Naguib Mahfouz - The Beginning and the End

“Welcome!” he said. He ordered the policeman to leave the room and close the door. He waved the young man to a chair in front of the desk.

What does it all mean? Hassanein thought as he sat down. Welcome and compliments. What next?

The officer rose, and leaning with his right hand on the edge of the desk, stood facing Hassanein, carefully studying his face; a curious, perplexed sort of glance, as if he didn’t quite know how to begin the conversation. Hassanein found this short interval of silence coarse and intolerable. An abhorrent feeling of awe, worry, and annoyance had come over him from the very moment he stepped into the station.

Maybe he’s a refined officer and is too embarrassed to fling the charge in my face, he thought. This is curious in itself. Speak out and take the burden off my chest. How much I’ve dreaded this nightmarish moment. I already know what you want to say. Speak.

“The policeman said you wanted to see me,” he said, losing his patience.

“Sorry to bother you,” the officer apologized. “I’d have preferred to meet you under better circumstances. But you know what duty dictates sometimes!”

Breathing out his last hope of safety, Hassanein replied gloomily, “Thank you for your kindness. I’m listening.”

“I hope you’ll take what I have to say with courage,” the officer said earnestly and gently, “and behave in a manner that suits an officer who respects the law.”

Hassanein was wan and almost fainting. “Naturally,” he said.

The officer clenched his teeth, his cheeks contracting. “This,” he said curtly, “has to do with your sister.”

Hassanein raised his eyebows in surprise. “You mean my brother?” he said.

“I mean Madam, your sister. But excuse me. First I should like to ask you: Do you have a sister by the name of Nefisa?”

“Yes. Has she had an accident?” Hassanein asked.

“I’m sorry to tell you this,” the man said, lowering his eyes, “but she was arrested in a certain house in Al Sakakini.”

Hassanein rose to his feet. Frightened, rigid, and pale, he stared at the officer. “What are you saying?” he asked, out of breath.

The officer patted his shoulder sympathetically. “Get hold of yourself,” he said. “This has to be handled with reason and calm judgment. I hope you’ll help me do my duty without making me regret the measures I’ve taken to protect your reputation.”

Staggered, Hassanein stared at the officer, listened vaguely to his voice. As if in a dream, the voice would vanish, the face remain; the face vanished, the voice remained, sometimes only two lips spewing forth a stream of frightful, disconnected, incomprehensible words. Despairing, Hassanein glanced nervously around the room, his eyes blinking: a gun fixed on the wall here, a row of rifles there, an inkstand, and the strange odors, the dead smell of old tobacco, the strange scent of leather. In a kind of receding consciousness, his mind harked back to memories which had no connection with the present. The old alley floated in his mind’s eye; now he was again a boy playing with marbles with his brother Hussein.

She was arrested in a certain house, he thought. What house? Surely one of us has lost his mind! But which one of us? First, I’ve got to be sure that I’ve not gone crazy.

Resigned, Hassanein sighed weakly. “What did you say, sir?” he asked the officer.

“A Greek woman has a house in this quarter,” the officer continued. “She rents rooms to lovers at so much per hour. This afternoon, we raided the house, and found Madam…with a young man. We arrested her, of course, and I proceeded with the customary cold-blooded formalities, of which, of course, she was frightened, you know, and in the hope that I would release her, she confided that her brother was an officer.”

“My own sister? Are you sure? Let me see her.”

“Please control yourself. Had I been sure she was your sister, I’d have released her. But I was afraid she was lying. So I referred the matter to my boss, the Mamur. He approved of suspending legal action on condition that we could prove the truth of what she was saying.”

Curiously enough, Hassanein entertained no doubt about the identity of the arrested girl. Yes, his pessimistic heart told him, it’s got to be Nefisa. Was this the end of his journey in life? In his state of shock, he felt like some ancient relic of the past, of no relevance to the present. He was eager to get it all over with.

“Where is she?” he said in a lifeless voice. “Please let me see her.”

The officer pointed to a closed door. “She fainted when she knew I’d sent for you instead of setting her free, so we left her in this room. Conduct yourself like a man with respect for law and remember I’m responsible for security. You’re a decent, respectable man. So use your head. Nobody in this police station needs to know anything about it. But don’t forget, everything depends on you.”

“Please let me see her,” Hassanein repeated in the same lifeless voice.

With heavy steps, the officer walked to the door and opened it. Like a sleepwalker Hassanein approached, casting a glance over the officer’s shoulder like a man entering a morgue to identify a corpse. Close to the wall facing the door, a girl huddled against a sofa, her head flung back, her eyes half closed, dim, unseeing. She was either unconscious or had just recovered. Her face was as pale as death, and a few wet strands of hair stuck to her forehead. It was unmistakably Nefisa.

When it comes to disaster, he thought, my heart never lies to me. If she was dead, I’d disown her without hesitation. Unaware of their presence, she remained motionless, perhaps too exhausted to move. The officer looked inquiringly at him. But Hassanein’s eyes became glazed as he stared at his sister. Surprisingly, in the deathlike silence, he found a temporary escape from his agony. Oblivious of the passage of time, he seemed to hear a terrible inner voice shattering the silence: Everything is finished! it proclaimed. He recalled the scene at home before he had left, an hour earlier, his mother desperate and perplexed, standing between him and Hassan, who was then preparing to escape. His mind filled with blasphemous imprecations, Hassanein wished he might die.

What does the officer expect me to do? he thought. What should I do? Oh, God! How can I leave this place? He heard the man address him. “I’ve done my duty. The rest is up to you.”

“Where is the other?” Hassanein asked, avoiding the officer’s eyes.

Understanding his meaning at once, the officer replied rather sternly, “After the usual legal routine, I released him.”

“Thanks,” Hassanein murmured. “Let’s get out of here.”

In the dark outside, a cold breeze was blowing. With heavy steps, he walked out of the police station, followed at arm’s length by his sister, her face cast down. The two walked along the tram tracks. Since this was his first visit to this quarter, he did not know where he was going. The street was deserted, although it was still early in the evening. Where does this street go? he wondered, surprised at the nature of his own thoughts. Where the street went was without significance for him. What to do with her was the main thing. He had thought of doing something as soon as they came out of the police station, and this was exactly what she expected. But he did nothing, and they continued to walk. He felt her intolerable presence behind him, the sound of her footsteps like bullets shot into his back, crushing every desire to look back at her over his shoulders. The terrible silence estranged them; he appeared absorbed in deep thought, but in reality his mind was utterly, terrifyingly, involuntarily blank. His self-control had vanished, all power of will was gone. Helpless, he yearned to recover his customary authority. When his foot collided with a small stone in his path, a flash of anger burst in his chest, as if attracted by his wandering thoughts in the dark. Should he strangle her, he wondered suddenly, or smash her head with his shoe? His pent-up feelings demanded some kind of relief. The infernal silence which separated them still prevailed. He was mustering all his willpower to break through this barrier when, to his surprise, she did it herself. He heard her murmur in a quaking, sobbing voice, “I’m a criminal, I know. I won’t ask for forgiveness. I don’t deserve it.”