On the way home, Dimyan asked Magd al-Din, “Why all these weapons today?”

“Don’t you see the trains loaded with Italian prisoners coming from the desert? The war there is quite hot.”

“It seems like the war will go on for a long time, Sheikh Magd.”

“The weapons come from Suez and from the harbor in Alexandria, and the soldiers come from all over the world, Dimyan. It seems to me it’s not war, but Judgment Day.”

They both fell silent for a long time. Magd al-Din started thinking about Hamza, whom he had mocked today, and how Hamza now seemed noble in his eyes. Then he remembered Lula and what had happened a few days earlier and he grew tense. It was not easy for Zahra to be acquainted with a woman who turned out to be an adulteress. It was not easy also to live in the house of good Dimitri, who since that day had felt ashamed every time he saw Magd al-Din because he had not carefully screened his tenants. What were people saying now about good Dimitri and his children? Could Dimitri have turned down a tenant paying sixty piasters a month? And Bahi, his brother, had he known about Lula? And if he did, how could he have chosen for him to live in the same house? He smiled sarcastically at this last question and heard Dimyan say, “Look, it’s Wahid the plainclothes policeman!”

Wahid was walking toward them in a blue gallabiya with vertical white stripes and a khaki overcoat. He had a white skullcap on his head and a gray scarf around his neck. In his hand he held a long bamboo stick that he waved around from time to time. They knew him well and met him almost every day and shared some of the goodies that the soldiers had given them. He was used to that and did it to all the workers he came across. And even though he was well dressed in clean clothes, and despite his pleasant, placid face, when he spoke he sounded like an uncouth, brutal clod, as Sheikh Magd al-Din described him all the time. Wahid was notorious in the whole neighborhood for shaking down everyone and for having no scruples whatsoever when it came to framing someone. He saw them as he saw them every day, and shouted as if he had just noticed them, “What are you carrying?”

“As you can see, some English canned stuff,” Dimyan answered, smiling, and Wahid said, “You mean from the English warehouses?”

Neither of them knew where the English warehouses were, but they figured that today he wanted to get more than he usually got from them.

“What warehouses! Here, just take a couple of packets of tea, Wahid,” Dimyan said, as his smile grew broader.

But Wahid shouted, “I have to take you in — this is larceny!”

He raised his stick, threatening them. Magd al-Din gave him a long savage look. He had looked around and saw the open space, as the sun was quietly setting, a cool breeze blowing and the dark gently beginning to cover the ground. He could hardly see the rails on top of the crossties, as everything was the color of dust.

“You know, Wahid,” said Magd al-Din, “I could knock you to the ground and slit your throat on the track without anyone seeing you.”

“What did you say, Sheikh Magd? Slit my throat?” Wahid asked in a more subdued voice, and he lowered his stick.

“Yes,” Magd al-Din replied, “and the train will come, and in the morning people will see that it cut off your head.”

Dimyan was genuinely frightened by what his friend was saying.

“We have two cartons, as you can see,” Magd al-Din went on. “In each there is tea, cookies, corned beef, and cheese. We will give you a whole carton, and the two of us will share one, on condition that you never bother us again. Every time you think of doing it, remember that I can slit your throat without anyone seeing. Take the carton and leave in peace.”

Wahid, as if in a daze, took the carton.

Dimyan and Magd al-Din walked in silence, then Dimyan asked, “You were really going to slit his throat, Sheikh Magd?”

“Yes. Today I can slit anyone’s throat.”

They continued on their way home in silence.

15

Japan attacked Indochina, expanding its war along the western and southern coast of Asia, since it was already at war with China. The Japanese giant was restless, and it began to stretch and spew forth its fire. America saw Japan’s military power and ventures as a threat and began to stand on guard. People everywhere began to realize that the entire globe would soon be engulfed in the flames of war.

In Egypt, British planes attacked the new Italian positions in Sidi Barraní, in raids that lasted four hours and extended into Benghazi to hit the Italians’ lines of communication. The ministry of supply decreased the amount of coal sold to ironers and pressers, since no coal was being imported from England and a large number of trains were being used for military transport. Ironers and pressers complained vociferously. Some brazen young men started going out at night, wearing frightening gas masks to take girls and women by surprise in the dark alleys. Groups of such masked youth appeared at times like herds of bulls going to their bullpens or leaving them for the faraway grazing pastures. The Italians started using a new kind of bomb that looked like a thermos bottle, which did not explode on impact but afterwards, when moved or touched. A campaign began to warn Alexandrians against such bombs, which had shiny surfaces that could not be seen clearly in bright sunlight. People were distressed because for the second year in a row, the month of Ramadan came and no lights or public celebrations were permitted. The price of many commodities went up, and kerosene was rationed. The price of potatoes rose from fifteen milliemes an English kilo to twenty-seven and from ten milliemes an Egyptian kilo to twenty. A large section of the wall of the corniche at Sidi Bishr collapsed as a result of water seepage. The royal banquets of Ramadan were no longer enough to keep the poor happy. In Alexandria there was only one banquet, held in front of the Mursi Abu al-Abbas mosque, whereas in Cairo, people said, they were held everywhere. In that banquet, taro root, meat, rice, fava beans, vegetables, and pastries were served for free. The deputy-governor himself inaugurated the banquet and ate with the poor, apologizing for the absence of the governor, who had gone to Cairo to congratulate His Majesty the King on the advent of the month of Ramadan. The ministry of social affairs formed a commission to study the increasing immodesty of women, as a result of the increase in the number of foreigners and their need for entertainment and the need for money among many segments of the population.

For Magd al-Din, Ramadan was no different from the year before, only now the women stayed up without Lula. Zahra noticed that Camilla had once more become silent and oblivious to others. She spoke once and said it was no longer permitted to stay in the cinemas during raids, night or day. Maryam asked Zahra why she did not leave Alexandria when everyone was leaving, especially since she was now pregnant and it would be better for her to give birth in her village. Zahra said that was a long way away, but that she would surely do that. She was lying, for she could never leave Magd al-Din. But she had no choice, as she could not explain how her husband had been expelled from his village.

As the feast celebrating the end of Ramadan approached, the world watched with bated breath as Italy started its predations of Greece. On October 28, which coincided with the feast in Alexandria, Italy invaded Greece from Albania. The Greek prime minister, Metaxas, displayed great courage in rejecting the Italian ultimatum, and Greece launched a counterattack. The Greeks in Alexandria rose up against the invasion. Young Greek men gathered in front of the Greek consulate, volunteering to fight in defense of the country of Achilles, Agamemnon, Hercules, Zeus, Hera, Aphrodite, Apollo, the Muses, Oedipus, Electra, and Pygmalion — the country that no one had ever disliked or could dislike now. The Egyptians admired the courage of the Greeks and began to greet their Greek neighbors with admiration and respect, The Greeks continued to be optimistic: “Il Duce is a miserable fellow,” they told their Egyptian neighbors. They held enthusiastic poetry readings and sang and danced fervently.