25. Tales of Romance

If Saʿīd ʿAllām is absent from you for no more than half an hour, he will report at least two incidents that befell him during that interval. You are free to believe what he says or not; to him, however, your belief or disbelief makes no difference.

He will tell you, for example, that while he was walking on such-and-such a street toward such-and-such an establishment, his eye fell upon a girl than whom none was sweeter or more beautiful. Her eyes slaughtered, her cheeks burned, her figure cut, and her bosom struck down.[89] Scarcely had glance met glance when she shot him a wink from the corner of her right eye. With his left hand he lifted his hat and greeted her. Together they made an appointment for a certain day at eight in the evening, rain or shine.

That, for instance, is the first of his incidents. The second is that, while returning from the establishment he had visited, he hurried along with no wish to look at any girl whatever, even if she were descending from heaven. Suddenly, as he walked, he collided with someone. When he looked up to apologize, he discovered a girl upon whose brow beauty had inscribed its first and final verse. Necessity forced him to apologize in gentle words. The affair ended with her hinting that she would not object if he accompanied her home. Necessity forced him to accompany her. When they reached the steps, he bade her farewell, gave her his name and address, took hers, and pledged with her to exchange letters and visits.

He concludes: “Between Molly and Katie, I have lost all my time.”[90]

Saʿīd ʿAllām has many inventions for composing these incidents. A companion might imagine the young man had been created especially to serve as the object of every girl’s hopes. Whenever he sits in company, he never stops telling the listeners about a girl nearly driven mad by love for him, then about another girl and everything that happened in her affair, until he astonishes and bewilders the mind.

He possesses a strange power of invention. He shapes his tales and lavishes verbal spices and descriptive appetizers upon them. Even when a listener doubts the truth of his narration, he does not tire of hearing it. Rather, he marvels at whether everything heard from Saʿīd ʿAllām could really have happened.

A person is astonished by his reports of the amorous nets into which he falls and those he himself sets for American girls. The listener says inwardly, “How marvelous that all this should happen to this young man! He possesses no advantage over anyone else in looks, character, learning, money, wit, or language. If everything he relates is true, then American women must certainly have no minds—or their minds must be nothing but tra-la-la.”

A friend told me that Saʿīd ʿAllām always ground him down with accounts of appointments with American girls and of astonishing coincidences that entangled him with them unintentionally—indeed, against his will.

“I was always thinking about the young man’s life,” he said. “I turned him over in my thoughts on the assumption that everything he reported was true. What, I wondered, made him desirable and beloved in girls’ hearts? Why did not even one of the thousands of incidents that happened to him happen to me, when I am handsomer, more neatly dressed, bolder, and sweeter in conversation?

“At last I firmly resolved to discover the truth of his stories myself. I watched for a chance to walk with him for an entire day through the heart of the city, back and forth, and enter every gathering with many girls and every dance hall or similar place. I wished to see with my own eyes how the fair sex cast its nets from every hill and valley to capture the heart of this extraordinary young man.

“Time brought me a day I had long desired. After great effort and insistent pleading, Saʿīd ʿAllām agreed to go with me to Central Park. He tried to slip away on the pretext that he had one appointment before noon, another after noon, and still another in the evening. God made the task easy and I persuaded him to go to the park with me. We would surely spend the day flirting with beauties who would compensate him for the appointments he had broken for my sake.

“We entered the subway together. Scarcely had we sat down in a car whose seats were full when I saw with my own eyes something that pleased and astonished me. By good fortune, the entire row before us was occupied by ladies. At first sight I said, ‘By God, then Saʿīd has told the truth in all the strange incidents with New York girls that he has related to people!’

“I saw smiles upon the mouths of the ladies before us. Their eyes watched him; some even winked. He lowered his lids languidly and murmured to me, ‘Do you not see that I have grown tired of this life? Look before you now, and excuse me another time if I refuse to go with you or anyone else to parks and gatherings.’

“I was dumbfounded,” my friend continued. “My heart began to dance. I said within myself, ‘Glory to the Creator! He places in souls an attraction invisible in outward appearances.’ I looked at the seated passengers and marveled at the rush of their glances toward my companion Saʿīd ʿAllām. I nearly pitied him for the shots fired by winking eyes and the volleys from smiling mouths.

“Then a middle-aged man stood before us. He hooked his hand through a strap for standing passengers, bent toward my friend on my side, and told him that one leg of his trousers had caught in his sock garter. He asked him to pull it down and put an end to the disturbance it was causing.”[91]

My friend also said: “I looked at Saʿīd ʿAllām. His face was filled with blood, and shame wrapped him in a scarf. Our excursion was shortened to reaching the park. There we separated: he went one way and I another.

“Whenever I met him afterward, I moved my hand in imitation, reminding him of the mishap that had occurred in my presence. I laughed loudly and he smiled faintly. Better still, if I surprised him among friends telling them about his marvelous affairs, he immediately changed the subject from one form to another.”

NOTES

[89] Arabic: ʿaynāhā tadhbaḥān wa-khaddāhā yuḥriqān, wa-qadduhā yaquddu wa-nahduhā yahuddu. The description accumulates violent rhymes: eyes slaughter, cheeks burn, the figure cuts, and the bosom demolishes.
[90] The Arabic prints a rhymed immigrant catchphrase, bayna Mālī wa-Kātī ḍāʿat awqātī: ‘Between Molly and Katie, my time was lost.’ The names represent Saʿīd’s supposedly innumerable American romances.
[91] Men’s elastic sock garters were worn below the knee. Saʿīd’s trouser cuff has caught in one, exposing his leg and causing the women’s laughter and glances that he mistakes for desire.
