Death in Zanzibar

by M. M. Kaye

  It was as though the exotic contents of a tropical aquarium had been emptied onto the crude trestle tables, the floor and the wooden-sided pens and tubs: fish of every conceivable shape and colour, the beautiful jostling the sinister — such things as sting rays, hammer-headed sharks, cuttle fish and octopuses.

  Competing with it in the matter of colour, while greatly improving on it in the way of smell, were the stalls of the open market where fruit and grain and vegetables were sold. A glowing, aromatic medley of oranges, limes, bananas, coconuts, cloves and chillies; yams, pawpaws, sweet potatoes, piles of green vegetables and flat wicker baskets full of assorted grains.

  ‘What’s that you’ve been buying?’ inquired Lash, coming across Dany standing before a fruit stall with her hands full of greenish-yellow objects.

  ‘Mangoes. I said I only wanted one — just to try. But it seems they don’t sell them in ones. Only by the basket, and I couldn’t possibly cope with that many. But luckily Seyyid Omar came along, and he____ You do know each other, don’t you? This is Seyyid Omar-bin-Sultan; he was on the plane with us.’

  ‘Yeah, I remember,’ said Lash, shaking hands. ‘I’m very pleased to know you. I’m Lash Holden. I don’t think we actually met.’

  ‘You’re an American?’ said Seyyid Omar.

  ‘That’s right. The Country of the Future.’

  ‘Of the present, surely?’ corrected Seyyid Omar with a faint smile and a slight emphasis on the noun.

  ‘Maybe,’ said Lash lightly, and turned to regard Dany with some suspicion. ‘Say, you aren’t going to start in eating those things right here, are you?’

  ‘Where else?’

  ‘Well, in your bath, I guess. It looks a messy business. And anyway, you can’t possibly eat six mangoes.’

  ‘Just watch me.’

  ‘Not on your sweet life!’ said Lash; and arbitrarily confiscated her booty.

  Seyyid Omar laughed and said: ‘It is plain that Miss Kitchell has not yet tried to eat a mango. A plate and a knife are a help. Will you allow me to lend you one? My house is only a short way from here, and I know that my wife would be very pleased to meet you. If you would accompany me, you may eat your mangoes in more comfort.’

  Dany threw a quick look at Lash, and Seyyid Omar, intercepting it, made him a slight smiling bow that included him in the invitation.

  ‘Sure,’ said Lash slowly. ‘We’d be very pleased to. Here — would you mind holding these for a minute?’

  He unloaded the mangoes on Seyyid Omar and strode off across between the stalls to where Nigel was assisting Lorraine in the selection of pineapples, and returned a minute or two later to say that that was O.K. and that the others would be going on to the English Club later in the morning, and would meet them there.

  ‘I will drive you over,’ promised Seyyid Omar, and led the way out of the market and towards the harbour.

  Seyyid Omar’s house was in a narrow street that was a cavern of cool shadows slashed by an occasional hot, hard shaft of sunlight: a huge old Arab house, four storeys high and colour-washed in saffron and blue.

  A magnificent brass-studded door with elaborately carved lintels and architraves opened into a stone-paved hall and a central courtyard surrounded by rising tiers of pillared verandahs: a house that was almost a duplicate of Tyson’s, though larger.

  Seyyid Omar led the way up two flights of stairs to a room on the second floor, where there were latticed windows looking out over the old stone-built town of Zanzibar to where the open sea lay blue and dazzling in the morning sunlight.

  A white-robed servant brought sherbet, fruit and cigarettes, and their host’s pretty wife instructed Dany in the best way — or the least messy one — of eating a mango.

  Seyyide Zuhra-binti-Salem was on first sight a character straight out of the Arabian Nights: Scheherazade herself, or one of Bluebeard’s lovely wives. A slender, charming, dark-eyed young woman with blue-black hair and a complexion of pale ivory. It was something of a shock to discover that this enchanting creature not only spoke six languages besides her own, but was entitled, if she so wished, to write the letters B.A. after her name.

  It altered all Dany’s preconceived notions on the subject of ‘ladies of the harem’ to find that the young wife of an Arab in Zanzibar was infinitely better educated than herself, or, for that matter, than the majority of European women with whom she had so far come into contact.

  It proved to be an entertaining, stimulating and surprising visit; in more ways than one. Time slipped past unnoticed while Zuhra laughed and talked of Oxford and Paris and the Sorbonne, and her husband told them enthralling tales of the island, and volunteered to take them that very afternoon, in the cool of the day, to see the underground wells and the ruins of the haunted palace of Dunga.

  Conversation was easy and animated until the subject of the two tragedies that had marred the arrival of Lorraine’s guests was raised. It was Lash who had introduced it, and his inquiry as to whether there had been any further developments in relation to the death of Salim Abeid was greeted by an odd little pause. Not long enough to be uncomfortable, but nevertheless definite enough to break the pleasant ease that had prevailed during the last hour and a half.

  ‘Ah,’ said Seyyid Omar thoughtfully. ‘Jembe — “the thin man”.’

  He did not reply to the question, but asked one of his own. ‘Did you know him?’

  ‘No,’ said Lash. ‘But he was on the same plane out from London. I understand he was kind of well known in your island. A public character.’

  ‘He wished to be one,’ said Seyyid Omar dryly. ‘That is not quite the same thing.’

  ‘I take it you knew him?’

  ‘Yes. Slightly.’

  Seyyid Omar’s expressive brown hands sketched a small deprecatory gesture as though he would have preferred to end the conversation, but Lash did not choose to take the hint. He said: ‘Tell us about him. Would you have said that he was a man who made enemies?’

  ‘He was a hireling of Moscow — and of Egypt,’ said Zuhra gently.

  She disregarded another faint gesture of her husband’s as Lash had done, and said: ‘Oh, he did not call himself that. He called himself a Democrat — which is Soviet double-talk for the same thing. He wished to found a Single Party in Zanzibar. In other words, a dictatorship. With himself, of course, as the dictator. It was very simple. He had a certain following, for there are, everywhere, dissatisfied, embittered or envious people who get pleasure out of tearing down what they cannot build. And also poor people and unfortunate people and ignorant people, who should be pitied and helped, not exploited — but who are so easy to exploit. Here in Zanzibar we have, perhaps, less of such people than in other places; but enough to cause trouble. He will be no loss.’

  Lash said casually, watching the smoke of his cigarette: ‘I guess it must have been a political murder. Sounds that way.’

  Seyyid Omar shrugged. ‘Perhaps. It is always a possibility.’

  ‘But you don’t believe it,’ said Lash. ‘Now I wonder why?’

  ‘I did not say so.’

  Lash gave him a slanting look. ‘Not in words. Why don’t you believe it?’

  Seyyid Omar laughed and threw up his hands. ‘You are very persistent Mr Holden. Why does the death of Jembe interest you?’

  ‘I guess because it interests your local police to such an extent that I have been requested to stay in Zanzibar for a few days. Just while they make some inquiries. I don’t know what that suggests to you, but it suggests quite a few things to me.’

  Seyyid Omar rose to replenish Dany’s glass, and said lightly: ‘Yes, I had heard. I too had an — interview with Mr Cardew yesterday. They seem to think that someone must have stopped to speak to Jembe at the airport, and dropped a pellet in his coffee. Myself, I think it would have taken a brave man or an exceedingly rash one, or else a very stupid one, to do such a thing. Think of the risks of being seen! I cannot believe it was as clumsy as that.’ He paused to stub out his cigarette, and ad
ded: ‘Mr Cardew also told me about the unfortunate tragedy that occurred on the night of your arrival. It must have been very distressing for all of you.’

  His face expressed nothing more than polite concern, but there was something in the tone of his voice that made Dany wonder if his linking of those two deaths had been deliberate, and she was conscious of a sudden and urgent sense of unease: as though someone had whispered a warning that she had been unable to catch.

  ‘Nigel Ponting told me in the market this morning,’ said Seyyid Omar, ‘that she had been with Mr Frost’s sister for many years — this Miss Bates. That is sad for Mrs Bingham; to lose a friend and a confidante. Nigel has not been so long with Mr Frost; a few years only, I think; but he could probably tell you more about Jembe than I could. You should ask him. If he does not know he will at least invent something interesting.’

  Lash grinned. ‘Yeah. You’re probably right there. Nigel’s a mine of gossip. He ought to be run as a syndicated column. But it’s your opinion I’m interested in, not his. You belong here.’

  ‘But is it not one of your sayings that the onlooker sees most of the game?’ said Seyyid Omar with a slight smile.

  ‘Meaning that you yourself are right out there with the team?’ inquired Lash.

  Seyyid Omar laughed and helped himself to another cigarette. He said reflectively, reaching for the match box: ‘If you really wish for my opinion, I do not think that Jembe’s group were either large enough or important enough to put any other party to the trouble of poisoning him. His was merely a splinter group, and though noisy, a thing of no real weight.’

  ‘Not even worth anyone’s while to nip in the bud?’ suggested Lash. ‘Vested interests, large land-owners and the ruling classes are never very anxious to see the seeds of revolution get sprouting.’

  ‘That is true, of course. But then they never believe it can come to anything. Never. And so they do not even trouble to reach for the weed-killer!’

  ‘You’re probably right there,’ said Lash. ‘Which leaves us with what?’

  ‘For a possible motive for the murder of a man like Jembe?’ said Seyyid Omar, striking a match. ‘Who can say? Except that as a grave risk was taken, it must have been a strong one. Hate possibly: if it were deep enough and sharp enough. Or money, if it were a large enough sum.’

  ‘Say — three million?’ suggested Lash gently.

  Seyyid Omar was suddenly very still. So still that he did not seem to breathe, or be aware that he still held a lighted match between his fingers.

  It burned down, and he dropped it with a quick gasp of pain and put his foot on the tiny glowing fragment, and Dany stood up hurriedly and said a little breathlessly: ‘It must be getting very late. I’m sure we ought to go. What time is it?’

  ‘Just on twelve,’ said Lash, rising. ‘Yes, I guess we’d better be going. Well, thanks a lot, both of you, for a most enjoyable morning. It’s been a great pleasure meeting you, and I hope we’ll see more of you. A lot more.’

  ‘I shall call for you this afternoon,’ said Seyyid Omar, recovering himself. ‘To take you to the wells. And now, if you must go, my car will be waiting below, and the driver will take you to the Club. You will forgive me for not taking you there myself, but I have some things to attend to.’

  They took their leave of Zuhra, promising to come again, and went out into the high, shadowed verandah, closing the door behind them. There were no stone jars full of shrubs and creepers here, but in the courtyard below there was a tulip tree and a fountain, and Dany looking down from the verandah edge said: ‘Are all the big houses in Zanzibar built like this?’

  ‘To this design?’ asked Seyyid Omar. ‘No. Very few of them. But it is not surprising that you should ask that, for this house and the one you are living in now were built for the same man, and almost certainly by the same builder. They are probably the oldest houses in Zanzibar. He was a bad character, that old gentleman, but plagued with many wives, so perhaps much may be forgiven him! He came to a bad end, but a richly deserved one — “hoist with his own petard”, I think you would say.’

  ‘How?’ inquired Dany, intrigued. ‘What happened to him?’

  ‘He fell into a trap that he had often laid for others. I will show you. But you must not tell, for it is a secret that very few know. Is that agreed?’

  ‘Yes, of course. It sounds very exciting.’

  ‘I think you will find it so. And instructive.’

  Seyyid Omar turned and looked over his shoulder down the length of the verandah, and then down over the balustrade at the storey below. But though they could hear voices and laughter, for the moment there was no one in sight, and he said: ‘Quick — while there is no one here.’

  He led the way swiftly to the top of the staircase that curved down to the verandah below — a duplicate of the stairs in the House of Shade — and telling them to watch, went to a nearby pillar and stooping down moved something near its base.

  There was a slow, soft grating sound; the sound of stone moving on stone; and two of the wide, shallow steps drew back into the wall, leaving a gaping space below the first step so that they were looking down on the stone floor of the verandah, sixteen feet below.

  Dany gave a long, helpless gasp that was almost a scream, and Lash caught her by the arm and jerked her back as though he were afraid that she might have walked forward.

  Seyyid Omar stooped again, and once more they heard that soft, rasping scrape, and the yawning gap closed as smoothly as it had opened. The steps were in place once more: solid and seemingly safe, and with nothing to mark them from any other steps.

  ‘It is very ingenious, is it not?’ inquired Seyyid Omar softly. ‘More so than you would think. Naturally I cannot show you, as it is too dangerous, but when it is open, the first step will tilt when a foot is placed upon it: to ensure that the victim will fall head first, you understand. When that happens the steps go back of their own accord — it is all an ingenious matter of weights and balances — and if it is not done, then one can replace it oneself, as I did. I was sure that you would be interested.’

  Lash swung round to stare at him, his mouth a tight line and his grey eyes dangerous, but Seyyid Omar returned his look blandly; the pleasant host, drawing attention to an unusual feature of his house for the entertainment of his guests.

  ‘You will understand,’ he said with a smile and a shrug, ‘why I do not show many people this. It is always so much safer to keep one’s own counsel, do you not think? Shall we go down? You need not be afraid. It is quite safe now.’

  He led the way, talking polite trivialities, down the curving stairs to the ground floor and out into the street where a huge white car and an ebony-coloured chauffeur waited to drive them to the English Club.

  It was a short enough drive, and during it neither Lash nor Dany spoke, or even looked at each other, and it was not until they were standing in the cool deserted hall of the Club that Lash said tersely: ‘Did you move her?’

  ‘Yes. I — I didn’t think of that before, but she must have been lying under the staircase when I found her. It was dark and I tried to drag her towards my room. That was why it looked as if — as if____’

  ‘As if she’d fallen over the edge,’ finished Lash. ‘Well, there’s the proof, if we needed it. But at least it couldn’t have been pinned on you. You couldn’t possibly have known about that devilish booby-trap.’

  ‘Yes, I could,’ said Dany, her voice a dry whisper. ‘Because I’m Tyson Frost’s step-daughter, and it would be difficult to prove that I didn’t know. You see, it’s sure to be in the book.’

  ‘What book?’

  ‘The House of Shade. The one Tyson’s uncle wrote. Tyson was talking about it at dinner that night, and he said that there were several copies in the house. There’s one in my room. It may have been put there on purpose, so that it would look____’

  ‘Business again?’ inquired a charming voice from the staircase, and Amalfi was there: wearing a preposterous rainbow-coloured hat of f
ringed straw, bought at some shop in Portuguese Street and looking, on Amalfi’s golden head, as decorative and enchanting a piece of nonsense as ever came out of Paris.

  ‘No,’ said Lash shortly. ‘Pleasure. I hope we haven’t kept you all waiting?’

  ‘For hours, darling! We’ve all been drinking pints and pints of Pimms. Except Larry, who is being all British-to-the-Backbone on luke-warm beer. Did your fascinating Arab friend introduce you to all the luscious lovelies of his harem? Or don’t they have them any more? Nigel says he has a quite ravishing wife, and Eddie’s simply pining to meet her. But as it seems that she’s got a classical degree, I feel he’d better keep away and keep his illusions.’

  Amalfi turned and led the way up to a large high-ceilinged room where the rest of the Kivulimi house-party were sitting under whirling electric fans, moodily sipping iced drinks and making no attempt at conversation.

  Gussie greeted them with a sombre look and Lorraine with a vague smile, and Nigel said crossly: ‘Had I known that you intended to spend the entire morning “fraternizing with indigenous personnel” as I believe it is termed among your countrymen, I should have gone home and sent the car back for you. I happen to have work to do, even though some people have not. I hope we can go now?’

  He sulked the whole way home, but both Dany and Lash had too much on their minds to notice the fact, and Larry Dowling, who was the fourth passenger in their car, took one long reflective look at Dany and also relapsed into silence.

  They found Tyson in good spirits but still as averse as ever to discussing any form of business, and on hearing that Lash and Dany were accompanying Seyyid Omar on a sight-seeing expedition that afternoon, he instantly announced that it was a damned good idea and that they could all go: it would give him a pleasant spell of peace and quiet.

  ‘Working, darling?’ inquired Lorraine solicitously.

  ‘No. Sleeping! And I shall do it a damn sight better without people chattering and nattering all over the house. Last time Gussie was taken to the wells she was eight — and screamed the place down, as far as I remember! Time she saw ’em again.’