The Beggar, the Thief and the Dogs, Autumn Quail

  “A passionate song. Who’s the singer?”

  “Margaret. The star of the New Paris.”

  The crescent-shaped garden which bordered the dance floor was cooled by the autumn breeze. The music came from a stage set inside red walls and lit from within.

  “She looks English.”

  “That’s what the owner of the nightclub claims, but what passes for English in the nightclubs could easily be something else.”

  The fine lines of her face, a certain look in her eyes, the lightness of her movement—perhaps it was the harmony of all these which evoked something of the long-sought ecstasy.

  “I envy your expertise in these forbidden pleasures.”

  “Just part of my job as editor of the magazine’s art section!”

  “Bravo…You said her name is Margaret.”

  He answered laughing, “Or twenty pounds a night, not counting the liquor.”

  The gentle autumn breeze carried greetings from an unknown world, a world not inhabited by just one mind, a world whose four corners lay behind the darkness of the cypress trees.

  “I’m in a mood where anything could happen.”

  “But don’t drink more than one glass!”

  “The first thing is to invite her to the table.”

  Mustapha went to look for the waiter. The fragrance of lilies spread in the air, and in the intervals of silence, the whispering of the branches was audible. He was eager to enter his life of fantasy. Strange shapes of human beings passed before his eyes and he said to himself in apology that all this was the effect of illness.

  Margaret approached the table, swaying in her dark evening gown, and greeted them with a smile which displayed her perfect set of teeth. The waiter, her shadow, stood a few feet away.

  “Champagne,” Omar ordered.

  You first drank it on your wedding night. It was a cheap brand, a joint present from Mustapha and Othman. What would the prisoners do if struck with an epidemic of your strange disease?

  Mustapha’s greeting indicated that he had known the woman previously. “Margaret,” he said, “we both admired your voice, and my friend is quite taken with you. It seems that every time you meet…” He winked, laughing. “He’s a prominent lawyer, but I hope you won’t need him in any professional capacity.”

  Her mouth spread in a soundless laugh, and she said, “I always need someone to defend me. Isn’t that the case with women in general?”

  Omar summoned forth a gift for flattery which had lain dormant for many years. “Except for those with your beauty and voice.”

  Mustapha said, with a cunning blink of his filmy eyes, “He started out as a poet, you know, but he hasn’t yet reached the standard of ‘I can’t help wanting you more.’ ”

  Inspecting Omar, Margaret said cautiously, “A poet…but he looks so sedate!”

  Omar responded, “That’s why I gave it up so quickly.”

  “So now he regards beauty as a treatment which will cure him of the strange illness he’s been suffering from recently.”

  The champagne bottle popped open and the bubbles raced into their glasses.

  “That means I’m some sort of medicine?”

  Mustapha followed quickly with a smile. “Yes, why not, of the sort that one takes before sleep.”

  “Don’t rush things. The cure doesn’t come as easily as you think.”

  Omar asked her to dance. Out on the floor, with his arm around her waist and the fragrance of her perfume quickening his senses, he savored the night. The humidity had relented, and the trees, alight with red and white lamps, seemed to have bloomed.

  “May it be a happy acquaintance.”

  “You’re as charming as you are tall.”

  “You’re not short yourself.”

  “But your sharp eyes frighten me.”

  “They’re shining only from joy, but I’m not much of a dancer. I’ve almost forgotten how.”

  “Don’t you see you’re too tall to be a good dancer?”

  “When my friend invited me to the New Paris he said I’d like what I’d find.”

  “Really.”

  Lying comes so easily in the autumn. Mustapha was clapping for them as they returned to their seats. Omar’s face glowed with a boyish happiness, and for a moment, bewitched by the night’s charms, he was restored to his lost youth. She touched the ring of his left hand, murmuring, “Married…really, you married men don’t give the bachelors a chance.”

  Mustapha said, laughing, “You two are getting along famously. I bet you’ll go out together tonight.”

  “You’ve lost the bet.”

  “Why, my dear Margaret? A lawyer like our friend won’t tolerate delay.”

  “Then he must learn.”

  “Conventions be damned!”

  Omar said gently, “In any case, my car’s at your disposal to take you wherever you’d like.”

  When she got into the car with him, he was elated. “Where to?”

  “Athens Hotel.”

  “Have you seen the pyramids after midnight?”

  “It’s a dark night without any moon.”

  He headed in the direction of the pyramids. “Civilization has robbed us of the beauty of darkness.”

  “But—”

  He said reassuringly, “I’m a lawyer, not a playboy, or a highway bandit.”

  His heart had not stirred like this since the rendezvous in the Jardin des Familles. He could hardly remember Zeinab’s youthful face and hadn’t really looked at their wedding picture for the past ten years. You, Margaret, are everything and nothing. With the desperation of a fugitive, I knock at the gate of the enchanted city.

  “Under this open sky by the pyramids, great events took place.”

  She lifted his arm from around her neck, saying, “Please don’t add to those events.”

  He pressed her hand in gratitude nonetheless.

  “It’s best that we don’t stop,” she said. “Don’t you see how strong the wind is?”

  “We’re well protected inside.”

  How dense the darkness is around us. If only its density could shut out the world, obliterating everything before the weary eye so that the heart alone might see, might gaze on the blazing star of ecstasy. It approaches now like the rays of dawn. Your soul seems to shun everything in its thirst for love, in its love for love, in its yearning for the first ecstasy of creation and for a refuge in the wellsprings of life.

  “Why don’t we spend the night here?”

  “Be sensible. Please take me back.”

  “You’ve never heard of what goes on at night at the pyramids?”

  “Tell me about it tomorrow.”

  He leaned toward her and they exchanged a kiss; but then she restrained him, pleading, “I said tomorrow.”

  He kissed her cheek lightly, signaling retreat, and started moving the car over the sand.

  “Please don’t be angry.”

  “I yield to the eternal conditions.”

  “Eternal?”

  “I mean the feminine conditions.”

  “Actually, I’m tired.”

  “So am I, but I’ll arrange the right place for us.”

  “Wait till we meet again.”

  “I’ll start setting things up.”

  “Wait a little.”

  “I have a feeling that we’ll stay together.”

  “Yes,” she said, looking ahead at the road.

  It was nearly dawn when he returned home, and as he rode the elevator, he remembered how his father used to rebuke him for his late-night escapades. Entering the bedroom, he saw Zeinab sitting on the dresser stool, looking at him with dulled and saddened eyes.

  He said quietly, “You should have been asleep.”

  She spread her hands in despair. “This is the third night.”

  Undressing, he said distantly, “It was unavoidable.”

  She asked him more sharply, “Home upsets you?”

  “No, but it’s true, I am disturbed.”

  “
And how have you spent your nights?”

  “No place in particular, at the movies, at coffeehouses, roaming around in the car.”

  “And I’m here with all kinds of ideas running through my head.”

  “While you should be sound asleep.”

  “I’ll grow ill in the end.”

  “Follow my advice.”

  She sighed deeply. “You treat me with such deadly coldness.”

  There’s no doubt of that. The man you know has shed his skin and now he runs panting after a mysterious call, leaving behind him a trail of dust, all the joys of yesterday, all his Utopian dreams, even the girl whose youthful beauty held such promise in store when church bells rang. Infatuated, you once looked into those green eyes and said, “Love is fearless.”

  She murmured, clinging to you, “But my family.”

  “I’m your family, I’m your world. The Day of Judgment will come before I desert you.”

  Today your life hangs on a cheap song.

  Sleep, Zeinab, for your sake and mine.

  —

  Another woman stood on the red stage, singing,

  “I can’t help wanting you more every time we meet.

  The flame leaps higher with each heartbeat.”

  He leaned over to Mustapha. “Where’s Margaret?” he asked.

  Mustapha got up to inquire, then returned saying, “An unpleasant surprise.”

  “What is it?”

  “She’s gone.”

  “Where?”

  “Abroad.”

  “Did this happen unexpectedly?”

  Mustapha brushed his hand disdainfully. “Let’s look for someone else.”

  EIGHT

  This act of faithlessness set off a reaction twice as intense and he felt he was in a desperate race with insanity. In the end those swaying branches would speak. Mustapha asked, “Do you really think this is the remedy?”

  “Maybe. It’s the only thing that’s helped so far.”

  He stopped the car in front of the Capri Club and said as they were getting out, “I’ve tried so many things, as you know, to no avail. I did feel a heartthrob with Margaret. Passing illusion that she was, the heartthrob was real.”

  They sat under a trellis roofing. In the dim light, the people sitting at the other tables appeared to be phantoms.

  Mustapha remarked, “The manager of this club is a friend of yours,” and indicated a man standing at the far end of the stage. He was a short barrel of a man, with a fleshy white face and heavy jowls puffed up like a water-skin. His heavy-lidded eyes peered drowsily yet they had a certain mischievous tilt. When he saw Mustapha he moved toward them with surprising speed for one so heavy. Omar recognized him as a former client for whom he’d won two cases. The man shook their hands warmly, then sat down, saying, “Omar Bey, this is a pleasant surprise.” He ordered whiskey and went on. “I never dreamed you’d stop by here, but after all, those who work hard deserve to play.”

  Mustapha interrupted with a decisive voice. “Let’s dispense with the formalities, Mr. Yazbeck.” As the manager looked at them warily, Mustapha laughed. “It’s as you suspected. The time has come to return the good services of your lawyer.”

  “Omar Bey?”

  “I thought of asking you to recommend a suitable girl for him.”

  The man smiled broadly and said, “A refined and beautiful girl…of good family.”

  “I’m speaking about love, not marriage!”

  “It’s up to him, sir.”

  “Do you have any such cultivated lovelies?”

  He waved his small, soft hand in deprecation and said proudly, “Capri’s main attraction.”

  He went on to elaborate, still glancing at Omar a bit skeptically. “She was a student at the Drama Institute, but wasn’t a success at acting. She loves to dance, though, and has created a sensation at the Capri.”

  “Warda!”

  “None other.”

  Mustapha said apologetically, “I didn’t think of her because of her height, which would naturally discourage me.”

  Yazbeck gestured grandiosely toward the stage, where the musicians had started playing an Oriental dance. A storm of applause greeted the dancer, a magnificent statuesque woman with wide-set languid eyes and a high forehead which gave her face a certain aristocratic distinction.

  Mustapha murmured, “Marvelous.”

  Yazbeck said jestingly, “You’re immune to such delightful temptations…”

  “I’m self-sufficient. It’s a pastime enjoyed by the best of husbands.”

  Omar smiled, remembering how Mustapha once said that he couldn’t betray his wife since he wasn’t able to make love with anyone else. Then he drifted away from the voices around him as he followed the movements of the lovely body, lithe in spite of her height. He loved her smile as he loved the cypress tree. Yazbeck’s outstretched hand, bidding them goodbye, drew him back to awareness. After the man had gone, Mustapha looked at him seriously and cautioned, “The raptures of love are seldom found in nightclubs.”

  Omar muttered sarcastically, “He who strives will be rewarded.”

  “You know whenever I see Zeinab now my conscience bothers me.”

  He said scornfully, “These pains are more severe than the luxury of conscience.”

  Mustapha pointed out the problems involved in such affairs, but Omar interjected, “In the feminine sex, I seem to see life on two feet.”

  Warda walked directly toward them, without pretense of delay, her wide, gray eyes glancing steadily at Omar. The scent of the jasmine flowers she wore in her bracelet diffused in the air. Shaking his hand, she exclaimed happily, “At last I’ve found a man I don’t have to look at from above!”

  She sat down between the two men and flicked her hand so that the jasmine spilled onto the red tablecloth. The champagne came and bubbled forth. Warda seemed composed, but there was a look in her gray eyes that cautioned against haste. She exchanged a smile of familiarity with Mustapha and listened to the accustomed praise of her dancing and beauty. Throughout, she continued looking at Omar with respect, while he searched her gray eyes for some clue, some answer to his unsatisfied longings. I came not because I loved but in order to love. The complexion is clear, the scent pleasant, and the long eyelashes alluring.

  “So you’re the famous lawyer?”

  “That’s of little importance unless you have problems.”

  “My problems can’t be solved through the law courts, unfortunately.”

  “Why unfortunately?”

  “They might have been solved by you.”

  Mustapha said, laughing, “He’s trustworthy, both in court and outside it.”

  He noticed her long neck surrounded by a simple pearl strand, the bare spread of her chest, the healthy passion expressed in her full, colored lips and flowing from her eyes, and felt his being throb with a strange and unbounded desire, like the mysterious yearnings which assailed him in the late hours of the night. He wished to address the depths, and to have the depths speak to him without an intermediary, but if the long-sought ecstasy eluded him, he would find a substitute in the firebrand of sex, the convulsive climax which consumes the wine of life and all its dreams in one gulp. He was delirious with longing, anticipation, the titillation of adventure, the effect of abandoned drinking, the scent of jasmine pressed under his glass, Warda’s encouraging glance, a star blinking through a gap in the trellis. As the club showed signs of closing, he said, “Shall we go?”

  Mustapha said his farewells and left.

  Warda was impressed by the sight of his Cadillac, an elegant little coupe de ville. “Where’s your home?” he asked.

  “It’s out of the question. Don’t you have a place?”

  “With a wife and two daughters.”

  “Then take me home as those without homes do.”

  He drove out to the desert by the pyramids, racing madly, seeking the shelter of the open sky as he had with Margaret. The half-moon was sinking toward the west. He reached toward her an
d gave her a light, artful kiss as a start. Then they exchanged a long kiss, incited by passions as old as the moon.

  She sighed, whispering. “This is nice.”

  He pressed her against him with a fervor which stretched into the solitudes of the desert. His fingers entwined in her hair, which was lit by moonbeams, and he said in a strange, breathless voice, “When the dawn comes.”

  With his cheek pressed against hers, they gazed at the sleepy moon, on a level with their eyes, and followed its languid beams on the sand. Its beams would die, leaving the heart still thirsting. No power on earth can preserve this godly moment, a moment which has conferred a secret meaning to the universe. You stand on its threshold, with your hand stretched out imploringly toward the darkness, the horizon, and the depths where the moon has fallen. A firebrand seems to burn in your chest as the dawn breaks forth and fears of bankruptcy and want recede.

  “Are you a dreamer?” she asked.

  “No, I’m realistic to the point of illness.”

  She laughed. “But you’re not a woman beater.”

  “I don’t beat men either.”

  “That’s good.”

  Pressing her closer, he said, “But at one time, I was about to kill.”

  “Because of a woman?”

  “No.”

  “Don’t talk of such things in the moonlight.”

  “In the end I decided to kill myself.”

  “In my presence?”

  “In your arms.”

  “In the moonlight?”

  “Now the moon is disappearing.”

  When he returned home and switched on the bedroom light, Zeinab opened her lifeless eyes. As he greeted her indifferently, she said tensely, “It’s almost dawn.”

  “So?”

  She sat on the bed, her eyelids swollen, looking tormented and desperate.

  “I haven’t heard this tone from you in all the years we’ve been married.”

  He put on his pajamas in silence and she cried out, “I’ve never heard anything like it.”

  He muttered resignedly, “Illness is like that.”

  “How can I bear such a life?”

  “My days are spoiled. Don’t spoil the nights.”

  “The girls are asking questions.”

  “Well, let’s face the situation with a certain amount of wisdom.”