Christine was sitting at her small desk next to the bar. She had put on her glasses and was absorbed in going over the accounts, purposely leaving them alone together. Now she came over wearing a wide smile. She loved Zaki so much that she was genuinely overjoyed whenever she saw him happy, and she had taken a liking to Busayna. Zaki cried out in drunken French, holding his arms out to her, “Christine, we’re old friends, n’est-ce pas?”
“Of course.”
“So… you have to do anything I say right away, right?”
Christine laughed and said, “That depends on the nature of the request.”
“No matter what the request, you have to carry it out!”
“When you’ve drunk half a bottle of whisky as you have tonight, I have to beware of your requests!”
“I want you to sing for us, now.”
“Sing? Now? Out of the question!”
This conversation of theirs always followed the same pattern, as though it were a necessary rite. He would ask her to sing, she would excuse herself; he would insist, she would protest and make excuses; and then in the end she would accept.
After a few minutes, Christine sat down in front of the piano and began stroking the keys with her fingers, scraps of tunes emerging. Then all of a sudden she raised her head as if she had heard some inner voice for which she had been waiting and she closed her eyes, her face tensed, and she started playing. The music rang out through the place and her voice rose loud and pure as she sang, exquisitely, Edith Piaf ’s song:
At the end of the evening they crossed Suleiman Basha Street on their way to the office. Zaki was completely inebriated so Busayna put her arm around his waist to hold him up as he described to her, his speech slurred, what the square had looked like in the old days. He stopped in front of the closed-up shops and said, “There used to be a lovely bar here with a Greek owner. Next to it there was a hairdresser’s and a restaurant, and here was the leather shop La Bursa Nova. The stores were all fantastically clean and had goods from London and Paris on display.”
Busayna listened to him and watched his steps anxiously in case he should fall down in the street. They proceeded slowly until they got to the Yacoubian Building, when Zaki stopped and shouted, “See the wonderful architecture! This building was copied to the last detail from a building I saw in le Quartier latin in Paris.”
Busayna tried pushing him gently so they could cross the street, but he went on, “You know, Busayna, I feel as though I owned the Yacoubian Building. I’m the longest resident in it. I know the history of every individual and every square meter in the building. I’ve spent most of my life in it. I lived my best days in it and I feel as though it’s a part of me. The day this building’s demolished or something happens to it, that’ll be the day I die.”
Slowly and with difficulty, they managed to cross the street and climb the stairs and eventually they reached the apartment.
“Lie down on the couch,” said Busayna. He looked at her, smiled, and sat down slowly. He was breathing noisily and it seemed to take him a lot of effort to focus. Busayna forced herself to stop hesitating and, pushing her body against him, said in a seductive voice, “I have a service to ask of you. Do you think you could do it for me?”
He tried to reply but was too drunk to say anything. Instead he stared ahead and sighed, and the thought came to Busayna that he might die then and there. However, she pulled herself together and said, “I’m applying to the Ahli Bank for a small loan, ten thousand pounds. I have to pay it off over five years, plus interest. They need a guarantor. Could you please be my guarantor?”
She had put her hand on his leg and spoke in such a seductive and thrilling voice that, drunk as he was, he stuck his face to her cheek and kissed her. She took this as an expression of consent and cried out joyfully, “Thank you! The Lord preserve you!”
She rose and got the papers quickly from her bag and handed him the pen.
“Sign here, please.”
She had got real loan application papers ready and stuck Malak’s contract in the middle. Zaki started signing, while she held his hand to help him, but suddenly he stopped and mumbled in a slurred voice, his face looking sick, “The bathroom… ”
She didn’t say anything for a moment as though she hadn’t understood. He waved his hand and said with an effort, “I want the bathroom!”
Busayna put the papers aside and helped him stand up with difficulty and supported him on her arm until he got into the bathroom. She had closed the door, turned round to go back and was halfway across the hall when she heard a loud crash behind her.
That night Groppi’s tea garden on Adly Street was full to overflowing with customers, most of them the kind of young lovers who feel comfortable in the dim lighting of the garden lamps that hides their faces so that they can exchange sweet nothings undisturbed and without attracting curiosity.
A man in his fifties entered, well built and sturdy and wearing a dark baggy suit and white shirt without a tie, his clothes seeming too large and not well matched to his body, as though they didn’t belong to him. The man sat down at the table next to the door, ordered a cup of Turkish coffee without sugar, and sat in silence, observing the place and looking anxiously from time to time at his watch. After about half an hour a thin, dark-skinned young man arrived wearing a track suit and directed himself toward the large man. The two embraced warmly, then sat talking in low voices.
“Praise God you’re all right, Taha. When did you get out?”
“Two weeks ago.”
“You’re being watched for sure. Did you do as Hassan told you when you were on your way here?”
Taha nodded his head and Sheikh Shakir continued, “Brother Hassan is completely secure. Use him to contact me and he’ll tell you where and when to meet. Usually we choose places that don’t arouse suspicion. Like here, for example. It’s crowded and dark, which makes it suitable. We meet in parks too and restaurants and sometimes in bars. But… don’t get used to sitting in bars!”
Sheikh Shakir laughed, but Taha remained unsmiling and a heavy silence took over. The sheikh continued bitterly, “The National Security Investigation Bureau is now launching a criminal campaign against all Islamists. Detentions, torture, murder. They open fire on our unarmed brothers while arresting them, then accuse us of resisting the authorities. Real massacres are committed every day. Verily, they will come back on the Day of Resurrection with the blood of these innocents on their hands. I’ve been compelled to leave my residence and stop going to the mosque and I’ve changed the way I look, as you can see. Speaking of which, what do you think of Sheikh Shakir in his Western getup?”
The sheikh let out a loud laugh, attempting to create an atmosphere of good humor, but in vain. An unbudgeable, dark shadow stretched between them, to which the sheikh soon submitted, sighing and saying “God forgive me!” Then he said, “Cheer up, Taha. I know what you’ve been through and appreciate your pain, my son. I wish you to think of everything the unbelievers did to you as going to your account with Our Lord, Almighty and Glorious. Verily, He will reward you for it with the best of rewards, God willing. Know that Paradise is the reward of those who are tortured for God’s cause. Everything that happened to you is but a paltry tax that those who struggle pay gladly for the sake of raising high the word of the Truth, Sublime and Magnificent. Our rulers are fighting for their interests and their ill-gotten wealth, but we are fighting for God’s religion. Their stock in trade finds no buyers and is of no worth, but God has promised us His aid and He will never betray His promise.”