Naguib Mahfouz - Palace Walk

At that moment he saw the Suarès omnibus slowly crossing the street heading for Palace Walk. His heart leapt. Pleasure at his own cleverness filled him. At once he tucked his book bag under his left arm and raced to catch it. He jumped on the back steps, but the conductor did not let him enjoy his pleasure for very long. He came and asked the boy for his fare, giving him a suspicious, challenging look. Kamal told him ingratiatingly that he would get off as soon as it stopped but could not while it was moving. The conductor turned from him and yelled to the driver to stop the vehicle. He was angrily scolding Kamal, but when he looked away the boy seized the opportunity to tread on the instep of his foot, take a swing at him, and hop to the ground. He shot off in flight. The conductor’s curses that followed him were filthier than balls of mud with stones inside. It had not been a deliberate plan or an original one. He had simply been delighted to see a boy do it that morning. When he got the chance to try it himself, he did.

Except for the father, the family gathered shortly before sunset for what they called the coffee hour. The chosen site was the first-floor sitting room surrounded by the children’s bedrooms, the parlor, and a fourth small room set aside for studying. Its floor was spread with colored mats. Divans with pillows and cushions stood in the corners. Hanging from the ceiling was a large lantern illuminated by an equally large kerosene lamp. The mother sat on a sofa in the center. In front of her was a large brazier where the coffeepot was half buried in the embers topped by ashes. To her right was a table holding a brass tray with cups lined up on it. The children were seated opposite her, including those permitted to drink coffee with her, like Yasin and Fahmy, and those barred from it by custom and etiquette, like the two sisters and Kamal, who contented themselves with the conversation.

This hour was well loved by them. It was a time to enjoy being together as a family and to have a pleasant chat. They would cluster under their mother’s wing with love and all-embracing affection. The very way they sat leaning back with their legs folded under them showed how free and relaxed they felt.

While Khadija and Aisha urged the coffee drinkers to finish so they could read their fortunes in the grounds, Yasin talked for a time and then read a story about two orphan girls from an anthology called "Evening Tales for the People". He was in the habit of devoting some of his free time to reading stories and poems. It was not because he felt a need for more education, since at that time the primary certificate was no mean achievement. Rather, he loved to be entertained and was infatuated with poetry and good style. He looked, with his massive body in a loose house shirt, like an enormous water skin. Yet, by the standards of the time, his girth did not detract from the good looks of his full brown face with its seductive black eyes, joined eyebrows, and sensuous lips. Despite his youth-he was only twenty-one-his overall appearance revealed a full-fledged manliness.

Kamal clung to Yasin to garner whatever rare stories he would toss him now and again. He kept asking for more, oblivious to the distress his insistence caused his brother. Kamal wanted to satisfy the yearnings that set his imagination on fire at this time every day. How quickly Yasin would be distracted from him by the conversation or get caught up in the reading. From time to time Yasin would favor him, when his urging became intense, with some brief words which, even if they answered one of his questions, were very likely to arouse new questions he could not answer. Kamal kept looking, sadly and jealously, at his brother when he was busy reading. This skill furnished Yasin with the key to a magical world. Kamal’s inability to read the story by himself vexed him. How sad it made him to have the book in his hands, to be able to turn the pages to his heart’s content, and not be able to decipher the symbols and thus enter the world of visions and dreams. Kamal found in this facet of Yasin a stimulus for his imagination, supplying him with a variety of pleasures but also arousing painful cravings. He would often raise his eyes to his brother and ask him apprehensively, "What happened after that?"

The young man would snort in response: "Don't give me a hard time with your questions. Don't push your luck. If I don't tell you today, then tomorrow". Nothing made Kamal more unhappy than having to wait until the next day. The word "tomorrow" came to be linked in his mind with sadness. It was not unusual for him to turn to his mother after the gathering broke up in hopes that she would tell him what "happened after that," but she did not know the story of the two orphan girls or the others Yasin read. Since it grieved her to turn him away disappointed, she would tell him what stories she remembered about brigands and the jinn. Slowly his imagination would be diverted to these, and he would be partially consoled.

In that coffee hour Kamal frequently felt lost and neglected by his family. Hardly anyone paid attention to him. Their endless conversations made them forget him. He was not above fabricating something to excite their interest, if only briefly. Thus he threw himself into the course of the conversation, daringly interrupting its flow. Like a torpedo going off, he said suddenly in a high-pitched voice, as though he had all at once remembered a momentous event, "What an unforgettable sight I saw on my way home. I saw a boy jump on the steps of the Suarès omnibus. He slapped the conductor and then rushed off at top speed. But the man raced after him till he caught him. He kicked him in the stomach as hard as he could".

Kamal glanced at their faces to judge the impact of his story, but found no interest there. He noticed, rather, a rejection of his news and a determination to continue their conversation. He saw Aisha’s hand stretching out to his mother’s chin to turn her away from him, after she had begun to listen to him. He even glimpsed a mocking smile spread across Yasin’s lips. He had not lifted his head from the book. Obstinately Kamal said in a loud voice, "The boy fell down writhing with pain and people crowded around him. Then what do you know, he had departed from this life".

His mother moved the cup from her lips and asked, "Son, are you saying he died?"

Kamal was gratified by her interest and concentrated his forces on her, like a desperate assailant throwing all his reserves against the weakest section of a forbidding wall. He said, "Yes, he died. With my own eyes I saw his blood pouring out".

Fahmy glanced at him scornfully as if to say, "I know it isn't the first story like this you've told". He asked sarcastically, "Didn't you say the conductor kicked him in the stomach? So where did this blood come from?"

The flame of victory that had been shining in his eyes since he caught his mother’s attention went out. Flashes of confusion and exasperation took its place. Then his imagination came to his rescue, and his eyes recovered their lively look. He said, "When the man kicked him in the stomach, he fell on his face and split his head open".

At this, Yasin, without raising his eyes from the two orphan girls, commented, "Or the blood flowed from his mouth. Blood might come from his mouth without any need for an external injury. There is more than one explanation for your fake news, as usual. So have no fear".

Kamal protested against his brother’s suggestion that he had made it up. He proceeded to swear the most awesome oaths that it was true, but his protests were lost in the clamorous laughter uniting harmoniously both the deep voices of the men and the high-pitched ones of the women.

Khadija’s sarcastic nature was aroused. She remarked, "You certainly have a lot of victims. If the reports you give were true, you'd leave none of the inhabitants of al-Nahhasin alive. What will you tell our Lord if He takes you to account for these reports?"