Michael Pearce - The Mamur Zapt and the return of the Carpet

“Guzman?”

“Yes.”

“If you came late?”

“Yes. They had nearly finished. Well, they had finished really. They were just waiting for me.”

“You couldn’t help being late.”

“No,” said Ahmed. “I had run all the way.”

“Were they angry?”

“No. They just-sort of joked.” He flushed and looked down. “What were they talking about when you arrived?”

“Nothing really. They were just waiting.”

“OK,” said Owen. “So what did they say to you?”

“They told me where to stand.”

“By Farouz?”

“Yes.”

“And give out leaflets?”

“Yes.”

“That was all?”

“Yes.” Ahmed looked at him. “I swear it,” he said.

Owen kept his face quite blank.

“And Farouz,” he asked, “what was Farouz to do?”

“To give out leaflets,” said Ahmed. “I thought…”

Owen waited.

“Really!” Ahmed insisted. He seemed suddenly on the verge of tears. "He had a bag over his shoulder. Like mine. I thought-I thought-” He stopped.

“Yes?” said Owen.

“That he had leaflets in it,” said Ahmed faintly. “I wondered why he wasn’t giving them to people. I thought perhaps he was saving them to throw before the soldiers.”

His voice faded away and came to a stop. Owen was beginning to think he had stopped for good when he started again.

“He didn’t throw,” Ahmed said. “Not for a long time. I kept wondering why.”

Again the voice faded.

Owen let the silence drag on for some time before he prompted. “But then he did throw.”

“Yes,” said Ahmed.

“You saw?”

“He put his hand in the bag and took something out. I couldn’t see. The crowd was very thick. He tried to throw, but the crowd-he was all hemmed in. It went up in the air. Not very far.”

Tears began to run down his cheeks.

“As Allah is my witness,” he whispered, “I did not know.”

Owen waited for him to say more. When he did not, he said: “Let Allah be your witness still: surely you knew what these men would do?”

Ahmed shook his head decisively.

“No,” he said. “No. No.”

“You knew they were Tademah.”

There was a long silence.

“Yes,” said Ahmed at last. “I knew.”

At this hour in the evening the office was completely quiet. There were a couple of orderlies at the end of the corridor and occasionally Owen could hear their low voices. The constable who had brought Ahmed up was probably with them. The only other noise was the buzzing of insects around the lamp.

Owen got up, walked across the room and poured himself a cup of water from the large earthenware jug standing in the window where the night air would cool it. All the offices had water. Yussuf refilled the jugs every morning. At this time of year, when Cairo was so hot, it was necessary.

He poured out a cup for Mahmoud, and then another for Ahmed, which Ahmed took without looking up.

“When did you first learn they were Tademah?” he asked, and then, as Ahmed did not reply, “At once, or later?”

Ahmed’s lips tightened.

“At once?”

There was a half-nod, suppressed.

“When you got back from Turkey?”

This time Ahmed looked up in surprise. “Yes,” he said. “How did you know?”

“You were given someone to contact?”

Again the half-nod.

“Guzman?”

The shake of the head was definite.

“Who, then?”

Ahmed made no reply.

“Farouz?”

No indication. He had obviously made up his mind to say no more. Owen sighed. He would have to work harder.

“You knew they were Tademah,” he said. “Are you saying you didn’t know they would kill?”

Ahmed’s lips remained tightly compressed.

“Not even,” said Mahmoud, coming into the conversation for the first time, “when they ordered you to kill your father?”

Ahmed looked up thunderstruck.

“No,” he said. “No. How could you think- It wasn’t like that.” “Wasn’t it?” said Mahmoud. “What was it like, then?”

He pulled his chair forward so that he was confronting Ahmed. Owen moved a little to one side to let him take over.

Ahmed started to say something, stopped, looked from one of them to the other and then said: “It wasn’t like that.”

“You heard Mustafa at the meeting.”

“Yes, but-”

“You spoke to him afterwards.”

“Yes-”

“You gave him hashish. Too much. More than you were supposed to.”

“No-”

“You found him a gun. They gave it you.”

This time Ahmed was silent.

“And you gave it to him.”

Mahmoud paused deliberately and then followed up with concentrated ferocity.

“To kill your father.”

“No,” said Ahmed. “No.”

Mahmoud sat back in his chair but did not relax the pressure. “Yes,” he said. “Yes.”

“It’s not true!”

“All those things are true,” said Mahmoud. “I’ve checked them.” “Yes, but-”

“Are you saying they’re not?”

“They’re true,” said Ahmed, almost in a shout, “but not-”

“Not what?”

“Not the last.”

“No?” said Mahmoud disbelievingly.

“It was to frighten him!” cried Ahmed. “That was all. I swear it!” “Mustafa does not say so.”

“I told him!” said Ahmed, weeping. “I told him!”

“What did you tell him?”

“I told him it was to frighten only. That it would be wrong to kill. It was right to punish Nuri for what he had done, but not to commit another wrong! I told him. I swear it!”

“And Tademah,” said Owen sceptically, “did they want to punish him, too?”

“No,” said Ahmed. “That was different.”

"What did they want?”

Ahmed was silent.

"Money?”

"No,” said Ahmed. “Not money.”

“There was a note.”

“I wrote that,” said Ahmed, surprisingly.

“You wrote it?”

“Yes. To frighten Nuri. To make him think Tademah would avenge.”

“Avenge? Denshawai?”

“No, no,” said Ahmed. “The girl. Mustafa.”

“It was just part of your personal campaign?”

“Yes.”

“What did Tademah think?”

Ahmed lowered his head. “They thought it was foolishness,” he said.

“They weren’t really interested?”

“No.”

“What were they interested in, then?”

Ahmed was mute.

“Nuri’s deal? With Abdul Murr?”

Again Ahmed was surprised.

“You knew?” “They wanted to frighten him off?”

“Yes,” said Ahmed. “They weren’t really interested in the girl, but when I told them what I planned, they said they would help.”

“So they gave you the gun?”

“Yes. They said it would serve a double purpose.”

“ ‘They,’ ” said Mahmoud. “You are always saying ‘they.’ Who are they? What are their names?”

“I daren’t tell,” said Ahmed. “They would kill me.”

“You realize,” said Mahmoud softly, “that if you instigated Mustafa to commit a crime, whether Mustafa planned to kill your father or not, then you bear responsibility?”

Ahmed went ashen.

“I did not mean…” he whispered.

“Whether you meant to or not,” said Mahmoud.

“Who are ‘they’?” asked Owen.

Ahmed licked his lips. “I dare not,” he said. “They would kill me.” “I will start you,” said Mahmoud. “Guzman. Farouz. Ismail. Abu el Mak.”

The last two were the men Georgiades had arrested.

He waited.

"I do not know any others,” Ahmed protested.

“Were there others?”

“I do not know,” said Ahmed wretchedly.

“Did you ever see any others?”

“No. The printer,” he remembered.

“That was all?”