27

So the experiment was launched, and his philosophy embraced it with open arms. Mahgub himself, however, felt some anxiety. Although this anguish did not prevent him from taking part and even made him desire it all the more, he never forgot his goal for one moment and worked ceaselessly, as if work provided relief from his whispered doubts. He amassed the documents to justify his appointment. The one that was apparently the most significant was a certificate attesting to his “good behavior and conduct.” Al-Ikhshidi and one of his colleagues signed that, causing Mahgub to wonder sarcastically: Who will attest to the bride’s character?

He received twenty pounds to set his affairs in order and grasped the banknotes dumbfoundedly, because he had never seen so much money at once. He began to shuffle them carefully, scrutinizing them with awe and disbelief. This was the price of the two horns that crowned his head. Each was worth ten pounds! He found the image of a peasant on one bill and that brought the suggestion of a smile to his lips. He remembered his bedridden father, who was on the verge of starvation, and wondered why the currency did not portray a pasha or the Turkish flag. He told himself ironically that this use of the peasant’s picture was comparable to his signature on the marriage contract. With his pocket bulging, he headed to the tailor to purchase cloth for two suits. The man realized that the student was becoming a government employee, since he had only made a single suit for him throughout his four years of higher education. Then, like a proper bridegroom, he went to the Muski, where he purchased two pairs of pajamas, some dress shirts, underwear, socks, shoes, and a new fez. As he packed his clothes into a large valise, his face flushed with delight and vitality. Casting around his small room a malicious look, he remembered those foul February nights and the beanery on Giza Square. To hell with those black days! No matter what it cost him, they would never return. He would have to bring some color to his pallid cheeks, fill out the space between his bones and skin, keep his phenomenal intellect in good form, and slay the dread specter of hunger. To survive, the ostrich stretched its neck as long as a serpent, the lion made its paw as lethal as a grenade, and the chameleon acquired the ability to shift colors. That was what he had done, by different means. Yes, let his aspirations be unlimited and his ambition boundless. He had paid a steep price and the reward must be commensurate. He reflected for a time and then gave himself some advice. Caution? He should do what he wanted but should say only what other people wished to hear. He had grasped this truth from the start. If he volunteered a word or two in praise of virtue, someone would always call him virtuous. Had he candidly declared his enmity to virtue, everyone would have attacked him, egged on by the most sullied among them. Let al-Ikhshidi serve as his role model—al-Ikhshidi who was seen at every charity event. Indeed, he himself might think seriously about joining some of these benevolent societies. Then, remembering his marriage, he wondered again how little Ali Taha seemed to have meant to Ihsan. How had her foot slipped? What might Ali do in the future if he learned that Ihsan had become his wife? He would be aghast; his mind would be torn by anxiety. He would not believe that he—Mahgub—was responsible for his suffering. If he felt obliged to accept this bizarre truth, he would spitefully and rebelliously accuse Mahgub of every meanness, baseness, and reprehensible deceit. So be it. He could accuse him as much as he wished. Let him despise him in every way. Even so, he remembered the loan he had not repaid—fifty piasters. He resolved to repay him that very day. Because of his guilt, he did not feel like seeing him in person and sent the sum by mail. He felt much better then, sensing that he had cut the last thread that linked him to Ali Taha and that it would no longer be possible for him to pay any attention to what the other man imagined or felt or to what he himself had done. He summoned the doorman and gave him the task of selling the contents of his room, promising him a third of the receipts in exchange for keeping an eye out for any letters that might arrive for him. Then he thought of his parents. It may have been the first time he remembered them without annoyance, grumbling, or anger. He fully intended to send his parents two pounds every month, in fact to increase that to three if he could.

The next day he would head to the ministry in the morning. That evening, he would escort his bride to her new nest.