Naguib Mahfouz: The Time and the Place: And Other Stories

The policeman concealed an involuntary smile behind a stern official glare and said brusquely, “Ask that deadly poison in your stomach!”

“You are addressing a former general manager,” said Safwan haughtily. At this the policeman grasped him by the arm and led him off. “Drunk and disorderly in the public highway!”

He took Safwan to the Daher police station, a short distance away, where he was brought before the officer on a charge of being drunk and disorderly. The officer took pity on him, however, because of his age and his respectable appearance. “Your identity card?”

Safwan produced it and said, “I’m quite in my right mind, it’s just that there’s no trace of my house.”

“Well, now there’s a new type of theft!” said the officer, laughing. “I really don’t believe it!”

“But I’m speaking the truth,” said Safwan in alarm.

“The truth’s being unfairly treated, but I’ll be lenient in deference to your age.” Then he said to the policeman, “Take him to Number 42 Nuzha Street.”

Accompanied by the policeman, Safwan finally found himself in front of his house as he knew it. Despite his drunken state he was overcome with confusion. He opened the outer door, crossed the courtyard, and put on the light at the entrance, where he was immediately taken aback, for he found himself in an entrance he had never before set eyes on. There was absolutely no connection between it and the entrance of the house in which he had lived for about half a century, and whose furniture and walls were all in a state of decay. He decided to retreat before his mistake was revealed, so he darted into the street, where he stood scrutinizing the house from the outside. It was his house all right, from the point of view of its features and site, and he had opened the door with his own key, no doubt about it. What, then, had changed the inside? He had seen a small chandelier, and the walls had been papered. There was also a new carpet. In a way it was his house, and in another way it was not. And what about his wife, Sadriyya? “I’ve been drinking for half a century,” he said aloud, “so what is it about this blessed night?”

He imagined his seven married daughters looking at him with tearful eyes. He determined, though, to solve the problem by himself, without recourse to the authorities — which would certainly mean exposing himself to the wrath of the law. Going up to the fence, he began clapping his hands, at which the front door was opened by someone whose features he could not make out. A woman’s voice could be heard asking, “What’s keeping you outside?”

It seemed, though he could not be certain, that it was the voice of a stranger. “Whose house is this, please?” he inquired.

“Are you that drunk? It’s just too much!”

“I’m Safwan,” he said cautiously.

“Come in or you’ll wake the people sleeping.”

“Are you Sadriyya?”

“Heaven help us! There’s someone waiting for you inside.”

“At this hour?”

“He’s been waiting since ten.”

“Waiting for me?”

She mumbled loudly in exasperation, and he inquired again, “Are you Sadriyya?”

Her patience at an end, she shouted, “Heaven help us!”

He advanced, at first stealthily, then without caring, and found himself in the new entrance. He saw that the door of the sitting room was open, with the lights brightly illuminating the interior. As for the woman, she had disappeared. He entered the sitting room, which revealed itself to him in a new garb, as the entrance had. Where had the old room with its ancient furniture gone to? Walls recently painted and a large chandelier from which Spanish-style lamps hung, a blue carpet, a spacious sofa and armchairs: it was a splendid room. In the foreground sat a man he had not seen before: thin, of a dark brown complexion, with a nose reminding one of a parrot’s beak, and a certain impetuosity in the eyes. He was wearing a black suit, although autumn was only just coming in. The man addressed him irritably. “How late you are for our appointment!”

Safwan was both taken aback and angry. “What appointment? Who are you?”

“That’s just what I expected — you’d forgotten!” the man exclaimed. “It’s the same old complaint repeated every single day, whether it’s the truth or not. It’s no use, it’s out of the question….”

“What is this raving nonsense?” Safwan shouted in exasperation.

Restraining himself, the man said, “I know you’re a man who enjoys his drink and sometimes overdoes it.”

“You’re speaking to me as though you were in charge of me, while I don’t even know you. I’m amazed you should impose your presence on a house in the absence of its owner.”

He gave a chilly smile. “Its owner?”

“As though you doubt it!” Safwan said vehemently. “I see I’ll have to call the police.”

“So they can arrest you for being drunk and disorderly — and for fraud?”

“Shut up — you insolent imposter!”

The man struck one palm against the other and said, “You’re pretending not to know who I am so as to escape from your commitments. It’s out of the question…”

“I don’t know you and I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Really? Are you alleging you forgot and are therefore innocent? Didn’t you agree to sell your house and wife and fix tonight for completing the final formalities?”

Safwan, in a daze, exclaimed, “What a lying devil you are!”

“As usual. You’re all the same — shame on you!” said the other, with a shrug of the shoulders.

“You’re clearly mad.”

“I have the proof and witnesses.”

“I’ve never heard of anyone having done such a thing before.”

“But it happens every moment. You’re putting on a good act, even though you’re drunk.”

In extreme agitation, Safwan said, “I demand you leave at once.”

“No, let’s conclude the incompleted formalities,” said the other in a voice full of confidence.

He got up and went toward the closed door that led to the interior of the house. He rapped on it, then returned to his seat. Immediately there entered a short man with a pug nose and prominent forehead, carrying under his arm a file stuffed with papers. He bowed in greeting and sat down. Safwan directed a venomous glare at him and exclaimed, “Since when has my house become a shelter for the homeless?”

The first man, introducing the person who had just entered, said, “The lawyer.”

At which Safwan asked him brusquely, “And who gave you permission to enter my house?”

“You’re in a bad way,” said the lawyer, smiling, “but may God forgive you. What are you so angry about?”

“What insolence!”

Without paying any attention to what Safwan had said, the lawyer went on. “The deal is undoubtedly to your advantage.”

“What deal?” asked Safwan in bewilderment.

“You know exactly what I mean, and I would like to tell you that it’s useless your thinking of going back on it now. The law is on our side, and common sense too. Let me ask you: Do you consider this house to be really yours?”

For the first time Safwan felt at a loss. “Yes and no,” he said.

“Was it in this condition when you left it?”

“Not at all.”

“Then it’s another house?”

“Yet it’s the same site, number, and street.”

“Ah, those are fortuitous incidentals that don’t affect the essential fact — and there’s something else.”

He got up, rapped on the door, and returned to his seat. All at once a beautiful middle-aged woman, well dressed and with a mournful mien, entered and seated herself alongside the first man. The lawyer resumed his questioning. “Do you recognize in this lady your wife?”