He’s batty, thought Whitfield. Now he’s going to the Arab quarter. But I’m going home. The last time I told Remal where Quinn might be, Remal had the poor thing beaten up. I feel shaken about it even now. I must plan something soothing at home The Arab quarter, Quinn discovered, was not very large. He walked the narrow streets slowly and twice ended up in open country where he could see no roads. The quarter was not large but it was complicated, and Quinn knew he was lost almost immediately But that did not bother him. He knew with an uncomplicated certainty he would find his man. Or Turk would find him. It was also very simple in his mind why he had to see Turk. There is a rat here whom I can understand. And maybe I can use what he knows. Quinn had no clear notion what this last thought really meant, but he did not question it. Remal, of course, had pushed him around, but the fact was, he had not yet reacted to it.
Maybe it never rains here, he thought, and the heat just hangs, just stays this way-He broke out in a sudden sweat, as if frightened. The noise got to him just as suddenly as if there had been silence before, which was not true. Some Arabs were arguing, or perhaps they were just talking, but they yelled, and children yelled, and a dog howled. Even the light makes a noise, thought Quinn. The yellow light in the doorway wasn’t still but jumped and gutted.
Quinn took a deep breath and smelled the warm oiliness of something cooking. All right, I’m hungry. That’s what all this is about, and he walked through the doorway into a long, crowded room with long tables, short tables, and men sitting on benches. The men stared at him but kept eating or talking. They looked at him as if they knew who he was.
Quinn sat down next to a man who was slurping a stew. He was an old man who seemed to have only one tooth and his jaw churned wildly while he ate. When Quinn looked up, there was a boy standing next to him who said something in Arabic.
“You the waiter?” said Quinn. “Eat,” and he showed what he meant by pointing at the stew the old man was eating.
“Don’t order that stuff. It’s not any good.”
Quinn turned and saw Turk standing behind him. Turk smiled quickly, as if it were expected of him.
“Why? Is it dog?”
“Not the point, friend. That dish is very cheap. The price goes by how rotten the meat is.” Then Turk said something to the boy, and when the boy had gone Turk sat down opposite Quinn. “I ordered for you. Okay?”
“Thank you.”
“You were looking for me, huh?”
Quinn felt an unreasonable annoyance at the remark, but then he admitted, yes, he had been looking for Turk. He wanted to ask, how in hell did you know I was looking for you, but felt cramped with his anger and said nothing.
“He beats you up, he beats me up, so of course we meet,” said Turk, and his smile made it sound like a stupid joke.
“You’re talking about Remal,” said Quinn.
“Of course. He who had them beat you up.”
“You seem to know everything.”
“Almost.”
“Is that how you lost your teeth, he beat you up?”
“No. I was speaking in a manner of speaking,” said Turk. “He beats me in some other way.”
“What way?” said Quinn, but his stew came at that moment, and while the boy put the bowl down Turk did not answer.
“In what way?” Quinn asked again.
“How does a strong man beat a weak one?” said Turk. “He ignores the weak one. He beats me in that way.”
That’s got nothing to do with me, and the thought came to Quinn in a rush of anger. He took a spoonful of stew and burnt his mouth.
“I would do an errand for him here and there,” Turk was saying, “and I would see how badly run all his business really is.”
“The smuggling?”
“Yes. And I would make suggestions, try to advise him on how to do better, more money, more everything. Ek-” said Turk with a shrug and a face as if avoiding the touch of something disgusting, “and he would ignore me.”
“You’re a sensitive bastard, aren’t you?” said Quinn, but though Turk answered something or other, Quinn did not hear him. The night’s beating, the off-hand treatment by Remal-all that came back now as a clear, sharp offense, like a second beating, not of the body this time, but something worse.
Like I didn’t exist, it struck Quinn. And this time, without moving a muscle, a cold hate, which seemed very familiar, moved into Quinn, settled there and started to heat.
“He could be somebody to admire,” Turk was saying, “but, well, ek-” and he made his gesture again.
“You poor bastard,” said Quinn with a lot of feeling. “You poor bastard,” and he started to eat his stew.
“Oh?” and this time, with a smile, Turk laughed. “What about you, man from the box?”
The stew was over-spiced and had some offensive flavors in it, but Quinn didn’t taste a thing. He swallowed without chewing very much and stared at Turk.
“All I meant was,” said Turk very quickly, “here you are now, here you come innocent like a lamb…”
“Tell me something, Turk. Why do you hang around me?”
“Oh that? Well, you were new in town, I heard about you and…”
“Stop crapping me. What do you want?”
Turk shrugged and said, “Perhaps money Perhaps company. Perhaps nothing else to do.”
“Money. That’s the only thing that makes sense in your answer,” and Quinn thought, I can use this bastard. I can maybe use him “It is really simple and no mystery and no double-talk,” Turk explained. He felt he had better say something solid now and no more grinning and crapping around, as the American had expressed it. “I have heard, of course, about your background. Or at any rate, the talk that has been about you, that you must have been somebody with the big-business criminals in your country.
“Go on.”
“And, as you did find out this night, how Remal is perhaps worried about you…”
“Why?”
“An unusual arrival draws unusual attention.”
“I never did anything to him.”
“Ah, that is Remal. He anticipates.”
Quinn felt suddenly dangerous and important. He felt like an embarrassed boy about this, but the sense of drama remained.
“I felt,” Turk went on, “that if you are pushed, you push back.”
“You haven’t told me yet what you want.”
“Ek-” said Turk. “I would like to see how a man like you deals with a person like Remal. That’s all.”
You left out the money, thought Quinn. And for that matter, so have I, so have I-A month or more in this burg with really nothing to do, and there’s some kind of set-up here, no mistake about it, and maybe a thing to be made. But the thought did not really interest him.
Quinn touched the side of his face where he had been cut in the beating, and he touched there to feel the burn and the sting. He touched there to feel just how much he had been hurt.
And then, eating stew as if nothing else mattered, he got back more of the old habits. It happened that smoothly. The old habits of grab and kick, of anticipate, the sharp, quick decisions to be ahead of the game, any game, or somebody else would be playing it his own way which means, Quinn, you’re out!
“The strangest thing,” said Turk from across the table. “You look like a new man,” and of course he grinned.
For a brief moment Quinn felt confused, and then lost and sad. But it was too fast and he knew nothing clearly. And of course neither he nor Turk understood that there was nothing new about Quinn now, that he was no longer new at all.
They left the place because Quinn couldn’t stand the smell any more, after he was done eating.
“The hotel?” asked Turk, because he would have liked to go there.
“No. Some place here is fine. But I don’t want to have to sit on the same bench with everybody.”
“Ah. You have secrets.”
“No. But I want to ask some.”
They walked down the street, deeper into the quarter.
“I don’t get this,” said Quinn, “how a smart man like Remal will pull such a primitive stunt. He gets me beaten up right there where he doesn’t want me to look around, and then when I wake up he’s standing over me with a lantern.”