Aggressor

by Nick Cook

  Neither of them said a word. Ram raised his foot and gave the door a sharp kick. It flew open and Girling was inside, calling her name and getting nothing in reply. When he saw the overnight bag by the front door it only served to heighten his anxiety. He checked each room in turn, moving down the corridor, Ram behind, the Israeli’s outstretched hand brandishing a small, compact automatic. Girling stood before the bedroom, its door slightly ajar. It was the last room in the apartment. He peeped through the crack and caught a glimpse of clothes strewn around the end of the bed. He called out her name, but again there was no reply. He took a deep breath and stepped inside. He had braced himself for the worst, but nothing had prepared him for the sight that confronted him.

  Al-Qadi lay in the centre of the bed, belly up, arms and legs outstretched. His face had gone a shade that was something between a pasty yellow and a watery grey, his lips a deeper hue of the same, sickening colour.

  The tip of his blackened tongue poked from between his teeth. It was just possible to see the hilt of the paper-knife protruding from a hole somewhere below the investigator’s heart. There was blood all over the investigator’s hands. In his last moments of life, it seemed Al-Qadi had tried to prise the dagger from his chest, but the blade had stuck fast between two ribs. The blood had poured through the wound, running over his great stomach in rivulets, soaking the bedcover, the sheets, and the pillows. Al-Qadi had bled like a stuck pig, unable to get up, unable to remove the paper-knife, too shocked, too weak to shout for help. His eyes bulged, unblinking, sightless, like a fish lying gutted on the slab.

  Behind him, Ram gagged. Girling fought to keep his mind clear. He, too, felt sickened, but the need to find Sharifa was uppermost in his mind. He saw Al-Qadi’s gun on the floor. As he reached for it, anxious to see if it had been fired, he heard a slight sound from the clothes cupboard in the far wall.

  He found her hunched in the very corner, hidden behind suitcases and a pile of clothes. She stared at him, at first not comprehending who he was. He pulled her to him and she began to cry, softly at first, then less so as her mind regurgitated her last moments with the investigator.

  Girling held her close until her sobs subsided. Then he took her face in his hands. ‘What happened?’

  ‘I killed him, Tom.’ She stared at him, eyes wide. ‘I stood here, where you and I are standing now, and I watched him die, slowly, painfully. It must have taken him almost half an hour, just lying there, bleeding to death. And do you know something? I enjoyed every minute of it. I’ve dreamed of this moment for as long as I can remember. And now he’s dead and I’m glad it was me who killed him.’

  ‘Sharifa, no.’

  She rounded on him. ‘Why not? Is it so wrong to want for something like that? Isn’t that what you have wished all along for Mona’s killers?’

  He found himself wanting, but unable to answer.

  ‘He killed Stansell,’ she said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘He told me.’

  ‘But that makes no sense. Al-Qadi couldn’t have been in league with the Angels of Judgement. If they’re half as radical as the Brotherhood, then Al-Qadi was the kind of person they would have despised.’ He shook his head. ‘No, there has to be some other explanation.’

  ‘He pulled Stansell’s autopsy report, tried to bury it -’

  ‘How do you know that?’ Girling interrupted.

  ‘Dr Uthman told me, in so many words. He rang yesterday, asking for you. I was just on my way out, to Lazan’s.’

  ‘What did he say?’

  ‘That Stansell had probably been held in two dif-ferent places, or shot in one and dumped in another. One of them was the City of the Dead. And that’s when I realized Al-Qadi was here, in the apartment, listening to every word.’

  ‘What happened then?’

  ‘Something in what I’d said to Uthman made him suspect you were still alive. He dragged me into the bedroom and began going through my clothes until he found your jacket. It was then that he just -’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘He just went berserk. He tried to rape me. If I hadn’t had the paper-knife he would have killed me.’

  Girling looked past her at the obscenity on the bed. ‘We’ve got to get rid of the body.’

  She couldn’t bring herself to turn round. ‘Where?’

  Girling found himself thinking fast. ‘There’s only one place... the City of the Dead.’

  She was poised to remonstrate, but he put a finger to her lips. ‘This is one death the Brotherhood can take the rap for, whether the Guide likes it or not.’

  ‘But how-?’

  Ram appeared at the door. Sharifa gasped and grabbed Girling in alarm.

  ‘It’s all right,’ Girling said. ‘This is Ariel Ram. He’s on Lazan’s staff.’

  Girling looked at him. ‘I’m getting the body out of here. Al-Qadi’s bound to have a car somewhere round here. I’ll use that.’

  ‘How to get the body outside?’ Ram asked.

  ‘You’re going to help me,’ Girling said. ‘We’ll wrap it up in the blankets and shove it in the boot. And then I’m going to drive his car to the City of the Dead and dump it there. The Brotherhood can have the lot.’ He turned to Sharifa. ‘You, meanwhile, are going to stay here with Ram until Lazan gets here. Then the three of you must go to the embassy and wait for me there.’

  ‘What happens then?’ she asked.

  ‘You and I are on the first plane out of here.’

  Girling turned the unmarked blue Fiat off the airport road down a track whose tarred surface soon gave way to the bare sandstone foundations that characterized the land beneath the Muqattam Hills on the south-east side of the city.

  He let the car coast, listening to its suspension protest as the wheels dipped in and out of pot-holes, or jarred against the protruding rocks. He had the windows down full. The sun was high in the sky and the heat was stifling. Girling thought he could smell Al-Qadi’s body decomposing, but it was nothing more than the regular odours of the city, odours that grew stronger the further he plied into the old, south-east side and the closer he got to the City of the Dead.

  Behind him, the walls of the Citadel and the mosque at its pinnacle towered over the surrounding landscape. The great Muhammad Ali mosque, at something over one hundred and fifty years old, was a comparatively new addition to the skyline, but little else had changed in almost a thousand years. Girling’s view was filled by the City of the Dead, a suburb of tombs, originally for the mighty, but over the centuries for anyone who could afford the money or the time to construct a mortuary for himself and his family. On his left were the egg-like domes of the Circassian Mamelukes, a dynasty that had governed Egypt from the middle of the thirteenth century until the arrival of the Turks in 1517. Girling thought back to the morning of his arrival and his fleeting impressions of the necropolis as the sun had crept above the Muqattam Hills.

  In the dawn light, the City of the Dead possessed a sinister kind of beauty, a thin curtain of mist softening its horrors, like muslin over a camera lens. It was here, at the turn of the millennium, that the Fatimid Caliph Al-Hakim liked to wander incognito, dis-guised as one of the simple peasants he had terrorized and ritually slaughtered during his reign. One evening he rode out in the direction of the Muqattam Hills and was never seen again, becoming a hero, his status embellished over the years, his return awaited by obscure Islamic sects across the Arab Empire. It was here, too, that many of the stories of thieving and roguery were composed for the Arabian Nights.

  Under the harsh light of the noon sun, however, the City shimmered in its true colours. Interspersed amongst the mausoleums of the Mamelukes were small bungalow-like tombs, some topped with fragile, crumbling domes and minarets, built in a pathetic emulation of the glorious sepulchres of the rich and the royal. It was to these tombs that the oppressed and the destitute of Cairo had flocked over the centuries. Too hungry and frightened to fear the dead, these people began to construct flimsy shanties, at first on any patch of lan
d they could find, and then, as space ran out, on top of the graves themselves. As the shanties spread, so too did the City’s reputation as a safe haven for murderers and thieves. Initially, the crime barons kept their distance, hugging the shadows for anonymity, and the traditions that had existed for so long in the City were allowed to con-tinue. On certain days of the religious calendar, for instance, families would still come to the tombs of their forebears to leave food and drink for the departed. But as the criminal fraternity’s grip on the City became firmer, so the visits of the simple law-abiding people became fewer and fewer. Staring across the City of the Dead’s desolate expanse now, his car stopped, the engine idling, Girling understood why the meek at heart had stayed away.

  Girling had halted the Fiat at the very boundary of the City. Behind him the air above the track still swirled with the dust thrown up by his tyres. Ahead stretched a street whose buildings crumbled from the neglect of centuries. Every now and again, the desolate monotony of its facade was interspersed with a whitewashed tomb here, a newly added shanty there. A dog crossed the street, stopped half-way to scratch its ear, then continued lazily on its way, lying down in a scant patch of shade on the other side of the road.

  At first, Girling thought this part of the City was devoid of any human habitation. But as his eyes adjusted to the contrast of bright light and shade, he became aware of faces watching him from the gloomy recesses of windows, or the dark innards of doorless rooms.

  Girling climbed from the car. He did not want to stay in this place any longer than he had to. He knew that to the wary inhabitants of the City of the Dead, the very colour of the car would reveal its identity. But as he stood under the sun, feeling as naked as a child, Girling realized that the disguise was paper-thin and would not last long. As his watchers became accustomed to the sight of him, they would know that there was no way an ‘agnabi would be in the employ of the Mukhabarat.

  Girling moved quickly to the back of the car. He opened the boot and stepped back as the smell of decomposition and the flies rushed to meet him. Al-Qadi’s automatic, which Ram had replaced in the waistband of the investigator’s trousers, had slipped from the folds of the blanket and now lay loose against the petrol tank. Girling reached for it on impulse and stuffed in into the pocket of his suit jacket.

  With one hand over his nose and mouth, Girling slammed the boot shut. As he glanced up, he saw the first wave of people creep from their houses towards him. He could see the hunger in their eyes as they studied his car. Girling knew that, body in the back or not, within the next hour the Fiat would be stripped from the wing-mirrors to the chassis. After that, it would simply cease to exist, except in a thousand and one parts on the black market. Al-Qadi’s body would be hungrily devoured by packs of scavenging dogs.

  He began to advance back up the hill, one hand thrust into his jacket pocket where it held on to the reassuring grip of Al-Qadi’s pistol. A hundred yards from the car, Girling glanced back to see it sur-rounded by a crowd. He pressed on, anxious to regain the airport road, where he could find a taxi that would take him back to the Israeli Embassy.

  As he proceeded up the track, he saw a figure in the distance, moving down the hill towards him. It drew closer and he realized it was a boy, probably no more than ten years old, dressed in a traditional jellaba, which was dirty enough to indicate he possessed no other garment. The boy skipped down the hill seemingly without a care. He appeared to pay Girling no attention until he drew level. Then he stopped, just as Girling stopped, and studied him, head inclined over one shoulder to exaggerate the act of contemplation.

  ‘‘Agnabi,’ he said. ‘I have a message for you.’

  Girling thought he misheard. He was convinced that this boy would ask him for money.

  ‘A message? Who from?’

  ‘From Sheikh Youssef, our Guide.’

  Girling felt his pulse quicken. ‘What does he say, ya walad?’

  ‘If you come with me, I will show you the house of Abu Tarek. You want him, don’t you?’

  Girling fingered the butt of the automatic. ‘Why should the Guide do this?’

  ‘He did not tell me.’

  Girling stared up the track. He could hear the traffic at the top of the road.’

  ‘Do you come, or not?’ the boy asked impatiently.

  Girling’s every nerve ending tingled. To be so close to Mona’s killer and not see where his house was...

  ‘How far is it, ya walad?’ he asked.

  The boy pointed down the slopes of the wooded grove beside the road. ‘He lives just beyond these trees.’

  Girling looked from the trees to the road and back. He gripped the gun more firmly in his pocket.

  ‘Well, ‘agnabi?’

  ‘Come on.’

  The boy stopped him with a hand on his jacket. ‘First, you must pay.’ He held his hand out.

  Girling actually allowed himself a smile. Somehow this simple act of enterprise made him feel better. He handed over a few piastres, notes which amounted to little more than a few pence, but were enough to sustain this artful boy for a week. They were bundled quickly into a pocket in the lining of his jellaba.

  He followed the boy as he skipped nonchalantly between the trees. The sun broke through the branches and the boy used the shadows for a game, jumping from each of them, humming happily as he went.

  And then they were out of the trees and moving through a cemetery. Girling slowed as he weaved between the headstones, but the boy waved him on. Finally they sat at the wall of the cemetery, the boy pointing at a collection of tombs across a clearing, the nearest of them about a hundred yards away. Girling crouched breathlessly, cradling Al-Qadi’s automatic in his lap.

  The boy looked down at the gun. ‘Are you a policeman, ‘agnabi?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then why do you have a gun?’

  ‘It makes me feel safer. Which is the house of Abu Tarek?’

  The boy pointed to the largest of the mausoleums, the one capped by a small, crumbling dome. ‘In there.’

  Girling studied it for a few moments, then turned to his small guide. But the boy was already weaving a path back through the graves. ‘How many people are inside?’ Girling hissed after him.

  The boy stopped. ‘He is alone,’ he said, before proceeding on his way.

  Girling knew he should turn back. Before good sense could get too firm a hold, he darted across the clearing, gun in hand, and pressed his back against the nearest wall. He stopped still and listened. The place was perfectly quiet. He could hear nothing, not even so much as a dog’s bark. He edged along the wall, stopped at a low gate and was over it, heading down a narrow passage, the tomb supposedly occupied by Abu Tarek straight ahead. He could see inside the mausoleum now. There was no door. Light streamed through a latticed window in the roof. There was a kind of raised platform in the centre of the room, beneath the dome. It looked like the sarcophagus in which he had seen Stansell at police headquarters.

  His heart in his mouth, Girling twisted through the doorway. There was no stopping him now. He felt that every minute he had been in Egypt had been in preparation for this moment. He stopped and listened again. His gun was ready, he had cocked it in the cemetery, and he held it out before him with both hands. The tomb was quiet. There was nobody there.

  When he turned to the door, he caught only the merest glimpse of the figure inside as it turned and coshed him in the face. At the moment Girling fell, he saw others. They were dressed in black, heads covered, moving into the room as nimbly as spirits. Girling rolled across the floor, coming to a halt against the sarcophagus. The figures advanced towards him. One of them held something in his hand.

  Just before the cloth was clamped over his face, Girling asked the question to which his delirious mind thought it already knew the answer.

  The mask moved. ‘We are the Angels of Judgement,’ it said.

  CHAPTER 20

  Girling awoke with a start. He sat up, trying to focus his eyes beyond the sunlight
streaming through the window. The floor of the cell was of loosely raked earth, so cold he was shivering convulsively.

  He tried to move towards the window, but his legs gave way. He lay with the chilled earth against his cheek and as the light started to fade drifted back into unconsciousness.

  He dreamt he had fallen into a deep well shaft and that there was someone there, framed in the circle of light far above him. He began climbing. The sides of the well were smooth, but somehow he forced his way upwards. And then he was at the top, clawing his way out. As his tired muscles began to fail and the weight of his body dragged him back, he looked up to see Mona and Stansell watching him, their faces impassive. He reached out to them, trying to find the strength to cry, but neither moved. It was as he slid inexorably down into the pit that he woke again.

  This time he managed to stand.

  As dusk fell, he groped for clues to his surroundings. The smell of the earth confused him. He was sure he remembered the rise and fall of a ship at sea, the smell of tar and salt spray.

  Then he was running once more through the graveyard, Al-Qadi’s gun in his hand, trying to keep up with the Sheikh’s messenger.

  Girling brought his hand up to his face and felt the bruise above his eye. He remembered rolling towards the sarcophagus, Al-Qadi’s gun skating across the floor. Figures, too. Dressed in black. A smell of ether in the air and a voice from behind a mask.

  ‘We are the Angels of Judgement...’

  Girling swayed. He felt pain and swelling in his upper arm. Whatever it was, it had been a powerful anaesthetic. The hollowness in his stomach told him that he had been unconscious for a day, maybe two.

  Before he made it to the window, a crude hole in the door criss-crossed by bars, a cool wind brushed his face, and brought with it the smell of cooking.

  He grasped the bars and looked outside.

  His prison lay now in the shadow of a high-sided rock face, at the end of a wadi. As his eyes adjusted to the light he made out a white crenellated building shimmering in the distance like a mirage.