“Her uncle is important, I see that. Our jobs at stake, etc.”
“More than that. Your whole life, for instance. Aren’t you missing a chance?”
“What chance am I missing?”
“Jane Postlethwaite.”
“Look, she’s a nice girl, but-”
“She’s a nice girl and. And her parents are dead, and her uncle is rich and influential, and for some strange reason he is quite attached to you, and Jane Postlethwaite is quite attached herself, and it’s time you got maried-”
“Oh, come on.”
“It is. You’re quite old-”
“Oh really.”
“You are.”
“I’m just over thirty.”
“You see? That’s quite aged. Especially in this climate. Maturity becomes senility very quickly here. It’s the heat and the sex and the drink. I’ve noticed it in a lot of my friends. Besides-”
“For goodness’ sake!”
“-you need to get married if you’re going to go any higher. At the top a single man is suspect. You wonder what he does with his time. Is he quite sound? And who will look after the entertaining?”
“Some brainless aide-de-camp. There are lots of those around.”
“Do not try to deflect me. We were talking about your career, in which I am taking a fatherly interest. Besides, I want you to take Jane Postlethwaite to the opera tomorrow night.”
“I can’t. I’m taking Zeinab.”
“Take them both. Jane Postlethwaite hasn’t met many Egyptian women. She certainly hasn’t met anyone like Zeinab.”
“Can’t you get someone else?”
“No. I’ve tried. None of the army officers will do because they’re all tone deaf. Besides, opera isn’t British.”
“How do you know Jane Postlethwaite will like it?”
“She sings, doesn’t she? I thought all Nonconformists did. You hear them on a Sunday morning.”
“Yes, but that’s different. It’s a different sort of singing.”
“There you are! A Welshman knows that sort of thing by instinct. Just the chap. Pick her up from the hotel at nine tomorrow.”
Jane Postlethwaite was not sure about opera. She had not, she confided in Owen, actually been to one before and the glamour and glitter plainly made her uneasy. Since the plot had the usual operatic complication he had advised her to read the programme notes beforehand, and she perused them with a certain grim incredulity. When the audience broke into applause on first beholding the characteristically extravagant set she at first appeared dumbfounded and then sat back in her seat rather stiffly. However, as the evening progressed she seemed to relax and even to be enjoying the music.
Zeinab, on the other hand, entered into the opera totally. Dramatic herself, she enjoyed drama in art; and the music swept in over emotional defences that were already down. Owen could hardly bear to look at her, so much was she at the mercy of the music, plunging with it into pits of despair, rising with it to heights of exaltation that were almost unbearable. By the time they reached the interval she was already emotionally shattered.
Intervals were always protracted in Cairo. The whole performance, which started late anyway because of the heat, sometimes went on till four in the morning. So there was plenty of time to leave the box and promenade around.
Owen saw several people he knew. Hadrill, for instance, the Adviser to the Ministry of Justice. Should he ask him what was going on at the top of the ministry and why they were resurrecting the Zoser case? But Hadrill was carrying a huge score and looked as if he took opera seriously. Then there was an aide-de-camp, slightly bored, piloting a bemused, middle-aged group to a table which had already been set out with refreshments. Important visitors, clearly. Owen started taking Jane and Zeinab across to join them but on the way they ran into a group of journalists whom Zeinab knew and got into conversation with them. They were all a-bubble with the opera and the state of the arts in Cairo generally and Jane Postlethwaite was a bit out of it. Fortunately he saw a nice couple from the Ministry of Education and was able to guide her over to them. They were talking to a Coptic family, parents and two children.
“Hello,” said Ramses, turning round, “how’s the Curbash Compensation Fund?”
“What?” said the man from the Ministry of Education, whose name was Lampeter.
“Captain Owen is deep in the toils of the accountants just at the moment.”
“Same here,” said Lampeter. “It’s the end of the year.”
“I’m deep in the toil of accounts too,” said Molly Lampeter. “It’s the end of the month. Do you like opera?” she asked Jane Postlethwaite.
“I’m new to it.”
“I was new to it when I came out here. Now I like it quite a lot.”
Back among the journalists Zeinab caught Owen’s eye and pulled a face.
“Is your friend Sesostris here?”
“Sesostris isn’t here,” said Ramses, “and he’s not my friend.”
“Where does he stand in the War of the Succession?”
“Out on a limb in my view. He’s completely opposed to any Coptic participation in the Government.”
“Even at the personal level?”
“You mean Patros? Yes. Especially.”
“Is that going to happen soon?”
“Is it going to happen? A lot of people are keen to stop it. Including Sesostris.”
“The Khedive will have to make up his mind soon.”
“Or have his mind made up for him.”
“Is that likely to happen?”
Ramses smiled and turned away.
They resumed their seats and Owen slipped away into a tide of music and colour.
When the opera ended Zeinab sat on, emotionally drained. Owen waited as usual for her to recover, talking quietly meanwhile with Jane Postlethwaite, who stole a glance at her from time to time, sympathetic and concerned but also slightly at a loss.
Zeinab caught one of her glances.
“I’m sorry,” she said, smiling. She was beginning to recover. “It’s always like this.”
“Are you all right?”
“Oh yes. It’s just the music.”
“You feel it very deeply.”
“Yes. Don’t you?”
Jane Postlethwaite considered.
“No,” she said. “I love the music, of course, the arias especially. But I don’t feel-I don’t get bowled over by it, in the way you do.”
“The terribleness of it,” said Zeinab, astonished and slightly losing her English, “you don’t feel?”
Jane Postlethwaite looked uncomfortable.
“No,” she said. “Very English of me, I’m afraid.”
Zeinab laughed.
“And very Arab of me, too, I expect,” she said.
“Not just Arab,” said Jane Postlethwaite. “Italians are like it too. Especially about opera.”
“You have been to Italy? And seen the opera?”
“I have been to Italy. I went last year with my uncle. But I’m afraid I did not go to the opera.”
“No?” Zeinab was astounded.
“Perhaps I should have gone. But really I was there to look at the pictures.”
“There are no pictures in Cairo,” said Zeinab.
“But there are beautiful buildings. Some of the mosques are so lovely.”
“I have never been to Italy,” said Zeinab.
“It’s not unlike here in some ways. There was a beautiful avenue of mimosas I saw at the Gezira when we were walking round. It reminded me so much of Italy, as I told Captain Owen.”
“Ah.”
Zeinab had not heard about this.
“I took Miss Postlethwaite to see the polo,” he explained.
“Indeed?” said Zeinab distantly. She removed her hand from Owen’s arm, where she had placed it.
“Against the deep blue of the sky just when it was getting dark,” said Jane Postlethwaite enthusiastically. “So like Italy. And so romantic.”
“Romantic,” said Zeinab, as if she was taking the word down to be used in evidence.
“The desert makes a difference of course,” said Owen.
“For better or worse?” inquired Zeinab.
“It’s the contrast,” said Jane Postlethwaite. “It shows up the differences.”
“You think so?” Zeinab was inclined to take this personally. Jane Postlethwaite caught the tone and stopped, startled. Zeinab rose to her feet and swept out of the box.