Free Donkey-Vous by Michael Pearce

two figures merged together for a moment and then the second figure detached itself and came across to Owen.
    “He is still there, effendi,” a voice whispered in his ear. “No one has come. He sits with the watchman. He has a case with him.”
    He put his hand on Owen’s arm and guided him forward. Ahead of him was a deeper darkness, something screening off the light, a wall perhaps.
    Abou brought him up to the wall and then stopped. There was a gap through which Owen could see. In front of him two Arabs were sitting on the ground with an oil lamp between them. One of them was an old man in a torn, dirty galabeah, the night watchman presumably. The other was a suffragi in a spruce gown. Owen thought he recognized one of the attendants from the cloakroom. On the ground beside him was Berthelot’s case.
    Owen shifted his position and something flashed in his eyes, dazzling him. Involuntarily he jerked his head back and was dazzled again. For a moment he could not work out what was happening. Then he realized. There was some glass opposite him which was catching the light from the oil lamp. Several bits of glass, because as he moved there were different flashes.
    He looked more closely. At first he could not make out what it was. Then he saw and could not believe his eyes. The space in front of him was piled deep with lanterns. That was what the “wall” consisted of: lanterns, hundreds of them. They stood in heaps and piles all around this part of the liwan, bright, colored lanterns with gaudy paper and flashy dangling beads.
    Then he remembered. The mosque was used to store the lanterns used on feast days to decorate the city’s streets and squares.
    The two Arabs went on talking quietly. From time to time the watchman looked at the case. The other man did not stir.
    At one point the watchman got to his feet and shuffled off into the night. Owen tensed expectantly but the suffragi did not move nor did anyone come. Eventually the watchman shuffled back, this time with a dirty black can. He produced two small enamel cups from the folds of his galabeah, set them on the ground and filled them from the can. The suffragi drank with appropriately polite smacking of lips.
    They resumed their conversation. Owen could follow it only in parts. It was purely trivial in nature. They were just passing the time. Owen felt sure the suffragi was waiting for somebody.
    Georgiades had slipped away. Owen knew what he was doing. He was making his way ’round to the other side to cut off possible escape routes.
    If the man was coming, though, it would have to be soon. The sky was beginning to lighten.
    The watchman produced some bread and an onion and offered to share it with the suffragi. The suffragi refused politely.
    Owen was beginning to get bothered now. It was getting light so quickly that a man coming through the liwan would be able to see the watchers. He signalled to Abou, who was standing beside him and they moved in front of two pillars to be less visible from behind.
    Still no one came.
    In the strange gray light that came before the dawn in Egypt things stood out as clearly as if it were day but with a gentle softness which lacked the harsh clarity of the sun. Owen always woke early. He would be awaking now if this were an ordinary day.
    Any moment now the sun would come over the horizon. The watchman leaned forward and extinguished the lamp.
    The suffragi rose from his squat and picked up the case. He bade the watchman the usual extended, ceremonious, Arab farewell and then walked off down the colonnaded arcade.
    Abou looked at Owen questioningly.
    Owen nodded and the tracker slipped off through the pillars. Owen followed a long way behind. Tracking by daylight, when it was so much easier to be seen, was far harder than tracking by night. It was best left to those who knew how to do it.
    He could not see Sadiq. Georgiades, he knew, would be doing the same as he was.
    They followed the line of the old city wall. The houses in