Death of an Effendi

by Michael Pearce

  ‘A good lawyer,’ said Mahmoud bitterly, ‘but a bad Egyptian!’

  All at once he seemed to crumple. He sat there silently for some time, brooding. A waiter brought more coffee but he ignored it. Owen, used to his violent swings of mood, waited.

  ‘Do you know what I have spent the morning doing?’ Mahmoud said after a while. ‘I have spent it talking to politicians. I have some contacts through the Nationalist Party. Well, I have been speaking to them. “This is an abuse of the system,” I say, “which must be put right.” “It must, Mahmoud,” they agree. “An individual’s rights are being disregarded,” I say. They look grave. “So can you help me?” I say. “Mahmoud, we would if we could, but—” they say. “But what?” I say. “Mahmoud, there are bigger things at stake.” “An individual’s rights,” I say. “They are deporting him illegally.” “Mahmoud,” they say, “which is the more important to you? Egypt, or this foreigner?” “The law,” I say. “The law is what is important to me. And if it is not applied justly everywhere, even to an insect foreigner, then Egypt itself is weakened.” “Mahmoud,” they say, shaking their heads, “what world is this that you live in?”’

  ‘It is too late to do anything now,’ said Owen.

  ‘No,’ said Mahmoud. ‘There is one other thing to try.’

  He stood up.

  ‘I am going to see Mirza es-Rahel,’ he said. ‘If the law can do nothing, then perhaps the press can. This,’ he said bitterly, ‘is the world we live in.’

  ***

  Nikos, Owen’s official clerk, was comfortable with paper, less at ease with people. What he would have made of Mahmoud this morning Owen could not think. But what he had made of the company files in the Registry was a lot more than Owen had.

  He laid some sheets of paper before him.

  ‘This is the list of shareholders in the Fayoum Light Railway Company,’ he said. ‘You will remember that shareholding was restricted to native Egyptians. The clerk in the registry has been checking how far this turned out to be so. He has put a cross besides those who are clearly not native Egyptians. The chief problem, however, is shares that are held in Egyptian names but almost certainly owned in reality by foreign investors. Now—’

  He directed Owen to another sheet.

  ‘This is a list of shareholders in the Covered Markets Company. You will see that there is considerable overlap.’

  He put another sheet before Owen.

  ‘This is a list of shareholders in other companies in the Fayoum. You will see again that there is considerable overlap.’

  ‘Wouldn’t you expect Fayoum people to invest in Fayoum companies?’

  ‘I’m not sure that I would. How many people are there in the Fayoum with money to invest? In particular, how many people are there with the money to invest in this company and that company and that—? We have checked some of the names that recur against census data. It is remarkable how many quite humble people in Medinet have really considerable holdings of shares.’

  ‘So you’re saying that somebody has been building up ownership under other people’s names?’

  ‘That is right. Now, I have also checked the names against data that Tvardovsky’s bank has supplied and in a number of the cases there is quite clearly a connection. Cheques have been made out to them, drawn on Tvardovsky’s account, and there have also been a lot of bearer’s orders. You must remember that many of these people, the ones in Medinet especially, do not have bank accounts. The orders are always for relatively small sums. Now, of course, with bearer’s orders it is not possible to identify names, although the bank clerks at Medinet may well be able to remember some of the people who have tendered them, especially if they are not people who normally have anything to do with the bank.’

  ‘You think Tvardovsky was paying them cash for the use of their names?’

  ‘Yes. And you should be able to check this. Tvardovsky will almost certainly have wished to hold the share certificates himself, which means that they should be somewhere among his effects.’

  He turned to go, triumphant. Nikos, too, had theories about the real world. It was a shadowy, exciting construct made of paper, of which the world of physical objects and people was a tedious reflection. Paper was where the exciting things happened, where real, dark secrets of the universe were revealed. Tvardovsky, he had decided, was a man after his own heart.

  ‘You know,’ he said, ‘you have to admire him. At the time he was stopped, he was well on his way to buying up the whole of the Fayoum.’

  ***

  Long mornings—Owen was awake at five, in his office by six and didn’t lunch till two—short afternoons (siesta for some) and long, dawdling evenings, that was the Cairo pattern of life. It was two o’clock now and he had arranged to meet Zeinab for lunch. He took an arabeah up to the Ismailiya quarter, got out at the Midan Suleiman Basha, glanced down the Sharia el Antikkahaneh el Masriyeh to where the Nile glistened in the sun and then set out along one of the side streets behind the Savoy Hotel.

  The street happened to be the one in which Raoul’s art gallery was, set there to take advantage, he hoped, of the tourists. It was a modern shop with a glass-fronted window and in the window were two paintings. Owen stopped to look at them as he went by.

  ‘An expert appraisal?’ said a voice behind him.

  It was Yussuf, one of the artists he had met at the reception.

  ‘What do you think of them?’

  ‘I think,’ said Yussuf, ‘that Raoul has put them in the window precisely because it doesn’t matter if the sun spoils them.’

  Owen laughed.

  ‘You artists!’ he said. ‘You’re always catty about each other.’

  ‘And we shouldn’t be, I know,’ sighed Yussuf. ‘Who is there to speak for us when we can’t even speak well of each other?’

  They walked along the street together, keeping, by mutual consent, to the shade.

  ‘On days like this,’ said Yussuf, ‘I sometimes think I would like to be a landscape painter. Preferably in the Fayoum.’

  ‘Like Natasha?’

  ‘Not like Natasha. Natasha is an amateur. Bother, there I go again, disparaging a fellow artist. Except that Natasha isn’t really an artist. But I still shouldn’t disparage her. Not everyone has a good eye.’

  ‘She has a good eye, has she?’

  ‘Oh, yes. Less for paintings, perhaps, than for objects. That’s how she makes her living, you know.’

  ‘Makes her living? I thought that maybe Savinkov—’

  ‘Oh, Savinkov looks after her. Perhaps I should say: that’s how she makes her pocket money.’

  ‘By—?’

  ‘Selling on objects.’

  ‘What sort of objects?’

  ‘Well, perhaps I shouldn’t say this, but antique objects. Usually not big enough to require an export permit, small stuff that is picked up locally and she gets from her friends in the Fayoum. You know that old Russian lady? She has contacts everywhere: with the archaeologists, with the shopkeepers, with the headmaster, even, who, I believe, is a particularly valuable source.’

  ‘And Natasha sells them on? To people like Raoul?’

  ‘People like. Not Raoul. I don’t think Raoul would bother himself with small stuff. Pottery, beads, that sort of thing.’

  ‘He was asking me about a mummy portrait, you know, like that one he had in his exhibition.’

  ‘Well, of course, that would be very valuable and he might well be interested in that. But that would, I imagine, require a permit. Unless it was in fragments.’ He looked at Owen. ‘You know about fragments?’

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘Well, the Department of Antiquities doesn’t usually bother about fragments. There are so many of them. In some places in Egypt you walk on them as you go about your daily business. Fragments of mummy cases, pottery. So a dealer can usually get away with expor
ting them. But then, when they get to their destination, they are fitted together again.’

  ‘And Natasha does that?’

  ‘I don’t think she actually breaks them, if that’s what you mean. She cares about them too much for that. But I think that what she looks for particularly are good examples of broken work, a mummy case, say, or a portrait, where the pieces, or most of them, survive. She is, you could say, a specialist.’

  They had come to the restaurant now and Owen could see Zeinab waiting inside. She saw Yussuf and waved a hand. Owen took him in and suggested he join them in an aperitif.

  ‘Well, perhaps fruit juice,’ conceded the artist.

  He sat down.

  ‘Yes’ he said, ‘she’s quite a specialist in her way.’

  ‘Specialist?’ said Zeinab. ‘Who?’

  ‘Natasha.’

  ‘Natasha again?’ said Zeinab, turning towards Owen.

  ***

  It was evening: the moment when the city woke up again after its siesta and became alive. The sun had gone off the streets leaving it just pleasantly warm. The sharp contrasts between light and shadow had disappeared, leaving a soft duskiness out of which people emerged without assertiveness. The stridency of the city during the day was suddenly muted. Everyone became gentler. Arabeah drivers no longer forced their way through the streets, the heavy carts had stopped altogether.

  As the lamps came on in the cafés the tables outside began to fill up with young effendis. In the side streets off the squares doors opened and children and women came out to sit on the steps. Sometimes a smell of fried onions drifted out from inside.

  The main thoroughfares like the Mouski filled with evening promenaders sauntering along looking into the glass windows of the shops. From inside, behind the counters on which the shopkeepers sat, came smells of spices and new leather, mingling, near the squares, with the sharper aromas of coffee and burnt peanuts.

  It was a moment of the day that Owen loved. He collected tomorrow’s newspapers from his office and wandered out into the streets, coming to rest, as he always did, at the café in the Musshi.

  It was where people knew they could find him and as he sat there, sipping his coffee, various people dropped into the seat opposite him for a few quiet words: a fat Greek, for example, who stayed for some time, the sweat spreading damp patches under his armpits, one or two nondescript men in galabeahs, even a donkey-boy. It was the time-honoured place for business in Egypt—not these great blocks like the Credit Lyonnais or the Office of the Public Debt—and for many of his agents a more comfortable place to come than his office at the Bab-el-Khalk.

  He took up a copy of Al-Liwa and looked at the front page. Then, puzzled, he opened it and searched inside. Nowhere could he find even a mention of Strakhov. Sure he had missed it, he went through again. There was nothing.

  He picked up the other papers. There was no reference to Strakhov in them, either. Well, perhaps that was not surprising. But that there should be nothing in Al-Liwa!

  He checked through the papers again, put them down, and sipped his coffee.

  Not long afterwards, Mahmoud, who also knew where to find him, came threading his way through the tables towards him. His face was expressionless.

  Owen tapped the newspapers. Mahmoud nodded.

  ‘I tried,’ he said.

  ‘And they wouldn’t—?’

  ‘They took the same line as the Ministries. I spoke to es-Rahel. He said they were afraid that it might prejudice other issues.’

  The waiter came and poured him some coffee.

  ‘So—?’ said Owen.

  Mahmoud shrugged.

  ‘So,’ he said.

  ‘Too late to do anything now,’ said Owen.

  ‘Yes.’

  They sat for a while in silence.

  ‘What now?’ asked Owen.

  Mahmoud shrugged again.

  ‘Back to Tvardovsky. Strakhov was only one lead among others.’

  ‘He probably couldn’t have told us much anyway.’

  ‘It was not what he had to tell that was important,’ said Mahmoud. ‘It is what they are doing to him.’

  ‘Yes.’

  He could see Mahmoud slipping into depression. To distract him, he told him what Nikos had found out. Mahmoud listened but without interest. His mind was still on Strakhov.

  ‘You’ve done what you could,’ said Owen.

  Mahmoud shrugged defeatedly.

  ‘Too late now, anyway.’

  Through the tables came a beaming man dressed in the livery of the Savoy Hotel.

  ‘Effendi!’ he cried.

  ‘Yes?’ said Owen, startled.

  ‘They said I would find you here!’

  ‘If it is the Mamur Zapt you search for, it is the Mamur Zapt that you have found.’

  ‘It is the Mamur Zapt that I search for. Effendi, there is a message for you. It is from Prince Fuad. He wishes to speak to you.’

  ‘Where is he?’

  ‘In Alexandria.’

  ‘Alexandria!’

  ‘Yes, Effendi, but he would speak with you by telephone. He rang your office, but—Effendi, these are his words, not mine—the idle sods had all gone home. So he rang the Savoy and told them to send someone out to find you.’

  ***

  ‘What’s the Savoy there for?’ said the Prince dismissively. ‘And, anyway, since you hadn’t got a telephone of your own—’

  ‘Prince, I’m always glad to answer the phone to you anywhere, but—’

  ‘Rang them up,’ said Fuad. ‘Rang them up as soon as Silvie left. About twelve o’clock. A bit later than I had expected. She’s a stronger girl than I thought. Anyway, rang them up, as I said. But got nowhere. So I thought, this won’t do, dammit, said I’d do something. So I drove down there—’

  ‘Drove down? To Alexandria?’

  ‘Yes. Nothing like talking man to man. Besides, time was short. It was already two o’clock by this time (had to have lunch, old chap—or was it breakfast?) so I knew I had to get a move on. So I drove down. Fast. Got two brace.’

  ‘Brace?’

  ‘Of sand grouse. Hit them as they were crossing the road. And a dog, but that doesn’t count. Nor the donkey.’

  ‘You hit a donkey?’

  ‘And a cart. Donkey’s all right, cart not too good, though. Nor the man.’

  ‘Prince—’

  ‘Slowed me up. Still, got there in time. “Can’t do this,” I said. “Can’t be sending chaps hither and thither. Especially to Russia. At least, not without my say-so. I want him out.”’

  ‘Out?’

  ‘Don’t trust officials. Never know what they might do. Safer to have charge myself. Interesting chap. Rings birds. At least, he did when he was in Russia. Shot one once myself, on my estate. A crane. There was this ring around its leg, attached to a cylinder about the size of a cartridge case. Inside, there was a note, to say the crane had been ringed in South Russia. Interesting, that, isn’t it? Long way, for a bird. And turned up on my estate! Can’t be much wrong with a chap who sends birds to my estate.’

  ‘Prince, we are talking about Strakhov?’

  ‘Who else did you think I was talking about?’

  ‘And you’ve got him out? Out of prison?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Prince, where exactly is he? Now?’

  ‘Here. I’ve got a place near Alexandria. Why don’t you come down?’

  Chapter Eleven

  A carriage was waiting for them when they got off the train at a stop just before Damanhur. It took them through fields of durra and, later, lentils and barley, until ahead of them they saw orange groves and, to one side, the palm trees of a village. They turned up through the orange trees and came to a courtyard with a long low house on one side and outbuildings on the others. In one corner of the co
urtyard there was a threshing floor, where a small boy was driving a pair of buffaloes over the cut corn on a wooden, harrow-like implement with what looked like a lot of circular knives.

  A raised verandah ran along the front of the house and on it two men were sitting having breakfast: Prince Fuad and a tall, thin man on whom a suit hung loosely. Fuad came down the steps to greet them.

  ‘He doesn’t shoot,’ he confided to Owen.

  ‘Well, no.’

  ‘Pity, that. You’d have thought a chap interested in birds—’

  He led the way up on to the verandah. Strakhov shook hands shyly.

  ‘Leave you,’ said Prince Fuad, and stalked off. A little later Owen saw him going into the orange trees with a .22.

  They sat down at the table with the used breakfast things. A servant came and took them away.

  ‘What am I doing here?’ said Strakhov.

  He seemed utterly bewildered.

  It was not an easy question to answer and Mahmoud did not try. Instead, he said:

  ‘I am the Parquet officer investigating Tvardovsky’s death and there are some things I want to ask you.’

  ‘Tvardovsky! Investigating?’ The Russian seemed stunned for a moment. ‘So,’ he said then, slowly, ‘it wasn’t an accident!’

  ‘That is for us still a question.’

  The man was silent for a while. Then he said:

  ‘No, no, you are right. I see that now. I did wonder at the time but I thought, I thought Tvardovsky is big, they will not reach for him. It is not the big fish they go for, but the small. Like me,’ he said bitterly. ‘So when they said it was an accident I believed them. Even though he had told me.’

  ‘He had told you?’

  ‘He knew. One day he came into the home—I run a home for seamen—and I could tell that he was frightened. I said to him: “What is the matter, Alexei?” And he said: “They have found out, and now they will try to kill me.” I said to him: “What nonsense is this, Alexei? Why should they try to kill you?” “They will think I have tricked them,” he said. “Well, in a way I have. But it is not as they suppose.” “Then talk to them, Alexei,” I said. “Tell them it is not as they think.” “Oh, they will not listen,” he said. And, of course he was right. One does not reason with the bear. “You must run away,” I said. “You must run away at once!” “No,” he said. “There is still a chance. If they see that there’s nothing they can do about it, then perhaps they will let it rest. There are other things for them to swallow, after all.” And after that he did not speak about it, and I thought, well, perhaps it had just been a bad day, and if he could forget about it, then I could. So I thought no more about it, even when he died. But now I see,’ said Strakhov, ‘that they reach out in the end. Even for the big fish. That is what they always tell you. “The Tsar’s arm is long,” they say, “and he never forgets.”’