The Yacoubian Building: A Novel

  When she had calmed down a little, she asked herself why she cared that much about her pregnancy. She was of course religious, and abortion was a sin, and she was also terrified of the operation itself because many women died during it. All these were genuine considerations, but they were secondary. A deep-seated, instinctive desire drove her to fight ferociously in defense of her pregnancy. She felt as though if she bore the child, she would recover her self-respect. Her life would acquire a new and decent meaning. She would no longer be the poor woman whom the millionaire Azzam had purchased to enjoy himself with for a couple of hours in the afternoon but a real wife who could not be ignored or slighted. She would be the child’s mother, going in and out with the Hagg’s son in her arms. Wasn’t that her right?

  She had gone hungry, begged, and tasted humiliation, and a hundred times refused to go astray, and in the end she had given her body to a man as old as her father, had put up with his dullness, his gloominess, his wrinkled face, his dyed hair, and his flagging manhood, had pretended that she was fulfilled and that her body was aching with desire, just for him to come to her and go away again in secret, as though she were a mistress; she had done all this only to sleep on her own in a cold bed and a huge, frightening apartment where she was forced every night to turn on the lights in order to dispel the lonesomeness and every day to weep out of yearning for her son; and then, when Azzam’s appointed time came, to do herself up for him and play out the role for which she had been paid. Wasn’t it her right after all that humiliation to feel that she was a wife and a mother? Wasn’t it her right to bear a legitimate son who would inherit the wealth that would protect her from the horrors of poverty forever? God had granted her this pregnancy as a just reward for her long patience and she wouldn’t give it up at any price.

  Such were Souad’s thoughts. Then she went into the bathroom and took off her clothes, and as soon as the hot water gushed over her naked body, a strange and new feeling came over her that her body, which Azzam had used and defiled and abused for so long, had suddenly been liberated and become her property alone. Her hands, her arms, her legs, and her breasts—every part of her body—breathed freely and she could feel a beautiful light pulse beating inside her, a pulse that would get bigger and grow and fill her day after day until the time came and it emerged as a beautiful child that would look like her, would inherit its father’s wealth, and would restore her self-respect and her proper station. She finished her shower, dried herself, and put on her night things. Then she performed the evening prayer and the additional extra prostrations and sat in bed reading the Qur’an until drowsiness overcame her.

  “Who’s there?”

  She woke from sleep at the sound of movement and muttering outside the room. She thought that a thief had slipped into the apartment, and, quaking with terror, decided to open the window and call to the neighbors for help.

  “Who’s there?”

  She screamed again in a high-pitched voice and strained to hear as she sat on her bed in the dark; the sounds, however, had ceased and quiet reigned. She decided that she would investigate herself and put her feet down on the floor, but fear paralyzed her limbs. She convinced herself that it was just her imagination and got back in bed and put a pillow over her head and for a few moments tried to plunge back into sleep. Then suddenly the door of the room opened so forcefully it banged against the wall and they fell on her.

  There were four or five of them. Their faces didn’t show in the dark. They pounced on her and one of them smothered her mouth with the pillow while the others grabbed her hands and feet. She tried with all her strength to slip out of their clutches and to scream at the top of her voice and she bit the hand of the man who was gagging her, but her resistance failed because they had tied her up tightly, completely paralyzing her movements. They were strong and well trained and one of them rolled up the sleeve of her pajamas and she felt something like a sharp thorn being stuck into her arm. Little by little her body began to weaken and relax. Then her eyes closed and she felt everything around her moving away and dissolving into nothing, like a dream.

  The newspaper Le Caire was established in Cairo a hundred years ago in the same old building that it still occupies in Galaa Street, and since its founding it has been published every day, in French, for residents of Cairo who speak that language.

  When Hatim Rasheed graduated from the Faculty of Humanities, his French mother was able to find him work on the newspaper. He proved his aptitude for journalism and was quickly promoted till he was appointed to be editor-in-chief at the age of forty-five. He introduced sweeping changes to the newspaper and added an Arabic-language section aimed at the Egyptian reader. During his time distribution rose to thirty thousand copies daily, which was a huge number in comparison to the other small local newspapers. This success came as a natural and just result of Hatim’s efficiency, his assiduity, his effective contacts with varied milieux, and his amazing capacity for work, which he had inherited from his father.

  If one remembers that over seventy individuals (administrative staff, reporters, and photographers) work under his direction at the newspaper, the first question that comes to mind is, Do they know about his homosexuality? The answer, of course, is yes, because people in Egypt are interested in the personal lives of others and delve into them with persistence and focus. Homosexuality is impossible to hide and all the employees at the paper know that their boss is homosexual. Despite the revulsion and contempt this arouses, Hatim Rasheed’s perversion remains merely a distant, pale shadow to his forceful, compelling professional image. They are aware of his homosexuality but do not feel it in any way in their daily dealings with him because he is serious and stern (more perhaps than is necessary) and, while he spends most of the day with them, not the slightest movement or glance that might hint at his tendencies escapes him.

  A few vulgar incidents have of course occurred during his time as head of the newspaper. Once there was a lazy and unsuccessful journalist on whom Hatim made a number of negative reports in preparation for his final removal from the newspaper. The journalist knew the chief editor’s intention so decided to get his revenge and exploit the presence of all the reporters at the weekly editorial meeting. He asked for the floor and when Hatim gave him permission, he addressed him, saying in a sarcastic tone, “I wish to propose to you, sir, the idea of an investigative piece on the phenomenon of homosexuality in Egypt.”

  There was a tense silence and the writer could not conceal a smile in his eagerness to insult Hatim, who said nothing but bowed his head and stroked his smooth hair (as was his custom when surprised or nervous). Then he leaned back in his chair and said calmly, “I don’t think the subject concerns the readers.”

  “On the contrary, it concerns them a great deal, because there’s been a major increase in the number of homosexuals and some of them now occupy leadership positions in the country, and scientific studies show that the homosexual is psychologically unfit to lead the work of any institution because of the psychological aberrations that homosexuality causes.”

  The attack was harsh and sweeping and Hatim determined to respond with violence, so he said firmly, “Your outmoded style of thinking is one of the reasons for your failure as a journalist.”

  “Has homosexuality now become a progressive behavior?”

  “Neither that nor is it the national issue in our country. My dear educated gentleman, Egypt has not fallen behind because of homosexuality but because of corruption, dictatorship, and social injustice. Likewise snooping into people’s private lives is a vulgar way of behaving that is inappropriate for a long-established newspaper like Le Caire.”

  The writer tried to protest, but Hatim cut him off sharply: “The discussion is closed. Kindly remain silent so that we may discuss the other topics.”

  Hatim thus won the first round deftly, demonstrating to all his strength of personality and refusal to bow to blackmail. On the other embarrassing occasion, which was even more vulgar, a trainee journalist harass
ed him. Hatim was standing among the workers in the print shop supervising the production of the paper when the journalist, on the pretense of talking to him about something, came up to him and pointing to something among the papers on the table pushed himself against him from behind. Hatim immediately understood the meaning of the act and moved away, quietly, resuming his rounds of the print shop in a normal way. When he got back to his office, he sent for the journalist, dismissed the other people in the room, and then left the man standing for several minutes while he looked through his papers in front of him without letting him sit or paying him any attention. Eventually he raised his head, looked at him for a while, and said slowly, “Listen. Either you behave decently or I throw you off the paper. Understand?”

  The journalist tried to make a pretense of surprise and innocence, but Hatim said in a decisive voice before going back to his papers, “That’s a final warning. No further discussion is called for. Get out. The interview’s over.”

  Hatim Rasheed is not merely then an effeminate but also a talented and inquiring individual who has learned much from experience and whose competence and intelligence have brought him to the pinnacle of professional success. Moreover, he is an exquisite intellectual, who speaks a number of languages (English, Spanish, and French, as well as Arabic) fluently and whose wide and deep reading has introduced him to socialist thinking, which has influenced him greatly. He has made efforts to become friends with the leading Egyptian socialists and as a result at the end of the 1970s was once summoned to an interview with National Security investigators, who interrogated him; however, he was released after a few hours after they had recorded in his file that he was “a sympathizer and not an organizer.” His socialism has caused his name to come up several times for enlistment in the secret communist organizations (the Workers’ Party, the Egyptian Communist Party) but his known homosexuality has dissuaded those in charge from going ahead.

  Such is Hatim Rasheed’s genuine but public persona. His secret life, on the other hand, is a kind of locked box full of forbidden, sinful, but pleasurable, toys that he opens every evening to play with, then locks again and tries to forget. He strives to reduce the homosexual space in his life to the narrowest possible, living his daily life as a journalist and an executive and practicing his pleasure for a few hours in bed at night. He tells himself that most men in the world have some special pastime that they use to relieve life’s pressures. He has known men in the most elevated positions—doctors, councelors, and university professors—who were devoted to alcohol or hashish or women or gambling and this never lessened their success or their self-respect. He convinces himself that homosexuality is the same sort of thing.

  This idea appeals to him greatly because it brings him relief, balance, and respect. This is why he is always looking for a stable relationship with a permanent lover so that he can satisfy his needs safely and restrict his homosexuality to his nighttime hours in bed, for when he is alone, without a lover, temptation seizes him and his importunate lust pushes him into ignominious situations. He has had days of pain and distress when he was driven to defile himself with criminal types and the scum of society in order to pick out from among them a lover with whom to satisfy his need for just one night, never to be seen again. Again and again he has been subjected to theft, insult, and blackmail. Once they beat him horribly in a public bathhouse in the quarter of El Hussein and took his gold watch and wallet.

  In the aftermath of such insane nights, Hatim Rasheed would hole up at home for a few days, seeing and speaking to no one, drinking a lot, passing his whole life in review, and remembering his father and mother with resentment and hatred. He would say to himself that if they had made a little time to look after him, he would never have sunk this low, but they were preoccupied with their professional ambitions and had devoted themselves to achieving wealth and glory so they left him and his body to the servants to play around with. He never blames Idris or doubts for one moment that he loved him truly, but he longs to see his father, Dr. Hassan Rasheed, rise from his grave just once so that he can tell him what he thinks of him. He would stand in front of him and face down his powerful glances, huge frame, and awe-inspiring pipe. He wouldn’t be afraid of him at all and he would say to him, “Great scholar, since you’d dedicated your life to civil law, why did you get married and have children? You may have been a genius at law but you certainly didn’t know how to be a real father. How many times in your life did you kiss me? How many times did you sit down with me so that I could tell you about my problems? You always treated me as though I were a rare art object or painting you’d acquired because it had taken your fancy; then you’d forgotten about it, and from time to time, when your crowded work schedule permitted, you’d remember it, look at it for a while, and then forget about it again.”

  His mother, Jeanette, he would also confront with the truth. “You were just a barmaid at a small bar in le Quartier latin. You were poor and uneducated and your marriage to my father was a bigger social leap than you’d ever dreamed of. Despite this, you spent the next thirty years despising my father and blackmailing him because he was Egyptian and you were French. You played the role of the cultured European among the savages. You kept grumbling about Egypt and the Egyptians and treating everybody coldly and haughtily. Your neglect of me was part of your hatred for Egypt. I think you were unfaithful to my father more than once; in fact, I’m sure of it, at least with Monsieur Bénard the embassy secretary, whom you used to spend hours talking to on the phone, lying on the couch, hugging the receiver, and whispering, your face contorted with desire, sending me off to play with the servants. You were just a whore like the ones anyone could catch by the dozen in the bars of Paris simply by sticking out his hand.” In these black moments, despair seizes Hatim, his sense of humiliation tears at him, and he surrenders himself to weeping like a child. Sometimes he thinks about suicide, but he lacks the courage to carry it out.

  Right now, however, he is in the best of form: his relationship with Abd Rabbuh has kept going and settled down and he has succeeded in linking Abduh’s life to his own by means of the kiosk and the room he has rented for them on the roof. He has guaranteed his physical satisfaction and stopped going altogether to the Chez Nous and other homosexual meeting places. He is urging Abduh to complete his education so that he can become a respectable, educated person capable of appreciating his feelings and ideas and worthy of his permanent friendship.

  “Abduh. You’re intelligent and sensitive and you can improve your circumstances through your own efforts. You’re earning money now, your family is taken care of, and your life is stable. But money isn’t everything. You have to get an education and become a respectable man.”

  They’d finished the morning love session and Hatim got out of bed, naked, and took a dreamy, dancing step on the tips of his toes, his face full of contentment and animation as it usually was after he’d had his fill of lovemaking. He started to pour himself a drink while Abduh, stretched out on the bed, laughed and said jokingly, “Why do you want me to get an education?”

  “So you can be respectable.”

  “You mean I’m not respectable?”

  “Of course you’re respectable. But you have to study and get a certificate to bear witness to that.”

  “‘There is no god but God’ is the only witnessing I’ll ever do!”

  Abduh laughed uproariously, but Hatim looked at him reproachfully and said, “I’m serious. You have to make an effort. Study, get the Intermediate and the Secondary, and go to a major faculty, like law, for instance.”

  “‘You can’t teach an old dog new tricks,’ as the old saying goes.”

  “No, Abduh. Don’t think that way. You’re twenty-four years old. Your whole life’s ahead of you.”

  “Everything’s fate and destiny.”

  “That backward stuff again? You can make your destiny in this world on your own. If there were any justice in this country, someone like you would get educated at state expense. Ed
ucation, medical treatment, and work are the natural rights of every citizen in the world, but the regime in Egypt is determined to abandon the poor like you to ignorance so it can rob them. Have you noticed that the government selects the Central Security troops from the poorest and most ignorant recruits? If you were educated, Abduh, you’d never agree to work for Central Security, in the worst conditions and for pennies. And at the same time the big men steal millions from the people’s pockets.”

  “You want me to stop the big men from stealing? I couldn’t stand up to the major who commanded the camp and now you want me to take on the big men?”

  “Start with yourself, Abduh. Make an effort and teach yourself. It’s the first step toward getting your rights.”

  Hatim looked at Abduh for a while, then said lovingly, “And who knows? Maybe one day you’ll be Mr. Abd Rabbuh the lawyer.”

  Abduh got off the bed, went up to him, took hold of his shoulders, kissed him on the cheek, and said, “And who’ll pay for my education? And who’ll open me an office when I graduate?”

  Hatim’s feelings suddenly took fire and he put his face close to Abduh’s and said in a whisper, “I will, my darling. I’ll never leave you and I’ll never be stingy with you.”

  Abduh hugged him and the two of them lost themselves in long, hot kisses. However, a distant sound reached them and gradually they became aware of repeated loud knocks on the door. Hatim looked at Abduh anxiously and they rushed to put on their clothes any old how. Hatim preceded him in the direction of the door, preparing his face with an annoyed and haughty expression for whomever he might find there. He peered through the peephole and said in surprise, “It’s your wife, Abduh.”

  Abduh came forward quickly, opened the door, and shouted angrily, “What’s the matter, Hidiya? Why are you here at this hour? What do you want?”