Arabian Nights and Days Read online

  “Then there is no mercy, no pardon,” he exclaimed.

  “Sir, why don’t you kill him yourself?”

  “He has brought me under his power with black magic,” he said with exasperation, “and he makes use of me in accomplishing purposes that my conscience does not approve of.”

  “But you are a force surpassing black magic.”

  “We are nevertheless subject to specific laws. Stop arguing—you must either accept or refuse.”

  “Have you no other wishes?” said Sanaan urgently. “I have plenty of money, also goods from India and China.”

  “Don’t waste time uselessly, you fool.”

  In utter despair, he said, “I’m at your disposal.”

  “Take care not to attempt to trick me.”

  “I have resigned myself to my fate.”

  “You will be in my grasp even if you were to take refuge in the mountains of Qaf at the ends of the world.”

  At that, Sanaan felt a sharp pain in his arm. He let out a scream that tore at his depths.

  II

  Sanaan opened his eyes to the voice of Umm Saad saying, “What’s made you sleep so late?” She lit the candle and he began to look about him in a daze. If it were a dream, why did it fill him more than wakefulness itself? He was so alive that he was terrified. Nevertheless he entertained thoughts of escape, and feelings of grateful calm took control of him. The world was brought back to its proper perspective after total ruin. How wonderful was the sweetness of life after the torture of hellfire!

  “I take refuge in God from the accursed Devil,” he sighed.

  Umm Saad looked at him as she tucked scattered locks of hair inside the kerchief round her head, sleep having affected the beauty of her face with a sallow hue. Intoxicated with the sensation of having made his escape, he said, “Praise be to God, Who has rescued me from grievous trouble.”

  “May God protect us, O father of Fadil.”

  “A terrible dream, Umm Saad.”

  “God willing, all will be well.”

  She led the way to the bathroom and lit a small lamp in the recess. Following her, he said, “I spent part of my night with a genie.”

  “How is that, you being the God-fearing man you are?”

  “I shall recount it to Sheikh Abdullah al-Balkhi. Go now in peace that I may make my ablutions.”

  As he was doing so and washing his left forearm, he stopped, trembling all over.

  “O my Lord!”

  He began looking aghast at the wound, which was like a bite. It was no illusion that he was seeing, for blood had broken through where the fangs had penetrated the flesh.

  “It is not possible.”

  In terror he hurried off toward the kitchen. As she was lighting the oven, Umm Saad asked, “Have you made your ablutions?”

  “Look,” he said, stretching out his arm.

  “What has bitten you?” the woman gasped.

  “I don’t know.”

  Overcome by anxiety, she said, “But you slept so well.”

  “I don’t know what happened.”

  “Had it happened during the day…”

  “It didn’t happen during the day,” he interrupted her.

  They exchanged an uneasy look fraught with suppressed thoughts.

  “Tell me about the dream,” she said with dread.

  “I told you it was a genie,” he said dejectedly. “It was a dream, though.”

  Once again they exchanged glances and the pain of anxiety.

  “Let it be a secret,” said Umm Saad warily.

  He understood the secret of her fears that corresponded to his own, for if mention were made of the genie, he did not know what would happen to his reputation as a merchant on the morrow, nor to what the reputation of his daughter Husniya and his son Fadil would be exposed. The dream could bring about total ruin. Also, he was sure of nothing.

  “A dream’s a dream,” said Umm Saad, “and the secret of the wound is known to God alone.”

  “This is what one must remind oneself,” he said in despair.

  “The important thing now is for you to have it treated without delay, so go now to your friend Ibrahim the druggist.”

  How could he arrive at the truth? He was so burdened with anxiety that he was enraged and boiled with anger. He felt his position going from bad to worse. All his feelings were charged with anger and resentment, while his nature deteriorated as though he were being created anew in a form that was at variance with his old deep-rooted gentleness. No longer could he put up with the woman’s glances; he began to hate them, to loathe her very thoughts. He felt a desire to destroy everything that existed. Unable to control himself, he pierced her with a glance filled with hatred and resentment, as though it were she who was responsible for his plight. Turning his back on her, he went off.

  “This is not the Sanaan of old,” she muttered.

  He found Fadil and Husniya in the living room in a dim light that spilled out through the holes of the wooden latticework. Their faces were distraught at the way his excited voice had been raised. His anger increased and, very unlike himself, he shouted, “Get out of my sight!”

  He closed the door of his room behind him and began examining his arm. Fadil boldly joined him.

  “I trust you are all right, father,” he said anxiously.

  “Leave me alone,” he said gruffly.

  “Did a dog bite you?”

  “Who said so?”

  “My mother.”

  He appreciated her wisdom in saying this and he agreed, but his mood did not improve.

  “It’s nothing. I’m fine, but leave me on my own.”

  “You should go to the druggist.”

  “I don’t need anybody to tell me that,” he said with annoyance.

  Outside, Fadil said to Husniya, “How changed father is!”

  III

  For the first time in his life, Sanaan al-Gamali left his house without performing his prayers. He went at once to the shop of Ibrahim the druggist, an old friend and neighbor in the commercial street. When the druggist saw his arm, he said in astonishment, “What sort of dog was this! But then there are so many stray dogs…”

  He set about making a selection of herbs, saying, “I have a prescription that never fails.”

  He boiled up the herbs until they deposited a sticky sediment. Having washed the wound with rose water, he covered it with the mixture, spreading it over with a wooden spatula, then bound up the arm with Damascene muslin, muttering, “May it be healed, God willing.”

  At which, despite himself, Sanaan said, “Or let the Devil do what he may.”

  Ibrahim the druggist looked quizzically into his friend’s flushed face, amazed at how much he had changed.

  “Don’t allow a trifling wound to affect your gentle nature.”

  With a melancholy face, Sanaan made off, saying, “Ibrahim, don’t trust this world.”

  How apprehensive he was! It was as though he had been washed in a potion of fiery peppers. The sun was harsh and hot, people’s faces were glum.

  Fadil had arrived at the shop before him and met him with a beaming smile which only increased his ill humor. He cursed the heat, despite his well-known acceptance of all kinds of weather. He greeted no one and scarcely returned a greeting. He was cheered by neither face nor word. He laughed at no joke and took no warning note at a funeral passing. No comely face brought him pleasure. What had happened? Fadil worked harder in order to intervene as far as possible between his father and the customers. More than one inquired of Fadil in a whisper, “What’s up with your father today?”

  The young man could only reply, “He’s indisposed—may God show you no ill.”

  IV

  It was not long before his condition was made known to the habitués of the Café of the Emirs. He made his way to them with a gloomy countenance and either sat in silence or engaged only in distracted conversation. He no longer made his amusing comments; quickly dispirited, he soon left the café.

&nbs
p; “A wild dog bit him,” Ibrahim the druggist said.

  And Galil the draper commented, “He’s utterly lost to us.”

  While Karam al-Aseel, the man with millions and the face of a monkey, said, “But his business is flourishing.”

  And the doctor Abdul Qadir al-Maheeni said, “The value of money evaporates when you’re ill.”

  And Ugr the barber, the only one among those sitting on the floor who would sometimes thrust himself into the conversation of the upper-class customers, said philosophically, “What is a man? A bite from a dog or a fly’s sting…”

  But Fadil shouted at him, “My father’s fine. It’s only that he’s indisposed—he’ll be all right by daybreak.”

  —

  But he went deeper and deeper into a state that became difficult to control. Finally, one night he swallowed a crazy amount of dope and left the café full of energy and ready to brave the unknown. Disliking the idea of going home, he went stumbling around in the dark, driven on by crazed fantasies. He hoped for some action that might dispel his rebellious state of tension and relieve it of its torment. He brought to mind women from his family who were long dead and they appeared before him naked and in poses that were sexually suggestive and seductive, and he regretted not having had his way with a single one of them. He passed by the cul-de-sac of Sheikh Abdullah al-Balkhi and for an instant thought of visiting him and confiding to him what had occurred, but he hurried on. In the light of a lamp hanging down from the top of the door of one of the houses he saw a young girl of ten going on her way, carrying a large metal bowl. He rushed toward her, blocking her way and inquiring, “Where are you going, little girl?”

  “I’m going back to my mother,” she replied innocently.

  He plunged into the darkness till he could see her no more.

  “Come here,” he said, “and I’ll show you something nice.”

  He picked her up in his arms and the water from the pickles spilt over his silken garment. He took her under the stairway of the elementary school. The girl was puzzled by his strange tenderness and didn’t feel at ease with him.

  “My mother’s waiting,” she said nervously.

  But he had stirred her curiosity as much as her fears. His age, which reminded her of her father, induced in her a sort of trust, a trust in which an unknown disquiet was mixed with the anticipation of some extraordinary dream. She let out a wailing scream which tore apart his compassionate excitement and sent terrifying phantoms into his murky imagination. He quickly stifled her mouth with the trembling palm of his hand. A sudden return to his senses was like a slap in the face, as he came back to earth.

  “Don’t cry. Don’t be frightened,” he whispered entreatingly.

  Despair washed over him until it demolished the pillars on which the earth was supported. Out of total devastation he heard the tread of approaching footsteps. Quickly he grasped the thin neck in hands that were alien to him. Like a rapacious beast whose foot has slipped, he tumbled down into an abyss. He realized that he was finished and noticed that a voice was calling, “Baseema…Baseema, my girl.”

  In utter despair he said to himself, “It is inevitable.”

  It became clear that the footsteps were approaching his hiding-place. The light from a lamp showed up dimly. He was driven by a desire to go out carrying the body with him. Then the presence of something heavy overtook his own collapsing presence, the memory of the dream took him by storm. He heard the voice of two days ago inquiring, “Is this what we pledged ourselves to?”

  “You are a fact, then, and not a dire dream,” he said in surrender.

  “You are without doubt mad.”

  “I agree, but you are the cause.”

  “I never asked you to do something evil,” the voice said angrily.

  “There’s no time for arguing. Save me, so that I can carry out for you what was agreed.”

  “This is what I came for, but you don’t understand.”

  He felt himself moving in a vacuum in an intensely silent world. Then he again heard the voice, “No one will find a trace of you. Open your eyes and you will find that you are standing in front of the door of your house. Enter in peace, I shall be waiting.”

  V

  With a superhuman effort Sanaan took control of himself. Umm Saad did not feel that his condition had deteriorated. Taking refuge behind his eyelids in the darkness, he set about calling to mind what he had done. He was another person; the killer-violator was another person. His soul had begotten wild beings of which he had no experience. Now, divested of his past and having buried all his hopes, he was presenting himself to the unknown. Though he hadn’t slept, no movement escaped him to indicate that he had been without sleep. Early in the morning there came the sound of wailing. Umm Saad disappeared for a while, then returned and said, “O mother of Baseema, may God be with you.”

  “What’s happened?” he asked, lowering his gaze.

  “What’s got into people, father of Fadil? The girl’s been raped and murdered under the elementary school stairway. A mere child, O Lord. Under the skin of certain humans lie savage beasts.”

  He bowed his head until his beard lay disheveled against his chest.

  “I take my refuge in God from the accursed Devil,” he muttered.

  “These beasts know neither God nor Prophet.”

  The woman burst into tears.

  He began to ask himself: Was it the genie? Was it the dope he had swallowed? Or was it Sanaan al-Gamali?

  VI

  The thoughts of everyone in the quarter were in turmoil. The crime was the sole subject of conversation. Ibrahim the druggist, as he prepared him more medicine, said, “The wound has not healed, but there is no longer any danger from it.” Then, as he bound his arm with muslin, “Have you heard of the crime?”

  “I take refuge in God,” he said in disgust.

  “The criminal’s not human. Our sons marry directly they reach puberty.”

  “He’s a madman, there’s no doubt of that.”

  “Or he’s one of those vagabonds who haven’t got the means to marry. They are milling around the streets like stray dogs.”

  “Many are saying that.”

  “What is Ali al-Salouli doing in the seat of government?”

  At mention of the name he quaked, remembering the pact he had made, a pact that hung over his head like a sword. “Busy with his own interests,” he concurred, “and counting the presents and the bribes.”

  “The favors he rendered us merchants cannot be denied,” said the druggist, “but he should remember that his primary duty is to maintain things as they are for us.”

  Sanaan went off with the words, “Don’t put your trust in the world, Ibrahim.”

  VII

  The governor of the quarter, Ali al-Salouli, knew from his private secretary Buteisha Murgan what was being said about security. He was frightened that the reports would reach the vizier Dandan and that he would pass them on to the sultan, so he called the chief of police, Gamasa al-Bulti, and said to him, “Have you heard what is being said about security during my time in office?”

  The chief of police’s inner calm had not changed when he had learned about his superior’s secrets and acts of corruption.

  “Excuse me, governor,” he said, “but I have not been negligent or remiss in sending out spies. However, the villain has left no trace and we haven’t found a single witness. I myself have interrogated dozens of vagabonds and beggars, but it’s an unfathomable crime, unlike anything that has previously happened.”

  “What a fool you are! Arrest all the vagabonds and beggars—you’re an expert on the effective means of interrogation.”

  “We haven’t the prisons to take them,” said Gamasa warily.

  “What prisons, fellow? Do you want to impose upon the public treasury the expense of providing them with food?” said the governor in a rage. “Drive them into the open and seek the help of the troops—and bring me the criminal before nightfall.”

  VIII
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br />   The police swooped down on the plots of wasteland and arrested the beggars and vagabonds, then drove them in groups into the open. No complaint and no oath availed, no exception was made of old men. Force was used against them until they prayed fervently for help to God and to His Prophet and the members of his family.

  Sanaan al-Gamali followed the news with anxious alarm: he was the guilty one, of this there was no doubt, and yet he was going about free and at large, being treated with esteem. How was it that he had become the very pivot of all this suffering? And someone unknown was lying in wait for him, someone indifferent to all that had occurred, while he was utterly lost, succumbing without condition. As for the old Sanaan, he had died and been obliterated, nothing being left of him but a confused mind that chewed over memories as though they were delusions.

  He became conscious of a clamor sweeping down the commercial street. It was Ali al-Salouli, governor of the quarter, making his way at the head of a squadron of cavalry, reminding people of the governor’s power and vigilance, a challenge to any disorder. As he proceeded he replied to the greetings of the merchants to right and left. This was the man he had undertaken to kill. His heart overflowed with fear and loathing. This was the secret of his torment. It was he who had chosen to liberate the genie from his black magic. It was the genie alone who had done this. His escape was conditional on his doing away with al-Salouli. His eyes became fixed on the dark, well-filled face, pointed beard and stocky body. When he passed in front of the shop of Ibrahim the druggist, the owner hurried up to him and they shook hands warmly. Then, passing before Sanaan’s shop, he happened to glance toward it and smiled so that Sanaan had no choice but to cross over and shake him by the hand, at which al-Salouli said to him, “We’ll be seeing you soon, God willing.”

  Sanaan al-Gamali returned to the shop, asking himself what he had meant. Why was he inviting him to a meeting? Why? Was he finding the path made easy for him in a way he had not expected? A shudder passed through him from top to toe. In a daze he repeated his words, “I’ll be seeing you soon, God willing.”