Mirage

by Soheir Khashoggi

  As if echoing the thought, Farid said, “Your main problem will be overcoming the old way of thinking. You know: Maktub. It is written. It’s God’s will.” He shook his head to indicate that he would say no more on the subject. “Well, we are almost there, gossiping like women as we have been.”

  “Cousin, you say that I can give Mahir hope, but it’s you who have given me hope. I cannot thank you enough. I wonder if one day—soon, God willing—you will come to work with me in Marseilles. We would make a team.”

  Farid smiled. “I may well do it, Cousin. God knows I lack the head to go into the family business.” With that, they were at Omar Badir’s house.

  O

  The home he had grown up in, large as it was, felt somehow smaller than Malik remembered. Even his father seemed a millimeter shorter, a fraction frailer. But the old man still had the look of a falcon, and when the ritual of greeting had been accomplished, the falcon’s eyes fastened on Malik’s suit.

  “Malik was just telling me, Uncle,” Farid said mischievously, “that he’s the best-dressed man in Marseilles.” Farid, for no reason anyone could fathom, was the favorite nephew, allowed to dance where Malik himself feared to tread. “Are we in Marseilles?” Omar smiled, but the smile had a knife’s edge to it. “My apologies, Father,’’ Malik hastened to say. “I fell asleep on the plane”—it wasn’t quite a lie; he had dozed—“and didn’t find time to change.

  I’ll do it now, if you’ll excuse me.”

  “No, no,” said Omar, mollified. “Stay as you are for the time being— until prayer, that is. Meanwhile, there is a man I want you to meet.” He called for Bahia. The servant appeared with a dark-eyed baby in her arms. The infant’s swaddling clothes had been pinned with amulets, each with a Koranic inscription to ward off jinn—the supernatural beings who took shape in order to commit all manner of evil deeds. “Your brother, Yusef,” Omar said proudly to Malik.

  When Malik had learned in France that he had a half-brother, his reaction had been strangely detached, as if he had merely found an interesting story in the newspaper. Now, with the child gurgling and smiling before his eyes, a dangerous undertow of emotions pulled at him.

  Growing up, he had longed for a brother; nearly all his friends had them, often three or four. But this little creature was young enough to be his own child. Suddenly, he had to resist physically the urge to tell Omar that he was not only a father again but also a grandfather. He felt relief when the old man signaled Bahia to take the baby away. It was nearing prayer again.

  After a little conversation about Onassis—Malik found his father’s comments insightful, if perhaps slightly tinged with envy—Omar indicated that the conversation could resume at dinner. “Make yourself at ease,” he told Malik—meaning change into proper garments. “After you’ve paid your respects to your mother, take a moment to do the same with Um Yusef. And don’t neglect your sister. She’s been sticking her head out of the women’s country”—the words referred to the women’s section of the house—“every time the wind blows, thinking it’s you arriving.”

  Malik longed to see his mother and sister, but feared that “paying his respects” to his father’s second wife would be awkward. She was only a matter of months older than he was, and had never appeared to like him. But as it turned out, his stepmother was still so overjoyed at having a son of her own— an accomplishment that earned her the right to be called “Um” or “Mother” of Yusef—that she was positively cordial.

  With a son, Malik reflected with a taste of bitterness, she had a security she had not enjoyed before. A security gained at his own mother’s expense.

  “But you’ll want to say hello to Amira,” she finally burbled. “I think she’s up in her room. Do you know the way? Oh, how stupid of me—of course, you do.”

  Malik climbed the familiar stairs and, in the Western fashion, knocked at the door. For a moment, he didn’t recognize the woman who answered. Then he did.

  Clearly, Amira was the desert flower that waits for the rain to bloom. When he’d last seen her, she’d shown only a hint of ever becoming anything more than a tomboyish adolescent, but before him now stood a beauty. “Little Sister?” he heard himself ask.

  “Who else, big Brother idiot,” she said and threw herself into his arms. How was he, how was Marseilles, how did he like being in al-Remal—as always, she was full of questions.

  “Has Farid spoken with you?” Malik managed to interject. “About his idea for Laila?” The rudeness was forgivable. Time was short: the radio was cautioning that prayer time was near.

  “Yes. Meet me in the garden after dinner. Then we can talk.”

  “All right. Oh! I met our new brother.”

  “He’s a sweetness. But did you notice the charms?”

  “Yes.” The custom of covering an infant with protective amulets was widespread, but among educated people, it was only a custom. To take it seriously carried a certain aura of peasant superstition. Commenting on it at all was a small, delicious act of brother-sister conspiracy against their father’s second wife.

  “You see what I must live with,” said Amira, “although certainly she’s more pleasant than she once was. Go. We’ll talk later.”

  Malik hurried to his room to find a thobe and sandals to replace his suit and shoes. Already, the radio was sounding the muezzin’s call, every line but the final one repeated:

  “God is more great.

  I testify that there is no god but God.

  I testify that Mohammed is the Prophet of God.

  Come to prayer. Come to salvation.

  Prayer is better than sleep. There is no god but God.”

  In the darkening garden, Malik wandered among the oleander and bougainvillea, savoring the fragrance, smiling at the sound of the little fountain whose tiny trickle proclaimed his father’s wealth. He remembered the story, famously known, that when the Americans and British had first come to search for oil, the king of al-Remal had prayed that their drills would strike water instead.

  It was the beautiful hour, as Malik had always thought of it, the interval just before night, when day’s heat had broken and was radiating back to the sky, making the bright early stars shimmer against a background of deepest cerulean. France had many wonders, but none to match the desert stars of al-Remal.

  “Brother?”

  “Who else, Little Sister idiot.”

  Laughing, Amira stepped from the shadows to take his hand. “I’ve missed you,” she said simply.

  “And I you.”

  “I doubt that you’ve had time to miss anyone. Your days must be very busy. Not to mention your nights.”

  “My days certainly. My nights, I’m afraid, are rather lonely.”

  “I’m sorry, Brother. I wasn’t thinking. I suppose I was just being jealous.” “Jealous?”

  “Envious.” Amira looked up at the sky, but there was no longer enough light to read her expression. “Sometimes, I think I’d give anything to do what you’re doing.”

  “To work like a slave for Onassis?”

  “I don’t know. To be in France. To do as I wished.”

  “And what would that be?”

  “I don’t know that, either. To go to school, I think. A real school.”

  It was what she had always wanted, but to hear it from this new Amira, this stunning young woman, made it different—more serious, yet also more disconcerting. His sister had always been unusual. He remembered her courage that day in the square, when his own courage had nearly failed. “I said once that you might have to leave al-Remal,” he told her. “Do you remember?”

  She made a gesture of impatience. “A dream,” she said. The moon, nearly full, peeked over the garden wall, throwing date palms into silhouette. “I still have Nanny Karin. We study together now. She orders books from London. I pay half, sometimes more. And Farid brings us little lessons in mathematics.”

  “What does Father say about all this?”

  “You know Father. He’s a dinosaur, certainly
, but he can surprise you by taking an enlightened view now and then—especially if there’s gain in it. I’ve convinced him that times are changing and that an education will make me a more valuable wife.”

  It took Malik a moment to realize what she was saying. “Surely, he’s not thinking of marriage for you just yet.”

  “Of course, he is. Why wouldn’t he be?” “He’s spoken of it?”

  “No. But he’s thinking of it.”

  “Does he have anyone in mind?” The whole topic had caught Malik by surprise.

  “I think he’s considered several candidates. He drops little hints now and then—praise of this one, criticism of that one, to see how I’ll react, I suppose. But he’s said nothing outright.”

  Malik had the odd sensation that time had slipped. It was impossible that he should be talking with Amira about her marriage. Only yesterday, she’d been the vexatious little sister rushing in to kick the soccer ball he and his cousins were passing—right over there, two date palms for goalposts.

  “Well, it’s early yet,” he muttered, trying to remember what a brother’s role was supposed to be in all this. “You’re still very young.” But that was his year in France talking, he knew. Here in al-Remal, their father might choose a husband for Amira tomorrow.

  “I don’t want to marry,” said Amira, “but I must. I don’t want to leave this house, but I do. I want to go to school in Europe, but I can’t.” In her voice, Malik heard the rebellious girl who had disguised herself in order to drive a car, but in the moonlight, silver-bright now, tears glinted on her cheeks. “I won’t marry someone I don’t want,” she said. ‘‘I won’t be like Mother. I won’t be like Laila. I won’t!”

  “Of course not, Little Sister,” he comforted her, though the mention of Laila cut deep. “God willing, when the time comes, there’ll be someone wonderful, and you’ll have a wonderful life together.” He felt like a fool saying it, but what else was there to say?

  Amira was silent for a moment. Then, as if they had been chatting about old times all along, she said, “Did I tell you that I see Um Salih often these days? She helped with Yusef ’s birth. Of course, that was my doing. But now Um Yusef worships her. She’ll be on the list for Ramadan money from now on.”

  “In other words,” said Malik, glad that the subject had changed, “Father’s paying her, and I’m paying her. That old woman will own al-Remal before she’s through.”

  “It’s possible. I’ve never known anyone like her. She’s a force of nature.” Now she was smiling.

  The quickness with which a woman’s mood could change, Malik told himself, was a thing he would never understand.

  “Listen,” Amira went on. “Farid’s plan is a good one. Are you going to do it?”

  “I’m going to talk with Mahir Najjar, but Farid says the man won’t agree to it.”

  “I think he will. Um Salih says they both want children more than anything. She also thinks that whatever the problem is, it can be fixed. ‘A cracked pitcher, not a broken one,’ as she puts it. Of course, that’s pure intuition, not a shred of medical science in it. But she has a way of being right in these matters.”

  “As I said, I’ll talk with Mahir. If he does agree, it shouldn’t take me more than a few days to arrange the papers. We employ hundreds of foreign workers, and Onassis makes sure that the bureaucrats are well oiled.” Amira said quietly, “So little Laila will grow up in France, lnshallah.” “Inshallah.”

  “I wonder, Brother—it’s something I’ve meant to ask: Do you plan to raise her in the faith?”

  It was a question Malik had thought about often, but had never tried to put into words. “If all goes well, Salima Najjar will be doing most of the raising for a while, so there’s that to consider. But later … it’s hard to explain. I still believe in God. How else can this be explained?”—he swept a hand toward the diamond heavens—“And I still believe that Mohammed is his prophet. But I can’t believe in—can’t accept—some of the things that are done in God’s name or Mohammed’s.”

  Amira nodded. “Those are my feelings, as well.” They had lowered their voices even though there was no one to hear. The words they were speaking were forbidden.

  “Of course,” said Malik, “when she’s of an age, I’ll force her to take the veil, make sure she never sees the inside of a book, and—”

  “You can’t be serious!”

  “No, but I wanted to see the look on your face.” “Idiot.”

  “What I really think,” Malik said contemplatively, “is that when Laila is your age, it will be very hard to tell her from any other little Francaise.”

  “I like that picture. I don’t know how it will sit with Father, though.” She came close and hugged him tight. “I’ve missed you, Brother.’’

  “And I you.”

  They talked in the garden long into the night; there was no certainty when, if ever, they would have an hour alone together again.

  O

  With Farid as the go-between, Malik arranged a meeting with Mahir Najjar. His home was no place to talk business, Mahir insisted; he was beset there by relatives and in-laws, he claimed.

  Suspecting that the man wanted mainly to be out of the hearing of his wife, Malik agreed to meet on neutral ground: a coffeehouse in a poor section of town, where neither man was likely to encounter close acquaintances. “I will want to see my daughter,” Malik added, “whether or not we come to some agreement.” In order not to be conspicuous in the neighborhood, he borrowed a thobe of Farid’s that had seen better days. He went early, just after dark, and sipped coffee and sweetened tea while a storyteller related an adventure of the hero Antar, known all across the Middle East.

  The son of a desert sheik and a black slave from Africa, Antar had gained his freedom through acts of bravery, and though he was ruthless against his enemies, he was always a friend to those who suffered injustice at the hands of the powerful. In this particular story, Antar was in danger because of his love for the daughter of a prince.

  Malik had heard it before, but the storyteller was not unskilled, and it was pleasant to sit in the crowded coffeehouse, a man among his countrymen, needing no explanation except that he was there.

  Mahir arrived and stood against the wall while the inevitable tragic death of the girl and Antar’s fierce retribution against her evil father were recounted. With the tale’s end, the crowd thinned, and Malik and Mahir took a table that offered a reasonable degree of privacy.

  Mahir Najjar was a small, rather dark-skinned man several years older than Malik. He had perpetually sad eyes, so that a nervous tic that occasionally twitched his nose and mustache caused him to resemble a melancholy rabbit.

  One thing Malik had learned was the worth of appearances. With the possible exception of Farid, he trusted Mahir as much as any man he knew. After the necessary courtesies, Malik decided on a direct approach. “A man in my position needs a driver,” he stated flatly, “and I thought of your honorable self before anyone else.”

  Without mentioning Salima, he added that he would be needing a cook and someone to look after his child, making it clear that Laila would be going to France one way or the other. He would pay well for these services, he said. He named a figure.

  On hearing it, Mahir’s eyes became sadder and his tic more noticeable. “As always, sir, you are most generous. But I already have an excellent position driving a water truck for the oil Americans.”

  “Ah. Well, then, you are to be congratulated for your industry and initiative. I’m sure you’ve heard, as I have, that many who work for the Americans find many opportunities to better themselves. Why, one fellow even went on to become a millionaire.”

  Mahir nodded tentatively, as if he were not sure where Malik was going. “Naturally, I would not want you to pass up an opportunity for such wealth. Nevertheless, I still need a driver and a cook.” Malik named a higher figure.

  Mahir thanked him. “But France is far away,” he pointed out, “and a man has responsibilities to
his kin, as well as to himself.”

  “Quite right,” Malik agreed—and then named a still higher figure, insisting that it was final. “And the move to France need not be permanent,” he noted.

  Mahir’s eyes became sadder than ever. “If I were only younger, sir,” he lamented, “if it were not for my relatives …”

  “Well,” said Malik, with a hint of exasperation, “this is either written—mak- tub—or it is not.”

  Mahir agreed that this was certainly true.

  For a moment, Malik feared that they were genuinely at an impasse. Yet, Mahir made no sign of breaking off the discussion. Instead, after a suitable interval, he said deferentially, “Tell me, Malik, son of Omar, will you be coming home soon to claim a bride of your own?”

  Malik smiled inwardly; Farid had prepared the ground well. “I doubt it,” he said casually. “What’s the hurry?”

  “Very wise, very wise. Sometimes, I wish I had waited myself. But don’t you feel the need to start a family, while you are still young?”

  “Oh, I suppose every man feels that way, but as I said, what’s the rush?” “Indeed, indeed, plenty of time.” The eyes were no longer sad, and the tic was much diminished.

  “Possibly, I’ve been in France too long, Mahir, and I have become infected with French ways.” Malik explained that the French were late marriers, not only the men, but the women. French females not uncommonly married as late as twenty-five. Even thirty. “No, don’t look at me like that, Mahir. It’s the truth.”

  “But who would marry a woman of that age, unless he were very old himself, or she were rich?”

  “Well, why not? Frenchwomen keep their looks very well—much better than ours do, I’m ashamed to say. Besides, even at thirty, they can have as many children as they want.’’

  “Now how can that be?” The eyes were those of a man with fever, and the tic had vanished entirely.

  Malik shrugged. “It’s simply a question of medical science. Unfortunately, we have nothing like it here.” He paused for effect. “There have even been cases where women of advanced age had other difficulties. Yet, the French doctors can remedy these as well.”