The Face in the Cemetery

by Michael Pearce

  Mahmoud stood up and went down to them.

  ‘Greetings, ladies!’ he said courteously, if a little stiffly. Mahmoud was not good with women.

  They knew it, of course.

  ‘Greetings, Mahmoud!’ they chorused back; but then one of them looked up at him mischievously and said: ‘But, alas, you’re not really interested in us, are you? You only want to talk to Fatima.’

  Mahmoud blushed.

  ‘I do indeed want to talk to Fatima,’ he said. ‘On business matters,’ he added firmly.

  ‘We know what sort of business that is!’

  ‘That is not so!’ said Mahmoud, blushing again.

  ‘Don’t tease him,’ said one of the other women. ‘Mahmoud is a married man.’

  ‘What’s your wife like, Mahmoud? Is she pretty?’

  Mahmoud was plainly not sure how to answer the question; or, indeed, whether to. They all laughed mercilessly.

  Taking pity, one of them stood up and Mahmoud led her hastily away up on to the bank where Owen was standing.

  ‘Gracious, there are two of them! What skills the woman has!’

  The group dissolved in laughter.

  ‘This is Fatima,’ Mahmoud said to Owen. ‘She is the sister-in-law I spoke of.’

  ‘You have spoken of me?’ said the woman. She seemed pleased.

  ‘To my friend only. And only because he, too, is looking into the death of the foreign woman.’

  ‘They are more interested in her now that she is dead than when she was living,’ said the woman, with a touch of acerbity.

  ‘That may, unfortunately, be so.’

  ‘I know you,’ Fatima said to Owen. ‘You came to the house before.’

  ‘I did not see you then.’

  ‘But I saw you!’ said the woman, her eyes glinting.

  There was no doubt, thought Owen, that the women were much freer in the provinces. Had she married into the family from down here? That might explain her relative independence.

  ‘I have been talking to your mother,’ said Mahmoud. The title was a general one which embraced mothers-in-law.

  Fatima made a face.

  ‘That must have been a pleasure for you,’ she said.

  ‘She has purchased poison. I asked her why.’

  Fatima sobered.

  ‘What did she say?’ she asked.

  ‘She said she had used it to kill cats.’

  Fatima nodded.

  ‘There were cats?’

  ‘At first there was one, which Sitt Hilde was fond of. She used to feed it. Then others came.’

  ‘And she poisoned them?’

  Fatima nodded again.

  ‘When? Before Sitt Hilde died or afterwards?’

  ‘Afterwards. The men were very angry. They said it would make the Cat Woman come again.’

  ‘Again?’

  ‘The men think it was the Cat Woman who came for Sitt Hilde. But that is nonsense.’

  ‘It certainly is!’ said Mahmoud.

  ‘I know it is,’ said Fatima. ‘For Sitt Hilde and the Cat Woman were friends.’

  ‘Friends!’

  ‘Our mother used to complain about Sitt Hilde feeding the cats in our yard. She said they would come into the house. So then Sitt Hilde took to feeding them outside the wall, at the edge of the sugar cane. And once when she was doing that I saw her talking to the Cat Woman.’

  ‘Now, come, Fatima,’ said Mahmoud. ‘This cannot be.’

  ‘I saw her!’ said Fatima indignantly. ‘They sat down together and talked.’

  ‘Some other woman, perhaps?’

  ‘No, the Cat Woman. Well, of course, there’s no such person. But the Nubian woman they call the Cat Woman.’

  ‘You saw her?’

  ‘I certainly did. And afterwards I spoke with Sitt Hilde and taxed her with it. And she did not deny it but said: “If that is where I must find my friends, if that is what it has come to, then so be it.” She said she had met her before and that they had talked often. The Nubian woman had told her her story and it was a sad one. She had lost her child and another one wouldn’t come, and her husband had beaten her. And one day when he was beating her, she had taken a knife and stabbed him. And then she had to run away and hide in the sugar cane, and it was there now that she lived. And I said to Sitt Hilde: “Take care lest one day she stab you too.” But Sitt Hilde said: “No, no, she will not stab me, for she is my friend.”’

  ‘I find this strange, Fatima,’ said Mahmoud.

  Fatima shrugged.

  ‘Nevertheless, it is as I have said.’

  ‘I do not doubt it. But still I find it strange. For how can two people so different be friends?’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said Fatima, ‘they both liked cats!’

  ***

  A water buffalo came nodding along through the shallows, a small boy behind it urging it on with a stick. When it came to the place where the bank was cut away, it climbed up out of the river and disappeared into the sugar cane.

  The women chattering on the bank stood up, picked up their pots and went down into the water.

  ‘Still at it, then, Fatima?’ one of them called, as they came up on to the bank again. ‘Which one are you going to take for a walk in the sugar cane? Tell me, and I’ll take the other!’

  ‘I think she’ll take both,’ said someone else. ‘She’s like that, you know.’

  ‘Well, she’d better get on with it or else that husband of hers will be wondering why she’s taking so long.’

  ‘It’s not her husband she ought to be worried about. It’s that old bitch of a mother-in-law!’

  ***

  As they were going back up the path through the sugar cane, keeping a decent distance behind Fatima, Owen said:

  ‘Have you talked to the ghaffir here?’

  ‘I don’t think so. Why?’

  ‘Is the ghaffir a man?’

  Mahmoud looked at him cautiously.

  ‘What else would he be?’

  ‘A girl.’

  ‘You are joking, yes?’

  ‘No.’

  Owen told him about the girl in the village he had passed through.

  ‘But that is disgraceful!’ cried Mahmoud.

  ‘That is what I told them.’

  ‘It is shaming!’ fumed Mahmoud. ‘It is backward. To treat their responsibilities so lightly!’

  ‘We know that these things happen. People do not always choose the wisest man in the village for their ghaffir.’

  ‘But to choose a girl!’ said Mahmoud, shocked.

  ‘They did not choose. Or so they said. That is what I find puzzling.’

  ‘I find it hard to believe,’ said Mahmoud. ‘The village chooses a ghaffir from among its own members. That is the principle. Always.’

  ‘But not in that village.’

  Mahmoud frowned.

  ‘There were, perhaps, circumstances special to the village.’

  ‘That is what I wondered. And so I asked about the ghaffir here.’

  ‘I have not seen him, but this I can tell you,’ said Mahmoud. ‘He won’t be a woman!’

  He stopped.

  ‘As you shall see,’ he said, striking off the path towards the houses.

  ‘He’d better not be!’ he said, his face set ominously.

  ***

  They found the omda sitting on the ground in front of his house, surrounded by a group of his cronies. They were playing a game that looked to Owen rather like the English game of five stones.

  ‘Greetings, Salah Hussein!’ said Mahmoud.

  ‘Greetings, Mahmoud. And to you, Effendi.’

  ‘I come in search of the ghaffir,’ said Mahmoud.

  ‘Then you have found him,’ said the omda, nodding in the direction of one of the men
, an elderly, worried-looking man with hollow cheeks and a consumptive-sounding cough.

  ‘You are the ghaffir?’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘That is a relief,’ said Mahmoud. ‘I feared for the moment that you might be a woman.’

  This might have been meant as an insult and the man bridled.

  ‘Why did you suppose that, Mahmoud?’ asked the omda.

  ‘Because my friend here met such a ghaffir in a village nearby.’

  ‘Oh, that!’ said the omda. The circle relaxed. ‘That would be at Dejd.’

  ‘It is a strange thing,’ said Mahmoud. ‘How did it come about?’

  The omda shrugged.

  ‘It just came about,’ he said.

  ‘It is not as it should be. For ghaffir one needs a man. As our friend here. For how can a slip of a girl be expected to fight off bad men if they come?’

  The ghaffir looked even more worried.

  ‘Besides,’ said Owen, ‘one needs as ghaffir a man who knows the ways of the village. As I am sure our friend here does. You come from this village, of course?’ he said, turning to the man.

  ‘Well, as a matter of fact…’ began the ghaffir, looking at the omda anxiously.

  ‘He comes from Bashawi,’ said the omda.

  He pointed across the sugar cane.

  ‘Far, is that?’

  ‘Far enough. A day’s journey.’

  ‘Ah, I see.’

  Owen gave him some time. Then he said to the ghaffir:

  ‘And how was it, then, that you came to be chosen by this village as its ghaffir?’

  ‘Chosen?’ said the man, looking puzzled.

  ‘Repute,’ said the omda quickly. ‘We chose him by repute.’

  ‘Yes,’ said one of the other men helpfully, ‘repute as a fighting man.’

  The ghaffir looked aghast.

  ***

  The next day, back at Minya, Owen went to see the mudir. He found him outside at his usual table. Although it was still early in the morning there were already several empty bottles under the table and his face was sweating. When Owen told him about the girl ghaffir the veins on his forehead seemed to swell alarmingly.

  ‘Girl?’ he shouted. ‘Girl?’

  ‘That is so.’

  ‘The useless sods! I’ll have their balls for this! Hamid!’ he shouted. ‘Hamid!’

  The mamur came running out of the house.

  ‘Yes, boss?’

  ‘Hear this: one of the ghaffirs out in the sugar cane is a girl!’

  The mamur shrugged.

  ‘They’re a backward lot, boss.’

  ‘Yes, but—a girl!’

  ‘Perhaps they thought she could double up and do some other things for them at the same time?’ suggested the mamur.

  ‘She’s about twelve,’ said Owen.

  ‘Hear that? Twelve! You pervert, Hamid!’

  ‘Boss—’

  ‘They’re laughing at us! They’re laughing at you, Hamid!’

  ‘The bastards!’ said the mamur automatically.

  ‘They’re laughing at me! Their mudir! Well, I’ll bloody show them. You’ll bloody show them. Get out there, Hamid, and sort it out!’

  ‘Sort it out?’

  ‘Yes. You can take the early truck.’

  ‘But, boss—’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘What do you mean, sort it out?’

  ‘Tell them to get a new ghaffir.’

  The mamur looked worried.

  ‘But, boss, is that for me? Is that for you? I mean, isn’t it interfering?’

  ‘Of course it’s interfering! If they pick a twelve-year-old girl, what the hell do they expect?’

  ‘But, boss—’

  The mamur looked very unhappy.

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘Boss, I don’t like interfering. Is it a good idea?’

  ‘Well, we’ve got to do something, haven’t we? Now that the Effendi has pointed this out. So get out and do it!’

  ‘Go over there?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘And tell them they’ve got to get a new ghaffir?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  The mamur looked perturbed.

  ‘Boss, I don’t know that they’ll listen to me.’

  ‘Of course they’ll listen to you! You’re the mamur, aren’t you?’

  ‘Boss, I think it would be better if it came from you.’

  ‘Well, it does come from me, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Yes, but I think it would be better if it came from you directly.’

  ‘Well, I’m not bloody going over there myself, if that’s what you’re thinking. I’ve got things to do here.’

  ‘Couldn’t you send a message? Honestly, boss, it would be much better if it came from you. They would listen to you.’

  The mudir reached a hand beneath the table, pulled up a bottle of beer, took a swig, and considered.

  ‘You’re the big man, boss, and I’m just a little one. They mightn’t pay any attention to me.’

  The mudir took another swig.

  ‘You could be right,’ he said. He sat there thinking. ‘OK,’ he said, ‘I’ll tell you what we’ll do. I’ll send a message and I’ll send you.’

  ***

  As he was going back into the town Owen saw the mamur walking glumly ahead of him. He quickened his pace and caught up.

  ‘What’s the matter, Hamid? You’ve been out there before!’

  ‘Yes, I know,’ said the mamur. ‘But that was different.’

  ‘How is it different?’

  ‘It wasn’t interfering. I mean, it was just a woman. And a foreign one at that. Now who cares about that? Nothing to do with anybody. I could just go in and do what I wanted. I wasn’t interfering. But this!’

  ‘For Christ’s sake!’ said Owen. ‘It’s only a matter of telling them to change a ghaffir!’

  But the mamur continued to look glum.

  ‘Look, I’ve been to the village myself. I’ve already spoken to the omda. They’ll be expecting something like this.’

  The mamur remained sunk in depression.

  ‘He ought to have sent a message first,’ he said. ‘Send a message and then send me. He ought to have made sure it would be all right.’

  ‘All right?’ said Owen, puzzled.

  ‘It’s better if it comes from him. He knows them, after all.’

  ‘Knows them? How does he know them?’

  ‘Because he was out there, Effendi. Before me. Didn’t you know that, Effendi? He was mamur out there for some years before he became mudir. He knows everybody. I don’t mind telling you, Effendi, it’s been a bit difficult taking over from him. In fact, I try to stay in Minya as much as I can. It’s better that way.’

  ‘You surprise me when you say he moved from mamur to mudir. That is a big step.’

  ‘It is indeed, Effendi. The world was greatly surprised.’

  ‘How did it come about?’

  ‘It was the previous mudir, Effendi. He thought highly of him. “He’s the only one down here with any brains,” he used to say. And when he himself was moved away, he saw to it that our mamur became his successor. “Continuity is a great thing in office,” he said. “That way we share the same interest and no one asks the wrong questions.”’

  ‘He said that?’

  ‘It was the way he spoke, Effendi. And our mudir speaks in the same way.’

  ***

  When they reached the waterfront they shook hands and the mamur climbed up into the truck. The driver had evidently completed his business in town and was waiting to go.

  Owen had worked it out now. The truck served both as a company vehicle and as a general means of transport for those going to the factory. It came into M
inya twice a day, in the morning and in the evening, carrying passengers and goods to and fro.

  Its arrival, certainly in the morning, was timed to coincide with the arrival of the steamer from down river. The driver would pick up any packages there were for the sugar factory.

  They would not be left lying for long. The truck would arrive just before the steamer and could depart immediately after.

  He checked it that evening. The boat this time was from the south. The truck came bumping down to the end of the jetty just as it appeared round the bend. There were a few sacks and crates to be unloaded and just two of them were for the factory. The truck driver identified them and porters threw them up into the back of the truck. Then the truck drove off. It would be easy, thought Owen.

  The truck hadn’t been carrying many people this time. They climbed down and went up into the town. Owen looked for the mamur, but he was not among them.

  Chapter Thirteen

  He was not on the truck the next morning, either, when it came in. Owen asked after him, but the driver appeared to know nothing.

  This time when the truck went back, Owen went with it. He sat in the cab with the driver but found it difficult to engage him in conversation. He wasn’t sure if he was being guarded in his replies or whether he was just naturally uncommunicative.

  After a while he settled back to enjoy the journey. Now he was getting used to the truck he found it quite agreeable. The countryside, the fellahin working in the fields close to the river, the tops of the sails behind the palm trees, the buffaloes working the water-wheels, went by so quickly. When you looked at things close to, it was disconcerting. Further away, though, they fell into place. It was like seeing things from a boat.

  When they came to the sugar cane there was less to see, just the tall cane itself, stretching to the horizon, concealing the few villages until you were right on top of them, unless you happened to see a dovecote sticking out above the palms.

  They were able to see the factory, though, some time before they got to it, partly because it was on a rise, partly because it was substantial enough for its roof to show above the cane. The driver swung down a track and came out into the factory compound.

  There seemed to be trouble of some kind. Men were running about, Schneider was standing there cursing. The omda was there, and Mahmoud.