Naguib Mahfouz - Khan Al-Khalili

The two of them greeted everyone else and then sat down next to each other. Ahmad was now able to take a good look around him and noticed that all his friends from the Zahra Café—except for Ahmad Rashid — were there. His attention was drawn to the center of the assembly where a striking woman was seated on a huge cushion of her own. She was striking indeed. Even when seated she was as tall as someone else standing up. She was broad-shouldered and long-necked, with a full, round face and clear features. Her complexion was somewhere between Egyptian and Ethiopian. Her hair was curly and chestnut-colored, tied up in a short, thick ponytail. The most amazing thing about her appearance was her huge eyes: prominent without making her look ugly, they had a gleam to them and could stare through anyone. Her size and strength were enough to inspire awe, while the animal magneticism in her gestures and the allure of her sensuality were clearly sufficient to arouse desires. She was wearing a striped shawl over her shoulders.

She started staring hard at Ahmad with her flashing eyes, and he realized at once that she must be Aliyat al-Faiza whom they all called “husband lover.” Her husband, Abbas Shifa, was sitting on her right and Boss Zifta, the café owner, was on her left. Boss Nunu introduced Ahmad to her, and she held out her henna-decorated hand and greeted him kindly. Boss Zifta gave him a look of reproof.

“So,” he scoffed, “at long last you’ve come to realize that God exists! How many years have you spent buried away in that room of yours? Why have you tortured yourself that way? You’re not married, but you’re not an old man yet either. How can anyone do that to himself?”

Boss Nunu was anxious to give his friend a break and make excuses for Ahmad’s behavior. “My friends,” he said, “my instincts never fail me, and my ever-watchful eye is always on the lookout. From the very first moment I saw him, I realized that our good friend, Ahmad Akif Effendi, was a child of chance, but that, for a while at least, circumstances had decreed that he would go off track, and I would have to be the one to guide him back to the true way, God willing.”

Kamal Khalil was also worried that these jokes would annoy Ahmad, since a combination of new factors had contrived to make Ahmad someone important to him. “Dear friends,” he said, “our learned friend, Ahmad Akif, likes to read a lot, but there’s nothing wrong with him trying to get a bit of pleasure out of life. After all, it can’t be all hardship and nothing else!”

Boss Zifta waved his hand in exasperation. “Why on earth do we voluntarily subject ourselves to hardship, whether it’s ongoing or not?” he asked. “Ahmad’s a ranking civil servant. If you’ll excuse me for saying so, why on earth does he have to keep studying as though he were still a schoolboy? So, Ahmad, promise us that, after tonight, you will never miss this gathering of ours!”

Ahmad gave a tentative smile, and his diffidence only increased when Aliyat al-Faiza responded to Boss Zifta.

“Take it easy, Boss!” she said, looking straight at Ahmad. “How can he possibly make such a pledge when he may not find our little gathering to his liking?”

Ahmad blushed. “Forgive me, Hanem,” he said as quickly as he could.

The others all usually referred to her as “Sitt” so, when Ahmad used “Hanem” with her, it sounded strange.

“You’re always welcome here!” she replied.

Abbas Shifa was busy preparing the wads of tobacco, arranging the coals, putting them on the water pipe, and then offering it to his wife. Ahmad kept eying the water pipe nervously. He leaned over to Boss Nunu.

“Shouldn’t I be a bit worried about taking the water pipe?” he whispered in his ear.

“If someone like you is scared of it,” the Boss chided him in a low voice, “what are our children supposed to do?”

Abbas Shifa was sitting in the middle of the circle and started handing the water pipe round from one person to the next. It came ever closer and reached Boss Nunu. Putting the pipe to his mouth, he inhaled deeply, causing the bubbles to make a loud noise and exhaling dark smoke from his nostrils. Finally, Ahmad saw the pipe reach his own lips, with everyone’s eyes on him. He wrapped his lips around it and took a short puff as though he were really scared.

“Inhale harder … harder,” Boss Nunu shouted at him. “Swallow the smoke.”

So he swallowed the smoke, then blew it out quickly, feeling as if a hand was stopping his breathing. He started coughing so hard that it wracked his entire body and made his eyes tear. Boss Nunu was watching him anxiously.

“How are you feeling?” he asked.

“I should only take small puffs to start with,” he said with a sigh. “You’re a really tough teacher, Boss!”

“Just as you wish,” Boss Nunu replied with a laugh. “It’s best to take things slowly.”

Abbas Shifa sent the water pipe round five times in a row; the smoke rose everywhere and formed into clouds. Ahmad smelled a strange scent, one that took him back to olden times, a scent very similar to this one — in fact, it was the very same scent. Where and when had he smelled it, he wondered. He did not have to wrack his brains for long. It had been the first night in Khan al-Khalili. This strange smell had wafted up to his room and worried him so much that he could not get back to sleep. It had been nothing other than the smell of this incredible, frightening narcotic. Maybe it had come to ease his transition to the new room and to the remarkable quarter to which he had moved, one where it was quite likely that every breath inhaled was like the one he had just taken. He was utterly delighted to have remembered that earlier moment, not least because by now the drug had started to work its magic on his nerves and calm them down. He even managed a smile.

Abbas Shifa went back to his seat to rest a little, while Boss Zifta started loading up the tobacco in preparation for the second round.

All of a sudden Aliyat al-Faiza spoke up. “Have you all congratulated Sayyid Arif Effendi?” she asked.

Everyone looked at her.

“I hope it’s good news,” Boss Nunu said.

“A really clever doctor’s told him about some new pills,” she said with a smile. “He said they’re bound to work.”

Everyone there — the friends from the café and the others — had a good laugh.

Boss Nunu turned to Sayyid Arif. “With all my heart,” he said, “I hope that one day I’ll see you acting just like us.”

“That shows just how bad your intentions are!” Sayyid Arif replied somewhat exasperated.

They all asked him about the new pills, but he refused to say anything about them in case of complications.

“Actions always reveal intentions,” Boss Nunu said.

Whatever the occasion, he was always inserting aphorisms, proverbs, and Prophetic sayings into his conversations, whether relevant or not, without being the slightest bit aware of the total inappropriateness of what he was saying to the matter at hand. Even so, only a few of those present ever noticed this trait of his.

Sulayman Bey Ata could not stand the noise, and his ugly face assumed an expression of sheer misery.

“Quiet, quiet!” he yelled angrily as was his wont when he disliked something. “This special gathering of ours has its own protocols, you know!”

“So what are they?”

“This amount of noise,” the monkey replied angrily, “is the kind of thing you encounter in a bar where people are blowing their minds on drink. A hashish circle like ours is the exact opposite; it should be peaceful and quiet. Hashish is a sultan that demands humility and silence from his subjects. It is that silence and peace that allows the drug to best achieve its effects. Your entire disposition is purified and your imagination becomes crowded with a host of dreams. Humanity can thus overcome all its daily problems and difficulties. As you can ponder them without hindrance, they are all solved one after the other.”