The Men Behind

by Michael Pearce

  “So that you can make sure?” Jullians swallowed. “Very well. You’re quite right. You can’t arrest a man just on my word. Only…”

  “Don’t worry. I’ve got two trackers outside. They’ll stay close.”

  “OK,” said Jullians.

  Abdul Kerim had come into the shop with Owen. He was good at this sort of thing, though not as good as the trackers. It took considerable expertise to follow someone in the city, especially in the crowded bazaar area. Owen sent him out to fetch the trackers to the back of the shop. They were waiting when Owen emerged with Jullians.

  Jullians pointed out the two men. They were standing some way up the street, apparently deep in conversation. Owen, mindful of Nikos’s comments, took a good look at them. There was little to distinguish them from hundreds of others. They were Egyptians—Arab not Copt—in their early twenties and wearing shirt and trousers. He tried to fix their faces in this memory but knew that the trackers would do it better.

  “OK now?”

  Jullians nodded and stepped back into the shop. He was pale but seemed determined. He probably had a strong sense of duty. You needed one to be a judge in Egypt.

  A little later he must have emerged from the front entrance, for the two men looked up and began to move unobtrusively down the street. Even more unobtrusively the trackers fell in behind them.

  Owen, waiting in a side street, looked for the guns as the two men went past. They would have to be in their shirts but the shirts were loose and he could not really tell.

  He had been wondering how to use Abdul Kerim. He would like him to be pretty close, in case of accidents, but not so close as to constrict the trackers. The Khan el Khalil was crowded and they would have a difficult enough job as it was.

  He himself kept well back. Provided they didn’t know him, and there was no reason why they should (unless they had been the two who had followed him? Were they? He couldn’t be sure), there was nothing to make Owen stand out. He was wearing a tarboosh, the potlike hat with a tassel of the educated Egyptian, and with his dark Welsh coloring could easily be taken for a Levantine.

  There was the doubt, though, about whether the two men knew his identity, so he kept well back. In any case this kind of thing was best left to the trackers.

  He didn’t find it very easy to leave it to them, however. He was taking a risk, a risk with Jullians’s life. It was always open to him to pick the two men up. The fair-minded Jullians might object that it would be improper to charge merely on his say-so, but other judges might well think differently.

  Besides, if the two men were out of the way, only temporarily, until the political crisis was over, that might be enough.

  Well, it wouldn’t really be enough. If they were terrorists, real or potential killers, they had to be got. Arresting on suspicion and then releasing wouldn’t do.

  Besides, there might be more of them.

  Going through the crowded bazaars, Owen found it difficult to keep them in sight. Occasionally he lost them for a few moments. When he did, and when he saw them again, he was relieved to see that the trackers were always with them, back a little and always with people in between, but near enough.

  Owen doubted whether an attack would be made in the bazaars. It would be easy to escape but interference was always likely. They would probably wait until Jullians reached the more open streets. Still, if they started moving up, the trackers would know what to do. They would intervene at once. Risk with Jullians’s life was acceptable but only up to a point.

  Jullians was leaving the bazaars now. The two men were still making no attempt to approach.

  An arabeah came up alongside Jullians. Owen cursed and began to run forward. He hadn’t allowed for this!

  Somebody got out of the arabeah and embraced Jullians effusively. They began talking animatedly. They obviously knew each other.

  Owen hastily stopped running and hoped he had not been noticed.

  The two men had been taken by surprise too, for they stopped for a moment as if at a loss and then turned quickly into a nearby shop.

  He didn’t see the trackers at all.

  He caught Abdul Kerim’s eye, however. Abdul Kerim was standing in a doorway. He nodded slowly.

  Jullians was trying to walk on but his friend, a portly Egyptian, was stopping him. He was clearly trying to persuade Jullians to get into the arabeah with him. He insisted. Jullians declined. Jullians made as if to go, the Egyptian seized his arm. He began almost dragging him towards the arabeah.

  In any other country it would have looked almost sinister. In Egypt it was quite normal. Egyptians carried hospitality almost to the point of it being a vice. If you had something and your friend refused to share it, you were really quite hurt. It might be a meal, a pot of coffee or an arabeah. If you had it and you met a friend, he had to share it.

  Jullians looked despairingly over his shoulder.

  The friend could not be denied. Jullians made a little apologetic gesture with his hand and climbed into the arabeah.

  Everyone was undecided: the two men, the trackers, Abdul Kerim, Owen.

  The arabeah-driver cracked his whip and the arabeah began to roll off down the street.

  The two men turned away.

  Owen made up his mind. He signaled urgently to the trackers to keep with him. Abdul Kerim he sent after the arabeah.

  The friend seemed harmless but it was as well to be sure. The arabeah was proceeding at a steady walk. Abdul Kerim would have no difficulty in keeping up with it. Even if it increased its pace he would probably be able to stay with it, which was certainly not true of Owen himself.

  He waited until they had all departed and then went back to his office.

  ***

  Abdul Kerim was the first to return. He reported that the friend had delivered Jullians to his own doorstep. He had seen Jullians get out and go in.

  Jullians rang next. He was very apologetic.

  “It couldn’t be helped,” said Owen.

  “Did you get them?”

  “That remains to be seen.”

  One of the trackers was the next to contact him. They had followed the two men into the Law Schools but there, in the crowded buildings with their many corridors, they had lost them. One of them was staying there in the hope of seeing them again, but for the moment they had lost them.

  Owen told the other tracker to go back there too and stay there for a few days.

  “If they’re students,” he said to Nikos, “they’ll see them sooner or later. If they’re not students and just using it as a cover, that makes it more difficult.”

  There for the moment they had to leave it; but Nikos rejoiced in the accession of hard data: properly observed, as he pointed out to Owen.

  “There is, of course, another thing that is becoming clear,” he said. “The more examples you get, the more evidence you have, not just about the followers or attackers but also about the sort of people who are followed or attacked.”

  “Well?”

  “Every single one so far has been in Government service—a civil servant.”

  Chapter Three

  I don’t think I like that,” said Paul.

  “Of course, there’s not much to go on yet.”

  “Not many people dead, you mean?”

  “There isn’t anybody dead yet. All we’ve got to go on is one attempted shooting and several cases of suspected following. It’s early days.”

  “Look,” said Paul, “you may take a detached view but there are a lot of people who won’t. All civil servants for a start.”

  “Do they have to know?”

  “Don’t you think they ought to be warned?”

  “I’m wondering. You see, it’s like this. At the moment we’ve got, I think, only one terrorist group operating. They’re different from the usual terrorist group in that the usual group c
oncentrates on one particular target, the Consul-General, say, whereas this group aims at a whole class. I suppose they think that way they’ll undermine morale over a much wider area.”

  “They’re dead right,” said Paul.

  “But the point is there’s only one small group. And while it stays like that we’ve got a hope of localizing it. Now if we warn everybody, it’s not just the civil servants who are going to hear. What I’m worried about is if the idea gets around—have a civil servant for breakfast—other groups are going to say, what a good idea, we’ll join in.”

  “You don’t think they’ve got the idea already?”

  “No. As I say, I think there’s only one group operating. Maybe some people are beginning to put two and two together and are saying, hello, they’re having a go at the British, but it’s at a very general level. They’re not saying, Christ, I’m a civil servant and they’re after me.”

  “How long do you think it will be before they get that far?”

  “Maybe long enough for us to get the group.”

  They were having a drink at the Sporting Club after playing tennis. They had, in fact, been standing in for John and his partner, another officer, both now confined to barracks. John was not happy.

  “It’s a pity you let those two go,” said Paul. “You should have picked them up while you could.”

  “I wasn’t sure. Jullians might have been imagining things. Think what a fuss the Press would have made if we’d picked the wrong people up.”

  “You control the Press, don’t you?”

  Press censorship was another of the Mamur Zapt’s functions.

  “I don’t control it. I just cut bits out.”

  “That would do.”

  “No, it wouldn’t. Those are the bits that get around quickest.”

  “It would have been worth the risk.”

  “I wanted to get the rest of the group.”

  Paul ruminated.

  “I suppose you’re right. You’ve got to balance risks. However, Gareth, I’m beginning to worry about you. You’re taking an increasingly cold-blooded view of things. It’s not like you. I shall ask Zeinab to straighten you out.”

  “It’s not something I like.”

  “No. Well, going back to this question of warning people. I’m still not happy about letting them go as unsuspecting lambs to the slaughter. You know about it and I know about it. Oughtn’t others too, so that they could take precautions?”

  “What precautions could they take?”

  “See they’re not being followed. Stay at home. I know it’s not much, but oughtn’t they to have the chance? The ones most at risk, at any rate?”

  “The judges?”

  “For instance.”

  Owen sipped his drink thoughtfully.

  “The trouble is,” he said, “where do you draw the line? Would you have said Fairclough was most at risk? Don’t we leave ourselves open to the charge of looking after the people at the top and letting the poor devils at the bottom, the Faircloughs, fend for themselves?”

  Paul was silent. After a while he shrugged.

  “OK,” he said, “so what are we going to do? Leave well alone?”

  “I’m not too happy about that either,” Owen admitted.

  Paul went on thinking.

  “What we could do,” he said, “is issue a confidential warning to Government employees to lie low generally for the duration of the present political emergency. We could tie it to that, not to any terrorist activity. You know, say that choice of a government is a matter for the Egyptians only, that it’s best if the British are seen to be having nothing to do with it, that in the circumstances, just for the time being, while the crisis remains unresolved, it might be better if everyone kept out of sight.”

  “Like the Army?”

  “Like the Army.” Paul brightened. “That’s it! It will look as if we have got a policy. I’ll get the Old Man on to it first thing in the morning.”

  “It’ll make the Army happier too.”

  “Yes.” Paul looked at him reflectively. “Although, you know…Are you sure you wouldn’t like to change your mind? In the circumstances.”

  “About keeping the Army out of it? Quite sure,” said Owen.

  ***

  Fairclough sat uncomfortably on his chair, a worried expression on his face. Dark smudges of moisture were spreading out almost visibly beneath the armpits of his suit. It was very hot in the room. A fan was going but with three people in the small space the temperature had risen uncomfortably.

  The Parquet official, Mohammed Bishari, had almost completed his questioning. Owen wondered why he was there. It was not usual for the Parquet to invite him to sit in on its cases. However, he had wanted to find out from Mohammed Bishari how the case was going anyway, so had come readily enough.

  Mohammed Bishari was a wiry, intense little man in his early forties. They would have put one of their most experienced men on the case since it involved a Britisher.

  He had been taking Fairclough through the events on the day of the shooting, concentrating on the homeward ride. He was very thorough. He had even asked Fairclough where the donkey was tethered during office hours.

  He was coming to the end of that part. He must have asked Fairclough those questions before, since they were written up in his preliminary report, a copy of which had been sent to Owen. Fairclough hardly needed to think to answer them. What Bishari was doing, presumably, was confirming things for the record.

  The report drawn up by the Parquet official was very important in the Egyptian judicial system. The Egyptian system was based on the Code Napoléon and, as in France, the Parquet had the responsibility not just of investigating but also of preparing the case and carrying through any prosecution. The court often decided issues on the basis of the Parquet’s report, or procès-verbal, rather than on the basis of testimony in court, which in Egypt was probably wise.

  Something in Mohammed Bishari’s voice warned Owen to pay attention. He was asking now about Fairclough’s private life, whether there was anyone in it who might bear him a grudge.

  Fairclough didn’t think so.

  “Servants?” asked Mohammed Bishari casually. “Servants in the past?”

  Again Fairclough didn’t think so.

  “Someone you’ve dismissed?”

  Fairclough thought hard.

  “I’ve only had three servants all the time I’ve been here,” he said. “There’s Ali—he’s my cook, and I’ve had him ever since I came. He was Hetherington’s cook and he passed him on to me when he went to Juba, because Ali didn’t want to go down there. I’ve had one or two house-boys. Abdul, that’s the one I’ve got now, I’ve had for a couple of years.”

  “Eighteen months,” said Mohammed Bishari.

  “Well, he’s all right. No grudge there.”

  “Before him?”

  “Ibrahim? Well, I did sack him. Beggar was at the drink. I marked the bottle and caught him red-handed. But that kind of thing happens all the time. You don’t bear grudges. Not to the extent of killing, anyway.”

  “You didn’t beat him?”

  “Kicked his ass occasionally. Have you talked to him? He doesn’t say I did, does he?” Fairclough looked at Mohammed Bishari indignantly.

  “He does say you did, as a matter of fact,” said Mohammed Bishari. “But they all say that and I didn’t necessarily believe him.”

  “Well, I bloody didn’t,” said Fairclough. “I don’t believe in that sort of thing. Ask Ali.”

  “We have. On the whole he confirms what you say.”

  Fairclough snorted.

  “However,” said Mohammed Bishari, “Ibrahim also told us something else, which, admittedly after a considerable time, Ali also confirmed. While Ibrahim was with you, he undertook various errands for you. He used to fetch women, for examp
le.”

  Fairclough flushed and looked at his shoes. “Needs of the flesh,” he muttered.

  “Quite so. We don’t need to go into that. Nor where he got the women. However, on one occasion there was some difficulty. A woman had come to you while her husband was away. When he got back, neighbors told him. He came round to see you.”

  “He was about off his rocker,” said Fairclough. “Foaming at the mouth, that sort of thing. He had a bloody great knife. It took three of us to hold him—Ali, Ibrahim and me.”

  “You gave him some money. Quite a lot.”

  “Poor beggar!” said Fairclough.

  “In fact, you gave him too much. Because when he had cooled down he realized that you were worth more than his wife was. He divorced her and kept coming back to you.”

  “Only once or twice. His wife came back too. Separately, I mean, after he’d got rid of her.”

  “You paid her too?”

  “Nothing much. Either of them.”

  “Enough for it to matter. Enough, after a while, to make you say you were going to stop it.”

  “Couldn’t go on forever,” said Fairclough.

  “You refused to pay any more?”

  “That’s right,” Fairclough looked at him incredulously. “You’re not saying that old Abdul—!”

  “He might be considered to have a grudge.”

  “Yes, but old Abdul—!”

  “He came for you with a knife.”

  “Yes, but that’s different. Anyway, it had all blown over.”

  “You had just stopped giving him money,” Mohammed Bishari pointed out.

  “Yes, but—” Fairclough looked at Mohammed Bishari and shook his head. “I just don’t believe it,” he said.

  Neither did Owen. Nor, he suspected, did Bishari. The Parquet man, however, went on with his questions, continuing on the same line. Were there other men who might have a similar grievance? Fairclough thought not. In fact, he was pretty sure. But Ibrahim had been on other errands for him, surely? Well, yes, that was true. But he didn’t think husbands were involved.