The Night Manager

"Why?" says Jonathan, meaning: Why are you now bringing me?

" 'Look at these people, Freddie,' I told him. 'Each time someone sells weapons to another tin-pot Arab tyrant, these people starve a little more. Do you know the reason? Listen to me, Freddie. Because it is more fun to have a pretty army than to feed the starving. You are an Arab, Freddie. Never mind that we Egyptians say we are not Arabs. We are Arabs. Is it right that your Arab brothers should be the flesh to pay for your dreams?' "

"I see," says Jonathan, with the embarrassment of an Englishman when faced with political emotion.

" 'We do not need leaders,' I said. 'The next great Arab will be a humble craftsman. He will make things work and give the people dignity instead of war. He will be an administrator, not a warrior. He will be like you, Freddie, as you could be if you grew up.' "

"What did Freddie say?" says Jonathan. Her smashed features accuse him every time he looks at them. The bruises round her eyes are turning to blue and yellow.

"He told me to mind my own business." He catches the choke of fury in her voice, and his heart sinks further. "I told him it was my business! Life and death are my business! Arabs are my business! He was my business!"

And you warned him, he thinks, sickened. You let him know you were a force to be reckoned with, not a weak woman to be discarded at his whim. You let him guess that you too had your secret weapon, and you threatened to do what I did, without knowing I'd done it already.

"The Egyptian authorities will not touch him," she says. "He bribes them, and they keep their distance."

"Leave town," Jonathan tells her. "You know what the Hamids are like. Get out."

"The Hamids can have me killed as easily in Paris as in Cairo."

"Tell Freddie he must help you. Make him stick up for you against his brothers."

"Freddie is frightened of me. When he is not being brave he is a coward. Why are you staring at the traffic?"

Because it's all there is to stare at apart from you and the wretched of the earth.

But she does not wait for an answer. Perhaps deep down this student of male weakness understands his shame.

"I should like some coffee, please. Egyptian." And the brave smile that hurts him more than all the recrimination in the world.

He gives her coffee in a street market and drives her back to the hotel car park. He telephones the Ogilveys' house and gets the maid. "Him out," she shouts. What about Mrs. Ogilvey? "Him not there." He telephones the embassy. Him not there either. Him gone to Alexandria for regatta.

He telephones the yacht club to leave a message. A drugged male voice says there is no regatta today.

Jonathan telephones an American friend named Larry Kermody in Luxor: Larry, is that guest suite of yours empty?

He telephones Sophie. "An archaeologist friend of mine in Luxor has a spare flat," he says. "It's in a place called the Chicago House. You're welcome to use it for a week or two." He searches for humour in the silence. "It's a kind of monk's cell for visiting academics, stuck onto the back of the house, with its own bit of rooftop. Nobody need even know you're there."

"Will you come also, Mr. Pine?"

Jonathan does not allow himself a moment's hesitation.

"Can you dump your bodyguard?"

"He has already dumped himself. Freddie has apparently decided I am not worth protecting."

He telephones a travel agent who does business with the hotel, a beery-voiced Englishwoman called Stella. "Stella, listen. Two VIP guests, incognito, want to fly to Luxor tonight, expense no object. I know the whole place is shut up. I know there are no planes. What can you do?"

A long silence. Stella is psychic. Stella has been in Cairo too long: "Well, I know you're very important, darling, but who's the girl?" And she gives a foul, wheezing laugh that chokes and whistles in Jonathan's ear long after he has rung off.

* * *

Jonathan and Sophie sit side by side on the flat roof of the Chicago House, drinking vodka and staring at the stars. On the flight she has barely spoken. He has offered her food, but she wants none. He has put a shawl over her shoulders.

"Roper is the worst man in the world," she announces.

Jonathan's experience of the world's villains is limited. His instinct is to blame himself first and others afterwards.

"I guess anyone in his business is pretty frightful," he says.

"He has no excuse," she retorts, unappeased by his moderation.

"He is healthy. He is white. He is rich. He is wellborn, well educated. He has grace." Roper's enormity grows as she contemplates his virtues. "He is at ease with the world. He is amusing. Confident. Yet he destroys it. What is missing in him?" She waits for him to say something, but in vain. "How does he come to be like this? He was not dragged up in the back streets. He is blessed. You are a man. Perhaps you know."