In a choking voice, he said, “My beloved Selma, very soon you will be taken away from the arms of your father to the arms of another man. Very soon fate will carry you from this lonely home to the world’s spacious court, and this garden will miss the pressure of your footsteps, and your father will become a stranger to you. All is done; may God bless you.”
Hearing these words, Selma’s face clouded and her eyes froze as if she felt a premonition of death. Then she screamed, like a bird shot down, suffering, and trembling, and in a choked voice said, “What do you say? What do you mean? Where are you sending me?”
Then she looked at him searchingly, trying to discover his secret. In a moment she said, “I understand. I understand everything. The Bishop has demanded me from you and has prepared a cage for this bird with broken wings. Is this your will, Father?”
His answer was a deep sigh. Tenderly he led Selma into the house while I remained standing in the garden, waves of perplexity beating upon me like a tempest upon autumn leaves. Then I followed them into the living room, and to avoid embarrassment, shook the old man’s hand, looked at Selma, my beautiful star, and left the house.
As I reached the end of the garden I heard the old man calling me and turned to meet him. Apologetically he took my hand and said, “Forgive me, my son. I have ruined your evening with the shedding of tears, but please come to see me when my house is deserted and I am lonely and desperate. Youth, my dear son, does not combine with senility, as morning does not meet the night; but you will come to me and call to my memory the youthful days which I spent with your father, and you will tell me the news of life which does not count me as among its sons any longer. Will you not visit me when Selma leaves and I am left here in loneliness?”
While he said these sorrowful words and I silently shook his hand, I felt the warm tears falling from his eyes upon my hand. Trembling with sorrow and filial affection, I felt as if my heart were choked with grief. When I raised my head and he saw the tears in my eyes, he bent toward me and touched my forehead with his lips. “Good-bye, son. Good-bye.”
An old man’s tear is more potent than that of a young man because it is the residuum of life in his weakening body. A young man’s tear is like a drop of dew on the leaf of a rose, while that of an old man is like a yellow leaf which falls with the wind at the approach of winter.
As I left the house of Farris Effandi Karamy, Selma’s voice still rang in my ears, her beauty followed me like a wraith, and her father’s tears dried slowly on my hand.
My departure was like Adam’s exodus from Paradise, but the Eve of my heart was not with me to make the whole world an Eden. That night, in which I had been born again, I felt that I saw death’s face for the first time.
Thus the sun enlivens and kills the fields with its heat.
6
The Lake of Fire
EVERYTHING that a man does secretly in the darkness of night will be clearly revealed in daylight. Words uttered in privacy will become unexpectedly common conversation. Deeds which we hide today in the corners of our lodgings will be shouted on every street tomorrow.
Thus the ghosts of darkness revealed the purpose of Bishop Bulos Galib’s meeting with Farris Effandi Karamy, and his conversation was repeated all over the neighborhood until it reached my ears.
The discussion that took place between Bishop Bulos Galib and Farris Effandi that night was not over the problems of the poor or the widows and orphans. The main purpose for sending after Farris Effandi and bringing him in the Bishop’s private carriage was the betrothal of Selma to the Bishop’s nephew, Mansour Bey Galib.
Selma was the only child of the wealthy Farris Effandi, and the Bishop’s choice fell on Selma, not on account of her beauty and noble spirit, but on account of her father’s money which would guarantee Mansour Bey a good and prosperous fortune and make him an important man.
The heads of religion in the East are not satisfied with their own munificence, but they must strive to make all members of their families superiors and oppressors. The glory of a prince goes to his eldest son by inheritance, but the exaltation of a religious head is contagious among his brothers and nephews. Thus the Christian bishop and the Moslem imam and the Brahman priest become like sea reptiles who clutch their prey with many tentacles and suck their blood with numerous mouths.
When the Bishop demanded Selma’s hand for his nephew, the only answer that he received from her father was deep silence and falling tears, for he hated to lose his only child. Any man’s soul trembles when he is separated from his only daughter whom he has reared to young womanhood.
The sorrow of parents at the marriage of a daughter is equal to their happiness at the marriage of a son, because a son brings to the family a new member, while a daughter, upon her marriage, is lost to them.
Farris Effandi perforce granted the Bishop’s request, obeying his will unwillingly, because Farris Effandi knew the Bishop’s nephew very well, knew that he was dangerous, full of hate, wickedness, and corruption.
In Lebanon, no Christian could oppose his bishop and remain in good standing. No man could disobey his religious head and keep his reputation. The eye could not resist a spear without being pierced, and the hand could not grasp a sword without being cut off.
Suppose that Farris Effandi had resisted the Bishop and refused his wish; then Selma’s reputation would have been ruined and her name would have been blemished by the dirt of lips and tongues. In the opinion of the fox, high bunches of grapes that can’t be reached are sour.
Thus destiny seized Selma and led her like a humiliated slave in the procession of miserable oriental woman, and thus fell that noble spirit into the trap after having flown freely on the white wings of love in a sky full of moonlight scented with the odor of flowers.
In some countries, the parent’s wealth is a source of misery for the children. The wide strong box which the father and mother together have used for the safety of their wealth becomes a narrow, dark prison for the souls of their heirs.
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