From that black day onward, Adham went to work in the estate office in the reception hall to the right of the mansion’s main gate. He worked zealously, collecting rents, paying out money to creditors and submitting the accounts to his father. He dealt with the tenants with honesty and decorum, and they liked him although they had a reputation for being surly and crude. The rules of the estate were secret, known only to Gabalawi, whose decision to have Adham run things awakened fears that this might be a prelude to his making Adham his heir. In truth, the father had never betrayed any sign of partiality among his sons until that day, and the brothers had lived harmoniously together thanks to the reverence their father inspired, and his justice, and even Idris—despite his strength, beauty and occasional excess of high spirits—had never offended any of his brothers until that day. He had been a generous and sociable boy who attracted friendship and admiration. Perhaps the four full brothers harbored a feeling of apartness from Adham, though none of them showed him any discourtesy, in word, deed or behavior; and perhaps Adham was most conscious of all of this apartness. He may have been too aware of the difference between their radiant color and his dark color, their strength and his slenderness, their mother’s high status and his mother’s humble origin. And though this may have caused him inner suffering, some pain he repressed, the fragrant air of the house, laden with aromatic herbs, and obedience to his father’s power and wisdom, did not allow any resentment to settle in his soul, and he grew up with a pure heart and mind.
“Give me your blessing, Mother,” Adham said before reporting to the estate office for the first time, “for what is the work he has entrusted to me but a test for you and me both?”
“May success be your shadow, my boy,” she answered humbly. “You are a good boy, and good people always prevail.”
Adham left for the reception hall under the eyes of watchers in the terrace and garden, and those peering from windows. He sat in the official estate trustee’s chair, and began his work. His work was the most important being pursued in the whole desert region between Muqattam on the east and ancient Cairo to the west. Adham’s watchword was honesty, and for the first time in the history of the estate even the tiniest payments were recorded in the ledger. He paid his brothers their salaries with such tact that they forgot the bitterness of their feud with him, and he was prompt in turning all revenues over to his father.
“How do you like the work, Adham?” his father asked him one day.
“Because you entrusted it to me, it is the greatest thing in my life,” said Adham humbly.
The man’s great face beamed, for despite his omnipotence he was charmed by the sound of praise. Adham loved sitting with Gabalawi. When he did, he stole admiring and loving glances at him. And how he loved to listen, with his brothers, to the stories of long ago, the exploits of the adventurers and youths, how Gabalawi had strutted around this area brandishing his fearsome club and conquering every place where he set foot. After Idris was expelled, Abbas, Ridwan and Galil met on the rooftop just as they had before, eating, drinking and gambling; Adham could only relax sitting in the garden. He had loved the garden and loved playing the flute, and he still played it even after he had taken over managing the estate, though he no longer gave it most of his time. If he finished up his work early, he spread out a carpet by the edge of a stream and leaned his back against the trunk of a palm or sycamore tree, or lay flat in a bower of jasmine to rest, gazing at the sparrows and doves. He played his pipe to imitate the chirping, cooing and warbling—what lovely mimicry it was!—or watched the most beautiful of skies through the tree branches. Once his brother Ridwan came by when he was like this and looked at him jeeringly.
“What a waste of your time, looking after this property!”
“If I weren’t worried about making our father angry, I’d complain,” Adham said, smiling.
“Let us praise the Creator of leisure!”
“May it do you good too,” said Adham innocently.
Ridwan spoke, masking his provocation with a smile: “Don’t you want to be like us again?”
“What could be better than spending my time in the garden, with my flute?”
“Idris was dying to work,” said Ridwan bitterly.
Adham lowered his gaze. “Idris had no time to work—he got mad for other reasons. This garden is where true happiness is.”
When Ridwan had gone, Adham said to himself, “The garden and its singing inhabitants, and water, and sky, and my delighted self—this is life. And it’s as if I’m looking for something. But what is it? Sometimes the flute almost tells me what, but the question goes unanswered. If this sparrow could talk, she would tell me so that my heart might rest secure. Even the shining stars know something. As for collecting rents—it’s a false note in my melodies.”
One day as Adham stood gazing at the shadow he cast on the path between the roses, a second shadow detached itself from his, signaling the arrival of someone from the lane behind him. The new shadow seemed to drift out of his rib cage. He turned around to see a black girl about to flee after noticing his presence. He gestured for her to stay, and she did.
Adham looked at her for a long time. “Who are you?” he asked softly.
“Umaima,” she stammered.
He remembered the name. She was a slave, a relative of his mother’s, and much as his mother would have been before his father married her. He felt like talking to her.
“What brings you to the garden?”
“I didn’t think anyone was here,” she answered, her eyes cast down and nearly closed.
“But you are not allowed here.”
“I’m sorry,” she said almost inaudibly.
She backed away until she disappeared in the lane and then his ears caught the sound of her running footsteps. Suddenly he was murmuring feelingly, “You are adorable!” He had never felt more like one of the creatures in the garden than at this moment, and it seemed to him that the roses, jasmine and carnations, the sparrows, doves and he were all part of the same melody. “Umaima is beautiful—even her thick lips are beautiful. All of my brothers except proud Idris are married, and isn’t my color like hers? And how bewitching it was to see her shadow mingled with mine, as if it were a part of my longing-racked body! My father won’t mock my choice—after all, didn’t he marry my mother?”