Pages 45-60 Summary

"It was a steamingly hot July night, the Nile that year having experienced one of those floodings that occur once every twenty or thirty years and become legendary - something for fathers to talk to their sons about" (Chapter 3, pg. 45). The people had to swim or use boats to get around the area. The narrator is out of town when the incident occurred but his father told him of hearing screams from Mustafa's house. When he didn't return home, the people searched for him. He is presumed to have drowned, even though they never found his body.

The narrator is familiar with the area since he grew up there. He wandered around after leaving Mustafa's house the night Mustafa told him his story. He hears his grandfather's voice as he walks by and wonders if he ever sleeps. He is thinking...