The Men Behind by Michael Pearce Page A

Owen.
    “You can bloody come with me,” said Roper.
    He fumbled in his pocket and pulled out a wad of bank notes.
    “Here!” he said. “Do you want some of these?” Soraya’s eyes glistened.
    “No knives!” warned Owen.
    “Just keep out of it,” said Roper. He grabbed the girl by the arm.
    She pulled a knife out of her sleeve and slashed him across the hand. Roper swore and let go of her arm. She snatched the bank notes, ducked under his arm and was gone.
    “What the hell!” said Roper, dazed.
    He sat down heavily in his chair and looked at his hand. A film of blood spread slowly back to his wrist.
    “Well, damn me!” he said.
    “Want a handkerchief?” said Owen.
    “What do you think I am?” said Roper. “Some kind of pansy?”
    “To tie it up,” said Owen, “so that the blood doesn’t get on your suit.”
    Roper swore again.
    “She a friend of yours?” he said to Owen.
    “Not until now.”
    Roper went on looking in dazed fashion at his hand. Suddenly he thumped on the table.
    “Drink!” he said. “Drink!”
    The waiter brought him a whisky, which he downed in one.
    “That’s better!” he said. “Bring me another.”
    The waiter caught Owen’s eye.
    “Bring him another,” said Owen. “Make it a special one.”
    Roper drank that too. Owen waited for him to fall. Instead, he clutched at the table and steadied himself. He seemed to be trying to think.
    “She bloody knifed me!” he muttered. He looked at Owen. “Friend of yours, wasn’t she? Well, she’s no friend of mine!”
    He lunged across the table at Owen. Owen caught his arm and held him there.
    “Shut up!” he said. “You’re going home!”
    “Am I hell!”
    Roper tried to throw himself at Owen, missed, and fell on the floor. Owen put a foot on his throat.
    “Get an arabeah,” he said to the waiter.
    He held Roper there until the arabeah came. Then he stooped down, hauled Roper upright and pushed him towards the door.
    A waiter plucked at his arm.
    “The drinks, effendi.”
    Owen put his hand in his pocket, thought better and put it in Roper’s pocket.
    Roper suddenly tore himself away. He caught hold of a table and hurled it across the room, then swung out at an Egyptian who had been sitting at it. As the man fell, the waiters closed in.
    The knot of struggling men edged towards the door. Just as they got there Roper went limp. He stood motionless for a moment, then bent forward and was violently sick.
    The waiters sprang back, cursing.
    Roper slowly collapsed until he was kneeling on the ground in the doorway, both hands pressed to his middle.
    “Christ, I feel awful!” he said.
    The second girl, the Durham one, came forward and put a hand under his elbow.
    “Come on, love,” she said.
    Roper got to his feet and looked around dazedly.
    “Christ, I feel awful,” he said again.
    With the plump girl helping on the other side, the Durham girl maneuvered him out of the door. An arabeah was drawn up, waiting. As they tried to get him inside he collapsed again and fell under the wheels, groaning.
    Owen bent down, caught him by the collar and tried to lift him up. The girls, used to such scenes, pulled Roper’s arms over their shoulders and took his weight. At the last moment, however, he lurched and they fell into a heap. Owen was pulled down too and found his nose pressed deep into the plump girl’s warm, soft flesh.
    “Owen!” It was McPhee’s surprised voice. “Owen! What on earth—”
    “Give us a hand, for Christ’s sake!”
    They eventually succeeded in bundling Roper into the arabeah. Owen took the money out of Roper’s pocket, paid the waiters and gave some to the girls. They would probably have picked Roper’s pockets anyway.
    He was about to get into the arabeah himself when he suddenly had a strong sense that somebody was behind him. He looked up quickly. There was no one there. For a moment, though, he had the impression that somebody was standing in the shadow. But then in Cairo there was always