Naguib Mahfouz - Midaq Alley (Chapter 27) lyrics

Chapter 27 Darkness had spread its vault over the alley and deep silence fallen on its every side. Even Kersha's cafe had closed its doors following the departure of the patrons-and at this watch of the night, what should pa** through the bakery door if not the shadowy figure of Zeita the Cripple-maker, setting off on his nightly rounds? The man pa**ed along the alley to Boxmakers Street and was turning hurriedly to the left heading for el-Hussein when he almost collided with another shadowy figure in the middle of the street. As the latter's face showed briefly in the dim light of the stars, Zeita exclaimed, "Doctor Bushi! Where are you coming from?" Swiftly and urgently, the doctor answered him, "I was on my way to see you." "You've got people who want deformities?" In a whisper, the doctor said, "Better. Uncle Abd el-Hamid el-Talbi has died." Zeita's eyes lit up in the gloom as he asked with interest, "When? Is he buried yet?" "He was buried yesterday evening." "Did you find out where the grave is?" "Between the Gate of Victory and the desert road." Zeita took his arm in his and moved off with him in the direction from which he had been coming, asking, to be sure, "You couldn't miss the way in the dark?" "Certainly not. As I walked in the funeral procession, I carefully watched where we were going and memorized the landmarks. Any­ way, we both know the route well and we've traveled it together in the pitch dark." ******* Zeita approached the grave without hesitation, followed by Bushi with quaking limbs, and bent over, feeling for the dirt over the buried steps that led down to the grave. He found that it was still soft and damp and worked it carefully and slowly with the mattock, piling it between his open legs and persisting in the work, which was not new to him, until he had uncovered the slabs that roofed the steps. Then he hitched up the skirts of his gallabiya, pulled them forward into a tuft of cloth, and kuotted this so as to hold the gallabiya out of the way around his waist. Applying himself to the edge of the first slab, he raised it, straining his muscles, until it was standing upright, and then, with Doctor Bushi's help, started lowering it to the ground. He did the same with the next. The gap that he had thus opened was big enough for him and his companion to slip through, which he did, descending the stairs and murmuring to Doctor Bushi, "Follow me." The latter did so unhappily, his skin crawling. In such situations, it was the doctor's job to sit halfway down the stairs, light the candle, and fix it on the bottom step, after which he would close his eyes and bury his head between his kuees. He entered the graves only because he was forced to do so and had often pleaded with Zeita to be merciful and let him off. However, the other, who took a secret delight in torturing him, refused to perform these services for him uuless he participated in them every step of the way. The candle's wick was now lit and illuminated the grave. Zeita cast an unflinching look over the stacked, shrouded corpses whose parallel rows filled the grave to its farthest reaches, their order indi­ cating the serial unfolding of history and time, their terrible silence speaking of the eternal emptiness. They raised no echo in Zeita's breast, however, and he quickly turned his gaze away and fixed it on the new shroud close to the entrance. Squatting down, he uncovered with indifferent hands the corpse's head, pulled the lips back, and worked the set of false teeth with his hand until he had removed it, placing it in his pocket with his now polluted fingers. Then he covered the head once more and turned from the body to the door, where he beheld Doctor Busbi, head between knees, and the candle shining at the bottom of the stairs. Casting him a mocking glance, he muttered con­ temptuously, "Step on it!" Trembling, Doctor Bushi raised his head, bent down to the candle, took it, blew on it, extinguished it, and ran up the stairs like one pursued. Zeita ascended the stairs too, but before he could stick bis head out of the opening, a great cry reached his ears and he heard Doctor Bushi crying with a kind of howl, "I surrender!" Zeita's feet rooted themselves to the spot. Then he turned and went back down the stairs, unconscious of his actions, his limbs like ice. Still retreating, his heel came into contact with the body, so he took a step forward and stood there unmoving unable to think of a means of escape. It occurred to him that he could lie down among the corpses but before he had time to take a single step, he was flooded with a brilliant light that caused him to close his eyes involuntarily, and he heard a harsh voice shouting at him in Upper Egyptian dialect, "Come on out, or I'll shoot!" Despairing, he surrendered and climbed the stairs as ordered, for­ getting about the set of false teeth in his pocket. It wasn't until the afternoon of the following day that word of the apprehension of Doctor Bushi and Zeita at the Taibi tomb reached the alley. The news spread and the reasons for it became known, and people pa**ed it on with amazement and alarm. The moment Mistress Saniya Afifi learned of it, she panicked, started to wail, pulled out her set of gold teeth, and threw it down on the ground, beating her cheeks in hysteria. Then she fell down in a faint. Her husband was in the bathroom and when her cries reached his terrified ears, he put his gallabiya on over his wet body and hurried straight to her.