“I’ve seen another side of the story,” he replied. “I know an Egyptian woman in London.” He must be careful not to make a mistake. If he was caught in a lie it might cost him very dearly. “Heard about the cotton industry…” He saw the Arab’s face darken. “She gave a good argument for factories here, not in England,” Pitt went on, feeling his skin prickle and smelling sweat and fear in the air. His hands were clammy.

“What’s your name?” the Arab asked abruptly.

“Thomas Pitt. What’s yours?”

“Musa. That’s enough for you,” came the reply.

Pitt turned to the Jew.

“Avram,” came the answer with a smile.

“Cyril,” said the Greek, also giving only his first name.

“What will they do to us next?” Pitt asked. Would it be possible for him to get a message to Trenchard? And even if he could, would Trenchard be willing to help him?

Avram shook his head. “They’ll either let you go because you’re English,” he replied, “or they’ll throw the book at you for betraying your own. What did you attack the police for, anyway? That’s hardly going to get cotton factories built here!” The smile did not fade from his lips, but his eyes were suspicious.

The other two watched, holding judgment by a thread.

Pitt smiled back. “I didn’t,” he admitted. “I tripped over a carpet.”

There was a moment’s silence, then Avram roared with laughter, and the second after the others joined in.

But judgment still hung in the balance. There was something here to learn, beyond just survival, and Pitt knew it. They might well think he had been placed with them to seek out the leaders of any potential trouble. There must be an equivalent to Special Branch in Alexandria. He must not ask questions, except about Ayesha, and perhaps Lovat, although Lovat had left Alexandria over twelve years ago. It was becoming increasingly important for him not only to learn the facts but to understand them, although he could not easily have justified it to Narraway, had he asked.

The three men were waiting for him. He must respond innocently.

“Tripped over a carpet,” Avram repeated, nodding slowly, the laughter still in his eyes. “They might believe you. Just possibly. Is your family important?”

“Not in the slightest,” Pitt answered. “My father was a servant on a rich man’s estate, so was my mother. They’re both dead now.”

“And the rich man?”

Pitt shrugged, memory sharp. “He’s dead too. But he was good to me. Educated me with his own son-to encourage him. Can’t be beaten by a servant’s boy.” He added that to explain his speech. They probably knew English well enough to be able to tell the difference between one class and another.

They were all watching him, Cyril with deep skepticism, Musa with more open dislike. Somewhere outside, a dog began to bark. In the room it seemed to grow even hotter. Pitt could feel the sweat trickling down his body.

“So why are you in Alexandria?” Musa asked, his voice low and a little hoarse. “You didn’t come just to see if we wanted cotton factories, and you didn’t get here for nothing.” That was an invitation to explain himself, and perhaps a warning.

Pitt decided to embroider the truth a little. “Of course not,” he agreed. “A British diplomat, ex-soldier, was murdered. He was stationed here for a while, twelve years ago. They think an Egyptian in London killed him. I’m paid to prove she didn’t.”

“Police!” Musa snarled, moving very slightly, as if he would get up.

“They pay police to prove who is guilty, not who isn’t!” Pitt snapped back at him. “At least they do in London. And no, I’m not police. If I were, don’t you think I’d have got out of here by now?”

“You were senseless when they carried you in,” Avram pointed out. “Who were you going to tell?”

“Isn’t there a guard out there?” Pitt inclined his head towards the door.

Avram shrugged. “Probably, although no one imagines we’re going to break out, more’s the pity.”

Pitt squinted up at the window.

Cyril stood up and went over to it, pulling experimentally at the central bar. He turned around and glared at Pitt, a slight sneer on his lip.

“You need brains to get out of here, not force,” Musa said to him. “Or money?” He raised his eyebrows questioningly.

Pitt fished in his shoe. Would it be worth spending what he had, if he still had it, to make allies? They probably knew nothing about Ayesha or Lovat, but they might help him learn-if there was anything worth learning. And he was beginning to doubt that.

Their eyes never moved from him; they barely blinked.

He pulled out about two hundred piasters-enough to pay for his room at the hotel for eight days.

“That’ll do!” Avram said instantly, and before Pitt could even consider a decision, the money was gone and Avram was banging on the door with his fists.

Musa nodded, his shoulders relaxing. “Good,” he said with satisfaction. “Yes-good.”

“That’s two hundred piasters!” The words were out of Pitt’s mouth before he thought. “I want something in return for it!”

Musa lifted his eyebrows. “Oh? And what would you like, then?”

Pitt’s brain raced. “Someone to help me get some real information about Lieutenant Edwin Lovat when he served here with the British army, twelve years ago. I don’t speak Arabic.”

“So you want fifty piasters of my time?” Musa concluded. “Well, you can’t have that if I’m in jail, now, can you?”

“I want a hundred and fifty piasters’ worth of somebody’s time,” Pitt responded. “Or we all stay here.”

Avram looked thoroughly entertained. “Are you making a bargain?” he asked with interest.

“I don’t know,” Pitt responded. “Am I?”

Avram looked at the window, then at the blind door. He raised his eyebrows in question to the others and said something in Arabic. There was a brief conversation. “Yes,” he said finally to Pitt. “Yes, you are.”

Pitt waited.

“I will take you to the village where the British soldiers spent their time off. I’ll speak to the Egyptians for you.” He held out his hand. “Now let’s get out of here, before they come and do something unpleasant.”

PITT HAD VERY LITTLE IDEA of what was said to the guard, but he saw the money change hands, and half an hour later he was walking on Avram’s heels along an alley back on the edge of the city, and heading east again. As always, the flies and mosquitoes were cruel, but it had become habit to swat at them without thinking. His head still ached from the blow in the bazaar.

Delicate, sweet smells mixed with the general ordure as they passed a cook sitting in the dust, leaning with one shoulder against the wall. He wore a shapeless robe of dun-colored linen and canvas shoes without heels. To one side of him was a flat, open-weave basket with dates, onions and what looked like a carrot and a pomegranate. Behind him was a large earthenware jar with a broken lip, and in front of him a brazier piled on bricks, and another earthenware pot on top of it. It was the mixture in that pot which he stirred carefully, and the steam from it which ensnared the passersby. The man’s skin was as black as the dates, his beard trimmed short and his head so closely shaven as to appear bald. There was a mildness and a symmetry to his features which made him almost beautiful.

He ignored Pitt and Avram as if they had been no more interesting than the donkeys in the street or the dromedary standing patiently at the opening onto the square.

Avram was several yards ahead and Pitt hurried to catch up with him. It would be worse than a waste of time to be lost here; it could be dangerous. Since the incident in the carpet bazaar he was more aware of the underlying mood of the men who appeared to be standing around talking or haggling. At times there was a stillness in their faces he realized masked a deep anger they dared not show openly. This was their city, and he was a stranger here, a member of a foreign race who had in effect taken what was theirs. That the British used it to far greater effect, efficiency, and purpose was irrelevant.