Naguib Mahfouz - Midaq Alley (Chapter 15) lyrics

Chapter 15 Mistress Saniya Afifi heard a knocking at the door, so she opened it and to her indescribable delight beheld Umm Hamida's eyes looking out at her from her pock-marked face. "Welcome, welcome, my dear lady!" she cried, from the depths of her soul. They embraced warmly (to outward appearances at least) and Mistress Saniya led Umm Hamida to the guest parlor, ordering the servant at the same time to i:nake coffee. Once they had settled, bodies touching, on the couch, Mistress Saniya took two cigarettes from a box, and they set about smoking them with relish. Mistress Saniya had been in an agony of suspense ever since Umm Hamida had promised to look for a husband for her. Surprisingly; she had endured years of widowhood in patience but now couldn't find enough of it to carry her through this period of waiting, short as it was. She had taken to visiting Umm Hamida incessandy, the latter keeping her up to date on everything she was doing for her and making her so many promises and raising her hopes so high that in the end Mistress Saniya con­ vinced herself that the woman was just drawing things out to get as much out of her as she could. Despite this, she was chivalrous with her and waived the rent for her apartment and made over to her a number of her own kerosene coupons and her ration of local cloth, not to mention having Uncle Kamel make her a platter of basbousa. Then Umm Hamida had announced that her daughter Hamida was about to get engaged to Abbas el-Helw! Mistress Saniya pretended to be pleased but the news made her worry whether she was now going to be asked to contribute to the costs of the girl's trousseau before she had had time to prepare her own. Thus fear of and affec­ tion for Umm Hamida tussled with one another throughout this waiting period. Mistress Saniya had sat down right next to Umm Hamida,and from time to time she stole glances at her, wondering what she could expect from her visit this time-the usual promises and hopes, or the good news that her heart yearned for? She hid her agitation by shift­ ing constantly from one topic to another, this time, and contrary to custom, being the one who talked while Umm Hamida listened. She spoke about the Boss Kersha scandal and how his son Hussein had left home, and she criticized Umm Hussein for the shameless way in which she'd tried to straighten out her husband's deviant conduct. Then the conversation moved on to Abbas el-Helw, whom she praised, saying, "What an excellent young man! God will give him opportunities, grant him a good living, and help him to make a happy life with his bride, who deserves every good thing." At this, Umm Harnida smiled and said, "That reminds me, I've come here today to get you engaged, so now you're a bride too!" Mistress Saniya's heart pounded as she recalled that it had told her that today's visit would be important, and that the woman had some secret that she was keeping hidden until the right time. Her face turned a rosy hue and the sap of youth flowed once more through its desiccated veins. However, she kept a hold on herself and said with false modesty, ''How too embarra**ing! Whatever are you saying, Umrn Hamida?" Lips parted in a smile of triumph and satisfaction, the woman replied, "I'm saying that I'm here today to get you engaged, my dear lady!" "Really and truly? How overwhelming! Of course, I remember what we agreed, but one's bound to be agitated, and unsettled too. How too embarra**ing!" ******** While it hadn't escaped the other woman that Mistress Saniya had somehow managed to overlook ten of her years, Umm Hamida said in reproachful tones, "You're still a young woman, Mistress Saniya! Plus, I told him you were forty and he was delighted to agree." "Was he really happy with that? What's his name?" "Ahmad Effendi Tolba, from el-Khurunfish, son of Hagg Tolba Isa, owner of the seed mastery on Umm el-Ghoulam Street. A good and noble family, descended from the Prophet through Our Master el-Hussein." "A good family indeed! I too, as you are aware, am descended from the Prophet, Mistress Umm Hamida." "I know, my dear. He's looking for just one thing-decent morals. Otherwise he would have married long ago. He has a poor opinion, though, of today's girls and accuses them of being immodest. When I spoke to him of your morals and your modesty and told him that you were descended from the Prophet and were a woman of means, he was absolutely delighted and said, 'That's exactly what I'm look­ ing for'-though he did ask me one thing that was entirely within the bounds of propriety, and that was to see a photo of you." Mistress Saniya's thin face flushed and she said anxiously, "The fact is I haven't had one taken for a long time." ' Don't you have an old one?" Without saying a word, Mistress Saniya nodded toward a photo on the table in the middle of the room, so the other woman bent over a little, picked it up, and looked at it searchingly. It dated from more than six years before, when its subject had still possessed a certain 'plumpness and vitality. "A perfect likeness," declared the woman, her eyes moving back and forth between the picture and the original. "You'd think it had been taken only yesterday." "You're really too kind!" said Mistress Saniya, her voice- trembling. Umm Hamida pocketed the photo, with its frame, lit another ciga­ rette offered her by Mistress Saniy\1, and said sedately, 'We spoke at length and I discovered that there are a number of things he wants...." Giving her, for the first time, a wary look, Mistress Saniya waited for her to continue. When the silence lengthened, she asked her with a wan smile, '1\.nd what does he want?" Did she really not know? Did she imagine he wanted to marry her for her good looks? Umm Hamida became a little angry, but said calmly in a slightly lowered voice, "I imagine that you won't object to obtaining the necessary furnishings yourself?" Mistress Saniya understood immediately what was meant. The man didn't want to pay a dowry and of course would want to leave to her the cost of the furnishings. Since she'd been well aware that this would be the case from the beginning, when she'd first conceived the idea of getting married, and Umm Hamida had also alluded to the matter in pa**ing, it never crossed her mind to object. "God is our helper,'' she said submissively. "We ask God for success and happiness," said Umm Hamida, smiling. Umm Hamida now rose to leave. They embraced warmly, and Mistress Saniya saw her to the front door before bidding her farewell, after which she stood leaning on the banister, watching as Umm Hamida descended the stairs to her own apartment. "Goodbye. Give Hamida a kiss for me," she called out to her before she disappeared from sight. Mistress Saniya then returned to her room, her heart, warmed by new hope, light as a young person's. Sitting down, she went over again what Umm Hamida had said, sentence by sentence and word by word. Mistress Saniya was somewhat chary, but not so much so that this constituted an impediment to her happiness. True, money had long been a companion to her loneliness, whether the money she kept at the savings bank or the bundles of lovely new notes in her ivory chest that she pored over with such delight, but neither could substi­ tute for the amazing man who would, God willing, become her lord and master. But would he like the photo? Her face flushed so much she was aware of the heat of the blood burning her brow, and she rose and went to the mirror to inspect her image, turning her face right and left until she found what seemed to her to be its best angle and holding it there. As she contemplated the image closely, her face dis­ played a certain degree of satisfaction, and she murmured prayer­ fully, "May God make all well." Then she returned to her seat, saying, "Money covers many a blemish." Hadn't the woman told him that she had means? Well, that she had, and fifty wasn't too late for children; she still had ten years ahead of her, and many a woman of sixty led a happy life, provided God granted her good health. Marriage was • gnaranteed to restore the sap to the withered branch and breathe new fire into the body's embers ... the current of her rosy thoughts car­ ried her thus along until she ran into a patch of darkling spume and she suddenly frowned and asked herself furiously, "What will people say tomorrow?" Ah, she knew them well, and Umm Hamida herself would be among the first to gossip. They'd say Mistress Saniya had gone mad. They'd say a woman of fifty was marrying a man who at thirty was young enough to be her son. They'd speak at length about money repairing the ravages of time, and they might well say a lot of other things that she couldn't even think of. Let them say what they wanted. Had they spared her their evil tongnes when she was a widow? Mistress Saniya shrugged her shoulders dismissively, and then prayed from the depths of her soul, "Dear Lord, preserve me from the eyes of the envious!" An idea now occurred to her that she was quick to welcome and decided to act on right away: she would go to Sheikha Rabah at the Green Gate, have her fortune read and get her to give her some charms-for who, in her present state, could be in greater need of an effective amulet or some prophylactic incense?