Naguib Mahfouz - The Mirage

My girl’s two other admirers gave me no rest. On the contrary, they kept hovering about her until I’d come to fear them as much as I feared helplessness and poverty, and until I loathed them as much as I loathed the wretchedness that was tightening the noose around my neck. The most enjoyable thing about this sort of life was running away from it. As a result, I found a way to get to the pub no matter what it took. Alfi Bey Street wasn’t a suitable haunt for me anymore. Hence, I sought assistance from my carriage driver — my number two advisor on worldly affairs after my mother. I asked him to take me to a modest sort of pub, and where should the man take me but the vegetable market! He himself, or so he told me, used to go there from time to time, and as evidence of the appropriateness of his choice, he said to me, “The big pubs are just showy places that steal people’s money. But booze is booze, and the best booze is the type that gets you drunk for the cheapest price!”

I listened to his lecture in a state of pained embarrassment that was echoed by a profound sorrow in my soul, as though he was lamenting my end and consoling me over the loss of times gone by. Taking my leave of him hurriedly, I proceeded in the direction of a small pub at the head of one of the side streets leading to the market. As I did so, I got the distressing feeling that I was descending into the abyss that had swallowed up my father before me. However, neither this nor anything else was going to stop me from doing what I was destined to do.

The run-down, dingy-looking pub was a small, square-shaped place with just a few tables in it. Its waiter was an old, bleary-eyed Greek, and its clientele were lower-class folk and some down-and-out government employees. But, as the carriage driver had said, booze is booze, and I can’t deny that I brightened at the sight of the bottles that lined the long shelf. In fact, I was so happy to see them, I forgot the sting of the lowliness to which penury had bound me. I also saw a new type of container for liquor. A carafe of cognac sold for ten piasters, a price so negligible that I’d be able to come to the pub twice a month or more. I drank and yielded to wandering dreams in longing and delight. Then coincidence supplied me with new fuel for my dreams when I was approached by a man peddling lottery tickets. “A thousand pounds!” he cried as he waved a piece of paper at me. I reached out and took it from him, paid him for it, then folded it up and slipped it into my pocket. Indeed, new fuel for dreams on a par with liquor’s intoxication. Lord! What would the world be without dreams! I was now the exclusive owner of a thousand pounds! The earth was solid under my feet, unshaken by fear and poverty. The world was smiling, and it was sure to laugh out loud if my father bit the dust! From now on it wouldn’t do to hesitate. I’d meet my sweetheart’s venerable father and tell him straight from the shoulder, “I’d like the honor of being your in-law.” Then I’d give him my card. After all, I thought, who doesn’t know the Laz family? It’s true, of course, that my job is a humble one, but I own a sizable fortune, and I’ll be inheriting another one as well. The man would have no choice but to welcome me. I saw myself being escorted down a candle-lined aisle, my bride promenading alongside me like the moon.

I couldn’t bear to stay any longer once I’d downed the carafe’s contents, so I left the pub and went wandering aimlessly through the streets, looking about me dreamy-eyed and pleased with myself and the world. I wouldn’t go home until I’d sobered up again. However, before the intoxication had worn off completely, I found myself in front of my beloved’s house, so I didn’t head for Manyal. It was nearly two in the morning. The deserted street was enveloped in thick darkness, and there was a silence so deep you could almost have heard the thoughts going through someone’s head. I stood on the sidewalk looking at the sleeping household. My gaze settled on her bedroom window, my spirit slipped through it, and I imagined myself feeling her rhythmic, fragrant breaths. My faith in the spirit knew no bounds. After all, hadn’t it drawn her glance my way in the past? If so, then it could insinuate itself into her dreams and cause her to see me, and even to hear me if I called out to her.

So I spoke to her, saying, “I love you, my life! I love you with a love that’s no less a wonder of the universe than the rotation of the heavenly bodies in their orbits. How I long to say, ‘I love you’ when I’m sober, but I can’t. Shyness is dumb, my love, and poverty is a high-walled prison. Someone who owns no more than a pound and a half of his monthly salary has no right to declare his love to a precious angel like you. Yet in spite of it all, I love you, and I can’t bear for you to spurn my affection. I nearly go mad when I see those two nasty men looking at you. So encourage me, my darling. Make some gesture toward me. Smile in my face. There’s nothing wrong with your doing that as long as I’m sincere in my love for you (as you surely know me to be), and as long as I’m helpless and hopeless, as you also, no doubt, realize.… Ahh!”

I stood there for a long time without taking my eyes off the closed window. Eventually my eyelids grew heavy and I was overcome by a feeling of dizziness and fatigue from my hangover and the strain of walking. Then suddenly I heard the sound of heavy footsteps. Turning fearfully in their direction, I saw the shadow of a policeman approaching. So I stepped back from where I’d been standing and went quickly on my way.

What was standing between my beloved and me? Poverty. I could see no other answer to my question, since it was the only obstacle I couldn’t be considered responsible for. At least, this was what I believed. How could I get money, then? I pondered the matter glumly. Then where should my thoughts take me but to my father! This was the person whose death I’d long wished for, but wishing had gotten me nowhere. So why not visit him? Why not ask him for the money I needed? The thought seemed bizarre, unbelievable, especially for me, who feared him more than anyone else. Never in my life had I expected anything from him. However, during those days anxiety and fear were taking me to the limits of my endurance, love ran in my blood, and I had a growing, increasingly dismal sense of life having passed me by. I feared that if I got to be thirty years old without marrying, I’d be a goner. Such worries tormented me, and the sweet glances bestowed on me by my beloved brought with them both happiness and a silent rebuke. So in the end I felt I had no choice but to think seriously of visiting my father.

I went without announcing my intention to my mother, and I found my way to Hilmiya with the help of the tram conductor. When I reached Ali Mubarak Street, I recalled immediately the way I’d come with my grandfather nine years earlier. I glimpsed the large house with the tall treetops looming up behind the wall that surrounded it. I also saw the gatekeeper, so aged now that he was little more than a black specter, sitting in front of the gate. But when I was two steps away from him, my courage failed me, and instead of turning to go in, I kept on walking. Gripped by a sense of futility, I told myself to go back where I’d come from. After all, what was the use of making an attempt that was doomed to failure! I didn’t flee far, however, and perhaps it was despair itself that shored me up with an unanticipated strength. Hence, I headed back toward the gatekeeper with renewed determination, reproaching myself for the weakness of will that would deign to come between me and a house to which I had an undeniable right. I hailed the gatekeeper, and he returned my greeting without rising to his feet.