The Thief and the Dogs

Well, you'll have to go out sooner or later, to take a walk in the night, even if only to safe places. But let's postpone that until the police are worn out looking for you. And let's hope to God Shaban Husayn isn't buried in one of these graves here; this run-down quarter could hardly stand the strain of such a painful irony of fate. Just keep cool, keep patient, until Nur comes back. You must not ask when Nur will come back. You'll have to put up with the dark, the silence, and the loneliness — for as long as the world refuses to change its naughty ways.

Nur, poor girl, is caught in it too.

What, after all, is her love for you but a bad habit, getting stuck on someone who's already dead of pain and anger, is put off by her affection no less than by her ageing looks, who doesn't really know what to do with her except maybe drink with her, toasting as it were, defeat and grief, and pity her for her worthy but hopeless efforts. And in the end you can't even forget she's a woman. Like that slinking bitch, Nabawiyya, who'll be in mortal fear until the rope's safely installed around your neck or some rotten bullet is lodged in your heart. And the police will tell such lies that you'll be cut off forever from Sana.

She'll never even know the truth of your love for her, as if that, too, was just a bullet that went astray.

Sleep came over Said Mahran and he dozed off for a while on the sofa, unaware that he had been dreaming in his sleep until he woke, to find himself in complete darkness, still alone in Nur's flat in Sharia Najm al-Din where Ilish Sidra had not surprised him and had not fired a hail of bullets at him. He had no idea what time it was.

Suddenly he heard the rattle of a key in the lock and then the door being closed. A light in the hallway went on and filtered in above the door.

Nur came in smiling, carrying a big parcel.

She kissed him and said, "Let's have a feast!

I've brought home a restaurant, a delicatessen and a patisserie all in one!"

"You've been drinking?" he said as he kissed her.

"I have to; it's part of my job.

I'll take a bath, then come back. Here are the papers for you."

His eyes followed her as she left, then he buried himself in the newspapers, both morning and evening. There was nothing that was news to him, but there was clearly enormous interest in both the crime and its perpetrator, far more than he'd expected, especially in the Zahra, Rauf Ilwan's paper. It discussed at length his history as a burglar and the list of the exploits revealed at his trial, with stories about the great houses of the rich he had burglarized, comments on his character, his latent insanity, and an analysis of "the criminal boldness that finally led to bloodshed."

What enormous black headlines! Thousands upon thousands must be discussing his crimes at that moment, all amused at Nabawiyya's infidelity and laying bets as to what his fate would be. He was the very center of the news, the man of the hour, and the thought filled him with both apprehension and pride, conflicting emotions that were so intense they almost tore him apart. Meanwhile, so many other thoughts and ideas crowded in confusion into his mind, that a kind of intoxication seemed to engulf him. He felt sure he was about to do something truly extraordinary, even miraculous; and he wished he could somehow communicate with all the people outside, to tell them what was making him — there all alone in the silence — burst with emotion, to convince them that he'd win in the end, even if only after death.

He was quite alone, separate from everyone else.

They didn't even know, did not comprehend the language of silence and solitude. They didn't understand that they themselves were silent and alone sometimes, and that the mirrors dimly reflecting their own images were in fact deceptive, making them falsely imagine they were seeing people unknown to themselves.

His mind's eye focussed on the photograph of Sana, with a sense of wonder, and he was deeply moved. Then in his imagination he conjured up all their pictures — his own wild-looking self, Nabawiyya, looking like a whore — coming back to the picture of Sana. She was smiling.

Yes. Smiling. Because she could not see him and because she knew nothing. He scrutinized her intensely, overwhelmed by the sense that he'd failed, that the night out there through the window was sighing in some kind of sympathetic sadness, desperately wishing he could run away with her to some place known to no one else. He yearned to see her, if only as his last wish on earth before his execution.

He went over to the other sofa to pick up the scissors lying in a pile of pieces of fabric, then returned to snip the picture carefully out of the newspaper. By the time Nur emerged from the bathroom he felt calmer. When she called him, he went into the bedroom, wondering as he walked how she could have brought him all those news reports and know nothing of them herself.