“You must tell me. I’m going crazy. I realize I’ve been despicable, but you’ve got to tell me. Tell me the girl’s my daughter.”

“The only thing I’ve got to say to you is: Get lost!”

“I know I deserve to roast in hell, but now I’ve a chance to do something good. Please don’t make me lose it!”

“Go away,” she yelled in a voice like a hurricane, “and don’t let me see your face again.”

“Riri, listen to me. Can’t you see that I’m asking you to say something? Even if I died…”

“Go to hell! I warn you; get out of my way!” She rushed past him and dashed toward the door of the building.

THIRTY

He returned home before dawn after spending ages wandering along the Corniche by himself. He did not hear the sound of the waves, nor did he notice a single star. He found Qadriyya still awake waiting for him. She looked extremely anxious and annoyed. He was on the point of confessing everything to her; had he noticed any sign of encouragement from his conversation with Riri, he would have done so. But all he could tell Qadriyya was that he had been trying to resist his bad habits and had felt the need to hang around on the Corniche till dawn. “Damn it all,” he told himself as he flung himself on the bed, “I must pull this false life out by the roots. Either there’s got to be a new life, or else there’s no escape; it’ll be back to the gambling, cognac, and old women’s chatter in the corner of El Bodega.”

He went begrudgingly with her to the Rio cinema the next day in the evening, and then they ate dinner in a tavern. Afterwards they went home, and he made to go out. “Go to sleep, my dear,” he told her, “sleep well and leave me to cure myself.”

He hovered for a long time around Riri’s place and in front of the building in case he might catch a glimpse of the little girl, but without success. He sat down in the Eagle Café. In spite of his failure the day before, there was still a vague hope that kept toying with him as though he were drunk. He believed that tonight all the world’s problems would be solved without any trouble. He looked up at the sky, obscured by dark clouds, and told himself that autumn in Alexandria had a spirit of paradise about it to wash away all sorrows; they were merely illusions, and death was the guardian of eternal happiness. “How marvelous,” he whispered to himself, “to be drunk without drinking any wine.”