“You don’t believe it, do you? You are one of those skeptics who want to know what I am concealing behind this act of compassion and generosity, which is somewhat improbable coming from a hardheaded millionaire businessman. I say it again, here and now: there is nothing. Nothing more egotistical than a feeling of lightness when I get up in the morning. You would say that I created this foundation to buy back my conscience, but I say that it has given me a form of serenity—it is a matter of one’s point of view, I would imagine. I am not the demon some wish to see in me. As I told you: I am similar to all men, neither completely bad nor really good.”
“And yet bad men exist. Monsters capable of the worst atrocities.”
Keoraz held his cue in front of him, vertically, and leaned his hands on the top of the heel, about level with his breastbone. “That is the question, my dear fellow. The rift of evil.”
Jeremy took up a playing position. “The rift of evil?” he asked. “I’ve never heard of it.”
“The rift between those who think that monsters exist, and those for whom Man is born good, or at least neutral, and becomes what he is by dint of his experiences. Is evil an entity or a corruption of our society?”
“Rousseau?”
Keoraz winked at the detective. “Very good. But not just Rousseau. The rift of evil is a question that has been haunting our race since the dawn of civilization. Are we the fruit of our experiences or are we born predisposed to those experiences? Are the worst criminals all that way because they have experienced the worst torments in their development to manhood, or is it because they were born with this inclination toward violence?”
Jeremy delayed his shot long enough to ask a question. “Don’t recent thinkers on the subject of the mind say that it is the child, through its development, who constitutes the foundation of our character? A child who is persecuted at school by the other children could perhaps develop a sort of … defense mechanism, hating the other children without any distinction among them and—”
“Tut-tut-tut, Detective, I must stop you there. The question is not about what that situation might engender in the head of a child, but ‘why did we arrive at this situation?’ Why did this child arouse the anger and hatred of his comrades? Through his misdeeds, his wicked words, or his calumny, I suppose. Why did he have this basic attitude?”
Keoraz had entered into the state of earthly detachment experienced by great orators, who are captivating as much because of their charisma as the emotion they put into their words. He continued: “Is evil an affectation that we contract through having lived, like a sickness of the soul, in a way similar to melancholia, or is it that mysterious force that inhabits our cells from the first sparks of our creation? Two distinct visions of the essence of evil. That is the rift of evil. An eternal debate on the existence of good and evil, or on the colorless and chameleonlike nature of Man.”
Jeremy jabbed his cue forward and missed his shot.
“Well, well, Jeremy, is this debate about our nature awakening some kind of contradiction in your mind?” teased Jezebel, momentarily casting off her haughtiness.
The detective swapped places with the millionaire, ignoring Jezebel. “I confess I do not know on which side of this rift of evil I should stand, I … I have from time to time observed the terrible nature of certain individuals among us. I do not say whether we are born evil or become that way; I am very afraid that the two are not so far apart. But I know that existence carries this evil within it. And that even the best people can sometimes topple over onto the other side, contaminated without hope of remission. Man is capable of anything.”
The tone he used and the expression on his face commanded Jezebel’s respect. “You talk as if you were a victim of this transformation yourself.”
There was no hint of a question in what she said, nothing but a troubled observation.
“In a way.”
“Are all detectives burdened with this wound?” she asked, almost tenderly.
“This has nothing to do with my job.”
Keoraz understood all at once. He laid his cue on the edge of the table. “The war…,” he said.
Jeremy raised his eyes to look at him. Keoraz went into more detail, “You are of the age, and in the physical and intellectual condition to have served during the Great War.”
Jeremy ran his tongue over his lips. He looked around for his glass. Jezebel got up and brought it to him without a word.
“It is in extreme conditions that a man reveals his true nature, is that not a well-known fact?” he said, taking a drink. “From experience, I say that evil is as much an essence in the cosmos as a fever in our society.”
Keoraz approached, carrying a crystal decanter, and topped Jeremy’s glass.
“However atrocious they may be, the barbarous actions in time of war are, alas, completely in context,” suggested the millionaire.
Jeremy drank again, taking two long swallows. “The context is a pretext. What I am talking about doesn’t concern the killings against the Germans. But what happened within a unit. Among British gentlemen.”
Jezebel folded her arms across her chest.
“During that fearsome era of organized slaughter, I was present at the most infamous persecution. A group of perverted NCOs, deranged by spending too much time in the blood and the mud. And a young soldier who was too naïve. Young and handsome like a beach after the tide has gone out, leaving it with not a scar upon it.”
His moist eyes trembled under the light from the billiard table. “I saw them persecute him. Turn him into their whipping boy, by turns a means of physical, moral, and sexual release. He was spared nothing. Nothing. It lasted eight months. And between each torture: the battles, the pulp of flesh pulverized in the air by the din of the guns, the agonized cries of men who’d been playing cards three hours earlier, and the only point of reference that arid land, a field plowed by weapons and gorged with blood, where nothing grew but the roots of despair.”
“Didn’t anyone intervene to save this young man?” demanded Jezebel indignantly, her voice a whisper filled with emotion.
“We were cut off from the rest of the troops, in an isolated post, commanded by an officer too blinded by dignity to allow himself to believe that his men could do such a thing. During the war, the chain of command was the only constant that could be respected. You could die of hunger, cold, or bullets, but you could never call your hierarchy into question. The punishment would have been the firing squad. And the torturers were all noncommissioned officers. Picking a fight with them would have been tantamount to suicide.”
Without a word, Jeremy picked up the decanter and poured himself another glass. “One day, a man—his name was Dickey—intervened. He couldn’t bear the young soldier’s tears anymore. Seeing three of the four NCOs approaching to lay into their ‘object,’ Dickey got up to bar their way. He was away three days in the hospital, and when he came back, the NCOs gave him a hard life. He died a week later, in a trench. From then on, the unit chose to close its eyes and ears when necessary. The majority of the men had at least a fiancée, if not a wife and children, and they wanted to go home. Death was already too constant a visitor to the trenches and the barbed wire for them to go out of their way to provoke it. And in time of war, it is easier to close your eyes.”
“And what about you?” inquired Keoraz.
“I waited until it passed.”
“How did it end?” asked Jezebel, troubled.
“In blood.” Jeremy finished his drink, gazing into emptiness. “One day,” he went on, “the young soldier refused to submit. It was one time too many, I imagine. The NCOs fixed their bayonets and amused themselves with him. One by one, the other soldiers emerged from the tent. The torture lasted several hours. The sheets were covered with blood afterward. This time, the torturers couldn’t hide all the horror, and the unfortunate was sent to the hospital. It appears he said nothing for several days, not one word, not one cry of pain. He just shat blood. With a swollen face and
an enormous gash on his chest.”
In the silence that followed, Keoraz lit a cigar without taking his eyes off the detective. Jezebel wept.
Her incandescent green eyes were covered by a veil of tears; she pursed her lips tightly to hold in the sobs as best she could.
“What happened to the NCOs?” asked Keoraz.
“They were sentenced to death by court-martial. But in the time it took to convict them, they had decimated half the unit in suicidal attacks.”
“And the young soldier?”
“I don’t know. He died or as good as died, I would imagine. Unless the evil entered him by dint of his having been confronted by it every day. Whatever happened, his life was shattered.”
Jeremy swung around toward Jezebel, who gazed at him unblinkingly, the tears rolling down as far as the lines of her lips, where they gathered into a glistening pearl.
What did she see in him now? What image was drawn up by the mention of his name, of their shared memories? He who had always lied when she asked him questions about his past at that time, about his service in the war, who had disguised this truth behind tirelessly repeated lies until he had convinced himself they were true.
“You see, Mr. Keoraz,” Jeremy said in a voice that was abnormally low and trembling, “evil men do exist, men who are capable of the worst things. There may be those who become that way, victims of evil who carry around their pain like ghosts unable to find absolution. In any event, there are people who do evil without fighting against it, without apologies, without any inner struggle; on the contrary, they rejoice in it. Those people are monsters.”
He leaned forward to hand Jezebel a handkerchief from his jacket pocket. Without even looking at his audience, he continued in the same tone, laden with anger and suffering: “And those men do not deserve any trial; all they deserve is death. Only death.”
* * *
His thighs bulging from the effort, Azim climbed the last of the building’s stairs and finally reached the roof by means of the ladder.
Khalil was waiting for him and stretched out a hand. “Well? What did you see? Was it really the … the demon?”
Azim collapsed onto the carpet, reaching out for the water jar. Khalil poured some out for him to drink.
“False alarm,” grunted Azim between two gulps.
“But … but the signal…”
“A man who was too jumpy, who grabbed the lamp as soon as he spotted a shape moving strangely. It was a lame man, not a beast from Hell.”
Disappointment appeared on the young man’s face. “Do you think we’ll really see it?” he asked.
“I don’t know, Khalil, my plan rests on a crazy probability. The ghul has been seen in this area several times in the past few weeks; if we are lucky, then maybe.… Come on, rest now, I shall keep watch and you can relieve me for the last few hours.”
Khalil lay down in one of the hammocks and swiftly sank into an agitated sleep.
Azim wrapped himself up in a blanket and sat himself at the corner of the building, overlooking the torpor of the district. The curtain of stars lit up Cairo’s anarchic silhouette.
Azim was not at all tired. His run through the narrow streets had rather reinvigorated him, as the fear had mingled with excitement in a volcanic cocktail. All the same, what emotion! Approaching the suspect had sent terrible shivers through him, one hand on the stock of his revolver, ready to draw and fire.
If it had really been the ghul, shooting at it would not have been any great help to him. According to the legends, only the power of prayers had the ability to ward off the demon.
“Come on, admit it,” he whispered to himself. “You don’t believe that. If you did, you wouldn’t have charged right up to it, knowing your weapon would be no use. You think that behind all this are the machinations of a man.”
Then who was he? Why had he taken an interest in children at night? In sniffing their clothing, and trying to enter their bedrooms as the trader had testified?
A little disoriented, Azim’s gaze strayed over the cracks in the roof.
He no longer knew what to think. The tiredness … the emotion …
He must concentrate, not doze off, wait for the signal. Nothing else …
Azim waited, with the greatest vigilance.
The hours went by, little by little. The streets were still as silent as ever. The cold became thicker, pressing blankets to clothing and skin even more as the night wore on.
Azim ate a lot of dates as he waited.
To his great surprise, the imam came to pay him a visit a little after one in the morning. He found it pointless to wait at the mosque for someone to fetch him and had decided to go around to all the lookouts to bring them support. Azim and he spoke a little, essentially about the ghul, which the imam barely dared name. The little detective was disturbed to discover that the religious man seemed to fear the monster. Sweat beaded his brow when they discussed the imam’s decisive role if the human factor was eliminated.
The imam left an hour later, declaring that he would keep an eye on the roofs and the lanterns. If the signal was given, he would wait five minutes, allowing Azim the necessary time to judge the situation in situ, and then come to help, remaining within hearing distance just in case.
Azim returned to quietness and solitude.
His thoughts wandered. And halted at his colleague.
Matheson did not believe in the supernatural. He refused to keep an open mind about this lead, even though it had been verified by two distinct witnesses. The Englishman had an unappealing reputation in the Cairo police force. He worked alone, and when he was forced to do otherwise, he did not share, leading his investigation in his way, keeping silent. He was a bad partner. But an excellent detective.
His reputation as a “trustworthy man” ensured that he found all doors open, or almost. People said he was mysterious about his private life. Azim, who was beginning to get to know him, preferred the adjective reserved. Matheson did not share easily—neither his work, nor his private life. And he had the same attitude of savage defense as wounded animals, preferring to be left alone, to bind his wounds, in this case a wounded heart.
Yes, the more he thought about it, Matheson was—
Azim leaped forward, suddenly getting to his feet.
A lantern was frantically waving to and fro in the distance.
With such intensity that the flame had difficulty remaining steady. The person giving the signal was terrified.
He wasn’t just giving the signal, no …
He was appealing for help.
32
Marion looked up from her reading.
The storm was blotting out the sun, darkening the Salle des Chevaliers. The pillars added to these areas of shadow by masking the far corners; the only things missing were burning torches on the walls, and you would think you had stepped back into the Middle Ages.
During her first hour’s reading, Marion had heard religious chants filtering down from the church above, reinforcing the impression that she was outside the world. Now there was nothing to accompany her but the anger of the elements outside; they hurled themselves ceaselessly against the window behind her, tapping and raging on the glass, and making her jump.
Intermittently, a long, high wail sounded along the stone corridors, wandering along, dying from door to door, and then losing itself in the Mount’s foundations.
Marion rummaged in her bag in search of the one or two biscuits she’d brought with her. She ate them slowly, savoring each mouthful.
Jeremy’s confidences regarding his wartime experiences had particularly upset her, and she found herself dwelling on his reflections on evil and its roots. In parallel, Azim’s watch on the streets of Cairo with his men was heart-stoppingly suspenseful. At the end of the day, the irony of the situation was almost comical. While one was tracking down evil, the other was attempting to understand its essential nature.
Marion shook the numbness from her legs by walking around the nearest fireplace
, beneath the shadowy eaves, as far as the raised passage on the south side of the chamber. She imagined this place with its walls decked in rich tapestries, as much to keep in the heat as to partition the hall into smaller rooms; with roaring fires in each hearth, and monks bent over their desks, illuminating manuscripts with stiff pages. The smell of the candles must have imbued every inch of the place, down to the carpets covering the floor. And the light could only have been a vast, moving creature, flowing among the draperies, its spectral leopard skin spotted with black and amber, undulating across the soaring ceilings.
She was there. She could almost hear the quill pens scratching over the parchments, the clink of the jars containing the inks, the isolated creak of a chair, and the soft rustling of sleeves on the wooden tables.
Marion threaded her way among the monks as they worked, between the cold pillars, to reach the window and her possessions.
Little by little they evaporated, leaving only damp grayness behind them. Marion drank a little water from her bottle, put it back in her bag, and turned around to look at the landscape through the window.
The trees down below were shaking dangerously, their branches clashing against one another and threatening to snap, and all the bushes were under attack from the incessant winds’ wantonly destructive breath.
The rain was falling almost horizontally, slicing through the air. At this altitude, the sea became confused with the sky; whirlpools of little droplets rose and fell all over the place, except when they merged and imploded.
Marion breathed in noisily under the effect of such a sight, then she returned to her book, leaving the Mount to its battle with nature and time.
She had reached a passage about Azim, the famous chapter exiled to the very end of the diary.
I find it easy to imagine Azim running along the district’s still-warm paving stones, in the middle of that starry night, then pounding the beaten earth of the narrow streets, forced to bend double at the sharp twists and turns, so as to get by more easily, and only just avoiding all the detritus that littered his path. As he approached the area where the alarm signal had originated, Azim suddenly forced himself to calm down, slowing to a walk to get his breath back and to ensure greater discretion. He must be careful. He was on the trail of a ghul.… His mind was torn between his ancestral beliefs and the more Cartesian training that the colonial world had instilled in him. That was the source of the dilemma in his mind. What was he really expecting to find? A real demon or a sick person in disguise? The weight of his revolver did not give him any real comfort. Azim was on the …
The Cairo Diary Page 21
