existence of a father thirty years ago. How true. He was the image of his father. A handsome, virile-looking man, his tarboosh slightly tilted to the right, enhancing an already impressive figure.

  The guests had started to arrive at the neighbors’, the sound of music blending with the chants of the Qur’an in the dead woman’s bedroom.

  Where is reality, and where is dream? Your mother, whose last words are still echoing in your ears, now lies dead. Your dead father is seeking resurrection. And you, penniless, persecuted, tarnished with crime and sin, looking for a miracle that will lead you to a life of honor, freedom, and peace of mind.

  Two

  Better to let the matter remain secret for the moment. Should he despair of the search, he could seek aid from his acquaintances. He’d start with Alexandria, although it was unlikely that someone like his father would be in Alexandria without his mother’s knowing about it.

  The telephone directory for a start. The letter S, Sayed el-Reheimy. Aha…if only luck were on his side. Sayed Sayed el-Reheimy, owner of el-Manshiya bookshop. Very unlikely for a person of his father’s social condition. In any case, el-Manshiya was an area worked by his mother for more than a quarter of a century. Still, this might be a useful clue.

  The bookshop owner was a man over fifty, bearing no resemblance to the photograph. Covering his mother’s face, he showed him the picture.

  “No, I don’t know this man,” said the bookshop owner.

  Saber explained that the photograph was taken thirty years before.

  “I don’t remember seeing him.”

  “Is he perhaps a relative?”

  “We are Alexandrians, and all my relatives live here. Some of my relatives on my mother’s side live in the countryside. Why are you looking for this man?”

  He hesitated a moment, then said quickly, “He’s an old friend of my deceased father. Do any of the Reheimys live elsewhere?”

  The man looked at him suspiciously and said, “El-Reheimy is my grandfather, and there are only my sister and me.”

  There was no other course but to be patient. He had only two hundred pounds, and these were dwindling away with every passing hour. When they were gone, so went the hope of an honorable life. His eyes ached from scrutinizing every passerby. He consulted a lawyer of his acquaintance, who suggested that his father might have an unlisted number. “Ask the local Sheikh el-Hara,”* he suggested.

  “My father is an important man,” retorted Saber indignantly.

  “Strange things can happen in thirty years. I was going to suggest that you ask about him in the various jails.”

  “Jails!”

  “Why not? A jail is like a mosque, open to all. Sometimes people go to jail for noble reasons.” With a short laugh, the lawyer continued: “Let’s start with the registry offices, then the jails and the property registrars. If there is no trace there, we have no alternative but to ask the local sheikhs.”

  Saber rejected the idea of an advertisement in the paper. This would give his enemies an opportunity to make fun of him. The advertisement would have to wait until he left the city. He made the rounds of the local sheikhs, from one end of Alexandria to the other.

  “What does he do?”

  “I don’t know anything about him except that he is a well-known personality and of ample means. This is a photograph of him taken thirty years ago.”

  “Why are you looking for him?”

  “He’s an old friend of my father’s and I’ve been asked to look for him.”

  “Are you sure he’s still alive?”

  “I’m not sure of anything.”

  “How did you know he’s in Alexandria?”

  “Only a hunch, nothing more.”

  Then the final answer would resound like the clanging of a cell door, “Sorry, we don’t know him.” He did not cease his scrutiny of every passerby, in a continuous whirlpool of searching, without success. The raindrops forced him to retreat from the seashore and move on to Miramar. He looked up to the late afternoon sky with the first shades of darkness gently edging away the remaining daylight. A voice cried out in welcome, “Come.”

  He shook hands and sat down.

  “I wasn’t able to pay you my condolences, but I waited until you came to Le Canard. Everyone is asking about you.” The rain had stopped. He stood up, making some excuse about an appointment. She got up and said softly, “Are you in financial straits?”

  So they’ve begun talking!

  Temptingly she continued: “Someone like you should never be in want of money.”

  He shook hands coldly and left. Someone like you should never be in want of money. The call of the madam. That’s just what your enemies want. I’d rather be dead. What’s left in Alexandria?

  The palm reader; but nothing new.

  The sheikh, all-knowing perhaps. He visited him in his ground-floor room, shuttered and musty. The sheikh, sittin
g cross-legged on the floor lost in thought, said, “Seek and ye shall find.” The sound of waves seemed to augur a promising start. “A search as tedious as the winter nights,” the sheikh added. Every day is like a year, and at what expense! “You shall obtain what you seek.”

  With a startled voice: “What is it that I’m seeking?”

  “He is waiting for you impatiently.”

  “Does he know about me?”

  “He’s waiting for you.”

  Maybe his mother didn’t tell him everything.

  “Then, he is alive!”

  “Thanks be to God.”

  “Where do I find him? That’s what I really want to know.”

  “Patience.”

  “I can’t be patient indefinitely.”

  “You’ve just begun.”

  “In Alexandria?”

  The sheikh closed his eyes. “Patience, patience,” he murmured.

  “You’ve told me nothing,” retorted Saber angrily.

  “I’ve told you everything,” replied the sheikh.

  He walked out cursing and was greeted by the introductory rumbles of a thunderstorm. He decided to sell his furniture and leave for Cairo. He had already sold the costly objects in order to maintain his expensive tastes and extravagant living. He hated having the secondhand dealers and buyers come to his flat, so he paid a visit to “Madame” Nabawiya, a close friend of his mother’s, and the only one in that circle he did not dislike.

  “I’ll be glad to buy your furniture, but why are you leaving?” she asked, offering him a puff from her narghile.

  “I’ll make a new life for myself in Cairo, away from all this.”

  “May God have mercy on her soul. She loved you and ruined you for any other kind of life.”

  He understood what she meant and said, “I’m no longer fit for this kind of life.”

  “What will you do in Cairo?”

  “I have a friend who promised he’d help me.”

  “Believe me, our work is suited only to the proud.”

  He spat in a large incense bowl. That was his response.

  Alexandria faded in the distance as the train sped south toward Cairo. A quarter of a century of memories faded away in the autumn twilight, enveloped in dark clouds heralding November with its cold winds blowing through half-deserted streets. He bade a silent farewell to the city, wondering what the future held in store for him. His sole companions for the journey were his thoughts, thoughts about his father. The questions he had asked, the evasive answer from his mother. He had always assumed that he was the product of a moment of pleasure in any one of the numerous brothels. A bastard.

  The sudden din of the Cairo station cut through his thoughts. His immediate impulse was to board the next train for Alexandria. But he thought better of it, left his luggage at the station, and walked out into the late afternoon sun. He was struck by all the appurtenances of a big city, the cars, buses, pedestrians, street vendors, noise, wide streets, noise, narrow streets, noise. Contradiction and contrasts everywhere. Even the weather, the hot rays of a sun struggling to the last before setting, and a pleasant cool breeze waiting to take over after the struggle was inevitably finished.

  He eventually found himself in an arcaded street across from the Cairo Hotel, an establishment that looked like it was within his means. And as though to emphasize this fact, a beggar was sitting cross-legged near the doorway chanting a religious song. The street was crowded with shops on both sides, and piles of merchandise were strewn all over the sidewalks.

  The hotel was an old building with sand-colored walls rising four floors above him. An arched doorway led into a long corridor with a stairway at the end. In the middle of the corridor stood the reception desk presided over by a seated old man, and beside him stood a woman. What a woman! He felt an immediate awakening of long-dormant desires and memories lost in the fog of time. The sound and smell of the sea and moments of insane passion, inflamed by the darkness of night. An intimate relationship sprang up between him and the hotel; it was as though they were destined to meet.

  He crossed the street and entered with a burning curiosity. The beautiful dark girl, her almond eyes flashing with temptation and seduction. A clinging, pale-colored dress, long fingernails suggesting an exciting animal desire.

  She reminded him of her. Ten, maybe more years ago, the name long forgotten but the moment recaptured in its entirety. The girl of long past was of no consequence, but here she was now, bringing back the past, calling out, just as his father was doing. A call from the dead that brought him from the sea to this exciting, teeming city. She gave him a fleeting glance full of meaning, then quickly turned her face toward the hotel lounge on her right. Saber walked up to the desk, where the old man was bent over a large register, a magnifying glass in his trembling hand. The old man did not notice him, so he stole a glance at the woman and assured himself of the promise he had first detected. She glanced back at him with a touch of scorn and nudged the old man, upon which Saber immediately greeted him. “Good evening, sir.”

  The old man raised his head to display a deeply lined face with a prominent hooked nose. The look in his pale eyes indicated a total lack of interest in the whys and wherefores of this world.

  “I’m looking for a room,” Saber said.

  “Twenty piastres a night.”

  “And if I stay for two weeks?”

  “Twenty piastres is worth nothing nowadays.”

  “I might stay for a month or more.”

  The old man gave up the bargaining and murmured, “As you wish.”

  Saber gave his name and place of origin, and when asked about his occupation simply said, “I have private means.” He gave the old man his identity card, stealing glances at the woman while the man was busy writing down the details. Their eyes met, but he failed to read the meanings he had first seen. Nevertheless, he convinced himself that she was that girl of his past. Once more the smell of the sea stung his nostrils as well as the scent of the carnations that had adorned her hair. All of a sudden he was optimistic about the success of his mission and did not doubt for a moment that this woman was ready and willing. She appeared to be disinterested, but an enchantress lay beneath that cool façade.

  The old man returned the identity card, saying, “You are from Alexandria?”

  He nodded and smiled, and said slyly, looking to the girl, “I bet you like Alexandria?”

  The old man smiled, but the girl, contrary to his expectations, did not appear even to have heard, so he quickly asked, “Did you ever know Sayed Sayed el-Reheimy?”

  “It’s not improbable that I did.”

  Saber became keenly interested, forgetting the girl. “Where and when?”

  “I can’t remember, I’m not sure.”

  “But he is an important man.”

  “I’ve known many, but now I don’t remember one.”

  His optimism increased. He glanced at the girl and saw a look of doubt and mockery in her eyes, as though she were asking why a man of private means should stay in this hotel. It didn’t bother him. The truth would appear when she discovered the reason for his being there. And she would find out sooner or later.

  Did she remember him? He felt the long fingernails dig into his flesh after the long chase along the Corniche in Alexandria. The chase that ended in the dark with the sea breeze blowing over their naked bodies. But where was her father then? And when did he move to Cairo to run this hotel?

  The woman called out, “Mohamed el-Sawi.”

  An old man stood up from his seat near the door and answered her call. He was very dark, short, and lightly built. He wore a gray-striped galabiya and a white skullcap.

  She pointed to Saber and said, “Room thirteen.”

  Saber smiled at the number. He excused himself and went back to the station to get his luggage. When he returned, he followed Mohamed el-Sawi to his room on the third floor. A middle-aged porter, moving far too quickly for his profession, carried his bags. The porter had small,
closely set eyes and a very small head that gave him an air of naivete.

  “What’s your name?” asked Saber.

  “Aly Seriakous.”

  The way he said it told Saber that he was a man who could be bought.

  “Is the old man at the desk the owner of the hotel?”

  “Yes, Mr. Khalil Abul Naga.”

  He was about to ask about the woman when he warned himself that naivete can be a two-edged sword.

  When he was alone he looked over his surroundings. The immediate impression was that of age. High ceiling and a four-poster bed. His father must have enjoyed such surroundings when he made love to his mother. He looked out the window onto a square at the northern end of the street. Children were splashing about in the fountain in the center of the square. He switched on the light and sat on the old divan, closing his eyes. Sexual fantasies, intermingled with dreams of finding his father, swept over him.

  He could hear the call of those almond eyes. She might now be thinking of him and asking herself about the reason for his presence. There was no doubt that she was the girl. He could hear her voice above the din of the festival, telling him sharply not to come near her in this manner.

  You had replied haughtily that no girl had ever spoken to you like that before. She retorted that she did and would repeat it. She left with a vulgar-looking woman, the breeze caressing her hair. Where was Mr. Khalil then? Your eyes met today more than once, and the looks were full of meaning. But no hint of memories past. No hint of long talks by the sea near the overturned fishing boats, conversations that disguised passion and powerful desires. A stolen kiss followed by a friendly tussle. Then you cried out, “One day I’ll pull out those long fingernails!”

  As to the long chase which ended in the dark, that was a total victory, a victory that was followed by disappearance and a long silence. Then sorrow that lasted for a long time until your mother moved from one quarter to the other, and ended in the elegant flat in the Nabi Danial district. Who knows? This hotel might have some connection with that dark night and the girl with carnations in her hair. This woman arouses a tempest of passion in your veins. And you need moments of warmth and passion to ease your search and alleviate the pangs of loneliness. And then, when the miracle occurs, you will cry out, “I’m Saber, Saber Sayed Sayed el-Reheimy! Here is my birth certificate and here is the marriage certificate, and look carefully at this photograph.”