by N E. David
He evidently believed his own propaganda.
Throughout the policeman’s provocation, Lee Yong had remained thankfully silent, but Blake could not resist rising to the bait, just as he’d done with the First Secretary.
“But this has nothing to do with Islam. It’s a popular uprising. In Cairo…”
“But we’re not in Cairo,” Rasheed cut in. “We run things differently here.” He gave another sneer. “The authorities in Cairo are weak. They should never have allowed that protest to take root. They ought to come to Aswan – we could show them a thing or two. It’s still like the old days here. We kicked the British out of Suez in ’56. We kicked the Israelis out of Sinai in ’73. You don’t suppose we’re going to let a little upset like this worry us?”
The scenes Blake had witnessed had been horrific. If they were anything to go by, he could well believe it – there’d been an element of ruthlessness about them he’d found chilling.
While Rasheed had been speaking, Blake realised he was in danger of falling into the same trap that had been laid for Lee Yong. He decided to concede the point.
“I’m sure you’re right.”
“Certainly I’m right, Mr Blake.” Rasheed wagged a bloated finger. “And when we’ve cleared out this little nest of sedition, make no mistake, you will thank us for it. You must think—”
But whatever it was that Blake was supposed to think, he never did find out as the phone jangled on the edge of the desk and cut the fat policeman off in full flow. Rasheed took the call, then turned his back on them and began a fast and furious conversation, becoming ever more agitated until finally he was shouting into the mouthpiece just as he’d barked into his megaphone the night before. He spoke angrily in Arabic, but in a form that Blake could not fully understand.
Blake exchanged glances with Lee Yong and raised his eyebrows as a means of enquiry as to her wellbeing. There was no response. With her hands still firmly in her lap, she seemed calm enough.
Rasheed slammed the phone down and turned back to face them.
“These renegades are like flies. They buzz about everywhere and make much noise. They’re harmless and they carry no sting – but it annoys me that they keep me so busy. Now I have work to do and it’s late. You’ll have to excuse me. Your Mr Eldasouky will be waiting…”
He dismissed them with a wave of his podgy hand and went back to his telephone.
Blake retrieved his passport and as soon as they were outside in the corridor they could hear his angry voice start up again. Blake ignored it. His first priority was to apologise.
“I’m sorry about that little story I concocted in there. But after that business about Reda being a spy, I felt I had to offer some other explanation. I hope you don’t mind.”
“No, not at all.” Lee Yong shook her head. “Anything…”
So even though they were now alone, she still didn’t bother to deny it…
They headed back down the corridor toward the front office.
Reda was already sitting on one of the plastic chairs, in much the same position as his neighbour, the jiggling Egyptian. He’d spent just the one night in jail and yet Blake expected him to look somehow different, as if the experience had fundamentally altered him. But he did not and he was easily recognisable, still as rotund as ever, and his face carried the same chubby weight of flesh as it had the day before. His clothes were soiled and he appeared a little dishevelled, but there was nothing to suggest he’d done anything more than have a bad night out on the town. It was not until he saw them approach and stood up that they noticed any change.
He hobbled to his feet and visibly winced as he leant to one side, trying not to clutch at the small of his back which was evidently the source of his pain. Movement of any kind was clearly difficult.
Blake had imagined that Lee Yong might rush forward and fling herself round Reda’s neck, but she hung back – although whether this was because he’d mistaken their relationship, or because she didn’t wish to add to the young man’s discomfort, he wasn’t sure. Instead, she stayed firmly by his side.
“Are you alright?” she asked.
Reda gave a weak smile and tried unsuccessfully to straighten up.
“A light beating, that’s all. It’s nothing to worry about, I assure you.”
He held up a hand as if to say, I’m fine but then sank back down onto the chair.
“He can’t walk back to the ship like that,” said Blake. “We’ll have to get him a taxi.”
Fortunately, along with his passport and Lee Yong’s money, he’d remembered to bring his mobile phone. A tattered poster pinned to the wall near the entrance doorway gave him a clue as to a number. Overhead, the ceiling fan whirred uselessly on like an old clockwork toy, and with the phone clamped to one ear, Blake covered the other with his hand to hear himself speak.
“Yes, yes, the police station – as soon as you can…”
In front of the row of black plastic chairs, Lee Yong was trying to set Reda upright.
“Here, let me help you with that.”
Blake pocketed his mobile and went to her assistance. Between them they managed to haul the young Egyptian into a standing position and with an arm round each of their shoulders, he hopped awkwardly toward the doorway.
They were about to pass through the opening when their progress was halted by an imploring cry from behind.
“Hey! You forgot to sign!”
On the other side of the counter, the desk clerk was waving a pen and tapping at his grubby sheet, his oversize tunic hanging off him as if he were a scarecrow.
Blake gave a sigh of irritation. In his desire to get his charges back to the ship the matter of paperwork had slipped his mind. As always, it would have to be dealt with.
He looked outwardly displeased, but at heart he understood the desk clerk’s need. He’d once been a bureaucrat himself. In fact, he’d once been part of the greatest bureaucracy the world had ever seen, Her Majesty’s Foreign Office with all its memos, manuals and forms, and yet somehow he’d survived. Now he was free and rid of it all, but it was not beyond him to recognise when a fellow worker needed help. He untangled himself and having propped Reda’s hand against the door jamb, returned to the counter where he took the proffered pen and signed off the sheet with a flourish.
The desk clerk beamed his thanks. His duty was done and he could go home that night with a clear conscience. For a few precious moments, Blake had made his impoverished life bearable, and he was happy. The chief would be pleased –although whether he would remain so was open to question. It would depend, thought Blake, on how long it would take him to discover that his most important prisoner had just been released into the custody of a certain Mickey Mouse.
High above their heads, the ceiling fan reached a vibrating crescendo and shuddered at the prospect.
Chapter Twenty-three
Getting Reda into the back of the taxi proved difficult. His body didn’t want to bend in the required places, or at least, not without pain. They finally settled for putting him in the front where they could push the seat back and allow his legs to remain straight. Lee Yong took up a place in the rear. Blake gave directions, then joined her and at the end of Sharia Abtal they turned down onto the Corniche and sped along the carriageway.
Framed against her side window, Blake watched as the light of each street lamp flickered across Lee Yong’s face. She still had a dour, almost sullen look as if every care in the world had been heaped on her, and whatever relief Reda’s release may have brought had not yet turned to joy. She’d said little since they’d left the ship and had remained mercifully quiet during the meeting with Rasheed, content to let Blake take the lead. He’d thought it a ploy designed to draw sympathy from the fat policeman, but she’d maintained her silence and he’d come to think of it as her normal state as if she became introverted when under pressure. Beneath that calm exterior, her mind was probably in turmoil and she was bursting with questions. She shortly turned towards him, and thinki
ng she was about to speak he put his finger to his lips and gave a little shake of his head. They were not yet alone, and for their driver, the price of having a poster on display in the police station was almost certainly the provision of information.
They might keep their thoughts to themselves but they could not disguise their destination. On the quayside next to the Corniche, the cruise ship loomed large and was ablaze with lights. With a good deal of help they prized Reda out of the front seat and sat him on a bollard at the top of the steps leading down to the gangplank.
“Wait here,” said Blake. “I’ll go and see what’s happening on board. We need to be as discreet as we possibly can.”
They’d succeeded in setting Reda free but that was not enough – his whereabouts needed to be kept secret and the ship was full of prying eyes and wagging tongues. Blake crossed the gangplank and slipped unnoticed into reception.
He returned five minutes later and found Lee Yong pacing anxiously up and down. Reda, unable to move, had to content himself with subtle changes in posture to remain comfortable.
“We’re in luck,” said Blake. “Everyone’s in the Forward Lounge watching television. The captain’s found a video copy of Casablanca and he’s put it on to keep them occupied. They daren’t go out for a run ashore in case there’s a repeat of last night. It looks as though half the crew’s there as well, so if we make a move now we might just get away with it.”
He turned to Reda who was beginning to get fidgety. “Here, put these on.”
He’d taken the opportunity to visit his cabin and had fetched a lightweight green gilet, his battered Panama and the pair of dark glasses he’d bought a day earlier.
“It’s better than nothing and there’s a chance you won’t be recognised. Oh, and I found this too.” In the crook of his arm hung a wooden walking stick. “I’ve no idea who it belongs to, but they really should take better care of it. When we’ve finished I’ll put it back where I found it, but in the meanwhile it’ll come in useful. Now come on, let’s get you ready.”
Reda struggled to his feet. He was in no position to resist and allowed himself to be dressed. Much to Blake’s satisfaction, the resultant disguise was quite effective and in a matter of moments the young Egyptian was transformed into an elderly gentleman with a bad back and a limp. Crouched forward and heavily reliant on the stick, Reda had no need to act the part. It came all too naturally and it was painful to watch as he hobbled gingerly down the steps, across the gangplank and into the foyer. Fortunately, the reception desk was unmanned and the lobby empty.
That was the easy bit, thought Blake. Now we have to get him upstairs.
But Reda had other ideas and began by heading down toward his old quarters below decks. Blake held him back.
“No, I think not. If you don’t mind me saying so, I don’t think that’s wise. That’s the first place someone’s going to look – you’d be better off elsewhere. You see, it doesn’t end here. I know these people – they’ll come after you, trust me.”
Reda was in agreement.
“Unfortunately I think you’re right, Mr Blake.”
He turned to come back, planting his stick firmly on the stairway. But if he could see the logic of it, then for the moment Lee Yong could not.
“I thought we’d paid their ransom – doesn’t that count?”
“You have a point, and that’s fine for Aswan,” said Blake. “But it won’t matter a damn where we’re going. Things will be different in Luxor.”
“So he’s not exactly free?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“So what do you suggest?”
“Well, I’d be happy for Reda to share with me,” said Blake. “I’ve a twin-bedded room and he won’t inconvenience me in the least. He may feel differently of course.”
“No,” said Lee Yong firmly. “That’s far too obvious. I’ll make space.”
She was quick to make the proposal, although it was no more than Blake had expected. Reda, he noticed, did not object.
The stairs were as troublesome as Blake had imagined, and it was some while before Reda was ensconced in Lee Yong’s room. Despite what she’d said earlier she made no pretence about ‘clearing a space’ and they lowered the young Egyptian straight onto the bed where he lay propped up by pillows. He expressed his thanks between grimaces.
“I’m very grateful, Mr Blake.”
“It’s not me you should be thanking,” said Blake. “It’s Lee Yong. I’ll let her explain. Well, I think I’m going to cut along and leave you both to it.” He’d already decided not to hang around – his continued presence was superfluous and a potential embarrassment. “I’m in Room 23 by the way. Call me if you need me. But don’t use the internal phone – you’re better off using a mobile. Here’s my number.” He found a scrap of paper on the desk and jotted it down. “I’ll leave it turned on just in case.” He took a last look round. “Well, goodnight.”
“Goodnight, Mr Blake – and thank you.”
Lee Yong showed him to the door. They were as safe as he could possibly make them, but her face still carried that careworn look.
“You needn’t be so worried – it’ll be alright.”
She did not appear convinced.
He found himself alone in the corridor for the second time that day. Before departing, he’d recovered his belongings from Lee Yong’s room. Draped over one arm was the green lightweight gilet while one hand held the dark glasses and the other the Panama hat. He put them on and affecting a pronounced limp, headed towards the stairway. To all intents and purposes, an elderly gentleman with a stick had gone into Lee Yong’s cabin and one had come out. If anyone should ask, he’d decided to say he’d sprained his ankle coming up the gangplank.
It wasn’t until he got back to his cabin that he remembered he still had over eight thousand US dollars of Lee Yong’s money in his back pocket.
Chapter Twenty-four
He awoke as normal, at first light and with the image of his telescope and tripod materialising in the corner. The association was so strong that he wondered whether there really had been a day before. Perhaps he’d simply fallen back to sleep and dreamt it all – the scene in Lee Yong’s cabin, the visit to the police station, it might all have been imagined in some semi-conscious vision. As if to confirm his delusion, Reda’s mobile phone and wallet still lay untouched on his dressing table.
But this was not Groundhog Day – something had definitely changed and it was not until he’d got up to visit the bathroom that he discovered what it was. A slight vibration was affecting the ship through the thrust of its propellers and as soon as he’d made himself comfortable, he went to the window and drew back the net curtain. The view he’d enjoyed for the past few days, the hill of sand and the Tombs of the Nobles, that had all disappeared and been replaced by the banks of the Nile gliding slowly by. Just as Mr Mohammed had promised, the ship had set sail and was now heading north towards Luxor.
The news inspired him to get dressed and go up on deck. After all that had happened, he wanted to check the rest of the world was still there. While they’d been bottled up in Aswan, there’d been a revolution, Reda had been arrested, then freed. He wondered what else might have changed and he was anxious to find out.
The sights that greeted him were both disappointing and yet refreshingly familiar. He’d missed the sunrise (once again), so the chance of viewing his skein of Glossy Ibis receded still further into the distance. Neither was he the first on deck, and he soon discovered that the same social norms applied as people nodded their good mornings. The sky was still blue, the sun (now up) was still a bright yellow and the Nile, forever brown and muddied, slipped unhurriedly by. And yet, just as he’d expected Reda to have moved on after his one night in jail, he’d thought it might all be different.
Although in a way, it was. What had changed was not so much the physical nature of things but rather his perception of them. At times like these, the defining moments in life, you became much more aware of you
r surroundings. Today the sky was bluer, the sun brighter and the Nile more full of life than he could ever have imagined before. Merely to exist in this wonderful place they called the world was a thrill that ran through him, and he was suddenly overwhelmed by the desire to see it all before some accident, some unlooked-for freak event, snatched it all away. Tomorrow, it might not be there…
A return to birding was in order and he searched around, desperate for something to fix on. To his left, a pair of Little Egrets lifted from their roost and flew across the bows. Further downstream a sandbank approached, splitting the course of the river. Here would be the waders he’d spurned the previous day and he hurried toward the forward rail where he could set up his scope and tripod. With luck, if the ship kept its course, he could catch his prey in the full light of the sun.
The spit drew closer and he scanned the foreshore for stints and plovers – but there were none. Higher up the bank, tufts of saw-grass sprouted where the water couldn’t reach and just above them, he detected a series of white blobs. His pulse quickened. These were the bodies of Spoonbills, surely, and focusing in he discovered a group of a dozen or so, taking refuge on the sandy island. Shaped like a flamingo, they possessed the same long necks and stilt-like legs, but instead of the upturned base of a hockey stick, their beaks were more like the blade of a cricket bat. Common on the Delta, they were rarer in the Nile Valley and were probably on migration, heading for the lakes and estuaries of Southern Europe where they could settle down and breed.
Spoonbills were a favourite of Blake’s. As a young man he’d known them over-winter, like Avocets, close to his boyhood home, and on coming back each Christmas or New Year to visit parents he’d made a point of going out to find them. To him, they were the most beautiful of birds. And yet they were so inherently ugly. Perhaps that was why he loved them so much, and like an elephant and the wrinkled skin of its trunk, they defined the point at which ugliness became its own form of beauty. Their bills were quite preposterous, and yet they carried them with such dignity and grace that it was impossible to think of them without affection. And here they were, a dozen of them, waiting to be viewed…
