Thebes at War by Naguib Mahfouz

Author:Naguib Mahfouz [Mahfouz, Naguib]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: nepalifiction, TPB
ISBN: 9780307429674
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2007-12-17T18:15:00+00:00

14

The governor of the South finally granted Isfinis permission to set off after giving him a permit allowing him to cross the border whenever he wished. The convoy raised anchor and set sail in the cool of dawn, Isfinis, Latu, and Ahmose son of Ebana taking their seats in the deck cabin of the first ship, their hearts filled with longing and yearning, while the tears with which he had made his last farewell to his mother still stood in Ahmose’s eyes. Isfinis was lost in his dreams: he thought of Thebes and its people—Thebes, the greatest of the cities of the earth, the city of a hundred gates, of obelisks that reached up to the Heavenly Twins, of stupendous temples and towering palaces, of long avenues and huge squares, of markets that knew no peace or rest either by day or by night; Thebes the glorious, the Thebes of Amun, who had decreed that His gates should be closed before His worshippers for ten years of captivity, Thebes which, in the end, had been taken by barbarians who now sat in power as ministers, judges, commanders, and nobles and whose people they had enslaved, so that Fate rubbed their faces in the dirt of those who yesterday had been slaves to them. The youth sighed from the depths of his wounded heart, then thought of the men crouched in the bellies of his ships, all driven by a single hope, all propelled by an unshakable love of Egypt passed down from generation to generation. How they suffered from the pain of separation from the wives, daughters, and sons that they had left behind them at the mercy of their enemies! All of them might have been that brave youth Ahmose who had suppressed his longings and curbed his yearning and on whose face resolution and strength were engraved. Among these crowding thoughts an entrancing image rose to the surface of his mind and he looked downward, hiding his eyes from Latu of the piercing glance, who, if he were to discern what he was thinking of, would grow angry once more. He wondered at how his thoughts hovered around her image, unable to drag themselves away from her. In confusion he asked himself, “Is it possible for love and hate to have the same object?” A sad look appeared in his eyes and he said to himself, “However it be with me, I shall not set eyes on her again, so there is no call for disquiet. Can anything in the world defeat forgetfulness?” Latu interrupted his dreams, saying in tones that betrayed concern, “Look to the north! I see a convoy coming on fast.”

The two youths looked behind them and saw a convoy of five ships cutting through the crests of the waves at speed. The eye could not make out who was on board but the convoy was approaching fast and its component parts soon became distinct. Isfinis caught sight of a man standing at the front of the convoy and recognized him.

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