At that time she made a huge effort to hide her feelings. She prattled on about inconsequential matters and laughed as she carefully ironed his uniform. She folded it into a small case, said good-bye as he went out the front door and then burst into tears. Would Abd el-Aziz Gaafar, a man from a decent family, have to do a menial job for all eternity?
God be praised for everything. She stopped daydreaming, glanced at the clock in the sitting room and noticed that it was after nine. She rushed into the bedroom, opening the door quietly, and looked at Abd el-Aziz’s face as he slept. How she loved this man. She loved him for his strength, his determination and his pride. How could he cope with all these ordeals? Many other men would have given up the ghost, but Abd el-Aziz was a believer and accepted whatever God dealt out to him. She shook him gently to waken him, and he got out of bed. He took a shower and made his ablutions before saying his morning prayers and getting dressed. As he was sitting down to his breakfast, she set her plan into motion. She sighed and said, “May God give you the strength to support us all, dear Abd el-Aziz. May he grant you sustenance so you can sustain us.”
There was silence. Abd el-Aziz carried on carefully cracking his boiled egg, and as he laid the pieces of shell on his plate, he asked her calmly, “Is there something you want?”
Ruqayya sighed and whispered slightly apologetically, “The ration book for the cooperative shop . . .”
“At the end of the week, God willing. Anything else?”
“By God, I’m a little ashamed to mention it. You know how troublesome Said can be, but he has set his heart on buying a new shirt.”
“Whatever.”
He finished eating, lit a cigarette and sipped his coffee. Ruqayya seized the opportunity and moved the subject on a little. She smiled and said, “I have a request, my darling Abd el-Aziz, and please, I beg you by the Prophet, don’t embarrass me for asking you.”
“Well?”
“I want to sell two of my bracelets and buy a Singer sewing machine. You know I have always loved making clothes. I could buy a sewing machine and do some piecework. Even if I don’t earn a fortune, at least I will be sitting respectably in my own home, and every extra piastre will help us.”
Abd el-Aziz looked at her. He gave her that familiar look of someone who does not like what he has heard. He responded in a tone of sour derision, “You want me to come home from work and find you busy with customers?”
“A bit of work never hurt anyone.”
“So the Gaafar house will become a seamstress’s workshop for all eternity?”
She knew he would never agree, but she did not lose hope.
“All right. Let’s forget the sewing machine. Now, Saleha . . .”
“What’s the matter with Saleha?”
“If she were to leave school and stay at home, we’d save the school fees.”
“Shame on you, woman. So I should work my fingers to the bone to pay the school fees for Mahmud, who is stupid and keeps failing, and we should keep our brilliant and clever Saleha at home and throw away her future?”
“Her future is to get married and have children.”
“As long as she wants to keep studying, that’s what she must do.”
“I’ve got another thought.”
“You’ve been doing a lot of thinking lately, Umm Said!”
He spoke the latter words as he stood up and unhooked his tarboosh from the peg, and as he was straightening it on his head, he said, “Don’t worry, Ruqayya. We’ll see, by the grace of God. I’m certain.”
3
It was sheer madness.
From where Bertha Benz lived in Mannheim, it was more than a hundred kilometers to the town of Pforzheim, where her mother lived. How could she ever have imagined that she could cover this distance in the carriage? After all, what did she know about this machine she was driving? Just a smattering of information she had gleaned from Karl. She had only seen him drive it once— when it had moved forward some small distance and overturned with him in it— and now she was planning to cover a hundred kilometers nonstop. There was no thinking it over. She had been so moved by her husband’s despair that she was now rushing headlong into an act of folly. She was as sure to fail as the day is long. She was on her own now. She tried to control the accursed carriage, with her sons on either side fighting off sleep, perplexed at what their mother was doing. As she drove, Bertha discovered that the steering lever was not finely tuned, so there was a delayed reaction whenever she tried to move it left or right. She also noticed that the carriage was quite light in weight and bobbed up and down like a boat on ocean waves. Quite a few times, it shuddered and almost toppled over. Each time, she shouted at the boys to keep tight hold of the front rail. Then she discovered that the carriage ground to halt at the merest hint of a gradient. At every hill, she and the children had to get out and push. Then the fuel ran out.
She left the boys in the carriage and rushed off to the nearest pharmacist’s shop, where she asked for ten bottles of gasoline, which at that time was only used for domestic cleaning. The old pharmacist’s curiosity was aroused, and as he was packing the bottles into a bag, he asked, “I feel certain that madam must live in a very large house to need all this cleaning liquid.”
Bertha smiled shyly and answered, “Please come with me for a moment.”
The pharmacist hesitantly came from behind the counter, smiling with astonishment, and followed her into the street.
“I’m using the gasoline as fuel for this.”
He had heard about the invention and showed great curiosity and enthusiasm, inspecting the carriage as if it were a recently landed creature from outer space. He insisted on helping her. She opened the fuel cap, and he slowly poured the gasoline into the tank until it was completely full. Bertha climbed back up onto the seat and tugged on the drive belt. The carriage gave off a screech and the usual puff of smoke. The pharmacist clapped his hands in delight, and Bertha called down to him in gratitude before the carriage lurched off.
Then it was the turn of the cooling system to break down: the water ran out, and the engine became red hot. Bertha turned it off and, leaving the boys behind in the carriage again, set off on foot with Karl’s special rubber can to find a public tap in the park. She hoped that would be the last disaster, but it was far from it. The car soon shuddered to a halt again. Bertha got out and discovered that the carburetor was blocked. After a few moments’ thought, she took out one of her hairpins and, with the tenacity of an ant, used it to give the carburetor mesh a good poking. But this time when she tugged on the drive belt again, the motor did not respond. She pulled it again and again before it finally started turning, and the carriage set off. Ten full hours later, during which all sorts of problems and delays had occurred and after bouts of hopelessness, frustration and despair, Bertha drove the Benz carriage into the town of Pforzheim. Before going to her mother’s house, she stopped at the telegraph office. In her haste, she left the engine running and ran in to send the following telegram to her husband, “Today, the Benz carriage has traveled over a hundred kilometers from Mannheim to Pforzheim. Karl, we have done it. We are proud of you.”
The following day, Bertha drove the carriage back to Mannheim. Profiting from the previous day’s mistakes, this time she brought a large pitcher of water and a number of bottles of gasoline. She borrowed needles from her mother for unclogging the carburetor. All these preparations cut two whole hours from the journey. Words cannot describe the state Karl was in when Bertha and the children got home.