The Men Behind Read online

  “It was nothing. There was no real fighting in it.”

  ***

  The man from the Mines Department arrived shortly after. His name was Plumley and he was a shy little man with a nervous manner which disappeared completely when he was examining the bomb.

  “Oh yes,” he said, “I can see how this works.”

  He had taken off one of the screw-top ends and was poking about inside. Now he unscrewed the bottom end and extracted a long metal cylinder containing a liquid.

  “Picric acid,” he said.

  He showed Owen the other end of the piping. Inside the lip there was hung a small glass bottle closed with a loose plug of cotton-wool.

  “Nitric acid in this one,” said Plumley. “It’s all right as long as the thing is kept upright. Once it gets out of the vertical, though, the nitric acid oozes into the picric and detonates it.”

  “Then how the hell—?”

  “Don’t know. Perhaps it stayed vertical.”

  Owen thought of Omar holding it up to his ear and shaking it.

  “There are a lot of lucky people around,” he said.

  “Well, yes. It’s quite effective even though it’s very simple. The only thing is, you’d have to be very careful with it. I mean, it could so easily go off.”

  Georgiades took up the piping gingerly.

  “It’s safe now,” said Plumley.

  “I was hoping that.”

  He examined the bomb carefully.

  “There’s nothing special about the piping,” said Plumley. “Any piping would do.”

  “What about the picric? And the nitric?”

  “Easily obtainable. Any decent lab. The only difficult bit is fitting the screw-caps and hanging the bottle. And that’s something anyone can do. A workshop would be a help but you could manage without.”

  He inspected the ends of the piping.

  “A bit amateur, if you ask me,” he said.

  ***

  “Another one that doesn’t quite fit the pattern?” asked Owen.

  “It fits in some respects,” said Nikos defensively.

  “Not a public servant.”

  “Isn’t a Minister a public servant?”

  “Nuri’s an ex-Minister. And I thought you were ruling out Pashas.”

  “Clearly some Pashas should be included,” said Nikos coolly. “As more data comes in we can be more precise about our categorization.”

  “Maybe your original categorization only applies to one of the groups,” said Georgiades. “That is, if there are two groups. Suppose there are two groups,” he said, amplifying. “One is a following/shooting group and one is a bombing group. The following/shooting group confines itself to public servants—Fairclough, Jullians, that sort of people. The other group, the bombing one—”

  He stopped.

  “Pashas,” said Owen.

  “Students,” said Georgiades. “That’s the hard one to explain.”

  “Anyway,” said Nikos, “it doesn’t work. Ali Osman is in the Pasha category and also in the ‘following’ category. That is,” he added with a sniff, “if he genuinely is in the ‘following’ category.”

  “I would have thought the ‘following’ might cut across categories,” said Owen. “It’s part of the homework you’d do before making an attack of any kind.”

  “What about the attack on Nuri?”

  “They’d have had to have known that the car was going to be going past. Presumably it’s a regular journey.”

  “If it is,” said Georgiades, “you can bet that Nuri’s changing that!”

  “We ought to check. We ought to check in the street where the bomb was thrown, too. Someone may have seen something.”

  “It would all have happened too fast. The car didn’t stop.”

  “Better check, anyway.”

  “OK,” said Georgiades. “I’ll do that. There’s something else I want to do, too.” He picked up the piping. “Mind if I take this away?”

  ***

  One of the perquisites of the Mamur Zapt’s office was a box at the opera. How this had come about Owen did not care to ask. The office of Mamur Zapt in Cairo had been traditionally one of considerable prestige and among Owen’s Ottoman predecessors had been those who had known how to turn that to advantage.

  Owen was fond of music and, coming from a Welsh background, had an ear for singing. Until he had arrived in Egypt he had not, however, ever been to the opera. Now, though, he went almost every week. And he saw no reason why, just because of the present crisis, that custom should be broken.

  He had, moreover, an extra reason to be there. Plumley had mentioned that that evening he would be taking a guest to the opera and in the course of conversation it emerged that that guest would be Roper.

  Owen had rung Paul immediately.

  “What the hell are you doing?”

  “It’s nothing to do with me,” said Paul defensively. “It’s Mines. That’s where he’s based now.”

  “Yes, but—Plumley!”

  “I’ll have a word with them.”

  A little later he rang back.

  “It’s OK. They know each other. Plumley’s the bloke he’s working with.”

  “It’s not OK. It took about five men to get him into an arabeah last night.”

  “Drunk?”

  “He’s always drunk. But sometimes he’s fighting drunk.”

  “Oh.” There was a pause. Then Paul said: “Are you going to the opera yourself tonight by any chance?”

  “Yes, I am and I’m taking Zeinab and I’m bloody going in order to enjoy the opera.”

  “I shall be there myself, too,” said Paul, “with similar hopes. Still, it is encouraging to know you will be there. It is always helpful to have around a man who can knock other people on the head if the need arises.”

  “Yes, but that’s not what I had in mind for this evening. Whose bloody crazy idea was it to take Roper to the opera anyway?”

  “Plumley’s. He’s fond of opera himself and thought it would be a nice thing to take a visitor to.”

  “He’s insane. Or possibly a bit simple. All those people who muck around with explosives are. Can’t you talk to him?”

  “No. He and Roper are out at Gebel Zabarrah. They’ll be out all day. They’ll just have time to get back and change.”

  “Look, the only thing Roper will be interested in after a day in the desert is drinking himself into insensibility as speedily as he bloody well can. Not in going to the opera.”

  “Don’t you think he might point that out himself?”

  “There’s a chance, I suppose. All the same…!”

  All the same, when Owen entered the foyer with Zeinab on his arm, there were Plumley and Roper, dressed in cool white suits, their hair still wet from the shower, dutifully scanning the program.

  Roper greeted Owen warmly. His eyes automatically undressed Zeinab.

  “You’ve got a nice piece there,” he said. “How much was she?”

  “Qui est ce cochon?” Zeinab asked Owen.

  “You won’t say that when you get to know me, sweetheart,” said Roper.

  “She isn’t going to get to know you,” said Owen.

  Plumley went pink.

  “I’ve seen you here before, haven’t I?” he said hastily to Zeinab. “Have you a passion for opera?”

  “You bet she has,” said Roper. “And other things as well.”

  “Da Souza won’t be singing tonight, I hear,” Plumley continued heroically. “She’s unwell.”

  “I feel unwell too,” said Zeinab. “Perhaps I will not stay.”

  “Oh no. Do, please do, I’m sure—”

  “I do not like the people here.”

  “She doesn’t have a knife, does she?” Roper asked anxiously. “I mean, that othe
r girl of yours—”

  “What girl was this?” demanded Zeinab ominously.

  “Someone we met,” said Owen. “She didn’t like him either.”

  Paul suddenly materialized beside them.

  “Hello!” he said. “Hello, Zeinab. You’re looking marvelous this evening. That gown! The Princess noticed it at once. I think she’d like to ask you where it was from. Paris, of course, but which of the houses? Is someone doing something new? I was out of my depth, I’m afraid, so I said I’d ask you if you could bear to join us at the interval. I have a table…”

  Etcetera. Zeinab, pleased, simmered down. The warning bell rang and they started to make their way to the boxes.

  “Where is this table?” asked Roper.

  Paul looked over his shoulder.

  “Not you, you shit,” he said.

  ***

  The Princess Lamlun was a Cairo institution. She owed her position in society formally to the fact that she was the Khedive’s aunt, but without the addition of her formidable personality the simple status would have been nothing. It was rumored that the Khedive was terrified of her. Certainly his spirits lifted noticeably when she returned to Deauville at the end of the Cairo season.

  During the season, however, she held sway over Cairo Society. Her salon was the major center of intrigue and gossip and although her sphere of influence was theoretically limited to the social, as was proper for a woman in an Islamic society, there were many who felt that it extended covertly to other areas as well, including the political.

  The party which gathered, then, at the Consul-General’s table during the interval was an imposing one and Zeinab, despite herself, was impressed. Owen didn’t believe for one moment that the Princess had said anything at all about Zeinab’s dress, but when they joined the party Paul so managed it that within seconds she and the Princess were chatting away happily together.

  Owen took the opportunity to slip away. He had qualms about leaving Roper with Plumley. Christ knows what might be happening.

  In fact they were talking quietly by the bar. There was already a row of empty glasses in front of Roper and Plumley was looking rather green. He had switched to orange juice; too late.

  He looked up with relief as Owen came across.

  “Got to go!” he whispered. “Just for one moment.”

  He rushed off in the direction of the toilets.

  “Funny little bugger,” said Roper, looking after him. “Knows his job, though.”

  “I gather you’ve just got back from Gebel Zabarrah.”

  “Yeah. Dry place, the desert.”

  The bartender added a fresh whisky soda to the row.

  Obviously Roper and he had come to some arrangement, for as Roper was finishing one glass another appeared. There was no gap between them.

  “How are the emeralds?”

  “All right. Don’t know that we’re going to be interested, though. It’s a bit small for us.”

  “That’s the trouble with Egypt,” said Owen. “There’s lots of stuff here—emeralds, gold, copper, iron, lead, coal—but it’s all in small amounts.”

  “It wasn’t small originally,” said Roper, “but it’s all been worked.”

  “Yes,” said Owen. “The Pharaohs, the Greeks, the Romans, the Arabs, they’ve all had a go. There’s not much left now.”

  “Of course,” said Roper, “we can go deeper than they could.”

  “You think there might be more lower down?”

  “Not in emeralds.”

  Plumley reappeared, washed out.

  “You go easy, son,” Roper advised him. “We’ve got to be out early tomorrow morning.”

  Plumley eyed the row of glasses but said nothing.

  “Don’t worry about me,” said Roper. “It’s just replacing what I’ve lost in sweat.”

  “Where are you going?” asked Owen.

  “Tomorrow? Down into Minya Province.”

  “I thought there was nothing there but salt?”

  “Oh no,” said Plumley. “There’s more than that. There’s a lot more than that.”

  “Really?”

  Roper looked at his watch. “Wasn’t that the bell?” he said. “Time we were back in our seats, old son.”

  He moved purposefully away. Owen knew he had been cut short. He shrugged his shoulders. It wasn’t any of his business.

  There was a crowd in the doorway and he caught up with Roper and Plumley as they went out. Something came into his mind.

  “If you’re going down to Minya,” he said, “watch out for the camels. The Thieves’ Road runs through there and camels have a way of disappearing.”

  “I’ll do that,” said Roper. “But I wouldn’t worry, if I were you. I’ve met this kind of thing before. It’s the other people who’ll have to look out—if they don’t want a hole in their head.”

  ***

  Zeinab didn’t say anything until they got back to their seats. Then she said: “Did you find her?”

  “Who?”

  “That girl.”

  “What girl?”

  “The one that man said you were with.”

  “I wasn’t looking for her. Anyway, I’d hardly find her in a place like this.”

  “Why not?”

  “She’s a gypsy girl.”

  “Ah, you like the gypsy girls?”

  “Not particularly. Look, what is this? I met this girl once, when I was taking Roper to that bloody night club. She came up to our table.”

  “What was she doing there, dancing?”

  “Picking pockets.”

  “Picking pockets?” said Zeinab as if she could hardly believe her ears.

  “Yes, and—”

  “I know what she was doing there,” said Zeinab, “and it certainly wasn’t picking pockets.”

  ***

  When Owen received Georgiades’s message it was almost noon and as he walked through the streets the stalls were already closing down. He had chosen to go through the narrow side streets where he could twist and turn. Since his experience on the Masr el Atika he had not been too keen to offer much of a target to potential followers.

  Of course in the crowded bazaars or side streets it would be easy for anyone to walk right up to him and shoot him in the back. Somehow, though, he felt less exposed than in the broader streets of the more well-to-do areas.

  In the streets like the Masr el Atika you could be shot at a distance. All they had to do was step out of a doorway. Here, where it was more crowded, they would have to come right up to you and he thought he would stand a better chance of seeing them.

  It was, however, unpleasant to have to think about such things. It spoiled the walk. Usually there was nothing he liked better than a pretext to wander through the streets of the Old City, smelling its smells, seeing its oddities, catching its conversations. Now it was different.

  And if it was different for him, how would it be for other people? How long would it be possible to pretend that things were normal?

  There would come a point when the pretense could no longer be maintained. That point, of course, was when he would have to swallow his pride and call in the Army.

  He didn’t want to do that; not just because he didn’t like swallowing his own words, but because, or so he told himself, it was the wrong way. Call in the Army, put soldiers everywhere, and everyone would be affected. No one would be able to avoid being reminded that the British were an occupying power. They would be having their noses rubbed in it.

  Bringing in the Army was the surest way to stir up massive resistance. You’d have problems right across the board rather than limited, as they still fortunately were at present.

  And would you be any nearer catching the ones you really did want to catch? Would the Army be any better at it than he was? Owen didn’t think so. The atta
cks would surely continue, even increase. The Army would swipe out blindly in all directions, antagonizing even those at present moderately disposed to it. People would resist, the Army wouldn’t be able to tell their resistance from genuine terrorist attacks, would react heavily and everything would get worse.

  No, the only thing was to be selective. You had to hit the ones you wanted to hit and take care not to antagonize the population as a whole. Keep things normal, was Owen’s instinct. Normality was his greatest ally, because, despite what politicians said, most people just wanted to get on with their daily lives. Genuine terrorists were few and far between.

  Which was all very well, but at the moment so far from things being normal he was scared of his own shadow, and far from hitting those responsible, he had not yet succeeded in hitting anybody.

  ***

  He found Georgiades sitting down, which he had expected, but on the pile of rubble from the bombed café, which he had not expected. With Georgiades on the rubble were several workmen, who looked as if they might have been working. Part of the rubble was in the shade, however, and offered an opportunity too tempting to be resisted.

  “Ah!” said Georgiades, as if he had only been waiting for Owen to arrive before he burst into action. He scrambled down off the heap and pulled something out from under a piece of sacking.

  Even Owen could see at once what it was: a length of piping, battered and mangled by some enormous force.

  “When you know what you’re looking for,” said Georgiades, “it’s not too difficult.”

  Owen turned it over in his mind.

  “It’s the same,” he said.

  Georgiades nodded.

  “Yes,” he said. “When I saw the other one I just wondered.”

  “How long did it take you to find it?”

  “Two days.”

  “Anything else alongside it?”

  “If there was, it’s been moved. Since the blast, I mean. The whole pile’s been shifted.” He hesitated. “If you wanted,” he said, “we could go through it again. We haven’t really done it properly.”

  “Is there any point? All we’d find is glass.”

  “There’s some of that inside.” Georgiades showed him.

  “There’s some in one of the bodies, too.”

  Georgiades sat down on the rubble again. Owen put the pipe back in the sacking and then sat down beside him.