The Dreams

Dream 185

In Alexandria on the eve of Lesser Bairam, I was going from agent to agent, looking in vain for a vacant room. Finally — in despair — I decided to return to Cairo.

At Ramle Station, I met my friend “A,” who asked me to spend the days of the feast in his flat on Sa’d Zaghlul Street, where Umm Zaynab worked as his maid. Accepting his invitation, I thanked him for it. “Though it happened only by chance,” I told him, “this was the happiest encounter in my life.”

Since then the years have gone by, full of wonders of all different kinds. When I’m off by myself, I think back on that momentous coincidence, which the passing days have proved was the unluckiest one in my whole existence.