The Holiday Suit

Cheer and gladness were scattered abroad at the dawn of that day, and the small faces returned smile for smile and sparkle of eye for sparkle of eye. Fathers and mothers went about, their faces clothed in a new sweetness; much of care and wrinkling had vanished and much had dwindled; and the rough hands could not help clasping, with a pulsing gentleness, the soft warm hands that clung to the hand of a father or an elder brother.

It was as though the whole city — the mountain and the coast behind it and before it, the far and farther heavens above it — were pulsing and feeling, while a kindly sun warmed it, pouring it draughts of warmth and love, lining its eyes with the kohl of gay, graceful blossoms, and perfuming its breath with a flood of intoxicated sweetness.

It was a day full of expectation and fulfillment: it was the day of the feast.

The streets were crowded with a stream of the children of the feast, as though some mighty spring of life were sending forth gush after gush of radiant, delighted beings, merriment beaming from their faces, throbbing in their hearts, and quivering in their light feet in a harmony that was neither dancing nor human walking. Perhaps the city forgot its sorrows on that bright morning and kept no shady, darkened corners fit for pain and misery to fall into; perhaps wretchedness itself came out of the darkness of its shrinking and strolled through the streets glowing with the sun's heat, and swallowed long breaths of the fragrance of warmth and sweetness and beauty.

The small faces still smile, and the innocent eyes gleam with something chaster than tomorrow's ambition and more luminous than dreams: they were living childhood, living the hour, entrusting one hand safely to the palm of a tender father while with the other tracing circles and lines in the air at one moment and, at another, resting assured of the holiday gifts waiting at home. The faces turned upward were pleased to see their benefactor envelop them in confidence and protection, then bent downward to caress with admiring glances a new suit, or a shoe still creaking in its newness and stiffness.

One of those faces was beaming like the rest on that contented morning, well pleased with the feast, with the big hand that guarded his little fingers, and with the feast's elegance in the measure that was his share of it. They walked among the thousands, a father and his son — every one of those thousands a world unto himself, conscious of it or not, though a single fever drove them all, so that it might seem to a passing cloud — had it been granted leave to wrong the feast day and float above the city — that those thousands were a single being, not begrudging the sky that sheltered it current after current of the radiance of one and the same love.

But our little Wasim was not one to trifle and gamble away the feast's few hours in philosophical musings, after the night had all but gotten the better of him, with the holiday suit to beguile him through it.

And the holiday suit Wasim wore was not like its fellows: it was the first ever cut to his measure, not bought ready-made by his father. It marked a decisive date in his life, for it granted him the feeling of manhood and of worthiness. Had he not gone with his father to the cloth merchant, each of them choosing for himself the color he preferred, and each carrying his piece of cloth to the tailor — the very same tailor? Had the tailor not looked at him smiling, with something of silent congratulation in his eyes — because he had become worthy of the tailor's hand taking his measurements? Wasim did not fail to note all these stages with a certain pride: to be consulted in the choice of a ready-made suit is one thing; to have a suit sewn to one's measure is quite another. And it pleased his innocent pride to be worthy of buying his clothes from his father's own merchant and his father's own tailor; had his father chosen him some other merchant and some other tailor, the picture would have been marred and its harmony spoiled.

A suit made to measure, in which the tailor's hand worked an act of creation, transforming it from a dead, limp piece of cloth — a well-proportioned piece of cloth that we measure in length and breadth, elementary in its dimensions, which we toss upon the shelf and it lies still, neither kicking with a leg nor pushing with a hand, from which we cut off spans and meters and it neither turns monstrous nor rebels. A suit made to measure you can watch growing before your eyes; you see its flatness turn to fullness and then to plumpness, its sprawl to poise, its retirement to being and standing. A suit made to measure is something other than the ready-made suit, which you see swinging with the indifference of the rabble amid dozens of its sisters; the merchant takes it down with a hooked pole and throws it before you on the counter for you to have your say about it, and you are near to loving it — until you discover that it carries a number supposed to stand for a certain size and length, and you are near to cursing it, except that you are weary of the old suit that clothes you and must needs buy a new one. And if it does not please you, the merchant returns it to its hanger and lifts it back to its place, and it swings once more...

But this suit speaks to you, because it is a suit made to measure. You touch its buttons and each of them tells you that Naoum the tailor picked it out, then fixed its position, then fastened it there; and you test the length of the sleeve by folding your arm, and you hear it tell you that the end of the sleeve must not go beyond the wrist bone.

And a suit sewn to measure has a temperament and desires. You cannot fling it carelessly into the bottom of the wardrobe or onto a chair, as you do a ready-made suit. When Wasim brought it home from the tailor's workshop he did not yet know these differences of nature, nor that his new suit had a personality he could neither be ignorant of nor ignore.

He brought it home two full days before the feast and put it in the wardrobe, just as he used to put all his new suits in the past, and went off to the garden. Then he came home at suppertime and ate his meal, and did not fail — before slipping into his bed — to open the wardrobe and cast a glance at the suit; and within a few moments he was in his bed, surrendering his eyelids to a pleasant slumber.

And from there he began to discover that this suit had a temperament and a personality. It came to him with a proud slowness: clean, freshly pressed, its buttons gleaming, its chest puffed out. It came with reproach upon its face, but it kept silent; its pride forbade it to speak. Then it sat down facing him in a rocking chair and began rocking it gently, and it stayed so until morning, when it withdrew from the chair and returned to the wardrobe seconds before Wasim awoke.

In vain did Wasim try, in the morning, to understand the secret of its reproach, for it would not disclose it. He looked at it with appreciation and admiration, but it neither smiled in satisfaction nor put on a scowl of discontent. The occupations of that day and the preparations for the feast distracted him from the suit: from the holiday sweets to the flowers to the holiday banquet — all together they made that long day a thing that could be borne.

Night frowned once more, and Wasim laid his head, full of expectation and hope, upon the pillow; and the phantoms of darkness gave him only a little respite before they carried him across the threshold of consciousness into the world of dreams.

The suit did not come to him quickly, as on the night before, nor was its coming distinct; and since he had not yet discovered that it had a temperament and a personality, it escaped him to inquire into the reasons for its lateness. And while he was roaming his dim world, the wardrobe opened, and in a moment the suit was in the chair beside his bed, and near it, on the arm of the chair, his new shirt, a bag of sweets, and a small pocket wallet holding the feast's gift of money.

The suit stayed quiet in the chair, silent, keeping its pride without arrogance and its elegance without affectation; and it kept looking toward the door, as though torn between the pull of loyalty — stay where you are, close to the one who chose you — and the pull of rebellion and despair — leave this house without hesitation or delay.

Then the veil of ignorance lifted from Wasim's understanding, and he turned quickly and resolutely toward the suit, raised himself upon his elbows, and begged it with warmth and sincerity: do not go far from me, but stay at my side. And as though the plea had lit its whole being with lines of light, it smiled; a magic hand reached out and wiped the misery from its brow, and it answered: "Do you truly wish me to stay near you? Do you love me, Wasim?" He stretched out his hand gently and clasped its hand and touched it with tenderness and love, then laid his cheek against it and settled back into his bed.

And when morning overtook him, his cheek lay serenely upon the pillow, the sleeve of the new suit between his cheek and the pillow, and his fingertips touching the buttons of the sleeve, caressing, delighted.

A few hours later, as he strolled through the city with his hand in his father's hand, he had discovered that a suit made to measure has a temperament and a personality; and for that reason he never left off talking to it, a smile on his lips, and warmth, and a tear, in his eyes.

And the sky smiled from on high.