Sugar Street

152

Kamal had barely reached the stairway door after showing out the last visitors of the evening when an alarming din reached his ears from above. His nerves were still on edge, and he feared the worst as he bounded up the steps. The sitting room was empty, but through the closed door of his father's chamber he could hear the loud voices of several people, who were all speaking at once. Rushing to the door, he opened it and entered, expecting something unpleasant but refusing to think what it might be.

His mother's hoarse voice was exclaiming, "Master!"

Aisha was calling curtly for "Papa!"

Mumbling to herself, Umm Hanafi stood riveted to her spot by the head of the bed. When Kamal looked in that direction, he was overcome by desperate alarm and mournful resignation, for he saw that the bottom half of his father's body lay on the bed while the upper half rested on Amina's breast. The man's chest washeaving up and down mechanically as he emitted a strange rattling sound not of this world. His eyes had a new blind look, which suggested that they could not see anything or express the man's internal struggle. Kamal, near the end of the bed, felt that his feet were glued to the floor, that he had lost the ability to speak, and that his eyes had turned to glass. He could think of nothing to say or to do and had an overwhelming sense of being utterly impotent, forlorn, and insignificant. Although aware that his father was bidding farewell to life, Kamal was in all other respects as good as unconscious.

Glancing away from her father's face long enough to look at Kamal, Aisha cried out, "Father! Here's Kamal. He wants to talk to you."

Umm Hanafi abandoned her murmured refrain to say in a choking voice, "Get the doctor."

With angry sorrow, the mother groaned, "What doctor, you fool?"

The father moved as if trying to sit up, and the convulsions of his chest increased. He stretched out the forefinger of his right hand and then that of the left. When Amina saw this, her face contracted with pain. She bent down toward his ear and recited in an audible voice, "There is no god but God, and Muhammad is the Messenger of God". She kept repeating these words until his hand became still. Kamal understood that his father, no longer able to speak, had asked Amina to recite the Muslim credo on his behalf and that the inner meaning of this final hour would never be revealed. To describe it as pain, terror, or a swoon would have been a pointless conjecture. At any rate it could not last long, for it was too momentous and significant to be part of ordinary life. Although his nerves were devastated by this scene, Kamal was ashamed to find himself snatching a few moments to analyze and study it, as if his father's death was a subject for his reflections and a source of information for him. This doubled his grief and his pain.

The contractions of the man's chest intensified and the rattling sound grew louder. "What is this?" Kamal wondered. "Ishe trying to get up? Or attempting to speak? Or addressing something we can't see? Ishe in pain? Or terrified?… Oh…". The father emitted a deep groan, and then his head fell on his breast.

With every ounce of her being Aisha screamed, "Father!.. Na'ima!.. Uthman!.. Muhammad!" Umm Hanafi rushed to her and gently shoved her out of the room. The mother raised a pale face to look at Kamal and gestured for him to leave, but he did not budge.

She whispered to him desperately, "Let me perform my last duty to your father."

He turned and exited to the sitting room, where Aisha, who had flung herself across the sofa, was howling. He took a seat on the sofa opposite hers, while Umm Hanafi went back into the bedroom to assist her mistress, closing the door behind her. But Aisha's weeping was unbearable, and rising again, Kamal began to pace back and forth, without addressing any comment to her. From time to time he would glance at the closed door and then press his lips together.

"Why does death seem so alien to us?" he wondered. Once his thoughts were collected enough for him to reflect on the situation, he immediately lost his concentration again, as emotion got the better of him. Even when no longer able to leave the bedroom, alt Sayyid Ahmad had defined the life of the household. It would come as no surprise if on the morrow Kamal found the house to be quite a different place and its life transformed. Indeed, from this moment on, he would have to accustom himself to a new role. Aisha's wails made him feel all the more distraught. He considered trying to silence her but then refrained. He was amazed to see her give vent to her emotions after she had appeared for so long to be impassive and oblivious to everything. Kamal thought again of his father's disappearance from their lives. It seemed almost inconceivable. Remembering his father's condition in the final days, he felt sorrow tear at hisheartstrings. When he reviewed the image of their father at the height of his powers and glory, Kamal felt a profound pity for all living creatures. But when would Aisha ever stop wailing? Why could she not weep tearlessly like her brother?

The door of the bedroom opened, and Umm Hanafi emerged. During the moment before it was shut again, he could hear his mother':; lamentations. He gathered that she had finished performing her final duty to his father and was now free to cry. Umm Hanafi approached Aisha and told her brusquely, "That's enough weeping, my lady". Turning toward Kamal, she remarked, "Dawn is breaking, master. Sleep, if only a little, for you have a hard day ahead of you."

Then she suddenly started crying. As she left the room, she said in a sobbing voice, "I'll go to Sugar Street and Palace of Desire Alley to announce the dreadful news."

Yasin rushed in, followed by Zanuba and Ridwan. Then the silence of the street was rent by the cries of Khadija, whose arrival caused the household's fires of grief to burn at fever pitch, as wails mixed with screams and sobs. It would not have been appropriate for the men to mourn on the first floor, and they went up to the study on the top floor. They sat there despondently, overwhelmed by a gloomy silence, until Ibrahim Shawkat remarked, "The only power and strength is God's. The raid finished him off. May God be most compassionate to him. He was an extraordinary man."

Unable to control himself, Yasin started crying. Then Kamal burst into tears too. Ibrahim Shawkat said, "Proclaim that there is only one God. He did not leave you until you were grown men."

With morose sorrow and some astonishment Ridwan, Abd al-Muni'm, and Ahmad gazed at the weeping men, who quickly dried their tears and fell silent.

Ibrahim Shawkat said, "It will be morning soon. Let's consider what has to be done."

Yasin answered sadly and tersely, "There's nothing novel about this. We've gone through it repeatedly."

Ibrahim Shawkat responded, "The funeral must suit his rank."

Yasin replied with conviction, "That's the least we can do."

Then Ridwan commented, "The street in front of the house isn't wide enough for a funeral tent that can hold all the mourners. Let's put it in Bayt al-Qadi Square instead."

Ibrahim Shawkat remarked, "But it's customary to install the tent in front of the home of the deceased."

Ridwan replied, "That isn't so important, especially since cabinet ministers, senators, and deputies will be among the mourners."

They realized that he was referring to his own acquaintances. Yasin commented indifferently, "So let's erect it there."

Thinking about the part he was to play, Ahmad said, "We won't be able to get the obituary in the morning papers…."

Kamal said, "The evening papers come out at about three p m Let's have the funeral at five."

"So be it. The cemetery's not far, at any rate. There'll be time to have the burial before sunset."

Kamal considered what they were saying with some amazement. At five o'clock the previous day his father had been in bed, listening to the radio. At that time the following day… next to Yasin's two young children and Fahmy. What was left of Fahmy? Life had done nothing to diminish Kamal's childhood desire to look inside his brother's coffin. Had his father really been preparing to say something? What had he wanted to say?

Yasin turned toward Kamal to ask, "Were you there when he died?"

"Yes. It was shortly after you left."

"Did he suffer much?"

"I don't know. Who could say, brother? But it didn't last more than five minutes."

Yasin sighed and then asked, "Didn't he say anything?"

"No. He probably wasn't able to speak."

"Didn't he recite the credo?"

Looking down to hide his tearful expression, Kamal replied, "My mother did that for him."

"May God be compassionate to him."

"Amen."

They were silent for a time until finally Ridwan remarked, "The funeral pavilion must be large, if there's to be room for all the mourners to sit."

Yasin said, "Naturally. We have many friends". Then, looking at Abd al-Muni'm, he added, "And there are all the Muslim Brethren". He sighed and continued: "If his friends had been alive, they would have carried his coffin on their shoulders."

The funeral went off according to their expectations. Abd al-Muni'm had the most friends in attendance, but Ridwan's were higher iti rank. Some of them attracted attention because they were well known to readers of newspapers or magazines. Ridwan was so proud they were there that his pride almost obscured his grief. The people of the district, even those who had not known al-Sayyid Ahmad personally, came to bid farewell to their lifelong neighbor. The only thing missing from the funeral was the deceased man's friends, who had all preceded him to the other world.

At Bs. b al-Nasr, as the funeral cortege made its way to the cemetery, Shaykh Mutawalli Abd al-Samad materialized. Staggering from advanced age, he looked up at the coffin, squinted his eyes, and asked, "Who is that?"

One of the men from the district told him, "Al-Sayyid Ahmad Abd al-Jawad, God rest his soul."

The man's face trembled unsteadily back and forth as a questioning look of bewilderment spread across it. Then he inquired, "Where washe from?"

Shaking his head rather sadly, the other man replied, "From this district. How could you not have known him? Don't you remember al-Sayyid Ahmad Abd al-Jawad?"

But th e shaykh gave no sign of remembering anything and after casting a final glance at the casket proceeded on his way.