A Dead Man in Tangier

by Michael Pearce

  ‘They didn’t like that, I can tell you. Not one little bit. We had the police round, and then some other men who weren’t exactly the police. We were never quite sure who they were. We asked, but they wouldn’t tell us. But they spoke French.

  ‘So in our next number we asked who were these foreigners who broke into Moroccan property and knocked people about. But then they came back and really smashed the place up and I had to get out in a hurry. I went to Rabat for a year. And by the time I got back it was all over.'

  He looked at Seymour.

  ‘That was how I first came across Bossu. Actually, I didn’t know at the time how much he was involved. It only came out later. If I had known then, what a story it would have made! But it didn’t come out until later, years later, and then only in dribs and drabs. It never quite all came together and I could never quite make use of it.

  ‘But then when they announced his appointment as Secretary of that outrageous committee, then I could see how to do it. So I wrote that piece. Did you see it? No, of course you wouldn’t have done, you weren’t even in the country. I put it in New Dawn and splashed it around all over the place and I think it had quite an impact.

  ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if – well, you should never make such claims, I know, but – if it might not have had some bearing on what happened to him. It brought it all back to people’s minds. And maybe it put it into someone’s head to . . .'

  He gave a little, self-satisfied smile.

  ‘You are looking for the person who killed Bossu, Monsieur Seymour. Well,’ he leaned forward and placed his hand theatrically on his breast, ‘I think I can claim some of the credit at least for that particular service.'

  When he came out of the office with Sadiq, Mustapha and Idris closed in again.

  Sadiq was alarmed.

  ‘What are you doing?'

  ‘Looking after him,’ said Mustapha. ‘Which is more than you’re doing bringing him to a place like this.'

  ‘It’s a newspaper office!’ protested Sadiq indignantly.

  ‘Oh, yes!'

  They walked on a little way in silence. Then – ‘What’s your newspaper like, then?’ asked Idris.

  ‘It’s sort of . . . political.'

  ‘Political!'

  ‘Then he has been taking you to the wrong sort of place!’ said Idris. ‘You want to keep away from anything like that.'

  ‘Have you no shame?’ cried Sadiq, touched nearly and aroused despite himself. ‘Keep away from politics? At a time like this!'

  ‘What’s this about the time?'

  ‘When the French have imposed a Protectorate on us?’

  ‘What’s that?'

  ‘Protectorate. You know about the Protectorate. Don’t you?'

  ‘I think I’ve heard something,’ said Mustapha vaguely.

  ‘They’re taking over Morocco!'

  ‘The French?'

  ‘Yes.'

  ‘I thought they had taken over Morocco?’

  ‘Look, it’ll make no difference to us,’ said Idris.

  ‘Oh, yes, it will. There’ll be soldiers everywhere.'

  ‘There are now,’ said Mustapha.

  ‘There’ll be more!’ promised Sadiq. ‘And police.'

  ‘Police?'

  ‘Real police. French police!'

  ‘That could be a problem,’ admitted Mustapha.

  ‘Naow,’ said Idris. ‘Just offer them more.'

  ‘You don’t understand!’ cried Sadiq. ‘It will be different. The French will be running everything. Everything!'

  ‘Good luck to them.'

  ‘They’ll be in control!'

  ‘Not a chance!’ said Idris dismissively.

  ‘We’ll be all right,’ said Mustapha.

  ‘Is that all you think of?’ said Sadiq hotly. ‘Have you no pride? Have you no thought for Morocco?'

  ‘Morocco?'

  ‘You’re a Moroccan, aren’t you?'

  ‘Not me,’ said Mustapha. ‘I’m from the Rif.'

  ‘But that is –’

  ‘And I’m a Berber,’ said Idris.

  ‘We’re all Moroccans!’ cried Sadiq desperately. ‘And we must stand together and fight the French.’

  ‘Fight the . . .?'

  ‘French, yes.'

  ‘Soldiers?'

  ‘If necessary.'

  ‘He’s mad!’ said Mustapha.

  There was a silence. Then – ‘Is that what this newspaper of yours is all about?'

  ‘Well, yes.'

  ‘Stand up against the French? And get your heads blown off? Thank you very much!'

  ‘If we don’t fight now, we’ll never –’

  ‘Listen, laddie: do you know what fighting is?’

  ‘Well –’

  ‘Me,’ said Idris virtuously, ‘I don’t want to fight anybody. I just want to get on with my work.'

  ‘Well, of course, everyone – But . . . What is your work?'

  ‘Well, we do a bit in kif –’

  ‘Kif!'

  ‘Yes. Run the occasional load. Spread it around. That sort of thing.'

  Sadiq was silenced for a moment. Then, as they walked on, he whispered to Seymour:

  ‘These are not good people, Mr Seymour. I feel I should tell you.'

  They were going through a particularly squalid part of the city, a warren of narrow little twisting streets, and for the first time Seymour was glad that he had Mustapha and Idris with him. They closed in on him so that they stood touching shoulder to shoulder. Sadiq was plainly uneasy and pressed in on them too.

  It soon became apparent, however, that his uneasiness was prompted by a different cause than theirs. The houses in this part of the city were old and decaying. Their walls were crumbling and scarred as if attacked by leprosy and they had no windows. They had doors, however, and in the doorways people were standing. More precisely, and this was the source of Sadiq’s discomfort, women were standing.

  These, too, were not ‘good people’. They moved forward as the three men passed and muttered something presumably inviting but from which Sadiq shrank back. He kept his eyes fixed straight before him as if a look or a touch or even a listen was polluting.

  From behind the women in the open doorways came the fumes of cooking fat. Even here, thought Seymour, they were preparing the end-of-fast Ramadan meal. The smell of the burning fat blended with the strong smell of excrement which assailed him whenever they went past one of the putrid alleyways, strewn with refuse and rotting vegetables, which went off the street at irregular intervals.

  Yet you could get it wrong. Sometimes when you looked up the alleyway you caught a glimpse of a beautiful old façade, a piece of exquisite wood carving, or even a tiny, perfect Moorish patio with delicate balconies and colonnades.

  Some of the doorways had quaint inscriptions painted above them. Several of them, for instance, had printed the words: ‘Maison honnˆete’, a decent house. Strange, that people should so feel the need to proclaim their virtue. And in French, too!

  They were going through a warren of particularly filthy, dark, narrow, twisting streets when suddenly, high above them, something flashed. He looked up and saw to his surprise the glinting, coloured tiles of the minaret of a mosque catching the sun and realized that they were just behind the Kasbah.

  Sadiq saw his surprise and misinterpreted it.

  ‘It is wrong,’ he said indignantly, ‘that such people should be allowed to be so near the Kasbah! We have complained about it but nothing has been done. We went to the Préefet again only last week demanding that those dreadful women be removed. Perhaps they should be put in a reserved quarter near the barracks, not near a holy place. But every day another house is turned over to one of those places where they work. It is disgraceful! Think how it must be for the children, and how humiliating it is for decent people to have such neighbours.’

  And now Seymour understood the significance of the inscriptions he had seen above the doors: ‘Maison honnˆete’, a valiant attempt by the ‘decent people’
to distinguish themselves from their indecent neighbours!

  The puritanical Sadiq compressed his lips and walked on, keeping his eyes fixed straight ahead.

  He brought Seymour dutifully back to the spot from which they had set out and then hung around for a moment.

  ‘I hope you found Benchennouf interesting,’ he said awkwardly.

  ‘Oh, I did. Thank you for taking me.'

  ‘He’s not – not to everyone’s liking. But he’s different, don’t you think? He stands out against opinion. We need people like him in Morocco today.'

  ‘Indeed, yes. Perhaps, yes.'

  ‘I count myself fortunate to be among his friends. And he’s given me my chance, you know. A start. As a journalist.'

  ‘I wish you every success.'

  ‘Some say that New Dawn is nothing much –’ he looked daggers at Mustapha and Idris – ‘but I think it is a good place to be. It is not like the other newspapers. They’re all prisoners, prisoners of the French. New Dawn stands out against them. Against the French, and against the Sultan. And for Morocco. My father thinks that New Dawn is just a joke. But he doesn’t understand. We need papers like that if Morocco is to survive. And journalists like Benchennouf. I hope to be one,’ he confided.

  ‘A small newspaper is a good place to learn the ropes,’ said Seymour.

  ‘Yes, it is. I think so. That’s just what I said to my father. And what is so good, what is so useful, is that Ben-chennouf brings wider perspectives. He worked on a paper in France, you know. After he had finished at university. He went to a university in France, you know. A lot of people who do that don’t come back here. But he did, and all credit to him. I’ve thought about going to a university in France. To do something post-graduate. But if I did, I would come back here afterwards. Morocco must not be abandoned.'

  ‘No, indeed.'

  Sadiq seemed pleased by Seymour’s encouragement.

  ‘That’s what Benchennouf always says. “Morocco must not be abandoned.” Awad sometimes talks about going abroad but Benchennouf says he shouldn’t. “Your place is here,” he says. And he’s got a right to say that because he came back himself.

  ‘“If you’re here,” he says, “you can respond at once when you’re needed.” As he was in Casablanca. That was an awful time. The French were all screaming at us. Only Benchennouf stood up against them. I used to read every number of his paper as soon as it came out. I was at school at the time. And when they arrested the man who was selling New Dawn just outside the school, I took over. I was so angry, so angry at what they were doing, that I wanted to do something. And did until Benchennouf was chased out.'

  ‘Tell me about Casablanca at the time.'

  ‘It was horrible. They weren’t just beating people, they were shooting them! I saw two people once and they were dead! They had called the army in and they were shooting. And no one said anything! Apart from Benchennouf.'

  ‘And Chantale’s father, I gather.'

  ‘Captain de Lissac. Oh, he was wonderful. I so admired him! In fact, for a time I hero-worshipped him. We all did, at school. We thought he was so brave. To stand up like that! Even though he was a Frenchman and a soldier. But then they hounded him out, too.'

  ‘Well, I can understand that,’ said Seymour. ‘He was, after all, a soldier and soldiers have to do what they’re told. Or else you don’t have an army.'

  ‘Yes, but you can’t just do what you’re told. Sometimes you have to go by, well, bigger things. Well, I think that, anyway,’ he said, suddenly overcome by embarrassment.

  ‘I think it does you credit,’ said Seymour.

  ‘Thank you. Well, thank you . . .'

  Sadiq lapsed into tongue-tied silence.

  But then he burst out again.

  ‘But what I can’t see is why they had to be so nasty to him. You ought to be able to disagree without being nasty. But they couldn’t. And it went on and on. They couldn’t leave him alone. Even after he had stopped speaking out. “Come on,” some people said. “That’s enough!” And the army began to say that, too. At least, that’s what people said. People began to say that there must be something more in it, something personal. Something personal between de Lissac and Bossu.'

  ‘Why did Bossu come into it?'

  ‘Well, he had been organizing things on the company side. I don’t really understand that bit, you’d have to ask Benchennouf. But I suppose that brought them up against each other and maybe that was enough. But it seemed to go further than that. There was a sort of campaign against Captain de Lissac, and people said that Bossu was organizing it. We tried to organize a counter-campaign, but, of course, we were just schoolboys . . .

  ‘The headmaster spoke to our parents, and my father said it had to stop. I didn’t want to but my mother said it would only make things worse for Captain de Lissac.

  ‘It was a terrible time in our household, too. My mother was strongly in favour of Captain de Lissac. All Moroccans were. But, of course, my father worked for Bossu! Our friends, neighbours, stopped speaking to us. I realize now that it was very hard for my father. I suppose that, deep down, he admired Captain de Lissac as much as anybody. But he couldn’t say anything, he had to remain loyal to Bossu. Or, at least, quiet. And I don’t suppose I made things any easier for him.

  ‘But it wasn’t just Moroccans who objected to this campaign against him. A lot of the French did, too. This is going too far, they said. That’s when people began to mutter that there must be something personal in it. “There’s more in this than meets the eye,” they said. Because Bossu seemed almost demented. People said that it was because Bossu liked to have his own way and the Captain had tried to put a spoke in his wheel. But others said no, that there was bad blood between the two, that there was a history of this.

  ‘Well, I don’t know about that. All I know is that I thought the Captain was a hero. And Benchennouf, too. He was willing to stand up for Morocco. Unlike some,’ said Sadiq with a baleful glance at Mustapha and Idris.

  Chapter Eleven

  ‘Well!’ said Monique. ‘This is a surprise! A pleasant surprise, I must add. But, nevertheless, a surprise. I took it for granted that you, like everyone else, were putting me up on the shelf. Where, to be fair, I probably belong.’

  ‘I couldn’t resist taking you down again.'

  ‘Thanks! I was just getting used to independence. But independence is a strange thing, isn’t it? All my life I’ve pursued independence, it was the first thing I wanted, to get away from my parents. Then I wanted to be a woman on her own, a real free spirit. Then I wanted to get away from a man because, tied up with him, there was no independence. Every decision I’ve made I’ve tried to go for independence. And where do I finish up? Less free than half the boring married women of Tangier!'

  Seymour laughed.

  ‘It’s coming,’ he said. ‘It’s coming. I can feel it.'

  ‘Oh, good. Would you like a drink? Come out on to the balcony. Then we can talk. That is what you’ve come for, I presume. It’s not for my worn face and jaded eyes.'

  ‘You’re quite right. It is what I have come for. And I’d like a whisky, please. And, actually, it is your worn face and jaded eyes that have brought me here. Because they speak of experience, a woman’s experience, and that’s just what I need.'

  ‘Good gracious! Your plight must be desperate indeed. I’ll bring the whisky quickly.'

  She brought the whisky, two glasses, and sat down beside him. The sun had moved round her little balcony so that they were unable to sit in the shade but it was already losing its heat. Out in the bay the glitter had gone off the sea.

  ‘Now tell me,’ she said, ‘because I’m all agog to know what, in this country of men, leads you to think that a woman could have anything valuable to contribute.'

  ‘Almost everyone I’ve talked to,’ said Seymour, ‘has taken it for granted that Bossu’s death was tied up with politics. That it had nothing to do with his personal history. Now why is that?'

  ‘Morocco is a v
ery political country. Especially just at the moment.'

  ‘Sure. I can see that. And the temptation is to say, since he was so much bound up with these politics, that he died because of it. But might it not be something more personal?'

  ‘Like what?'

  ‘Love.'

  ‘Jesus! The things you say! Love? What’s that? Tell me about it.'

  ‘Bossu had a complicated love life.'

  ‘Not very. I was in a separate compartment. In all senses. And his wife was a simple soul.'

  ‘Maybe. But I’ve heard the officers. They were all after her. And I’ll bet there were others.'

  ‘She liked it like that.'

  ‘I’m sure.'

  ‘She had a thing about officers. It used to drive Bossu mad.'

  ‘In general? Or was there one in particular?'

  ‘Not that I know of. The point is, though, that they were admirers not lovers – Juliette is a great tease.'

  ‘Perhaps there was a note of disillusion in what they said.’

  ‘She liked to lead them on and have them panting. And then withdraw.'

  ‘How unsatisfactory! You don’t think, then, that in the tangled tease life there was an affair so serious as to . . .?'

  ‘I don’t think there was anything serious in Juliette’s life, love or otherwise. Perhaps money. Oh, and certainly vanity. But perhaps you shouldn’t ask me. Is a spurned mistress an objective source of information?'

  ‘Were you spurned?'

  ‘Not really. Except that he didn’t marry me.'

  ‘She sees you as a rival.'

  ‘And I, her.'

  ‘That, actually, is why I’ve come to you. You are likely to know anything to her discredit. And more than likely to be willing to tell me about it.'

  Monique laughed.

  ‘I hadn’t thought of that,’ she admitted. ‘But, even with all these advantages as a source of information, I am going to disappoint you. I know of no private affair which might have had a bearing on Bossu’s death. If that is what you are asking.'