The Last Cut

by Michael Pearce

  Babikr stood there miserably, head lowered.

  ‘Why did you do it, Babikr?’

  He waited, but Babikr did not reply.

  ‘That you did it is a bad thing. For that you must pay. But you must have had a reason, and if your friends knew that reason, then perhaps their hearts would not be so wounded. You had friends among them, Babikr. Can you not speak to them?’

  ‘No, I cannot,’ said Babikr in a low voice.

  ‘You have shamed them. They have to live with that shame. If they knew why you had done it, perhaps that would help them. Can you not help them, Babikr?’

  Owen could see that the man was feeling the words keenly; but still he would not speak.

  ‘They say, perhaps it was against us that he acted. Perhaps in his heart he hated us. Perhaps we have done wrong things.’

  ‘No, no!’ said Babikr. ‘No!’

  ‘Or against Macrae Effendi. Or Ferguson Effendi.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then why, Babikr? No one does a thing like this without reason. Could you tell them the reason? You have left a hole in their hearts, Babikr. Could you not at least make easy the wound?’

  ‘I cannot,’ said the man, distressed.

  ‘Why not? I refuse to believe, Babikr, that you are unfeeling to your friends.’

  ‘Effendi, I am not. Believe me, I am not!’

  ‘Well, Babikr, I will tell them that. That, at least, they will be glad to know.’

  ‘Thank you, Effendi,’ said the man brokenly.

  ‘But cannot you tell them more?’

  ‘Believe me, Effendi, I cannot. I would, but—’

  ‘What is it that stops you?’

  Babikr shook his head in misery.

  ‘Is it that you are not alone in this? That you think of others? That,’ said Owen with sudden inspiration, ‘you are perhaps bound to them?’

  ‘I have sworn an oath,’ said the man, in a low voice.

  Owen considered for a moment. This was where it could go wrong.

  ‘Then I can understand you,’ he said at last, gently. ‘May I tell your friends that, Babikr? That you had sworn an oath?’

  ‘You may, Effendi. I would be glad if you would.’

  ‘I will. But, Babikr, some oaths are good, some bad. They will want to be sure that this was a good oath. What shall I tell them?’

  ‘Tell them I was beholden.’

  ‘Ah, it was something you owed?’

  ‘Yes, Effendi.’

  ‘To a man, or to men?’

  Babikr looked him straight in the face and shook his head.

  Owen knew that, for the moment, he had taken it as far as he could.

  ***

  He was still sitting there thinking it over when Yussef, his orderly, announced that there was someone who wished to see him. Owen knew from this that he was an ordinary Arab. Most others, that is to say, those who were not Arabs or who did not think of themselves as ordinary, described themselves as effendi. Effendi wishing to see Owen usually presented themselves directly to Nikos, the Mamur Zapt’s official clerk. The ordinary Arab, abashed by the huge facade of the Bab-el-Khalk, lingered outside on the steps until he could pluck up enough courage to accost an orderly, who would, in lordly fashion, instruct him to wait outside the orderly room until his betters decided what to do with him.

  The man, when Yussef brought him along, confirmed Owen’s assumption. Almost. He was not the lowest of the low for his dress was of good cloth. The white turban bound round his tarboosh, for example, was of cashmere. But he was wearing a turban and not the pot-like tarboosh by itself, which would have been the mark of the effendi; and he was wearing a galabeeyah not a suit.

  Owen rose to greet him and led him across to the two canework chairs put beneath the window where there was a chance of catching a breath of air. The windows were shuttered against the sun but through the slats there occasionally crept a waft of something which was not entirely tepid.

  Yussef hovered for a moment outside the door. Owen knew why. He was wondering whether the man merited coffee. Evidently he decided that he did, for a little later Owen heard the pad of returning feet and smelt the coffee. That in itself was significant, for Yussef’s judgement in these matters was usually fine. All the same there was something about the man that was slightly puzzling, something that Owen was not familiar with.

  His name, he said, was Al-Sayyid Hannam, and he had come about his son.

  ‘You are Suleiman’s father?’

  ‘Yes.’ He sighed. ‘And sometimes I wonder what I have done.’

  ‘All fathers do that.’

  ‘All fathers have hopes for their sons; and when they see themselves disappointed, they ask themselves why.’

  ‘Sometimes it is mere youthfulness.’

  ‘That is what I told myself. When this foolish business of the girl first came up.’

  ‘You knew about it?’

  The man nodded.

  ‘Suleiman, since he came up to the city, has been staying with the family of a business friend of mine. When he learned what was happening he was troubled and spoke to me. I said: “Let it be. The boy is young. It will come to nothing.” But that was before I knew who or what she was.’

  ‘A water-carrier’s daughter?’

  ‘That would be bad enough. For I had set my hopes higher. I had sent my son to the city in the hope that he would do better than his father.’ He looked at Owen. ‘Not that I am complaining. God has smiled on me and I have prospered. But I work the land. Our family has always worked the land. Well, that is good; but it is hard work and a father always wants better for his boy. I had friends and they found him a place with the Water Board. It is a good job, I told him: water is a thing of the future as well as a thing of the past, and you will rise with the future.’

  ‘And so he has,’ said Owen, ‘if what he told me is true.’

  ‘I say nothing against him at work. It is when he is not at work that I am troubled.’

  Owen was used to people discussing their family problems with him. Yussef did; his barber did; Nuri Pasha did; all Egyptians did. It was the principal subject of conversation, taking the place of the weather in England. He wondered, however, if Suleiman’s father knew where things had got to.

  ‘You have doubtless heard,’ he said, ‘what has befallen the girl?’

  ‘I have heard she is dead. Well, that is bad, and, although her father may not believe it of me, I grieve for him. I grieve for my son, too, for I cannot believe that his love was anything but honourable. Foolish, perhaps, but not dishonourable. All the same, mixed with my grief, is a certain relief.’

  ‘You have heard of what she died?’

  The man nodded.

  ‘I have heard two things. The first is terrible, but must be as God wills. It is about the second that I have come.’

  ‘What have you heard?’

  ‘That the girl was strangled. And that my son is suspected.’

  ‘I would not go so far as that. The Parquet suspects all until they are proved innocent. That is how it is with your son. He is suspected neither more nor less.’

  ‘Nevertheless he is suspected? Well, my friend was right. It is time I came.’

  ‘There are powerful people who speak for him.’

  The old man smiled.

  ‘But not as powerful as the Mamur Zapt.’

  He had come in the time-honoured way to plead for his son. And in the time-honoured way he had gone to the Mamur Zapt, not for justice, for that was the prerogative of the Kadi, but for mercy, because that was the prerogative of power, and for centuries the Mamur Zapt had been the Khedive’s right-hand man, the man, after him, most powerful in the city. Things had, of course, changed; but many in the countryside were not yet aware of this.

  ‘The time for intercession is not yet,’ he said
. ‘It may be that there will be no need of it. The Law has still to ask the questions.’

  ‘In the asking,’ said Suleiman’s father, ‘lies danger.’

  ‘The man who asks,’ said Owen, ‘is a man of honour. But perhaps it would be well to find another man of law who can watch over your son and advise him.’

  ‘I have already done that. It is not that. It is—’ he hesitated—‘that the questions could go deep.’

  ‘Why should they go deep?’

  ‘Because these things have roots. There is bad blood between me and the girl’s father.’

  ‘Why should that affect your son?’

  ‘It already has affected him. It was why the girl’s father spurned him. If there had not been bad blood, perhaps none of this would ever have happened. That is why I wonder what I have done.’

  ‘You should not blame yourself. One cannot trace these things to their infinite cause. All these things are past.’

  ‘I wish they were,’ said the old man. ‘I wish they were. It was never my intention—but sometimes these things return upon us.’

  ‘How came it that there was bad blood between you?’

  ‘We came from the same village. We worked fields next to each other. There was a dispute between us over water. I thought I was in the right, he thought he was. We went to a kadi, who ruled in my favour.’

  The old man shrugged.

  ‘Bitter words were said. I was young and hot and enforced the law to the letter. It meant he went without water. He had to leave the village. It was the beginning for me. Afterwards, I prospered so that now I own more land than the entire village used to hold. But for him, it seems, it was the end—’

  ‘It was as God decreed.’

  ‘But sometimes He works these things out to their infinite end and lets justice fall not on us but on our children. That is what I am afraid of.’

  ‘Who can read God’s pattern?’ said Owen.

  ***

  The debate was not going well for the Government. The Minister had found himself unexpectedly under fire. He would certainly get his Supplementary Vote—the Government had an enormous majority in the Assembly—but things were proving stickier than he had expected.

  ‘This is a work of national importance,’ he said indignantly.

  A man rose on the benches opposite.

  ‘No one doubts that,’ he said. ‘It is the cost of the proposals that we are disputing.’

  Since it was unusual for the Opposition to want to reduce the cost of anything—they were normally in favour of increasing it—the Minister was slightly taken aback. He muttered something about technical reasons.

  ‘But that is precisely the point!’ said the man opposite. ‘We are being asked to take these technical arguments on trust. Has an independent opinion been sought?’

  ‘Tenders will be invited in the normal way,’ said the Minister.

  ‘But who has drawn up the specifications?’

  ‘The Department’s own advisers—’

  ‘British. And the contract will go to the British. Has consideration been given to asking independent consultants to draw up the specifications?’

  ‘That would increase the cost.’

  ‘It would probably reduce costs. The Department’s estimates are usually inflated. Why will not the Minister go outside the Department for advice? Outside the country, even? This is a very big contract and firms outside the country will be interested.’

  ‘They will have an opportunity of tendering.’

  ‘But on terms drawn up by the Department’s British advisers. That is what we are objecting to.’

  It was the usual Nationalist tactic. They wanted the British out; and while they certainly didn’t want other countries in, internationalism was a handy stick to beat the Government with.

  ‘Those estimates are pared to the bone!’ whispered Macrae, beside Owen, indignantly. ‘That laddie doesn’t know what he’s talking about. Who is he?’

  ‘Mohammed Jubbara,’ whispered Owen. ‘He’s a big man in the Nationalist Party.’

  The Minister was muttering something about The Time Factor.

  ‘This is an emergency,’ he proclaimed.

  Someone else rose on the benches opposite.

  ‘Hamad el Sid,’ whispered Owen.

  ‘I hope the Government, in its eagerness to do a quick deal with foreign business interests, will think about the effect of its grandiose schemes on the poor.’

  ‘We are always thinking of the poor,’ said the Minister.

  ‘And how to grind them down further, I know,’ said Hamad el Sid.

  The Minister affected shock. He turned to his colleagues on the benches behind him.

  ‘The schemes that Mr el Sid so disparages have increased the production of grain three times; the production of cotton five times; the production of—’

  ‘But at a price,’ interrupted Hamad el Sid, ‘in terms of the health of the poor. Is the Minister aware that the incidence of bilharzia and ankylostoma in the male population of Egypt is now eighty-five per cent? Would he care to put a figure—since he is so keen on figures—on the role of water-borne diseases over the last few years? And relate them to the public works of which he is so proud?’

  It was almost, thought Owen, as if he had been talking to Cairns-Grant. Perhaps he had; or perhaps Cairns-Grant had been talking to him.

  Macrae shifted restlessly.

  ‘Aye,’ he said, ‘but—’

  The Nationalists shifted back again.

  Was it true, a third man wanted to know—

  ‘Al-Faqih Mas’udi,’ whispered Owen.

  ‘—that the proposed new regulator will take up a substantial part of the remarkable gardens at the barrage. Gardens which were a source of pride and pleasure to so many ordinary citizens of Cairo—’

  And so it went on. At one point Owen took Macrae and Ferguson out for a cup of coffee. In the corridor he saw Labiba Latifa. She waved a hand to him.

  ‘We’re having a meeting. Care to join us?’ she said.

  ‘Thanks. I’ve got my own,’ said Owen.

  Back in the Chamber, Members were debating the effects of the Aswan Barrage on the Temple at Philae.

  ‘What has this got to do with replacing the Manufiya Regulator?’ pleaded the Minister despairingly.

  At last it was over and the Supplementary Vote, despite the Minister’s travails, agreed. Macrae and Ferguson were jubilant.

  ‘That means we can get on with it?’

  ‘Heavens, no!’ said Owen. ‘Now it has to go to London.’

  ‘But—but—that will take years!’

  ‘Aye,’ said Owen.

  ***

  A door opened and out popped Zeinab.

  Owen was astounded. She had hitherto shown absolutely no interest in the workings of parliamentary democracy. Power was one thing and she was interested in that, but parliamentary democracy, especially in Egypt, quite another. She was a true daughter of her father. Nuri Pasha had once been a Minister; indeed, had hopes, though they were receding, of being one again. But he knew that this had nothing to do with so unreliable a thing as voting. It was a matter of securing the Khedive’s favour. That, in Zeinab’s view, was what Government was all about.

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  ‘I have been at a meeting.’

  That was another shaker. Women didn’t go to meetings in Egypt, certainly not at the National Assembly. Even if they were, as Zeinab was, dressed in black from head to foot and heavily veiled. Except that…

  ‘Labiba?’ he said.

  Zeinab nodded.

  ‘Circumcision?’

  ‘Certainly not! In the Assembly? They would be shocked!’

  ‘I meant are you talking about circumcision? Is that the subject of the meeting?’

  �
�They would still be shocked. No, health. Sub-heading (very small letters): women’s health. That gets rid of the old dodderers, who would otherwise come to hear how their heart was getting on. It does, admittedly, attract some rather strange men, but Labiba is firm with them.’

  ‘Is she chairing?’

  ‘No, that Scotsman is. You know, the one who cuts you up.’

  ‘Cairns-Grant?’

  ‘Probably. He has a workman’s hands. But then he would.’

  ‘How’s the meeting going?’

  ‘It’s coming to an end soon. I thought I would leave early as the man next to me is getting too excited.’

  ‘I don’t blame him,’ said Owen, glancing along the corridor. No one was coming. He put his arm round her.

  ‘Not here!’ said Zeinab, alarmed.

  The door of the committee room opened again and they quietly disengaged. Out came Mohammed Jubbara, Hamad el Sid and al-Faqih Mas’udi. Owen wasn’t sure whether they had seen. Behind them, close behind, was Suleiman. His eyes were burning.

  Mas’udi stopped.

  ‘Can I get you an arabeah?’ he said to Zeinab.

  ‘No thank you. I have a word or two I want to say to the Mamur Zapt,’ she replied sweetly.

  Mas’udi gave him a startled look.

  Back at her apartment Zeinab did, indeed, have a word or two to say.

  ‘You have an unhealthy mind,’ she concluded severely, ‘in an over-healthy body.’

  ***

  Out at the barrage little clumps of papyrus were spiralling in the sun. When they neared the barrage they wavered for a moment uncertainly and then accelerated in towards the piers. Just before they reached them, they were sucked downwards and lost in the grating.

  In the shallows of the river’s edge two men were loading building water-skins on to a donkey. When they had finished, they led it up on to the bank. One of them put a large hamper-like wicker basket on top of the water-skins and then perched himself above that. The other man gave the donkey a thwack on the flank.

  The noise startled the doves in the palms and they fluttered agitatedly. They were all right, thought Owen. It was the ones in the basket that needed to worry.