The Dark Side of Love (82 page)

“What drove them to do it, though, if it wasn't expecting to have all their desires satisfied in Paradise?” asked Rasuk, interested.

“Exactly what drives today's fanatics: a sense of divine mission that makes them the elect. It's the only drug that can enable young men who enjoy life to overcome the fear of death and despise life itself. The idea of going to Paradise is the most dangerous of all civilized inventions. That's where communism and religion meet, and the only difference is in defining its location. In this world, say the communists. No, in the next world, says religion. The Muslim Brotherhood tried to synthesize the two. They want to set up the state of God here on earth, because they think that would solve all problems. Although it's the biggest problem of all in itself.”

“Do they really want that, or are you just making fun of them?” asked Rasuk.

“It's all in the stuff they write. You two ought to do a bit more reading,” Josef said, so worked up now that his voice was hoarse.

“And what does the Muslim Brotherhood plan to do about us Christians?”

“Oh, they're clear about that too – either you emigrate or you become second-class citizens,” said Josef.

“I'd rather emigrate,” Rasuk decided.

“I don't know what I'd do without Matta,” said Claire, the day before her mother's funeral. Farid could see for himself how hard his friend was working, collecting flowers and wreaths for the coffin, getting food and drink in for the wake after the funeral, and candles for the church. No errand was too far for him to go. He was also willing to be one of the six men carrying the coffin from the dead woman's house to the Catholic cemetery outside the city walls.

Elias surreptitiously slipped a hundred lira into Matta's aunt's bag as she sat with the other mourners. The old lady wept with gratitude and embarrassed Elias by trying to kiss his hand. He dropped a kiss on her forehead. “We're all fond of Matta,” he whispered, and patted her on the shoulder.

“God bless you and your Claire, and may the Merciful One protect Farid,” replied Matta's aunt, much moved, and she slowly made her way home. The size of the funeral procession surprised Farid. He had no idea that his family had so many well-wishers in Damascus. Josef and Azar walked beside him, just behind his parents and Claire's brother.

This was the first time Farid had seen his Uncle Marcel, his mother's only brother, at close quarters. He was tall and massive, and when he stood next to Claire you sensed that they had nothing in common. There was something shapeless about Marcel, whose face was scarred and pitted by chronic acne. When Farid expressed his condolences, the ugly colossus failed to recognise his nephew, and absently offered his limp, sweating hand.

Later, at the wake, Farid also saw his mother's cousin Sana, whom he had met quite often at his grandmother's house during the last two years. She was almost thirty and already had four or five children, but she looked like a girl of twenty. Her husband Habib worked for the tram company as an electrician. Sana laughed a lot. There was something wild about her that fascinated Farid.

Not long before Grandmother's death she had invited Farid to visit her, but at the time Claire had asked him not to go. “She's a slut,” she briefly explained.

But Farid had never noticed any sign of that about her. Sana was always elegantly dressed and smelled of expensive perfume. Of course she was very feminine, and her clothes emphasized her curves, but blaming her for that seemed to him excessively Catholic. So he decided to visit Sana a little while after the funeral. She lived quite close, in Kassabah Alley.

When Farid entered the inner courtyard of the two-storey house, she saw him from the kitchen window. “Oh, how nice! My cousin has come to visit,” she cried out loud, as if she wanted to let the whole street know. The stairs were crammed with toys, shoes, and cartons.

She hurried to meet him, trying to button up her open house-dress. But the buttonholes were too big, and she couldn't manage it.

“One of my fine relations comes visiting at last,” she said, kissing Farid. She smelled of cigarettes and cooking fat.

The apartment was a dump. An old woman sat in a faded green armchair in the sitting room to which Sana steered him. She looked as stiff and desiccated as a cast-off straw doll.

Children were crawling about, screaming, or running back and forth in the chaos. Sana ignored them. She made a way for Farid through the dirt to some seats in a corner around a low table. There was a smell of stagnant water. Farid soon discovered the source of it: a huge plant pot containing a dead papyrus, with black water in the saucer under it.

Sana disappeared to make coffee, and was gone for a long time.

“He comes every day,” said the desiccated figure suddenly, “he beats my son in front of the children every day, he takes his wife away from him.” Farid started with shock, and wished he could get out of
there. The old woman went on sadly, and when he looked at her, he saw that hers was really a beautiful face, but marred by sickness, dirt and grief.

“He comes home tired from work,” she went on, “and he has to feed me, and wash his children, and then the joiner comes and she tells him how many times he's to hit her husband, right there in front of the children, and the joiner knocks him about. My son weeps, and I can't do anything to help him. Habib was a pretty boy like you, but after he married that whore he became a hunchback. My poor son! Can you get me a pistol?” Farid didn't reply. “No? No, I suppose not,” she muttered despairingly, and relapsed into her silent grief. She did not say another word.

“I heard from Michel,” Sana began, putting the tray of coffee cups down on the table, “that you're very popular with women.” She gave him a broad grin. “Just like your father. And that you often go to the club,” she added, pushing the scratched tray over to him. Two coffee cups of different patterns stood on saucers that didn't match either of them.

“What Michel?” asked Farid, taking a sip.

“What Michel do you suppose?
The
Michel. He's done a lot of your carpentry at the club,” she said indignantly, sitting down and spreading her legs so wide that he could see her red panties.

Farid guessed that Michel was her lover.

“I don't know him,” he said obstinately, by way of taking sides with the old woman, who must be Sana's mother-in-law.

Sana was speechless. She looked sideways at him. “You don't?” she said incredulously.

Farid drank his coffee in silence. To his surprise, it tasted even better than Claire's. He kept glancing at the old lady in the dilapidated chair. She was looking at him with eyes wide open, but didn't move a muscle.

“Old viper,” whispered Sana, seeing the direction of Farid's gaze. “She'll live to be two hundred. She shits all the time, but I'm not cleaning her up. Her son can do that.” There was cold contempt in her voice.

Farid drank the last of his coffee, stood up and walked firmly out. He felt that if he stayed there a moment longer he'd throw up.

“Where are you going in such a hurry?” Sana called after him. The air was fresher out in the corridor. He stopped, leaning against the window sill, and feeling ashamed of his flight.

“I have to go home. There's a meeting at the club this evening, and I must look in at home first,” he lied, looking down into the yard. A young father was playing with his son, a boy of about five, laughing and tickling him, and then suddenly he shouted, “Hold still there!” It sounded as if he were training a dog. The child couldn't manage to keep still just like that. He fidgeted and went on laughing, at the same time looking at his father's right hand in alarm. It landed right in the boy's face, knocking him down. He screamed with pain, his father picked him up, carried him about, soothed him, gave him five piastres and began tickling him again. The boy, totally confused, began laughing once more, then his father put him down, laughed with him, gave him a candy, tickled him, and cried, “Hold still there!” And once again the hand came down on the boy's face.

Farid was about to shout at the man when he felt Sana's hand on his back. “Why in such a hurry, cousin?” She was gently flattering him. For a brief moment he forgot Rana, his mother, the old woman in the chair, the noisy children, the garbage and the sadist in the courtyard, and wanted to kiss her lips. She smiled as if she knew what he was after.

Farid ran to the stairs. Sana did not reply to his hastily murmured, “Goodbye.” She knew as well as he did that this was his first and last visit to her.

Farid was drinking tea on the terrace of the club late that evening when Michel the joiner came in. He seemed to be looking for someone among those present, and finally came over to their table.

“The bet's on,” whispered Josef, who thought Farid's entire story about his cousin and her lover was the old lady's fantasy.

“A friend of mine,” began the joiner, “tells me you said today you didn't know me, although we've known each other for years.” As he finished this remark he wondered why the two of them were suddenly roaring and choking with laughter. “Pay up!” Farid told Josef.

“And you're a fool,” Josef said to the joiner accusingly. “My clever friend here set a trap and you fell right into it. So it's true. You're screwing his cousin Sana and now I'm paying for his tea.” Josef and Farid left Michel standing there and set off for home.

It was just before midnight. Two men were running down the street. They stopped for a moment, looking up at the rooftops. The smaller of the two was holding a pistol.

“He went over the roofs and escaped down Jews' Alley,” said the smaller man breathlessly. He put the pistol back in his jacket pocket.

He had already been waiting quarter of an hour for the bus in vain when a taxi drove up. The driver got out, saying, “The bus driver's had a heart attack. At this moment they're treating him, he can't drive any more today. The next bus will be along in an hour.”

Farid didn't think about it for long, but got into the shared taxi. The driver seemed to be trying to pick up everyone he saw at the roadside today, and even stopped when a man who only wanted a match to light his cigarette waved to him. At his leisure, he gave the man his booklet of matches and asked at least ten times if he was sure he didn't want to go anywhere. “Times are bad,” he said apologetically to the passengers he already had. “You have to be patient.” At the next bus stop he told a different story about the bus driver, who this time had allegedly murdered his conductor, so that was why he couldn't drive any more that day. There was still plenty of room in the taxi. But no one got in, and the taxi driver made for the next bus stop. It didn't bother him at all when, at the fifth or sixth stop, the bus came up right behind him and its driver hooted the horn.

Farid was slightly late at the church. Rana was standing deep in thought under the picture of St. Barbara. He went quietly up to her,
and looked around before he touched her, dropping a quick kiss on her neck. Rana started, and then smiled.

They sat in a corner near the confessionals right at the back of the church and held hands. The service was just beginning, and there were only a few worshippers, sitting in the three front rows.

“For once my father was wonderful. My mother's been wanting me to marry my cousin Rami, her brother's son, as soon as I'd taken my high school diploma and left school. He's a first lieutenant in the army. But Papa said I was to study at the university first and then we'd see.”

“Well, that's good news. If you're studying we'll have four years' respite, and we're sure to have thought of something by then.”