The Beginning and the End by Naguib Mahfouz

Author:Naguib Mahfouz
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2016-06-15T04:00:00+00:00

FORTY-SEVEN

The members of the family were gathering in the brothers’ room, which henceforth would become Hassanein’s alone. As she cast a glance at Hussein’s face, Nefisa’s heart was pierced with pain.

“Oh, God! This will be the last night our family will be together!” she cried.

On hearing these words, their mother felt stabbed in the heart, despite the great patience life had taught her. Nevertheless, she smiled, or rather she forced a smile on her dry lips.

“Hussein is a mature man,” she said. “He can manage to live by himself with no trouble or confusion. I’m completely certain that he won’t forget us. He will always remember us as we shall always remember him. Don’t be silly, darling, this is life. Painful though it is, the members of every family are eventually bound to part happily from one another, for each has his or her own role to perform in life.”

Hussein knew his mother so well that he realized that she was hiding her sorrow under a cloak of wisdom and firmness, as she often did. So he decided to grapple firmly with his own sense of desolation. Like a child, he had wept bitterly. But he was destermined not to weep again. Imitating his mother’s smile, he murmured, “We shall meet during holidays. Perhaps I’ll be transferred to Cairo one day.”

“This is bound to happen one day,” Hassanein remarked thoughtfully.

Hassanein felt melancholy and depressed. He had never been separated from his brother, not since he was born. He did not know how to face life without him. Hussein was a brother and friend to him. Though there were many occasions for dispute between them, and they sometimes even quarreled, they were indispensable to each other. Had Bahia been less stubborn, he would never have complained of loneliness. Yet he consoled himself in parting from his brother by the thought of writing letters to him every now and then. Perhaps during holidays he could travel to Tanta to see him. Could he hope to receive a monthly sum of money from Hussein, perhaps fifty or thirty piasters, especially since the fees he received from private lessons were discontinued at the end of the school year? How he wished he had enough nerve to confide his hopes to his brother. But he persuaded himself to be patient, postponing this matter until a more favorable occasion.

Samira’s mind continued to churn. She was pleased that she had succeeded in maintaining an appearance of composure. However, this evening the agony in her heart reached its peak. She experienced a mysterious sense of remorse for the favoritism she had showed Hassanein and the sacrifice of the best part of herself for his sake. But what had things come to?! Hussein, her meek son, had accepted the sacrifice of his career and the suffering of loneliness for the sake of his family, and for Hassanein in particular. Her pain was intensified by the feeling that it was her duty to speak to Hussein, with detachment and no

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