Michael Pearce - The Mamur Zapt and the Spoils of Egypt

‘Ah well,’ said Abu Bakir over Owen’s shoulder, ‘that’s where the Mamur Zapt comes in.’

‘Not the Mamur Zapt; the police,’ said Owen.

‘The police!’ said Monsieur Peripoulin dismissively.

‘I’m inclined to agree with you,’ said Carmichael, from Customs. ‘The police can’t do much about it. Half the staff goes out under Capitulatory privilege.’

‘That’s why I said the Mamur Zapt,’ said Abu Bakir.

‘I don’t want to have anything to do with it,’ said Owen.

‘Very sensible of you,’ said Paul.

‘If it’s tied up with the Capitulations we won’t get anywhere.’

The Capitulations were privileges granted to European powers by successive Ottoman rulers in return for organizing international trade.

‘True,’ said Paul.

‘In that case that’s something for the Foreign Office, not me.’

‘Mm,’ said Paul.

‘In fact, I wonder why I was there at all. Who called the meeting?’

‘I did.’

‘You did?’ said Owen, surprised.

They were at a reception that evening in what Old India hands called the Residency and new English ones the Consulate-General. The house was, indeed, in the style of English building in India, designed to protect against the heat rather than against the cold. The floor was tiled, the roof domed, the windows shuttered and the doors arched. Through one of the arches Owen could see Miss Skinner talking to Abu Bakir.

‘Yes. It’s moving up the political agenda.’

‘The export of antiquities?’

‘People are getting interested.’

‘What people? Peripoulin goes on about it, I know, but—’

‘Other people. People outside Egypt.’

‘They’re the ones who are buying the stuff!’

‘Yes. But other ones are asking questions about it.’

‘About us exporting antiquities?’

‘And other things, too. About our stewardship, for instance, of Egyptian treasures.’

‘We’re looking after them all right, aren’t we? Old Peripoulin—’

‘We’re selling them off. At least, that’s how some people see it.’

‘ We’re not selling them off. Private individuals are. That’s nothing to do with us.’

‘Isn’t it? Some people think it is. Some people think there ought to be a regulatory framework.’

‘I see. So that’s what the meeting was about.’

‘It’s very important,’ said Paul, ‘that people get the right impression.’

‘Maybe. I still don’t see why I had to be there, though.’

Paul smiled.

Across the room Miss Skinner was now talking to Peripoulin and another Frenchman, L’Espinasse, the Inspector of Antiquities.

‘There’s that damned woman. Why are you spending time on her, Paul?’

‘Her uncle could be the next President of the United States.’

‘Really?’

‘If he wins the election in a year’s time. He’s sent her out here on a fact-finding mission.’

‘You’d better make sure she finds the right facts, then.’

‘I am sticking to her like glue,’ said Paul.

Miss Skinner came towards them.

‘Perhaps you gentlemen can explain to me why it is that all the people in the Antiquities Service are French? No, don’t tell me! Can it be that the English concentrate on the money and leave the culture to the French?’

‘Shame, Miss Skinner! There are eminent English archæologists working in the service, too!’

‘And are there Frenchmen working in the Ministry of Finance?’

‘We work a lot in French,’ said Paul truthfully but evading the point. ‘Egypt’s links with France go back to the time of Napoleon.’

‘The first of the spoilers!’ declared Miss Skinner. She waved a hand at Owen as she moved away. ‘I’m so looking forward to tomorrow!’

‘What’s this?’ said Owen.

Paul looked uncomfortable.

‘I was hoping you’d come round for a drink.’

‘Certainly.’

‘And bring Zeinab.’

‘Certainly. But why particularly bring Zeinab?’

‘Miss Skinner would like to meet her.’

‘She’s never heard of Zeinab. Unless you’ve been telling her!’

‘She wants to meet an Egyptian woman. An ordinary Egyptian woman.’

‘Well, Zeinab’s not exactly ordinary—’

‘She’s the nearest I can get. You won’t believe how difficult it is in Egypt to meet an ordinary woman.’

‘I’ll see if she’s free,’ promised Owen.

‘I’m trying to get Miss Skinner’s mind off antiquities. The Woman Question is my big hope.’

‘Just a minute: antiquities. One of Miss Skinner’s hobbyhorses doesn’t happen to be the export of Egypt’s treasures, does it?’

‘As a matter of fact,’ said Paul, ‘I believe it does.’

Monsieur Peripoulin bestowed a fatherly pat as he went past.

‘A useful meeting!’ he said. ‘At last things are beginning to move.’

‘That meeting,’ said Owen, ‘it wouldn’t have anything to do with Miss Skinner’s being here, would it? The fact that you called it, I mean?’

‘It’s been in our minds a long time,’ said Paul.

Some time later in the evening Owen came upon Miss Skinner and Abu Bakir having an earnest chat in one of the alcoves.

‘I was just explaining to Mr Bakir,’ said Miss Skinner, her face slightly flushed, ‘that my friends and I are very concerned about the fact that so many of Egypt’s remarkable treasures are departing her shores.’

‘And I was explaining to Miss Skinner,’ said Abu Bakir, smiling, ‘that many of us in Egypt are concerned about that also.’

‘True,’ said Owen, ‘very true.’

‘Mr Bakir was explaining to me the Nationalist position.’

‘Not just the Nationalist position,’ said Abu Bakir quickly, his smile disappearing. ‘It is one, I believe, that the Nationalists share with the Government.’

‘Although, as you were saying, the vested interests of the big landlords make it very difficult to get anything through the Assembly.’

‘I was giving Miss Skinner some of the political background,’ Abu Bakir explained.

I’ll bet you were, thought Owen.

‘There are political difficulties, it is true,’ he said out loud, ‘but I think we’re beginning to face them.’

‘Yes,’ said Miss Skinner, ‘Monsieur Peripoulin was telling me about some meeting you had had recently.’

‘Oh yes,’ said Owen, ‘a very important meeting.’

‘Meetings are all very well,’ said Miss Skinner, frowning, ‘but it’s the action that results from them that is important. I understand, for instance, that there is a widespread evasion of the controls on the export of antiquities. What is being done about that?’

‘Ah,’ said Abu Bakir, ‘but that is just where we are taking action. The Mamur Zapt—Captain Owen here—is about to take steps to stamp that out.’

‘Are you?’ said Miss Skinner, beaming. ‘Oh, I’m so glad. I shall follow what you do with great interest.’

Owen was sitting in a café in the Ataba-el-Khadra watching the world go by. The Ataba was a good place for that because it was at the end of the main street, the Muski, which connected the old native city with the new European quarters. The square was, moreover, the main terminus for nearly all of Cairo’s trams.

At any hour of the day and deep into the night the Ataba was a tangle of trams, arabeahs—the characteristic horse-drawn cab of Cairo—great lumbering carts carrying stone, great lumbering camels carrying forage for the city’s donkeys and horses, native buses, of the open-sided ass-drawn variety, motor-cars (a few; tending towards the stationary) and sheep.

Quite why there should be so many sheep in the Ataba was a mystery. Certainly the Arabs were very fond of their fat-tailed Passover sheep and shopkeepers liked to keep one tethered outside their premises, to eat up the garbage, it was claimed; but why so many should be wandering loose in this most hazardous of places was hard to comprehend.