‘Oh, I wouldn’t say that—’
Cavendish smiled.
‘Not until you’re quite sure, is that it? Very wise of you. But anything that touches a Minister is big. And doubly big, just at the moment, if it’s the Minister of the Interior.’
‘Well, I don’t know. I recently talked to the inspector involved and, I must say, I came away feeling that he hadn’t got any deep designs.’
‘But, Owen,’ said McPhee, ‘he may have been just an unwitting tool.’
‘He wrote the report, didn’t he?’ said Cavendish. ‘Not so unwitting.’
‘If Owen thinks he’s sound,’ said McPhee loyally, ‘then he probably is.’
‘Well, I wouldn’t go so far as—’ said Owen. ‘And as a matter of fact, I’ve learned something about him since which has surprised me.’
‘You have? And it made you think?’ Cavendish nodded his head approvingly.
‘He’s behind bars, anyway,’ said McPhee. ‘No, it’s the others I’m worried about.’
‘Others?’ said Cavendish.
‘The ones who originally commissioned the report, then immediately accepted it, and who are now busily implementing it!’
‘Hmm,’ said Cavendish thoughtfully.
‘And who appointed six Germans to senior posts within the Ministry,’ said McPhee triumphantly.
‘That was probably McKitterick,’ said Owen.
‘McKitterick?’ said Cavendish.
‘The Adviser.’
‘The Adviser! And he appointed them?’
‘It doesn’t necessarily mean anything,’ said Owen hastily.
He began to regret that he had spoken.
‘It ought to be looked into.’
‘I really don’t—’
Cavendish took out a notebook and wrote the name down.
‘Look,’ he said to Owen, ‘I know you’re busy. McPhee has told me about all this internment stuff. Why don’t you let me look into McKitterick for you?’
‘Well, thank you, but—’
He couldn’t do this!
On second thoughts…
‘Well, I’m not sure that I—’
‘No, really. It would be no trouble at all.’
Why not? McKitterick was an arrogant sod who had it coming to him, and it would keep Cavendish happy. He wouldn’t find anything out because there was nothing to find out, so no harm would be done.
‘Well, thank you,’ he said.
‘Not at all. This is important. I’ll tell you what: why don’t I have a word with my people back in Whitehall and get them to free you? It’s ridiculous you being busy with this internment stuff when there’s something like this you should be following up.’
‘That would be most helpful—’
‘We need you down in Minya.’
Minya! Owen wasn’t so sure about that.
What, apart from anything else, would Zeinab say?
***
Plenty.
‘You don’t love me. All you want to do is get away from me!’
‘Nonsense! The idea came from him.’
‘I’ll bet you put it in his head.’
‘I certainly didn’t! What the hell do I want to go to Minya for? It’s hot and sweaty and sticky—’
‘Is there a woman there?’
‘No, there’s not a woman there! Look, I don’t want to go. I want to stay here with you.’
‘You’re practising,’ said Zeinab. ‘Practising for the time you go away altogether and get killed.’
‘No, I’m not! Listen, I don’t need to go there for long.’
‘I don’t care how long you go for. You can go there for ever, as far as I’m concerned.’
‘I don’t even have to go there at all. It’s a crazy idea. There’s nothing to it!’
‘Then why are you going?’
‘I told you. That bloody fool, McPhee—’
‘You always blame McPhee.’
‘—sold Cavendish this crazy notion that a conspiracy—’
‘The British always go on about conspiracies. When they are the worst conspirators of the lot!’
‘Yes, well…’
‘You,’ said Zeinab, ‘are conspiring against me!’
‘How am I conspiring against you?’
‘You’re plotting,’ said Zeinab. ‘You’re plotting how to get away.’
‘Nonsense!’
‘Well, go, then!’ she shouted. ‘Go to your woman down in Minya!’
***
Owen had no intention of going. Being freed from all this internment business was one thing; going down to Minya on some wild-goose chase was quite another. He didn’t believe for one moment that there was a conspiracy of the sort that McPhee thought. Besides, he hadn’t been officially freed from the internment work yet. And besides that, there were plenty of more sensible things that he could be doing in his office.
Most of his mail had been delivered by hand and was therefore unstamped, which made the letter from Alexandria stand out. He picked it up and opened it. It was in an old-fashioned, copybook hand and, although it was written in English, some of the letters were not formed in the usual English way.
Dear Captain Owen, it read:
I was very sorry to hear of the death of Hilde Langer. I remember her as a pretty little flaxen-haired girl running around the garden, ours as well as the Knippers’, who were next door. She always seemed so full of fun that it is hard to imagine all that energy and bubble cut off—at so young an age, too! I must say, I had my misgivings when she decided not to go back with the Knippers but to stay in Egypt. It is very hard to be a woman on your own in this country, as I have found since the death of my husband. But how much easier for me, as a married woman with a house and friends, than it must have been for her!
In answer to your letter: yes, we have kept in touch. Hilde wrote regularly to me at least twice a year, at Christmas and, usually, in the summer just after my grandchildren had gone back from their holidays and she knew I would be feeling low. There was a whole burst of letters last year when she herself was going through an unhappy period, but then they dried up and I haven’t heard from her for some time. Indeed, I was rather expecting a letter from her when yours came instead.
You ask me if I can throw any light on her state of mind. I have already told you that about six months ago she was very unhappy. It was a period of strain in their marriage, not because of tensions between Aziz and her—they loved each other dearly—but because of circumstances. I am sure you are aware that when they returned to Egypt, Aziz’s mother came to live with them, as is normal in Egypt. Unfortunately the rest of the family decided to come too and I think—well, it was not what Hilde had expected.
They managed all right for a time, but then things came to a head. Oddly, it was over the piano. You see, there it was, virtually taking up an entire room which they thought could be made better use of. They were used to sharing, you see, and couldn’t understand why a room should be set aside for the use of one individual.
But Aziz insisted. He knew what it meant to her. And besides, I think he felt guilty that things had not worked out better in Uganda and that they had had to settle for this. She had had to give up so much, you know—at least, that is what I think he thought, he was always such a nice man—that he couldn’t ask her to give up this. And so he put his foot down, which was most unlike him.
I think, actually, that, for the sake of peace and quiet, she would have been prepared to share the room with them, but he was adamant.
In fact, of course, she was rather glad. The piano had become a lifeline for her. It was the only thing that connected her now with that other life that might have been hers. I don’t mean just our comfortable European way of living—she didn’t care a scrap for that—but the world of music and art and intellectual life which had onc
e been so important to her. (Did you know she had hoped to become a professional musician?) It wasn’t so much that she wanted to go back to that life as that she needed to know it was there. Otherwise, she said, life became impossibly narrow.
I think I know what you want to ask me. Did life become impossibly narrow for her? Did it become more than she could bear?
I don’t know how to answer; except to say that while she and Aziz were together, no, I don’t think it was more than she could bear.
I do feel, looking back over my letter, that I have not helped you at all. Your news has come as such a shock to me. Perhaps when I can think more clearly, I will write to you again.
He took the letter home with him, with the vague intention of dropping it off at the Ministry of Justice, so that Mahmoud could see it. In fact, as he was going through the Midan Abdin he saw Zeinab ahead of him, waiting for an arabeah, so they took one together. He told her about the letter and then, as she seemed interested, let her read it.
Zeinab’s sympathies were easily aroused. Initially they had been caught by the fact that the German woman had been a musician; now, though, she began to enter imaginatively into what life had been like for Hilde Langer down in Minya. What—with her own wide artistic interest—struck her now was the painful narrowing that Hilde Langer had experienced.
‘And all for love,’ she said. She looked at Owen pointedly. ‘I don’t think I would do that for love,’ she said.
‘Fortunately, you’re not being asked to.’
‘No. But suppose you got a job as Mamur Zapt in the Aleutian Islands?’
Owen tried to think where the Aleutian Islands were.
‘I don’t think they have Mamur Zapts up there,’ he said.
‘And anyway you’re going to the war,’ said Zeinab. ‘Yes, I know.’
Owen wisely held his peace and they drove on for some time in silence.
Then Zeinab said:
‘What made it go wrong?’
‘Well, the family—’
‘No, no,’ said Zeinab, shaking her head impatiently. ‘Before that. In Uganda, or even before. What made it necessary for them to have to come back and live like that?’
‘Money,’ said Owen. ‘It’s usually money.’
‘Yes,’ said Zeinab thoughtfully, ‘that’s where marriages often go wrong. Especially if it’s between two people from very different backgrounds.’
‘It’s where one of them has to move to something different from what they’re used to. It comes as a surprise, I suppose.’
‘Yes.’
‘It won’t be like that with us,’ said Owen confidently.
‘No,’ said Zeinab. ‘I’ve known from the start that you’re never going to have any money.’
***
To his surprise, McKitterick wanted to see him. Nikos said he had rung three times. He rang again a few minutes later and asked if they could meet at the Sporting Club that lunch-time.
‘I’ll buy the drinks,’ he said; so Owen knew there was something wrong.
When Owen arrived, McKitterick was already there, sitting alone at a table. He jumped up.
‘What’ll it be? You’re a whisky man, aren’t you?’
The bar was almost empty. Even so, McKitterick led him away to a corner.
‘Good of you to come,’ he said. He fidgeted for a moment or two. ‘The fact is,’ he said, ‘I’m in a spot of bother.’
‘Oh, yes?’
‘I know I ought to have come to you before. But after what you said, I didn’t like to.’
‘What I said?’
‘About issuing guns to the ghaffirs. You were against it, weren’t you? Mind you, I still think it a good idea in principle. But—’
He stopped and swallowed.
‘Something gone wrong?’
‘There’s been an over-issue,’ said McKitterick miserably.
‘I’m sorry, I don’t…?’
‘When we started implementing the new policy, we put in a big order for guns. Really big. It took up a sizeable chunk of our budget. But we thought, if we’re going to do this, we’d better do it properly. So we put in a big order. Not for fifty thousand at once—our budget wouldn’t run to that. But for ten.’
He looked at Owen.
‘We thought we’d do the south first, you see, where there was more need of guns. And then extend it by stages to the rest of the country.’
‘How many have you issued so far?’
‘All ten thousand. We thought we’d better crack on with it because we could see we were going to be short-staffed, in the key places, at any rate.’
‘With the Germans going, you mean?’
‘That’s right. So we pushed on with it.’
‘And?’
‘Well, we got them all out, as planned. But then, well, you have to check these things, you know, if only for audit purposes. One of our chaps made a check and found that there were more guns issued than there were ghaffirs.’
‘Significantly more?’
‘Two hundred.’
‘Two hundred!’
‘It’s not a lot on ten thousand,’ said McKitterick defensively.
‘Still…’
Still it would send the Administration berserk. Allowing guns to leak out unaccountably into the civilian population, given the strength of the Nationalist movement in Egypt, was about the most heinous crime an official could commit.
‘I should have told you at once,’ said McKitterick miserably.
He certainly should. Since most leaks occurred from military armouries (sold by the soldiers for drink) and the Army was in a somewhat ambiguous position when it came to investigation, successive Consul-Generals had decreed that any disappearance of arms was to be reported at once to the Mamur Zapt, who would personally conduct the investigation.
‘But, knowing how you felt…And not wanting to waste your time…Well, I thought we’d better make another check first.’
‘And?’
‘We sent down one of our brightest. And he found it was absolutely true. We’d over-issued in Minya province. I couldn’t believe it! I don’t know how it could have happened. We have a whole system in place to stop this kind of thing occurring. Procedures, checks, double-checks—I still can’t believe it!’
‘But they’ve gone?’
‘It—it rather looks like it.’
And unless Kitchener had softened remarkably during his holiday in England, so, very shortly, would McKitterick.
‘It’s my responsibility, I know,’ said McKitterick despondently, ‘and I shall have to stand the consequences. I shall inform the C-G’s office tomorrow. But first I wanted to tell you.’
‘You can say you’ve told me,’ he said generously. ‘I shan’t tell them when you told me unless they ask.’
‘Thanks, Owen. Thanks.’
‘I doubt if anything will happen until Kitchener gets back,’ said Owen encouragingly, ‘so we’ve got a bit of time, and maybe if we sort this thing out—’
‘They’re on to me already,’ said McKitterick, depressed.
‘They?’ said Owen. He was surely the only ‘they’ as far as disappearance of arms was concerned. And ‘already’?
‘Cavendish. That bloke from Constantinople. He’s been sniffing around. Making inquiries.’
‘Oh!’ said Owen, guiltily.
Chapter Eight
The repercussions began to reverberate through the Administration. Cavendish was the first to ring.
‘Owen,’ he said, ‘Trevelyan has just told me. Apparently he had a note from McKitterick this morning. Two hundred rifles! What is the Ministry up to? Nothing good, I suspect. But we’ve had our suspicions, haven’t we? You’re going down to Minya, of course.’
‘Of course.’
‘Half expected to find you already gone.�
��
‘Er, um, yes, well, shortly. Very shortly.’ Inspiration came to him. ‘Still waiting to get shot of all this internment stuff.’
‘It’s not come through? Good Lord, I’ll get on to them right away. But, look, you don’t have to wait for that. I’ll see you get authorization. It’s just a case of putting someone else on to it, isn’t it? How about that strange Scottish fellow?’
‘McPhee?’
‘Is that his name? I’ll see about getting the duties transferred. You’ll want to be off, won’t you? It sounds as if Minya’s the place to go, doesn’t it? You were on to that very early. Smart of you. Look, I’m glad I managed to catch you. There’s a thing I want to ask you. You remember that inspector you mentioned?’
‘Fricker?’
‘That’s the one. Any chance of having a word with him?’
‘I’m having him brought up to Cairo tomorrow, as it happens.’
‘You are? You don’t waste time, I must say. Perhaps we could see him together? Then I’ll know just where you’ve got to. I want to be as much help to you as I can on this. Oh, and there’s one other thing. In confidence, you know. What about this chap, McKitterick? Shall I take him in? Before he does any more harm…?
‘Leave him, you think?’ He chuckled. ‘So you can keep an eye on him, is that right? You never know where it may lead! Wise man! Well, I’ll go along with you. You’re the man—about the only one out here, I can tell you!—who seems to know what he’s doing!’
Then it was the Sirdar, the Commander-in-Chief.
‘Owen, this is serious. Two hundred rifles! The latest model, too. We could do with a few of those ourselves. Do you know what we’re currently issuing? Indian Army rejects. And that’s to people who could be going out to fight tomorrow!
‘But, look, what I really wanted to say is: what the hell are you doing about it? That’s a lot of fire power to go missing, Owen. Who could be wanting to make use of it? And who against? Not us, I hope. Jesus, Owen, that’s too much fire power to be wandering about behind your back when you’re trying to fight a war!’
And then there was the Financial Adviser, Cunningham, whose memo Owen had still not answered. He tried to signal to Nikos that he wasn’t in, but Nikos merely smiled and held out the phone to him.
The Face in the Cemetery Page 9