Free Sphinx by T. S. Learner Page A

distracted by the sight of Hermes Hemiedes, still at Francesca’s elbow. To my surprise, her expression changed to one of apprehension and she turned away quickly.
    A tall, handsome man in his early thirties approached me, his veiled wife beside him. Ashraf Awad, son of Aadeel, Francesca’s housekeeper. He had grown up with Isabella and their friendship had lasted into adulthood. I didn’t like to think I found Ashraf threatening, but I suspected his relationship with Isabella had more than once slipped into something approaching intimacy. An ardent socialist and supporter of Nasser, Ashraf had completed his engineering degree at Moscow University, which had appealed to Isabella’s left-wing leanings. ‘Meet the new Egypt’ had been the way she’d always introduced him; she’d seen his education and political fervour as a manifestation of the better side of Egyptian nationalism. Ashraf had visited us once in London en route from Moscow to Cairo. He had slept on our couch and dominated our dinner parties for a couple of weeks, captivating the women and outraging the men with his fervent discourses on socialism and the Middle East. I sensed that he’d never fully approved of me, but Isabella had loved him. In many ways he’d been the brother she’d never had. More importantly, through him she had seen a way she could fit into this new post-colonial society. Noting the full abeyya his wife was wearing and Ashraf’s traditional clothes and newly sprouted beard, I wondered about ‘the new Egypt’. Why and when had he become a fully practising Muslim?
    To my surprise, Ashraf began to weep as he reached to grasp my hand.
    ‘Oliver, my friend, it is a tragedy, a real tragedy. I have lost a sister, you a wife. But Isabella, she had courage. More than perhaps we will ever know.’ He embraced me; embarrassed, I patted him awkwardly on the back.
    I had always secretly envied the openness with which Middle Eastern men expressed their emotions. I couldn’t remember my father ever embracing me or Gareth. A hand on the shoulder was the best we could expect, and as a child I had craved the ponderous intimacy of that deceptively casual gesture. In Egypt, men kissed, held hands; fathers openly caressed their sons. I watched Ashraf’s tears with secret envy. My grief hadn’t broken yet and I wished I could weep like that now.
    Francesca, determined to follow protocol, interrupted Ashraf’s condolences and guided me to a podium at one end of the marquee. It held three ornate chairs.
    ‘You, as the husband, sit in the centre. I am on your right, while the mother,’ Francesca spat the word with ill-hidden disgust, ‘sits on your left. People will pay their respects and we shall conduct ourselves with proper decorum. Then my duties as a grandmother will be over.’
    Cecilia collapsed into her chair. She moaned quietly, her painted mouth opening and shutting like a beached fish. There was a self-conscious theatricality to her grieving that appalled me, and I noticed Francesca glaring disapprovingly at her.
    Despite Isabella and I having been married for five years, I had never met Cecilia before now. Isabella had described her mother as having a pathological fear of intimacy. ‘It makes her claustrophobic to spend time with her own daughter,’ she’d told me one night after an argument on the phone with Cecilia. ‘She doesn’t like to be reminded that she gave birth. This is a woman who is running from her past and she is terrified that one day it may trip her up in the shape of a resentful daughter.’
    I could still hear Isabella’s scornful tone ringing in my ears. She had reason to be resentful. As far as she was concerned, her mother had abandoned her. Seeing Francesca’s reaction towards Cecilia now, I suspected the situation might have been a little more complex than that.
    The Valium was beginning to wear off. I desperately needed something to defend myself from encroaching grief and the tedium of greeting a