The day the leader was killed

intelligent gamble which enables a person to move up from one class to another.

So spare no efforts in making them feel at home!”

These, then, are business calls! I did not feel comfortable.

“I had been given to understand that you were financially secure,” I said.

“Only in this sense.

Other than that there’s no sense of security for anyone with this perpetual rise in prices!” he answered blatantly. I was totally dumbfounded while he went on excitedly:

“God won’t forgive you if you don’t amass an incredible fortune under these circumstances.”

“Isn’t it enough to have what will allow us to live comfortably?”

“Comfortably?

We’re in a merciless rat race, my dear.”

Here, then, is a new person emerging, with amazing rapidity, from behind that other person. He will not hear of patience nor will he be satisfied with rising gradually. As for my reactions, they’re beside the point. He’s very simply saying: That’s me, pure and simple, with no retouches. How about that? He sees only his own ambitions in this world, and those are his sole concern. He prostrates himself before them in prayer a hundred times a day. It’s as though I have no existence apart from the role I may be able to play in his broader strategy. Even those false pretenses of his, he’s no good at them, and doesn’t even seem to care. He’s a total surprise to me, a colossal surprise which strikes me like a thunderbolt. Love is only a thing of the moment. I soon experienced an inconsolable sense of disappointment. I had sold myself for nothing. Or maybe things are even worse than that. I am ashamed to confess my disappointment. I was deluded into thinking that I was, to say the least, an end, and I now discover that I am no more than simply a means to an end, quite worthless other than my function as such. My job here is to

he

courteous, to entertain, and offer drinks. He was not even satisfied with that, and soon informed me that he could no longer postpone his evening duties and that I would myself have to be responsible for receiving and entertaining guests.

“It’s an extension of your public relations job,” he said with a laugh.

“But there’s nothing in common between those people and myself,” I objected.

“It’s not important. Suffice it that you are eloquent, intelligent, and cultured. We’re partners and are supposed to substitute for one another, particularly when there’s ultimately much to gain from it.”

“This is the language of the market. I never thought I would have to deal with it!” I said sharply — the first sharp words uttered during our honeymoon.

“The sooner, the better,” he said with a smile.

Biting sarcasm.

I felt that my experience was rapidly proving to be a failure. I found myself amid men who were drinking, laughing boisterously, leaping to break all boundaries. I could hear a dirty joke now and felt a wave of irritation and anger surging up within me.

“Enough!” I said coldly.

They looked at me gloomily.

“Enough drinking!”

I said roughly.

“Were we being impolite?” asked one of them.

“It seems so!” I answered coldly.

“Is this an indication that we should leave?”

“Definitely!”

I said, growing angrier.

I was in the sorriest of states as I stood waiting, tormented by misgivings and apprehensions. When he returned around midnight, he turned pale as soon as he set eyes on me, and asked:

“Is everything fine?”

“Absolutely not.

This is a house, not a bar.”

“What happened?”

“In a word, I threw them out. Interpret it as you wish.”

He sank silently into the seat facing me. Following a period of silence, he muttered:

“A great structure has just collapsed.”

“On top of a handful of bastards,” I shrieked.

“A disappointment.”

“Don’t you want to understand?” I asked, highly incensed.

“I thought you understood things better,” he said in an irritatingly calm tone.

“Actually, I don’t understand you. You’re a strange person,” I continued.

And, again, with his irritating calmness, he added:

“It’s simply a misunderstanding.”

“A misunderstanding?”

“I mean a misjudgment on my part.”

“You are indeed a vile person!” I shrieked.

With a wave of his hand, he indicated that I should control myself and then continued:

“No, no, no need to bring up this subject. I’ve lived a lifetime without getting angry.”

“This speaks for you.”

“Calm down. There’s been a mistake and it can be corrected.”

“I’m going,” I said insistently.

“Why the hurry?

Wait until morning.”

“I shall not remain in this house a minute longer!”

“Do what you please, but no need to get angry,” he said, giving up on me.

Muhtashimi Zayed

He loves not the evildoers. What is this decree all about? You declare a revolution on May 5 and then annul it on September 5? You throw all sorts of Egyptians into prison — Muslims, Copts, party men, and intellectuals? Only the opportunists are on the loose. God help you, Egypt!

And whosoever is blind in this world shall be blind in the world to come, and he shall be even further astray from the way.

I remember the day Saad Zaghloul was placed under house arrest in Bayt al-Umma and the opportunists started crawling toward the Palace in a show of affected loyalty. Why are you replaying that old drama that looms large in the repertoire of Egyptian tragedies? I remember the dark days of oppression. Was 1919 then a dream or a myth? (Might does not make right. The mighty are those who can, when incensed, exert self-control.) I wonder what the morrow has in store for

us?

As for me, I lost my closest and very last friend yesterday. Our friendship tasted seventy-five years, ever since we first set foot in primary school.

Were

it not for old age and poor means of transport… Oh! I insisted on attending the funeral services, a painful journey like the pilgrimage. I leaned on Elwan. Later, during the condolence services, I recalled old memories: school, the street, the café, the pub, student committees, weddings,

birthdays

.

That face and that smile.

Have you heard the latest?

Complaints about the hardships of life.

We saw eye to eye about everything except football: are you for the Zamalek team or the National team? Drink a glass of water on an empty stomach. Don’t forget the medicine for the memory. I missed your comments on September 5, but I know exactly what you would have said. The Quranic recitation begins: Every soul shall taste of death.

Soon death came along smiling cunningly, and sat beside me. Don’t hurry: only one step left. The death of my old friend is a rehearsal for my own death. I can just see the whole thing: the washing of the corpse, its burial,

the

pallbearers. I read the obituary: Muhtashimi Zayed, sometime educator and supporter of the Nationalist Movement in his youth. Do you remember him? I thought he had died ages ago. Oblivion shuffles by wearily, but I surrender willingly. Indeed, it has been a long life, but now it seems like only a fleeting moment.

Love, violence, anger, hope — so many already gone.

There is no difference now between your being in the coffin and my walking behind you or vice versa. His son greeted me warmly and told me that, as he was dying, he said: Please remember me to him.

That evening, my son Fawwaz reprimanded me: