Glenn Meade (10 page)

'Have the police any suspects for
the murder?'

Sanson shook his head. 'Not so
far. Arkhan questioned most of Evir's criminal acquaintances, and he's
reasonably certain none of them had anything to do with his death.'

'How was he mutilated?'

'His legs and buttocks had been
severed by a ship's propeller.'

Sanson crushed out his cigarette.
'His widow claims she doesn't know why her husband was murdered, or who might
have killed him. And she says she knew nothing about the sketch. But she
belongs to a family of thieves and liars, and you couldn't believe any of them.
However, we might be able to help Arkhan's investigation.'

'How?'

'Like most Egyptian peasants,
Evir's wife has a grudging fear of authority. Arkhan thinks that the sight of a
couple of military officer uniforms might help loosen her tongue.'

'You really think that would
help?'

Sanson shrugged. 'Right now, the case
has Arkhan baffled, and he'd appreciate any assistance. Besides, if Evir's wife
knows more about this matter than she's telling, or there's been a breach of
security, it may concern us.'

Weaver raised his shoulders. 'I
guess it could do no harm.'

Sanson reached for his cap. 'We
can take my car.'

It was hot in the olive-green
Humber
, and Weaver rolled down the window. He held on to
the door for safety as Sanson turned the staff car into a cobbled street and
swerved past a cart drawn by a camel and loaded down with watermelons. His
patched eye seemed to make judging corners fraught with danger.

Since returning to
Egypt
, Weaver had been surprised by how
international
Cairo
had become. The tight streets were crowded with shoppers and soldiers, the
crush of bodies and smells almost overwhelming. Aside from half a million
Allied troops of every nationality, there were White Russians, French, German
Jews, British, and Greeks. Over a hundred thousand foreign refugees had crowded
into the city since the war began, and the streets were a babble of strange
dialects. The Egyptians didn't seem to mind; the restaurants, brothels, lodging
houses and bazaars were all doing brisk business.

Apart from the uniforms, the war
might not be happening at all as far as
Cairo
was concerned, for there seemed to be no shortage of anything. From tiny
cramped shops, competing vendors sold charcoal-cooked kebabs, or juicy kofta
from huge bubbling, blackened vats of oil. Merchants beckoned from the doorways
of cupboard-sized shops, inviting passers-by for a glass of mint tea or Turkish
coffee, ready to haggle over the price of anything from a needle to a camel
saddle. Stalls were weighed down with food and spices, cheap jewellery and
trinkets, cotton and papyrus, carpets and bales of wool cloth, and an endless
variety of brass and copperware. And everywhere, as always, there was the
pungent, herbal smell of hashish in the air.

Sanson turned down a littered
street with an open sewer and pulled up outside what could hardly be described
as a house. It was no more than a ramshackle ruin, in the middle of a row of
shanty dwellings. All the windows were broken and had been replaced with
tattered cloth and bits of wood. A couple of scrawny-looking children played
with makeshift toys in the dusty street, skinny-ribbed, half-wild dogs barking
and yelping at their heels.

Sanson led the way to the
entrance, which hadn't even a door, just a beaded curtain. 'This way.'

He pushed through the beads and
Weaver followed. The first thing that struck him was the overpowering stench. A
mixture of stale sweat and rancid food, and that particularly unpleasant,
rotting smell you got in the more destitute quarters of
Cairo
. The place was a pitiful hovel. There
was a tiny fireplace, no more than a hole in the grimy whitewashed wall, a
rickety wooden table but no chairs, and the floors were bare, filthy concrete.

In one corner sat a wailing,
black-robed woman, clutching an infant in her arms. She was surrounded by three
grieving females, all dressed in black, despite the terrible heat. Weaver
guessed they were relatives or neighbours. Half a dozen noisy, barefoot
children were crowded into the room. They seemed unaffected by a death in the
house, giggling and smiling playfully at their visitors. Sanson scattered them
with a wave of his hand. 'HarmI Banal Outside! Outside!'

When the children had scurried
out, Sanson had words with the women mourners, and they shuffled out of the
room, leaving them alone with the woman and her child. 'This is Evir's widow.
She speaks no English, naturally. And you may find it difficult to understand
her dialect, so I'd better translate.'

The woman looked well over forty,
her skin lined with wrinkles, but Weaver guessed she was probably ten years younger,
six births and a miserable life adding a decade to her face. There was a room
leading off that served as the sleeping area, but no beds, just a couple of
worn rugs scattered on the floor. Weaver felt something tug at his jacket and
looked down.

A small boy no more than ten, with
big eyes and a cheeky, dirty brown face, smiled up at him. Weaver patted his
head and saw to his horror that the child's hair was infested with lice.

Sanson said to the child, 'BarraF
The boy clung to Weaver, and Sanson made to pull him away. 'No, leave him, he's
OK.'

'A word of advice from a former
policeman, Weaver. The boy here could probably have your wallet before you know
it.

His type are born with a hand in
the midwife's purse.'

The child seemed harmless, but
Weaver guessed that Sanson was probably right. 'I guess you'd better explain
why we're here.' He nodded at the woman. 'You want to ask her if she knows why
her husband had the sketch?'

Sanson spoke to the woman as she
continued to wail. After a few moments, she babbled something tearfully. It was
a tenement dialect, spoken rapidly, and Weaver found it almost impossible to
grasp a word.

Sanson looked frustrated. 'She
says she doesn't know why he'd have such a thing. She says she's puzzled. Not
only about the drawing, but why such an important effendi should call at her
home.'

'Tell her the information could be
important. And any help she can give will be rewarded.'

While Sanson translated, the boy
tugged at Weaver's jacket.

He reached into his pocket and
handed the child a stick of gum.

The boy smiled with delight,
peeled off the silver wrapper, and slipped the gum into his mouth.

When the woman replied, Sanson
said, 'She says her husband never spoke about his private business. And she
doesn't know where he might have gone the night he was killed. But the night
before his death he told her he was going to meet someone. He left the house
about nine and came back before midnight. She wants to know if this helps.'

'Who did he meet?'

'She claims she doesn't know. Her
husband never told her where he went, or who he met.'

'She's sure?'

Sanson nodded. 'I'm reasonably
certain she's telling us the truth, Weaver.' too The woman jabbered something
else, and Sanson answered in Arabic, 'Be quiet.'

'What did she say?' asked Weaver.

'She wanted me to tell you she has
a bare cupboard and six mouths to feed, and for any help the effendi could give
a widow, Allah will smile on you. But pay no attention to her.'

Weaver looked at the baby in the
woman's arms, at the pitiful squalor around them, and took out his wallet. The
experiences of war had hardened his heart to pretty much everything, had
toughened him in so many ways, but he couldn't endure the thought of the woman
and her small children going hungry. Sanson said, 'You don't have to, Weaver.

These people always survive.
Besides, she told us nothing really useful.'

'No, I'd like to.' Weaver
generously peeled off several large notes and left them on the table. The woman
clutched her child to her breast and rocked back and forth, sobbing her thanks.
As he put away his wallet, Weaver felt the boy tug at his coat again.

'Take it easy, son.'

The boy babbled something. Weaver
looked at Sanson.

'What the hell did he say?'

'He thinks he knows where his
father went.'

Weaver looked beyond the windscreen
as Sanson's staff Member trundled into the Khan-el-Khalili bazaar. The streets
were bedlam, lined either side with cavernous huckster shops, heavily laden
stalls, and food vendors.

Harassed-looking waiters ran in
every direction, carrying silver trays of tea or coffee balanced above their
heads. Children carrying huge bales of cotton scurried past, their backs bent
double like those of old men. The pedestrian and donkey-and cart traffic was
chaotic. A legless beggar, wearing cut-up parts of a car tyre strapped to his
stumps, propelled himself past them with frightening strength. Sanson blasted
his horn as he inched the car through the throng.

'He says that since his father
came out of prison, he wanted to get to know him again, but he hardly bothered
to even speak with him. So he followed him on several occasions. Twice he went
to a house in Gamaliya, not far from the El Hakim mosque.'

The boy's name was Jamal and he
had wanted to ride up front in the car. He sat between them, and Sanson had
questioned him relentlessly since they had left the house. Weaver knew the El
Gamaliya district. Its narrow streets contained the Khan-el-Khalili, the area
peppered with tenements, cheap lodging houses and belly-dance halls that
doubled as brothels.

'On one occasion,' Sanson
continued, 'he waited until his father had gone inside the house, then he
followed him. He saw him go up a flight of stairs, and knock on a door on the
first floor.

A man came out into the corridor,
and then they both went inside.'

'How does he know his father went
there the night before he was killed?'

'He doesn't. But he followed him
towards the El Hakim mosque that evening. His father saw him and told him to go
home. The boy thinks that maybe he went to the same place.'

'Did he see what the man looked
like?'

'Tall, and he had a beard.'

Weaver handed the youngster
another stick of gum. The boy nodded his thanks and slipped it into his pocket.
Finally, Sanson turned down a narrow cobbled street that came out into a small
dusty square, ringed with dismal-looking four-storey tenement houses and
crumbling pavements. The area looked totally forbidding to a foreigner. Most of
the buildings were badly neglected, tattered washing hung from balcony windows,
and a few shifty-looking men lazed in doorways and on street corners.

When they saw the staff car slow
down, the effect was immediate.

They disappeared.

The boy pointed to a house across
the square, its door open and leading into shadowed darkness. 'That's the
place,' said Sanson.

He pulled in and jerked on the
handbrake. Weaver told the boy to wait in the car.

'OK, let's take a look.'

As they walked across the square,
it suddenly occurred to Weaver that he had no gun in case there was trouble. He
rarely carried his Colt service automatic, but Sanson had a revolver, a
standard-issue Smith & Wesson.38, and as they approached the house, Weaver
noticed him release the holster flap.

'Shouldn't we have called your
friend Arkhan?'

'Time for that later. We have a
few questions ourselves that need answering.'

The front door of the tenement was
open and they stepped into a cool, dark hallway. The bare floorboards were
filthy, and there was a smell of rotting wood. Several doors led off, to
individual flats Weaver guessed, and there was a stairway leading Up. 'Wait
here a moment.'

Sanson went down the hallway and
knocked softly on the first door. An elderly woman came out, dressed in black.
When she saw Sanson's uniform, she seemed alarmed. Weaver couldn't hear the
whispered conversation between them, before the woman went back inside, the
door closed and a bolt rattled.

Sanson came back. 'There's an Arab
man living alone on the first floor, matching the description the boy gave. The
woman doesn't know him except by sight, and she doesn't know his name. He's
been renting the flat for about nine months and comes and goes at all hours. He
keeps to himself and she hasn't the foggiest what he does for a living.'

'Anything else?'

'She hasn't seen much of him for
the last few days.' Sanson looked up towards the landing. 'Let's see if he's
in.'

Weaver followed him up the
creaking stairs. When they reached the first landing, they saw a solid door
with three sturdy locks.

'He's careful, I'll give him
that.' Sanson knocked. There was no reply. He banged very hard on the door.
When still no one answered, he tried once more. Finally, he said frustratedly
to Weaver, 'Wait here.'

'Where are you going?'

Sanson said simply, 'I won't be
long.'

He went down the stairs, and when
he came back minutes later he had a steel wheel brace from the car. In
Cairo
, a military uniform
often carried enough authority for the wearer to do what he wanted, but Weaver
was alarmed. 'You're going to break in without a warrant?'

'The man may be a suspect in a
murder and he could already have fled. The woman said she hasn't seen him in
days. Besides, I checked the rear of the building. There's no way to reach the
windows without a ladder, and in this neighbourhood you can be sure they're
well locked. Believe me, Weaver, this way is quicker.'

'But he might be entirely
innocent.’

'He might also be guilty, and
trying to hide. But if he's innocent, I'll apologize and have the locks
repaired.' Without another word, Sanson wedged the brace between the door and
the jamb. He jerked the brace hard, and the wood splintered.

Then he pulled out his pistol,
kicked in the door, and they moved into the flat.

The place was untidy. It was also
empty. Sunlight poured into the room through filthy gauze curtains. There was
an old ottoman couch by the window, covered in red velvet, a low coffee table,
some cushions strewn around the bare floor, and a metal stove against one wall.
Three doors led off, one of them open to reveal a tiny kitchen. Weaver saw a
gas stove, a sink, and some cupboards.

The room was pretty bare, and
while Sanson went off to check the other rooms, Weaver stepped into the
kitchen. There was some tinned food on the shelves, jars of sugar, coffee and a
few spices, but the cupboards themselves were empty. He noticed a dark
brown-black stain on the sink. He licked his finger, dabbed it on the stain,
and brushed it against his tongue.

Coffee.

Sanson called out, 'In here.'

Weaver stepped into a bedroom.
Like the other room, it was pretty bare and functional. There was a mattress on
the floor, covered with dirty grey blankets. No pictures on the walls, or
personal belongings, except some empty wooden boxes on the floor, and a
tattered cardboard suitcase lying under the bed, containing a couple of
djellabas.

'Weaver?'

For a moment, Weaver couldn't see
the Englishman, but then he noticed a walk-in closet off to the right, a single
red light bulb on overhead, Sanson standing inside. He joined him in the
cramped room. 'What have we got here?'

There was a miniature camera lying
on a wooden ledge, some jars of chemicals, and several rolls of film. A stretch
of twine ran from wall to wall, with some clothes pegs attached for hanging
negatives out to dry.

Sanson said, 'It seems our friend
has a keen interest in photography.' He took down the camera and examined it.

'A German Leica. Did you find
anything in the other room?'

'Nothing.'

'I'll have the flat searched
thoroughly, and I'll need a man on duty at the door until I can get it repaired
and sealed up. After that, we'll put a watch on the place and see if anyone
turns up.

There's a phone at the railway
station. Could I ask you to wait here while I call headquarters?'

'What happens if the Arab shows up
in the meantime?'

Sanson removed his revolver and
offered it to Weaver.

'You'd better take this as a
precaution. I'll be as quick as I can. Ten minutes, perhaps less.'

Weaver opened the window. There
was hardly a breeze. He looked down into the back alleyway below. A tiny
bricked-off courtyard lay behind the tenement house, filthy with stinking
garbage. The door leading in was rotted off its hinges. He went to sit on the
ottoman, laid the revolver on the coffee table, and looked around the room. The
place was functional, nothing more. There were no photographs, no personal
belongings, no knick-knacks that showed the kind of man they were dealing with.
But even bare functional rooms with a mattress, some clothes and three locks on
the front door told them something.

The man was secretive, cautious,
had simple needs, and lived alone.

The man was also a spy, of that he
had no doubt. And ruthless, assuming he had killed Evir. Weaver was intrigued.

Why had Evir been murdered? And
what was the Arab up to in
Cairo
?
The Germans had recruited agents and sympathisers in the city's clubs, bars and
brothels, but since Rommel had been defeated they were pretty much redundant.

Something else struck him. If the
man was a spy, he probably had a radio. He knew he should leave the proper
searching to Sanson and his men, but his curiosity got the better of him. He
stood and went into the kitchen. He rapped his knuckles on the insides of the
cupboards, checked the floors and walls, but there were no false panels. He did
the same in the bedroom and in the darkroom.

Nothing.

He went back into the front room,
tried the same, with no luck. The stove was all that was left. It was unlit,
the metal cold.

He knelt and pulled at the bricks
at the base. One of them came loose, then another. Four bricks later, a recess
was revealed. He put his hand inside, felt something and hefted it out on to
the floor. It was a small leather suitcase with a sturdy handle and a couple of
straps. He undid the straps. Inside was a German shortwave radio set, a pair of
earphones, and a Morse code key.

He guessed the battery was still
in the recess or hidden somewhere else.

Weaver smiled and whistled. 'You
know something, Harry, I think you're in luck.'

Suddenly he heard a faint creak
behind him and turned. A tall, bearded Arab stood in the doorway, a Walther
pistol in his hand. He wore a djellaba and a livid expression on his face which
suggested he was furious that his territory had been violated.

Weaver stood. 'Who in the hell-?'

'Move away from the radio,' the
Arab ordered in English.

'Do it very slowly.'

Weaver stepped back. Sanson's
revolver was still on the coffee table. The Arab saw Weaver's eyes flick to it.
'Don't, unless you want a bullet. Empty your pockets on the table.'

Weaver did as he was told. The
Arab picked up Weaver's identity card and examined it without expression. 'An
American.

What are you doing here?'

'I came looking for a friend and
saw the door open.'

'Don't lie to me, or you'll lose
your life. Answer the question - what are you doing here?'

Weaver glanced at the radio. 'I
think that's obvious.'

'Hand the radio here.'

Weaver closed the suitcase and
moved to hand it over. At that moment, there was a clatter of feet below on the
stairs. The Arab looked behind, startled. Weaver saw his chance and made a
move. Just as the man looked back, he managed to grab the Walther's muzzle, and
punched him hard in the face, with a sound like bone cracking. The gun went
off, the slug drilled the wall, and the man reeled back. As Weaver struggled
for the weapon, the man's free hand came up. There was a flash of a blade and
Weaver felt a searing pain in his throat. He cried out and let go of the
Walther. The Arab kicked his feet from under him and he fell to the floor.

There were shouts outside the doorway,
and moments later two of Sanson's men appeared, their guns drawn as they moved
gingerly into the flat, Sanson unarmed behind them. The Arab grabbed the radio
and moved towards the window, then turned and fired twice as he clambered out.
One of the men was hit in the chest and slammed back against the wall, as
Sanson and the second man frantically sought cover.

'Stay down, Weaver!' Sanson
roared.

Weaver was bleeding heavily from a
gash in his neck, but he got to his feet, grabbed the revolver from the table
and staggered to the window. Down in the alleyway he saw the Arab climb on to a
motorcycle and kick it to life. He tried to aim with his left hand, but the
Arab's weapon came up smartly and spat twice, the shots whistling past Weaver's
head as he ducked back inside.

He heard the motorcycle roar away,
and when he looked out again the man was already halfway down the alley. Weaver
tried to steady his hand against the window frame, but he felt terribly weak.
He noticed blood washing down his chest, turning his tunic bright crimson.
Sanson was beside him in an instant, prising the gun from his fingers.

'Give me that!'