'Does it follow from the previous statement that you defend the actions of the mutineers in Alexandria?'
'No.'
The head of the commission turned his attention from me to Tal'at, reading to him the statement of the Italian station chief in Alexandria and asking for his testimony, and what he said left me speechless.
He confirmed before me and without the slightest hesitation every word the station chief had written: I was the one who had opened fire on the Bedouin for no reason and he had tried to stop me. He said that I'd received a bullet because of my reckless provocation of the Bedouin but didn't mention that I had visited him in hospital after he was injured.
And that was enough to support the station chief's accusation against me that I had been absent without leave while on duty during the fire. When the interrogator asked him whether he had heard anything to confirm my support for the Urabist mutineers, he tried to appear truthful, and said that, no, he had heard nothing from me that pointed to my supporting the actions of the mutineers but it was also true that he had heard nothing from me that would point to my support for the August Presence!
At that moment, I couldn't believe he would say all that to my face. I told myself that, however bad things were, there were limits to how much one could lie. Not while looking me in the eye! But he did precisely that, and they believed him and declared everything I'd said at the first investigation to be lies. I realized that he must have come to an understanding with the Italian station chief and his superior officers in Alexandria.
I couldn't forgive him and I didn't understand the secret of why he'd turned against me until Captain Saeed explained it to me later, in a whispered confidence. Now, though, what
I think is, even if I don't forgive him, why should I blame him? In those days everybody was looking for something that would save him from prison or expulsion from his position. A traitor, but honest with himself. He lied about me but not to himself, as though all his enthusiasm for the revolution in Alexandria had been just a whim. And indeed, my enthusiasm too and the enthusiasm of the whole country passed like a frivolous whim from whose spell we were woken by defeat.
In what way am I better than Tal'at? Why do I deliberately not think of the moment of ignominy and betrayal? It was two short answers I gave during the commission's interrogation, which I constantly push aside in my memory but which continue to lurk inside me like embers.
Question: 'Did you support Ahmad Urabi and his followers?'
Answer: 'On the contrary, I was one of those who most bitterly condemned the actions of those miscreants.'
Question: 'What do you know of the activities of His Excellency Umar Basha Lutfi, Governor of Alexandria, during the civil strife of 11 June?'
Answer: 'I know that His Excellency ordered the police companies to suppress the civil strife but that those assisting the mutineers failed to carry out his orders. I misunderstood what the Bedouin said, however, because of my ignorance of their dialect.'
It was Captain Saeed who suggested these answers to me. He himself never underwent investigation. His caution, which made him always remain silent and move carefully, even when helping the revolutionaries, protected him. He was always advising me in those days to keep my mouth shut. He'd tell me, 'Be aware that the Protected City has more informers than inhabitants.'
But he knew that I knew his past at the time of the revolution and he also wanted to protect me, so he pointed out the weakness in my statements to the first investigation, which he had conducted himself, which was the charge that Umar Basha had enlisted the Bedouin to carry out the massacre. He advised me to withdraw that statement, saying, 'As you see, Umar Basha is now the minister for the army, and yesterday's revolutionaries are now "mutineers".' I added my own contribution at the investigation and described them as 'miscreants'!
Saeed said, 'We shelved the first investigation and circumstances may help you this time. The ministry may shelve this one too and then, after a little while, destroy all the papers. It may be that they are anxious that no trace remain among the official papers of the charge against Umar Basha.'
Circumstances did indeed help me and they kept me on active service, after reducing my salary and issuing a reprimand. The price was small — to deny the truth, to betray and save my skin. So I too accepted the bargain.
Then, however, I had to accept my situation in the police as someone who had been found guilty and remained under observation. My promotions were frozen and they entrusted me with missions such as guarding installations, accompanying delegations on official visits, and unimportant clerical work. Tal'at, who chose to remain in Alexandria, or on whom this choice was imposed, far outdistanced me in promotions. This persecution served my interests, however: by degrees I created for myself the image of the forgotten victim, the man with a cause.
Following the investigation I lived for months in a state of self-disgust. I drank like one running after death. Then came the blessing of forgetfulness and I pushed out of my memory the disgrace of cowardice and betrayal. An entire life during which my main concern has been to chase away the memory every time it raises its head, and to deny it.
This time, however, it's not a memory, it's real.
Yes, I saw the stone falling on the boy and I rushed forwards with Ibraheem to save the young Mahmoud. At the last instant, however, in the final seconds during which I saw that the large stone would hit me too, I stopped. I went rigid with fear where I stood. I was the one closest to him but Ibraheem passed me with a single bound and flung himself forwards, taking the boy in his arms, pushing him away, and throwing himself on top of him. Coming to my senses, I flung myself on top of Ibraheem as well but it came too late — after I'd made sure my own life was safe and after the stone had smashed Ibraheem's leg.
Young Mahmoud didn't receive a scratch but Ibraheem was screaming and Catherine too was screaming from a distance and there was a great crowd of children and adults milling around and yelling. I saw the blood spreading over Ibraheem's ripped trousers so I picked him up carefully and laid him down on the ground, the blood gushing from his leg, which a sliver of rock had sliced through like a knife. My mind was completely paralysed but I moved as though someone else was dictating to me what to do. Catherine handed me a large handkerchief, which I used to bind the wound, and Ibraheem moaned with pain, thanking me through his moans. When I tried to make him stand, though, his moans turned into suppressed screams and tears burst from his eyes in spite of himself.
I must have spent entire days standing next to Ibraheem's bed. We treated him with the disinfectants and bandages in the keeping of the soldier charged with nursing at the police station. Ibraheem's leg, however, continued to swell and, with the fever that struck him, his pain became unbearable and he started to rave. He would raise his torso and say he could see the cholera but was going to throttle it with his own hands before it could attack Zahran and Darwish, and that he was going to complain unto his Lord against the honourable officer Abd el Rahman because he'd refused to give him leave. And beware, beware, Your Excellency, of the snakes on the wall. Then his eyes would fall on me and he'd yell that he didn't want to die in a strange place and we had to get him back so that he could sleep next to the tomb of his father and mother and children.
I watched him impotently, aware that all that pain would have been mine if I had gone forwards instead of back. All I could do for him now, though, was to stay with him. Sometimes his mind would be clear and he'd recognize me and apologize to His Excellency for the trouble he was causing me, but begging me too to bury him in his own village. I would try to comfort him and say that he had a long life ahead of him, God willing, and that he'd recover soon from this minor wound and be as strong as a horse again. What was this wound compared to all the things that had happened to him in the wars?