Laziness in the Fertile Valley (10 page)

XIII

She was weary now; all afternoon a gang of college students had played truant in her room. They did this often, at least twice a week. While their parents believed them away at school, they came to her room and gave themselves up to a kind of little orgy. They brought with them a bottle of whiskey and some cigarettes, made a lot of noise and caroused like madmen. Then they went stumbling away with dark circles under their eyes, overjoyed at believing themselves already men. Imtissal loved these riotous gatherings and the tender promiscuity of youth made bold and feverish by her nakedness. They made love by turns and behaved as if it were a question of sportive competition. Afterwards, each bragged before his comrades of his own prowess. The victor of the day was known all over the quarter, but his glory did not last for long. It was quickly eclipsed by other more glittering virilities.

This amorous emulation intoxicated Imtissal and created around her the legend of a femme fatale. All the adolescents of the quarter wanted to convince themselves of their erotic acumen,
and so her room was never empty. However, at the end of the day, Imtissal was tired and didn’t know where to go to relax or to get a change of air. Before the child was born, she often went to the movies. The vulgar sentimentality of the stories which unrolled before her eyes was a comfort and made her forget her own life. This pleasure was now forbidden her; she could not leave the infant alone. She was suffocating in her room and her existence began to seem wretched to her, bound up in distress and loneliness.

She went over to the cradle and watched the baby sleeping. It was strange the way he slept all the time. Even the coming and going of her clients did not seem to disturb him. Sometimes, Imtissal thought he was dead. She had to lean down close over him to hear his thin, fragile breathing. For a long moment she stood by the cradle and watched. Then, she went to her bed, stretched herself out on it and sank down into her thoughts.

It happened now that she often thought of Rafik, but this was only to delight in imagining him tortured and restless. The marriage of old Hafez seemed to her like a divine vengeance. She could not think without a malevolent pleasure of this grotesque event which was going to ruin the life of her former lover. She had never forgiven him for leaving her, for giving in to his father. For a long time she had wished the worst afflictions on him. And now her desire was going to be realized by an unforeseen event. From now on Rafik would be enclosed in a circle of torments that would make him dizzy. Imtissal already knew through Hoda that the young man could no longer sleep, and that he was contriving by all possible means to prevent his father’s marriage. She was eager to know all the details of this scabrous affair. She was waiting for the next visit of Hoda, who had promised to bring her news of the latest developments. Rafik’s discomforts had become the only distraction that brightened her imprisonment.

Someone knocked on the door. She got up from the bed and went to open it. In the obscurity of the landing she couldn’t make out the face of her visitor. She thought he was one of her clients and said mechanically:

“Come in.”

“It’s me,” said Rafik. He entered the room and closed the door behind him.

Imtissal uttered a cry and thrust out her hands as if to repel the apparition of a ghost. She drew back to the bed, lowered her hands, and remained stunned for several minutes. She could not bring herself to realize that Rafik was in her room. Then she recovered and started to overwhelm him with abuse.

“Scoundrel! Why did you come here? I don’t want to see you.”

“For heaven’s sake, stop shouting,” Rafik said. “I didn’t come here to fight with you. I’ve got to talk to you.”

“What have you got to say to me?” Imtissal cried. “Get out of here, you devil!”

Rafik stood in the middle of the room, still out of breath from his haste to escape Mimi. The brutal way he had left Mimi, after having wounded his artist’s vanity, had so pleased him that he had arrived at Imtissal’s room without knowing it. All along the way he had thought only of Mimi’s sorrowful and bewildered face illuminated by the vague glare of a distant street lamp. And now, in Imtissal’s room, he still thought of the scene with satanic joy. For some time he remained indifferent to the hysterical rage of the woman, then he yawned, remembered he had come to explain something, leaned on the back of a chair and said weakly:

“Listen! I don’t deserve your insults. Why do you treat me like an enemy? I’ve only come to explain to you . . .”

“And how would you like me to treat you?” Imtissal cried at the height of her fury. “You who’ve done so much harm to me! Do you expect me to be grateful to you? Listen to him. What impudence!”

“I’ve suffered as much as you have,” Rafik said. “But it had to be. Try to understand that I’ve come to explain all that to you.”

“Explain what? I know you and your family. All the quarter knows you. You’re snobs and idlers. And you dare come here to insult me!”

“I haven’t come to insult you. Just listen to me. And above all, stop shouting. You’ll rouse everybody.”

“You’re afraid of everybody now? Don’t worry. This isn’t a cemetery like your house. People are alive here: shouts don’t disturb them. I’d like them to come and find you here. That would be a pretty sight.”

“I beg you, Imtissal, don’t cause a scandal.”

She laughed sarcastically.

“A scandal! The scandal is you and your family. You can’t get away from it. Everybody knows about you. No one would learn anything new.”

She had sat down on the edge of her bed, her dressing gown half open over her naked legs, in a pose of abandon that contrasted with the hate reflected in her eyes. She seemed calm now, her rage had yielded to the bitter pleasure of fully tasting her vengeance. She thought she understood why Rafik had come to see her. His unhappiness had brought him. She couldn’t believe anything else. The approaching marriage of his father — this menace had finally roused him from his inertia. He had only come to her in search of a little consolation — to dissipate the torments that were stifling him. She saw him so beaten down that she had one instant of forgetfulness, and all her being was invaded by pity. But this only lasted a moment. She became enraged and vindictive almost at once.

“I know what brought you here,” she said. “You’ve left home, and so you’ve come to tell me all your troubles. I warn you, don’t count on any sympathy from me. You won’t get it.”

“I don’t want your pity,” Rafik said.

“What do you want then, you bastard?”

“First I’d like to sit down,” he said. “I’m very tired.”

He sank into a chair and sat immobile, his back stooped, his gaze absent. Imtissal had almost cried out again to stop him from sitting down, but she remained voiceless, held by a kind of contagious torpor which emanated from the young man. It was true that the simple presence of these people induced drowsiness, even sleep; Hoda was right. Before the lax and almost lifeless air of Rafik, she was seized by a frightful weakness; she felt herself the prey of a senseless dizziness. She couldn’t fight against the sensation of torpor which held her. She closed her eyes as if under the shock of a sudden fatigue, reopened them with fear and looked at the young man slumped in the chair. Before him she felt as impotent as if she were faced with a corpse. How could she fight a dead man?

Rafik had not budged; he felt secure in this room and thought only of going to sleep. The silence which had followed Imtissal’s abuse seemed propitious to sleep. Yet some torment persisted in him. The comfortable warmth of the room concealed a trap more cunning than all the traps of the world: the presence of this woman’s body, half clothed, swollen with anger and stupor. He made a great effort not to look at her. In spite of him, she was crushing him with her massiveness, becoming more vital and obscene. He thought he would never get to sleep and stared at her with terror. What he saw convinced him of the danger he was in. Fallen back on the bed, Imtissal had spread her legs, and her half-opened dressing gown bared, like a defiance, the inexorable nudity of her flesh. There was no doubt, she defied him. But, extraordinary thing, he felt no desire before that offered flesh. All that was part of a world long since abandoned; it was a pale vision from a distant and miserable past. He sighed, yawned, stretched himself full length, then once more fell into immobility and silence.

“Speak,” she said. “Tell me what you want.”

He looked at her, a little stupefied. He had completely forgotten why he had come and tried to remember.

“I’ve simply come to tell you why I left you two years ago. Back then you wouldn’t allow me to explain my decision. You chased me out like a dog, without even wanting to listen to me. And then, the idea that you thought I was only obeying my father tormented me. There is something else. I want to make you understand what forced me to act the way I did . . .”

“Your father!” Imtissal cried. “I knew you’d end up talking about him. He’s the reason you came here tonight. I know what he’s cooking up for you, and it makes me very happy.”

She burst out with a strident laugh that made the flame of the candle dance. A feeble cry of fright came from the cradle.

“He wants to get married?”

“You know about it, then,” said Rafik, stunned by her question.

“Yes, I know about it, and I’m delighted by the news. It gives me great pleasure to see you miserable at last.”

“Don’t rejoice too soon,” Rafik said. “The marriage is not going to take place.”

“You’re going to stop it, I suppose! Infant!”

“Perhaps I don’t have to stop it,” he said. “In any case, the marriage will not take place. There’s one thing you don’t know about.”

“What, you devil?”

Rafik did not reply. He realized he had ventured too far. Now he had to tell this wretched woman everything because she wished to know everything.

“What thing? Tell me.”

He smiled slyly, closed his eyes, and said after a moment of silence:

“It’s a secret.”

“The hell with you! What’s the secret?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

“By Allah, you’d better tell me! If you don’t I’ll scream so loud all the neighbors will come here and chase you out like a dog. Come, tell me, tell me!”

In spite of his torpor, Rafik sensed a storm and searched for a refuge against this possible onslaught. But it was too late for him to react. There was no limit to the fury of this woman. He knew that too well; she was capable of rousing the whole quarter for the simple pleasure of creating a scandal.

“Ah well!” he said. “Since you insist you might as well know that my dear father has a hernia.”

“A hernia!” she exclaimed.

“A hideous hernia,” said Rafik. “A real disaster.”

Imtissal leaned forward and stared at Rafik with a dazed look.

“I don’t understand. What is this hernia? You’re making a fool of me, scum!”

“It’s easy enough to understand,” said Rafik. “You undoubtedly know what a hernia is? Very well! My dear father is afflicted with a hernia as big as a watermelon. One doesn’t marry with a thing like that. Now do you understand?”

Imtissal remained dumfounded for a moment as she began to comprehend. Then she was seized by a sudden fit of hysteria, and began to jerk as she laughed, her bead thrown back, her body shaking with convulsions.

“I beg you, he quiet,” Rafik implored.

She didn’t seem to hear him; she laughed on, carried away by a wild gaiety. Rafik stared at her, his face drained by terror. The spectacle of this degraded frenzy brought him back again to a detested world of perversity and corruption. He would have liked to flee, but his inertia held him in the chair, and he felt that her laughter would follow him forever in his sleep.

At last she calmed herself.

“What a family!” she said. “I could wish to kill you all, but instead you’ll make me die laughing at your stories.”

“This is hardly a story to laugh at,” said Rafik. “If you only knew what I suffered before I found out about this hernia. I couldn’t sleep. It’s saved us all from a catastrophe.”

“No matter, it’s a charming tale,” said Imtissal. “And trust me, I’ll take it upon myself to spread it around the quarter.”

But suddenly she appeared to be profoundly disappointed. The thought that the marriage of old Hafez could really be ruined by this hernia moved her so that her eyes filled with tears. Her vengeance might escape her. Then anger seized her again, and glaring at the young man she cried:

“It isn’t true!”

“What isn’t true?’

‘That your father has a hernia. It’s a lie you’ve invented to get me in trouble. Admit it, you bastard.”

“It’s all true,” said Rafik. “On my honor, it’s no lie. My father has a hernia. Do you want to see it?”

“Shut up, dog! Do you want me to kill you?”

“Forgive me,” said Rafik. “I see you don’t dare accept it. However, it exists. Believe me.”

He was alarmed to see this stupid grief in her. For the first time he noticed the changes in her features. On her face, already aged, was the brand of long prostitution. Rafik felt again an immense pity for her, and saw that she would soon be nothing more than a worn-out whore with hanging flesh. But what was this woman’s fate to him? There were thousands like her spread across the world. She could do him nothing but harm.

“Listen to me, Imtissal. I haven’t come to talk about my father’s hernia. Now, I beg you, stop treating me like an enemy. You must know why I abandoned you two years ago, and you must pardon me. You thought it was in obedience to my father, and that isn’t true. The truth is that I was afraid.”

“Afraid of what?” demanded Imtissal.

“I was afraid of all that was not our house. Of all that moves and strives uselessly in life. When I’m not in my bed, I feel as though something fatal will happen to me. I’m not really at peace except in bed. That’s easy enough to understand.”

“I won’t try,” cried Imtissal, “You’ve come to tell me these stupid little stories, you son of a whore.”

“Yes. I’ve wanted to make you understand the distance that has separated us for a long time. I knew you wanted me to leave you. But now that you know the reason, I hope you’ll forgive me.”