The crowd stirs. The frowning young man crinkles his face even further. A few people gesticulate indignantly. The woman herself throws up her arms and turns away. Winston wipes off his fogged glasses, apologizes to the crowd, and rushes over to Snyder, who is still smelling spices at a nearby stall.
"What'd you get?" he asks.
"She's against it," Winston blurts. "In favor, basically. But sort of against it."
"Okay, but what did she say, exactly?"
"Uhm, yes, I think so."
"What?"
"Uh-huh."
"Take a deep breath, dude. What did you ask her about?"
"About terrorism."
"Sweet."
"And about the clash of civilizations and that. The hijab and so forth."
"Isn't that a burka?"
"Yes, exactly," Winston says. "But she prefers the hijab. Only, her husband won't let her wear one. Because of the Taliban."
"The Taliban? There's no Taliban in Egypt."
"Metaphorically. The metaphorical Taliban. At least that's how I took it."
"We need to air this out. Go get her again."
"I think she's gone."
"She's right there by the fruit stand, dude." Snyder shoves Winston forward. "You want the job, right?"
Agonized, he sidles up to her once more. The crowd watches his second pass, a few people smirking, others shaking their heads. "Excuse me?" he says. "Hi, sorry-excuse me?"
She turns sharply and harangues him in Arabic.
"What's she saying, dude?" Snyder asks.
"She mentioned her husband again."
"The Taliban guy? Push for more on that."
Winston-recalling the Just Listen 'n Learn Arabic course he did on the flight over-dredges up the word for "husband." He utters it as if it were a question.
This riles the crowd further.
Snyder whispers, "Ask her if she plays around. Is that common in Islamist circles?"
"I can't ask that," Winston says, meaning this in every sense.
The crowd is growing in size and hostility.
"Maybe she's had a lesbian experience," Snyder remarks.
"But she's wearing a burka."
"Women in burkas can't express their sexual orientation? That is so racist."
"I can't ask her stuff like that."
"Islamist swingers would be an awesome story, bro. Serious awards material."
At this, the tall thin man who followed them from the cafe steps forth from the crowd. "What do you want to obtain here?" he demands in crisp English.
"It's okay," Winston sputters. "We're journalists."
"Who do you work for?" The man addresses Winston but looks at Snyder.
"For the paper," Winston answers. "Are you a journalist, too?"
"I'm with the interior ministry."
At this, Snyder steps forward. "Rich Snyder, foreign correspondent. Good to meet you. You speak awesome English, man. I totally envy you having a second language. We Americans are a disgrace. What's your name again?"
"I'm with the interior ministry," the man repeats, then barks a command to the onlookers, dispersing them at once. He returns his attention to Snyder. "I don't appreciate these topics of yours. You wish to write about sexual perversions in Egypt. There are no sexual perversions in Egypt. Sexual perversions are a Western phenomenon."
"I wish, bro."
The ministry man smiles thinly. "Find another topic. Something pleasing. Something cheerful about my country. Not all this"-he winces-"mixing up of people."
"What topic should I write about, then?"
"That is your job, is it not? I suggest you study The Egyptian Gazette. They publish some excellent articles."
"About Mrs. Mubarak being a good housewife? Look, if you don't want me to write about Egyptian sex practices, give me something better."
"What are you looking for?"
"I want what everybody wants. I want the Mideast money shot: terrorism."
The ministry man turns sharply to Winston. "Put your notebook away! This is not on the record!"
"I want Gamaa al-Islamiya," Snyder goes on. "Bang-bang in Upper Egypt. I want to know about security cooperation with the United States. I want interviews with special forces."
"Step into my car."
Seemingly, this request does not apply to Winston, who is left by the fruit stand as the black sedan pulls away.
He remembers too late that Snyder has the house keys. He calls Snyder's mobile, but there is no answer. Around nightfall, Snyder finally picks up. "Hey, man, why didn't you come?"
"I didn't know I was invited."
"Can't hear you. I'm at the military airport."
"When are you getting back? I'm stuck outside again."
"I'm totally coming back."
"But when?"
"Weekend at the latest."
"I need the house keys!"
"Ohmigod, relax. You worry way too much. Just have fun with it. Listen, I'm getting on a C-130 in, like, two hours. I need you to do some research." He reels off names and organizations.
"What about my keys?"
"Call me in five minutes."
"And you still have my laptop."
Snyder hangs up.
Winston calls back every few minutes for three hours, but Snyder's mobile is turned off. Winston must ask Zeina, the wire-service reporter who rents him the apartment, for a spare key. By way of apology, he insists on buying her a drink at a nearby pub.
She orders for them in fluent Arabic, picks a table, and carries over their pints of Sakara beer. She sits, sweeping aside gelled strands of her black hair, revealing a rakish grin. "So," she asks, "you enjoying Cairo?"
"Oh, yeah. It's really interesting," he says. "I have a couple of gripes, but they're pretty minor."
"Like?"
"Nothing serious."
"Tell me one."
"Well, the air is kind of hard to breathe, with all this pollution. Sort of like inhaling from an exhaust pipe. The heat makes me faint sometimes. And the food isn't all that edible. Or maybe I've just been unlucky. Also, it's a police state, which I don't love. And I get the impression the locals want to shoot me. Only when I talk to them, though. Which is my fault-my Arabic is useless. But basically, yeah," he summarizes, "it's really interesting."
"What about Snyder? What do you make of him?"
"You know Snyder?"
"Oh, sure."
"And what do I think of him?" Winston hesitates. "Well, I suppose that, on the surface, I have to admit, he did come off as slightly, uhm, sort of ambitious. But now that I know him better I'm actually starting to think that he's-"
"Even more ambitious."
With unintended candor, he responds, "Sort of a jerk, I was going to say." He wipes his glasses. "Sorry. I'm not offending you, am I?"
"Don't be crazy. He's not a friend of mine," she says. "What are you guys working on, anyway?"
"I'm not even sure. To be fair, before he arrived I wasn't writing a thing. But I was making progress. Or I thought I was. I was getting to know the city, studying my Arabic. I was going to produce something eventually. Then he colonized. He stole my laptop. He has this strange power to trample me and make me feel obligated at the same time. He is encouraging-he's constantly saying I'm a shoo-in for the stringer job, that he has no chance, that I'm the obvious choice, and so forth. Yet the more time I pass with him, the more ridiculous I feel. And I don't understand why a guy with that sort of experience is even trying out for this position."
"Iraq," she explains. "He's trying to get into Iraq. Snyder has been looking for a way in ever since the war started. Did he tell you what he was doing before he came to Cairo?"
"Something about an award?"
"He wrote a blog about Iraq. Or, rather, about trying to get into Iraq. About him getting turned back at the frontier with Iran, with Turkey, with Syria, with Jordan, with Saudi Arabia, with Kuwait. Thank God Iraq has so many borders-it gave him lots of material. I grant him this: he's determined. The guy is more than just a pretty face."
"You consider him pretty?"
"Well, he has that whole gritty war-correspondent thing going. Some women find that sexy," she says. "As far as Iraq goes, his problem is that nobody can figure him out. The Americans don't trust him, the Iranians think he's CIA, the Iraqis are just spooked by the guy. Nobody understands what he's doing there when no publication is sponsoring him."