Farid did understand Claire, but he was not to be so quickly mollified. He thought his father a coward, pretending to be disappointed instead of admitting his mistake. The hell with him, he thought.
“He may be a good husband to you, Mama, but if men had to pass a test to see if they were suitable to be fathers Elias Mushtak would have failed it.” He grinned at his own idea. Claire smiled too, but she shook her head.
“No, no,” she said, “I won’t have that. You mustn’t bear a grudge even if he does make mistakes. He’s your father, and he’s anxious about you. Disappointed, yes, but when I left he told me to indulge you a little on the way home. Your father can be different from the way you know him.”
This conversation was leading nowhere, and to escape such a blind alley Farid asked his mother about Matta.
“Oh, the poor boy,” Claire replied, “they left him in a very bad state. He had a terrible time in a mental hospital, where they treated him with electric shocks, and then two months ago he came to Damascus. But crazy as he may be, he knows one thing for certain: he never wants to go back to Mala. He’s living with his aunt in Masbak Alley, quite close to us. He’s broken psychologically, but physically active. He works running errands for several souvenir shops and a few families,” she added.
“What’s his aunt like?” asked Farid.
“Nice, very nice. She has no children, and she’s glad to have a quiet young man about the house. Who knows, perhaps going crazy saved him. She treats him as lovingly as if he were her own son. In Mala he’d have been living in stables and caves and infested with lice. But now he’s indispensable to a number of people, because when Matta does something he does it thoroughly. He’s at the door on the dot every morning, asking for his errands, and he carries them out conscientiously.”
“What kind of errands?”
“Oh, getting in everything a household needs when the woman of the house doesn’t have time for it.”
“Are you generous when Matta does something for you?”
“That’s another story; he won’t take money from me. He says he owes you his life, he’ll never forget all your goodness to him, you’re his only brother on earth. So I go to see his aunt on the quiet and give her double what he asks from other people, which heaven knows is little enough. What did you do for him that was so good?”
“Nothing,” he said. “I was nice to him, that’s all.”
It was late when Claire and Farid returned to the hotel on their fourth evening, feeling exhausted. Claire was looking forward to that evening’s fish dinner. Promising aromas were wafting out of the kitchen.
Farid stood on the balcony for a while, looking out at the sea over which so many conquerors had come. The wind had died down. Fishing boats and sailing ships seemed to be glued to the shining surface of the water.
That night’s fish dish was a sight to gladden the eyes, it was music to the palate, in short, it was a work of art on which Italians, Greeks, Turks, and Arabs had worked for several centuries.
“Do you begin to feel like going home?” Claire asked later, in the dark. The balcony door was open, and the surging breakers of the sea sent a cool breeze into the room.
“Yes,” said Farid. “I’m better. Now I want to see Rana as soon as I can.”
“Ah, yes,” smiled Claire. “We haven’t talked about Rana much, have we? Are you still fond of her?”
“Oh yes. I love her,” he replied.
“She loves you too. Your cousin met her at an ice-cream parlour in the Suk al Hamidiye. She flung her arms around Laila and kissed her passionately. Laila felt quite uncomfortable. It was for you, Rana said, and Laila was to pass it all on.”
Farid smiled. “It’s crazy,” he said. “Crazy to be in love with someone and not even able to show it. I feel like a dog who wants to wag his tail and doesn’t have one.”
“If I know you, you’ll be barking out your love for all to hear, so go to sleep now, my handsome little dog.”
He turned over, and soon he heard Claire’s regular breathing.
BOOK OF GROWTH II
He who reads books in spite of school will become a master.
DAMASCUS, 1956 — 1960
146. Coming Home
When Farid got out of the taxi with Claire that afternoon he took a deep breath, savouring all the aromas of his street. Bitter orange and lemon trees grew in the interior courtyards of the houses, roses, oleander, and jasmine. He knew he wouldn’t be able to see Rana at once, but he decided to get up as early as possible next morning and wait for her on her way to school.
He wanted to call in on his friend Josef, but Claire insisted on him going to see his father at the confectioner’s shop first. Farid was afraid of that encounter, but not visiting him would have meant more trouble.
“You wait, he’ll be pleased,” she said as Farid turned back once more at the door of the house. He strolled slowly off to Bab Tuma. Nothing here had changed. Posters for the candidates in past elections were still stuck to the walls, showing a set of men with artificial smiles on smooth faces that gave nothing away.
The confectioner’s shop looked to Farid majestic, but he thought his father seemed smaller than he remembered him. Elias was busy putting the finishing touches to a large order, packing sweetmeats into boxes with the firm’s elegant logo.
“Hello, Papa,” called Farid, trying hard to seem cheerful. Elias Mushtak looked up, murmured a greeting, and devoted himself to packing up his pastries again. Farid stood waiting, but his father, who was talking to everyone else, didn’t deign to look at him a second time.
“Can I help, Papa?” Farid asked at last, helplessly.
“Go over to Salman and fold sheets of card with him,” replied Elias, without looking up from the scales on which he had just put a number of filled puff pastries.
Disappointed, Farid joined the young employee in the stockroom and helped to fold twenty more boxes bearing the shop’s logo. When they were ready he went back to the shop itself, where Elias was still at work behind the scales. Farid waited at the counter for his father to say something, but he seemed to have been struck mute.
“Tell your mother I won’t be home until nine today,” he growled at last. “I have to go to a meeting of the confectioners’ guild. You needn’t wait supper for me.”
Farid went home feeling angry. When he told Claire about it tears rose to his eyes, and he hated himself for it. He quickly washed and went to see Josef.
When he knocked, he found that a clever construction now opened the door automatically. Josef could pull a cord up on the second floor that undid the lock of the front entrance. Farid came in and stopped at the foot of the steep staircase. Josef appeared at the top of the stairs and he let out a yell of delight. “Farid’s back! Farid’s back!” And he ran down the stairs taking three steps at a time.
“You’re still alive! Oh, that’s marvellous!” he cried, embracing his friend, patting his head, and making incoherent noises like a lunatic. The entire family now appeared in the stairwell. Farid was touched. His own father was cold to him, but the family next door rejoiced at his return as if he were their own son. All of them, Josef’s father, mother, aunts, grandmother, and those of his siblings who were still living at home welcomed him heartily. Even Josephine the rebel, who didn’t like either Josef or his friends, came and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “Well done,” she said. “I was afraid you’d be idiot enough to come back in a black habit and with a long beard.” She grinned. “I have to admit, a few of my brother’s friends do have something like intelligence.” Then she quickly stepped aside, avoiding a playful punch from her brother.