The Mamur Zapt and the return of the Carpet mz-1

by Michael Pearce

  Several customers were already in the bath room, lying on the couches being scraped or massaged by the attendants, or else sitting with their feet in the central sunken area talking to their friends. One of the towel-swathed figures, Owen did not know which, was Mahmoud.

  When they had talked this over beforehand, they had wondered how to cover all the rooms. If any money changed hands it would almost certainly be in the outer room, either before or after bathing. It was more likely to be afterwards. The men would meet in the baths and leave together. As they dressed, the balance of the money would be handed over and then the parties would leave separately. Or so they thought. Whether they had guessed rightly remained to be seen.

  Owen and Mahmoud had agreed that it would be best for them to be in the bath room. They would try to spot their men, wait until they left and then go with them into the outer room. If they missed them it should not matter too much; the normal attendants in the outer room had been replaced for the day by Owen’s men.

  Owen went across to one of the marble couches and lay down. A huge Berberine attendant, naked except for a loin-cloth, approached and seized him. Without a word he began to work systematically over him, kneading the flesh and cracking the joints. Whenever he applied pressure he would give a little grunt. From all over the bath room came similar little grunts, both from the massagers and from the massaged. Mixed in with them was another sound which Owen could not at first identify. When the Berberine turned him over he saw that it came from the slab next to his. A man was having his feet rasped. If you always went barefoot or half-slippered your feet developed large, hard callosities. The rasps were made of Assiut clay and shaped like crocodiles, and as rough as breadcrumb graters.

  The Berberine removed the towel from Owen’s head and began to twist his ears. When they cracked, he transferred his attention to the neck, twisting the head first one way and then the other. Little drips of sweat fell from the Berberine on to Owen’s body. Everyone in the room was sweating profusely. The bath room was heated with hot air and the water which played from the fountain was only just below boiling point. In two of the corners of the room were further tanks of extremely hot water. Occasionally, helped by an attendant, a man would plunge into one of these.

  The Berberine finished with Owen and moved on to someone else.

  Owen lay for a few moments recovering. Then he went to a separate water-tank for cleansing. The attendant lathered him with soap using a large loofah and then washed it off. When the real work was done the attendant went away and Owen was allowed to play with the taps and spray himself with water which he considered to be at a more reasonable temperature.

  The attendant returned with four fresh towels. Owen wrapped himself in them and wandered back into the first of the warm chambers. It was cooler in there, though still too hot for the singing birds. Owen could hear them next door in the outer room. He chose a couch and sat down. An attendant brought him cushions and coffee and he made himself comfortable.

  From where he sat-he had chosen the spot deliberately-he had a good view into the bathroom. Mahmoud, he knew, was still in there. Between them they would cover the two rooms.

  He sipped his coffee and waited.

  Hamid had given descriptions of the men but that was not what helped him to spot them. Two brawny men wandered in a lost fashion through the warm chamber, came to the doorway of the bath room and stood sheepishly, obviously never having been in the place before. One of them muttered something to the other and they walked to the far side of the sunken area and sat down with their feet in the water and their backs to one of the slabs.

  Two only of the men had come, one to watch the other, Owen supposed. The others would be waiting outside. And outside Georgiades would be waiting, too, along with Hamid and a few other men.

  The man they had come to meet did not appear for some time. Owen would have worried, had he not seen the men worrying, too.

  Eventually he appeared. His head was screened in towels and at first when he came in he did not go anywhere near them. But then, watching from under his own towel, Owen saw him make his way as if by chance across to them and sit down beside them. He spoke to them. The men’s faces cleared and they sat waiting docilely while he went over to the water-tank for his soaping and washing.

  As the attendant removed the towels Owen had a good look at the man.

  It was Fakhri! Fakhri, the so-helpful editor! Fakhri, who had started the whole thing with that first eyewitness report!

  He could not believe it! He must have made a mistake! It just could not be.

  But then the man turned his face and Owen could see so clearly that there was no possibility of error. It was indeed Fakhri.

  Fakhri completed his washing, took his towels and then sauntered round the bath room chatting to various other patrons. Eventually, as if by accident, he came to rest near the two men.

  Owen’s mind was whirling. The various pieces of the pattern that he had detected and fitted so cleverly together suddenly sprang apart, jumped into the air, somersaulted and crashed down all over the place. For a moment or two all he could do was contemplate the ruins. Then, one by one, unbidden, the pieces rose up again in his mind and each one, seen in a new light, was totally transformed. Things taken for granted moved round before his eyes and pointed in a completely new direction. Things new fitted in with a click. And underneath, slowly, realization dawned.

  He had been duped. From the start he had been fooled. From the very moment Fakhri had walked into the office with the testimony which had set everything in motion. How much of that original testimony was true, Owen wondered now. Probably enough to confuse! And then the solicitous inquiries into Nuri’s health at the cafe! And, also in that conversation at the cafe, now he came to think about it, there were other things as well, deliberately planted no doubt. It almost made Owen groan to think of them. Denshawai, Nuri’s past. And then Ahmed! It was Fakhri who had directed him to that number of al Liwa, the one that had led on to the Nationalist meeting and Ahmed’s connection with the Nationalists, and his presence at the village, and his possible links with Mustafa. He had seen things the way Fakhri had meant him to see them. And even when Fakhri had been taken by surprise, as when Owen had turned up unexpectedly at his party, he had turned it to his advantage!

  Owen thought back over the party. The introduction to Daouad, the firm pointing at al Liwa, the apparently incidental analysis of Nationalist politics, the pinpointing of key factions. Oh yes, Fakhri had been obliging, all right. He had told him, or had seen that he learned, everything he needed to know. Everything he wanted to know. Because Fakhri had probably seen the drift of his thinking and carefully fed him things which would confirm it and distract.

  Fakhri was a shrewd political operator. And that was it! Owen should have realized he was being operated on. Fakhri was part of Egyptian politics, he had a political position of his own. He was not just an independent commentator. He had his own game to play.

  Whatever that game was, he played it very well. Fakhri’s innocent brown eyes and chubby, sympathedc face floated before him. The convivial chatter, the apparently unconscious giveaways, the way he made you feel that you were in control and he was just a clumsy, fat pigeon struggling unavailingly in your grasp.

  God, Fakhri had run rings round him. He had round everybody. Especially the British! The British thought they were in control and all the time Fakhri, apparently accepting, perpetually deferring, forever giving way, was doing exactly as he pleased.

  And to think they’d got on to him through Hamid! The super-subtle brought down by the super-simple! It was the kind of irony Cairo would relish.

  It would relish even more, he thought uncomfortably, the story of how Fakhri had made a monkey of the Mamur Zapt.

  Never mind. There would be one person at least who would not be sharing in the general enjoyment.

  Owen waited grimly.

  Eventually Fakhri rose to his feet, said his farewells and came into the warm chamber.
After a dutiful interval the two men followed him.

  On their way they nearly collided with a figure so densely wrapped in towels it was evident he could hardly see. The man apologized profusely, stepped aside to let them pass ahead of him and then followed. Owen guessed that it was Mahmoud.

  Fakhri went over to the other side of the room and sat down with his back turned to the two men. They found a couch some way off and sat down, very obviously waiting.

  They had to wait some time.

  Fakhri, clearly enjoying his pretending, called for coffee and then more coffee. He seemed to know everyone in the hammam. Everyone, that is, except for Owen and the morose, densely towelled Mahmoud who had planted himself down on the couch next to that of the two men.

  After a while Owen himself stood up and walked on through into the outer room, where he collected his clothes and valuables. There was no need to hurry through. He could linger as long as he liked. Here, too, one could sit on cushions and drink more coffee, and enjoy the singing birds suspended from the pillars in their fine gilt cages. Here, too, the main object appeared to be conversation. Owen fell into earnest discussion with his neighbour, a portly gentleman who, it appeared, supplied chestnuts to half the stands around the Ezbekiyeh Gardens and was more than happy to describe at length both their virtues and the problems he had in getting them there. Owen listened with rapt attention, a towel draped over his head to soak up the last drips of moisture.

  Out of the corner of his eye he saw Fakhri come in and collect his clothes. The two men came in close behind him. They all three went over to one side behind a pillar and he lost sight of them, though he noticed that Mahmoud, towelling his head vigorously, had placed himself where he could see them.

  The three emerged from behind the pillar and soon afterwards the two men left.

  Fakhri himself took his time. Even when he had finished dressing he did not leave at once but fell into conversation with a newcomer. He then spent some time tipping the attendant.

  When, finally, he left, Owen and Mahmoud were just behind him. As they stepped out into the warm evening air they drew alongside.

  “Hello, Fakhri,” said Owen.

  CHAPTER 1 1

  “No,” said Fakhri. “No. It wasn’t like that at all.”

  “You arranged the attack,” said Owen. “Are you telling us you didn’t?”

  “I arranged the attack,” Fakhri admitted, “but I didn’t mean him to be hurt.”

  “No?” said Mahmoud sceptically.

  “It was a signal. That was all.”

  “Who was the signal to?” asked Mahmoud.

  “Nuri, of course.”

  “What was it saying?”

  “You know,” said Fakhri. He looked at them almost appealingly. “You know it all,” he said.

  “Tell us.”

  They were in Owen’s office. The others were in the cell below. Hamid had identified both the men and Fakhri as they entered the baths. When the men came out they had been followed. They had gone straight to a small square a kilometre or so away where the other men were waiting. Georgiades had arrested the lot. Now he was questioning them.

  “I didn’t want to hurt the boy. Really. The men were told-” The brown eyes regarded them anxiously. “They didn’t make a mistake, did they?”

  “Go on,’’ said Owen, refusing to be drawn.

  “I wouldn’t want you to believe-”

  He read the message in their faces and shrugged his shoulders. “Very well, then,” he said quietly. “Nuri had been meddling. He is always meddling. Trying to create new alliances. His own faction, which is very small now, and other moderates usually. This time he was after the Nationalists. He was trying to do a deal with Abdul Murr. He thought that if he could get Abdul Murr to go in with him the Khedive might see them as a possible government.”

  “Never in a million years!” said Owen.

  “He might!” Fakhri insisted. “If he thought he was securing a new base of popular support.”

  “The Nationalists would never go along,” said Mahmoud.

  “They would,” said Fakhri, “if they thought there was power at the end of it.”

  “Jemal?” said Mahmoud sceptically. “El Gazzari?”

  “Not them,” Fakhri conceded. “But others would. Abdul Murr.” “Never!”

  “He might,” said Fakhri. “He’s got very fed up with Jemal and el Gazzari lately. Understandably,” he added.

  “Fed up is one thing,” said Mahmoud. “Going in with a man like Nuri is another.”

  “It’s not just that,” said Fakhri. “Abdul Murr is no fool. He thinks that if the Nationalists could once get into power and show they could govern, then the Khedive wouldn’t be able to do without them.”

  It was plausible. Certainly Owen felt so, and probably Mahmoud felt so. Mahmoud, however, clearly had a distaste for the whole thing. It ran counter both to his strong dislike of Nuri and his equally strong sympathy for the Nationalists.

  “Nuri in a Nationalist government?” he said. “I don’t believe it.” “It wouldn’t be a Nationalist government,” said Fakhri. “The Khedive won’t agree to that. It would have to be a coalition and Nuri would have to lead it.”

  “Lead it!” cried Mahmoud.

  “The Khedive won’t agree on any other terms,” said Fakhri. "That’s why Nuri is in such a strong position.”

  “They won’t go along,” said Mahmoud.

  “You’d be surprised!” said Fakhri.

  There was a little silence. Owen could see Mahmoud struggling to come to terms with what Fakhri had said. He was still reluctant to accept it.

  “You say these things, Fakhri,” he said, “but how real are they?” “Very real.”

  “How real?”

  “Real enough to worry all the other political groupings. Real enough,” said Fakhri, with a glance at Owen, “to worry the Mamur Zapt apparently. When I saw you taking an interest,” he said to Owen, “I guessed that the British suspected something.”

  Owen let it pass. Sometimes there were dangers in being over-subtle.

  He noticed Mahmoud look at him, however, and wondered if he would have some explaining to do.

  “It could be a powerful combination,” he said, “the Nationalists and the Khedive.”

  “That’s just it,” said Fakhri. “It worried us, too.”

  “Us?”

  “Everybody, really. There are various factions around the Khedive, rivals of Nuri. They don’t want it to happen. Then there are the Nationalists themselves. Plenty of them are opposed to it. Jemal and el Gazzari for a start. And then, of course,” said Fakhri, “there are moderate groups, like my own, who are worried about being left out in the cold.”

  “And you were worried especially.”

  “Not especially,” said Fakhri. “Why do you think that?”

  “Because you did something about it.”

  Fakhri was silent for a moment.

  “Not especially,” he said again. “It was just that someone had to do something.”

  “And that someone just happened to be you?” said Owen sceptically.

  “Yes,” said Fakhri defiantly.

  Owen let the pause drag on.

  “So you decided,” he said at last, “to send Nuri a signal?”

  “Yes. We thought that if we sent him a direct warning-”

  “By killing Ahmed?”

  “Killing?” Fakhri looked shaken. “No,” he said, “how could you think that? We wanted to give him a good thrashing. That was all.” “Why pick on Ahmed?”

  “Because he’s Nuri’s son. Because Nuri loves him. Because Nuri has been using him as a go-between.”

  He looked at Owen.

  “I did try to tell you,” he said, almost reproachfully. “I’ve been trying to point you in his direction. I thought if you knew how far things had got, you might find a way of stopping it.”

  “How far had they got?” asked Owen.

  “Further than wp thought they would. Nuri is a c
unning old devil. He seemed to be persuading Abdul Murr. It suddenly looked as if things were coming to a head. As if he might succeed.”

  “Was that the point of Nuri’s visit to the al Liwa offices?”

  “Yes. That was part of it, though the real fixing was to come later, in private. Anyway, we had to do something. I wanted to let Nuri know that we knew. So-” Fakhri shrugged. “I hired those men. They didn’t overdo it, did they?”

  Again the sympathetic brown eyes regarded Owen anxiously. Again Owen did not reply. The longer Fakhri was kept on the hook the better.

  “I am sorry,” said Fakhri softly. “It was just one of those things. Just politics.”

  Even the coffee did not help. Sensing the mood that Owen was in, Yussuf entered silently, filled the mug and withdrew without saying a word. The shutters, which had been opened first thing to air the room, had long since been closed. Owen had been in for three hours already, and all the time he had been thinking about what Fakhri had said the evening before.

  They had got nowhere, nowhere on anything really important. Ahmed’s thrashing, his and Nuri’s visit to al Liwa, what Nuri was up to, all this had been explained, and it did not seem to have advanced matters one little jot. The original attack on Nuri, the grenades, the Tademah connection, if there was a Tademah connection, they knew no more about now than they did before he and Mahmoud had gone to the hammam.

  He had thought for a moment, the moment when Fakhri had revealed himself, that everything had suddenly tumbled into place. It had been a shock but once he had recovered he had felt that he had grasped the true pattern. The man behind had finally declared himself.

  But it was not true. Fakhri was not the man behind, or if he was behind anything, it was only the most trivial parts of the pattern. At first in his fury Owen had thought Fakhri capable of anything. Now he had simmered down he realized that Fakhri was not really like that. The trouble was that Owen believed him. He believed what Fakhri had said the previous night. That Nuri was scheming along those lines was completely credible, knowing Nuri. That the Nationalists, or some of them, were tempted, was entirely likely, despite what Mahmoud might think. That the Khedive would play along, distinctly probable. That the other parties would be worried, certain. Even that Fakhri, who was definitely not a man without resource, would take it upon himself to do something about it.