The Naqib's Daughter by Samia Serageldin

Author:Samia Serageldin [Samia Serageldin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780007319992
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Published: 2008-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

‘Sitt Nafisa, Shaykh Jabarti is at the door with urgent tidings.’

‘I will be down directly.’ Nafisa veiled with all the haste she could muster and descended to the lower hall. ‘What news, God willing, Shaykh Jabarti?’ She had never seen the scholar so perturbed, his face nearly as grey as his turban. ‘Take a seat, please, and tell me what has happened.’

‘Sitt Nafisa, half the diwan has been taken hostage!’

‘Hostage! The diwan? Why?’

‘This morning Menou convened the diwan and announced he was leaving for the coast at the head of an army, and warned against any sedition; at first his threats were veiled. He said, “Sensible people like you should advise the troublemakers. For retaliation strikes not only the troublemakers but others as well.”’ Jabarti seemed too agitated to take a seat. ‘I replied that punishment should be meted out to the guilty only. For did not the Almighty say that every soul shall be pledged for what it has earned. To this, Menou replied: “Guns and bombs have no mind to distinguish between evildoer and good man. Nor do they read the Koran.”’ Jabarti threw his hands up. ‘And he calls himself Abdullah-Jacques Menou!’

‘The lion is most dangerous when he is at bay,’ Nafisa pointed out, ‘and Menou is cornered. The Ottomans and the English must be advancing even closer to Cairo than we thought.’

‘You are right, Menou fears an uprising when news of the advance is known, but he makes a great show of strength. He claimed to the diwan that the French will never leave Egypt, never abandon it, for it has become their land, subject to their rule. But the general must have seen that his words did not convince, and when we made to disperse, we were stopped at the door. We were told that, with Ottoman forces approaching, it had become necessary to detain certain dignitaries among us as hostages, as the Turks were coreligionists for whom Muslims might be expected to feel sympathy and loyalty, unlike the English.’

‘Ah! So the Ottomans must be practically at the gates!’ And with them the amirs, she thought: Murad – and Elfi. She turned back to Jabarti. ‘But the French did not detain all of you?’

‘No. They left four of us, including myself and Shaykh Bakri, to run the affairs of the city.’

‘I see.’ But she had almost ceased to hear Jabarti; her pulse raced with dread and relief combined. The final confrontation would come any day now. All over the city, there were women, like her, who yearned to be reunited with a husband or lover in exile; and others who dreaded the day of parting with a husband or lover they had taken among the French. There were men, on both sides, who longed to go home: the Mamlukes to their City Victorious, and the French to their land across the sea. There were those among the citizens of Cairo who chafed for the day of revenge and those who quaked at the prospect of retribution.

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