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HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd. 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF
First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 1993
Copyright © Michael Pearce 1993
Michael Pearce asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
A catalogue record of this book is available from the British Library
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination
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Source ISBN: 9780008259327
Ebook Edition © SEPTEMBER 2017 ISBN: 9780007484980
Version: 2017-09-05
Contents
‘Pearce summons up his vanished world with a finesse that’s dab, fond and droll. Impeccably done’
Literary Review
‘The Mamur Zapt’s sly, irreverent humour continues to refresh the parts others seldom reach’
Observer
‘Pearce’s secret policeman is implausibly likeable’
TLS
It was, alas, not uncommon for senior members of the Department to nod off in their offices, overcome by their exertions and the heat, so when Abdul Latif stuck his head through the door and observed Osman Fingari he thought nothing of it.
It was, however, decidedly unusual for them to be at their posts after two o’clock, when the city as a whole closed down for its siesta; so when, going round to make sure the shutters were closed, Abdul Latif found him still there at three, he was taken aback.
‘It’s not like him,’ he said in the Orderly Room. ‘He’s usually away by two.’
‘He’s usually away by half past eleven,’ said one of the other orderlies.
Abdul Latif felt called on to defend his master.
‘It’s these lunches,’ he said.
‘That’s right. Eat too much, drink too much–’
‘Drink too much?’ Abdul Latif was shocked. Osman Fingari was, so far as he knew, a strict Moslem.
‘He likes his drop.’
Abdul Latif disapproved of this and felt he should bring the conversation to an end.
‘We can’t leave him there,’ he said.
‘Why not?’
‘It’s not proper,’ said Abdul Latif firmly. ‘Besides, I want to go to the souk.’
‘Then why not go? He can wake himself up, can’t he?’
Unfortunately, this was one thing that Osman Fingari could not do and so it was that the night porter found him still there when he made his rounds at seven o’clock. A cruder individual than Abdul Latif (night porters were paid less than orderlies), and taken by surprise, he said roughly: ‘Here, come on, you can’t do that!’ and shook Osman Fingari by the shoulder.
Whereupon Osman Fingari slid slowly out of his chair and fell to the ground.
‘Nasty thing in one of the offices,’ said Farquahar in the bar the following lunch-time. ‘Chap in Agriculture. Found by the night porter.’
‘Heart attack?’
‘I expect so.’
In the heat of Cairo such things were not unusual and conversation passed to other topics.
Owen, sitting at a table nearby, heard the remark but did not think it worth registering. People were dying all the time in Cairo. Not in Government offices, of course, or something