“Don’t you think she’s lovely?” the bald man asked.
The Egyptian looked at the woman, at her dark-blond, slightly curly hair, her blue eyes, her blouse, the swell of her breasts. He nodded.
“She truly is lovely,” the bald man said. “She’s the loveliest.”
The Egyptian shook his head slowly. “I’d like to,” he said. “I don’t even know your name, but I’d really like to. But it’s impossible. I don’t want to end up like that — I’m too old to end up like that. I have nothing valuable to offer you; I don’t know anything. I know nothing. No one takes me seriously, that’s why I don’t know anything.”
The bald man got up, walked to the door, and locked it. Then he went to the bar and searched around amid the pile of tapes and CDs beside the little stereo. The Egyptian looked questioningly at the woman across from him, and she smiled at him.
“Beethoven? Do you like that?” the bald man asked.
“I enjoy classical music,” the Egyptian said. “I lived in France for many years. Worked in France for many years. I’m familiar with French cuisine, and that’s where I first heard classical music. I speak French. A little. French is classical, too.”
The bald man put on a piano concerto by Beethoven and sat back down at the table. “Look at her,” the bald man said. “Look at her, my friend. I brought her along for you. As a token of friendship. As the start of something beautiful. Look at her.”
The Egyptian looked, but he was afraid, and tired — that, too — and he was also worried about his dogs. Who would go with them into the garden at night to cry at the moon if he wasn’t around?
The woman with the dark-blond hair began unbuttoning her white blouse.
“You people will leave my dogs alone?” he asked.
“Of course,” the bald man said. “Of course we’ll leave them alone. What have your dogs ever done to us?”
“When business is good,” the Egyptian said, “I donate money to Hamas, because I suffer from depressions, actually, and giving money helps. I opened an account for them here in Switzerland. Every good cause needs a Swiss account. I used to give a lot of money to my parents, but it wasn’t enough. They’re doing good things in Palestine, Hamas is. That’s why. They’re not corrupt, they believe in something. I don’t, I can’t help you people, I don’t believe in anything, that’s why I’m depressive, that’s why my head hurts. It pounds, it pounds all day long. I take pills for it, but the pounding doesn’t stop. You two are representatives of the Zionist entity; you must believe in something, but I don’t. That’s why my head pounds.”
And while he spoke, he stared at the woman’s lovely breasts.
“Put your hand on them,” the bald man said. “Touch her tits, touch them, that’s what tits are for, that’s what they’re made for, to be touched, to be sucked. Tits make you forget everything. The left one will make you forget that you’re a filthy Arab, the right one will take care of the shit-fly you’ve become. The shit-fly that feeds on the excrement of others. You don’t have to think about any of that anymore. You’re with us now. Love has come home. You have come home.”
The Egyptian reached out his hand and put it on the woman’s right breast. She smiled, but said nothing. He felt how warm she was. He touched her nipple, he thought about other nipples, and then again only about this nipple, which was different from all the others.
“Is she a whore?” he whispered.
“She loves her country,” the bald man said, glancing at the woman as though to make sure he’d expressed himself well, had not passed along information that would afterwards prove inaccurate. “Her fatherland. And you?” The bald man took his video camera out of its case. “Do you love your fatherland?”
The woman got up and stood in front of the Egyptian. She took his hand and moved it over her bare upper body.
“What about you?” the bald man asked again as he turned on the video camera, which made a zooming sound before he pointed it at the two of them. The recording had begun.
“What about me?” the Egyptian asked. She was loosening his tie. Truly lovely she was, beautiful the way people in movies were beautiful, voluptuous, overwhelming — a machine, really, but a luscious machine, cold and hot at the same time.
“Do you love your fatherland?” the bald man asked as he started filming.
“I don’t know,” said the Egyptian, whose shirt was now being unbuttoned and pulled off. “I can’t lose my heart anymore. Not to people, not to countries. My heart is locked up. I have two dogs. That’s enough.” He took a deep breath. The woman’s hand was taking his breath away, and making him nervous — that, too. That hand was now moving across his stomach, his chest. Her nails — they were painted, pink — he looked at them the way you look at an unfamiliar creature crawling up your bare leg. You’re curious, and just a little frightened, too, because it’s bigger than you thought.
“Is she a Jewess?” the Egyptian whispered.
“Ask her,” the bald man said. “Go ahead, you can ask her. You can talk to her. Maybe we should turn on some more lights — it’s kind of dark in here.”
He went to the bar. The Egyptian looked at him and said, “The switches are down there, on the right.”
The bald man leaned down. The little restaurant was flooded with light; the only time it was ever this light was when the Nigerian cleaner came to mop the floor. He wondered where the cleaner could be. What time was it, anyway?
The woman took off the Egyptian’s shoes. He submitted, passive and mute. She pulled his socks off, too. Dark-blue socks. He sat there bare-chested, but didn’t feel the draft. Lust is a strange animal. The animal was stronger than the fear, it made the Egyptian greedy. He was lost anyway — what difference did it make? Cold consolation is better than no consolation at all. He wanted so badly to feel like a man.
The bald man sat back down where he’d been sitting the whole time.
“Do we have to do this?” the Egyptian asked. “Do we have to film this?” He felt a hand on his crotch.
There was no reply. The bald man filmed on as though he hadn’t heard a thing, and in the background the piano concerto by Beethoven sounded sadder all the time. The Egyptian tried to concentrate on the music. His days in France — that’s what the music reminded him of.
“Get up,” the woman said, “so I can take off your pants.”
Her voice sounded pleasant. Gentle and helpful, the voice of a nurse, an experienced nurse, the voice of someone to whom you can surrender, someone you can trust, because you figure she knows what she’s doing.
But the Egyptian didn’t get up yet; his legs were like jelly; everything about him was like jelly. He had once wanted to be a pianist, a concert pianist.
“Are you a Jewess?” he asked.
She nodded. Like him, she was half naked, but she still had her shoes on — she was wearing tennis shoes. A thought flashed through his mind: She’s stoned. And so is the bald guy. They’re both stoned out of their minds.
The Egyptian smiled politely, but uncomfortably, too, because he was half naked. “I have lots of Jewish customers,” he said. “Friendly people, good customers, we don’t talk about politics. I never talk about politics.”
Then he looked at the video camera. “I can’t do it,” he said. “Not with a man around. I have to be alone. Can’t you go away?”
“No,” the bald man said. “Later on, yes. I have to be there the first time. The first time, I have to film it. I keep the film, because sometimes the informant forgets what the purpose of his life is all about, and then we show him the film. That refreshes his memory. Soon the purpose of your life will be on videotape. Then you can never forget it. Even if you go senile, the purpose of your life will have been documented. That is happiness: being able to watch the purpose of your life on video.”