The Camel of Destruction Page 6

  ‘Perhaps you’d better put it under some other heading.’

  Nikos threw down his pen in exasperation.

  ‘You can’t do that! There are rules in this business, you know. They put you in prison for something like that.’

  ‘It’s only a little—’

  ‘It’s the principle. That’s the whole point. You’ve got to stick to principles. The same principles. Everyone!’

  ‘Surely no one would notice—’

  Nikos breathed heavily.

  ‘They have a whole Section which devotes itself to noticing. It’s called Audit.’

  He turned back to his papers and thrust out a hand. ‘Receipts!’ he commanded.

  The man standing in front of his desk put his hand in his pocket and fished out a crumpled piece of paper.

  ‘I’ve got discipline,’ he said.

  He was a Greek, the one, in fact, who had come to the restaurant late and talked to the patron. His name was Georgiades and he was one of Owen’s agents.

  ‘You!’ said Nikos witheringly. ‘You’re the one who’s led him into it.’

  Owen was roused to protest. ‘I’m just trying to do my job,’ he said. ‘All this stuff gets in the way.’

  ‘You’re the people who introduced it,’ Nikos pointed out.

  One of the first things Cromer had done when he was appointed Consul-General had been to introduce modern accounting procedures into the chaotic, and corrupt, system of Egypt’s finances. It was commonly regarded—outside Egypt—as his greatest triumph.

  Nikos had taken to the new procedures—they were, after all, bureaucratic procedures—like a duck to water and was jealous in their defence.

  ‘He needs to be able to have a few more lunches,’ said Owen. ‘It’s important.’

  ‘Quite right,’ said Georgiades. ‘Rosa’s been cutting down on the food lately. She says I’m overweight.’

  ‘Well, all right,’ said Nikos. ‘It’s just that if he eats them now, he won’t be able to eat them later.’

  ‘Hard times,’ said Georgiades, as he followed Owen out of the office, ‘and harder to come. That’s what they all say. You know, I don’t understand this financial stuff at all. What’s gone wrong? We were doing all right, weren’t we?’

  ‘We were doing too all right, apparently. That seems to be the root of the problem.’

  ‘I’m a child in these things,’ Georgiades confided. ‘Rosa does all the sums in our household. What a head that girl has got! It comes from the old woman, you know, her grandmother. Sharp as a knife! Looks after it all. I stay right out of it.’

  ‘A good thing you married her,’ said Owen.

  ‘He married her?’ said Nikos from his desk. ‘She married him.’

  ***

  Barclay was as good as his word and showed Owen round the Derb Aiah district. It was a warren of narrow, mediæval streets to the north of the Ezbekiyeh Gardens, lying between the newer European quarter to the west and the Old City to the east.

  At first sight it was unpromising since it seemed to be an area of rabas, tenements consisting of one or two sleeping-or living-rooms, a kitchen and latrine (but not a bathroom; you went outside to wash). Many of them were built above shops.

  They were easy to pick out because they tended to be built at an angle to the street; that is, instead of there being a flat wall above the shop, there was a sort of triangular street corner with windows looking both ways, windows without glass, of course, just fretted woodwork which gave passage to the air and allowed the women inside to observe without being observed. In Cairo you always felt as if you were being watched; and you usually were.

  ‘This street, old boy.’

  Half way along the street, tucked in behind the rabas, were some marvellous old Mameluke houses. The box-like windows of each storey projected further and further across the street so that at the top they almost touched the windows opposite. The structures rose like the fortress of a Spanish galleon.

  ‘Look at the woodwork!’ breathed Barclay. ‘There’s no one who can do that today. Once that goes—’

  They went down the tiniest of alleyways and came out in a small square. At first it looked a very ordinary little square with nothing to mark it out except a rather plain flight of mosque steps which appeared to lead up to a blank wall.

  But at the top of the steps there was an open passage, at the other end of which there was something blue and shining. They went down the passage and came out in a courtyard. In the centre of the courtyard was a blue tower. It flashed and shone in the sunlight, sparkling like a turquoise.

  ‘It’s the tiles, you see,’ said Barclay.

  The tower was faced with thousands of tiny blue tiles which caught and reflected the sunlight like the facets of a precious stone.

  They went inside. The tower was, Owen realized, a small Dervish mosque. It was fitted out with fine, soft carpets and beautiful glass mosque lamps. From the dome, painted blue to match the tiles outside, hung a cage of fretted meshrebiya woodwork, with a canopy roof like a Turkish fountain and lots of Moslem prayers hanging from it.

  They came out and walked round the outside. At the back of the tower there was some scaffolding and some men were at work repairing the tiles.

  ‘It’s being restored,’ said Barclay. ‘By the Waqfs.’

  ‘Waqfs?’

  ‘Ministry of.’

  ‘I thought they just administered the endowments?’

  ‘They do. Upkeep is part of the administration.’

  A young man came round the corner carrying a piece of broken tile. He recognized Barclay and smiled at him.

  ‘This is Selim,’ said Barclay. ‘He does quite a bit of work for us.’

  ‘When it’s there,’ said the young man, shaking hands. ‘At the moment there’s more with the Waqfs.’

  ‘Do you specialize in restoration?’ asked Owen.

  ‘I’d like to. But there really isn’t enough work of that sort. Especially now. It’s one of the things that get cut.’

  ‘He’s done some lovely work,’ said Barclay. ‘I’ll show you one day.’

  ‘Thanks. I’d like to see it.’

  They shook hands and moved on.

  ‘Good chap,’ said Barclay. ‘A bit political, but he knows his job.’

  At the top of the steps they turned and looked back.

  ‘A gem!’ said Barclay. ‘Pity if that got in the way of a developer.’

  ***

  The Widow Shawquat, impressed but slightly flustered at so exalted a response to the letter she had placed in the Mamur Zapt’s box, was prepared to receive him. Mindful of proprieties, however, she could do so only in the presence of a suitable male and it took a little while to find him; especially as, equally mindful of what was her business and not that of her neighbours, she went to some pains to choose one who was deaf.

  Eventually, though, Owen was seated on a low, moth-eaten divan with a brazier in front of him on which a brass pot of coffee was warming.

  ‘The Mamur Zapt, eh,’ said the Widow, wriggling with pleasure, ‘in my house!’

  ‘Be quiet, woman!’ shouted the old man. ‘Men speak first!’

  The Widow, behind her veil, gave him a look but subsided.

  The old man, conscious, too, of proprieties, clapped his hands.

  ‘Coffee!’ he bawled. ‘Coffee for the Effendi!’

  An old woman scuttled in and poured Owen some coffee in a small brass cup. Owen sipped it dutifully and praised it copiously. It was quite some time before they were able to get down to business.

  ‘Please tell the Widow Shawquat that when the Mamur Zapt read her letter he was deeply concerned.’

  ‘The Effendi was deeply concerned,’ the old man told the Widow.

  The Widow’s eyes flashed impatiently but she said nothing. ‘I cannot promise to do
anything for her since this is really the business of the Ministry of Waqfs.’

  ‘This is not woman’s business,’ shouted the old man.

  Owen thought he saw a distinct bridle on the part of the Widow Shawquat but ploughed on.

  ‘I will do what I can, however. It would help if she gave me some more details. The waqf, for instance—’

  ‘What?’ said the old man.

  ‘The waqf,’ shouted the Widow.

  ‘What? Oh, waqf.’

  ‘It was in the name of your husband, naturally.’

  ‘My husband’s family—be quiet, you, the Effendi can’t wait all day—the Shawquats. It went back to his great-great-grandfather’s time. It’s always been in the family. I wouldn’t have married him if it hadn’t been. What was Ali Shawquat to me, a rich woman, with my own property—’

  ‘What property?’ asked the old man suddenly.

  ‘My uncle’s shop—’

  ‘That wasn’t your property!’

  ‘It would have been—’

  ‘The waqf,’ said Owen.

  ‘It was the waqf, you see. Without that he wouldn’t have been anything. Oh, a nice enough man but weak—oh, so weak! You wouldn’t believe it! Mind you, it’s not always bad when a man is like that, it means you can get on with things in your own way. But then something comes along like this—my son’s just the same, he’s not going to get anywhere without his mother behind him—’

  ‘The waqf was in the name of the Shawquats and entitled them to what?’

  ‘The kuttub. It’s in the fountain-house in the El Merdani.’

  ‘Your husband received a salary as headmaster?’

  ‘Yes. Not much, but more than a man like him could earn anywhere else. And more than my layabout of a son could earn, though in his case it’s his own fault, he’s intelligent enough, anyone can see that—’

  ‘And then, when your husband died—?’

  ‘Some man comes along in a smart suit and a tarboosh and tells us it doesn’t belong to us any more!’

  ‘His name?’

  ‘I don’t know. He probably hasn’t got a name. He probably hasn’t got a father, not one that would acknowledge him—’

  ‘Yes, yes. Can you give me the name of the relative it passed to?’

  ‘Mungali Shawquat. Rashid Mungali Shawquat,’ she spat out. ‘But he’s not really a relative, he’s so far removed…and no relative would behave like that, not even a Shawquat. Of course, you may say it’s not his fault, the old fool is senile, but then whose fault is it, I ask? And he’s not so senile as all that, he got some cash for it, I’ll be bound. Of course, all the Shawquats are a bit simple—’

  ‘And now it’s in the hands of—?’

  ‘Mr. Adli Nazwas. That was his name.’

  ‘Have you got his address?’

  ‘Address?’ The Widow stopped in midflow.

  ‘Were you sent a letter?’

  ‘A letter? People like me don’t get sent letters. His man came round, this man in the tarboosh, and said: “Now you’ve got to get out. Be gone. By next Friday!”

  ‘So the school is already closed?’

  ‘Closed?’ said the Widow Shawquat indignantly. ‘Certainly not! My son’s along there. He doesn’t know anything but he’ll do as a teacher. He was at school himself, wasn’t he? Well then, he can do it.’

  ‘But I thought you said—’

  ‘It’ll close,’ said the Widow Shawquat with determination, ‘when they throw us out. And that won’t be so simple. I’ve told my son, Abdul, I said, if the men come, just send for me. I’ll send them off with their tails between their legs, you see if I don’t! That’s right, isn’t it, Mustapha?’ she appealed to the old man.

  The old man had, however, fallen into one of the catnaps of the aged.

  The Widow shrugged.

  ‘But, effendi,’ she said, turning back to Owen, ‘what if they send the police?’

  Owen thought it probable that the redoubtable widow would send them packing too. Aloud, however, he said sternly: ‘The law must be obeyed.’

  ‘But what if it’s unjust?’

  ‘There are proper ways of seeking redress.’

  ‘That’s just what I said!’ cried the Widow, gratified. ‘My very words! I said, we’re going to have to set about this in the proper way. So I put a letter in your box.’

  ‘Yes, well—’

  The Widow Shawquat eased her bulky frame forward to the edge of the divan and dropped on to her knees in the traditional posture of the suppliant.

  ‘You can stop them, effendi! You are the Protector of the Poor, the Hope of the Unfortunate—’

  Her voice rose into a sing-song.

  ‘No, no!’ said Owen hastily.

  ‘The Righter of Wrongs! The Sword of the People!’

  ‘Please stop.’

  ‘The Mamur Zapt is the All-Powerful!’

  ‘Not any more. Look, it’s all changed.’

  ‘They are strong and we are weak but you will stand between us!’

  ‘Look—’

  She clutched at his jacket, which was not quite as serviceable for the purpose as a galabeah, and kissed it.

  ‘You are our Father and Mother—’

  ‘All right, all right. I’ll do what I can.’

  The Widow stopped in mid-wail.

  ‘You will help us?’

  ‘Yes, but—’

  The Widow started to raise her voice in a pæan of gratitude, but checked on seeing Owen’s face.

  ‘I will do what I can,’ said Owen. ‘But these things are not straightforward.’

  ‘I know that,’ said the Widow, easing herself back up on to the divan. ‘Adli Naswas is tricky and deceitful. So I said, let us go to someone who is tricky, too. And so, effendi, I turned to you.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  ‘I went first,’ said the Widow, ‘to the Sheikh of our mosque. But he is without guile in these matters. All he could say was that he would speak to the Mufti—’

  ‘The Mufti!’

  The Mufti was the chief authority on religious law. One thing Owen could do without was for this to become a religious dispute.

  ‘But what good will that do?’ asked the Widow bitterly. ‘The Mufti will speak to the Ministry and then what? They will do nothing. For Adli Naswas has already spoken to them. And money speaks more loudly than words in our city.’

  She dug the old man heavily in the ribs.

  ‘Here, you, wake up! A fine thing! Supposed to be my protector and falls asleep! Why,’ said the Widow Shawquat with relish, ‘I might have been raped four times!’

  Chapter Five

  ‘This is the fourth lunch he’s had at our expense this week!’ said Nikos indignantly. ‘This way financial disaster lies.’

  ‘I’m following up a lead,’ protested Georgiades. ‘It’s the only one we’ve got.’

  ‘You’re following it up with too much enthusiasm,’ said Nikos.

  ‘I’m like that,’ said Georgiades.

  ‘You’re like that when you think you’re getting something for nothing.’

  Georgiades shrugged. ‘A man’s entitled to a free lunch occasionally.’

  ‘There is no such thing as a free lunch. Someone has to pay for it. I do.’

  ‘Who is this “I”?’ Georgiades asked Owen. ‘Has he taken over running the Department or something?’

  ‘I am the voice of Lord Cromer,’ Nikos announced grandly.

  ‘He left Egypt four years ago.’

  ‘His spirit lives.’

  Georgiades turned to Owen. ‘You’re not going to let him get away with this?’

  ‘Four is a bit much.’

  ‘Just when I was getting somewhere,’ said Georgiades dejectedly.

  ‘Where are you getting?’


  Georgiades helped himself to a drink of water from the large earthenware pitcher which, as in all Cairo offices, stood in the window to be cooled by the air which came through the shutters.

  ‘Is this OK?’ he asked Nikos, with the glass in his hand. ‘Or does Lord Cromer object to people having free drinks, too?’

  Nikos disdained to reply.

  ‘Are you getting anywhere?’

  Georgiades perched himself on the end of Nikos’s desk.

  ‘I’ve got three names,’ he said. ‘I’m following them up.’

  ‘Anything interesting?’

  ‘Two are from the Agricultural Bank.’

  ‘Directors? Or officials?’

  ‘Officials. Working lunches, my friend the patron says.’

  ‘You’ve no idea what they were working on?’

  ‘Not yet. I am, as it happens, having lunch with one of them tomorrow.’

  ‘Another!’ cried Nikos.

  ‘You want me to stop?’ Georgiades asked Owen.

  ‘You’d better go ahead. But try to cut them down,’ advised Owen.

  ‘It might be nothing. A lot of papers. Sounds like the civil service to me. The third man might be more interesting, though.’

  ‘Name?’

  ‘Jabir. Jabir Sabry. Young. Effendi. Suit, of course. But no papers.’

  ‘Have you talked to him?’

  ‘No. I need to know more about him before I do that. With the people from the Agricultural Bank it was OK. I could be a businessman talking to businessmen. They understand that sort of thing. But I don’t even know that this bloke is a businessman.’

  ‘Did they drink? Aisha said that Fingari had started coming home the worse for wear. He’d been mixing with a bad lot, she said.’

  ‘They drank. They all drank.’

  ‘Yes, but people from a bank wouldn’t count as a bad lot, not to her.’

  ‘It was lunch. They’d do proper drinking separately.’

  ‘You might try and find out about that.’

  ‘Yes. Actually,’ said Georgiades, ‘there’s something you might be able to find out.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Better than me. Apparently, this man Jabir was an old friend of Fingari’s. At least, that’s the impression the patron got, hearing them talking. College, or possibly, even, school.’