This chapter is quite short, and on a different note. It will prepare the following chapters which will take place from 1929 to 1933. Happy reading!

XIII. Before sorrow comes ...

Haven't you heard the news? Like a crazy rumor, it goes from mouth to mouth, from whisper to whisper, and how they run these terrible words! On that night of February 27, 1933, the Reichstag is on fire! But the fire was already there, on all faces and in all hearts! Now, as the new chancellor says, "Es gibt jetzt kein Erbarmen; wer sich uns in den Weg stellt, wird niedergemacht. Das deutsche Volk wird für Milde kein Verständnis haben. "

On February 28, a very cold sun will rise over Berlin, while an even colder day will end in New York, while the 27's night will drag over America. But at this hour, as sun's scraps sadly illumnate Brooklyn skyline's cold gray, the Reichstag lights up in the dark. As Hitler said us so well, there is no pity left now. It's an obtuse, desperate, and rancid afternoon.

On a terrace overlooking the East River, a woman as frozen as this sun, in a long silk robe, lights her cigarette and smokes as the daylight decreases in America, on steel, concrete and glass. And it is infinitely sad to think that Alma Kane will never know how the Reichstag burned down, or how they arrested Communists, how they suspended civil liberties, or how they resurected the Germanic Empire, the Reich. A muffled foreboding must have seized her, she must have felt it too, the fire on her face and in her heart, since she threw down her cigarette and declared: it is today.

She put on her beautiful black gown, an evening dress with silver highlights. She combed her dark hair, powdered her olive skin, put her lipstick on. Then she went to get her son, sitting quietly in the bookstore, leaning over a history book. "Amos" she called him, "come here." The boy followed her in silence. He had the silent gravity of those little phantom children adorning the walls of Egyptian tombs. Her heart sank at the thought that he was only hers for a few more nights, but that her tenth birthday would soon come, and that she couldn't hide him anymore. She sat him down beside her, read him the Thousand and One Nights, as when he was really a child.

At past 5 p.m., the Reichstag has been burning for three hours already. Day is also dying in New York, and it's a another kind of fire on the buildings's windows in Manhattan. Julius Kane returns home, passing by the Metropolitan Museum, through Perneb's mastaba. At 5:23 pm precisely, he knocks on the Twenty-First Nome's door. His aunt Zaïna opens it for him. Julius goes off to kiss his mother and his brother, whom he has not seen for over a month, but is surprised not to find them in the living room, nor in the large library, nor in his mother's apartments. "They went for a walk. », answers his aunt.

"But it's already dark! »The boy wonders. Her mother would never go for a walk alone at night, for obvious reasons. Zaïna looks a little worried as well, a wrinkle hollows out her forehead. Outside, the snow is swirling and the wind has picked up.

"Did they go to the usual place?"

- I think so. "

Julius knows the usual place, how many arguments has he heard between his parents on this matter. "Why on earth would you take my son to Manhattan? I told you, it is not a place for us to be!" But nothing had helped, Alma had returned day after day to the other bank, taking her youngest son with her. Why did they went out if it's dark? Something very heavy falls on his chest. Fear. He glances at his aunt, grabs his coat and runs outside.

The icy wind stabs him like a knife in the face. He runs and he runs, his chest on fire. Julius knows exactly where they are, he knows it deep down. He tries to silence this gnawing anguish, runs down a frozen staircase, misses a step, rolls on the sidewalk. He gets up, a little bloody, sets off again at full speed.

The East River is not completely frozen. The current whashes away huge patches of ice. The Brooklyn Bridge is deserted. Amos walks beside his mother, running to keep up with the rhythm of her long strides. They hurry in silence. The child turns his head, watches their shadows flicker in the lampposts' light, the cohorts of squalls and snowflakes hurry over the the upper bay's waters.

As for Julius, he still runs breathlessly in the city's streets. Another step, and another turn, another street, and it's so far, and the more he runs, the more he feels that time is slipping away. Time has broken like a necklace whose unruly pearls roll in all directions, and it may already be too late. Every second missed, every second gone strengthens this terrible uncertainty.

Up there, as he begins his ascent, Alma and his brother have stopped, a little further than the middle of the bridge, towards Manhattan. Alma kneels down and steps down to her son's level. She speaks to him very softly.

"I love you so much, you know?" She plays softly with his locks, then hums a lullaby. "Everything will be fine."

On the brink of ruin, you will see it clearly. How steep is the fall. How long the way back is.

Amos lets go of her hand, scared. Alma drops her coat, takes a few steps forward, then turns and offers him a hand. "Come, there is nothing to fear. I'll keep you safe, you'll see." But the child does not move. Alma smiles at him, then, with grace, climbs the parapet. "Umi" calls the child, terrified. But Alma stands there like some ghostly spirit, beautiful and light, her hair flapping in the breeze, strewn with white snow. She shivers like a bird, standing on this thin beam, sublime in the icy February wind.

And Amos stretches out his hand towards her, but this outstretched hand is all he will give, for immediately two arms, his brother's, are closing around him. And he finds himself pressed against Julius' chest, who squeezes him so hard that he'll get two enormous bruises on his arms the next day.

Alma arches her eyebrows in surprise, but then, in mighty silence, gives them one last solemn look. One of those looks that pierces the heart. A second later she's no longer there, she's nothing. And if Julius covers his brother's eyes with his hand, himsef can't look away, and he sees it, how she falls, and falls, and falls again. So they stand there in silence, halfway to the bank of the dead. They huddle together under the wan glow of streetlights and car headlights. The Reichstag's fire is now extinguished, and it is already another dark day across the Atlantic.

That's when Julius knew death.

After a while, the two boys, at the same time, run towards the parapet, climb it, to look down. "Do you see anything?" Amos asks. Julius nods negatively. Zaïna arrives in the meantime. She followed Julius before losing him. Seeing them, she gives a horrified shout, grabs them firmly by the shoulders and pulls them away from the edge. She hugs them thightly, one under each arm, they don't protest.

It doesn't matter how they got back to the Nome. They don't remember it anyway. What they remember is sitting for hours under Thoth's statue, still not saying a word. They remember the moment the door slammed and their father came in like a hurricane. He walked over to them, Amos jumped up and ran into his arms. Jabari lifted him up and buried his face in his neck, whispering a prayer of thanks in Arabic. Julius had never heard his father pray. He got up too and let him hug him with his free hand against his large chest.

A few days later, they found the body. Neither of them saw it, it remained hidden in a large sarcophagus. Amos asked if they mummified it. Julius didn't want to know. After this night, two things have changed. Amos refuses to sleep if there isn't someone, anyone for that matter, with him. Julius is afraid of death. He hardly sleeps anymore.

They had to return to Cairo eventually. Before they left, Jabari made his elder swear on his ancestors' heads of that he would watch over the smaller one. When they left the Nome, he remained alone for hours on the terrace, staring at Manhattan, still searching through his memories when he had missed the inevitable. He's still going over the last few years, no, all their years, to find an explanation, something. He will never find it. There are parts of existence that remain obscure. Mysteries that never come to light. Tragedies that cannot be explained. There is also this other consciousness that has remained closed to the other, these pieces of life that Jabari will never know. There is immense loneliness too, and the ever more creeping fear under the roof of this big empty house.

Translation of Hitler's quote "There is no more pity now; anyone who gets in our way will be shot. The German people will not understand mercy. "