Voices Page 6

  'At your service, my fair lady,' he answered.

  The roof had been flushed with a large amount of phenol and cologne after being cleaned, and the chickens had been shut into their coop. It smelled like a pharmacy during an epidemic. A mat was rolled out and a rug unfolded over it, with pillows placed around the edges. Simone sat beneath the pale yellow moonlight. I was placed on one side of her with Ahmed on the other and her mother-in-law and Zeinab across from us, aping her manner of eating, and smiling at each other in open mockery of their guest. I don't think it was lost on Simone either. All around us, the eyes of our neighbors stared over piles of hay and firewood from the neighboring rooftops, some nearby and others at some distance.

  We finished our dinner, and Simone opened a large envelope containing a collection of photographs of her family which she began showing to her mother-in-law, as well as to Zeinab, Ahmed and myself. There were pictures of her with her parents and of her with Hamid, in their house, at school, at the hotel, at the restaurant, on the street, on the Champs-Elysees, near a broad boulevard, in the museums and near the Eiffel Tower. Ahmed paused a long time looking at the pictures of the

  hotel and restaurant, while Zeinab paused over the Parisian women in the background of the pictures. The mother-in-law, for her part, took long hard looks at pictures of her grandson and granddaughter, and even went so far as to praise their beauty and grace. Simone gave her a picture with Hamid and both children in it. She was delighted by her mother-in-law's great joy at having the picture and by her request that Ahmed frame it and hang it in the living room to celebrate her grandchildren. I thought I smelled something rotten about this as I observed Ahmed and Zeinab's agitation. The envy in their movements and eyes was obvious. I only hoped that Simone, who was, I believed, unfamiliar with this sort of jealousy, had not noticed anything.

  Simone changed her position, her thighs tightly pressed together and her legs crossed and folded under her to one side, when suddenly she jumped and turned to me saying accusingly: 'Monsieur Mahmoud, did you tickle my foot?'

  I was startled for a moment; then looked over at Ahmed who was sitting on the other side of her next to her legs. Then I said with innocence: 'No, I didn't do it.'

  She then turned to Ahmed and said to me as she stared at him, 'Tell him I am faithful to my husband.'

  I looked first at Ahmed, then at Zeinab, then back to Simone before saying, 'I can't.'

  'Why?' she asked.

  'His wife will know,' I answered.

  'You're so sensitive, Mahmoud,' she told me.

  Then she shocked me by turning to Ahmed Al-Bahairi and using an Arabic word I'd never heard her say before.

  (She'd probably heard Hamid saying it occasionally to his children.) Without changing her seated position she said to him in Arabic: 'Naughty! Naughty!'

  Zeinab picked up on the exchange and stood up, trembling and staring down at her husband. She wanted to speak, but her words all crashed into each other in her mouth before she could say anything and in the end she ran off. Ahmed's embarrassment showed as he stood and excused himself to go to sleep. Once he'd disappeared Simone laughed and said to me, 'All the better. Now maybe she'll stop running after Hamid, and he'll stop flirting with me.'

  The mother-in-law, being hard of hearing, was unaware of anything that had happened. We all got up to descend from the roof, and I said 'goodbye' and left to go back home.

  Monday, August 13

  I was unable to write in my diary yesterday. I was far too busy. Simone went out with me into the streets of the village and we entered several homes. We had long conversations with the men, women and children of the village. But I was not guiding her. Instead, she was moving me through my own village. It occurred to me that she must be taking all these pictures and talking to all those people because she intended to write about Darawish and its people for the Parisian paper she was working for.

  We went to the coffeehouse where she drank a lukewarm bottle of lemon-and-lime soda and told me that

  she did, in fact, intend to write a number of articles about Darawish. She also informed me that a woman had come to her yesterday before we met and asked her about a treatment for her daughter's sore eyes. On the spot she had pulled a bottle of eyedrops from her purse, a couple of drops of which she had squirted into the little girl's eyes. She added, 'That little girl's head was filthy. I took her to the bathroom and rinsed her head with water, then washed it with shampoo.' She became excited as she went on, 'Can you imagine, Monsieur Mahmoud? There were lots of tiny insects in her hair!'

  I was overcome with embarrassment for Darawish and I said, 'Her family must be very poor.'

  Simone shouted in protest: 'What are you saying, Monsieur Mahmoud? You have plenty of water here. What about your Nile, Monsieur Mahmoud?'

  When I went back home, my mother talked to me about what a disappointment I was becoming, wasting all my time with 'that French woman.' My father added that she was corrupting me, so I walked out in anger and went to sit in the coffeehouse until the Omda sent for me just after sunset and I went over to his house.

  I found Simone there sitting with him and his wife and the other wives of the village leaders. Of course, I had to be present amongst all these women to serve as translator. The evening lasted until after midnight and was filled with food, talk, tea and songs sad enough to rend one's heart. Nafeesa, the village beautician, danced directly in front of Simone. She sang her a cheerful song, then a song for work and an elegy, for one who's been killed. Simone particularly enjoyed the elegy so I trans-

  lated its lyrics for her as she copied them down, and I tried to use a moving language that would make it into something a little more special — but, to be honest, it was like trying to get blood from a turnip.

  Later in the evening, long after midnight, the Omda and I escorted her back to the Al-Bahairi house. Along the way, I asked her if she wanted to go tomorrow (that is today) to the summer house. She said she couldn't go tomorrow but would like to take me up on the idea when Hamid was along. She said she planned to lock herself in her room tomorrow since she had so much to do, and she wanted to get on with it. She had to write letters and make notes. She wanted to record some observations and asked me not to come except for lunch with Ahmed, Zeinab and her mother-in-law. When we'd arrived at the Al-Bahairi house, Zeinab opened the door for us. When Simone went inside, Zeinab turned back to us and said, 'Good night, Mr. Omda.' Then she slammed the door in our faces leaving the Omda to curse her and her husband all along our return route until we parted.

  Today, I left my house an hour before my appointment at the Al-Bahairi's, so I could stop by the coffeehouse and sit there until lunchtime. When I went over to the Al-Bahairi house I found a large group of women and children standing in front of it and pushing through its entrance into its living room. When I looked in to see what was happening, I found Simone inside putting eyedrops in the children's eyes one after the other.

  She saw me and cried, 'Monsieur Mahmoud! Come, help. I've worn myself out all morning and haven't been able to write a thing.'

  I came in to help her, amazed by her zeal and asking myself how she could possibly have brought so many of these little bottles lined up beside her. Ahmed then informed me, as he sat laughing sarcastically at her predicament, that she had asked him to go to the town that morning and buy the medicine after all these 'little bastards' came to her.

  As lunchtime approached we completed the ministration of the eyedrops. Ahmed chased away the little parasites and shut the door behind them. Zeinab began setting out the pots of food — most of it boiled as usual — and Ahmed knocked on Simone's door to call her to eat.

  Because Simone had not been able to get into her work and had failed to start her writing that morning, she excused herself from our evening program, and I left her until the appointed time the following morning.

  THE SIEGE

  Um Ahmed

  It started on Monday morning. Some of my old friends, all getting on in years,
came to visit: Um Khalil, Um Ibrahim, the Hajj Tafeeda, Lady Nazeera, and Saniya Hanim. Some had had children and money, others had seen neither husband nor children, only living out lonely lives. We were sitting huddled together in the open area on the roof under a bit of shade in the heat and humidity, all because of the Lady Simone, the Frenchwoman; we were trying not to upset or bother her. We'd left her in peace and quiet.

  My friends had wanted to see my foreign daughter-in-law again and sit and chat some more with her. But the

  orders of my son, Hamid, and Ahmed after him, were clear that we weren't to go near her. We were to leave her be, and she would sit with us or go out or shut herself in her room as she liked.

  The Hajj Tafeeda beat her breast and bellowed, 'My darling sister, since when does a woman tell men what she wants to do?'

  Then Saniya Hanim said, 'But, my sister, this is a French woman ... a foreign Madame. The whole town and all its people are at her beck and call.'

  Then Lady Nazeera said, 'But how could it be? The name of the Prophet protect and preserve him, isn't Hamid one of us? How could he leave her like that to do what she pleases?'

  Then Um Khalil said, 'She pokes around with her hair all undone in the fields and back alleys. And always with that boy, Ibn Al-Munsi. Why they even saw her drinking beer in town!'

  Then Saniya Hanim told her, 'Like her husband Hamid, but then again she was raised that way.'

  Now Um Ibrahim spoke, asking me: 'And the Lady Simone — God bless her heart — what might she be doing now?'

  I told her, 'She's writing to her family in France. They say she's also writing about Darawish for her country's papers.'

  This had all my friends sucking at their lips, and Um Khalil said, 'We've lived it all and seen it all. But in the end, we'll all be dragged through the mud in her papers.'

  Then Saniya Hanim said, 'God pity us. We haven't been to school and we have never once worked for

  ourselves. We are all of us living as though we were the living dead, whether rich or poor.'

  Then Lady Nazeera said, 'Health and life, and in the end, may God grant us a "happy end." '

  Then Um Khalil, that two-faced viper, asked about my daughter-in-law Simone, Ts she a Christian like the other foreigners or did she convert to Islam and become one of us?'

  I told her what Ahmed had told me, that she'd kept her own family's religion; then she came right back and asked me slyly,

  'And the boy and the girl, will they be Moslems like Hamid or Christians like their French mother?'

  Then my other daughter-in-law, Zeinab, making her own private judgment, said with a smile:

  'The boy will be a Moslem like his father, and the girl a Christian like her mother.'

  We all laughed when she said this, but Zeinab claimed that my son Hamid had made this agreement with his wife, Simone. But I challenged her over this, saying, 'How could his own daughter, from our own flesh and blood, be a Christian?'

  At that point Um Khalil said, 'You none of you know your heads from a hole in the ground. You're making guesses without really knowing a thing. Whoever told him in the first place to leave all our chaste Moslem girls and marry a Christian and a foreigner?'

  I felt like my blood would boil over with anger, at Hamid, and at Um Khalil, and I asked Lady Nazeera, whose husband taught in the Mosque, what Islamic law said about mixed marriage, 'Isn't a Moslem man permit-

  ted to marry a Christian woman?'

  Then this wise woman answered: 'God is all-knowing, my sister. That's correct. Islamic Law permits the Moslem man to marry a Christian woman.'

  Then Um Khalil said, 'Sure, I know. Give her your verdict, you and your husband. You're always ready to permit what's proscribed and proscribe what's permitted.'

  Then Lady Nazeera added, 'But God also says, "The Moslem girl is preferable for a Moslem." I heard the Sheikh say so with my own ears . . .just a few days ago.'

  Finally, Lady Nazeera made us change the subject by saying, 'By the Prophet's life, we've been talking enough.'

  The meeting on the roof went on and on. Then my friends all left because the Lady Simone hadn't stepped out of her room since morning. If they'd only waited a little while, they could have seen her like a hospital nurse treating the eyes of the village children, talking and giving orders, as my son Ahmed listened to her and obeyed.

  I went to watch her and, shocked at her aggressive conduct, asked myself, 'Has my son Hamid married a man?'

  Zeinab, all the while, was swearing and cursing — Simone not realizing she was the one being cursed — because now Zeinab would have to clean the house again and sweep up the footprints of the women and children, all for Simone's sake and while Simone, herself, was locked away in her room. Ahmed sat there the whole time like a dumb animal, scared to say so much as a

  word to stop her and keep our house from becoming a free clinic.

  In the afternoon, Lady Simone went into her room and closed the door behind her. Lady Nafeesa came to me then to sit with me on the roof and began whispering in my ear things which shocked and angered me.

  She said, 'Simone, the wife of your son, Hamid, doesn't shave the body hair under her armpits or between her thighs.'

  I knew she was partly right. I'd seen her armpits with my own eyes when she ate with us. But I told her I couldn't believe she didn't remove that other hair as all our women do, either with hot ashes, red earth, or hot putty made from molasses or melted sugar with lemon.

  Then Lady Nafeesa told me: 'The proof is in the pudding. It's up to us to examine.'

  'What do you mean?' I asked her.

  She didn't answer me. She just went on, saying:

  'Simone, the wife of your son, Hamid, who could have used his youth and money to buy any of a thousand women just like her, is not circumcised like other women — or even young girls in our village for that matter.'

  'How do you know?' I asked.

  She waved her hands around and said, 'That's the way things are in her country.'

  Suddenly, I felt half crazed and angry. I said to her, 'If that's the way things are there, and Hamid is happy with the way things are, let him do what he likes.'

  Then she leaned toward my ear to say, 'Listen to me, Auntie. If one of our women is not circumcised as a girl, she is on fire, like a cat in heat. She demands men and is

  never satisfied. She wears her man out every night and she cheats on him at every chance. Simone must have done it so many times, both before and after getting married.'

  Then she added, 'Look for yourself. Don't you see your son, Ahmed, running after her ... he and Mah-moud Ibn Al-Munsi? She laughs at all the men. She walks into every house, sits in the coffeehouse with the men and drinks the wine that corrupts even the men themselves if they should fall into its trap.'

  I didn't want to believe her. I began assuring her that my daughter-in-law must have been circumcised as a child, or at least after she married Hamid. My son, Hamid, would never agree to leave his wife in such a state, throwing herself at any man. Nafeesa just laughed and went back to saying:

  'The proof is in the pudding.'

  'How?' I asked.

  'We'll give her a check-up,' she said. 'No one will know. See no evil, hear no evil.'

  But I was afraid and told her, 'But if my son, Hamid, finds out. What then?'

  'He'll never know. Simone is a woman like us and will be too embarrassed to tell him what we've done to her. Also we'll keep her calm by telling her why we did it.'

  Nafeesa's words drifted into my ears and convinced me. I made an appointment with her in the evening when Ahmed would be praying at the Mosque before he went to the coffeehouse to spend the evening with the men of the village. I told her to bring Um Khalil and Um Ibrahim but not to talk to anyone else. I was to convince

  Zeinab. I was sure she would agree to help because I knew that she was jealous of Simone and would be happy to see her humbled.

  Zeinab

  The whole affair looked to me like a game of blind-man's bluff.
I told myself that surely even if Hamid found out what we'd done to Simone, he wouldn't be able to do anything about it. He would get a little angry, then resign himself and forget the whole thing. But still, he'd know then that his wife is no better than I am, and certainly no cleaner. He'd realize the Egyptian woman is better than the French woman a thousand times over. And Ahmed would also know that I'm better than Simone with her light flesh and delicate bones, and that he should accept a woman like myself with open arms,

  poor and ignorant as he is compared to his brother Hamid.

  Even if Hamid and Simone did leave us in anger . . . To hell with them and their money! I'd rather relax and be rid of the torture of her company, and his, and of constantly having to grovel under their feet like a servant. Then Ahmed would come back to me, humbled before them, and be there at my own feet every night.

  Ahmed had gone to the Mosque for the evening prayer. We had all gathered on the roof of the house: my mother-in-law, Lady Nafeesa, Um Khalil, Um Ibrahim and myself.

  The French woman was still in her room listening to her music box and writing and dancing. (I'd watched her many times through the keyhole). I'd also checked up on her about an hour ago by bringing her tea in her room. She was writing away like some sort of lawyer. I hated her with all my heart and envied her whole world. Her luck on this earth had been so much better than mine. Her husband was better than mine, and one picture of her two children was better than all my five children in the flesh. Now finally, the time had come to satisfy my lust for revenge and chill the raging fire in my heart.

  We came down from the roof without a sound. I led the other women to her room and opened the door. She was dancing.

  She jumped when she saw us. Maybe it was something about the look in my face that scared her, or maybe the sight of all the women behind me. I said to her (knowing