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  Almost finished now with her military training, Layla had a new sense of self that never left her. The pleasure of it pulsed through her body and shone in her eyes.

  Layla raised a smiling, rosy face to Dr. Ramzi. Her military uniform swinging from her arm, she said, “Good morning, professor.” On her way back from the training field, she had come face to face with Dr. Ramzi at the main entrance into the college.

  Astonishment appeared on his face. This was the first time that Layla had ever raised her face to look him squarely in the eye or had taken the initiative in speaking to him. He noticed the training uniform on her arm.

  “Where are you coming from?”

  “From training.”

  “What training?”

  “The National Guard.”

  He took a drag on his cigarette, giving her a searching look all the while.

  “Forget that nonsense. Just concentrate on your studies—much better.”

  Layla looked at him, a light smile playing around her mouth as if she were humoring a child. Her expression angered him.

  “I guess you think you are quite important? You are going to fight, is that right?”

  Layla’s smile broadened.

  “When will we grow up? Outgrow these childish ideas? When will we understand that everyone has his own sphere?”

  Layla looked at him inquiringly. He went on. “Intellectuals are a select group. It is not a group that goes into combat. Every country is composed of two population groups—one group that thinks and the other that wars. Defending the country is a duty that must be limited to those who are not intellectuals.”

  The smile on Layla’s face faded, and she spoke with trembling lips. “Defending the country is everyone’s duty, whether an intellectual or not.” She muttered something to excuse herself, turned, and hurried in the other direction, feeling that some sort of danger slunk after her.

  A week had passed since this encounter. Dr. Ramzi sent a message summoning Layla to his office. As she extended her hand to open the door, the courage and determination with which she had begun to face others deserted her. Whenever she stood in front of Dr. Ramzi, the feelings that had tormented her the first time she had entered his office came over her again, a blend of fear and awe, of dread and attraction.

  He was standing, his back to the desk, searching for a book in his bookcases. He turned his head when she opened the door, simultaneously noticing her and snatching a book from the shelf. Without another glance he said, “Please make yourself comfortable.”

  She perched on the edge of the chair by the desk and yanked the hem of her dress down over her knees. He let her wait for a few minutes while he flipped through the book. Then he turned and sat on the edge of the desk. “I want to meet your father. Would you be able to set up an appointment?”

  Layla’s face reflected her astonishment. “When would you like to meet him, sir?” Slowly, Dr. Ramzi took his diary out of a desk drawer, opened it, and, again slowly, leafed through it, concentrating on each page. Layla’s mind began to whirl. Why did he want to meet her father? He did not know her father; there was no connection to link them. This was what a man said to a woman when . . . Layla peered at Dr. Ramzi out of the corner of her eye. He seemed very distant, isolated as usual in his glass case.

  No. It was not possible. No, it could not be. He must have some interest to pursue in the Ministry of Finance and he had heard that her father was employed there.

  He raised his head to look at her. “Would Monday be good, Layla?”

  “Fine, Doctor.” She stood up.

  “When will you give me an answer?” he asked, smiling.

  “Tomorrow, God willing.” She stood a moment, hesitating, but she did not dare to ask him why he wanted to meet her father. Contrary to his usual practice, Dr. Ramzi stood up and shook her hand before she left the room.

  Sitting at lunch, her mother said, “I swear by the Prophet, my heart senses it, he wants to marry you, Layla.”

  “Don’t you have anything in your head other than marriage, Mama?” shrieked Layla. “Do people get married just like that, with a snap of the fingers?”

  Her father gave her a stern look. “What do you mean, ‘just like that’?” He turned to her mother. “In any case, there is no reason to put such nonsense into the girl’s head. A man with his position, his status, his name—when the time comes for him to think about marriage, he’ll be looking high.”

  “And is Layla so bad?” said her mother protestingly. “Si Mahmud al-Atrabi says—” She went on to relate a story she had told perhaps a hundred times before, the upshot of which was that if the Faculty of Letters could boast three students like Layla, it would be the top college in the whole university.

  Layla waited until her father had left the table. She leaned over to her mother and spoke in a low voice. “I wish you wouldn’t start with these guessing games. If it were a question of marriage he would have at least given me a hint. It just is not!” She got up from the table, exasperated.

  It was a question of marriage. After Dr. Ramzi left the apartment, her father put his arms around her, in such a transported state he could hardly stand still. “Congratulations, Layla! We read the sacred Fatiha together—the word of God in the sight of God.”

  No one consulted her; that was the first thing that came into Layla’s head. No one—neither her father nor Dr. Ramzi, as if the marriage concerned someone other than her. But she forgot this observation in the flood of self-pride that submerged her. Once the news got around the college, her pride increased, too; she enjoyed the looks of envy and curiosity that came her way. She felt constantly as if she were the target of pointing fingers, and that whoever had not known her before knew her now, because she had become Dr. Ramzi’s fiancée.

  Adila gave her a hug when she saw her. “You scoundrel! What a marriage! The whole college is rocking with the news.”

  Sanaa kissed her. “Congratulations.”

  “I told you so,” Adila said to Sanaa once Layla left them. “I pick these things up, you know.”

  “Who would have believed it?” Sanaa’s voice was melancholy, her face grave. But Adila’s response made it clear that she had missed the import of Sanaa’s words. “Really! Who would have believed that Layla would hook that grim man, before he even had a chance to realize what was going on! But remember that proverb—Still waters run deep.”

  “Don’t be so dumb! Wallahi, he’s the one who hooked her and pulled the wool over her eyes. Not the other way around.” Sanaa sounded disgusted.

  Chapter Eighteen

  THE BATTLE BETWEEN DR. RAMZI and Layla’s mother began early, even if it wasn’t a conflict in the usual sense of the word. Layla’s mother did not dare even to speak in front of her daughter’s betrothed.

  When the subject of the engagement party came up for discussion, Dr. Ramzi gave his opinion simply, swiftly, and concisely. He thought it should be “on a small scale”; moreover, the ceremony of the contract signing and the actual wedding should be collapsed into one, scheduled for the summer vacation following Layla’s graduation. Her father concurred. Her mother opened her mouth to say something but closed it without a word. But after Dr. Ramzi’s departure, she did say something. And as usual she put the blame on Layla.

  “Now, why did you just sit there like a wretched lump, as if he hadn’t just trampled all over you? Does he think you’re an old spinster who’ll take anything? On a small scale! I might swallow that if the wedding itself was coming up soon, but it’s a year and a half away! Happy the one who lives that long!”

  “Okay, okay, Mama. What do you want?”

  “I want to celebrate! Don’t I get any joy out of this?”

  She was so happy; finally, finally, she had found a bridegroom for her daughter—and one whom she could flaunt in front of her sister. So how could she possibly let this opportunity fizzle, she moaned?

  Her sister always had better luck than she did! Her sister had married a judge, while she had married a low-lev
el civil servant in the finance ministry. Then, Gamila had married years before Layla. And what a marriage! A marriage to end all marriages! Such a respectable match, that fetched her the finest clothes and put her in the company of all the best people! Samia Hanim’s children, and Dawlat Hanim’s, were part of Gamila’s set. She went out with them and came in with them. Sidqi, Samia Hanim’s son, and his sister Shushette, were always over at Gamila’s home. Isam, too, of course—and what made him so special?

  He had graduated a year ahead of Mahmud, because he was clever and bright and had not wasted an entire year on the war or other such nonsense. Now he was a deputy at the Qasr al-Aini Hospital. Meanwhile, Mahmud was unemployed, having finished his intern year but still waiting for a permanent assignment. He might or might not get an appointment; even if he did, it would be as a general practitioner, not as a deputy like Isam. Moreover, he would certainly not get a place in Cairo but rather would be appointed somewhere out in the provinces. He would live far from her, in exile, while Isam went on living in his mother’s embrace.

  And Isam knew the best people and socialized with them, too. Her heart told her that behind Gamila’s social contact with Samia Hanim’s children there was a story. No doubt her sister had her eye on Shushette for Isam. After all, when her sister struck, she always aimed high. She knew her sister so very well.

  She herself had requested Mahmud to please be attentive to Shushette, but her son had paid no heed, shown no interest. She was too much like a boy, he had said. He was so thick-headed; he had no sense of what was in his own interest. His fate would be to fall into an unlucky, wretched marriage, she just knew that was what would happen. And there was Isam, so wise to things around him, so sharp. No doubt he was at this very moment hovering around the girl. Otherwise, why did they mix so much? What was the point? And why did Sidqi and Shushette stop by Gamila’s house so often? There must be a secret behind it all. And if a match between Isam and Shushette really did take place, then it just would go to show that her sister’s luck was as high as the skies.

  And they were not even willing to give her the chance to celebrate her own daughter’s fortune, as if such a thing was not for her! The grumbling in that household went on for days. Layla’s mother complained to her sister and to her niece, to Isam, to Mahmud, to her husband. She repeated the grievance so often that Layla’s father finally blew up in her face.

  “Stop it! That’s enough—we said it would be that way and that’s the way it is going to be.”

  She said nothing, but her tears streamed down. Layla gathered her courage and began to broach the subject cautiously with Dr. Ramzi. But he blocked her way immediately.

  “Enough, Layla. Is she getting married or are we? We don’t like fusses and large crowds.”

  Gamila came to the rescue with a proposal that mollified Layla’s mother. They could hold the engagement party “on a small scale” at home, to satisfy Dr. Ramzi. But then she would throw a grand party at her house to celebrate, inviting all the relatives and friends. It was Layla’s job to convince Dr. Ramzi. She hinted her way round the subject; finally, she tackled it directly, begging Dr. Ramzi to accept Gamila’s proposal. He gave her a long look.

  “What is important to me is the way that you see things. Are you persuaded by my perspective, or not?”

  “Of course I am. But for Mama’s sake—” Her eyes reflected a pleading urgency: a child’s entreaty, a cherished demand, a father’s reply in the balance.

  “All right, Layla,” he said, smiling. But, as if in self-reproach for giving in at a time when he should have been firming up the rules of engagement for their relationship, he added, “But you must understand, Layla, that if this time I gave in, it is for your mother’s sake. I do not expect ever to have to give in again. In the future, my opinion must be yours—one and the same.”

  She told him that she understood his position perfectly and respected it, and took a deep breath. She was so ready to be rid of these trivial matters—the engagement, Gamila’s party, everything. She wanted to free herself for him, to be alone with him, to open her heart to him, as he would open his heart to her. Their feelings would become uppermost, and the barrier that separated them would vanish. The professor-student relationship that had brought her into his circuit no longer satisfied her. She wanted to feel that she was his fiancée, his beloved.

  Yes, his beloved. Otherwise, why had he proposed? She was not beautiful, not rich, not from a family of great social position; she wasn’t distinguished in any way. So what would cause a man like him to marry a young woman like her, other than love?

  Up to this point she had lived in the shadow of his strength; now she craved the shade of his warmth. She dreamed of the day when he would remove the mask that enclosed his emotions toward her, when an effusive, resplendent affection would envelop her—would envelop them together—and would erase the awe she felt for him, and the fear she felt in his presence. She longed to feel that she was not merely accepted as a person but also loved as a woman, and desired. This longing kept her awake at night, although in the days preceding the formal engagement announcement there was much to distract her from it.

  The house hummed with people; wherever she turned, Layla saw faces dear to her heart: her mother, her aunt, Gamila, and sometimes Mahmud. Her brother’s term of residence at the hospital as an intern had ended, and he was living at home again while he awaited his appointment. If he spent most of his time out, the moment he came home life seemed to erupt everywhere in the apartment, as if a freshening breeze had blown in with him—as if he were so happy that his joy must overflow into the lives of others. For he seemed very happy indeed; he was barely capable of staying still, like a foaming fountain, or like the bubbles rising to the surface of soda water. He would breeze in to give Layla an affectionate kiss, or fling his arms exuberantly round his mother, or pat his aunt breezily on the shoulder. He would praise Gamila’s taste in clothes. And whenever he looked in the direction of Sanaa, the bubbles would disappear, the eyes would deepen, the lips would soften, all concentrated into a long, deep gaze, weighted by his overpowering feelings. Then the bubbles would stream out again, and Sanaa would drop her eyelids as if she were under the irresistible influence of a powerful drug.

  Didn’t Sanaa worry that people would notice her? Layla asked herself. And how did she know when Mahmud was going to be at home? He must be calling her on the telephone, and they must be meeting outside the house. But how? For Sanaa was watched very, very closely. How did she manage to escape that strict observation? Sanaa was playing with fire, thought Layla. The flames must inevitably burn her, and Mahmud, too.

  It was clear, though, that they found fire to their liking. Mahmud, utterly happy, seemed reborn: he seemed stronger, more manly, more handsome, more confident in himself and in the future. And Sanaa did not even touch ground in her daily life; she was flying. They had become bolder and more confident these days, as if they had agreed on a specific step—one that would demand all the audacity they could muster. They were so bold that it could not possibly escape Gamila’s searching eyes. Nothing could get by those eyes now.

  Over the past three years Gamila had changed startlingly; sometimes her transformation seemed hard to believe. The young, unstudied, impulsive girl had become a mature, clever, practical, and extremely worldly-wise woman. Her figure had filled out, and her curvaceous body moved with stately elegance. That handsome face was steady on a long, white, slender neck, no longer dancing about, turning this way and that like the whirlwind that Gamila had once been, so like Mahmud’s impetuous energy. The jet-black plaits now circled that placid white brow proudly, all strands carefully in place, as if drawn by an artist’s brush. Those lustrous eyes that had flickered and shone like a pure spring now had a gaze that was hard, cold, and intrepid. The shy grin had become a carefully sketched, studied smile. Gamila appeared more like a breathtakingly beautiful marble statue than a live, warm human being; but below the tranquil surface simmered fire. Those veiled flames were
the sort that kindle men’s desires, provoked further by a tranquil surface that fueled their sense of masculine contest, a trial of strength against this beautiful woman who was perfectly aware of her appeal. Confident of drawing any man she had the slightest desire to attract, Gamila enjoyed every moment she spent at every party she attended. But she returned home from her evenings out to an engulfing depression as she passed her husband’s closed door and his snoring reached her ears. She would stretch out in her own bed and dream that she was once again seventeen years old, still young, still unmarried, and in love. With whom? Someone who was not any of the men she met at her parties. They passed time pleasantly enough, those men, as she did, no more and no less. But flirtations were not what she wanted. She longed for a profound love, a quiet, true love that would not encase her in a heated battle but enfold her in a tender peacefulness.

  When Gamila learned that Layla was about to become engaged, her eyes clouded with anxiety and she quickly found an opportunity to be alone with Layla in her room. She asked immediately, “You love Ramzi, Layla, right?

  Layla nodded. The worry faded from Gamila’s face and her frame relaxed as she let out a short, nervous laugh. “I knew as much. All your life you’ve been wiser than me. You waited until somebody came along who loved you and whom you loved.”

  Layla leaned over to Gamila and seized her hand. “And you—you’re happy too, in your marriage, aren’t you, Gamila?” A sad look came into Gamila’s eyes but it soon disappeared. She stood up. At the window she turned. Layla could see her profile; the usual cold, hard expression had returned.

  “Ask Mama, she’ll tell you. She’ll tell you the kind of happiness I have.” She turned to face Layla. “In any case, we are on the subject of you at the moment. We have to give this some thought. What shall we do for the party?” She was very involved in the subject of Layla’s engagement, in the party, in all of the details. She was dropping by to see Layla almost every day. Her perfume would announce her entrance; as she sailed in, wearing her stunningly simple, luxurious, perfectly composed outfits, everyone would sigh in relief. Now they could turn everything over to her. She was the one who knew everything; she made the suggestions, and then she it was who arranged things, seemingly without any complication or confusion, as if she had been mounting weddings and engagement parties all her life. In the beginning she usually came in the company of her husband, but soon she started coming by herself.