Karnak Café by Naguib Mahfouz Page B

I’d finished.
    â€œÂ â€˜You’re going to see one of my assistants now,’ he said. ‘He’s going to make you an offer beyond price.’ For a few moments, he said nothing, then he went on, ‘I would strongly advise you not to turn it down. It’s the chance of a lifetime.’ ”
    So Zaynab had become an informer as well. She was offered special privileges, and it was decided that Isma‘il was to be the pawn in the whole thing. It was made very clear to her that she had to maintain total silence; she was told that the people she was working for had absolute control of everything.
    â€œWhen I went home,” Zaynab told me, “and had some time to myself, I was utterly horrified by what I’d lost, something for which there could be no compensation. For the first time in my entire life I really despised myself.”
    â€œBut …,” I began trying to console her.
    â€œNo, don’t try to defend me,” she interrupted. “Defending something that is despicable places you in the same category.” She continued angrily, “I kept telling myself that I’d become a spy and a prostitute. That was the state I was in when I met Isma‘il again.”
    â€œI assume you kept your secret to yourself.”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œYou were wrong to do that, my dear!”
    â€œMy secret job was far too dangerous to reveal to anyone else.”
    â€œI’m talking about the other matter.”
    â€œI was too afraid and ashamed to tell him about it. I was keeping my hopes up as well. I told myself that, if I had things put right by surgery, then I might be able to think about a happy life in the future.”
    â€œBut that hasn’t happened so far, has it?”
    â€œSmall chance!”
    â€œMaybe I can do something for you,” I offered hopefully.
    â€œForget it,” she replied sarcastically. “Just wait till I’ve finished my story. I may have made a mistake, but in any case I proceeded to take the only course open to me, torturing my own self and submitting to the very worst punishments I could possibly imagine. By taking such action I was relying on an unusual kind of logic. I’m a daughter of the revolution, I convinced myself. In spite of everything that’s happened, I refuse to disavow everything it stands for. Therefore I am still responsible for its welfare and must fulfill that obligation. As such, I am implicitly to blame for the things that have happened to me. On that basis I decided to stop pretending to live an honorable life and instead to behave like a dishonorable woman.”
    â€œYou did yourself a grievous wrong.”
    â€œI could tolerate everything about it except the idea that Isma‘il might come to despise me. At the same time I didn’t want to betray him. While I was going through all this, I couldn’t even think straight and went completely astray.” She shook her head sadly. “A number of things happenedwhich made it impossible for me to put things right again or to return to the straight and narrow. It was at precisely that point that old Hasaballah, the chicken seller, saw me again.”
    I stared at her in alarm.
    â€œThis time he found the path wide open.”
    â€œNo!”
    â€œWhy not? I told myself that this was the way to lead a debauched life. You couldn’t do that without there being a price to pay.”
    â€œI don’t believe you!”
    â€œI took the money.”
    With that I felt a sense of revulsion toward the entire world.
    â€œAnd Zayn al-‘Abidin ‘Abdallah as well!” she continued, giving me a sarcastic and defiant stare.
    I didn’t say a word.
    â€œHe used Imam al-Fawwal and Gum‘a, the bootblack, as go-betweens,” she added.
    â€œBut I always thought they were both decent, loyal people,” I blurted out in amazement.
    â€œSo they were,” she replied sadly. “But just like