The Night of the Dog (11 page)

Back in the church the priests were shouting angrily at the men. The men, who were mostly Sudanis from the south, ignored them but looked uneasy.

Georgiades came back mopping his face. He stood in the centre of the church beneath the great dome and began to look carefully all round him.

The men, returned from the second time, stood waiting.

“Have you done the crypt?”

Georgiades nodded without speaking. His eyes were now on the roof.

The Father broke away from the knot of priests, shrugging off the efforts of the men to restrain him, and came across to Owen.

“I am not having this,” he said.

Owen ignored him. He thought he could hear a growing murmur outside.

“You have no right!” the Father said hotly.

“The Mamur Zapt has the right,” said Owen.

Strictly speaking, he was correct. The Mamur Zapt had right of entry to all premises in Cairo. However, it was a right which it was sometimes wise not to use.

“This is sacrilege!”

“My men have been very careful.”

He turned away. The Father hesitated, looked for a moment as if he was going to come after him, then shrugged and rejoined the knot.

The door of the church opened. The murmur of the crowd became more distinct. Mahmoud came in.

“Soon,” said Owen.

He would not be able to hold them for long.

Mahmoud went out. The door closed firmly behind him. He would hold the crowd as long as he could. Owen had no doubts on that score. But he was a Moslem and the crowd would be Copt. Owen himself would have to go out soon.

Georgiades made a sudden dart. There were no towers to the church, no staircases going upwards. But there would be access to the roof, if only for care and maintenance.

Georgiades had found out. It was a series of pegs in the wall going upwards. He began to climb. Two of his men followed him.

Georgiades was a bulky man, not good at this sort of thing. It would have been better to have let the men go first. He could see Georgiades stop to catch his breath. No doubt he was thinking the same thing. He went grimly on.

The pegs went up to the level of the bottom of the big dome. Now Owen looked, he could see a thin gallery running round it. It could be no more than a foot wide. In the darkness it was hard to see but it looked as if there wasn’t even a railing.

“Light the lamps!” Owen said.

The men ran round the church seizing any lamp they could find. Some of them brought candles and torches. There were indignant shouts from the priests.

As the lamps were raised, the shadows chased back towards the top of the dome. In the less than half light Owen saw that Georgiades had come out onto the gallery.

There was a sudden shout. Below Georgiades his men leapt up the last few pegs. Georgiades began to go one way round the gallery, his men the other. Their shadows loomed grotesquely on the sides of the dome.

And with them another shadow, smaller, hunched, desperate.

The shadows converged.

And then, before they quite met, the smaller shadow seemed to detach itself from the wall and move out into space. It hung there for a moment. Then it fell.

Dead! In his own church!” said the Moslems with satisfaction. There was general agreement—among the Moslems—that justice had been done. It was accepted without question, even by the Copts, that Zoser had been the Zikr’s killer and the Moslems were pleased that the matter had ended in such a satisfactory and clean-cut way. The British, it was agreed by all, on this occasion, were men of justice despite their many other faults, only they did have a habit of making tidy things untidy by over-insistence on bureaucratic process. Better that it should end like this, when justice was not only done but manifestly seen by all to be done.

Surprisingly, however, some Moslems, mostly at the upper end of the social scale, disagreed.

“It’s this tax business,” Paul explained, “this levy the Khedive is proposing. Word of it is beginning to get round and the Copts are already showing signs of growing restive. The Khedive is starting to realize that he might have trouble on his hands. So he doesn’t want incidents like this.”

“It’s a mess,” was the way Garvin put it later. “Administratively, I mean. It would have been better to have taken him prisoner. We could have delayed the trial until the tax business was settled. Then it wouldn’t have mattered.”

“Jane Postlethwaite wouldn’t have been here to give evidence.”

“You weren’t planning to use her, surely?” said Garvin, rubbing his chin.

That was one good thing to come out of the affair. Jane Postlethwaite wouldn’t have to give evidence. When the news was broken to her she suddenly went white. “Poor man,” she said. “Poor, poor man.” Zeinab took a more practical view. “It was a good job you didn’t have to climb up that ladder,” she said. “What ladder?” asked Owen. Zeinab was always imprecise about detail.

The reaction of the Copts was strangely muted. The Metropolitan, of course, complained—that was what Garvin was seeing Owen about. Various local delegations came to Owen to protest about the invasion of the church. Zoser was scarcely mentioned.

Andrus was a member of one of the delegations. On this occasion he said unusually little.

So far there was no word from the Patriarch, or from Abyssinia. Owen began to hope that they viewed the incident as too small to bother about. Perhaps it had not even been reported to them.

Mahmoud, busy as ever, had immediately switched to another case. It was clear that he regarded the matter as closed.

Owen was not so sure. Tit-for-tat- exchanges between the communities of Cairo did not necessarily end just because a man had been killed. He was waiting to see if there were any further attacks.

As the days went by, however, and no further incident was reported, he began to relax. His words to Osman appeared to have had some effect. On the Copt side, too, all was quiet. One morning he went so far as to say to Nikos that he thought the affair was now over.

“Yes,” said Nikos, “provided that it was the simple case.”

“What do you mean?”

“The simple case,” said Nikos, “is that the matter began and ended with the Zikr. He desecrated the tomb; he has paid for it.”

“Well?”

“The other case is when it doesn’t end there. Suppose Andrus were right? Suppose it were not the whole thing but part of a pattern? That gets more complex.”

“Polo,” said Paul.

“What?”

“Polo. It’s a game you play on horses. There’s a match tomorrow. Would you like to go and see it?”

“No!” said Owen.

“Pity. I’ve arranged for you to take Miss P.”

“I don’t want to watch polo. I’ve got better things to do.”

“Hasn’t everybody? However, that’s not the point. I need her out of the way tomorrow afternoon because things are reaching a juicy stage and I’ve got to work on her uncle.”

“Couldn’t you find somebody else?”

“I’ve picked you. Though not with the confidence I used to. However, with polo you ought to be all right. Just confine yourself to watching the game, that’s all. If a horse has to be shot, or, I suppose, a rider—perhaps they do that sort of thing in polo; I expect they do since the Army has a hand in it—you don’t have to go out of your way to ensure that she has a ringside seat. Nothing nasty this time, please.”

“It will be very boring,” Owen complained.

“I certainly hope so.”

“Mightn’t she find it boring too?”

“Oh, I don’t know. There are the horses. Don’t girls like horses?”

“I would have thought she’d have outgrown that.”

“I would have thought so too, but last night I spent a whole dinner sitting between two girls who talked about nothing but horses. That’s what gave me the idea.”

“I think she may be different.”

“So she may, and tomorrow’s the chance for her to find that out. I’ve arranged for you to pick her up from her hotel at four o’clock.”

The polo took place at the Khedivial Sports Club, or Gezira, as it was familiarly known, and the following afternoon found Owen walking dutifully about its spacious grounds with Jane Postlethwaite’s hand resting lightly on his arm. He had been somewhat apprehensive about the encounter in view of the way their last meeting had ended, but fortunately she seemed to have put her irritation behind her. They stood beneath the trees for a while watching the game.

“Do you play polo yourself, Captain Owen?” she asked politely.

“A lot of people did in India,” he said. Honesty compelled him to add: “I didn’t. I couldn’t afford the ponies.”

Jane Postlethwaite turned her candid gaze upon him.

“They are very expensive, I presume?”

“Not in themselves. It’s the things that go with them. Stabling, a syce—that’s a sort of groom—that kind of thing. You couldn’t really manage it on a subaltern’s pay. Of course, most of the officers had private incomes.”

The play moved over to the other side of the field and they stopped their conversation for a moment to follow it. Then a long hit sent ponies and riders thundering away.

“It seems wrong,” said Jane Postlethwaite.

“What does?”

“To spend your money on this sort of thing.”

“There are worse things to spend your money on.”

“And better.” She turned away. “Shall we walk through the grounds?”

The grounds were beautiful and well kept. There were marvellous flowerbeds, rose-gardens and herbaceous borders, well-established trees and shrubberies in full bloom. Yet the pride of the Gezira was its turf. Lush, green fields stretched in all directions. They were heavily watered each day in both the morning and the evening and kept their greenness in spite of the wear and the sun. All the pitches were lined with trees under which spectators could sit and which made splendid spots for picnics when no game was going on. There were several families under the trees now, with little children running around and babies crawling about in the grass. Jane Postlethwaite watched them with pleasure.

“I can see now,” she said. “I can see how it might be possible to bring up a family here. I wondered how an English family could manage it. It’s so hot. It would drain the energy out of you.”

“You get used to it.”

“Especially with children.”

“Lots of men send their families home to England in the summer.”

“I wouldn’t like that,” said Jane Postlethwaite with a decided shake of her head. “I wouldn’t like that at all.”

They made a wide circle through the grounds. By the time they came back to the club house the sun was already setting. Through the trees they could see the spectators returning from the polo. Because of the heat games never started before four and they had to finish soon after six because of the early Egyptian twilight. There was time for one innings only if you were playing cricket. All matches had to be two-day ones.

They approached the club house through a fine avenue of tall mimosas. Jane Postlethwaite dawdled.

“It’s lovely,” she said enthusiastically. “It’s just like one of those avenues you sometimes see in Italy. Different trees, of course. But against the sky, especially when it’s beginning to get dark… Have you ever visited Italy, Captain Owen?”

Owen hadn’t. To him Italy was as alien and remote as— well, as England was. It was ten years since he had been in Europe. He had left England when he was nineteen. The landscape he knew was that of the East.

Jane Postlethwaite went happily up the steps of the club house and off to the ladies’ room. Owen waited outside. At this time of day it was cooler outside than in the airless rooms of the club. He took a turn along a path between the great bougainvillaea bushes. A man came along the path towards him, obviously taking the air, as he was. He looked at Owen, stopped and stretched out his hand.    
_t

“Hello,” he said. “Enjoying the polo?”

“The grounds more,” said Owen.

It was Ramses, the civil servant from the Ministry of Finance whom he had talked to at the Consul-General’s reception.

“Me too,” said Ramses. “I bring my family out here for a picnic. The boys like watching but I can’t say I greatly enjoy it myself.”

They fell into step beside each other. Owen asked how John Postlethwaite was getting on in the ministry.

“All right. He’s very thorough. He knows his stuff.”

“I wish I did. Accounting has always been a closed book to me.”

“I don’t suppose it figures large in an officer’s training.”

“No. But when you move into administration you find you need it.”

“All administration is ultimately money,” said Ramses, who had a professional bias in the matter.

“Money. And people.”

“The two go together.”

“Especially in Cairo.”

They both laughed.

“I’m having problems,” said Owen.

“A soldier’s pay doesn’t go far,” said Ramses neutrally.

“No, no. It’s not that. I’m having problems with my viring.”

“You don’t have powers of virement, surely?”

“I’ve sort of had in the past.”

Ramses grinned.

“But they’ve found out?”

“Yes, but I need to vire, if that’s what you call it. I get my money through all sorts of old accounts. It might have been all right in the past but it doesn’t work now.”

“That’s the problem with Egypt’s finances as a whole,” said Ramses. “And that, actually, is why Lord Cromer suspended all delegated powers of virement. Everyone was switching money from one account to another and usually into their own account as well.”

“I’m not doing that. I’m just trying to make things work.”

“You won’t get them to agree to virement. What you’ll have to do is to ask for your allocation to be increased.”

“Garvin said I wouldn’t get anywhere doing that. It’s mixed up with the levy on Copts, apparently.”

“The proposed levy. It’s not been agreed yet. Yes, that’s quite true. There’s an across-the-board freeze on any increases in allocation until the levy business is settled. But there usually is at this time of year anyway. It’s getting near the end of the financial year. You won’t get any increase this year, but if you put in a good bid now you might get your allocation upped for next year.”

“Well, thanks,” said Owen. “It’s now that I need it.”

“That’s what they all say. Including the Khedive.”

They headed back towards the club house.

“It’s not just the levy,” said Ramses. “It’s the general political situation. The levy’s only a pretext.”

“I thought the Copts didn’t like it?”

“They don’t. But that’s not the only reason for introducing it.”

“The Khedive needs money.”

“He always does. No, it’s not that either, though that also is true. No, the real point is to make it impossible for Patros Bey.”

“Make what impossible?”

Ramses looked sideways at him.

“You haven’t heard?” He hesitated. “I thought you would have. Otherwise I wouldn’t have spoken. Oh well, you’ll soon know, or else you’ll find out: the Consul-General is trying to get the Khedive to make Patros Prime Minister.”

“A Copt?”

“It’s all these people wanting increases in their allocations,” said Ramses. “You need someone who is both competent at finance and honest. In Egypt the two don’t usually go together. Especially in politicians.”

“Just in Patros.”

“He’s come up through the ministry. The Consul-General knows he can trust him.”

“He’s one of the blokes that stops me viring?”

“That’s right. Only he left the ministry some time ago to go into politics.”

“Is he in favour of the levy or against it?”

“A good question, the answer to which the Coptic community would dearly like to know. The point is, however, that whether he’s actually in favour of the levy or not, he can’t accept the Prime Ministership while the issue is still on the agenda. He would lose all credibility with the Coptic community. So, if you don’t want him to become Prime Minister you keep the issue on the agenda.”

“Which the Khedive is doing.”

“Which the Khedive is doing for different reasons. He just wants money to go to France. The politicians around him are encouraging him in his insistence on the levy because they want to stop Patros.”

“And when is all this likely to be resolved?”

“It’s coming up to the boil, I would say,” said Ramses, “coming up to the boil.”

“I went to a funeral yesterday,” said Georgiades.

“I’m sorry. It—” Owen began.

Georgiades cut him off.

“On business.”

“What business?”

“Zoser’s. At least, it was his funeral. It was in the Mar Girgis. I thought I’d go and see who attended.”

“And who did attend?”

“Pretty well the whole congregation. Top to bottom.”

“Ramses?”

“And Sesostris.”

“Andrus?”

“Certainly. And did a lot of talking afterwards.”

“What did he say?”

“Couldn’t get close enough. I didn’t want to make myself too obvious. In view of my last visit.”

“A lot of people there?”

“Yes.”

“That worries me,” said Owen, “a bit.”

“It surprised me,” said Georgiades. “I’d thought he was a loner.”

“It looks as though, on this occasion at least, a lot of Copts identify with him.”

“It might be just that he’s one of their flock.”

“Wife there?”

“A woman smelling of perfumes.”