The Dark Side of Love (75 page)

“Oh, well … too much talk, not enough action,” he replied, feeling that that was a fair summary.

Damascus was full of life again. There was a new democracy in power, governing with an elected parliament, and the newspapers were making full use of the freedom they had regained. But at the same time, the Syrians noticed the radical changes being made by the now very popular President Satlan of Egypt. His speeches were followed with mingled enthusiasm and dislike in Damascus, Baghdad, Algiers and Mecca. He had a wonderful voice. People heard it on the radio and said it was as captivating as the voice of the famous Egyptian singer Um Kulthum. Satlan had wit and charisma.

No Syrian politician could compete with him. Even those who never discussed politics suddenly began abusing the British, just because Satlan condemned them.

At home, Farid couldn't even mention Satlan's fine voice, for to Elias and Claire the Egyptian was a dangerous demagogue who took money from Arabs and stirred up mob feeling against Christians. Elias even claimed that Satlan had once been a member of the Muslim Brotherhood, and attacked the British and the French only because they were Christians.

Farid woke up every morning feeling curious about life these days. Those three years in the monastery seemed to him like a long, deep sleep.

Matta seemed to be getting better all the time, returning to life. He came to find out what errands Claire wanted him to do, stood in the courtyard awkwardly when he came back, and usually wouldn't eat or drink anything. But sometimes Claire persuaded him to take some refreshment. Then he would sit by the fountain as he drank, and he always said, “Thank you, brother,” when he saw Farid. After a while he would rise with a smile and leave.

Matta was very much on Farid's mind, but he was saddened by what he heard from Josef about his Jewish friend Saki. Saki had turned quieter and quieter over the last year, said hardly a word, and when he did speak he gave nothing away. His words were just covering up for his silence. Then he suddenly disappeared. He was less that fifteen at the time. He planned to go south to Israel, and had hung around the Golan Heights hoping to get out of the country with the smugglers who knew all the paths there, but someone gave him away, and he was arrested.

After that Saki, once a lively boy, went through hell. He had been accused of espionage, he was tortured and interrogated, and he wasn't set free until a year later. Now he was distrustful; he never came out into Abbara Alley any more, and he mixed only with other Jews. He prayed a great deal and worked for his father, whose anxiety about his son had made him sick. Josef said that over a thousand Jews out of what was only a tiny Jewish community anyway had already fled to Israel by way of Cyprus or Istanbul.

“The funny thing is,” he said thoughtfully, “the government says the Jews are well off in Syria, and life in Israel is miserable, but then why do so many Jews leave all their worldly goods behind and flee to Israel? Either they're total idiots or our government is lying.”

Saki had fled for the second time just before Farid's return in the spring of 1956, this time with his sister Sarah and forged papers, making for Tel Aviv by way of Beirut and Paris. His parents had been questioned and humiliated, but they hadn't known anything about his plans.

“Suleiman and I are going to the New Town,” Josef told Farid one day. “Students demonstrate in the streets every day there.”

“What's it like, demonstrating?”

“Oh, people shout slogans and carry banners saying what they want, and pretty soon it's reported all over the world.”

“And,” added Suleiman, his eyes gleaming, “some time or other there's bound to be a clash, scuffles break out between opposing sides, and it turns into a street battle. Sometimes it spreads all over the New Town. I've been there three times and joined in.” He rubbed his hands with glee.

“How do you mean, joined in? On whose side?” asked Farid

“Suleiman doesn't mind,” said Josef, with a dig at his friend, “just so long as he can hand out punishment.”

The demonstration was impressive. Farid followed the procession, Josef and Suleiman were right in the middle of it. Josef was shouting slogans along with everyone else. Farid couldn't help laughing at his friend. He'd hardly have known him. Josef of all people, that thin, much-indulged boy, leaping in the air, clapping and yelling as he demanded instant union with Egypt. Good heavens, thought Farid in surprise. Suleiman didn't shout at all. He ran around more like an American Indian in a Western, expecting trouble and always looking out for any kind of threat. But there was no counter-demonstration, and the police provided an escort for the demonstrators and were extremely friendly.

Two men, much struck by Josef's show of spirit, raised the thin boy on their shoulders so that he could be heard better. Josef's voice cracked, sounding as hoarse as a young rooster's. Farid applauded, the men chanted Josef's slogan.

A week later Satlan made a passionate speech denouncing the British and the French who, he said, were trying to blackmail him, and suddenly, to the surprise of millions of listeners, he addressed the demonstrators in Damascus directly. “My brothers in Damascus,” he said, proudly repeating their slogans, which he claimed encouraged him in Cairo to promote union between Egypt and Syria.

Josef couldn't sleep that night. He regarded Satlan as a new Saladin who would unite the Arabs into a rich and powerful nation.

That day in the summer of 1956 people streamed out of all the surrounding streets, houses, schools, and shops. Motor traffic came to a standstill until the procession of demonstrators reached the Square of Seven Fountains.

Farid was amazed by the atmosphere. He had never known anything like it: thousands of people all shouting the name of Satlan, praising him to the skies. When the procession passed Rana's house, he felt his heart beat faster. What would she say if she saw him? He didn't know.

None of her family appeared at the windows.

Later, when Josef, Suleiman and Farid were on the bus going home, Josef was hoarse and exhausted. Suleiman was disappointed because it had all passed off so peacefully.

Wanting to cheer him up, Farid asked how Lamia was. He knew the two of them had been in love since they were seven, but he wasn't aware that he was probing a deep wound. Only two weeks earlier Lamia had been married against her will, and had moved to the north with her husband.

Lamia had lived in the house next door, separated just by a wall from Suleiman's family. His sister Aida always mocked the couple. “My brother is a chocolate addict,” she once said. “If Jesus Christ asked him for a piece, he'd convert to Islam straight away. But he'll give Lamia a whole chocolate bar and watch lovingly as she lets piece after piece melt in her mouth.”

When they were small, of course, Suleiman and Lamia had played together, but all that changed when she was twelve. Suddenly she
wasn't allowed to visit him, and he couldn't touch her or give her presents any more.

He was in despair, but Azar had a bright idea: they could bore a hole in the wall between the two buildings, and then talk to each other or exchange letters through the small opening. The mud-brick wall was thin, so it wasn't difficult to bore the hole. A trickier business was finding a place on both sides of it where they wouldn't be disturbed. In the end they decided on the lavatory on Lamia's side, while Suleiman had to disappear into a small broom cupboard under the stairs. He let his sister into the secret so that she could cover up for him if necessary. In spite of her sharp tongue, Aida could always be relied on.

All went well for months. But one day Lamia's elder brother Ihsan discovered the hole, waited until his sister went to the lavatory, stood outside the door and eavesdropped on her love-talk. She was given a beating, and the hole was bricked up.

For a while Lamia's best friend Nadia carried messages between the lovers when they arranged secret meetings in the New Town. But Nadia's father saw his daughter three times speaking privately to Suleiman, and suspected that she herself had a relationship with the son of the consul's chauffeur, now that Lamia's parents had ended his affair with their own daughter.

Nadia was brave and didn't give the lovers away, even when she was beaten. In his room, Suleiman could hear her screams after every blow, and wept with rage.

In her desperation, Lamia now turned to her favourite brother Usama as a messenger. He was only five, and she gave him a piece of chocolate for every letter he delivered. She thought he was a guileless child, but he began blackmailing his sister and had soon drained her of all her pocket money. When she couldn't pay any more he gave her away. This time her parents didn't beat her or lock her up, but in secret they frantically looked around for a man who would marry her even though she was so young. Soon they succeeded, and found a teacher urgently searching for a wife. He was twenty years older than Lamia, and came from the north.

At the sight of the young girl he felt suspicious. But when a woman doctor confirmed that Lamia really was still a virgin he married her.

Claire's mother had just celebrated her eightieth birthday when she had a fever that left her mentally confused. She needed care all around the clock now, and even though Claire didn't do it herself she had to be constantly within reach of the nuns who were looking after Lucia. There was no way she could go to Mala for the summer vacation as usual.

Farid consoled his mother, saying he'd rather stay in Damascus anyway, he never wanted to set foot in Mala again. She raised her eyebrows. “Your father won't like that,” she said.

“He ignores me anyway, so it can't make any difference to him where I am. I hate Mala.” Claire stroked his head.

Elias didn't know how to behave with his sick mother-in-law, and visited her once a month just out of politeness. He complained daily of the heat in Damascus, bewailing the fact that their lovely cool house in Mala was standing empty. However, Claire was not to be moved.

So Farid spent that summer in the city. Josef, Suleiman, and the other boys stayed in Damascus as well, but Rana had to go to Greece for two months with her parents. She phoned Farid a week before they left.

“Why Greece?” he asked on the telephone.

“A friend of my father's has a house there.”

“Can we see each other before you go?”

“Tomorrow, if you like. We could go to the cinema. Dunia and I have tickets. I could persuade her to let you have hers, and my parents wouldn't know.”

“Wonderful,” cried Farid. “When does the film begin?”

“At three in the afternoon. I'll wait for you outside the entrance.”

“Aren't you afraid of Jack? Suppose he …”

“Never mind Jack,” she interrupted. “We'll meet outside the cinema.”

He was there half an hour early, and Rana herself turned up quarter of an hour before the appointed time. “My mother's such a viper!” she said angrily as they sat down in a small café in the cinema building. “Ten minutes before I was about to leave, she said Jack had better go
along to look after me and my girlfriend. Think of that! What was I to do? I told myself to keep calm, and I told him, ‘All right, come with us, then. We're going to this marvellous Indian movie.' Because I know Jack hates Indian movies. He thinks they're badly made, the actors are too fat, the stories are too thin, and the songs are dead boring. But I still held another trump card.”

Farid looked at her inquiringly.

“It's a love story. Jack hates love stories worse even than maths,” she explained. “So my mother was still trying to lumber me with Jack, and tempted him with a lot of money, saying he could take me and Dunia out for an ice after the film. Then I played my trump card and told him it was a particularly good love story. That did the trick!”

Rana and Farid sat side by side in the dark cinema, holding hands. It was one of those mammoth Indian films that spend three hours telling a story in which the lovers do their utmost to be unhappy and keep singing at each other without warning. One-third of it was singing that no one could understand.

Farid managed to kiss Rana surreptitiously twice, and was surprised by the tears that ran down her cheeks when she looked at him.

When the film was over she handed him a letter, dropped a quick goodbye kiss on his cheek and whispered, “Think of me.” Then she pushed her way through the audience to the main exit. Farid left more slowly, choosing the side exit.

He read Rana's letter in the bus, and had difficulty in keeping back his own tears.