No one excelled Warda in the art of love. Mad about her man and their little nest, she devoted herself completely to the service of love and to performing all its tasks. Omar would look around the place, smell the roses in the vase, listen to the music in the Oriental room, and would feel he was in paradise. Though she asked nothing of him, he would urge her occasionally to buy clothes and other things. She tried to keep her weight down by taking walks and watching her diet, and urged him also to be careful about his eating and drinking. He felt that she’d become a part of his personality and that she clung to him as her last hope. In the long winter nights they withdrew into themselves and stayed in the Oriental room until late at night, and between kisses and embraces talked endlessly about the past, present, and future, about truth and fantasy, reality and dreams, and were it not for the closed porch overlooking the square, the winter storms and rain showers would never have disturbed them at all. When conversation was exhausted, the silence that fell was one of mutual understanding, security, and comfort. But at times he was overcome by his fantasies, some of them laughable, others more disturbing. He was alarmed by one particular vision: the collision of two cars at a crossroad, a middle-aged gentleman tossed in the air.

“Where are you?” the gentle voice whispered.

He answered, a bit ashamed, “It’s nothing.”

She put her arm around his neck. “It must be something important.”

He shook his head. After a moment’s silence she probed again. “Why wouldn’t Buthayna and Jamila visit you in your office?”

He was thinking of what a strange house the spider builds to hunt flies. “Buthayna didn’t want to.”

“She knew of your wish?”

“Mustapha conveyed it to her.”

“You haven’t talked to me about it.”

“It’s not important.”

“Whatever concerns you is important to me.”

They began to watch television more. It helped in forestalling the strange fantasies. Mustapha rang them up one day to ask how they were. She invited him to drop by, and so he began visiting them. He asked Omar how his poetry was progressing.

“He does write,” Warda replied.

Omar protested, “It’s an abortion.”

“Happiness is more important than poetry,” Mustapha said consolingly.