Pasha?’
‘I thought he’d retired from active politics.’
‘Those bastards never retire from active politics,’ said Mahmoud. He looked at Owen curiously. ‘Don’t you know? Really?’
‘No,’ said Owen.
‘I don’t really know either,’ said Mahmoud. ‘I just assumed—’ He broke off.
‘What did you assume?’
Mahmoud hesitated.
‘I’ve got no particular reason for assuming,’ he said at last. ‘I just took it for granted.’
‘What?’
‘That it was to do with Denshawai.’
‘Why should it be to do with Denshawai?’
‘Because Nuri Pasha was an Under-Secretary in the Ministry of Justice at that time.’
The Denshawai Incident had happened in 1906, just before Owen was transferred to Egypt and took up the post of Mamur Zapt.
Some British soldiers had been marching from Cairo to Alexandria and en route five officers had gone to the village of Denshawai to shoot pigeons. Round every Egyptian village were flocks of semi-wild pigeons kept for food and manure. No one was allowed to shoot them without permission from the head man of the village. The officers had misunderstood a guide who was with them and, thinking they were free to shoot, did so. The infuriated villagers had attacked the officers. Two had been wounded and one had died, of sunstroke it was thought, as he lay on the ground. The British-controlled Administration had taken exemplary action against the villagers. Four had been sentenced to death, others sent to prison, and seven had received fifty lashes.
The incident had sparked off widespread protests throughout Egypt. It had not been too popular with the new British Government, either. Word went that Cromer had been in effect forced out over the issue. He had been replaced as Consul General by the more pliable Sir Eldon Gorst, something which hadn’t, in the view of old hands, helped matters one little bit.
‘Denshawai flavours most things,’ said Owen slowly. ‘I don’t know that it is particularly important in this case. How closely was Nuri Pasha involved?’
‘Not very,’ said Mahmoud. ‘Which is why my assumption may be quite wrong.’
He looked around him.
‘And also why,’ he went on breezily, ‘I should get on with my reconstruction before the remaining half million of the Cairo population arrive on the scene to help me.’
The number of people on the Place was indeed beginning to grow. The first water-cart was coming down the Sharia el Maghrabi spraying water behind it to keep down the dust. The first forage camels were weaving their way along the Ezbekiyeh Gardens, great stacks bobbing precariously on their backs. The cab-men and donkey-boys lunched their animals on green forage, and from dawn a steady train of camels slouched over the Nile bridge to supply them. The first donkeys laden with heavy blocks of ice wrapped in dirty sacking were making their way to the hotels. People who had slept on the pavement, or on the wall next to the railings of the Gardens, or in the gutter (which was probably safer since they could not fall off), were beginning to stir. In the early morning it was sometimes quite difficult to get along because of the number of men lying about with their faces covered like corpses, sleeping as soundly as the dead. Now, as he watched some of the white or blue-gowned figures get to their feet, Owen was suddenly reminded of apocalyptic accounts of Judgement Day that he had heard from Welsh preachers. Not normally given to such visions himself, he thrust it out of his mind and concentrated on Mahmoud’s reconstruction. The Parquet followed French practice and usually required a ‘reconstruction’ of a crime by its investigators, and Owen, whose knowledge of standard police procedures was limited, was interested in seeing how Mahmoud approached it. Briskly, it appeared.
The Egyptian went over to a mark he had scuffed in the dust.
‘Nuri Pasha,’ he said, ‘was about here, facing out across the Place towards the Ezbekiyeh Gardens.’
‘According to Fakhri?’
‘And others.’
Mahmoud pointed to where a man was relieving himself in the road.
‘Fakhri’s arabeah was about there.’
‘He would have had a good view,’ said Owen.
‘Yes,’ said Mahmoud, ‘I think he did. Though between him and Nuri Pasha there were a lot of people.’
‘Did you find any of them?’
‘Yes. The first they knew of it was a loud bang. They looked round to see Nuri Pasha falling—’
‘Why was he falling?’ asked Owen. ‘He wasn’t hit.’
‘Don’t know,’ said Mahmoud. ‘I’ll have to ask him. Reflex, perhaps.’
He darted back and affected to stumble.
‘An old man,’ he said. ‘Dazed, winded and scared. Perhaps half-stunned. Anyway, he lay approximately here until about five hundred people took it upon themselves to carry him into the hotel.’
‘Who took the initiative?’
‘As I was saying,’ said Mahmoud, ‘about five hundred of them. Each one says.’
He looked up and down the road and then walked over to another mark.
‘Meanwhile, an ordinary fellah who had attempted to run away immediately after the shot was seized and brought to the ground, or tripped, or just fell over, about here. Definite, because he stayed there, unconscious, till the police came and one constable, brighter than most, marked the spot.’
‘That’s where he was taken,’ said Owen. ‘Where was he when he fired the shot?’
‘Or when the shot was fired. Don’t know. Fakhri Bey said he moved to the right, so if we move to the left—’ He counted out four paces. ‘He might have been standing here.’
‘About twelve feet from Nuri.’
‘In which case,’ said Mahmoud, ‘why didn’t he hit him?’
‘It’s more difficult than you might think,’ said Owen, ‘even at twelve feet. Especially if you’ve never fired a revolver before.’
‘Which might well have been the case,’ said Mahmoud. ‘Why is it so difficult?’
‘It kicks back in your hand when you fire,’ said Owen. ‘If you’re not holding it properly the barrel jerks upward.’
‘If the shot went upward,’ said Mahmoud, ‘how did it hit the lemonade-seller?’
‘Could have ricocheted.’
‘Off what?’
Mahmoud moved back to where Nuri Pasha had been standing. Owen took up the position they had guessed at for the assailant.
‘Off the statue,’ said Owen. ‘Maybe.’
They went over to the statue of Ibrahim Pasha and examined it.
Mahmoud put his finger on a mark.
‘Yes?’ he said.
‘Yes.’
They became aware that a small crowd was watching them with interest.
‘I think your half million is beginning to arrive,’ said Owen.
‘It’s unreal to reconstruct without a crowd,’ said Mahmoud. ‘It’s impossible with one.’
He walked across the Place to where Fakhri might have observed the scene from his arabeah. For a moment he stood there looking. Then he walked slowly back to Owen.
‘Just fixing it in my mind,’ he said, ‘before I talk