City of the Sun Page 15

  “And it also means ‘water’ in Arabic,” she said. “My parents just liked the name. They picked funny names for all of us.”

  “You have a large family?”

  “Twelve brothers and sisters.”

  “Oh, my goodness!” He whistled. “I must come from the only Irish Catholic family in the world with just one kid. I wish I had siblings. I want to have a whole bunch of children one day.”

  “Is your mother worried about your being here?”

  “She died a long time ago,” he said. “Of course, she would have worried. But she would have loved it here herself. Like you, she was a very curious lady.” He winked. “Though she’d never been there and couldn’t speak the language, she adored everything French. She named her bakery La Parisienne and sang ‘Frère Jacques’ to me every night. She had a bottle of French perfume, Joy, which was absolutely sacred to her. She dabbed it on her neck every Sunday before church.”

  “That’s very sweet,” Maya said.

  “I just wish I had helped out more around the bakery. I had no idea that my time with her was running out. She died my junior year in high school. She had me promise to go to college. She always believed I would make something of myself.”

  “And you did, Mister Ace Reporter! And a nicely groomed one at that!”

  He smiled sheepishly, enjoying the compliment. He’d tried hard this morning.

  She placed her elbow on the table, her chin in her palm. “I have to tell you,” she said. “I also had a boyfriend who cheated on me. He was the first one I really cared about. I was seventeen. He was much older. I think loyalty is the most important quality, for a lover or a friend, don’t you?” Suddenly she looked behind him and motioned to someone to go away.

  Mickey turned and saw a girl anxiously tapping her watch at Maya.

  “I have to go,” she said, uneasy, and leaned to pick up her purse from the floor.

  “Please,” he insisted. “We haven’t even celebrated yet.” He looked around for the waiter. “I doubt this joint has any champagne, but let’s not let that stop us. Mademoiselle, your glass, please.” He mimicked holding a bottle with one hand and pouring into an imaginary glass in the other. He then offered to pour her some.

  “Come on! Your glass! I can’t do this by myself.”

  She obliged, humoring him, and pretended to hold a glass. “I must go, really, and what are we celebrating, anyway?”

  “Shh, shh.” He tilted his hand as if pouring and then clicked his imaginary glass against hers. “To our first date.”

  CHAPTER 20

  The Jew has vanished,

  Kesner wrote, dipping his pen into the bottle of disappearing ink that sat on the wrought iron table under the white parasol on the foredeck of his boat. He’d woken up in a foul mood and more than ever he felt the need to write in his diary.

  Despite his contacts, Abdoul was unable to trace him after he got off the boat in Alex. The Jewish community center here in Cairo is inundated with refugees and even with that silly little Jewish cap on my head I couldn’t extract any useful information. It’s clear the Jew must be getting help from somewhere. Given his importance, I bet it’s coming from powerful Jews. I must send Samina to that big Jewish soirée on the king’s yacht. No doubt the American spy will be there. With her smarts and instincts she’ll help pick out this Fastball.

  I snooped around the American Embassy the other day, but without any contacts, I had no success. Who would have thought I would have to worry about the Yanks? The American community here is small and dispersed, and they don’t have a restaurant or club where they gather, but Abdoul, bless his fat heart, is getting me a list of all registered Americans. Maybe he can even find out which Americans will be invited to the party on the royal yacht.

  I did discover that representatives of an American consortium are here to investigate oil prospects in the Middle East. The Americans are catching up.

  Kesner put his pen down and took a tentative sip of the black Egyptian Arousa tea that he drank for breakfast with honey and walnut rolls. It was still piping hot. He checked his watch: 6:50. He’d better get going. He had an important meeting this morning with Anwar Sadat, the cofounder of the Revolutionary Committee, as the rebels within the Egyptian army called themselves. Kesner was hoping to introduce the young lieutenant to Hassan al-Banna and convince him to arm the Brotherhood. With the two subversive groups joining forces, Rommel, whose Afrika Korps had already entered Egypt in several places, would sail through the country easily. Rumor had it that they had taken Mersa Matruh, leaving only El Alamein as the last Allied stronghold before Cairo, a mere sixty miles beyond. Feeling chipper that Rommel would be here in no time, he grabbed the Biro ballpoint from his shirt pocket and jotted down in big letters:

  Kairo

  Wednesday, October 10, 1941

  Max. 29° C Min. 19° C

  Sometimes he provided more details, like wind and other trivial facts, masking his journal as a weather log, but today these would be the only notations he’d make. He shut the diary and read the quote from Sun Tzu’s The Art of War he’d inscribed in large printed letters on the cover of the journal: Invincibility is in oneself. Vulnerability is in the opponent. He read it every day for strength and inspiration.

  “Haz saeed (Good luck),” the taxi driver said as Kesner stepped out of the cab. The driver wouldn’t take him deeper into the City of the Dead, or Araafa, as the cemetery was referred to. Even for thick-skinned Egyptians, the poverty here among the tombstones and catacombs was too wretched to face. Kesner knew that it was against Islamic teachings to dwell among the dead, yet fellahin from poor villages and impoverished city dwellers had formed shantytown communities here. Tea stands and fruit markets had sprung up between the graves all through the enormous cemetery where Egyptians of all social standings had been burying their dead for centuries.

  “A city within a city,” Kesner thought as he negotiated his way inside the cemetery’s walls. Row after row of tombstones formed a labyrinth of alleys that stretched as far as the eye could see. He searched for the obelisk he’d been assured he’d find near the south gate entrance, where he was to meet Sadat and Sheik al-Banna. Kesner could easily understand why the sheik, like many other wanted men, had adopted this area as his hideout. He could sleep and strategize with his cohorts in different sepulchers for months on end, and, in an emergency, he could disappear through one of the innumerable exits, either into the city or into the desert. But this kind of emergency was unlikely, since both the Egyptian and British police shied away from this place as if it housed the plague.

  Kesner breathed easier when he spotted a rose-colored marble obelisk next to a tomb covered with dry flowers and desiccated food offerings. It must be a saint’s vault, he surmised. He could see a soldier’s cap partially visible behind the obelisk.

  “Good morning, Herr Sadat,” Kesner called.

  Sadat came around. His Egyptian army uniform was immaculate, hardly what he expected from a revolutionary leader. Kesner hadn’t seen the young officer since he’d been sent off to Mersa Matruh three months ago. With his new, well-trimmed mustache, he looked older than his twenty-two years, but his beady, youthful eyes were as fiery as ever.

  “Good morning, Herr Kesner,” Sadat answered, standing erect. “I almost did not recognize you in your galabeya.”

  “It is I, it is I,” Kesner said, adjusting the gray cap he’d chosen to wear today instead of a tarbush, which would have attracted more attention in this neighborhood. “You’re looking fairly well, Herr Sadat, although I know it must pain you to wear a uniform after that terrible insult of having your weapons taken from you by the British.” He placed his hand on his chest. “My heart went out to you when I heard about it.”

  Sadat did not flinch. “I must tell you right away that we do not intend to arm the Brotherhood,” he declared. “My colleagues assisted you in getting Sheik al-Banna out of prison, but that is as far as we will go.”

  “Nobody’s talking about armin
g anybody,” Kesner responded, annoyed with the youngster’s naïve idealism. “I just ask that you meet with him. You may have more in common than you realize.”

  Sadat looked away. When he looked back, his face wore a pained expression. He gestured at the laundry that hung between tombstones to dry. “This is what the British have done for Egypt. They’ve reduced us to animals.” He suddenly pointed behind Kesner. “There he is, I think.”

  “That’s him, all right,” Kesner confirmed as he turned toward the slight silhouette of Hassan al-Banna. The sheik wore his distinctive red abaya with the hood pulled low over his face, his long beard sticking out. He was carrying a heavy wooden staff and stood on top of a large stone. Kesner waved to him.

  Al-Banna did not wave back but raised his stick over his head—follow me—and began to jump from stone to stone over the broken ground like a mountain goat. Although he was wearing sandals, he was spry and moved quickly as he led them deeper into the cemetery. He finally came to a halt in an uninhabited section and crouched down behind a rock.

  Two men appeared out of nowhere, rifles on their shoulders.

  “He is swift for an old man,” Sadat whispered, panting.

  “Old man? He’s only in his midthirties,” Kesner replied, wiping sweat from his forehead with his sleeve. He looked around, feeling claustrophobic amid the closely packed tombstones and cenotaphs. Except for the occasional buzzing of a fly, the cemetery was a strange and creepy oasis of calm.

  The sheik sprang to his feet as they approached and pulled back his hood, revealing deep-set, sad eyes and leathery skin. He reminded Kesner of a lizard. There wasn’t a single bead of sweat on his face. Al-Banna and Sadat sized one another up.

  “Unusual place to set up shop, eh?” Kesner joked in Arabic, trying to break the awkwardness of the moment. He shook hands with the sheik and tapped his back, but the sheik was still eyeing Sadat.

  “Peace be with you.” Al-Banna spoke first, addressing Sadat with a toothy smile and offering his hand.

  Sadat took it. “And also with you.” He embraced him before continuing. “Sheik Hassan al-Banna, you may not know that we have met once before—some years ago, when I was only a boy. I came to hear you speak outside a mosque near the Bab El Khalq.”

  “That must have been a long time ago. I have not spoken publicly in Cairo for many years,” the sheik replied.

  “How are you enjoying your freedom?” Kesner asked him.

  “As long as the British are in Egypt none of us are truly free. But I don’t wish to seem ungrateful.” Al-Banna took Kesner’s hand into his own two hands. “Thank you, my friend, for releasing me from jail. I did not understand at first why I was being transferred to a higher security jail, but then, when I was taken to the car and heard the crickets in the reeds along the banks of the Nile and smelled the sweet scent of the river, I knew I was being set free. Thanks be to God.” He raised his eyes piously to heaven.

  “Thanks be to God,” Kesner agreed heartily. “Without the Almighty the operation would never have been successful.” From the corner of his eye, he noticed Sadat giving him a dirty look, impatient with this religious pronouncement.

  “We will go somewhere we can talk,” the sheik announced, turning on his heel and leading them to a doorway. Stairs inside would lead down to catacombs, no doubt. Above it was a cenotaph still richly carved with Arabic markings even though the white glare of the sun had bleached the color from the weather-beaten stone.

  The burial chambers below had been transformed into tidy rooms furnished with cots and tables and chairs where men could gather in groups. The sheik showed Kesner and Sadat to a private room furnished with large pillows.

  “We thank Allah, the Merciful and Compassionate, for giving us the strength to lead the struggle against the infidel,” the sheik began when they’d settled. “Lieutenant Sadat, I understand you, too, are involved in the mujahida.” His voice was soft, and the light from the torch illuminating the chamber cast long shadows on his face.

  “You could say that,” Sadat replied, folding his legs Indian style. “I am an officer in the Egyptian army, but I am a member of the Revolutionary Committee.”

  “And they are striving in the path of Allah?”

  “We are striving for the people of Egypt.” Sadat spoke solemnly. “We are seeking to throw the colonialist invaders out of our country and overturn the feudalism that persists.”

  The sheik smiled, pleased. “And this will mark a return to Islam.”

  “The aim of the Revolutionary Committee is to establish a people’s republic in Egypt. We are not interested in going back to the Middle Ages or becoming a theocracy,” Sadat stated flatly, staring defiantly into the sheik’s eyes.

  Kesner bit his lip. “But as you said,” he quickly reminded Sadat, “you both are dedicated to getting rid of the occupier.” The young officer was being impetuous. Kesner thought that as a leader of his group he should show more diplomacy.

  “Anwar, why do you seek a path that turns away from the light of Allah and emulates foreign systems of government that we know do not work?” the sheik asked, looking pained. “Why overthrow something, only to replace it with its copy? The Holy Qur’an contains all the laws you need.” He counted on his fingers: “Human rights; equality; brotherhood; right to freedom of speech; right to life, to property, to dignity and to justice. All this is in the sayings of the prophet.”

  “Yes, and they are also the principles of the French Revolution,” Kesner interjected, knowing this would strike a chord with the young officer. “Liberté, égalité, fraternité.”

  “The Qur’an is a great and wonderful book, Sheik Hassan,” Sadat replied, ignoring Kesner, “but it is just a guide. It is not government in practice.”

  “There you are wrong, my young friend!” the sheik cried out, his voice rising for the first time. “The four caliphs governed only by the Holy Book, and for centuries we had a golden era for Islam.”

  “The caliphs ruled in another time,” Sadat argued.

  “The caliphs were entrusted with their power from God. Sovereignty belongs to Allah alone. Man is merely a temporary custodian. Even the king is not empowered by God.”

  “That’s right, he owes his throne to the British,” Sadat responded.

  “The true representative of Allah’s power here on earth must be pious and unfailingly dedicated to His word.”

  “Who do you think Allah has in mind for the job?” Sadat asked sardonically.

  Kesner was dying inside. Sadat was going too far.

  But the sheik did not flinch. He just looked to heaven and opened his hands, gesturing that he didn’t know—or, perhaps, that it would be him.

  “The ruler must be chosen by the people,” Sadat continued.

  “The ruler is chosen by God,” the sheik corrected.

  Kesner had to stop this conversation before it spiraled into an argument. “First things first. Why don’t we wait and see what comes after the British have been removed?” he suggested. “They have brought such shame and misery to your country that you must unite to overthrow them and settle your differences afterward.” He looked from Sadat to al-Banna.

  After a short silence, the sheik waved his hand and said, “Herr Kesner is right. We must be brothers now. Our country is suffocating.”

  But Sadat looked wary.

  Kesner nodded to the sheik and got to his feet. “Come.” He held out his hand to Sadat on the floor. “Let’s you and I talk in private.”

  He led him to the room next door where three men scurried away when they entered.

  “Lieutenant, you must understand,” Kesner whispered. “The Brotherhood can bring about the collapse of British rule. They are brave guerrilla fighters, loyal to the sheik’s every word. They have been very successful at sabotaging communications lines, as you know.”

  “You want me to arm them,” Sadat replied loudly, confronting Kesner.

  “The sooner they are armed, the sooner you will have your revolution,” Kesne
r conceded, whispering hoarsely and gesturing with his hand for Sadat to lower his voice. “Only God knows what will happen afterward.”

  “Understand me,” Sadat replied in a softer voice. “I am a Muslim, and I believe that our people should be taught the prophet’s teachings about humility and charity and goodness. But I cannot arm civilians and send them hopelessly against the might of the English. That is the job of the army. I am sorry.” On these words, he strode out of the chamber toward the exit.

  As Kesner started after Sadat, he noticed in the adjacent room, lit by a feeble candle, the silhouette of a young man sitting at a table, one hand placed on the Qur’an, the other on a revolver. He was repeating the oath of initiation into the Brotherhood that an officiate was administering: “Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope. The messenger is our leader. The Qur’an is our law. And Jihad is our way.” He pledged with such passionate religious fervor that it gave Kesner goose bumps and he stopped in his tracks. He’d catch Sadat another time.

  When he returned to the chamber, he found the sheik crouched on the floor, cleaning his nails with a large curved knife that he’d produced from the folds of his robe.

  “He will come around,” Kesner assured him. “But I need a favor from you. I’m looking for a Jew. His name is Erik Blumenthal.”

  CHAPTER 21

  “Pssst … Lili,” Maya whispered, “are you awake?”

  But no response came back from the girl, who, along with the entire household, had gone to bed right after the enormous meal Allegra had served following the Yom Kippur service. She found the Levis’ custom of breaking the fast with coffee and sweets to be rather strange, and she wondered how the family could still have an appetite after that. But they’d gorged themselves at the dinner table nevertheless, except for Maya, who was furious with Erik for having gotten into a fight with Vati. Since returning from schul, Vati had been complaining about how lax the rabbi’s service had been and criticizing the Sephardim for their materialism and lack of spirituality. Erik, the atheist, had finally exploded, expressing his contempt for all forms of organized religion, including his own family’s Ashkenazi brand of Judaism. He called his father weak-minded. The two men did not talk to one another all evening.