The Night of the Dog (9 page)

He put a neck-lock on the youth he was holding and looked around for help.

Now the fighting was over there was plenty forthcoming. He got some of the men to carry the leather-worker to Zeinab’s flat. Others went to fetch a policeman. When, some time later, one appeared, Owen handed the youth over to him with strict instructions to keep him in the local caracol until Owen would question him. Then he went to Zeinab’s flat.

Zeinab was sponging the boy’s face. His father had already been attended to and lay quiet and grateful on one of Zeinab’s sofas.

“You’re going to have to do something about this,” said Zeinab, looking up at him.

The caracol, one of the old ones, consisted of a single room underground. It was hot and foetid in there and Owen had the ringleader brought upstairs for questioning.

The boy was about fourteen years old and had the long, fuzzy hair of the dervish. He looked scared, not so much, Owen judged, because he was in the hands of the police but rather because he was in different surroundings from those he was used to, the modern, built-up, Europeanized part of the city and not the warren of tiny mediaeval streets he normally inhabited.

Owen sat on a chair in the cramped little office and made the boy stand in front of him.

“What is your name?” he asked.

“Daouad.”

“Where are you from?”

“I am from near the Sukkariya,” the boy growled.

“Well, Daouad, you will not see the Sukkariya again for a long time unless you answer my questions.”

The boy looked around like a trapped animal.

“Whose man are you?”

“I am no man’s man.”

“You come from the Sukkariya. You are a dervish. Who is your sheikh?”

“The Sheikh Osman Rahman,” the boy said reluctantly.

“Did he tell you to do this?”

The boy was silent.

“Will he be angry if I tell him what you have done?”

“No,” said the boy proudly. “He will be pleased.”

“Because you have done his bidding?”

“Because I have done what he wants.”

“How do you know it is what he wants?”

The boy would not say. After a moment, though, he looked away and muttered: “It was only a pig of a Copt.”

“There are always Copts. Why attack one now?”

“To avenge!” the boy said hotly. “To avenge the blow against one of ours! A death for a death!”

“Is that what the sheikh says?”

“It is what we all say.”

“There are other sheikhs who do not say it.”

“They turn the cheek,” the boy said, “when they should set their face in anger. They fold their arms when they should lift their hand in wrath. They let the faithless strike them when they should strike the faithless.”

The words had the ring of preacher’s rhetoric.

“Is that what the Sheikh Osman says?”

“Yes,” said the boy defiantly.

Owen had him taken back to the underground room. In a few days he would release him. There was no point in acting against him.

The Sheikh Osman Rahman, however, was a different matter.

Owen came up with him that evening. It was in a tiny square of the Old City. There was a dais on one side of the square on which the Sheikh Osman sat cross-legged. All around him, squatting on the ground, were his followers; and beyond them, around the outskirts and blocking up the mouths of the little streets which gave on to the square, was a wider, more disinterested audience. Those nearest the dais carried raised torches in their hands, so that the dais was illuminated and the sheikh clearly visible to all.

Owen stayed in one of the side streets and listened. The sheikh was only just getting into his stride. He spoke vehemently but quietly. He was expounding a sura, one of the parable-like stories of the Koran, extracting from it lessons for the faithful. As he pointed up the moral, contrasting the way of the good with the way of the bad, his voice deepened and became more indignant. Almost imperceptibly the exposition became a harangue. The crowd stirred and became involved. There were sympathetic cries. The sheikh now had moved into denunciation: of the wrongdoer, the infidel, those who mocked Islam. Of those who protected the infidel from the just wrath of the servants of Allah.

Owen waited for the words which would justify his own intervention. They came. Incitation to riot. His men, who knew the law as well as he, looked at him expectantly.

“Not yet.”

He did not want to do it in front of the crowd. That might provoke a riot, the very thing he was trying to avoid. He did sometimes break up meetings but that was usually when they were political. Religion you handled with kid gloves.

Afterwards. When the crowd was beginning to disperse.

He could sense his men fidgeting. This was always the difficult time. They were disciplined, though, Sudanis, hand-picked ex-soldiers from the south. They would do what they were told.

The sheikh began a final exhortation. The last part of his serman, or speech was accompanied by continuous cries from his followers. His voice rose to a howl and drew the audience up with it into an excited, almost exalted, crescendo.

And then it stopped. The shouting went on, though, for several minutes. People leapt to their feet and milled around excitedly. This was the moment when, sometimes, a procession formed and they would march off to take action. If they did on this occasion Owen would be ready. His men drew their truncheons.

For a moment or two it seemed as if that was what would happen. A little group of men had got together and appeared to be trying to enlist others into a formation of some kind. There was so much untidy milling about, however, that in the confines of the tiny space they found it hard to organize themselves and eventually seemed to abandon the attempt.

The excitement died away and the crowd began to drift off down the side streets. The throng in front of Owen melted away, leaving his men exposed, so he drew them back into the shadows. In the square the torches began to go out, until there were only one or two left near the dais.

The Sheikh Osman sat on, relaxed now. A few of his followers had joined him on the dais.

Then he, too, rose to his feet. The square was quite empty by now and he and the little group of men with him made their way across it without difficulty. They disappeared down one of the side streets. Owen’s men moved unhurriedly after them.

They came up with Osman just where the street joined up with two others. The street was wider there and Owen’s men found it easy to slip round the sheikh, separating him from his followers and surrounding him.

The sheikh looked up, startled.

“What is this?”

Owen stepped forward.

“Come with me,” he said.

Then Osman understood.

He opened his mouth to shout. One of Owen’s Sudanis put a hand over his mouth, preventing him. There was a little struggle and Osman half-dragged himself free.

“There will be blood!” he shouted.

“It will be yours,” said Owen, and signalled to his men.

They closed round Osman and now he was silent. Muffled and tied, he was quickly shepherded away. For good measure Owen took several of his followers too. The others were left, startled and winded. One lay on the ground.

The passers-by at the end of the street had not even noticed.

Osman was taken to one of the cells beneath Owen’s office in the Bab el-Khalkh. The building was the Police Headquarters and well away from the Old City. It was also big and strong. Just in case.

Owen, though, did not expect any difficulty. It would take some time for the news to get around. Osman’s followers would have to get together; and Owen would see that they did not find that very easy. He had warned the Assistant Commissioner, McPhee, and together they would ensure that for the next two or three days the city was flooded with agents who would alert them at once to an assembly. By then perhaps Zoser would be caught. The crowd would have other things on its mind and Osman could be released.

It might even be possible to scare him into silence, although when he was brought to Owen’s office in the early hours of the morning that did not seem very likely.

“There will be blood,” he said again as he came through the door.

“There has been too much of that already,” said Owen. “That is why you are here.”

“There will be more,” Osman promised.

“It is bad there is blood,” said Owen, “either Moslem or Copt.”

“Where there is a blood debt,” said Osman, “there must be blood.”

“There was no debt originally,” said Owen. “There was just a foolish act.”

Osman did not reply.

“A sacrilegious act,” Owen pursued, “which you, as a holy man, ought to have done your best to prevent. Instead of encouraging it. And perhaps instigating it.”

“I did not instigate it,” said Osman haughtily.

“But you knew about it. He was one of your men.”

Osman shrugged.

“He was his own man,” he said, “in this.”

“But you knew. And could have stopped.”

“Why should I stop? It was only a Copt. Besides, have not the Copts—”

“Be quiet!” said Owen. “Such talk will not help you now. You allowed this thing to happen and so must bear some of the guilt.”

“There is no guilt.”

“You treated heavy things lightly,” said Owen, “and that does not accord with the Book.”

“You quote the Book at me?” Osman glared at him.

“I do. Where the Book itself is taken lightly the offender is not worthy of respect.”

Osman was plainly taken aback. He had not expected things to go like this. Owen pursued his advantage.

“You have done wrong,” he said, “and you must put things right.”

“I?” said Osman. “I?”

“You.”

“I have struck no blow.”

“You have caused many to be struck. It must be stopped before someone is killed.”

“Someone has been killed,” said Osman. “A Moslem. By a Copt.”

“That is for me,” said Owen. “Not for you.”

“There is a debt.”

“Which I will see is paid.”

“The Christians protect the Christians.”

“And the Moslems too.”

Osman looked at him.

“See that it is so,” he said.

Owen did not reply. After a moment Osman said: “Why have you taken me?”

“While I am pursuing the offender I do not want blood on the streets.”

“If you take me, there will be blood on the streets.”

“It will be Moslem blood,” said Owen, “and I would not have it so.”

“What do you want?” asked Osman.

“I want you to hold your hand,” said Owen, “for a time.”

“Why should I do that?”

“I suggest you go to some holy place, preferably out of the city, and pray for forgiveness for the levity which started this business.”

“What if I don’t?”

“You will stay here. And if there is blood you will have to pray for forgiveness for that also.”

Owen sent him back down to the cells to think about it. He did not expect Osman openly to agree but he thought it quite likely that the sheikh might indicate his willingness to accept Owen’s proposition. He thought he saw in Osman, beneath the intransigence and fanaticism, a certain uneasiness as to his own role in the affair. “Lightness” was not an easy charge for a religious sheikh to bear, especially if he felt there was some justification for the charge; and in his heart of hearts, away from the public arena, Osman might well accept the need for some self-examination. Owen hoped so. He would probably try releasing Osman even if he gave no outward sign of acquiescence. That might, in fact, make it easier for him. And, of course, if he did stir up trouble he could always be put inside again. However, Owen did not want to do that if it could be avoided. It would be better if the sheikh went away quietly by himself.

The attacks on the Copts brought, as Owen had expected they would, bitter representations from the Coptic community. Among the leaders who came to complain was Andrus.

“If you do not take action,” he said, “we shall.”

“You have said that to me before.”

“And you took no action.”

“I took action. But so did you.”

Andrus looked shaken.

“What do you mean?”

“Did you not take action?” Owen pressed him.

“If we did,” said Andrus, “who can blame us?”

“I blame you,” said Owen. “Without your action there would not have been blood, Coptic blood, on the streets.”

“I do not know what is this action you refer to.”

“Don’t you?” said Owen, looking him straight in the eye.

“No,” said Andrus, returning the look.

Owen was not sure. The contradiction was direct and on the whole he believed Andrus to be an honest man. But he sensed an unease beneath the directness. Perhaps although Andrus had not been personally involved, he knew more than he pretended.

Andrus returned to the burden of his present complaints. They were the same as last time but with, probably, more justification. And whereas previously, under the shock of the immediate offense, he had been fiercely indignant, now there was a savage bitterness which was in a way more alarming.

He answered Andrus, as he had done the other Copts, with assurances and counsels of patience; and with a touch of iron.

“Do not be drawn into reprisals,” he said as Andrus left, “or there will be trouble.”

“Do you think we should just sit back and take it?” asked Andrus.

“There won’t be any taking it. I’ll see to that.”

“I hope you will,” said Andrus. “I hope you will.”

Andrus’s name, of course, appeared on the list that Nikos compiled. Owen was surprised to see how extensive the list was. The church seemed to be a microcosm of Coptic society, with representatives of all social layers. Perhaps because it was conveniently placed on the edge of the Old City closest to the modern, developed parts where the more well-to-do lived, there were surprisingly wealthy people in its congregation. The Zosers rubbed shoulders with men with a hundred times their income. Another way in which the church was comprehensive was in the range of cultural levels among its members. Primitive fundamentalists like Zoser stood alongside sophisticated civil servants like Sesostris and Ramses. Sesostris Owen could understand; he was a fundamentalist too. But Ramses?