Michael Pearce - Mamur Zapt and the Return of the Carpet

McPhee always found relations with the Khedive’s staff very difficult. On the one hand he had great respect for royalty, even foreign royalty; on the other, he knew that not all the Khedive’s requests were to be met. Some were acceptable to the British Agent, others were not, and McPhee lacked the political sense to know which was which. The adroit politicians of the Khedive’s personal staff ran rings round him, forever laying traps which he was forever falling into.

Owen was responsible through Garvin directly to the British Agent and had little to do with the Khediviate, something for which he was very grateful.

On this occasion, however, he was unable to keep out. Shortly after he had heard Yussuf’s slippers slapping away down the corridor, he heard them slap-slapping back. Yussuf appeared in the doorway.

‘The Bimbashi would like you to join him,’ he recited.

He saw that Owen had not finished his coffee.

‘I bring you a cup,’ he said.

The man from the Khedive was a Turk in his late fifties, with close-cropped hair and a grey, humourless face.

‘Guzman Bey,’ said McPhee.

He introduced Owen as the Mamur Zapt. The other barely nodded. Owen returned the greeting as indifferently as it was given.

McPhee sat stiff and uncomfortable.

‘It’s about Nuri Pasha,’ he said to Owen. ‘The Khedive is very concerned.’

‘Naturally,’ said Owen.

‘He would like to know what progress has been made.’

‘It’s very early days yet,’ said Owen, ‘but I believe the Parquet have the matter well in hand.’

‘What progress?’ said the man harshly.

‘A man is held. He has confessed.’

Guzman made a gesture of dismissal.

‘The others?’ he said.

‘The Parquet has onlyjust begun its investigations,’ Owen pointed out.

‘The Parquet!’ said the man impatiently. ‘And you? The Mamur Zapt?’

‘The case is primarily the concern of the Parquet,’ said Owen. ‘I am interested only in security aspects.’

‘Precisely. That is what interests the Khedive.’

‘I am following the case,’ said Owen.

‘No progress has been made?’

‘As I said—’ Owen began.

The man cut him short. ‘The British are responsible for security,’ he said to McPhee. ‘What sort of security is this when a statesman like Nuri Pasha is gunned down in the street?’

‘He was not gunned down,’ said Owen.

‘Thanks to Allah,’ said the man. ‘Not to you.’

Owen was not going to be provoked.

‘The Khedive has many valued friends and allies,’ he said evenly. ‘It is not easy to protect them all.’

‘Why should they need protection?’ said the Turk. ‘That is the question you have to ask.’

‘That is the question the Khedive has to ask,’ said Owen, counter-attacking.

The man gave a short bark of a laugh.

‘If he is not popular,’ he said, ‘then it is because he shares the unpopularity of the British.’

Owen drank up his coffee.

‘Ah,’ he said, ‘I am afraid that is a problem I cannot help you with.’ He stood up to go. ‘If you will excuse—’

‘The Khedive wants reports.’

‘Reports?’

‘Daily. On the progress you are making in tracking down Nuri Pasha’s killers.’

‘That is a matter for the Parquet.’

‘And the Mamur Zapt. Or so you said.’

‘Security aspects only.’

‘Security,’ said the Turk, ‘is what the Khedive is especially interested in.’

Owen pulled himself together.

‘If the Khedive would genuinely like reports,’ he said, ‘then he shall certainly have them.’

‘Send them to me,’ said Guzman. ‘Directly.’

‘Very well,’ said Owen. ‘I’ll see you get them directly from the Agent.’

‘The Khedive has spoken to the Agent. Directly to me. With a copy to the Agent.’

Owen found the Turk watching him closely. He put on a charming smile.

‘Of course,’ he said.

‘Good!’ said the Turk. ‘See to it.’ And walked out.

McPhee swore softly to himself.

‘See to it!’ he reported. ‘I’ll bloody see to him. Just wait till I get to Garvin!’

‘He’s very confident,’ said Owen. ‘He must have got it fixed already.’

‘I’ll bloody unfix it, then. Or Garvin will. We can’t have the Mamur Zapt reporting to the bloody Khedive or where the hell will we be?’

Owen was thinking.

‘Gorst must have agreed.’

‘The stupid bastard!’

There was little liking among the old hands for the liberal Gorst.

‘If he has agreed,’ said Owen, ‘Garvin will find it hard to get him to change his mind.’

‘Stupid bastard!’ said McPhee again. He got up. ‘I’ll go straight to Garvin.’

‘Don’t let it worry you too much,’ said Owen.

McPhee stopped and turned and opened his mouth.

‘If the Khedive wants reports,’ said Owen, ‘he can have them.’

He winked deliberately.

‘All the same,’ said McPhee, soothed, ‘it’s the principle—’

Walking back down the corridor Owen thought that it was doubly advisable that no students should get into Abdin Square.

‘Yes,’ said Mahmoud. ‘The Khedive has been on to us, too.’

They were sitting outside an Arab café in one of the small streets off the Place Bab el Khalk. The café was tiny, with one dark inner room in which several Arabs were sitting smoking from narghilehs, the traditional native water pipe, with its hose and water jar, too cumbersome to be carried around so hired out at cafés. Outside in the street was a solitary table drawn back into the shade of the wall. The café was midway between the Parquet and Owen’s office off the Bab el Khalk: on neutral ground.

‘Reports?’

Mahmoud nodded. ‘Daily.’

‘Why is he so worried?’ asked Owen.

Mahmoud shrugged. ‘Perhaps he’s scared. First Nuri, then him.’

‘There have been others,’ said Owen. ‘Why this sudden interest?’

‘He knows something that we don’t?’ offered Mahmoud.

‘If he does,’ said Owen, ‘he’s not going to tell us.’

‘He has his own people,’ said Mahmoud.

‘Guzman?’

‘And others.’

A forage mule made its way soporifically towards them. Its load was so huge as almost to span the narrow street. Owen wondered if they would have to move, but at the last moment the mule was twitched aside and the load, bowing almost to the ground, grazed the table.

They were meeting at Mahmoud’s request. Later that morning he had rung Owen proposing a coffee before lunch.

Mahmoud waited until the mule had passed on down the street and then said: ‘I have been checking on the gun.’

‘Find anything?’

‘Part of a consignment missing last March from the barracks at Kantara. They suspected a sergeant but nothing was ever proved. All they could get him for was negligence – he was in charge of the store. He’s done six months and is due out about now.’

‘Probably sold them,’ said Owen.

Mahmoud nodded. ‘That’s what they thought.’

‘No lead?’

‘He wouldn’t talk.’

‘He won’t talk now,’ said Owen, ‘especially if he’s due out.’

‘If he was told he’d be all right?’

‘Out of the goodness of his heart? No chance.’

‘If he thought he was just shopping an Egyptian—’ suggested Mahmoud tentatively.

His eyes met Owen’s.

He could be right, Owen was forced to admit. In the obscure code of the ordinary Tommy, shopping a mere Egyptian might not count.

‘Just worth trying.’

‘I was wondering—’ began Mahmoud, and then hesitated.

Owen knew what he was thinking. It would have to be an Englishman and would probably need to be army rather than civilian.