He saw them turn and move his way, passing by him nonchalantly. He followed them with his gaze and considered trailing after them but changed his mind almost irritably. He loitered by the toy display and gazed at it without seeing anything. Then he looked after them one last time, as if to bid her farewell. She got ever fartier away, vanishing at times behind other people only to appear again. He saw one side of her once and then the other. All the strings of his heart were murmuring, "Farewell". The tormented feeling that gripped him was accompanied by mournful melodies, which were no strangers to him. He was reminded of a comparable situation in the past. This emotion pulsed through him, carrying with it various associated memories. It could have been a mysterious tune, evoking the most sublime pain but at the same time bringing veiled hints of pleasure. It was a single emotion in which pain met pleasure, just as night and day encounter each other at dawn. Then she disappeared, perhaps forever, exactly as her sister had before her.
He found himself wondering who her fiance was. Kamal had not been able to scrutinize the young man, although he would have loved to. He hoped if the man was in the civil service that his rank was inferior to that of a teacher. But what were these childish thoughts? It was embarrassing. As for the pain, a person as experienced with it as he was should not worry, since he would know from experience that its fate like that of all things was death. For the first time, he noticed the toys that were spread before his eyes. The display was beautiful and well arranged. Included in it were all the kinds of toys that children adore: trains, cars, cradles, musical instruments, and dollhouses with gardens. He was so drawn to this sight by the strange force welling up in his tortured soul that he could not take his eyes off the shop window. In his childhood, he had not been allowed to enjoy the paradise of toys. He had grown up harboring this unsatisfied longing, and now it was too late to gratify it. People who spoke of the happiness of childhood what did they know? Who could declare authoritatively that he had been a happy child? How foolish this wretched and unexpected desire was to become a child again, like that wooden one playing in a beautiful make-believe garden…. The impulse was both absurd and sad. By their very nature children tended to be unbearable creatures. Perhaps it was only his vocation that had taught him how to communicate with them and how to guide them. But what would life be like if he returned to his childhood while retaining his adult mind and memories? He would play once more in the roof garden but with a heart filled with memories of Aida. He would go to al-Abbasiya in 1914 and see A'ida playing in the yard. Yet he would be aware of the treatment he would receive at her hands in 1924 and thereafter. Speaking to his father with a lisp, he would disclose that war would break out in 1939 and that al-Sayyid Ahmad would die following an air raid. What foolish thoughts these were…. All the same, they were better than focusing on this new disappointment, which he had just encountered on Fuad I Street. They were better than thinking about Budur, her fiance, and Kamal's relationship to her. Perhaps unconsciously he was atoning for some past error. How and when had that mistake occurred? Whether an act, a word, or a situation, it was the cause of the torment he was suffering. If he came to know himself thoroughly, he could easily separate the cause from the pains it brought. The battle was not over. The capitulation had not yet taken place. Nor should it. Perhaps this was the reason for the infernal vacillation that had left him biting his fingernails while Budur strolled by arm in arm with her fiance. He would have to think twice about this torment that concealed within it a mysterious delight. Had he not experienced it once before, when he was in the desert at al-Abbasiya, looking at the light from the window of Aida's bridal chamber? Had hishesitation with Budur been a trick to put himself into a comparable situation so that he could revive the old sensations, reliving their pleasure and their pain? Before lifting a hand to write about God, the spirit, and matter, he ought to know himself, his individual personality, that of Kamal Effendi Ahmad… Kamal Ahmad… no, just plain Kamal. Then he would be able to create himself anew. He should start that night by reviewing his diary in order to examine the past very carefully. It would be a night without sleep, but not his first. His collection of them could be put into a single album under the title "Sleepless Nights". He should never say that his life had been in vain, for he would leave behind some bones future generations could play with. Budur had vanished from his life forever, and this truth was as doleful as a funeral dirge. She had left behind not a single affectionate memory, not an embrace or a kiss, not even a touch or a kind word.
He no longer feared insomnia. In the past he had faced it alone. Today he had countless ways of diverting his mind and heart. He would go to Atiya in her new house on Muhammad Ali Street. They would continue their endless conversation.
Last time he had told her with a diction slurred by drink, "We're perfect f}r each other."
With resigned irony she had answered, "You're very sweet when you're drunk."
He had continued: "What a happy couple we'll make if we ever get married."
Frowning, she had said, "Don't make fun of me. I've been a lady in every sense of the word."
"Yes. Yes. You're more delectable than ripe fruit."
She had pinched him mischievously, observing, "That's what you say, but if I asked you for an extra twenty piasters, you'd flee."
"What we have goes way beyond money."
Giving him a look of protest, she had remarked, "But I have two children who prefer money to talk about a loving relationship."
His sorrow and intoxication having reached their climax, he had said sarcastically, "I'm thinking of following Madam Jalila's example and repenting. When I become a Sufi, I'll leave you my entire fortune."
Giggling, she had said, "If repentance catches up with you, that will be the end of us."
He had laughed loudly and answered, "If repentance would harm women like you, I'll certainly forget about it."
This was his refuge from insomnia. Realizing that he had tarried by the toy display long enough, he turned and walked away.
163
Khalo, the proprietor of the Star Tavern, asked, "Is it true, my dear, that they're going to close all the bars?"
With confident self-assurance, Yasin replied, "Inconceivable, Khalo! The deputies say all sorts of things when the budget is being debated, and the government complacently promises to investigate the deputies' requests at the earliest opportunity. But this has a way of never arriving."
The members of Yasin's group in the bar on Muhammad Ali Street vied with each other to offer their comments.
The personnel director said, "For as long as anyone can remember they've been promising to throw the British out of Egypt, to open a new university, and to widen al-Khalig Street. Have any of these pledges been kept, Khalo?"
The honorary dean of pensioners observed, "Perhaps the deputy proposing that had drunk some of the lethal wartime liquor and was attempting to get even."
The attorney said, "No matter what, bars on streets visited by foreigners won't be touched. So, Khalo, if the worst happens, just buy into some saloon or other. Like buildings that stand cheek by jowl, dramshop owners support each other."