Michael Pearce - The Mamur Zapt and the Night of the Dog

This was a mistake.

“How is she not like them?” Zeinab asked.

Owen floundered.

“Well, she’s quieter. More retiring.”

“She doesn’t seem to have retired so far,” said Zeinab. “What’s she like? Is she beautiful?”

“No. She’s not beautiful. I don’t know what she’s like, really. Mostly she’s been under that hat.”

“Cunning.”

Owen looked at the memo incredulously. It came from Accounts, and it said:

To the Mamur Zapt:

CAMEL WATERING

We notice there have been two recent transfers of sums from the Camel Watering Account to the Curbash Compensation Fund. We assume these transfers to have been made in error. We remind the Mamur Zapt that he has no capacity to vire.

“What the hell does that mean?”

“It means that you can’t switch money from other accounts into the Curbash Compensation Fund,” said Nikos.

“Why not?”

“Because you have no capacity to vire.”

“What the hell’s that?”

“It means to take money which is under one heading and put it under another. It’s an accounting term.”

“I can’t switch money from one account to another because I can’t switch money from one account to another. Is that it?”

“Exactly.”

“But I’ve always done it.”

“And now they’ve found out.”

“But I need to. The accounts are all wrong otherwise.”

“If I were you,” said Nikos, “I wouldn’t tell them that.”

“Who the hell do they think they are? I can vire if I want to.”

“No,” said Nikos, “you can’t. The restriction on viring was one of Cromer’s first measures. It’s a basic accounting principle. Ask Postlethwaite.”

“Well, I don’t know that I’ll take it up with him-”

“If I were you I wouldn’t take it up. It’s one of the things they’re very hot on.”

“Yes, but we need the money.”

“You’d better talk to Garvin. Though I don’t know that that will do much good.”

“About that hedgehog of yours,” said Cairns-Grant, the forensic pathologist.

“What?” said Owen, startled.

Cairns-Grant chuckled, pleased at the success of his little joke.

“That Zikr. The one with all the spikes in him.”

He wiped his mouth with his napkin and signalled to Owen to take the seat opposite him. He was still at the soup stage and was, indeed, having full Sudani, which was the main reason why Owen went to the Sporting Club for lunch.

“You’ve done the autopsy?”

“Yes. Very straightforward.”

There was a touch of regret, even reproach, in Cairns-Grant’s voice.

“Sorry.”

“Never mind,” said Cairns-Grant comfortingly. “You’re doing very well. It’s not every day you get a Zikr with knives all over. It’s out of the common run. I’ve great hopes of you.”

The waiter, who knew Owen’s preferences, brought him the full Sudani.

“What did you find?”

“First, that it wasn’t one of the blades still sticking in him that killed him. None of them went near a vital place. The Zikr may get carried away,” said Cairns-Grant, “but they’re not daft.”

“They know where to put the blade in?”

“Ay.”

“Even so-”

“I know what you’re thinking. Loss of blood. Well, there’s less of that than you might think. I remember when I first came out here being able to check some Zikr over after they had finished their dance. The Government wanted evidence that it was excessive and dangerous. Well, I knew some of the sheikhs so I got them to let me give their men a checkover. There was very little bleeding and when the blades were retracted the wounds healed very quickly. It took a week or two, of course, but even immediately after the dancing most of them were able to walk around quite normally. I dare say you noticed that yourself?”

“Yes,” said Owen, remembering.

“They’re strong,” Cairns-Grant acknowledged, finishing his soup and putting down his spoon. “They’re big strong laddies and very fit. But there must be another factor. And I don’t know what it is.”

He looked thoughtfully into space. The waiters, on whom he had the same effect as he did on Owen, thought the gaze was meant for them and rushed to bring him his chops.

“Ay, well,” he said, recovering and glancing down at his chops, “that’s another story.”

“How was he killed, then?”

“We found another stab wound. It penetrated the heart.”

“Not one of the blades still sticking in?” said Owen.

“No.”

“Fallen out?”

Cairns-Grant shook his head.

“Unlikely. Very deep. Inserted with considerable force. It would have taken force to pull it out.”

“Removed, then?”

“Yes.”

“Someone else, then. Not self-inflicted.”

“No doubt about it,” said Cairns-Grant. “Inserted from behind.”

Owen nodded.

“Okay,” he said. “Thanks.”

“An upward thrust,” said Cairns-Grant, “delivered by somebody small. About five feet six or five feet eight. I’ve tried it out.”

“He would have died at once, presumably?”

“Yes.”

“It must have been someone in the dance, then.”

“Another Zikr?”

“Someone who joined the dance,” said Owen.

“Got someone who fits?”

“Yes.”

“Good,” said Cairns-Grant. “Good.” He examined his chops with a view to dissection. “Well, young man,” he said, reaching out for his knife and fork, “you would seem to have a murder on your hands. Yes, definitely.”

They met at the Bab es Zuweyla, one of the old gates of Cairo, now the centre of the native city. As they approached the gate the street narrowed and became more mediaeval. The houses with their heavy wooden windows leaned over the street until they almost touched in the middle, making it always cool and dark. At ground level the street was lined with traditional little native shops, most of them carpenters, it seemed; and as they came through the Tentmakers’ Bazaar, with its gay awnings and saddle-cloth and leather work, they saw ahead of them in the archway of the gate the gleam of the blue tiles of the tiny dervish mosque.

Most of the bazaars were on the other side of the gate. There were nine main ones: the Silk Bazaar, the Cotton Bazaar, the Tunisian and Algerian Bazaar, the Silversmiths’ and Goldsmiths’ Bazaar, the Sudanese Bazaar, the Brass Bazaar, the Shoemakers’ Bazaar, the Turkish Bazaar, and the Scentmakers’ Bazaar.

The Scentmakers’ Bazaar, which was where Mahmoud was taking them, was one of the oldest and most traditional of the bazaars. The shops were mere cupboards, little dark recesses, six feet high, six deep and four wide, lined with shelves, in front of which was a long, low counter on which the owner sat, like some carved idol in a niche.

Beside him on the counter were large dirty bottles of gilt glass from which he would take out the stoppers and daub them on the sleeves of passers-by. On his other side was an array of cheap, gaudy small bottles for the scent he sold; and on the floor in front of him were ivory balls with cavities for scent.

Behind him, on the shelves of his dark recess, were large brown bottles criss-crossed with gold and rows of foolish otto-of-roses bottles, cut and gilt, but with hardly more inside than a thermometer. Sometimes, too, there was an assistant, a boy for fetching the bottles, a woman for modelling the perfume, but always, in this most traditional of bazaars, totally concealed in shapeless black.

Mahmoud, hesitantly, had asked Owen if Zeinab could possibly come too. Owen had put it to her and, slightly to his surprise, she had agreed. The Scentmakers’ Bazaar was not normally a place she would have allowed herself to have been seen dead in. Like many well-to-do Cairenes, she took her perfumes, with her fashions, direct from Paris. However, on this occasion she was intrigued and agreed readily enough.