He Shall Thunder in the Sky (6 page)

     “A slight accident. I’ve been waiting a good half hour or more,” said Ramses accusingly. “The concierge informed me you had left the hotel, but since the motorcar was still here I assumed you would be back sooner or later. Might one inquire —”

     “No, not yet,” said Emerson. “Was it here at Shepheard’s that you had your — er — accident?”

     “No, sir. It was at the Club. I dined there before coming on to meet you.” His lips closed tight, but Emerson continued to fix him with that cold blue stare, and after a moment he said reluctantly, “I got into a little argument.”

     “With whom?” his father inquired.

     “Father —”

     “With whom?”

     “A chap named Simmons. I don’t think you know him. And — well — Cartwright and Jenkins. Egyptian Army.”

     “Only three? Good Gad, Ramses, I had thought better of you.”

     “They didn’t fight like gentlemen,” Ramses said.

     The corners of his mouth turned up a trifle. Ramses’s sense of humor is decidedly odd; it is not always easy for me to ascertain whether he is attempting to be humorous.

     “Are you attempting to be humorous?” I inquired.

     “Yes, he is,” Nefret said, before Ramses could reply. “But he is not succeeding.”

     Ramses caught the eye of the waiter, who hurried to him, ignoring the urgent demands of other patrons. Being snubbed by the Anglo-Egyptian community has only raised Ramses in the opinions of native Cairenes, most of whom admire him almost as much as they do his father.

     “Would you like a whiskey and soda, Mother?” he asked.

     “No, thank you.”

     “Nefret? Father? I will have one, if you don’t mind.”

     I did mind, for I suspected he had already had more than was good for him. Catching Emerson’s eye, I remained silent.

     Nefret did not. “Were you drunk tonight?” she demanded.

     “Not very. Where did you go with Russell?”

     Emerson told him, in some detail.

     “Ah,” said Ramses. “So that was what he wanted. I suspected as much.”

     “He told us you had refused to help him find Wardani,” Emerson said. “Ramses, I know you rather like the rascal —”

     “My personal feelings are irrelevant.” Ramses finished his whiskey. “I don’t give a damn what Wardani does so long as David is not involved, and I won’t use any influence I may have with Wardani to betray him to Russell.”

     “The Professor felt the same,” Nefret said quietly. “He only wanted to talk to the man. We tried to warn him —”

     “How kind. I wonder if he knows that.” He turned in his chair, looking for the waiter.

     “It is time we went home,” I said. “I am rather tired. Ramses? Please?”

     “Yes, Mother, of course.”

     I let Emerson go ahead with Nefret, and asked Ramses to give me his arm. “When we get home I will rub some of Kadija’s ointment onto your face,” I said. “Is it very painful?”

     “No. As you have so often remarked, the medicinal effects of good whiskey —”

     “Ramses, what happened? That looks like the mark of a riding crop or whip.”

     “It was one of those fashionable little swagger sticks, I think,” Ramses said. He opened the door and helped me into the tonneau.

     “Three of them against one,” I mused, for I now had a clear idea of what had occurred. “Contemptible! Perhaps they will be too ashamed of themselves to mention the incident.”

     “Everyone who was at the Club knows of it, I expect,” Ramses said.

     I sighed. “And everyone in Cairo will know of it tomorrow.”

     “No doubt,” Ramses agreed, with — I could not help thinking — a certain relish.

     I had never known Ramses to drink more than he ought, or allow himself to be drawn into a vulgar brawl. Something was preying on his mind, but unless he chose to confide in me there was nothing I could do to help him.

Two

O
ne might have supposed that with a war going on, people would have better things to do than engage in idle gossip, but within a few days the news of Ramses’s latest escapade was all over Cairo. I was informed of the impertinent interest of others in our affairs by Madame Villiers, whose expressions of concern served as an excuse for her real motive (malicious curiosity) in ringing me up. As the mother of a plain, unmarried daughter, Madame could not afford to alienate the mother of an eligible unmarried son, though I could have told her Celestine’s chances were on the order of a million to one. I did not tell her, nor did I correct her version of the story, which was wildly inaccurate.

     Not quite as inaccurate as I had first supposed, however. One of the things she told me roused my curiosity to such an extent that I decided I must question Ramses about it.

     We were all together on our roof terrace, taking tea and occupied in various ways: Emerson muttering over his notebook, Nefret reading the
Egyptian Gazette
, and Ramses doing nothing at all except stroking the cat that lay beside him on the settee. He was his usual self, uncommunicative and outwardly composed, though for a while his face had presented an unattractive piebald appearance — one cheek smooth and brown, the other greasily green and bristly. Like love and a cold, the use of Kadija’s miraculous ointment could not be concealed. From her Nubian foremothers she had inherited the recipe to whose efficacy we had all become converts, though not even Nefret had been able to determine what the effective ingredients might be. It had had its usual effect; the swelling and bruising were gone, and only a thin red line marked his lean cheek.

     “Is it true that Percy was present when you were attacked the other evening at the Club?” I inquired.

     Nefret lowered the newspaper, Emerson looked up, and Seshat let out a hiss of protest.

     “I beg your pardon,” said Ramses, addressing the cat. “May I ask, Mother, who told you that?”

     “Madame Villiers. She usually gets her facts wrong, but there would seem to be no reason for her to repeat such a story unless there was a germ of truth in it.”

     “He was present,” Ramses said, and said no more.

     “Good Gad, Ramses, must we use thumbscrews?” his father demanded hotly. “Why didn’t you tell us? By heaven, he’s gone too far this time; I will —”

     “No, sir, you won’t. Percy was not one of my antagonists. In fact, it was he who brought Lord Edward Cecil onto the scene in time to — er — rescue me.”

     “Hmph,” said Emerson. “What do you suppose he’s up to now?”

     “Trying to worm his way back into our good graces, I suppose,” I said with a sniff. “Madame said that on several occasions he has spoken up in Ramses’s defense when someone accused him of cowardice.
She
said
Percy
said that his cousin was one of the bravest men he had ever known.”

     Ramses became very still. After a moment he said, “I wonder what put that extraordinary notion into his head.”

     “What is extraordinary is the source,” Emerson said gruffly. “The statement itself is true. Sometimes it requires more courage to take an unpopular stand than to engage in heroics.”

     Ramses blinked. This, together with a slight nod at his father, was the only sign of emotion he allowed himself. “Never mind Percy, I cannot imagine why any of us should care what he thinks of me or says about me. Is there anything of interest in the
Gazette
, Nefret?”

     She had been staring at her clasped hands, frowning as if she had discovered a blemish or a broken fingernail. “What? Oh, the newspaper. I was looking for a report about Mr. Russell’s failed raid, but there is only a brief paragraph saying that Wardani is still at large and offering a reward for information leading to his capture.”

     “How much?” Ramses inquired.

     “Fifty English pounds. Not enough to tempt you, is it?”

     Ramses gave her a long level look. “Wardani would consider it insultingly low.”

     “It is a large amount to an Egyptian.”

     “Not large enough for the risk involved,” Ramses replied. “Wardani’s people are fanatics; some of them would slit a traitor’s throat as readily as they would kill a flea. You ought not have expected the censors would allow any report of the incident. Wardani pulled off another daring escape and made Russell look like an incompetent ass. I don’t doubt that all Cairo knows of it, however.”

     Nefret appeared to be watching the cat. Seshat had rolled onto her back and Ramses’s long fingers were gently rubbing her stomach. “Is press censorship really that strict?” she asked.

     “We are at war, my dear,” Ramses replied in an exaggerated public-school drawl. “We can allow nothing to appear in print that might give aid and comfort to the enemy.” He added in his normal tones, “You had better not pass on any personal confidences to Lia when you write her. The post will also be read and censored, quite possibly by an officer who is an acquaintance of yours.”

     Nefret’s brow furrowed. “Who?”

     “I’ve no idea. But you do know most of them, don’t you?”

     “That would be an unacceptable violation of the fundamental rights of free English persons,” I exclaimed. “The rights for which we are fighting, the basic —”

     “Yes, Mother. All the same, it will be done.”

     “Nefret does not know anything that could give aid and comfort to the enemy,” I insisted. “However . . . Nefret, you didn’t tell Lia about our encounter with Wardani, did you?”

     “I haven’t mentioned anything that might worry her,” Nefret said. “Which leaves me with very little to write about! The primary topic of conversation in Cairo is the probability of an attack on the Canal, and I am certainly not going to tell her that.”

     “Damned war,” said Emerson. “I don’t know why you insist on talking about it.”

     “I was not talking about the war, but about Mr. Wardani,” I reminded him. “If there were only some way we could manage to talk with him! I feel certain I could convince him that for his own good and the good of Egypt he ought to modify his strategy. It would be criminal to throw away his life for what is at present a hopeless cause; he has the potential to become a great leader, the Simón Bolívar or Abraham Lincoln of Egypt!”

     The line between Nefret’s brows disappeared, and she emitted one of her musical, low-pitched laughs. “I’m sorry,” she sputtered. “I had a sudden image of Aunt Amelia knocking Mr. Wardani over the head with her parasol and holding him prisoner in one of our guest rooms, where she can lecture him daily. With tea and cucumber sandwiches, of course.”

     “Enjoy your little joke, Nefret,” I said. “All I want to do is talk with him. I am reckoned to have fair powers of persuasion, you know. Is there nothing you can do, Ramses? You have your own peculiar methods of finding people — you tracked Wardani down once before, if I remember correctly.”

     Ramses leaned back against the cushions and lit a cigarette. “That was entirely different, Mother. He knew I wouldn’t have done anything to betray him so long as David was involved. Now he has no reason to trust me, and a hunted fugitive is inclined to strike first and apologize afterward.”

     “Quite right,” Emerson ejaculated. “I cannot imagine what you were thinking of, Peabody, to suggest such a thing. Ramses, I strictly forbid . . . uh . . . I earnestly request that you will make no attempt to find Wardani. If he didn’t cut your throat, one of his fanatical followers would.”

     “Yes, sir,” said Ramses.

From Manuscript H

     They met just after nightfall, in a coffee shop in the Tumbakiyeh, the tobacco warehouse district. Massive doors, iron-hinged and nail-studded, closed the buildings where the tumbak was stored; but much of the area was falling into decay, the spacious khans abandoned, the homes of the old merchant princes partitioned into tenements.

     There were four of them, sitting cross-legged around a low table in a back room separated from the coffee shop itself by a closed door and a heavy curtain. A single oil lamp on the table illumined the oblong board on which the popular game called mankaleh was played, but none of them, not even the players, was paying much attention to the distribution of the pebbles. Conversation was sparse, and a listener might have been struck by the fact that names were not used.

     Finally a large gray-bearded man, dressed like a Bedouin in khafiya and caftan, muttered, “This is a stupid place to meet and a dangerous time. It is too early. The streets are full of people, the shops are lighted —”

     “The Inglizi are drinking at their clubs and hotels, and others are at the evening meal.” The speaker was a man in his early twenties, heavily built for an Egyptian, but with the unmistakable scholar’s squint. “You are new to our group, my friend; do not question the wisdom of our leader. One is less conspicuous in a crowd at sunset than in a deserted street at midnight.”

     The older man grunted. “He is late.”

     The two who had not yet spoken exchanged glances. Both were clad like members of the poorer class, in a single outer garment of blue linen and turbans of coarse white cotton, but there was something of the student about them too. A pair of thick spectacles magnified the eyes of one man; he kept poking nervously at the folds of his turban, as if he were unaccustomed to wearing that article of dress. The other youth was tall and graceful, his smooth cheeks rounded, his eyes fringed with thick dark lashes. His zaboot was open from the neck nearly to the waist; on the sleek brown skin of his chest lay an ornament more commonly worn by women, a small silver case containing a selection from the Koran. It was he who responded to the Bedouin. “He comes when he chooses. Make your move.”

     A few minutes later the curtain at the door was swept aside and a man entered. He wore European clothing — trousers and tweed coat, kid gloves, and a broad-brimmed hat that shadowed the upper part of his face but exposed a prominent aquiline nose and clean-shaven chin. The gray-bearded man sprang up, his hand on his knife. The others stared and started, and the handsome youth clapped his hand to his chest.