They fell silent. Magd al-Din and Dimyan exchanged glances. The train had stopped at a station. The abonne stopped talking then stood to look out the window at the platform.
“Nobody got on. Nobody got off,” he said. “The station-master didn’t even leave his room.”
The train moved on.
22
What do the armies of the Earth amount to?
Look at the moon in the sky.
Magd al-Din had never before seen such an arid expanse before, True, there is open space in the countryside, but it is an expanse of soft green fields teeming with birds flying and humans playing or working peacefully. Next to the water wheels you can see children having fun, animals sleeping, women talking, old men playing tictac-toe, and ducks splashing in the water on which willows cast their shadows, while on the land, camphor, sycamore, and oak trees cast theirs. Now as Magd al-Din stood on the short, low platform of al-Alamein. railway station next to Dimyan, he was seeing nothing but a wilderness, with no birds and no trees. Dimyan likewise was staring incredulously at the awesome, vast expanse. The train had started again slowly, then moved away, looking like a green worm spotted with yellow, wiggling away into the endless beyond. In the distance was military equipment, some scattered, other pieces arrayed close together. Among them were a few wooden kiosks and half-naked soldiers, their bodies above their khaki shorts gleaming in the distance, and other soldiers whose black bodies did not gleam. The train that sped away like a wondrous yellow-spotted worm, the high faraway sky, the mysterious groupings of soldiers, and the all-engulfing wilderness gave both Magd al-Din and Dimyan a sense of being lost. Five or six Bedouin had gotten off the train from the other cars, but they had not paused for a moment. Waiting for them were a few others, who spoke in loud, fast rattling voices, of which Magd al-Din and Dimyan could not understand a word. The two of them watched the Bedouin hurrying away down the narrow road next to the station between two rows of low, limestone houses deserted by their inhabitants. The Bedouin stirred up little eddies of dust, as if they were a herd of goats scurrying around. The stationmaster had gone out of his room to meet the train and spoke briefly with the engineer. As soon as the train began to move and the stationmaster turned around to go back to his room, he saw Magd al-Din and Dimyan and recognized them, for only a railroad worker would be wearing a green suit when he got off the train at the station. He approached them slowly. On the platform were two wooden rooms with pitched roofs also made of wood, painted a dull gray in several thick, clotted layers, betraying the painter’s lack of skill.
“Welcome,” said the stationmaster once he had come very close to Dimyan and Magd al-Din. Either they were still too awed by the expanse to respond or he did not wait for a reply.
“Are you the new workers?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“Come on in.”
He walked and they followed him to his room. At that moment, another man appeared at the door of the other room and stood there, staring at them. The stationmaster told him that they were the new crossing workers. The man welcomed them. Before they got into the stationmaster’s room, Dimyan said, “Our stuff’s on the platform.”
The stationmaster smiled and said calmly, “Don’t worry. Nothing gets lost here.”
In the stationmaster’s room they all sat, Dimyan and Magd al-Din on a small wooden bench and the stationmaster and his colleague on another one facing them.
“My name is Hilal,” said the stationmaster. “My colleague here is Amer — he’s the telegraph operator. His work is extremely important. Being late sending or receiving a telegram can have serious consequences.” He paused for a moment and looked at Amer as if he needed confirmation for what he had said, then continued, “There may come a time when neither he nor I will be needed. Perhaps only the two of you will remain to handle the army traffic at the crossing. Military trains will not stop, which means your work is very important. Here we are working directly under the British command, supervised by a young English officer who knows a little Arabic. He’s a little arrogant but quite sympathetic. There’s an old housing compound, which is vacant now. Amer and I live in one of the houses. You can take the one next to it. The water train comes only once a week, and if it’s late we get some water from the soldiers. There’s no one in town except a few Bedouin in a settlement to the south. Some of their men sometimes show up when the water train arrives. They fill their jerry cans, but they don’t mix with anyone. They walk fast and they look like camels. Every one of them is so tall you’d expect them to keel over any minute.” He laughed by himself and continued, “They never feel hungry. They live on the fat of their bodies, exactly like camels. And they guard their dignity fiercely. Sometimes a young shepherdess comes with her sheep and her little brother. I hope no one will give her any trouble — but I haven’t had the honor of your names.”
“Magd al-Din.”
Dimyan was a little hesitant to say his name. He had had it with the man’s chatter, but politeness, especially because this was the first meeting, compelled him to listen on. “Dimyan,” he finally said.
Resentment showed on the face of Amer the telegraph operator. Hilal was silent for a few moments, then said as if to rebuke Amer, whose resentment was visible, “In any case, Jesus is a prophet and Muhammad is a prophet, too.”
But Dimyan was still thinking about what the man said in his long talk and was amused by the thought that the stationmaster’s name meant ‘crescent,’ while his face was as round as the full moon.
It was noon. There was a big clock in the stationmaster’s room, and Magd al-Din thanked God for that, otherwise how would he know prayer times when there was no mosque calling the faithful to prayer, for neither he nor Dimyan had a watch. He did not know that he would soon meet Muslim soldiers of the empire on which the sun never set.
The stationmaster got up to show them the house where they would stay. No sooner had they made it to the platform than they saw in front of them the young English officer wearing khaki shorts and a short-sleeved shirt. His knees were dark, which meant that he had spent a long time in the desert unlike new soldiers whose knees looked white and red, with the exception of the Africans, naturally. The officer wore a green cap.
“Hello Mr. Spike,” the stationmaster called out. The officer pretended not to hear him and asked Magd al-Din and Dimyan in English, “Do you speak English?”
They understood the question but did not answer. Magd al-Din was at a loss for words; he thought immediately of Hamza, who knew a little English, actually a lot of English compared to the two of them. Hamza was lost.
Magd al-Din felt his face cloud over and sadness came over him as if ants were crawling all over his hot cheeks. He bowed his head and looked at the floor and almost asked the officer if he knew anything about Hamza. He heard the officer ask the stationmaster in annoyance, “What happened, Hilal?”
Dimyan blurted out, “Yes, sir, afandim?”