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  She had been standing in the middle of the room, Dawlat Hanim facing her, probing her with a shrewd eye. Pulling her closer, Dawlat Hanim ran her right hand slowly from top to toe, and then from bottom to top, stopping as it crept up to her waist and then again on her chest.

  Layla covered her eyes, still sitting on the bed, and whispered, “Ya Rabb, Oh God.” Although she tried to block it out, Dawlat Hanim’s voice echoed in her ears. “The girl has to have a proper dress, one that reveals her shape, and she needs a corset to lift her breasts and keep her middle in. As she is now, she’s a disaster.” She had faced Layla’s mother sternly, and Layla recalled the exact words she had said. “Shame on you! This girl’s on the brink of marriage now. And like any girl—if she doesn’t dress right, she won’t bring any sort of price in the market.”

  Layla jumped up from the bed. A slave, nothing but a jariya! A jariya in the slave market! Dressing and adorning herself to raise her price. But why was she so angry? Why so worked up? Wasn’t this the truth, after all? But how could it be? Yet, it was the truth. This was the way life was; such were the conditions of a girl’s life in the society in which she, herself, lived. She would have to accept this situation or die . . . . Die?

  Layla sank into the cushions of the Asyuti armchair, hugging her legs to her chest. This was life. Whenever a girl was born, they smiled in resignation. When she began to grow up, they imprisoned her, and trained her in the art—yes, the art of—life! They taught her to smile, to yield to others, to wear perfume, to exude sympathy. And to lie—to wear a corset that would pull in her middle and lift her chest so her price would go up in the market and she could marry. Marry whom? Any old person; after all, “the only thing that can shame a man is his pocket.” So she’d put on that white veil, and she would move to the husband’s residence, “because that’s the way the world works.” And everything was just so easy and straightforward and understood by all. But . . . but she would have to be very careful indeed. She must not have feelings or emotions; she must not use her mind, or fall in love. Or else—or else they would kill her, as they had killed Safaa.

  Layla shivered and shrunk further into the chair, remembering that when she had voiced this thought, in this very room, her mother had looked at her oddly, as if she were a complete stranger to this home, her mouth dropping open in surprise, before she hurried out of the room without saying a word in response. Layla was nothing less than delighted, though, by what had happened after Dawlat Hanim had left; she was utterly satisfied with every word she had said, and every gesture she had made.

  It had been one of those very rare occasions when she had dared say precisely what needed to be said. She’d been sprawled across her bed, too drained to cry, without even a thought in her head. Coming in, her mother had said a few words that had seemed to ring in her ears so echoingly that she could not even understand them. Then her mother had grabbed her roughly by the shoulder and given her a violent shake. “What’s the matter? Have you gone to sleep?”

  She raised her face to meet her mother’s. “What’s the matter with you? Why is your face so yellowish?” Layla dropped her face back into the pillow. Her mother spoke more gently.

  “Don’t pay any attention to what Dawlat said. You know it is far too early for this talk of marriage.”

  A layer of tears veiled Layla’s eyes. She kept her face in the pillow; her voice was barely audible. “What does she want from me?”

  “Who?”

  “That woman.”

  “Why would she want anything from you?”

  She sprang up on the bed and faced her mother. “Does she want to kill me like she killed her own daughter?”

  “Hold that tongue of yours if you want to keep it!”

  She spoke quietly, deliberately, as if merely repeating a widely known fact. “Didn’t she kill her daughter?”

  “You really don’t have any feelings—a poor wretched woman like that, to say such things about her!”

  But her mother’s words had no visible effect. “Well, isn’t it true that she committed suicide?”

  “Where did you hear that?”

  “I just know. I know why she killed herself, too, Mama—d’you want me to tell you why? Did Dawlat Hanim make her swallow the poison?” Layla lay back on her bed slowly with a sad smile. “She was the one who poisoned her life, and closed the doors of mercy in her face. Safaa had nothing else—no alternative but poison.”

  Her mouth wide open, Layla’s mother stared at her soundlessly, strangely, as if this were the first time she’d ever seen her daughter’s face, and hurried from the room.

  Layla stretched her legs out and leant back into the chair. For three days, her mother had not said a word to her. Three whole days! She knew perfectly well why her mother had been so angry. In the first place it was because she had known about Safaa’s suicide, for at the time her mother had simply told her that Safaa “had died.” And then she had made it worse by adding, “D’you want me to tell you why she killed herself?”

  Her mother was always vigilant about keeping such matters from Layla. But she would hear a word here, a phrase there; she’d gather the stray ends of conversation and weave them together thoughtfully in her mind, which was precisely how she got to know Safaa’s story. First, she heard that Safaa had killed herself by swallowing an entire bottle of sleeping pills, which she had been taking to help her sleep in the shadow of a husband whose pocket was the only thing that did not shame him. What Layla did not know then was that Safaa had died on the very night that she had gone in desperation to her mother. Dawlat Hanim had gone by the rules—by those same “fundamentals” that Layla’s mother was so fond of invoking—and had refused to shelter her daughter. She had slammed the door in Safaa’s face. So Safaa had returned to her husband’s home and killed herself. Layla had learned that later, and still later she learned of the love story, and of Dawlat Hanim’s angry reaction; of the request for divorce and the husband’s refusal. She learned all of that after a time—a time long enough to have turned that lovely young woman to dust.

  And it had not changed Dawlat Hanim in the slightest, even if she was the mother of that lovely young woman. She had gone through the sort of experience that would shred your insides, yet here she was, same as ever. She had grieved over her daughter’s death, of course, as any mother would; but had Dawlat Hanim doubted for even a moment the wisdom of her own actions? No, pondered Layla, she had not felt the slightest uncertainty, and neither had anyone else. She walked with head held high, with a firm gait, and she imposed this respectability of hers on others. Lord, what kind of strength was this? What sort of invulnerability did it impose? What sort of self-confidence did it require? And where did people find such abilities—where? Furthermore, why didn’t anyone else see this woman’s ways through Layla’s eyes? Why had their respect for Dawlat Hanim grown after her daughter’s death? What was the secret? What could the secret of such respect be?

  At her wit’s end, Layla struck her palms together soundlessly and got up to pace the room. Was it possible that she was wrong? Had she misjudged this woman? Had she been wrong this time, too? Whoever knows the fundamentals cannot go wrong. That’s what her mother always said. Cannot go wrong, and cannot—Layla stopped dead in the middle of the room, her eyes widening, her voice coming out in a whisper. “Cannot go wrong, and cannot weaken, and will not lose any confidence in her self.” She pressed her lips tightly together, her eyes flashing as if she had suddenly stumbled upon a truth for which she had searched long and hard. And it was such a simple business, the matter that had required all this thinking. So simple! Her mother had known it without having to search far and wide. Whoever knows the fundamentals cannot go wrong. Exactly like . . . like in the game of rummy. If one knew the basic rules of the game, and then stuck to them, and played assuredly, confident through it all that she was doing what was right and proper, she’d never make a mistake. Ever. It wasn’t important whether one won or lost, but it was very important to play according
to those fundamental rules.

  So Dawlat Hanim, playing the game, had killed her daughter. But she had been right to do so for she had followed the basic rules of the game. And that was why people respected her. Layla toppled heavily onto the bed. Their consciences! What about their consciences? Didn’t they have any? No, it seemed not. What was important was the appearance of things. What people saw was what counted.

  And Mama . . . One day she’d asked her mother, “Mama, couldn’t you have just gotten me two dresses instead of three, and then bought me two undershirts? All of my underwear is falling apart.” But what was it her mother had said in response? “People don’t see your underwear. What’s important is a good appearance.”

  And then Mahmud had said—

  Layla’s door flew open and in rushed Mahmud, still in his outdoor clothes. “You’re just sitting here, when the whole city’s boiling over?!” Layla, well aware of her brother’s tendency to exaggerate, just smiled and gave her legs a little shake. “Boiling over with what?”

  “The government’s gone and cancelled the treaty, the ’36 Treaty.”

  As she jumped to her feet she could feel the blood rushing hotly into her face. “You’re joking!”

  “Turn on the radio and you’ll hear it for yourself!”

  She shot into the front room, intent on switching on the radio, but as she passed her brother she stopped with a sudden impulse to fling her arms around him and give him a kiss. But she turned aside as an abrupt shyness came over her, and merely gave him an embarrassed smile.

  She could not get to sleep that night. Her whole body pulsed with excitement as she lay on her back, wide awake, as if awaiting something that she was sure would happen.

  Chapter Three

  THE NEXT MORNING LAYLA WAS late getting to school. The bell was already ringing as she arrived. Passing through the main entrance, her demeanor stiffened, as if she were in wary anticipation of some particular event. As she glanced round, though, her features relaxed and she took off at a run. The bell was still ringing, but the pupils had not yet formed themselves into the usual line. Girls were scattered in small knots across the courtyard, and she began to flit from one group to another in some confusion, without knowing why she did so. The words that flew into her ears tumbled directly into her heart; a shiver that began in her feet ran all the way up her body, until it came to concentrate in her head, leaving a prickly feeling down to the ends of her hair.

  “Bring down the girls who’ve gone up to the classrooms! No, no work today, none of the girls will work.” “Aliya, go see about the first-year girls, reassure them if they’re scared.” “Scared? They’re all fired up!” “Yes, they’re even bolder and braver than the older girls.” “We’re every bit as ready as the boys are.” “Girls, girls—girls have just as many feelings about it all!” “We have to show what we feel!”

  The bell rang and rang, supervisors and teachers clapped their hands, but the girls remained scattered in their little groups. Layla found her own friends.

  “Come on over here, Sitt Layla!” called out Adila. “Come see your cousin, she doesn’t want to go!”

  Layla looked astonished. “Go? Go where?”

  “The demonstration, of course.”

  “You’re all going out there, to join a demonstration?”

  “Of course we’re going. The whole city’s jumping with excitement, all the schools will join in, why shouldn’t we show how we feel, too?”

  Discussion stopped suddenly as the headmistress appeared in the courtyard, but the bell went on ringing, its shrill urgency outdoing all. The small groups fell together into a single, huge, human mass, each knot of girls bolstering the next, and the shouting rose.

  “Down with imperialism! We want weapons—weapons!”

  The headmistress approached the microphone. Woman’s job was motherhood, she said. Woman’s place was in the home, she said. Weapons and fighting were for men.

  A stifling silence fell heavily over them, but just for a moment. A dark figure, her short curls bouncing, her shoulders wide and firm, broke the ranks. Her black eyes shone as she crossed the yard and mounted the four steps that divided the students from the headmistress. She stood in front of the woman. Her voice shook as it came through the microphone.

  “Our esteemed headmistress says that woman belongs in the home and man belongs in the struggle. I want to say that when the English were killing Egyptians in 1919 they didn’t distinguish between women and men. And when the English stole the Egyptians’ freedom they didn’t distinguish between men and women. And when they plundered the livelihood of so many Egyptians, they didn’t stop to think whether that belonged to men or to women.”

  Yells went up from the crowd, and students skittered about, hugging each other. As the voices rose they became one: “Down with the English! Weapons, weapons—we want weapons!

  The headmistress stepped back.

  “She’s great!” Layla said to her friend Sanaa.

  “Yeah, that’s true toughness. Could you do something like that?”

  Layla laughed as she closed her eyes and tried to imagine herself in such a situation. “I wish.” Then, a moment later: “What’s her name?”

  “Samia Zaki. She’s in her prep year, science division.”

  By unspoken agreement Samia was now the leader, and the pupils followed her to the school’s main gate. Samia pounded on it and the girls followed her example, but it remained tightly shut. The rhythmic slogans stopped as the would-be demonstrators broke up into groups, gesturing, shouting to each other. But all grew quiet as they heard a muffled commotion in the distance. They listened as it rose gradually into a deafening shout. One girl took the steps at a run.

  “It’s the boys—the students from Khedive Ismail School.”

  The girls gathered again into one mass and the shouts rose again in unison, slogans batted back and forth from the boys outside to the girls inside and back again. “No more imperialism!” “Down with the agents of imperialism!” “Weapons, weapons—we want weapons!” “We’ll die so Egypt lives forever!” The girls hammered harder and harder on the gate and one of the boys climbed up the school wall. “Get away from the gate,” he called. The girls drew back and the gate began to give way under a succession of blows from outside.

  “Hurry up, Sanaa,” said Adila. Sanaa followed her without even a glance back as the little group parted into two, Layla staying with Gamila, who declared, “I’m not leaving this place.” Layla shrugged as she walked forward toward the gate. “Fine, stay. Me, I’m going.”

  “Layla, you’ll have to take responsibility for whatever happens, you know,” warned her cousin. “Suppose your family sees you—your father, or Mahmud?”

  Layla’s lips went pale. “My family, my family! Am I the only one with family?” There was irritation in her voice, but she paused uncertainly, wavering between her solidly planted cousin and the mass of classmates pushing forward.

  “Come back,” urged Gamila. “Come back, it’s better to stay here, this is going to be a mess.” But just as she spoke a knot of girls pushed forward into Layla’s path as she was trying to step back. She tried to push her way against the human mass that was surging ahead, but the crowd swept her forward with it and the distance between her and Gamila grew. And Layla found herself in the street.

  The boys stepped back to clear a space for the girls, who pushed forward to take the lead in the procession. The boys fell in behind them. On either side of Khayrat Street passersby stopped and gathered, the owners of the little shops along the street emerged to watch, and so did the children who peopled the side streets. Faces filled the windows above the street, and balconies were crammed with watching figures. Layla walked on, staring round, fear vying with embarrassment to assail her. She was afraid someone she knew would catch sight of her; she felt an embarrassed shyness about her full body and was sure that every pair of eyes on the street was focusing on her. The rhythmic yells surged like waves and abated, the first wave chased by
a second, the pair coming together into one swell. Applause, the watching women’s trilling zagharid, all of those hands waving, hundreds of eyes sparkling, bodies everywhere, rising and falling in mad leaps. Mouths open wide to shout, drops of sweat glinting on a broad forehead, feet pounding, flags and banners fluttering, tears streaming down, and always the pushing, the pushing, on and on.

  Blood pulsed into Layla’s head and she felt a surge of energy. She felt alive, at once strong and weightless, as if she were one of those birds circling above. She pushed through the lines and found herself scrambling onto classmates’ shoulders, heard herself calling out with a voice that was not her own. It seemed a voice that summoned her whole being, that united the old Layla with her future self and with the collective being of these thousands of people—faces, faces as far as she could see. Then that new voice was lost, caught up in thousands of others, and she slipped down from her perch.

  A pair of eyes was drawing her, staring in mute insistence, in an unyielding appeal that enveloped her, to stifle the wells of strength in her body and spirit. She kept moving forward but she felt the eyes follow her with unabated pressure, as if they were aimed at the back of her neck. Layla saw herself at home, at the dinner table, her father’s face darker than usual, twisted in anger, his hand out threateningly, her mother’s paled lips. A fierce shudder ran through her body and at once her legs felt as though they would collapse. She whipped around. She saw her father. Yes, he was standing there, in that spot where she thought she had seen him, on the pavement at Lazoghli Square, next to the café. Even from here she could see his teeth as he chewed furiously on his lower lip.

  Behind her the crowd pushed forward without mercy, pushing her further from her father, his face very dark indeed, and away from the image of her mother, her lips even paler now. Her father vanished from sight and she saw only the crowd of thousands, and herself melting into the whole. Everything around her was propelling her forward, everything, everyone, surrounding her, embracing her, protecting her. She began all of a sudden to shout again, in that voice that belonged to someone else, a voice that joined her whole self to them all.