Read Online The Girl in the Nile by Michael Pearce - Free Book Online Page B

wish?”
    “I was thinking of myself.”
    “But for you to wish, you must have already known her. How did you come across her in the first place?”
    “In the first place? I hardly remember.”
    “In the second place, then,” said Mahmoud quietly, recognizing that he was being fenced with. “For you certainly knew her.”
    Again the sharp glance from the Prince.
    “She had been about the Court.”
    “Come!” said Mahmoud, a trifle wearily. “About the Court?”
    “Not in the strict sense, of course. My father doesn’t have that sort of thing. Not in public.”
    “You met her at the Palace?”
    “Not exactly at the Palace.”
    “Where, then?”
    “About.”
    “These things are important, Prince.”
    “Why are they important?”
    “We need to know her identity.”
    The Prince rubbed his chin. “Yes,” he said. “Yes. I thought you would.”
    “Well, then?”
    “This is the embarrassing part. I don’t know.”
    “Come!”
    “I know you don’t believe me but it’s true. I don’t even know her name. Well, no, that’s not true. Her name was Leila. But that is all I know. I do not know her family.”
    “Are you sure, Prince?”
    “She did not wish me to know her family. I used to tease her about it. ‘Little Miss No-Name from Nowhere.’ She would not say. She was, I think,” said the Prince, “ashamed.”
    “Where did you meet her?”
    “At a play. I do not ordinarily go to Egyptian plays. I find them unredeemingly turgid. This one, I was assured, was different. It was by a modern playwright. I went in the belief that I was encouraging a modern renaissance of the Egyptian theater. I was,” said the Prince, “horribly mistaken. The play was as turgid as ever. And, what was worse, ridiculously radical.”
    “The girl?”
    “I met her afterwards, backstage. There was a party. Naturally I had been invited. Foolishly I went, to encourage, as I say, the theater. It was awful. The one interesting thing was the girl. I met her again afterwards. Several times. And then I thought of inviting her to accompany me on this foolish expedition.”
    “Could you tell me the name of the play?”
    “
New Roses in the Garden
.” The Prince shuddered. “Never again. The avant-garde is not for me. Not in the theater anyway.” He looked at his watch.
    “Perhaps we can continue some other time,” said Mahmoud, rising dutifully.
    “Of course. Of course.”
    He accompanied them to the door. At the door he hesitated. “You have not,” he said diffidently, “not yet found the body?”
    “I am afraid not.”
    “No? Well, I expect you will.”
    He hesitated again and then suddenly brightened.
    “Of course,” he said, “if you don’t…Well, there ceases to be a problem, doesn’t there? No body, no crime.”

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Chapter 4
    « ^ »
    No problem?” said Zeinab, outraged. “The girl is dead, isn’t she?”
    “We can’t be sure of that,” said Owen cautiously.
    “No? You think she jumped off the top of that boat and swam to the shore?”
    “Well, in principle she could have done—”
    “Egyptian girls,” said Zeinab haughtily, “do not swim.” Owen was beginning to wish he hadn’t told her.
    “In any case,” he said, “Narouz is wrong. Just because there isn’t a body, that doesn’t mean there couldn’t be a case. A potential crime has been reported. The report itself is sufficient to trigger things. An investigation has been started and it will continue until, well, the file is closed. It has become a bureaucratic matter now.”
    “There are times,” said Zeinab, “when you sound boringly cold-blooded.”
    “The investigation will continue,” Owen contented himself with saying.
    “Oh, good.” Zeinab brooded awhile. Then she said, “It will continue, yes, but will it get anywhere?”
    “We’ve only just started,” said Owen defensively.
    “You haven’t got very far yet,” Zeinab pointed out.
    “It’s a difficult case.”
    “That is because you started in the wrong place.