His only cause for regret in those days was his brother’s bad luck. His sorrow was compounded when it was decided that Dawud would be sent to France. He asked his friend, Shaykh al-Mu‘awiya, who had replaced Shaykh al-Qalyubi at al-Azhar when the elder retired in old age, “What did Dawud do wrong, Shaykh Mu‘awiya?”
“Not all infidel learning is heresy. Nor is living in an infidel country. Let God take care of your brother,” the shaykh replied.
Aziz entered the furnace of adolescence and, despite his piety, began to stray. “We must marry him,” Yazid said to Farga.
“Your friend Ata’s daughter, Ni‘ma, is pleasant and suitable.”
The girl was wedded to Aziz at his father’s house in al-Ghuriya. Two years later his friend Shaykh Mu‘awiya married Galila al-Tarabishi at the house in Suq al-Zalat. Yazid al-Misri and Farga lived to see the births of Rashwana, Amr, and Surur, then Yazid died at work at the paper supplier. He was buried in the enclosure he built near the tomb of Sidi Nagm al-Din after he dreamed he saw the master inviting him to be beside him. Farga al-Sayyad joined him a year later. Significant events took place: Ni‘ma’s mother, Sakina, died; Ata al-Murakibi married the rich widow who lived on the top floor of the house opposite the shop and suddenly moved into a higher class. He built a mansion on Khayrat Square and purchased a farm in Beni Suef. He fathered Mahmud and Ahmad in old age and began a new life as though he was in a dream. Aziz Effendi found himself related by marriage to an important nobleman while his wife, Ni‘ma, found herself the daughter of a grandee. Tongues wagged with the tale of Ata al-Murakibi, his luck, and how his rich wife melted under his wing. Yet neither Ni‘ma nor her family enjoyed the benefits, with the exception of a few presents on festivals.
“If the wife dies before the husband, he and his sons will be beneficiaries and your wife will be too. But if he dies first your wife won’t get anything,” Shaykh Mu‘awiya said to his friend Aziz.
Ata and Aziz’s families exchanged visits and Amr, Surur, and Rashwana played with Mahmud and Ahmad. Aziz would run his eyes over the garden and objets d’art and mutter to himself, “Glory be to the Bestower of graces, the Giver.”
“He’s a boor and doesn’t deserve such blessings,” he said to his friend, Shaykh Mu‘awiya.
“God has reasons,” replied the shaykh.
Meanwhile, Dawud returned from France as a doctor, married al-Warraq’s granddaughter, took up residence in a house in al-Sayyida, and brought Abd al-Azim into the world. Aziz Effendi educated his two sons, Amr and Surur, then Amr was appointed to the ministry of education and Surur to the railways. Rashwana married Sadiq Barakat, the flour merchant in al-Khurnfush. She was wedded to him in his house in Bayn al-Qasrayn. Amr married Shaykh Mu‘awiya’s oldest daughter, Radia, and Surur married Zaynab al-Naggar. The brothers moved into two adjacent houses on Bayt al-Qadi Square. When the Urabi Revolution came, Aziz supported it with all his heart, but Shaykh Mu‘awiya supported it with his heart and his tongue and was incarcerated when the revolution was quashed.
Amr and Radia’s marriage took place in the period following the shaykh’s release, but the shaykh was not permitted to attend the wedding ceremony for he died a week after the engagement was announced and the opening sura read. Aziz Effendi was blessed with good health, longevity, and a happy marriage and did not suffer poverty or deprivation. He enjoyed close family ties with his relatives on Khayrat Square and in al-Sayyida and Suq al-Zalat. His children venerated him just as he rejoiced in their education, entry into government service, and sporting of suits and tarbooshes. As the days passed, he began to take pride in his younger brother’s status and rank, especially once he was confident of his faith, observance of religious duties, and loyalty; that their two families could sit together around the table whenever he visited; and that they could walk together around al-Hussein and al-Qarafa. God was kind to him. He witnessed the birth of his grandchildren and was afforded a chaste departure at the end, for he died kneeling on his prayer mat one morning in autumn at home in al-Ghuriya. He was buried next to his father in the family enclosure, which later became known as “The Enclosure of Nagm al-Din.”
Iffat Abd al-Azim Pasha
She was born and grew up in the family villa on Sarayat Road in East Abbasiya. She was the last of Abd al-Azim Pasha Dawud and Farida Husam’s offspring after Lutfi, Ghassan, Halim, and Fahima. Iffat was born for great beauty. Blending her Syrian mother’s fairness and father’s tanned complexion, her cheeks were rosy and wheat-colored while a look of dominion and cunning could be detected in her black almond eyes. She lived comfortably in the elegant villa surrounded by rank and medals, and so, like other members of her family, got up onto feet rooted firmly in pride, superiority, and conceit. From the start, her father did not want his daughters to be illiterate, or near illiterate, like the girls in other branches of the family. Nor did he view their education as a preliminary to a career, which was how he saw it for the daughters of the poor among the general public. He therefore elected to give them a sophisticated education that he believed would set them up to marry eminent men. He found what he was looking for in the European schools, more particularly La Mère de Dieu. Iffat studied French, English, belles lettres, home economics, and music. Her soul was imbued with foreign tradition so that in taste, mentality, and heritage she appeared European to the observer. Although she never uttered a word to dishonor Islam, she knew nothing of her religion or history, and although she lived through the 1919 Revolution, she displayed no affiliation to her country other than some superficial enthusiasm for her father’s political position born out of pride and family sentiment.
Yet her natural impulses revolted against all this, for from childhood her heart inclined to Amer, a relative on her father’s side. In those days family ties meant more than class, status, rank, and fortune. Visits to Bayt al-Qadi, with their unusual scenes, peasant food, and Radia’s mysteries, were enjoyable excursions for the Dawud family, though their sense of superiority never left them. Amer and Iffat’s mutual affection thus met no opposition, indeed was welcomed, in Abd al-Azim’s house. Expectations for daughters were, in any case, different to expectations for sons: the Dawud family could give a daughter to an acceptable son from Amr’s family, but if a son coveted one of Amr or Surur’s daughters, it constituted a serious aberration and had to be firmly suppressed. Amr’s gentle manners allowed him to tolerate such a position and he looked for reasons to excuse it. It did not, however, escape the vicious tongue of Surur, who was consequently not as close to hearts in al-Murakibi or Dawud’s families. When the need arose he would comment ironically, “How come the great family of Ata has forgotten the pantofles and the shop in al-Salihiya? How come Dawud’s family has forgotten Uncle Yazid and Farga al-Sayyad?”
When the time came for Iffat to marry, the pasha had a beautiful house in Bayn al-Ganayin built, where she turned to meet the happy married life that would shatter the theories of its opponents. True, from the beginning she behaved like a princess whom circumstances had placed amid the herd, and the new setup created certain tensions between her and Amer’s sisters, Surur’s daughters, Shakira when she became her sister-in-law, and even Radia herself despite her friendship with Farida Husam. But the quarrels never reached the point of rupture or enmity; traditional bonds of friendship always triumphed. As for the married couple, they lived in sweetness and peace. Amer submitted fully to his beloved’s strong will; he seldom raised an angry voice and they never argued. Iffat gave birth to Shakir, Qadri, and Fayyid but she was not able to extend the umbrella of her authority over them. Shakir hurt her pride and Qadri aroused her fear and anxiety. Yet the three were good examples of nobility and success. The July Revolution came, then successive defeats, then victory and peace, then clouds of strife and crime gathered once more. Meanwhile, Iffat sought refuge in the fort of the observer and let none of this worry her except insofar as her family and children were directly affected. She grew old and her arrogant tendencies calmed. Despite the stream of events, she lived happily with the love of her life, children, and grandchildren until Amer disappeared from her world in a blink of an eye, in the middle of a conversation. Thereafter, her life was silent and overshadowed with constant gloom.