Naguib Mahfouz - Khan Al-Khalili

Staring out of the window, he watched as a long line of buildings and villas went flashing by. The train then took them through lush, green fields and captivating rural scenery, before finally approaching the beginning of the endless, barren desert, fringed on the horizon by lofty hills. The progression of buildings, fields, and desert made him feel sad, and he found himself once again sliding into a deep depression.

The train reached Helwan, and the two of them left the train station. The journey had exhausted Rushdi, so they took a taxi to the sanitorium. It went down a deserted road, until the sanitorium loomed in front of them at the foot of the mountains, like some forbidding castle. Both brothers stared at it, their hearts beating fast.

“Let us pray,” said Ahmad, “that our Lord will take you by the hand, bestow a cure on you, and let you leave this place fully restored to health.”

When they got to the sanitorium, they took the elevator to the third floor, where the nurse showed them to the room they were looking for. It consisted of two beds, on one of which a young man of Rushdi’s age was lying down; he looked just as thin and pale as Rushdi. They all exchanged greetings, and Rushdi sat down to recover his breath. With his brother’s help he changed his clothes and lay down on the bed. Ahmad sat down on a comfortable chair, then pointed to the other young man in the room.

“I’m sure he’ll be a good companion for you,” he said. “You’ll be able to help each other kill time and avoid feeling lonely until you both get out of here, hale and hearty, God willing!”

Ahmad spent some time chatting with his brother and the other young man. He discovered that his name was Anis Bishara; he was a final year student in the School of Engineering. However, it was obvious that the journey had exhausted Rushdi — he simply lay there on the bed in a kind of stupor — so Ahmad chatted with them both for a bit longer until he was sure that Rushdi was settled in, then he stood up to leave. As he clasped his brother’s hand to say farewell, he could feel tears welling up inside him and had to grit his teeth to stop them emerging from his eyes. Once he had left the room, it occurred to him that Rushdi had also been on the verge of tears when bidding him leave. He was on the point of going back, but rejected the idea and continued on his way out of the building. Walking down long corridors with patient rooms on either side, he shuddered as he noticed ghost-like human beings all wearing billowing white garments. On his way back to the station he kept looking back at the imposing sanitorium building and muttered yet another prayer.

The Akif family spent a miserable evening together. The father looked totally distracted, and the mother wept so much that her eyes were red. Ahmad tried to make things easier for them by talking in hopeful terms, but the fact of the matter was that he too needed someone to lighten his own burden of misery.

The family had to wait impatiently until Friday, which was visiting day at the sanitorium. Kamal Khalil decided that he and his family would go with them. Both families made preparations for the visit. Ahmad bought his brother a box of chocolate biscuits, while Sitt Tawhida, Nawal’s mother, prepared a pastry dish for which she was renowned. At noon they all went together — the three men, two wives, and Nawal — to Bab al-Luq Station and sat opposite each other, the men on one side and the women on the other. That is how Ahmad found himself directly opposite Nawal. From the very first moment he avoided looking at her. He had not seen her since that fateful day when he had discovered what had been going on between her and Rushdi, but the fact that she was sitting so close to him now brought back old memories and triggered some painful feelings. He was afraid of succumbing to his emotions, so he decided to avoid the possibility by engaging Kamal Khalil in conversation for a while and then reading the al-Ahram newspaper. However, even though he managed to avoid looking at her, the flood of emotions he was feeling got the better of him. How was he supposed to forget his thwarted hopes or the bitter anger he had once felt toward his own brother? How could he overlook the terrible disease that had converted his anger into an unstaunchable wound in his own conscience? How could he forget that at one point he had even been worried in case the girl herself got infected? He had even considered accusing his brother of exposing her to all kinds of risk. All these worries had turned his entire life into a firetrap. He was quite ready to believe what he had once told himself, “Rushdi may have a lung disease, but my disease is in the mind!”

He started wondering what kind of feelings Nawal was having now that she was sitting directly opposite him in the train. Sorrow? Shame? Wasn’t it reasonable for her to feel sad that the illness had afflicted her beloved and to pay no attention to his middle-aged brother? There was absolutely nothing unfair or unreasonable about that. But he still had to ask himself: what was the point of his own life, and how was he supposed to make use of the fact that he was healthy? He immediately began to feel the familiar sensation of being persecuted, one that was both painful and enjoyable. There was something else as well that he had to admit: he was happy to know she was there in the train compartment with him, even though he was avoiding looking at her. Why was that? he wondered. Was he testing his ability to forget and feel dismay? Or was it rather that he wanted to slake his old urge to show her how easily he could ignore her and rise above his feelings?

He came to himself for a moment and decided that it was wrong to be entertaining such thoughts when he was on his way to visit his dear brother at the sanitorium. Such was the pain he felt inside him that he found himself wishing that there were some kind of operation that could suture the wounds in the human soul as was possible with the limbs of the body.

The journey came to an end, and everyone walked along the road, their eyes glued to the sanitorium looming in front of them. Even though Rushdi had only been there for three days, the fact that he was now forced to relax and take things easy led Ahmad to hope that his brother would already be feeling better. He walked ahead of the rest of them, went into the room and looked at Rushdi’s bed. His brother was lying down. Even though he was aware of their arrival, he did not move. He received their greetings with a wan smile on his pale lips, and then they all gathered around his bed. Ahmad’s hopes rapidly faded. His brother’s appearance shocked him, and he immediately realized that his condition had actually worsened since the day he had brought him there. That confounded him, and his heart sank. Rushdi’s visitors sat down, and Ahmad put the chocolate biscuits and pastry down on a small table near the bed.

“I’m hardly eating anything,” Rushdi said weakly as he spotted them. “I don’t feel hungry at all.”

His mother kept staring at him, trying desperately not to show how absolutely devastated she was. “Don’t you like the sanitorium food, Rushdi?” she asked.

“The food’s fine, but I’ve lost my appetite.”

“Don’t worry,” Sitt Tawhida said. “This always happens when the disease is in its early stages. Tomorrow this pure, dry air will make you feel hungry again.”

Rushdi gave her a smile and then Nawal too, since she was sitting beside her mother.

“The last three nights have been dreadful,” he told Ahmad. “I keep waking up and can’t get back to sleep. The pain is much worse, and the.…”

He didn’t finish the sentence. Ahmad realized at once that he was avoiding the word “coughing.” It was at this moment that he realized that the decision to bring Kamal Khalil’s family with them had been a huge mistake. Even so, he was anxious to give his brother as much encouragement as possible.