“The play is a fantasy. And even if it were true…”

“Tell me what you really think.”

“I don’t bother my head, not for one minute, about anything but the play itself. Any crime the hero commits onstage is good for the play. That’s all that concerns me.”

“But doesn’t he betray his parents and kill his wife?”

“And a very good thing, too.”

“What do you mean?”

“The elements of tragedy!”

“Don’t you believe that’s what actually happened?”

“It’s got nothing to do with me.” He shrugs.

“I want to know the truth.”

“The truth is, we have a great play. And I am, as you know, the owner of a theater, not a public prosecutor.”

“And I am in agony.”

Al-Hilaly laughs. “What are you talking about? You never loved him!”

“The present isn’t the past. You should understand that better than anyone else.”

“A play is just a play. Nothing more. Otherwise the law would have the right to put ninety percent of our authors in the prisoner’s dock.”

“You don’t want to offer me any comfort.”

“I wish I could. Karam. Don’t get worked up over absurd conjectures. No one could share them with you anyway except your most intimate friends. As for the public, they won’t look beyond the play itself. By the way, why did you turn down your old job as prompter?”

“Thanks for asking. Abbas suggested that, and he told me you’d agreed. But I have no wish to go back to the past.”

Al-Hilaly laughs again. “I can see that. You’re your own boss now. And perhaps you make more money from the shop. That’s all right, my friend. But don’t get upset over Abbas. He’s trying to establish himself. He’ll surface at the proper time.”

Our meeting is over and I take my leave, weighed down by contempt for all mankind and thinking: No one cares about me, and I care for no one. I don’t even love Abbas, though my hopes are pinned on him. A treacherous murderer. Why should I blame him, though? I’m just like him. His outer paint has been peeled off, and he’s shown the true colors he’s inherited from his father—the naked self everyone pretends to honor these days, revealed without hypocrisy. What is goodness but mumbo jumbo, empty words said over and over in the theater and the mosque? There are pickup joints and rooms by the hour all along the Pyramids Road. How could he get me thrown into prison?

Who’s this? At the door of the cafeteria I run into Tariq Ramadan, who holds out a slimy hand. I refuse it and tell him to get out of my sight.