Oasis of Night

by J. S. Cook

  “I very much want to take you.” His grin flashed white in the darkness. “But not by force.”

  “That slap was a nice touch, Samir. Very effective. Mrs. Halim’s guests probably think we’re down here beating each other’s brains out.” He felt good pressed up against me like that. Yeah, Sergeant Samir was one hot little number.

  “I needed to speak with you. A diversion was in order.”

  “Is it about Sam?”

  “Yes.”

  I took a deep breath. “I don’t think we should talk here. It’s not safe. There’re too many people around. I don’t know who to trust.” I wasn’t entirely sure I could trust him, but I had to start somewhere. If Samir really was Sam’s number-one man, he might have information pertaining to Sam’s disappearance. “Listen, wait half an hour and then get over to Shepheard’s.” I gave him my room number and key. “Let yourself in and wait for me. I’m going to sniff around and see what I can find out here.”

  “There will be questions when we go back to the house… speculation. If we appear together, they will think we have reconciled our differences.”

  “Want me to smack you around a bit?” I grinned. “Make it look real?”

  “I think we might dispense with that,” he said dryly. “Allow me to precede you into the house. Then, after a few minutes have passed, you may return.”

  “Gonna make them think you beat me senseless, Samir? Some of that good, old-fashioned police brutality?”

  He offered a withering look in reply. “I have my reputation to think of.” With that, he was gone. I heard him climbing the hill behind the house, then the crunch of his feet on gravel as he rounded the corner. I smoked a couple of cigarettes while I waited, gazing out over the Nile and admiring the reflections of the lights across the river. What would it be like, sitting out here with Sam, enjoying the quiet of the evening? Would I ever see him again? He once said to me: Nothing is certain in this life. I couldn’t disagree. Since leaving Philadelphia, my life had taken some unpredictable turns, and if somebody had looked into my future and told me I’d be running a cafe in St. John’s, Newfoundland, I’d have said they were screwy. Yeah, I’d figured I was done with love, too, until Sam Halim walked into my life one day and kissed me. I guess Sam was right. Nothing is certain.

  Tareenah Halim met me at the door. “What is going on?” She was agitated, wringing her hands. “What have you done to Sergeant Samir?”

  “I’m sorry if I caused a scene.”

  She pressed her hand to her forehead. Clearly, she was upset. “He is my husband’s…. He and my husband…. Please, come into the house.” I let her take my elbow and guide me inside. I could almost hear Sam’s amused voice in my head: Jack, my wife is a very unforgiving woman. I hope you realize what you have done. I figured everybody would be staring at me when I came back in, and I was right. Sure, they’d seen plenty of fights in their time, but nobody quite knew what to think about the brash Americani. Usually, if somebody took a swing at a Cairo cop, he’d get his ass beat. They must have been wondering what the hell was going on, especially since Samir didn’t have me in handcuffs and wasn’t giving me the business end of his truncheon. Well, that was fine. Sometimes it’s good to let people wonder: it’s just the thing to shake information out of them.

  Once the furor died down, I went to the buffet and got another plate of food and a glass of juice, and I nosed around a bit. There was nothing much going on, though. I was just about to call a cab when the tall guy in the Greek uniform said something that caught my ear. It wasn’t so much what he said as the way he said it—with a tremor in his voice, a kind of expectation. “They ought to have known better.” He nodded, and then he laughed, but it wasn’t a pleasant laugh. “If they had known, they would have taken anybody else but him.”

  I didn’t get much else, but that was enough to set me thinking. After I said my good-byes to Mrs. Halim, I went out to hail a cab and found Shiva already waiting for me. I opened the door and slid in beside him. “You tailing me?”

  “Never, effendi Stoyles.” He yawned and switched on the dashboard radio. “To your hotel?”

  Something prickled at the back of my skull. “Why would I want to go to Shepheard’s?”

  He smiled. “The young policeman is waiting for you there.”

  I reached for the door handle. “I think I’m gonna get another cab.”

  “I would not advise it, effendi.”

  I was already out of the car and standing on the sidewalk. “Why not? I haven’t got you on retainer.” Something about this whole thing was weird. It seemed too much like a setup to me, and I didn’t like it one little bit. This guy had been dogging me since I’d come to Cairo, for no good reason I could see. Sure, every taxi driver wanted to make baksheesh wherever he could, but this was ridiculous.

  “I would strongly advise the effendi to get back into the taxi.”

  “Why?”

  “Simply let us say it is kismet.” He raised his hands and shrugged. “After all, I would be betraying a confidence if I told you that—”

  He didn’t get to say anything more. Gunfire opened up somewhere in the Cairo night, and two bullets shattered the windshield of Shiva’s taxi. I ripped open the door and dived back inside, but it was too late. Two blue holes in his forehead told me what I already knew.

  He was dead.

  I WASN’T dumb enough to stick around. I knew Tareenah Halim’s house was crawling with off-duty cops, so I took off out of there as fast as I could and didn’t stop running till I was a good five blocks in the other direction. I found a taxi near the Bulaq Bridge. He let me out in front of Shepheard’s. The night was warm, but I was freezing.

  I went up to my room and knocked on the door. Samir opened it and peered out. “What is the matter?” He drew me into the room and held my shaking hands in his. “You look terrible. What has happened?”

  I felt like somebody had slipped me one hell of a mickey. The more I thought about it, the harder it was to make sense of things. “Taxi driver…. Somebody shot him through the windshield.”

  “Are you hurt?” His quick, clever hands patted me all over.

  “No, no, I’m fine. I just don’t know why anybody would want to….” What the hell was I thinking? What was I doing here? This wasn’t my country; I had no business being here, and maybe I was doing more harm than good. The best thing to do was go home. Get on the first flight heading away from here and make my way back to St. John’s by any means necessary.

  “I will telephone. One moment.” Samir crossed to the phone, and I heard him speaking quietly in Arabic. I wondered what he was saying and to whom. Was this all part of the setup? Maybe he was going to turn me in, and I’d spend the rest of my life rotting away in some filthy Egyptian prison cell. “Forgive me.” He glanced at me, but spoke into the phone. “I am remiss. Stoyles-bey does not speak our language. Let me continue in Engleezhi. A taxi driver, shot to death, two bullets. Of course. No, Mr. Stoyles was merely a bystander. I will bring him in directly to make a statement.” He hung up and looked at me. “If you wish me to go, I will.”

  “No.” Dammit, I couldn’t get warm. Despite the heat outside, it felt like someone was pouring ice-cold water down my back. “No, I’ll order some coffee.”

  He chafed my cold hands in an effort to warm them. “You’re freezing. It is a delayed reaction. Come, hot water will help you more than coffee.”

  It was completely nuts, but then again I was hardly in a position to judge. I was ready to take whatever comfort there was about then. When Sergeant Ibrahim Samir took me into the bathroom and stripped us both naked, I didn’t object—and as good as Samir looked clothed, naked, he was goddamn spectacular. He was lean and tanned, fit like you expect a cop to be, with nicely developed muscles—just enough, not too much—and a tattoo of some Arabic words on his right arm. He was lightly dusted with dark hairs, thickest on his chest, arrowing down to where his nice, thick cock lay quiescent, waiting. He stood with me under the hot water, rubb
ing my back and arms, warming me.

  But I hadn’t been touched in a long, long time and pretty soon his caresses burned like fire. I shoved him back against the wall and kissed him, our bodies pressed together like I meant to push myself right into him, then and there. I held his face and kissed him so hard our teeth knocked together. I was grinding myself against him, wanting to be near him, to be near someone, anyone. I was moving too fast, practically forcing him to do what I wanted, holding him up against the wall like I’d hired him for the evening. Sam had once said to me “You do not allow yourself to understand the enormous debt you owe to pleasure.”

  I took a breath, forced myself to slow down. “Sorry,” I whispered. “I’m sorry.”

  “Come.” Samir took my hand. “Let us lie together awhile.”

  He laid me down and touched me all over, warming my skin with the palms of his hands, caressing me in a way I hadn’t enjoyed for a very, very long time. I was more than capable of giving pleasure to another, of holding someone in my arms to comfort and sustain them, but I had trouble accepting the same thing for myself. It had always seemed superfluous, something you did if you were involved with someone, if you were lucky enough to be in love. It wasn’t something I did—yet now, every time I tried to move, Ibrahim Samir gently pushed me down and kissed me, and warmed my flesh with his mouth and hands, and with his body. Time became a fluid thing, stretching out into forever, and I was floating on it like a broad swath of subtle water that effortlessly bore me up.

  He lay beside me, kissing me, murmuring gentle words and stroking me until my belly pulsed with heat and my swollen cock leaked fluid onto my thighs. I opened my legs, took him on top, and held him tightly against me as we kissed. I noticed a little of his iron control had gone; he was feeling this as much as I was. He trembled when I slid my palms down his back and stroked his perfect ass, and when I set my teeth in his shoulder and lightly bit him, he whimpered. I pushed against him, and he pushed back, his cock trapped between our bellies, subject to the delicious friction of our coupled skins.

  I guess the world went away a little bit then, because it seemed like there was nothing besides the two of us, clutching at each other and rubbing ourselves together until Samir cried out, his fingers digging into my upper arms hard enough to leave marks. His head dropped forward, his dark hair touching my shoulder as he shuddered through his climax and its aftershocks.

  I sought his lips and kissed him as my pleasure peaked and spread through me, a release so sudden and so violent, I shouted into his open mouth. I jerked, shivering, as the last of it dispersed itself, and lay for a long time with my eyes closed, my skin humming with a subtle pleasure.

  “WHAT’S THIS say?” I traced the Arabic lettering on Ibrahim Samir’s right bicep.

  “It is a quote from the Holy Quran. It says ‘Allah helps those who persevere.’” He took a drag off the cigarette and passed it to me. The Cairo night was very quiet outside the hotel room. Now and then, we could hear the far sound of a siren or the honking of a taxicab’s horn, but that was all. The radio played quietly in the far corner of the room, and Vera Lynn was singing “We’ll Meet Again.” We lay in each other’s arms, talking softly about nothing in particular.

  “We have a similar saying.” I smoked, handed the cigarette back to him. “God helps those who help themselves.” I looked into his big, black eyes, and I knew I was a real son of a bitch. “Ibrahim, where is Sam?”

  He stubbed out the cigarette and rolled up on his elbow so he could look at me. “You are sorry for asking it of me, and yet that is why you came to Cairo in the first place.” He kissed me gently. “I am under no illusions, Jack. This is but a pleasant interlude.” He was trying his best, but his expression said he was hurt, and I hated myself.

  “You been real good to me.” I waited for his answer. Either my guesses were way off or Samir knew something.

  “Captain Halim has been my superior officer for ten years, ever since I joined the police force. I fear I am not the easiest man, yet Captain Halim has a saying he feels applies especially to me.”

  “I bet he does.”

  “Some people are controlled only with patience.”

  “Mm.” I laughed. “I had a supervisor used to say that about me, too.”

  “I have had to learn patience, a great deal of patience. During our long association, I have functioned as what you Americans would call a right-hand man. Captain Halim has trusted me with things he would not normally tell anyone else. I have a special drawer in my desk, a drawer that is always locked. I have the only key. In that drawer, I keep a record of the things Captain Halim has asked me to do for him, the errands he wishes me to run, the messages he would like me to deliver.”

  I waited. He was going somewhere with this.

  “Captain Halim is a highly respected policeman in the city of Cairo. A highly respected policeman is often the target of those less scrupulous than himself, parties who believe his influence can be purchased for a few piasters. Shortly after the outbreak of the war, back in ’39, a group of Allied agents contacted the police commissioner, asking if there were any experienced officers who might like to aid the Allied cause; Sam Halim was chosen from a small pool and entrusted with certain assignments. One of these assignments involved the investigation of alleged war profiteering by a certain Greek, a man named Jonah Octavian.”

  “Octavian.” Yeah, I knew him. Jonah Octavian had kidnapped Royal Newfoundland Constabulary sergeant Alphonsus Picco and stuffed him in a cave on the South Side of St. John’s. When I went to look for Picco, Octavian showed up just in time to shove me into the cave with him. “Yeah, I know all about Jonah Octavian.”

  “Then you will know he is a lying, murderous dog who will do anything for profit. Captain Halim had been requested to go to Newfoundland, where Octavian’s latest project was progressing. His identity would be altered so it would seem he was a member of the British Consulate.”

  I am Samuel Halim, assistant to the British consul…. “But he wasn’t.”

  “No. Captain Halim often volunteers his services to the Allied cause. His mother was Greek and he attended Oxford University. The cause of the Allies is very dear to his heart.”

  “Sam is… very dear to your heart, isn’t he, Ibrahim?”

  He dropped his eyes and nodded.

  “I saw you at Mrs. Halim’s party, standing in front of his picture. You were touching it.”

  “I… Captain Halim sees me as nothing more than his… irritating inferior.” His smile was sad.

  I didn’t believe it, but I didn’t think I had the right to say so—not to Ibrahim Samir, not now. “So you know where he is?”

  He shook his head. “Captain Halim left Newfoundland en route to Cairo. He was following Jonah Octavian. Octavian is a Nazi operative who uses his business connections to glean information he sells to the highest bidder. Captain Halim landed in Cairo. This much we know. After that, he disappeared. We heard nothing from him for many days. Last week, a coded message arrived at the police station. We knew by the code used it was from Captain Halim.”

  “You’re kidding me.” My heart thumped against my ribs. “So he’s been in contact.”

  “The message was only two words. I must confess they made no sense to anyone, even to me.”

  I clenched my fists in the sheets. “What were they?”

  “Cafe Heartache.”

  It must have shown in my face. “Huh.”

  “These words mean something to you?”

  “No.” I concentrated on looking blank. “Nothing.”

  Samir glanced over at the clock. “Sahbi, I must go. My shift begins very soon.”

  I lay there thinking while he took a shower. The night air through my hotel window was very soft, almost a gentle caress, but I couldn’t rest. I couldn’t stop seeing those two blue holes in Shiva’s forehead, and I couldn’t stop thinking about Sam. Not knowing where he was or if he was alive was killing me. Maybe Octavian’s boys had gotten hold of him and wer
e torturing him. Mrs. Halim had asked me to circulate among her guests and see if I could find out anything, which could have meant she suspected someone at the police department of having inside information. She’d even told me someone had arranged to meet me at the party. Was Ibrahim Samir the man she meant? Under normal circumstances, this would have been plenty bad enough, but there was a war on, goddammit; Sam was out there somewhere in the midst of it, and there was nothing I could do to help him.

  I got up and threw on a bathrobe. The shower had stopped, and I heard Ibrahim moving around in the bathroom. I turned out the lights and stood by the window, smoking in the dark and listening to the radio. Everything I’d felt and heard and seen started to get hot inside of me, like it did sometimes. It was like the meter was running and the driver was gunning the engine, but you weren’t getting anywhere.

  “There is an answer.” Ibrahim’s arms went around me from behind, and he hugged me. I leaned back into his embrace. “Sometimes the thing to do is stop thinking about it.”

  “Yeah, maybe you’re right.” I turned so I was facing him. “Be careful out there tonight, huh?”

  He stroked my cheek. “I will.” His mouth was warm when he kissed me. I closed my eyes and melted into the caress. The darkness was briefly sliced by a sliver of light from the opened door, and then he was gone.

  I sat down on the bed and took a few deep breaths, trying to ground myself. Was the coded message really from Sam? And why “Cafe Heartache?” Why would he reverse the name of my cafe, and what was it supposed to mean? As far as messages went, it was damned obscure, or maybe that was deliberate. The sick, empty feeling in my stomach told me Jonah Octavian was probably behind this whole thing; he’d taken off for parts unknown after his little girlfriend, Julie Fayre, had tried to poison me, leaving her to face the gallows alone. Yeah, this sort of thing had Octavian’s nasty stamp all over it.

  The diorite bowl Blount had given me lay on the bedside table. I picked it up and held it, instinctively seeking out its cool, stone contours. I tapped it against my palm while I thought.