Children of the Alley Read online

  Gabalawi’s shout could be heard even in the garden and the harems: “Get out of here!”

  “This is my house, my mother is here, and she is its rightful mistress, no one can deny it!”

  “You are banished from here forever!”

  His great face darkened until it was the color of the Nile at full flood, and he moved forward with that river’s inexorable majesty, his granite fists clenched. Everyone knew Idris was a dead man. This would be only the latest of the tragedies this house had endured silently. How many pampered women had a single word transformed into wretched beggars? How many men had limped out of this house, after long service, their backs showing welts from lead-tipped whips, their mouths and noses running with blood? The consideration everyone enjoyed in good times was of no help to anyone, no matter how exalted, in times of wrath. So everyone knew Idris was a dead man. Even Idris, the firstborn, his father’s rival in strength and beauty! Gabalawi took two steps closer to him.

  “You are not my son and I am not your father. This is not your house, and you have no mother, brother or friend here. The world is before you—go forth with my anger and my curse. Time passing will teach you your true worth as you wander forlornly, having lost my love and protection!”

  Idris stamped his foot on the Persian carpet. “This is my house—I will never leave!”

  His father grabbed him even before Idris saw him coming, and holding him by the shoulder in a grip tight as a vise, pushed him along in front of him, backward, through the door to the terrace. Idris fell staggering down the stairs, then Gabalawi pushed him down the path enclosed with rosebushes and henna planted over with jasmine, down to the great gate, where he threw him out and bolted the gate. Everyone in the big house heard Gabalawi’s shout. “Damnation to anyone who lets him back in or helps him!”

  He raised his head to the shuttered windows of the harem and shouted again. “And divorce to anyone who dares to try!”

  2

  From that black day onward, Adham went to work in the estate office in the reception hall to the right of the mansion’s main gate. He worked zealously, collecting rents, paying out money to creditors and submitting the accounts to his father. He dealt with the tenants with honesty and decorum, and they liked him although they had a reputation for being surly and crude. The rules of the estate were secret, known only to Gabalawi, whose decision to have Adham run things awakened fears that this might be a prelude to his making Adham his heir. In truth, the father had never betrayed any sign of partiality among his sons until that day, and the brothers had lived harmoniously together thanks to the reverence their father inspired, and his justice, and even Idris—despite his strength, beauty and occasional excess of high spirits—had never offended any of his brothers until that day. He had been a generous and sociable boy who attracted friendship and admiration. Perhaps the four full brothers harbored a feeling of apartness from Adham, though none of them showed him any discourtesy, in word, deed or behavior; and perhaps Adham was most conscious of all of this apartness. He may have been too aware of the difference between their radiant color and his dark color, their strength and his slenderness, their mother’s high status and his mother’s humble origin. And though this may have caused him inner suffering, some pain he repressed, the fragrant air of the house, laden with aromatic herbs, and obedience to his father’s power and wisdom, did not allow any resentment to settle in his soul, and he grew up with a pure heart and mind.

  “Give me your blessing, Mother,” Adham said before reporting to the estate office for the first time, “for what is the work he has entrusted to me but a test for you and me both?”

  “May success be your shadow, my boy,” she answered humbly. “You are a good boy, and good people always prevail.”

  Adham left for the reception hall under the eyes of watchers in the terrace and garden, and those peering from windows. He sat in the official estate trustee’s chair, and began his work. His work was the most important being pursued in the whole desert region between Muqattam on the east and ancient Cairo to the west. Adham’s watchword was honesty, and for the first time in the history of the estate even the tiniest payments were recorded in the ledger. He paid his brothers their salaries with such tact that they forgot the bitterness of their feud with him, and he was prompt in turning all revenues over to his father.

  “How do you like the work, Adham?” his father asked him one day.

  “Because you entrusted it to me, it is the greatest thing in my life,” said Adham humbly.

  The man’s great face beamed, for despite his omnipotence he was charmed by the sound of praise. Adham loved sitting with Gabalawi. When he did, he stole admiring and loving glances at him. And how he loved to listen, with his brothers, to the stories of long ago, the exploits of the adventurers and youths, how Gabalawi had strutted around this area brandishing his fearsome club and conquering every place where he set foot. After Idris was expelled, Abbas, Ridwan and Galil met on the rooftop just as they had before, eating, drinking and gambling; Adham could only relax sitting in the garden. He had loved the garden and loved playing the flute, and he still played it even after he had taken over managing the estate, though he no longer gave it most of his time. If he finished up his work early, he spread out a carpet by the edge of a stream and leaned his back against the trunk of a palm or sycamore tree, or lay flat in a bower of jasmine to rest, gazing at the sparrows and doves. He played his pipe to imitate the chirping, cooing and warbling—what lovely mimicry it was!—or watched the most beautiful of skies through the tree branches. Once his brother Ridwan came by when he was like this and looked at him jeeringly.

  “What a waste of your time, looking after this property!”

  “If I weren’t worried about making our father angry, I’d complain,” Adham said, smiling.

  “Let us praise the Creator of leisure!”

  “May it do you good too,” said Adham innocently.

  Ridwan spoke, masking his provocation with a smile: “Don’t you want to be like us again?”

  “What could be better than spending my time in the garden, with my flute?”

  “Idris was dying to work,” said Ridwan bitterly.

  Adham lowered his gaze. “Idris had no time to work—he got mad for other reasons. This garden is where true happiness is.”

  When Ridwan had gone, Adham said to himself, “The garden and its singing inhabitants, and water, and sky, and my delighted self—this is life. And it’s as if I’m looking for something. But what is it? Sometimes the flute almost tells me what, but the question goes unanswered. If this sparrow could talk, she would tell me so that my heart might rest secure. Even the shining stars know something. As for collecting rents—it’s a false note in my melodies.”

  One day as Adham stood gazing at the shadow he cast on the path between the roses, a second shadow detached itself from his, signaling the arrival of someone from the lane behind him. The new shadow seemed to drift out of his rib cage. He turned around to see a black girl about to flee after noticing his presence. He gestured for her to stay, and she did.

  Adham looked at her for a long time. “Who are you?” he asked softly.

  “Umaima,” she stammered.

  He remembered the name. She was a slave, a relative of his mother’s, and much as his mother would have been before his father married her. He felt like talking to her.

  “What brings you to the garden?”

  “I didn’t think anyone was here,” she answered, her eyes cast down and nearly closed.

  “But you are not allowed here.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said almost inaudibly.

  She backed away until she disappeared in the lane and then his ears caught the sound of her running footsteps. Suddenly he was murmuring feelingly, “You are adorable!” He had never felt more like one of the creatures in the garden than at this moment, and it seemed to him that the roses, jasmine and carnations, the sparrows, doves and he were all part of the same melody. “Umaima is be
autiful—even her thick lips are beautiful. All of my brothers except proud Idris are married, and isn’t my color like hers? And how bewitching it was to see her shadow mingled with mine, as if it were a part of my longing-racked body! My father won’t mock my choice—after all, didn’t he marry my mother?”

  3

  Adham went back to the estate office, his heart overflowing with a beauty as subtle as perfume. He did his best to review the day’s accounts, but the only picture in his mind was of the black girl. It was not strange that he should have seen Umaima for the first time only today, for the women in the mansion were like the internal organs which a man knows of, and thanks to which he lives, but which he never sees. Adham sank into his rosy daydreams until he was torn out of them by an enraged bellow so near that it seemed to be exploding from somewhere in his own office.

  “I am here in the desert, Gabalawi! I curse all of you! A curse on all your heads, men and women, and I challenge anyone who doesn’t like what I have to say! Are you listening, Gabalawi?”

  “Idris!” Adham called, and came into the garden from the foyer. He saw his brother Ridwan coming toward him, looking visibly upset.

  “Idris is drunk,” was Ridwan’s hurried greeting. “I saw him from the window, falling-down drunk. What new scandals are in store for our family?”

  Adham closed his eyes in pain. “My heart is breaking with sorrow, Ridwan.”

  “What should we do? This is a catastrophe threatening us.”

  “Don’t you see that we must talk to our father about this?”

  Ridwan frowned. “Father never changes his mind, and this will only make him twice as mad at Idris.”

  “Can nothing spare us from these troubles?” Adham murmured sadly.

  “Yes, the women are crying in the harem, Abbas and Galil are busy with recriminations, and our father is alone in his chamber and no one dares go near him.”

  Adham was lost in worried thought, sensing that this conversation was leading him into a predicament. “Don’t you see that we must do something?”

  “Of course, all of us want to be safe, and nothing threatens safety more than seeking it at any cost. Besides, I’m not going to do anything rash—not even if the sky falls. As far as family honor goes, it is being soiled this very minute, in the form of Idris.”

  So why did you come to me? Overnight Adham himself had become as inauspicious as a cawing crow. He sighed. “I have nothing to do with all this, but I won’t be able to live with myself if I do nothing.”

  “You have enough reasons that obligate you to do something,” Ridwan told him as he left.

  Adham was left alone, with the words You have enough reasons ringing in his ears. Yes. He was on the spot though he had done nothing. Like a jug crashing onto a man’s head, pushed by the wind. Every time someone felt sorry for Idris, he cursed Adham. Adham headed for the gate, opened it gently and passed through it. Idris was not far off, staggering around in circles and rolling his eyes. His hair was disheveled, and the front of his shirt was open, exposing his chest hair. When his eyes lit on Adham, he bounded up and pounced at him, like a cat diving at a mouse, but he was too drunk and fell down. He gathered dirt in his fist and threw it at Adham. It hit him in the chest and scattered down his cloak.

  “My brother,” Adham said to him gently.

  Idris continued to rage and stumble around. “Shut up, you dog! You son of a bitch! You are not my brother and your father is not my father. I will bring this house down on your heads!”

  “You were the pride of this family,” Adham pleaded. “And one of its noblest sons!”

  Idris cackled humorlessly. “Why did you come here, slave boy? Go to your mother and put her back in the servants’ quarters where she belongs.”

  “Don’t give in to your anger,” said Adham in the same kind tone. “Don’t slam the door on people who want to help you.”

  Idris raised his fist. “It’s a rotten house where only cowards can feel at home, who dunk their food in servility and worship their degradation. I will never come back to any house where you are in charge. Tell your father I am living in the wasteland that produced him, that I’ve become a thief as he was, and an evil troublemaker as he is. Everywhere I spread corruption people will point to me and say, ‘He’s a child of Gabalawi!’ This way I can drag you all through the mud, all of you who think you’re gentlemen, when you’re just thieves.”

  “Wake up, Idris,” Adham begged, “Don’t say things you’ll regret. The way back isn’t closed to you unless you close it yourself. Everything can still be as it was, I promise you.”

  Idris took a halting step toward him, as if walking against the wind.

  “By what power do you make promises, slave boy?”

  Adham gazed at him warily. “The power of brotherhood.”

  “Brotherhood! I shoved that down the first toilet I found.”

  “I’ve never heard you use this kind of language before,” said Adham, sounding pained.

  “Your father’s injustice helped me speak the truth.”

  “I don’t like people seeing you this way.”

  Idris let out a screech of angry laughter. “They’ll see me worse than this every day—I’ll cover you all with shame and scandal and sin. Your father expelled me without a second thought and now he can just take what he gets.”

  He pounced at Adham, who swiftly stepped aside. Idris nearly fell on the ground, but righted himself against the wall, panting with fury as his eyes scanned the ground for a stone. Adham retreated softly to the gate and slipped in, his eyes brimming with tears. Idris was still yelling. Adham turned to the terrace and saw his father through the door as he crossed the hall, then started toward him almost without realizing, his sorrow momentarily stronger than his fear. Gabalawi looked at him, his eyes revealing nothing. His commanding height and broad shoulders loomed against a portrait painted in a wall niche behind him.

  Adham lowered his head somewhat. “Peace be upon you.”

  Gabalawi gave him a searching look, and spoke in a voice that cut to the depths of his heart: “Say what you have come to say.”

  “Father, it’s about my brother Idris—” Adham whispered.

  His father stopped him with a voice like steel on stone: “Don’t mention his name in my presence ever again.” Then, as he went back in: “Get back to work!”

  4

  Still the sun rose and set on the desolate land as Idris deteriorated into ever more terrible mischief, adding some new folly to his credit every day. He loitered outside the mansion, shouting the filthiest curses, or sat near the gate, as naked as the day he was born, basking in the sun and singing the most indecent songs. He roamed the nearby neighborhoods, domain of the bullies and gangsters, menacing pedestrians with rude stares and starting fights with anyone who got in his way. People avoided him and did not speak to him, but whispered to one another, “He’s Gabalawi’s son!” He never worried about food—he simply reached out for whatever food attracted him, whether in a restaurant or on a cart, and ate until he was stuffed, then went on his way without a word of thanks from him or payment for the others. When he felt like fun he reeled into the first bar he found and drank barley beer until he was drunk, at which point he became a veritable fountain of his family’s secrets and all their gossip, their ridiculous traditions and loathsome cowardliness. He particularly emphasized his rebellion against his father, the biggest bastard in the whole city. Then he started rhyming, only to collapse laughing, or singing and dancing, and his happiness was complete if the night ended with a brawl—then he left with a greeting for everyone. He was known everywhere for this behavior. People stayed away from him as much as they could, but were resigned to him as they were to any other natural disaster; his family, of course, suffered terrible pain and sadness. Idris’ mother was defeated by grief, and she became paralyzed and then died. When Gabalawi had come to bid her farewell, she pointed her good hand at him accusingly and fell back dead in sorrow and anger. Grief settled over the family like
a cobweb; the brothers’ long talks on the rooftop stopped, and Adham’s flute was no longer heard in the garden.

  One day Gabalawi exploded again; this time the victim was a woman. His bellowing voice resounded as he cursed Nargis, a servant girl, and threw her out of the house. He had found out that day that she was pregnant, and questioned her until she confessed that Idris had raped her before his expulsion. Nargis left the mansion wailing and smiting her cheeks, and wandered all day long until Idris found her and took her in without welcome but without mistreatment, as the time might come when she would make herself useful.

  But every tragedy, however great, eventually becomes a mere fact of life, and life at the mansion returned to its normal course, just as a populace returns to the homes an earthquake has forced them to leave. Ridwan, Abbas and Galil resumed their evening conversations on the roof, and Adham his evenings communing with his flute. Umaima, he noticed, shed light in his mind and warmed his senses; the image of her shadow mingled with his was sharply etched in his memory, and he went to see his mother in her room, where she sat embroidering a shawl, to tell her everything.

  “She is Umaima, Mother—your relative,” he concluded.

  His mother smiled a rather pallid smile which showed that her pleasure at the news could not erase the pain of her illness, and said, “Yes, Adham, she is a good girl, as right for you as you are for her. She will make you happy, God willing.”

  When she saw a blush of delight appear in his cheeks, she went on. “Don’t show her any attention yet, my boy, or all will be lost. I’ll talk to your father about it, and perhaps I’ll be blessed with the sight of your children before death claims me.”

  Gabalawi did summon him, and when Adham saw his father’s kind smile, he said to himself, “There’s nothing like his severity except his kindness.”

  “Now you’re looking for a wife, Adham. How time goes by! This house scorns the poor, but in choosing Umaima you honor your mother, and you will have fine children. Idris is lost to us, Abbas and Galil have no children, and so far none of Ridwan’s children have lived. None of them have inherited anything but my arrogance. So fill this house with your children, or I will have lived for nothing.”