Michael Pearce - The Donkey-Vous

An additional difficulty was the fact that the incident had been the main topic of conversation in the neighborhood ever since Monsieur Moulin had been reported missing. Whatever may have been the original perceptions, by the time they were reported they had long been confused by a mass of eager embroidering, ill-informed conjecture and plain fantasy. By the end Mahmoud was in despair.

“I’ve got to find a way of going back to the beginning,” he said. “This is hopeless.”

Owen commiserated.

“How about a reconstruction?” he suggested.

Mahmoud at once brightened. The Parquet, French-trained and French in style, adhered to French methods of investigation, of which the “reconstruction” of the crime was usually part.

“That’s a good idea!” he said enthusiastically. “I might try that.”

Owen, whose own training was limited to a brief exposure to English police methods while serving under Garvin at Alexandria, was less convinced in general of the value of “reconstructing.” How could one re-enact an event as fluid as Moulin’s disappearance, with so many holes and loopholes? He could, however, see a case for it on this occasion. Seeing even a crude dramatization of the incident might jog the memories of people as inclined to the dramatic as most Egyptians were.

Mahmoud, happy now, could turn back to Owen’s problems. He sipped the iced water which came with the coffee and thought hard.

“Anton’s,” he said after a while. “Why did it happen there?”

“No special reason. That’s just where it happened to happen.”

“It’s a surprising place for it to happen to happen.”

“Why?”

“If they’ve Senussi connections, as Nikos thought. That sort of Islamic fundamentalist wouldn’t go near a gambling salon. He wouldn’t even have heard of Anton’s.”

“There’s no real evidence that they have Senussi connections. It was just the name that suggested it to Nikos-‘Zawia’.”

“‘Zawia’ can mean a lot of things.”

“I thought it might be Nationalist. You know, ‘turning-point,’ that sort of thing.”

Mahmoud, who was himself a member of the Nationalist Party, laughed.

“You see Nationalist influence in all sorts of funny places,” he said drily.

“I know. There’s nothing much to suggest it in this case. Except that it was aimed at foreigners.”

“They kidnapped a foreigner,” said Mahmoud, “on this particular occasion. That doesn’t mean their target is foreigners in general. Next time it could be an Egyptian.”

“Even if it was an Egyptian, there could still be a Nationalist group behind it. Most of the kidnapping in Cairo is done to raise money for political purposes.”

“So they say.”

Owen sensed he had better move off the topic. Mahmoud and he got on very well together but there were some issues it was best to steer clear of. The Egyptian Nationalist movement was one.

“I agree with you,” he said. “If they’re Senussi, Anton’s is a funny place to use.”

“If they’re fundamentalist at all it’s a funny place to use. It’s not just they’d avoid it, it’s that they wouldn’t know enough about it to be able to use it.”

“Maybe it’s not a fundamentalist group.”

“There’s another thing. You said that in their note they didn’t tell Berthelot how to get to Anton’s. They knew he already knew. How did they know that?”

“Seen him go there.”

“What strikes me,” said Mahmoud, “is how remarkably well informed they are on the habits of guests at Shepheard’s.”

“It must be an inside job, you mean?”

“Or else they’ve got a very good contact there. Now if you put the two together, Shepheard’s and Anton’s, you get a picture of a group with a background of knowledge very different from that of the usual group. It could hardly be a fundamentalist group. It’s most unlikely, I would have thought, to be one of the student groups at El Azhar. They wouldn’t have the money for a start and it’s all a bit sophisticated for them. Too Western. It’s even a bit Western for the Nationalists.”

“I’ve seen Nationalists at Shepheard’s,” Owen could not forbear saying.

“And I’ve seen Nationalists at places like Anton’s. But on the whole they’re not the sort of places where you would expect to find them. The Nationalists you do find there are-”

Mahmoud stopped.

“Successful politicians?” suggested Owen.

Mahmoud was reluctant to say anything which might yield a later opportunity for criticism of the Nationalist Party.

“They are not always very good Nationalists,” he said unwillingly. “They are a bit too fond of Western ways.”

He closed his lips firmly. You knew he would rather bite off his tongue than say any more.

“Not the sort of people to go in for kidnapping,” said Owen helpfully.

“Not the sort of people at all.”

Mahmoud arranged his reconstruction for the following afternoon. When Owen got there he was having trouble: the usual trouble. It was not that, Europeans apart, people were unwilling to cooperate. On the contrary: they were only too willing; indeed, could not be dissuaded from cooperating. Every waiter in the hotel, whether he had been there on the day or not, stood beaming on the terrace. The waiter who had actually served Monsieur Moulin, distinguishable from the others by the fact that a certain apprehensiveness was mixed with his bursting pride, had only to take a step with a tray for a dozen other waiters to rush forward to help him. Much the same thing went for all the other participants.

On the terrace, apart from the waiters, things were not too bad. Generally speaking, when guests came out of the doors of the hotel and saw what was going on, they recoiled in horror and went to the other end of the terrace. A number of those who had been near the table on the day in question were prevailed upon to stay and sit, stiff and awkward, at neighboring tables. Their general sentiments were expressed most clearly by Mr. Colthorpe Hartley, held back lurking in the hotel on instructions from Mahmoud. “God, how embarrassing!” he kept saying. His wife, doing her duty, was out on the terrace, accompanied by Lucy, the only one who actually appeared to be enjoying herself. She caught sight of Owen in the throng below and gave him a delighted wave. A difficult cast to direct, reflected Owen, but on the whole they were playing their parts.

The real trouble was down below. At the bottom of the steps things were threatening to get out of hand. The vendors who normally lined the front of the terrace had gathered that something special was going on, a wedding, perhaps, or the arrival of a new boatload of tourists, and flocked to that end of the terrace. The space in front of the hotel steps, normally under pressure anyway from encroaching beggars, performers, artists and street sellers, and kept free only by the extreme vigilance of two policemen posted there for that purpose, was now completely taken over by the crowd. So great was the pressure that more sellers were forced up the steps, a situation they immediately turned to commercial advantage, and soon no one could move at all, either up or down.

Assisted by McPhee, who rather enjoyed this sort of thing-it was, after all, very like a football scrum-Mahmoud formed his constables into a wedge and drove straight down the steps, pushing everyone off them and forcing the crowd to give ground. In an instant the constables opened out into a ring, creating a small space at the foot of the steps in which the play was to be played.

The snake charmer, unhappy, and the snake, disdainful, took up their positions. Mahmoud mounted the steps to get a better look, nodded with satisfaction and gave the signal to begin. A small figure, hobbling with gusto, came out of the hotel entrance and began to make his way painfully across the terrace. A posse of waiters descended upon him at once, one taking one arm, another the other, despite the small figure’s vigorous attempts to shake them off. Two waiters ran in front of him, pulling back chairs to clear a passage. Another was so carried away that he crouched down in front of the pretend Monsieur Moulin and tried to flick specks of dust from his shoes as he stumbled forward.