Naguib Mahfouz - The Mirage

It was then that help came whence I’d least expected it. The servant girl volunteered to reveal that which had so perplexed me and fired my imagination. She was years older than I was and quite unattractive, but she devoted all her free time to serving me and every now and then, on those rare occasions when my mother was too busy to oversee us due to some task or necessity, she would be alone with me. It seems that one day she’d overheard the conversation between me and my mother concerning the mysteries that had awakened me from my slumber. Thus, she declared to me that she knew certain things that were worth knowing. Interested and pleased, I was drawn to her despite her ugliness, and I entered into the experience with ingenuousness and delight. However, those days were short-lived, since it wasn’t long before my mother caught us in the act. Seeing the frigid, forbidding look in her eyes, I realized that I’d committed a serious mistake. Grabbing the girl by the hair, she escorted her out and I never laid eyes on her again. I waited, fearful and shamefaced. Then she came back, still looking dour and unforgiving. Describing what I’d done as wicked and disgraceful, she spoke to me about the punishment such things call for in this world and the torments they merit in the next.

Her words stung me like a whip, and I burst into sobs. Then for days I was so ashamed and humiliated, I avoided looking her in the eye.

A miracle — or so my grandfather described it — took place when at last I passed my end-of-year examination. Consequently, I was promoted to the second grade after spending two years in the first.

When my grandfather looked at the report card he said to me playfully, “If I were still in the army, I’d bring you the artillerymen’s band and have them give you a twenty-four-cannon salute in celebration of your success!”

But although my grandfather hadn’t been able to give me a twenty-four-cannon salute, he managed — with the best of intentions — to drop a bomb on my life that nearly did me in. It so happened that one day he was visited by a fifty-year-old retired officer who had worked under his command in Sudan. After the man left, my grandfather came to join us on the balcony and began looking searchingly into our faces. He said nothing, but there was a look of joy and satisfaction on his face.

Then, addressing my mother in a jolly tone, he said, “Follow me, Miss Zouzou. I’d like to have a word with you alone!”

I burst out laughing at this charming term of affection. As for my mother, she followed him to his bedroom while I entertained hopes of pleasant things to come. My mother disappeared for an hour, then returned to me, and as soon as I saw her, I hailed her, saying, “Welcome, Miss Zouzou!”

Then I burst out laughing again. Contrary to my expectations, however, she just smiled wanly, then sat down on her chair looking grave-faced and pensive. Feeling concerned, I leaned toward her and asked her what the matter was.

“Nothing,” she replied tersely. “Just trivial things that are no concern of yours.”

Her evasiveness only fanned the flames of my curiosity, so I pressed her to tell me what was on her mind. She sighed irritably, begging me to be quiet. So we sat for a long time without saying a word, then halfheartedly exchanged our usual conversation. When we were called to dinner, I only ate a few bites. As we got ready for bed, she stood for a long time in front of the mirror. Then she lay down beside me, placed her hand on my head and recited some short suras from the Qur’an the way she usually did until my eyelids grew heavy with sleep. During the latter part of the night, I woke up to the sound of what seemed to be whispers. When I listened closely, I realized that my mother was muttering, and I assumed she was dreaming. So I called to her until she woke up, and we remained wakeful till daybreak.

The following day, my grandfather was visited by the same retired officer, and the events of the day before were repeated: he called my mother to his room, and the two of them remained alone for around an hour. When they came out to the balcony together, my mother was clinging to his arm and crying frantically, “No! No! It can never be! And I don’t want him to know a thing!”

However, he seemed to take no notice. Then, turning to me, he said firmly, “I’m waiting for you in my room.”

My mother began begging and pleading with him, but he just marched back to his room with me close on his heels, while my mother proceeded to our bedroom, indignant and irate. My grandfather sat down on his big, comfortable chair and instructed me to come near. I went to him feeling fearful and overwhelmed.

Placing his lean hand on my shoulder and looking at me searchingly, he said, “Kamil, I want to speak with you about something very important. You’re still young, of that there’s no doubt. Even so, there are boys your age who take on men’s responsibilities. I want you to understand me well. Do you promise me that?”

“I promise you, Grandpa,” I replied mechanically.

He smiled at me kindly, then said, “The matter is that a friend of mine who’s an upright, wealthy man wants to marry your mother. I’m in agreement with his proposal, since I want your mother to be happy. After all, a woman needs a man to take care of her. I’m over sixty now and I’m afraid I might die before you’ve taken on your duties as a man, in which case she won’t have anyone to depend on.”

He went on about the matter in great detail, but my mind grew weary and shut down, and before long I couldn’t make any sense out of what he was saying.

As for the phrase, “marry your mother,” it buzzed cacophonously in my ears and exploded in my brain. My eyes wide with astonishment, dismay, and revulsion, I wondered: Does my grandfather really mean what he’s saying? It was true that my mother had told me the story of her marriage. But that was just a story, and ancient history. I’d never imagined it to be something that had really happened. Then I remembered the ousted servant girl and my heart sank.

“My mother would never get married!” I gasped. “Don’t you understand what marriage is?”

Laughing in spite of himself, the elderly man said with a smile, “Marriage is a way of life that God has established, and God prefers people who are married over people who aren’t. I married your grandmother, your mother was married in the past, and you’ll get married some day too. Listen to me, Kamil. I want you to go to your mother and tell her that you want her to get married just as I do, and that whatever makes her happy will make you even happier. You have to agree to what will bring her happiness. She’s suffered enough already for all of you.”

I looked at my grandfather the way a felled animal looks at its captor, and my limbs started to tremble with agitation. Then I asked him in a trembling voice, “Do you want that man to take her?”

He smiled and said to me, “Yes. But I want him to take her so as to take care of her and make her happy.”

“And me?” I asked petulantly.

Ever so gently he replied, “If you wish, you can go with her, or you’d be welcome to stay here with me.”

Biting my lip fiercely to keep back the tears, I suddenly retreated and fled. I ran out of the room, ignoring his pleas to come back, and rushed to our bedroom, where my mother sat red-eyed from weeping. She opened her arms to me and I flung myself into her embrace, still trembling with emotion.

“Don’t believe it,” she said. “I mean, don’t believe that anything he told you will happen. Don’t cry and don’t be sad. Ahhh … what torment!”

Gaping at her in shock and reproach, I shouted, “Didn’t you tell me that this was shameful and forbidden?”