Yasmina left the house swathed in black, Abda’s parting words ringing in her ears: “Goodbye, daughter, may God keep you and protect you. Rifaa is in your hands. I will pray for both of you day and night.” Night was beginning to fall; the coffeehouse lamps were being lit, and boys were playing in the light shed by the handcart lanterns. At the same time, cats and dogs were fighting—as they always did at that time of day—around the heaps of garbage. Yasmina walked toward Gamaliya with no room for mercy in her passionate heart. She did not hesitate, but was filled with fear, and imagined that many eyes were watching her. She had no sense of composure until she had left al-Darasa for the desert, and felt truly safe only when she was in the reception hall, in Bayoumi’s arms.
When she pulled the veil away from her face, he looked at her attentively. “Are you afraid?”
“Yes,” she answered, panting.
“No, you’re a lot of things but not a coward. Tell me, what’s wrong?”
“They fled over the rooftops to Karim’s house, and they’ll leave the alley at dawn.”
“At dawn, sons of bitches!” muttered Bayoumi scornfully.
“They talked him into going away. Why don’t you let him go?”
“Long ago, Gabal went away, then came back,” he said with a smile of mockery. “These vermin don’t deserve to live.”
“He renounces life,” she said distractedly, “but he does not deserve death.”
“The alley has enough madmen,” he said, his mouth distorted in disgust.
She looked at him earnestly, then lowered her gaze, and whispered, as if to herself. “He saved my life once.”
“And here you are handing him over to his death,” said Bayoumi with a coarse laugh. “An eye for an eye, and the one who started it loses!”
She felt an alarm as painful as a sickness, and glanced at him rebukingly. “I did what I did because I love you more than my life.”
He stroked her cheek tenderly. “We’ll be free. And if things get hard for you, you have a place in this house.”
She felt a little better. “If they offered me Gabalawi’s mansion without you, I wouldn’t take it.”
“You are a loyal girl.”
The word “loyal” pierced her, and the sickening sense of alarm came back to her. She wondered if the man was mocking her. There was no more time for talk, and she got up. He stood to say goodbye to her, and she stole out the back door. She found her husband and his friends waiting for her, and sat beside Rifaa.
“Our house is being watched. It was wise of your mother to leave the lamp lit in the window. It will be easy to get away at dawn.”
“But he’s so sad,” Zaki said to her, looking sorrowfully at Rifaa. “Aren’t there sick people everywhere? Don’t they need healing too?”
“There is a greater need for healing where the disease is out of control.”
Yasmina looked at him pityingly. She said to herself that it would be a crime to kill him. She wished that there was one thing about him that deserved punishment. She remembered that he was the one person in this world who had been kind to her, and that his reward for that would be death. She cursed these thoughts to herself, and thought, Let those who have good lives do good. When she saw him returning her look, she spoke up as if commiserating with him. “Your life is worth so much more than this damned alley of ours.”
“That’s what you say,” Rifaa said, smiling, “but I read sadness in your eyes!”
She trembled, and said to herself: God help me if he reads minds as well as he casts out demons!
“I’m not sad, I’m just afraid for you!” she said.
“I’ll get supper ready,” said Karim, getting up.
He came back with a tray and invited them to sit down, and they seated themselves around it. It was a supper of bread, cheese, whey, cucumbers and radishes, and there was a jug of barley beer. Karim filled their cups. “Tonight we’ll need warmth and morale.”
They drank, and Rifaa smiled. “Liquor arouses demons, but it revives people who have got rid of their demons.” He looked at Yasmina beside him, and she knew the meaning of his look.
“You’ll free me of my demon tomorrow, if God spares you,” she said.
Rifaa’s face shone with delight, and his friends exchanged congratulatory looks and began to eat their supper. They broke the bread, and their hands came together over the dishes. It was as if they had forgotten the death that surrounded them.
“The owner of the estate wanted his children to be like him,” said Rifaa. “But they insisted on being like demons. They were foolish, and he has no love for foolishness, as he told me.”
Karim shook his head regretfully, and swallowed. “If only I had some of the power he used to have, things would be the way he wants them to be.”
“If, if, if, what good does ‘if do us!” said Ali crossly. “We must act.”
“We have never failed,” said Rifaa firmly. “We have fought the demons ruthlessly, and whenever a demon departs, love takes its place. There is no other goal.”
Zaki sighed. “If only they had let us do our work, we would have filled the alley with health, love and peace.”
“It’s incredible that we’re thinking of fleeing when we have so many friends!” Ali objected.
“Your demon still has roots deep inside you.” Rifaa smiled. “Don’t forget that our aim is healing, not killing. It is better for a person to be killed than to kill.”
Rifaa turned abruptly to Yasmina and said, “You’re not eating or paying attention!”
Her heart contracted with fear, but she fought down her agitation. “I’m just marveling at how cheerfully you all talk, as if you were at a wedding!”
“You’ll get used to being cheerful when you’re cleansed of your demon tomorrow.” He looked at his brothers. “Some of you are ashamed of conciliation—we are the sons of a nation that respects only power, but power is not confined to terrorizing others. Wrestling with demons is hundreds of times harder than attacking the weak, or fighting the gangsters.”
Ali wagged his head sadly. “The reward of good deeds is the terrible situation we find ourselves in now.”
“The battle will not end as they expect,” said Rifaa decisively. “And we are not as weak as they imagine! All we have done is shift the battle from one field to a different one, only our battlefield now calls for more courage and tougher force.”
They resumed their dinner, thinking over what they had heard. He seemed to them just as calm, reassured and strong as he was handsome and meek. In the long lull came the voice of the local poet, reciting: “One noon Adham sat in Watawit Alley to rest, and fell asleep. A movement woke him, and he saw boys stealing his cart. He got up and threatened them, and one boy who saw him warned his friends with a whistle; they overturned the cart to distract him from going after them. The cucumbers tumbled all over the ground while the boys dispersed like locusts. Adham was so enraged that he forgot his decent upbringing and screamed obscenities at them, then bent down to retrieve his cucumbers from the mud. His anger redoubled with no outlet, so he asked emotionally, Why was your anger like fire, burning without mercy? Why was your pride dearer to you than your own flesh and blood? How can you enjoy an easy life when you know we are being stepped on like insects? Forgiveness, gentleness, tolerance have no place in your mansion, you oppressor! He seized the handles of the cart and set out to push it as far as he could get from this accursed alley, when he heard a taunting voice. ‘How much are the cucumbers, uncle?’ Idris stood there with a mocking grin.” Then there was a woman’s shout, over the poet’s voice, crying, “Little boy lost, good people!”