Had they gone to the tomb? Did he know which tomb? Yes, he did. It was the tomb of Andrus. He knew Andrus because the Copt had often chided him when he saw him among the tombs; but he had sometimes given him alms, too. He knew the tomb because he had sometimes seen Andrus there, praying. It was a holy place and he, the old man, often liked to sit there, especially when the sun had just moved off the wall, because then he could sit there with his back against the wall and the stone would warm his back. He knew the tomb and he had seen the men going there.
Did they go in? Yes, but not for long. It was a holy place and perhaps they had been frightened. He had heard the door squeak and then they had all come running down the stairs and made off into the rubble.
He had seen the men in the moonlight: what sort of men were they? Bad men. Only bad men would do a thing like that. To come at night to the Place of the Dead! And there to do mischief. Bad men. Bad men.
But what sort of men were they? Were they-and this was the tricky question-were they Copts? Or Moslems? The old man was silent. Owen tried again. How were they dressed? In galabeahs or in trousers? Alas, the old man could not see. He had been far away and it had been dark. Yet he had seen the men in the light of the moon. The old man became confused and fell silent.
Owen tried a different tack. Did they come as men who knew the necropolis, or did they hesitate, wondering which way to go? The old man thought they knew. But then he thought that they had stopped before going to the tomb because perhaps they had not been quite sure which one it was.
His attention began to wander and it soon became apparent that there was no point in questioning him further.
The second witness was a small boy. There were lots of small boys in the necropolis. Not all of them were abandoned orphans. Some of them had loose connections with families in the poor districts which surrounded the cemetery. The families were often unable to sustain too many children and the older ones sometimes drifted away into a kind of semi-independence.
The girls became household servants or prostitutes. The boys made for the wilderness of the necropolis. Like the old man, they sustained themselves by begging from the wealthy Copts and fighting for scraps of food among the garbage tossed out into the cemetery from the more well-to-do Moslem houses along its western side. They moved in gangs, like the packs of dogs of which there were plenty in the necropolis, and with which they had a curious relationship, half-inimical, half-tolerated, sharing a mutual signalling system which alerted them at once to any intruders.
Aware of newcomers though they might be, that did not make them more ready to come forward. Even though they had already made Georgiades’s acquaintance, when he appeared with Owen they remained hidden among the stones, and he had to have recourse to the strategy which had worked before. He settled himself comfortably on the edge of a tomb and began to toss a coin casually into the air.
He went on tossing for about ten minutes, and only then did the first heads begin to appear. Slowly they moved forward until there was a ring of little boys surrounding them, all keeping at safe fleeing distance. At last Georgiades’s contact came out of hiding. Once he had made his move he came boldly forward, but stopped just beyond arm’s length.
“Who is this man?” he said, pointing at Owen.
“He’s a friend of mine,” said Georgiades.
“I know him,” said the boy. “He’s the Mamur Zapt.”
“Like I said. He’s a friend of mine.”
“You have powerful friends.”
“I need them.”
The boy looked doubtful.
“It is dangerous to have powerful friends,” he said.
“Worse to have powerful enemies.”
“He couldn’t touch me.”
“I wouldn’t want to touch you,” said Owen.
The boy seemed more than half-inclined to retreat back among the stones. Georgiades began to toss his coin speculatively.
“Does he pay you?” said the boy suddenly.
“Not enough,” said Georgiades.
That seemed to reassure the child.
“One never gets enough,” he said, with the air of an old man.
“One has to live by one’s wits.”
“Will he pay me, too?”
“I will pay you,” said Owen, “if you tell me what I want to know.”
The boy still did not come forward.
“I am afraid,” he said.
“I shall not hurt you,” said Owen.
“It’s not you I’m afraid of.”
“Who are you afraid of?”
“The big man with his knife. Also the holy one.”
“Which one are you afraid of most?” asked Georgiades.
The boy considered.
“The holy one,” he said at last. “The other, though big, is slow. He would never catch me. The holy one has many men. He might get one I did not know to seize me and hold me so that he could beat me. Also,” he added as an afterthought, “the holy one might call down great curses on me.”
“If you tell me the truth,” said Owen, “I will give you something which will heal both the beatings and the curses.”
“How much?” said the boy practically.
Owen mentioned a sum.
The boy turned away disappointed.
“It is not worth us talking.”
“It is always worth talking,” said Georgiades, flipping his coin in the air.
“Not for that it isn’t.”
“No?”
Georgiades continued to flip.
After a little while the boy said: “For two such coins I might be willing.”
Georgiades was so shocked by the suggestion that he missed his catch, almost, and had to fumble to stop the coin from falling on the ground, where it might have rolled away to join the lost treasures of the pharaohs; but fortunately he recovered.
“Three piastres I might manage,” said Georgiades grudgingly, “if the information is good. The fourth piastre-well, who knows, you might be able to tell me something later on.”
The boy accepted three piastres; one paid in advance, one paid when he came close enough for Georgiades to catch hold of him, and one to be paid after he had given his information. The fourth piastre was to be a bonus depending on the extent and quality of the information.
The story in outline was the same. The men had come into the necropolis late at night and had made their way towards the house of Andrus joking uneasily and talking loudly among themselves. They had quietened down as they approached the tomb and the last part of the journey had been covered in silence. They had stopped when they were some way short of their objective. The boy said it was because several of the men were afraid there might be spirits lingering about the tomb who might be hostile towards them because they weren’t Christian. They had succeeded in infecting the others with their fear and in the end no one had wanted to go on. Then one of them had said that it would be a shame to go back again without having done anything now that they had come so far, and that he was not afraid, especially as the spirits would be bound to be weak ones, being Coptic. He would go by himself if no one would go with him. No one would go with him and the man became angry, saying they were cowards and weaklings and feeble of faith. Still no one would go with him and in the end he had taken the bundle himself. He had gone to the tomb alone.
Alone? Yes, said the boy, alone. Not with the others? No, not with the others. They had watched from afar.
Owen was inclined to believe him. His account was more circumstantial than the old man’s. He reported conversation, too, which suggested that he or his informants had gone closer to the men. It might all be invention, the sort of stuff that he thought the Mamur Zapt would like to hear, but on the whole the account rang true.
What happened then? While the man was delivering the bundle a door had scraped along the stone making a loud, grating sound. The man had come rushing down the steps in a fright and all the men had run off into the darkness. They had scattered and some of them had lost their way and had not been able to get out of the necropolis till morning. The boy reported this with a trace of contempt in his voice, as of a professional speaking about amateurs.