All of them tried to seduce me, but I refused them. A whore?! It’s true that I was raped once: and that I slept with your father, though not for long, before I turned celibate. I am a nun, my son, not a whore. Was it your father who painted this false picture for you? Desolate woman that I am, with wretched luck—I have no other hope but you. How could you picture me like that? I’ll tell you everything! But when are you going to come back?

At night those carousers would slink into our old house, their shamelessness polluting the street that led to Sidi al-Sharany. My heart sank as I read their debauched looks and I worried about Abbas in his room. But you are a jewel, son. You must not be stifled in the mire of poverty. I’d put on a cheerful front as a welcome mat and take them to the room on the upper floor that we’d furnished with borrowed money. I was supposed to be the barmaid and serve them food and drinks; little did I understand that we were at the beginning of a slippery path downward.

“Don’t be alarmed, dear. They’re your father’s friends. All men do that.”

“But, Mother, what have you got to do with it?”

“They’re my colleagues from the theater and it wouldn’t be right for me to neglect them.”

“A good, safe place,” Sirhan al-Hilaly said, beaming as he took his seat at the table, where Ismail was shuffling the cards.

“Tahiya isn’t allowed to sit next to Tariq,” Fuad Shalaby said with a chuckle.

Karam stood behind the cashbox at the edge of the table and there was a laughing remark from Tariq: “A votive offering box, Mr. Karam Younis?”

“No voice should be raised above the sound of battle!”*3

Karam was dissolving some opium in black tea. What a beginning that knew no end!

I have returned myself to my prison cell, just as I have returned the clothes I wore to the theater to their owner. He sits here, his face morose and blank; sells peanuts and melon seeds and joins the customers in complaining about the times. Almost to myself, I murmur, “The play’s a success, that’s one consolation.”

“One can’t judge before a week has passed.”

“What counts is the audience, their excitement, the effect it has on them.”

“I wonder how much al-Hilaly paid him for it.”

“The first work always brings in the lowest price. Abbas doesn’t care about money.” He bursts into that boisterous laugh of his, for which I curse him with all my heart.

In the vastness of his throne room, the evil deity gazed upon us smiling, “Welcome, Halima. I suppose your son is offering us a new play?”

“That’s right.”

“The last one was worthless,” he said, addressing Abbas.

“I always profit from your comments,” replied Abbas.