Michael Pearce - The Donkey-Vous

All along the front of the terrace was a thick row of street-vendors pushing their wares through the railings at the tourists above: ostrich feathers, hippopotamus-hide whips, fly switches, fezzes, birds in cages, snakes coiled around the arms of their owners, bunches of brightly colored flowers-roses, carnations, narcissi, hyacinths-trays of Turkish Delight and sticky boiled sweets, souvenirs straight from the tombs of the Pharaohs (astonishingly, some of them were), “interesting” postcards.

The street behind them was thick with people, too. They could not be described as passersby since they had stopped passing. Mostly they gathered around the pastry sellers and sherbet sellers, who stood in the middle of the road for the convenience of trade but to the great inconvenience of the arabeah-drivers, and just looked at the spectacle on the terrace above them.

“With all these people looking,” said Mahmoud, “you would have thought that someone, somewhere, must have seen something.”

He went down the steps into the crowd. Owen hesitated for a moment and then decided to join him. McPhee turned back into the hotel to conduct yet another search.

Mahmoud went straight to the snake charmer and squatted down beside him. The snake charmer had rather lost heart and was trying to find an untenanted patch of wall against which he could rest his back. From time to time he played a few unconvincing notes on his flute, which the snake, now completely inert, ignored.

The snake charmer pushed his bowl automatically in Mahmoud’s direction. Mahmoud dropped in a few milliemes.

“It has been a long day, father,” he said to the charmer. “Even your snake thinks so.”

“It needs a drink,” said the charmer. “I shall have to take it home soon.”

“Has it been a good day?”

“No day is good,” said the charmer, “but some days are less bad than others.”

“You have been here all day?”

“Since dawn. You have to get here early these days or someone else will take your place. Fazal, for instance, only he finds it hard to get up in the morning.”

“And all day you have been here on the steps?”

“It is a good place.”

“They come and go, the great ones,” said Mahmoud. “Yes, they all pass here.”

“My friend-” Mahmoud indicated Owen, who dropped into a sympathetic squat-“cannot find his friend and wonders if he has gone without him. His friend is an old man with sticks.”

“I remember him,” said the snake charmer. “He comes with another, younger, who is not his servant but to whom he gives orders.”

“That would be him,” said Owen. “Have you seen him?”

“No,” said the charmer, “but then, I wouldn’t.”

He turned his face toward Owen and Owen saw that he was blind.

“Nevertheless,” said Mahmoud softly, “you would know if he had passed this way.”

“I would,” the old man agreed.

“And did he?”

For a long time the old man did not reply. Mahmoud waited patiently. Owen knew better than to prompt. Arab conversation has its rhythms and of these Mahmoud was a master.

At last the old man said: “Sometimes it is best not to know.”

“Why?”

“Because knowing may bring trouble.”

“It can bring reward, too.”

Mahmoud took a coin out of his pocket and pressed it into the old man’s hand.

“Feel that,” he said. “That is real. The trouble may never come.” He closed the old man’s fingers around the coin. “The coin stays with you. The words are lost in the wind.”

“Someone may throw them back in my face.”

“No one will ever know that you have spoken them. I swear it!”

“On the Book?”

“On the Book.”

The old man still hesitated. “I do not know,” he said. “It is not clear in my mind.”

“The one we spoke of,” said Mahmoud, “the old man with sticks: is he clear in your mind?”

“Yes. He is clear in my mind.”

“Did he come down the steps this afternoon?”

“Yes.” The old man hesitated, though. “Yes, he came down the steps.”

“By himself or with others?”

“With another.”

“The young one you spoke of?”

“No, not him. Another.”

“Known to you?”

There was another pause.

“I do not know,” said the old man. “He does not come down the steps,” he added.

“Ah. He is of the hotel?”

“That may be. He does not come down the steps.”

“But he did this afternoon. With the old man?”

“Yes. But not to the bottom.”

“The other, though, the old one with sticks, did come to the bottom?”

“Yes, yes. I think so.”

“And then?”

The snake charmer made a gesture of bewilderment.

“I–I do not know.”

“He took an arabeah, perhaps?”

“No, no.”

“A donkey? Surely not!”

“No, no. None of those things.”

“Then what happened?”

“I do not know,” said the charmer. “I do not know. I was confused.”

“You know all things that happen on the steps,” said Mahmoud. “How is it that you do not know this?”

“I do not see,” protested the charmer.

“But you hear. What did you hear on the steps this afternoon?”

“I heard nothing.”

“You must have heard something.”

“I could not hear properly,” protested the charmer. “There were people-”

“Was he seized?”

“I do not know. How should I know?”

“Was there a blow? A scuffle, perhaps.”

“I do not know. I was confused.”

“You know all that happens on the steps. You would know this.”

The snake charmer was silent for so long that Owen thought the conversation was at an end. Then he spoke.

“I ought to know,” he said in a troubled voice. “I ought to know. But-but I don’t!”

The donkey-boys were having their evening meal. They were having it on the pavement, the restaurant having come to them, like Mohamet to the mountain, rather than them having gone to the restaurant.

The restaurant was a circular tray, about a yard and a half across, with rings of bread stuck on nails all round the rim and little blue-and-white china bowls filled with various kinds of sauces and pickles taking up most of the middle, the rest being devoted to the unpromising part of meat hashed up in batter. The donkey-boys in fact usually preferred their own bread, which looked like puffed-up muffins, but liked to stuff it out with pieces of pickle or fry. They offered some to Mahmoud as he squatted beside them.

“Try that!” they invited. “You look as if you could do with a good meal.”

Mahmoud accepted politely and dipped his bread in some of the pickle.

“You can have some too if you like,” they said to Owen. “That is, unless you’re eating up there.”

“Not for me. That’s for rich people.”

“You must have a piastre or two. You’re English, aren’t you?”

“Welsh,” said Mahmoud for Owen.

“What’s that?”

“Pays Galles,” said a knowledgeable donkey-boy. Many of them were trilingual.

This sparked off quite a discussion. Several of them had a fair idea of where Wales was but there were a lot of questions about its relation to England.

“They conquered you, did they?”

“It was a long time ago.”

“It’s hard being a subject people,” they commiserated. “We should know! Look at us!”

“The Arabs.”

“The Mamelukes.”

“The Turks.”

“The French.”

“The British.”

“We’ve had a lot of rulers,” someone said thoughtfully. “When’s it going to end?”

“Very soon, if the Nationalists have it their way,” said someone else.

That set off a new round of discussion. Most of the donkey-boys were broadly in sympathy with the Nationalist movement but one and all were sceptical about its chances of success.