'But why you?' Jack Butler sounded humbler now. 'You're supposed to be out of the Middle East.'
'Out of the Middle East – but not out of favour with Sir Frederick,'
said Audley quickly. 'If it came to the push I could still pull some strings, and Jake knows it. And he trusts me, that's the point. He may even suspect I'm already involved – he knows Hugh's a friend of mine, anyway. And remember, all he wants is to get the heat off for a day or two, if what Razzak said is anything to go by – '
'But is it?' Roskill interrupted. 'I still don't quite know what makes Razzak tick. You were going to find out about him, David – I haven't even seen the official file on him, damn it!'
'But I have,' Butler said shortly. 'There's not a lot in it either. He's peasant stock, with a dash of Turkish or maybe Albanian. Cairo military academy. Two tank conversion courses over here — that's why his English is so good. He did one on Shermans back in '46, and one of Centurions a few years ago, with attachment to the R.T.
R. – they thought he was pretty sound. And he's been blooded three times: he was in the Irak al-Manshia siege in '48, where Nasser won his spurs. Then in '56 he broke out of Um Katef – it took him fifteen days to walk home. And then the '67 business.'
'What about his politics?'
Butler nodded. 'I'm coming to them. He was in the Free Officers movement by the end of '49 – he was one of the group that captured Farouk's palace. Then Nasser put him in Intelligence, and dummy2
he was in the special squad that smashed the Muslim Brotherhood after they tried to kill Nasser in '54. Went to Russia next year and put up some sort of black there – he was sent home in disgrace, anyway – '
'He broke a Russian officer's jaw in an argument,' said Audley.
'Officially it was a professional argument. Actually it was over a girl – a bit of uncomradely racial prejudice. He doesn't like the Russians much.'
'Well, it certainly stopped his promotion dead,' said Butler. 'He was shipped back into the army and it took him ten years to get his battalion. And the rest you know.'
'Not quite,' said Audley. 'Those are just the bones of it. What it adds up to is that Razzak's a patriot – and not an Arab patriot either. An Egyptian.'
'So that's why he doesn't like the guerrillas much?'
'If they were Egyptian guerrillas he'd like them, Hugh. Egyptians –
yes. Palestinians, Syrians, British and Russians – all damn foreigners to him. And when you think that Nasser's the first real Egyptian to rule Egypt for a couple of thousand years you can see his point. In fact Razzak's more an Egyptian than an Arab in just the same way Shapiro's more an Israeli than a Jew – maybe that's what they've really got in common! Anyway – '
The phone beside Mary overwhelmed the rest of his words with a shattering burst of sound, startling them all.
Mary picked up the receiver. 'It's all right – it's only the house phone. We haven't got a proper one any more. It'll be Penny about dummy2
lunch – yes, Penelope?'
But as she listened her eyebrows lifted in surprise, and her eyes fastened on Audley. She put her hand over the mouthpiece.
'We've got another visitor – and for you, David!'
Audley pursed his lips. 'So soon? I'd rather expected Jake to wait for me to come to him. But it seems I was wrong.'
'It isn't Colonel Shapiro,' said Mary. 'It's the Egyptian – Colonel Razzak.'
'Razzak!' Audley frowned and blinked. ' Razzak?'
'For you? But how the devil did he know where to come?' Butler snapped. 'I made sure no one tailed me, and the driver's not born who can keep up with Hugh – '
He stopped dead as his question answered itself: any toddler in his pedal car could keep up with Audley's driving, and with Audley none the wiser – if he even bothered to look in his mirror.
'Well, don't look at me,' Audley said defensively. 'I'm not a field man used to peering backwards all the time, blast it. And no one but Faith and Hugh – '
Audley stopped too, for once one second behind everyone else in making the connections, and laughably put out by it. Roskill couldn't help grinning at him: that celebrated incompetence in practical matters was at last playing a practical dividend.
'And Jake' he said. 'So at least we don't have to test your theory about Shapiro and Razzak. You've proved it yourself, David. The real question's why Razzak's coming out into the open now.'
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Audley sucked his lower lip, glaring at a point in space two feet in front of his nose. 'The real question is why it's Razzak and not Jake. Damn it – I was depending on Jake.'
'Will Razzak know enough to connect young Jenkins' death with Firle?' Butler asked.
'What are you getting at, Jack?'
'Well, if he does he'll be scared stiff we're going to pin it on him.
The very fact we're here means we know one hell of a lot. It's logical.'
'So why's he making contact with us now?'
'To stop us doing anything,' said Audley quickly. 'From what he said to you, Hugh, I'll bet it's time he's trying to win. Anything to get us off his back until whatever he and Jake are doing is completed. And that gives us a club to hit him with – let's get him up here, Miss Hunter.'
'A club to hit him with?'
'A lever, I should have said, Miss Hunter. If it was Jake it would be different. But Razzak doesn't know me, and he's not going to tell us more than he has to.'
'But he wants your help.'
'He wants us to delay doing anything. And that's a risk I'm not going to take unless I know exactly why, down to the last detail.
Which means we're going to have to throw a scare into him.'
'What I've seen of him, that isn't going to be easy,' said Roskill. 'He doesn't strike me as the scaring type. And we haven't got much to scare him with, when it comes to the crunch.'
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'I'm afraid I shall just be in the way,' Mary said diffidently. 'He's certainly not going to be scared of me.'
Audley focused on her. 'Now you could just be wrong there, Miss Hunter – you could just be wrong. If I've got it right Jake wanted me involved because he knows I feel the same way about the Middle East as he does. I'm a dove from conviction, not necessity.'
He looked from Mary to Roskill. 'But you two are different.
You've each got a score to settle with someone. Razzak won't have allowed for that, but it's something he'll understand when he meets it. The Koran says that Allah rewards those who forgive — but then it lays down that those who avenge themselves when wronged incur no guilt!'
'But, Dr. Audley – David – I don't want vengeance. It won't bring Alan back.'
'Hugh doesn't feel that way, do you, Hugh?' Audley nodded at Roskill. 'You've wanted an eye for an eye from the start. Now's your chance to force Razzak to show you how to get it. I'll give you a cue, don't worry.'
Roskill studied Audley suspiciously. The tricky sod was up to something for sure; his very eagerness betrayed it. But so far their objectives still seemed to coincide...
Mary watched them both for a moment, reluctance written plainly on her face.
'We can't keep him waiting any longer, Miss Hunter,' Audley said.
'Ask him up, please – and trust me!'
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XIII
CHARACTERISTICALLY, PENELOPE DID not show Colonel Muhammed Razzak where to go; from the tentative way he put his head round the door it was clear that she had given him the same vague directions that she gave to everyone else.
The liquid brown eyes – Omar Sharif's eyes set incongruously in that battered face – passed over each of them uneasily before finally settling on Mary. Already this was something less than the jolly, confident Razzak of the previous night.
'Madame,' the Egyptian bent courteously over Mary's hand, though he was too well-versed in English protocol to kiss it. 'Your niece informs me that you are holding a levee and that I may join it. I hope I am not intruding.'