Adrift on the Nile

Sana turned her gaze out to the Nile like a fugitive, and he put his arm apologetically around her. Unconnected questions poured into Anis' head. Had this group of friends been gathered before as they were tonight--clad differently--in Roman times? Had they witnessed the burning of Rome? And why had the moon split off from the earth, dragging the mountains behind her? And who was it, in the French Revolution, who had been killed in his bathroom by a beautiful woman? And how many of his contemporaries had died--as a result--of chronic constipation? And how long after the Fall did Adam have his first quarrel with Eve? Did Eve never try to blame him for the tragedy brought about by her own hand?

Layla looked at Samara. "Are you always clearheaded?" she asked her.

"Coffee and cigarettes--nothing else."

"As for us, if ever we heard of a crackdown on drugs, we'd all be at our wits' end," Mustafa remarked.

"Is it that bad!"

Ragab remembered that they had some whiskey with them. She accepted a glass gladly and he rose to fetch it. Then she asked why they were all so attached to the water pipe. No one volunteered a reply--until Ali said: "It's the focal point of our gatherings. None of us is really happy except when we are here."

She nodded, agreeing that it was a very pleasant party. Then Saniya Kamil addressed her. "You can't escape so easily--you have plenty to say that goes right to the heart of the matter!"

"I don't want to repeat clichés. Nor do I want to come across as a piece of bad didactic theater!"

"But we want to know your opinion!" Ahmad protested.

"I expound it week after week," Samara said, and took a sip of her whiskey. "But what do you have to say about it?" she continued.

"Well," began Mustafa, "for the first half of the day we earn our living, and then afterward we all get into a little boat and float off into the blue."

Now, genuinely interested, she asked, "Are you not concerned at all by what goes on around you?"

"We sometimes find it useful, as material for jokes."

She smiled disbelievingly. Mustafa went on: "Perhaps you are saying to yourself, They are Egyptians, they are Arabs, they are human beings, and in addition they are educated, and so there cannot be a limit to their concerns. But the truth is that we are not Egyptian or Arab or human; we belong to nothing and no one--except this houseboat. . . ."

She laughed, as she might at a good joke. Mustafa continued: "As long as the floats are sound, and the ropes and chains strong, and Amm Abduh is awake, and the pipe filled, then we have no concerns."

"Why!" she exclaimed, and then thought for a minute. "No," she amended. "I will not be tempted into the abyss. I will not allow myself to be a moralizing bore."

"Don't take Mustafa too literally," Ali suggested. "We are not as egotistical as he makes out. But we can see that the ship of state sails on without need of our opinion or support; and that any further thinking on our part is worth nothing, and would very likely bring distress and high blood pressure in its wake."

High blood pressure. Like adulterated kif. The medical student turns hypochondriac the moment he enters college. The Director General himself is no worse than the operating room. That first day in the operating room! Like the first death I knew, the death of those most precious to me. This visitor is interesting even before she opens her mouth. She is beautiful. She smells wonderful. And the night is a lie, since it is the negative of day. And when dawn breaks, tongues will be made dumb. But what is it that you have tried in vain to remember all evening?

Khalid Azzuz turned to Samara. "Your writing shows a literary talent."

"One that has never been tested."

"Doubtless you have a plan."

"I am mad about the theater, first of all."

"What about the cinema?" Ragab asked.

"Oh, my ambitions do not go so far," she replied.

"But the theater is nothing but talk!" he retorted.

Mustafa smiled. "Just like our little society here."

Samara replied earnestly now. "No! The opposite is true: the theater is . . . concentrated; every word has to have a meaning."

"And that is the fundamental difference between the theater and our group," Mustafa suggested.

Suddenly her eyes fell on Anis, who was sending the water pipe around the circle, as if she had discovered him for the first time. "Why don't you speak?" she demanded.

. . . She is tempting you, so that she can say to you, when it comes to it: _I am not a whore._ She reminds me of someone. I cannot remember who. Possibly Cleopatra, or the woman who sells tobacco down in the alley. She's a Scorpio too. Does she not realize that I am absorbed in abstractions of an erotic nature?

Mustafa excused him. "He who works does not speak," he said.

"Why does he do it all himself?"

"It is his favorite pastime," Mustafa replied, "and he allows no one to help him."