The Beginning and the End (31 page)

Hassanein's face turned pale. Dumbfounded and desperate, he cast down his eyes, his heart seething with anger. Again and again, his lips twitched as if he would speak, but overwhelmed with mounting despair, he soon closed them. Sullen and miserable as Hassanein was, Hassan had no mercy.

“Don't you see,” he persisted, “that you prefer the star on
your uniform to an honorable life? I don't blame you. Like you, I prefer my earnings to an honorable life.” He laughed. “We're brothers and the same blood runs in our veins.”

Frowning, Hassanein stood up. “Don't mock me for the advice I've given you. Farewell,” he added as he walked to the door. But he paused, his hand on the knob.

Hassan spoke to him with unexpected tenderness. “Before you go, don't you want to shake hands with me?”

Hassanein turned, stretched out his hand. Hassan pressed it for a while in his. “I'm sorry I've made you angry,” he said with a laugh. “Forget what has happened and let's keep, even at a distance, the same old mutual feelings. You'll always find me the same Mr. Head you know quite well. And please convey my regards to Mother and Nefisa. Goodbye.”

Intolerably miserable and preoccupied, Hassanein gave his mother a clear picture of Hassan's life. Heavy in heart, sullen, rancorous, and hopeless, he listened to her advice and consolation. With still a few days left before he had to join his regiment, he thought of leaving for Tanta to visit Hussein. The same old urge to consult with his brother in time of distress! He hesitated, but did not carry out his plan. Instead, it was consolation, not longing for the girl, that drove him to visit Farid Effendi. Conscious of this change, Hassanein attributed it to his melancholy, although he realized it was more than casual or temporary. On the third morning after his visit to Hassan, he wondered, baffled, if he had stopped loving Bahia. He sat alone with her in the sitting room, while her mother was busy in the kitchen, and continued to wonder if he was still in love with her. She was his girl, body and soul, and sure enough, she stimulated his desire. Yet he felt inclined to break with her as part of the process of breaking with his past. Yes, he desired her, but he was torn by a perplexing conflict between desire and uncertainty whether he still loved her! How was it possible, he wondered, to desire her and stop loving her at the same time? But despite the strong physical attraction, he wished to break their engagement as much as he wished to break with the alley and his brother's life. She was no longer his ideal girl. He came to think of his attachment to her as a symptom of a kind of lunacy of which he must be cured. As he gazed at her fine, quiet face, an incarnate torment, his heart pinched in pain. Undecided, he tried to dismiss his thoughts.

“Don't stare at me like that!” he heard her say.

If only he could take her to his breast and press a thousand
kisses on her! In the future his attitude toward her might change, but he regretted this period of protracted deprivation. “I'd like to give you a kiss. With this we could start a new life!” He smiled.

“That's all you think about!”

“Is there anything more pleasurable?”

She lowered her eyes. “There are more important matters,” she said hesitantly.

He guessed her meaning at once. Dismissing his worries, he inquired, “What's more important than a kiss?”

“For once in your life, would you speak to me seriously?”

“But, seriously, I want to kiss you.”

Somewhat perplexed, as if deliberately to oppose threatening danger, once she gained control she continued: “Don't you know what Mother says?”

He guessed right, it was bound to come. “What did she say?” he asked stupidly.

Shyly, she answered with difficulty in a low voice. “She says we've been waiting too long, now that you're an officer!”

Her presumptuous statement angered him in the extreme; although he realized that there was no reason for anger, at this moment his heart filled with hate for her mother.

“Does she want to hasten our marriage?”

“No,” she murmured, flushing, “but she thinks it's about time we announced our engagement.”

“Hasn't it already been announced?”

Embarrassed, she felt the ring finger of her right hand. “Certain formalities are still incomplete,” she said.

He got the point, and was overcome with an unaccountable resentment. The request was reasonable enough, but, like a hunted animal at the approach of danger, he developed an aversion to the girl's family. As he studied her face, he remembered what his classmates on the bus had said about her.
She's a good-hearted girl,
he thought,
but she doesn't deserve to be the wife of an
officer like me. And if this marriage takes place, it would be the first of its kind.

“These things aren't important,” he said calmly, with a smile.

“But to other people they are extremely important. Our relatives have been asking about the engagement ring for a long time.”

If only, he wondered, she could show the same enthusiasm for making love.
She wants to marry me, not love me,
he thought.
That's why she's so frigid and reserved. Why would I marry her if I didn't love her passionately?

“No need to hurry,” he said. “We'll realize our hopes in due time.”

“But when is ‘due time'?”

“I think,” he said, knitting his brows as if in deliberation, “I will be able both to support our own home and to help my family—who need me, as you know—when I'm promoted to the rank of lieutenant.”

Downcast, dumbfounded, and dim-eyed, she bit her fingernails. While his words afforded him relief and a sense of liberty, yet her misery touched his heart. His heart beat violently as he looked at her body. Forgetting his anger and fears, he arose and sat beside her on the sofa. But she moved away from him to the farthest end, holding him back with her arms, resisting him, with a lingering, sad look in her eyes. He seized her arms and imprinted kisses on her palms. She arose and left him. “Let go of me,” she exclaimed. “Let go of me. You've changed.”

Out of his mind with excitement, he rose and followed her. Embracing her, his limbs quivered. She pushed him away, but he thrust his mouth violently on her lips. She leaned her head back, and he missed her mouth, his lips touching her chin. She wrested herself from his grasp, and they stood, panting, face to face.

“Don't use force with me,” she sobbed.

As his lust turned to anger, he thought of leaving the room. He took two steps toward the door, then turned suddenly to her. Anger giving way to mad desire, he pounced upon her, determined to satiate it. Her hands resisted, but he embraced her, took her to his breast with brutal violence, and pressed a kiss on her lips. It was no use turning her face away to escape him. His mouth persistently searching for hers, he struggled against her resistance with brutal force until he crushed her to him. She almost fainted in his arms. Paying no attention, he kept pressing her to his chest until he sensed the softness of her plump body on his abdomen and thighs, and a profound sensation of satisfaction arose in him as though he were exploring the pleasures of life for the first time. She put up a feeble, token resistance as short-lived as the moments of wakefulness that precede death. But as he crushed her resistance, he became mad with desire, and yearned for further satisfaction. A sweeping, melting pleasure ran through every one of his nerves, inconceivable pleasure; then he collapsed in sudden surrender. When he came to, he found the girl in his arms, his lips on her cheek. As his arms relaxed, she retreated with a push on his chest. “I'll never forgive you,” she said.

Her words had no effect at all; he ignored her existence and was indifferent to them. He felt triumphant and relieved. As his senses cooled, he retreated in astonishment to his former seat. Wavering, she stood motionless, then resentfully returned to her chair, scolding his deaf ears. He looked at her curiously. He wondered:
Is it she? Is it I? Where are we?
An intolerable sense of coolness weighed heavily upon him.

He listened to her without taking the trouble to apologize. Her mother came in; taking advantage of the latter's presence, he sat for a while with her, then excused himself. As he left the flat he felt a strong desire to escape, and at that moment the thought of traveling to Tanta returned. He smiled, welcoming the idea with enthusiasm.

It was about five o'clock in the afternoon when he reached the Britannia Hotel on Al Amir Farouk Street in Tanta. A boy showed him the way to his brother's room, and he knocked on the door and stood smiling, waiting for the pleasant surprise. The door opened and Hussein appeared in a gallabiya. At once his eyes opened wide with astonishment and, welcoming his brother, he exclaimed, “Hassanein! I don't believe my eyes!”

The two brothers embraced warmly. As they entered the small room, Hussein, with love and admiration, cast a scrutinizing glance at his brother. “What a happy surprise!” he exclaimed with delight. “Do military men thus attack without an ultimatum? Congratulations. I sent you a cable of congratulations.”

“I received it and thought of coming in person to thank you.”

“How are Mother and Nefisa?”

“Very well. With still a few days' leave before starting my assignment, I thought of spending them with you.”

“Well done. What about Hassan? Do you have any news about him?”

Hassanein's face darkened. But so as not to spoil the pleasure of their meeting, he said, “For now, at least, let's forget about him.”

Hussein guessed the reason for his brother's sadness. No less eager than his brother to avoid spoiling their meeting, he invited Hassanein to sit on the only chair, while he himself sat on the bed. They looked at each other carefully, each observing the signs of health and vigor in the other. Hussein had put on more weight than his brother might have expected. His new mustache, as broad as his lips, lent him a dignified, manly appearance,
making him look older than his years. “You're born to be a good father,” Hassanein remarked.

His brother's words stirred sad memories, but Hussein made no reply. “I'm proud of you,” he said, pointing to the star on Hassanein's shoulder.

Hassanein was touched. “I'm indebted to your noble sacrifice,” he said.

Soothed by these words, Hussein murmured, “Don't mention it. You deserve it.”

There's nothing about this brother to be ashamed of,
Hassanein thought.
But for Nefisa's past and Hassan's present, I'd have been the happiest man on earth.

“Cheer up,” he said to his brother, with a feeling of delight. “I've begged Ahmad Bey Yousri to try to get you transferred to Cairo, and he promised me he'd do something about it.”

“Splendid! By the way, I have my annual leave now, so I'll go back with you to Cairo.” He got off the bed. “Now go wash your face,” he said, “and brush off your suit; it's covered with dust from the train. Why stay in this room? Let's go into town.”

Hussein dressed in his suit and the two brothers set out for the streets of the town. They continued their conversation in a coffeehouse. Speaking at length of his life in Tanta, Hussein complained of his loneliness, how it had brought him to frequent this place, to spend no less than two hours on backgammon or conversation, before he returned to his room to read for an hour or so before falling asleep. The last book he had bought, he told Hassanein, was
Socialism,
by Ramsay MacDonald, translated into Arabic from the English, in which the author claimed that the socialist system did not run counter to religion, family, or morality.

Lonely and bored, he found pleasure, he said, in dreams of social reform, imagining the emergence of a better society than the present one and improvement in living conditions. The prospect of realizing his dreams without jeopardizing the religious
creed he had imbibed early in childhood made his heart overflow with exuberance.

Hussein wondered whether his mother had divulged to his brother the secret that had driven her to pay him a visit nearly a year and a half ago, but since Hassanein made no mention of the matter, Hussein was confirmed in his early conclusion that his mother had said nothing about it. The thought, now reminding his calm and peaceful heart of past suffering, would have entirely ceased to trouble him but for a general feeling of longing for love and companionship. When he asked his brother about his fiancée, Hassanein answered vaguely. “She's well, thanks be to God.” Hassanein wondered whether he should speak frankly to his brother about his change in attitude toward Bahia. Shying away from the revelation, he postponed it for some future time, for he knew in advance that Hussein would never approve of his motives and intentions. But their amiable, lengthy tête-à-tête induced him to broach the grave subject which preoccupied him most.

“Imagine how marvelous our life would have been,” Hassanein sighed, “but for Hassan and our family's past.”

Hussein understood the sorrow and discontent underlying his brother's sigh. “I believe our troubles are over now,” he said simply. “Besides, there's nothing to be ashamed of in our family's past. As for Hassan, it's a pity, but he can do harm only to himself.”

Hassanein shook his head in disapproval. “I've learned that, as time went on, Hassan degenerated into a thug and a dealer in narcotics.”

Although Hussein's view of his brother was negative, indeed, he could not possibly have imagined this fall into such an abyss. “No! Don't say it!” he exclaimed in horror.

Disregarding the shock to his brother, Hassanein related what he had seen and heard on his latest visit to Hassan. Silent and sullen, Hussein listened. To break his brother's protracted silence, Hassanein inquired, “What do you think?”

Hussein extended the palms of his hands as if to say, “What can we do about it?” “Alas!” he muttered. “Hassan was the victim of our father, and our father was the victim of his own empty pockets.”

“Can't you persuade him to renounce his way of living?” Hassanein asked in fright.

“Whatever we do or say, he'll never change it,” Hussein sighed. “The only possibility would be to provide him with enough money to start a new life. Can we afford it? That's the question.”

The answer being too obvious, the two brothers exchanged despondent glances.

“Should we,” Hassanein asked sharply, “allow him to destroy our hopes by his wicked behavior?”

“He's destroyed only himself.”

“And destroyed us, too. With a brother like him, how can we face the world? One day our names will appear in newspaper stories about arrests and crimes.”

Hussein sighed sorrowfully. His brother's words revived thoughts that had often tormented him in his loneliness. “We aren't to blame,” he said. “And we shouldn't allow exaggerated fears to fill our hearts. Sooner or later we may be exposed to the slanders. But we won't be able to face life unless we develop a measure of indifference.”

To Hassanein, his brother was either unaware of what he was saying or indifferent to the family's good reputation, which he considered the foundation of all his hopes in life. But Hussein's circumstances were different. He knew none of the friends of Hassanein, whose discovery of the family secrets his younger brother dreaded. Moreover, Hussein, not being ambitious, did not fear people who told tales. Offended at this lack of a sympathetic hearing from his brother, Hassanein regretted that he had confided his fears. At the moment, he was not only indignant toward his brother; he despised his calm resignation.

“Do we have the right to consider ourselves honorable people?” he exclaimed in a flash of anger.

“Why not?” Hussein inquired with surprise.

“Because we've straightened out the difficulties of our lives with tainted money!”

His eyes emitting sudden sparks of fury, Hussein silently stared at his brother's face. Grief, long buried, surfaced in his consciousness, evoking with it the most somber memories.

“We had to defend ourselves,” he said sharply. “And even murder is justified in self-defense.”

Secretly relieved at his brother's anger, Hassanein began to wonder at his own motive in confronting him with this painful revelation. Now they were separated by a wide gulf of silence; as the two brothers tired of it, their conversation drifted to other matters. But it took some time before the strain wore off and amiability was restored.