Yasmine (13 page)

Nehad brought her up to date on all the social news – who had married whom, who now had a son or a daughter, who had built a house and who remained single. Yasmine became conscious of the gulf that had opened between them and asked herself what kind of woman and wife she would have been if Azme had lived and they'd had children.

After Nehad rushed off to take care of her children, Yasmine checked the telephone directory for West Jerusalem. She pored over the lists of names but did not find Edna Mazursky.

Abu George phoned me to ask for an urgent meeting. He came to my office in Sheikh Jarrah but after a relatively short exchange of the usual courtesies seemed to get stuck and couldn’t say why he wanted to meet. I already knew him well enough to understand that he found it difficult to ask for anything, and in fact so far he’d never asked anything for himself.

“
Tfadal! Talab! Khidmah
?” I prodded him. “Is there any request or service I can help with?”

He moved uncomfortably in the armchair and finally grasping the end of the rope I had thrown him, he said formally, without the familiarity which was developing between us, “I need some advice.”

“A dear man has asked for a trivial thing,” I replied with the well-known saying.

“My daughter Yasmine has come home. She studied special needs education for a PhD, and all she needs now is a period of practical work. I’m afraid she won’t find a suitable institution among us. Not that she’s planning to stay, but…” He took out a silver cigarette box, lit a cigarette, inhaled loudly then squashed it in the ashtray. He tried to smile. “
Yaani
, I mean, I just wondered if you have such an institution.” He wiped his
forehead. I poured him a glass of water and he thanked me with a nod but didn’t drink.

“We, my wife and I, we so much want her to stay. She’s our whole life…Maybe you…” He fell silent and looked down.

“I’ll do my best,” I said and touched his shoulder lightly as a gesture of friendship. I walked with him to the door and he left in a hurry.

I phoned Levanah, who knows everything there is to know about the government ministries, and she advised me to ask at the Ministry of Social Welfare: she even gave me the name of the man in charge of the relevant department. I contacted him immediately and he recommended me to the director of the special education youth village in Kiryat Menahem in Jerusalem with whom I made an appointment for Yasmine.

But on the day she didn’t show up. I apologised to him and made another appointment, but just when she was expected at the youth village Abu George came to my office again, deeply embarrassed and apologetic.

“I want to ask the director’s pardon, and…I’d like to make a donation to the youth village,” he said.

“It’s not necessary.”

“What can I say to you, brother? I…” I nodded and urged him to go on. “You see, Yasmine feels that to do her research at your institute means recognising the occupation. The young are suspicious; they don’t think, they see every move as collaboration with the enemy. I don’t know what to do,” he sighed.

“Abu George, why don’t you remind her what happened when Mustafa Kamel refused to hold any negotiations with the British before they left Egypt. His rival, Sa’ad Zaghloul, was just as much a true patriot as Mustafa Kamel, but he was a practical
man and thought he should try to get as much as possible out of the British. He went to London and in the end scored some major achievements on behalf of his country. Tell her she can make use of our services with an easy conscience. It will not commit her to anything.”

“Everyone is urging her to try, even Senator Antoine. Have you heard of him? Even this senator, who does not recognise you and refuses to accept the fact that you’re here, even he tells her that she should complete her training in one of your educational institutes. He loves her and wants her to stay with us,” Abu George explained frankly. In the silence he frowned then smiled slightly. “Actually, in spite of his total rejection and resistance to you, Senator Antoine is sure that training at an educational institute in your country will be first-rate professionally.”

A few days later he came to see me again. “
Al hamdu lillah
, she agreed,” he announced, and I quickly made a third appointment with the director of the youth village. Abu George said hesitantly, “Could you perhaps come with us, if it’s not a problem for you? And perhaps we could even drive around a little in West Jerusalem?”

“At your service. Shall we leave from here?”

“No, no. Not from your office,” he replied in alarm. “Could we meet at the American Colony?”

“Certainly. By all means.”

At the appointed time I waited for them, dressed in my new suit, in the hotel café. Unlike modern luxury hotels with their ostentatious settings, here the café was a spacious patio, breathing freshness. A small fountain played in the middle, surrounded by beds of bright pansies, trees and shrubs, with tables and chairs scattered around invitingly.

Abu George arrived with his daughter on his arm. He looked like a different man. With his daughter at his side his face shone openly with tenderness, pride and devotion. The light summer suit he wore on this occasion seemed to reflect the light of his love. He looked around and when he spotted me he came over with her, solemn and dignified, and introduced us. We shook hands, though her hand barely touched mine. She was wearing a very fine perfume. What is more, she was as beautiful as she had appeared in the photograph I noticed the first time I entered their living room, though there was now a touch of sadness in her eyes.

“So you are the saviour?” she said mockingly in French.

“My French is poor. We can speak Arabic or…Hebrew?”

“My Hebrew is not up to date and my accent is poor,” she surprised me by saying in fluent, sabra Hebrew. “We’ll speak English!”

The waiter moved the chair closer for her and she sat down, supple and graceful, but held her back very straight and her shoulders stiff and high like a pair of bodyguards on full alert. She took out a packet of foreign cigarettes and laid it on the table, and her turquoise-blue eyes, the colour of a dreamy lagoon, looked straight at me.

The waiter quickly brought a jug of water and glasses and poured for her first instead of for her father, then remained to receive the order, staring at her in amazement. I must admit I didn’t know what to do with myself. I began to sip the water, wondering about her air of sadness which made me want to stroke her gently, to make her smile. I forgot the purpose of our meeting and instead of talking like a man about the subject at hand I fell silent like an awkward boy. Abu George drank some water, cleared his
throat, took out his beads and began to roll them between his fingers.

The uncomfortable silence was interrupted by the waiter, returning with our order: lemonade for her, and for us
sadeh
coffee in little white china cups edged with gold. The aromatic coffee was as black as her hair. I breathed in the aroma and looked at Yasmine. Her gaze forced me to keep alert. Abu George sipped his coffee slowly, and when I remained silent he overturned his cup on the little saucer, waited a moment and handed it to me. I reversed the cup and examined it solemnly.

“You can tell the future?” Yasmine asked, still mocking.

“
Ya rait
, I wish,” I replied.

She looked around, her full lips tight, took out a slim cigarette but did not offer me one. Before she could light it the waiter appeared and lit it for her with a flourish. Didn’t he have any other customers to serve? Yasmine spotted the headline in the daily
Al Quds
, announcing that a curfew had been imposed on Jenin.

“So once again you’re imposing a curfew on innocent people,” she snapped at me.

I stroked my thick sideburns, fashionable at the time, but didn’t know how to reply.

“
Binti
,” said Abu George breaking into a nervous cough, “it’s not him, it’s the army.”

“It’s not the same government?”

I said nothing but looked at her – her somewhat elongated face, her fair complexion, her expression in which contempt and embarrassment were mingled. She straightened her blouse and looked at the full glass ashtray in the centre of the table. Right on cue the waiter materialised and replaced it with a clean one. His hovering must have annoyed her, because she
put her dark glasses back on and turned her head away. Her right foot was swinging restlessly.

I decided to get straight to the point. “The youth village we’re going to is one of the best in the country. People come from other countries to specialise there, and some are also doing research.”

Abu George nodded. “Yasmine hasn’t made up her mind yet. She just wants to see the place.”

Well, thank you very much, I thought to myself, beginning to resent the visiting princess. Her father glanced at his watch, took a deep breath and gestured to the waiter.

“I’m paying,” I said.

“That’s not our custom,” he smiled and put a bank-note down on the table.

Abu George settled comfortably in the driver’s seat of his Dodge and turned on the radio. The voice of Fairuz filled the car, sultry and yearning.
Aatini al-nai waghani
. Give me the flute and start singing! Yasmine relaxed a little and nodded her head in response to the beat.

“Do you know Fairuz?” Abu George asked me.

“I prefer Um Kulthoum.”

“I like Fairuz more,” said Yasmine.

“Fairuz is splendid, but she’s too controlled. Um Kulthoum is warm and speaks straight to the heart,” I said.

“They’re both good,” said the father.

Reaching the road where until recently the concrete wall separating the two parts of the city had stood, Abu George became tense and slowed down. He began to point out the sites he had known since childhood: “Mamilla. It’s changed so much…Under the Mandate it was a commercial centre, fine
shops, not dirty garages…Look, there’s the Palace Hotel. It’s where the Mufti of Jerusalem stayed, did you know?” he asked, seeking my eyes in the rearview mirror. “And here’s Terra Sancta. Yasmine, you remember?” She gave it a glance and her face twitched.

“This is a new hotel, Kings Hotel,” I told them. “But when King Hussein comes we’ll put him up at the King David, of course.” My attempt at a joke failed. Why are you playing the tourist guide, I asked myself. These people are visiting their own city.

We drove down Gaza Street. I watched Yasmine from the back seat. Her eyes seemed fixed between the road and the sky. Was she remembering? She was eight or nine when they had fled from their house, and should remember quite a bit. I was twelve when we came to Israel and Baghdad remains engraved in my memory.

At the end of Herzog Boulevard I said, “There on the left is an immigrant neighbourhood. My parents live there.”

“It’s al-Katamon,” said Abu George.

“And there, ahead, is Kiryat Yovel, also immigrant housing.”

“
Yaani, Bait Mazmil
…Looks like toy bricks.”

“And over there is Manhat.”

“Al Malhah!” he said. In his mouth the old names had a different flavour. He slowed down and looked around. “You’ve been building and building. Nothing is the same.”

The gatekeeper at the youth village bowed as we entered, an unusual gesture for an Israeli. “The director is waiting for them,” he told me in Hungarian-accented Hebrew, pointing to the office.

A well-dressed young woman came hurrying to meet us. “You
must be Yasmine,” she said with an attractive smile. “Welcome! My name is Michelle and I’m the village psychologist. I also studied at the Sorbonne.”

“Good morning, Michelle, I’m Nuri,” I broke in, extending my hand. “Please meet Mr Hilmi, Yasmine’s father.”

“‘Oh forgive me! I was so curious to meet the new trainee,” she chuckled and shook hands with everybody, just as Mr Lishinsky, the director of the youth village, arrived to greet us and invite us to follow him into his office. His secretary brought refreshments while Lishinsky, thin and bespectacled, fired questions at Yasmine – where had she studied and for what degree, had she finished her course obligations and what were her grades? Yasmine remained silent. Abu George hung his head, took out his beads but changed his mind and put them back in his pocket. We all looked at Yasmine, who still said nothing. Finally she removed her scarf, exposing a garnet necklace on her long neck, slowly opened her handbag, took out a packet of documents, and put it on the director’s desk.

Michelle took the documents and looked through them. “She graduated with exceptional grades, better than mine… We studied with the same professors. This is splendid, extraordinary!” There was something very attractive about this Michelle – her easy attitude towards Yasmine, the way she touched her, as if they were old friends, and above all her big warm smile. Yasmine’s eyes wandered over the room, but the tension in her forehead showed that she was listening to every word. I was afraid that the director and Michelle would speak carelessly in Hebrew, as I hadn’t told them Yasmine would understand every word. Then Lishinsky launched into a tiresome speech about the contribution of the youth village to the rehabilitation of children with special needs – you’d think
he was addressing potential donors – and I lost interest and watched Yasmine and Michelle, two beautiful, educated women.

Michelle smiled at Yasmine, looked at the director, who was still speaking, wrote something on a piece of paper but crushed it and threw it into a wastebasket. “Excuse me, Mr Lishinsky,” she interrupted him in full flow. “I think it’s best if we go and see some of the classes now. The children will be going to lunch soon.”

I thanked her with a nod. Her charm and liveliness were very attractive. As we walked towards the classrooms I approached Lishinsky and told him in a low voice that the director-general of the Ministry of Social Welfare was very enthusiastic about the idea that a Palestinian woman would do her research here. “He said that this would be the start of co-operation between them and us.”

“Why didn’t he speak to me then?” he replied. “Listen, your mademoiselle looks like a film star, not a psychologist for children with disabilities.”

Michelle stayed close to Yasmine, though the visitor remained distant and reserved. Michelle took her arm and chatted to her in rapid French. “Here we can try to apply what we learned at the Sorbonne!”

Yasmine only looked at her in silence.

In the classrooms the children greeted Michelle enthusiastically, and she responded with kind words, hugs and caresses. Yasmine’s shoulders began to relax; she bent down to the children and, to our surprise, spoke to them in Hebrew, and also hugged them impulsively. For the first time that day I saw a different Yasmine; it was as if she had dropped the heavy burden that weighed on her mind. She sat with the children,
enjoyed their chatter, looked at their paintings and asked Michelle who had sent them to the village. Abu George watched his daughter livening up and nodded to me, as if to say,
Inshallah
, it will be all right.