They were three — two boys and a girl — in the days when her husband would gather her and them into his arms, and she would feel that he was more impregnable than the stones of the house, and stronger than the days...
— Did he ask to see me?
She questioned her son-in-law in a weak, defeated voice, and he answered, taking her roughened hand between his own: "Yes. He wants no food or drink; he wants only you."..
— "Then tomorrow morning we shall go together"...
Her daughter kissed her and said, fighting down her tears: "Do you want anything — a cup of tea, perhaps?" She whispered absently: "No, my darling. I want to sit up a little by the window."..
Why could she find no tears to drown some part of the pain? Why could she not sob and wail, so that something of the masses of despair crouching on her heart might lift? She had wept much, more than people weep, until her eyes went dry and froze — those eyes that had seen so many of life's wonders and so little of the favor of kindly fortune... Yes, she would go to him in the morning to touch his face and see this stranger who cried out her name, calling... A stranger, because she had not seen him for years; crying her name, because he was her son.. And she would go to him, because one against whom the door of freedom has been bolted, who stands behind bars a criminal and a thief, cannot go to anyone... whoever loves him goes to him.. And she was going to see his face, and to learn whether she still loved him or not... How many times over had she gone back, remembering... her hopes in the days when they were three... two boys and a girl — when her husband shared life's due with her, strong and young; when he would gather her and them into his arms and she would feel him more impregnable than the stones of the house in his protection, steadier than the days in his constancy.. She remembered a night when she stood with him, carrying her baby girl "Basma," by the beds of the two boys, and said as one dreaming: What fortune, what future awaits them, I wonder? What kind of men will they be? Her husband laughed and took the little girl from her hands, saying:
"And this rose? Will she fill the world with fragrance and beauty? And who is the lucky man who will be blessed with the possessing of her?"
How feeble her sight had been, stretching her gaze into the future and seeing amid the dreams what is not to be seen! Had she found a truth then, she had wrapped it in dreams and let the future beguile her. And the days laughed in mockery: the truth vanished, and the wrapping fell, scattered by the wind!
She never knew how he panted his last, and she did not see him when he closed his lids and slackened, rigid and cold.. They carried him to her at noon, a silent corpse that filled her with terror and horror.. and she filled the house with wild clamor and fell to sobbing, keening hoarsely: "But how? How did he die? Take him away — this is not my husband; my husband was alive this morning. No, no — leave me to speak to him, for he is not dead.." And she went on raving, calamity moving her tongue to what she said.. and her hand kept rubbing his chest, trying to breathe life back into the heart that had stopped suddenly, choking the life within him... Then she grew still and lay down beside him, laying her cheek against his cheek, her arm around his neck, staring, silent, unable to stir...
After that she stood over her children's heads alone, trying to trust in hope anew, and she clung to its skirts to fight off her despair.. She asked for a strength to push her forward, a strength to kindle warmth in her heart, that she might warm her children's lives.
Her brother helped her a little, and her husband's brother likewise, with small sums sent at long intervals from the Mahjar. Beyond that she had to work: she took to sewing clothes for people's children at modest wages she dared not raise, not being fully skilled at sewing; and at times she washed and ironed people's clothes at home to earn what more coins she could... Often she grew weary and wished she could close her eyes and sleep for days upon days, forgetting her lot, leaving her present, turning her face from the fearful, far-off future.. How often she wished she might sit one whole day inside the house alone and give her weeping free rein! — neither washing nor ironing, only crying, to drive off the deadly, accursed fear.. No,
she never rested a single hour; she worked on always, and her children grew up around her...
A cold breath of wind came in at the window; she closed one shutter of it and rubbed her hands, then went back to sounding the depths of the dark,