God Dies by the Nile and Other Novels (32 page)

Fouada heard her weak voice saying: ‘Are you going to the laboratory?' ‘Yes,' she replied.

‘Will you be late?'

‘I don't know,' she replied distractedly. She wanted to ask her something but instead looked at her in silence, then descended the stairs and went out into the street.

The air was cold and dense but the darkness of the night was even denser. She walked along the street slowly and carefully as if about to collide with something, as if parts of the darkness had solidified, become obstacles she might walk into. She quickened her pace to get out of the dark streets and walk beside the flower garden, inhaling the scent of jasmine. Her heart faltered. Why did she still sense his smell? Why did she still feel his lips on her neck? Why did she still taste his kiss in her mouth? Why did these things remain with her whilst he himself had disappeared? Disappeared – flesh, bones, smell, lips, everything about him. So why did anything – these tangible memories of him – why did they remain?

But, did they remain? Wasn't this smell her own smell, this touch that of her own skin, this taste her saliva? Why did what was him and what was herself seem entangled and mingled? Was it possible that he was a part of her? Or that she was a part of him? She felt her head and limbs. Which part could it be? She felt her shoulders, chest, stomach. Suddenly she was aware of being in a broad, well-lit street and that many glances were on her. She hurried to the bus stop.

She took the bus to Tahrir Square and walked towards Qasr al-Nil Street. She saw the building in the distance and felt a hard lump move in her heart. The laboratory too had become something oppressive, those empty test tubes, waiting, with mouths open to the air and their transparent glass walls revealing emptiness, ranged in their wooden rack, flaunting their meaningless existence.

She opened the laboratory door and went in. On the floor was a piece of paper. She picked it up and read the reproachful words: ‘I came by at six and did not find you. I'll drop by at nine. Saati.' She looked at the clock. It was half past eight. Just as she was making for the door, she heard the bell, hesitated and stood for a moment behind the door without opening it. The bell rang again and she called out: ‘Who is it?' The caretaker's voice reached her and she took a deep breath and opened the door. With the caretaker were a man and a woman.

‘They were asking for an analysis laboratory so I brought them here,' she heard the caretaker say.

She led them into the waiting room where they sat down. In the research room, she put on the white overall, then went out to them.

‘We've come for an analysis to see why my wife's sterile,' the man said curtly.

He pointed to the woman who was sitting, head bowed, in silence.

‘Have you been to the doctor?' Fouada asked the woman. The woman stared at her in silence and the man replied:

‘I've taken her to many doctors. She's had analyses and X-rays but we still don't know what the cause is.'

‘Have you also been examined?' Fouada asked him.

The man looked at her in astonishment.

‘Me?' he snapped.

‘Yes, you,' she replied quietly. ‘The man can sometimes be the cause.'

The man got to his feet, pulled his wife up by her arm and shouted:

‘What's all this rubbish! She's not going to be analysed here!'

He might have taken his wife and left, but the woman did not move. She stood, staring at her husband, wide-eyed and unblinking, as if she had died and frozen into that position. Nervously, Fouada went over to the woman and tapped her on the shoulder saying:

‘Go with your husband, madam.'

As if there were an electrical charge in the touch, the woman started and clung to Fouada's arm with all her strength, crying in a strangled voice:

‘I won't go with him! Help me! He beats me every day and takes me to doctors who put metal prongs in my body. They've examined everything, they've analysed everything and said I'm not sterile. It's him that's sick! Him that's sterile! They married me to him ten years ago and I'm still a virgin. He's not a man! In the dark, he doesn't know my backside from my head!'

The man pounced like a wild beast, hitting out at her with his hands, feet and head. The woman hit back. Fouada moved away from them in fear, muttering to herself:

‘He's mad! He'll kill the woman in my laboratory! What shall I do?'

She rushed to the door and went out into the corridor to call someone. Suddenly, the door of the lift opened and out came Saati.

In panic, she said:

‘A man's beating a woman in there.' At that moment, a piercing scream rang out and Saati rushed into the laboratory. The woman was on the ground with the man kicking her. Saati grabbed hold of him with one hand, slapped him across the face a number of times with the other, then threw him and the woman outside the room and slammed the door.

Fouada stood motionless, listening to their raised voices as they fought with each other on the stairs. She went to the door to see what the man was doing to the woman, but their voices had stopped and the corridor was quiet. She went to the window to watch them leave the building, thinking that the woman would not leave on her own feet, but was astonished to see the man come out followed by the woman walking quietly and with head bowed, as quiet as she had been before the incident. Fouada kept staring at her until she disappeared from view, then left the window and sank into a chair engrossed in thought.

Saati had been watching her, and when she sat down he also sat on a chair near her.

‘You seem upset for the woman,' he said smiling.

She sighed and said:

‘She's wretched.'

The prominent eyes flickered as he said:

‘No more wretched than others you will see here in your laboratory, but you can't do anything for them.'

He pointed upwards and said:

‘They have a god!'

‘Is there a god that takes people's mistakes away from them?' she replied irritably.

She didn't know why she uttered the sentence for it was not her own. It was Farid's sentence; she had often heard it from him. The sentence reminded her of Farid and her heart sank. She bowed her head, silent and dejected. She heard Saati say:

‘You seem to have been upset by the woman.'

She remained silent. He got up and took a few steps towards her, then said:

‘You are kind to everyone…'

He paused for a moment, then went on in an agitated voice:

‘… except me.'

She looked up at him in surprise. He gave an embarrassed smile and said:

‘Why did you miss our appointment? Were you busy? Or is this the way all women are?'

The words ‘all women' rang in her ear.

‘I am not like all women!' she retorted.

‘I know you're not like all women,' he said apologetically. ‘I know that very well, maybe only too well!'

She opened her mouth to ask him how he knew, but then closed her lips. A long period of silence passed, then she found herself saying:

‘What was the matter of importance?'

Sitting down, he said:

‘Yesterday, I ran into the undersecretary of the chemistry ministry at a supper party. He's been a friend for many years and I remembered that you work at the chemistry ministry so I mentioned you to him.'

‘He doesn't know me,' she said. Smiling, he said:

‘He knows you very well. He described you to me in detail.'

‘That's strange,' she exclaimed.

‘It would be strange if he didn't know you!' he said.

‘Why?' she asked.

‘Because he's a man who appreciates beauty!'

She glowered at him angrily and said:

‘Is that the important matter?'

‘No,' he replied, ‘only when I asked him about you, he told me that you were an excellent employee and have excellent reports.'

She smiled sceptically and he said:

‘When he talked about you so enthusiastically, I had an idea. I need a chemical researcher in the Board.' ‘What do you mean?' she said.

‘I mean that I can transfer you to my place, in the Board.'

‘To your place?'

‘There won't be as much work as in the Ministry,' he went on. ‘In fact, you won't have to do anything at all. The Board doesn't have a chemical laboratory.'

She looked at him in astonishment and said:

‘Then why should I go?'

He smiled. ‘To be in my office.'

She jumped to her feet, her head reeling. She glared steadily into his fish-flickering eyes and said:

‘I'm not like that, Mr Saati! I want to work! I want to carry out chemical research! I'd give my life in order to work as a researcher!'

She fell silent for a moment, swallowed hard and then said:

‘I hate the Ministry! Loathe it, because I do nothing there. I don't know how my reports can be excellent since I haven't done anything for six years! I won't go to the Board. I won't go to the Ministry. I'll hand in my notice and devote myself exclusively to my laboratory.'

His eyes clouded and he looked down. There was a long silence. Fouada got up, went over to the window then came back and sat on the edge of the chair as if about to get up again. He gazed at her fixedly from behind his thick glasses, a small muscle twitching under his right eye.

‘I don't understand you at these moments when you are angry,' he said softly. ‘Your eyes are full of buried sadness. Deep inside you there's a pain, I don't know why. You're too young to be so bitter, but it seems you've gone through harsh
experiences in your life. But, Fouada, life shouldn't be so serious. Why don't you take life as it comes.'

He went over to where she was sitting and, feeling his soft, fat hand on her shoulder, she jumped to her feet and walked over to the window. He followed her, saying:

‘Why waste your youth with such cares. Look,' he said, pointing to the streets, ‘look how young people like you enjoy life, while you, you are here in your laboratory submerged in analytical work and research. What is it you're searching for? What is it you want that can't be found in that world down there?'

She looked down at the street. The lights, the people, the cars glittered and rippled with an animated, living movement, but the movement was far away from her, separate from her, like a moving picture on a cinema screen, describing a life other than hers, a story other than hers, characters other than hers. She was alone, isolated, constricted within a circle that often threatened to crush her body.

As if from far away she heard Saati's voice.

‘You seem tired,' he was saying. ‘Take off that white overall and let's go out for some air.'

‘I've got a meeting tonight at the policy council,' he continued, looking at his watch, ‘but I won't go. These policy meetings are very boring. So much talk and the same talk every time.'

She suddenly remembered the many newspaper articles and pictures of him.

‘Apparently you have extensive political activity.'

‘Why do you say that?' he asked.

‘I seem to have read a lot about it.'

He laughed briefly, his thick glasses reflecting the light, and said:

‘Do you believe what you read in the newspapers? I thought that people no longer believe anything that's written. They simply read the papers out of habit, that's all. Do you read the papers every day?'

‘I read them and don't read them,' she replied.

He smiled, his teeth showing as yellow as ever.

‘What do you really read?' he asked.

Sighing, she replied:

‘Chemistry.'

‘You talk about chemistry as though you were talking about a man you love. Have you ever been in love?'

As if cold water had been dashed in her face, she recollected that she was standing at the window with Saati beside her, the laboratory empty and silent. She looked at the clock. It was eleven. How had that happened? Hadn't she tried to leave the laboratory before he came? Then she remembered the incident with the man and the woman. But couldn't she have left the laboratory immediately after? She glanced at Saati. His portly body was leaning against the window supported
by legs that were thin, like those of a large bird. His eyes – now like a frog's, she thought – darted behind the thick glasses. It seemed to her that before her was a strange type of unknown terrestrial reptile – that might be dangerous. She looked around in consternation and, taking off her white overall, went towards the door, saying:

‘I've got to go home immediately.'

He looked surprised, then said:

‘We were talking quietly. What happened? Did my question upset you?'

‘No, no,' she said. ‘Nothing upset me, but my mother's alone at home and I've got to get back immediately.'

Walking with her to the door, he said:

‘I can give you a lift in my car.'

She opened the door saying:

‘Thank you, but I'll take the bus.'

‘The bus? At this time of night? Impossible!'

They went down to the ground floor. He walked ahead of her to the long, blue car and opened the door for her. She saw the caretaker leap to his feet respectfully. She hesitated for a moment, wanting to run away, but unable to. The car door was open and the two men were waiting for her to get in. She got in and Saati closed the door. Then he hurried to the other side of the car, opened the door, got in and started the engine.

The street was practically deserted except for a few people and cars. The air was cold and damp. She saw a man standing
in front of a cigarette kiosk. Trembling suddenly, she was about to shout ‘Farid!' when the man turned and she caught sight of his face. It was not Farid. She shrank into her coat, shivering with sudden cold. Saati glanced at her and said:

‘Someone you know?'

‘No,' she said faintly.

‘Where do you live?' he asked.