The Man in the White Sharkskin Suit (18 page)

“We were with the thieves and prostitutes and pickpockets—all the female criminals,” my sister said, laughing, as if it had all been a lark.

César's recollection placed the events in a far less frivolous, less innocent cast. The arrest, he recalled, had taken place in a hotel, not a pizzeria, and perhaps inside a hotel room, where authorities had been alerted about two young women who had been seen entering with a couple of foreigners. In a paranoid era of a paranoid regime, my sister and her friend had pushed the envelope, and paid the price.

But on what charge? Surely, I persisted, there was a method to the madness of the Egyptian authorities, and even back then, they wouldn't simply have arrested someone without provocation. Under what ostensible grounds had Suzette and Doris been thrown in jail? Could it have all been trumped up? It had been entirely trumped up, she suggested—a bewildering, terrifying episode that had taken place in bewildering, terrifying times.

In that light bantering tone my sister had assumed throughout the conversation, she furnished the answer that had eluded me all these years, since the night at the police station, when my mother had stayed up crying on the sofa, and my brothers had paced self-importantly, and I had held Pouspous tightly, and the family had decided to leave Egypt—had decided that it was useless to try to stay because my father himself had deemed our lives there to be effectively over, that there was no point in even trying to hold on anymore.

The answer came in a single word: “Prostitution.”

Within weeks of my sister's arrest, my father had secured the proper papers the family needed to leave Cairo.

A
s a little girl, I believed there was only one bar in all of Cairo, perhaps in the whole world, and that was the bar in the Nile Hilton. Though most people ended their day at a bar, it was often our first stop when my father and I set out in the morning, the place where we went to get our day going.

In the months before we left Egypt, my father and I began going to the Nile Hilton more frequently, almost every day. The routine was always the same: A leisurely taxi ride from Malaka Nazli to the Corniche, then a stroll along the Nile. My Cat Scratch Fever was better, and I enjoyed the short walk in the sun with my dad.

Docked a few feet below us, we could see hundreds of small boats, mostly fishing vessels but some pleasure craft. Every once in a while, my father would pause; it was because his leg hurt, but he didn't seem to mind. He was so in love with the Nile, its vast, hypnotic calm, the boats that we could almost touch.

Pointing to a vessel, he asked me wistfully if I wanted to go for a boat ride.

But it seemed so little and slight and unsteady bobbing on the water that the thought of climbing aboard made me shiver. I shook my head no, gripped his hand even more tightly, and pulled him along, away from the boats and the Corniche. He chuckled, and resumed walking. I much preferred the large, imposing feluccas that we glimpsed in the distance, their gracefully curbed sails billowing in the breeze as they drifted along the water.

I was relieved when we finally made it to the safety of the Hilton. We entered through a discreet side door, bypassing the bustling sun-drenched lobby with its glass entrance and its loud tourists and its subdued diplomats who could be found day or night milling about the hotel. We found ourselves in a dimly lit bar, all dark leather and soft music and cold air.

My father headed toward his favorite booth, the one closest to the bar. I slid in and sat by his side.

He always made the same request of the friendly headwaiter: a Stella, the imported beer. I would help myself to a large bowl of peanuts the waiter thoughtfully placed in front of me. They were crisp and salty and delicious, and I felt perfectly content. The wonder of the Dark Bar was that even a child of six could feel at home.

Occasionally my father would let me have a sip of his beer. His hands, which were beginning to be affected by what we'd eventually learn was Parkinson's, shook slightly as he passed me the tall mug. We'd hardly exchange more than a word or two. It was enough merely to sit back and enjoy the gentle piano music and relief from the searing heat outside.

The spell was invariably broken by the arrival of one of Dad's clients. The Hilton bar was my father's makeshift office, where he often held his most important meetings, and there were more and more of them, those final days. The get-togethers with serious-looking men frightened me. I could tell they were startled to see me. They couldn't understand why a little girl would be permitted to join their grown-up conclaves.

The more astute among them tried to befriend me, asking the waiter to concoct some special child's drink. They'd pause, embarrassed when they couldn't remember my name, though my father had taken pains to introduce me. I'd immediately pipe up: “Loulou—je m'appelle Loulou.”

I didn't say much more than that. I had learned at an early age how to behave around adults. I was with them far more than with children my own age, and it would never have occurred to me to run around or make noise or have a tantrum in the bar. I knew from the time I was a toddler to watch my dad and take my cue from him, which usually meant doing nothing other than smiling and graciously accepting what was offered me—a kind word, a hug, even the occasional gift.

At the end, it was a blue doll. It was from a favorite associate of my dad's, an amiable man I'd met before, who had come to say good-bye and wish Dad well. He handed me a large oblong cardboard box. Both he and my father were smiling as I tore it open, for once shedding my reserve.

Inside was a striking, very un-Egyptian doll with flaming red hair and a short turquoise blue velvet dress. She was tall and thin and not particularly cuddly. Even her short hair had been sprayed and lacquered into a bouffant shape, so that I didn't know exactly what to do with her. She came glued to her own pedestal, and it was hard to hold her and play with her and dress and undress her the way I did my other dolls.

As I busied myself with the blue doll, my father and his friend were intent on their conversation. They ordered beer after beer, so that we lingered far longer than usual at the Hilton. Dad seemed so comfortable in his booth, he looked as if he could happily have stayed there forever.

I tended to view my father's clients as intruders, rivals for the bond I enjoyed with him and the quiet time we shared inside the bar. It was so blissfully peaceful there compared to the panic and mounting chaos on Malaka Nazli.

We had only a couple of months to sell our apartment and liquidate all our possessions. Under the draconian laws of the Nasser regime, we could take nothing with us save for a few Egyptian pounds; my family was allowed the equivalent of $200 for all six of us.

There was no choice but to spend down the money, but there wasn't much we could spend it on. Jewels, antiques, heirlooms, religious icons such as Torah scrolls, even works of art that had been in a household for generations, could not leave the country. The rules were strict and
often cruel. Women were forced to abandon even their engagement rings.

Clothes were among the few items deemed permissible to take in large quantities. My family, like many others, embarked on what amounted to a frantic shopping spree. There were endless trips to fabric stores, department stores, and tailors as we sought to exhaust our family savings on suits and sweaters, coats and dresses, Egyptian cottons, sheets, and blankets.

We were traveling to frigid climates. Europe and America may as well have been Alaska or the North Pole, the way we viewed them, places where, if we weren't careful, we could very well freeze to death with our delicate Mediterranean constitutions. “Il neige là-bas tout le temps,” my mother remarked; It is always snowing over there.

No one in my family had ever been outside the Levant, not even my father, who saw himself as worldly and seasoned because of his friendships with the British and the French and the Greeks, and virtually all other foreigners who came through Egypt. In fact, after leaving Aleppo as an infant, Dad had never traveled farther than Alexandria.

The snow-encased lands of our imaginings suggested a need to be practical, to opt for wool or cotton or thick flannel. I was taken by the hand from one boutique to another in search of a winter coat. There were none to be had in Cairo, since there was no winter to speak of in this land of perpetual sun, and it was no easy feat, finding a garment to protect me from the frigid days ahead. “Pauvre Loulou,” my mother kept sighing.

My dad went to the Mouski, the old textile district, and purchased yards and yards of shimmering brocade. He chose fabrics embossed with silver threads, in backgrounds of royal blue, crimson red, and green. It was partly an investment—he figured there must be a market for these lush, exotic fabrics outside of Egypt. But he had bought such an excess of brocade that tailors were commandeered to make dressing gowns for him and my brothers.

What they produced looked as if it belonged on some Hollywood set out of the 1940s. Leon, who was over six feet tall, found himself with a robe that came all the way down to his ankles, with a matching brocade belt. I only saw him wear it once, the day that he tried it on in Cairo. He
stood in front of the mirror gazing pensively at his own reflection. He looked majestic and formidable and, oddly, younger than his sixty-plus years.

The robes and leftover brocade were folded and packed into a large brown leather suitcase, one of twenty-six assorted pieces of luggage purchased for our trip. They were so massive and heavy, they took up practically the entire bag. Once a bag was packed, it was sealed, padlocked, and moved to another room, while another bag was brought out in its stead. Each bore a tag that read “Famille Lagnado,” but with no address, for we had none to give.

At last, at Cicurel, Cairo's leading department store, a helpful saleslady located one flimsy child's woolen coat in the stockroom. It was gray and hopelessly lightweight, with a single button, though it did come with a pretty matching woolen scarf. She assured us it would protect me from the harsh winters of the West. She seemed confident, but her knowledge base was limited to a city where temperatures rarely dipped below 50 or 60 degrees. My new coat was so thin, it folded into a small square and easily fit into a corner of a suitcase that wasn't even entirely mine, since I, alone in my family, didn't have enough possessions to warrant my own bag. With that crucial purchase, my mother crisply announced: “Loulou est toute prête”—I was all set.

I settled back in my favorite corner of the living room and surveyed the anxious goings-on.

Nearly all that we owned had to be left behind.

In my dad's case, his passion for white clothes, he knew, would have to give way to the more sober, subdued colors of the world beyond Egypt. Though he was free to take any clothes he wanted, he wasn't going to bring his prize possessions—the white sharkskin suits and jackets he had collected over the years. Like Mom's and Suzette's collection of white shoes, they suddenly seemed superfluous, a relic of a life that was ending. His secret stash of red tarboosh was also left behind.

Because most clothes were handmade, several times a day my mom and sister were off to fittings at the dressmaker. They would return carrying enormous packages. Dresses with full skirts were all the rage, and Suzette was having them made in what seemed like every fabric and color. I'd gaze enviously at a striking cherry-red corduroy dress, with an
enormous flare skirt, wishing I could have one exactly like it. My mother, who had always been more austere, also came home with extravagant new clothes that weren't at all what I knew her to wear. She modeled her new royal blue polka dot dress, and I stared, discomfited, wondering why my staid mother was suddenly wearing polka dots.

Would twenty-six suitcases even be enough? Sometimes one of my parents or siblings would hand me an item they'd helpfully picked out for me. It was a sweater several sizes too large, or thick pairs of woolen slacks, or more flannel pajamas and cotton undershirts. What I was getting seemed nothing like the fineries everyone else was purchasing.

No one seemed especially concerned as to how lost I was feeling. They had adult worries, and adult purchases to make, and adult goodbyes to extend, and my six-year-old's angst seemed too trivial to bother with.

The only creature who still seemed attuned to my needs was Pouspous, who was once again my constant companion. Any fears about letting me stay close to the cat had been set aside, or perhaps my family was simply too preoccupied to keep us apart.

She seemed to delight in the very mayhem that left me so anxious. Pouspous darted in and out of open suitcases, nuzzled her nose into the brocade robes, found in the new luggage a million nooks and crannies in which to hide, and generally tended to amuse herself in spite of—or perhaps because of—the tumultuous goings-on.

Pouspous had been with us since I was born. Like all the other cats that preceded her at Malaka Nazli, she was a stray who had wandered from the alley into our ground-floor apartment and made herself at home. She immediately gravitated to Leon—all cats did. He taught her to appreciate “human” food—since there was no cat food in Cairo, no cans of Little Friskies or Purina Cat Chow in a country where the average person could barely afford to buy a loaf of bread. Whatever Dad ate, Pouspous ate, which meant that when he was enjoying his favorite snack of cheese and Egyptian peasant bread, the cat would nibble on small cubes of cheese and bits of bread.

I almost expected the cat to lap up the hot tea Leon drank at each meal in a tall glass, but instead, he would pour fresh milk for her into a small porcelain saucer and place it near his tea. When she was with my father, Pouspous never ate on the floor.

As our departure date approached, my mother grew more nervous. I saw her one morning stuffing her wedding gown, veil and all, with its yards and yards of satin, into one of the suitcases. It was impossible to fold, so she laid it out almost full-length in the enormous leather bag. To protect it, she covered it with an old fur coat I'd never even seen her wear.

“Ah, c'est de l'astrakhan,” she told me proudly, as she noticed me peering at it. Like the wedding dress, it was from another era, when Persian lamb was the height of fashion and luxury. My father had given it to her as a gift during one happy interlude in their troubled twenty-year entente.

Finally, I saw her take a round, dark gray steel box, peer at the contents, and place it delicately under the wedding dress. Whatever was inside the box would be protected by multiple layers—fur, satin, lace, and steel.

My father took over a couple of suitcases and stuffed them with his favorite items. One bag, for example, was crammed with his books—prayer books, dozens and dozens of them, some so old and tattered they could have been holy relics. Their pages were so frail and withered that I didn't dare go near them, for fear that they would tear at the slightest touch. I knew from an early age that they were my father's most precious possessions, so there was never a question of leaving them behind—not even the oldest, most battered one among them.

Another was devoted to canned goods, as if the cities where we were venturing could lack edible food, and the family would go hungry. My father, who did business with a number of canning factories, took it upon himself to collect the staples he felt would help us survive this journey.

After our morning stop at the Nile Hilton, we'd take taxis to distant warehouses on the outskirts of the city. Dad would leave me in the middle of a factory to meet with the owners behind closed doors. He emerged with cases of canned mangoes, guavas, peaches, and pineapple. As we stocked up, my father had a sense that, even in the worst of times, without a home and bereft of money, the family at least wouldn't starve.