Bletchley continued to scowl.
A strange cover, said Joe. Whose idea was it anyway?
I'm not sure, answered Bletchley, still preoccupied. But don't try to expect too much from yourself too soon. Two weeks is nothing.
Why does he keep saying that? wondered Joe. What's he talking about? Rommel's getting ready to overrun Egypt and he keeps saying there's all the time in the world. It makes no sense, or isn't he worried about Rommel reading the British codes anymore? What's changed that I don't know about?
Bletchley was pushing his cup back and forth. The meeting seemed over. Joe got to his feet and lingered beside the table, not sure whether Bletchley had anything more to say.
Well I'll be on my way then. . . .
He started toward the stairs. Bletchley was still staring down at the table, his eye wide, empty.
See here, Joe, I could find you another room. This accident of yours, this isn't always the best part of town to be in. What do you say?
Joe shrugged.
Oh I don't think it matters. We are where we are, I guess, but thanks anyway.
Joe climbed the narrow stairs and stepped into the alley. Later he would often recall that quiet moment in the small bare cellar and Bletchley's concern, Bletchley's sorrow, his questions about Joe's welfare and his offer of another room elsewhere. At the time it had sounded like such a little thing, but had Bletchley meant something more by it? Something a great deal more important?
Could it even have made a difference and saved a life?
Two lives? Three lives?
***
As soon as Joe stepped into the night he heard the rumble of trucks in the distance. Everywhere now there were trucks moving into Cairo, pouring in from the desert with wounded soldiers and stragglers who had lost their units. Guns of all sorts and RAF wagons and recovery vehicles, armored cars and countless lorries crammed with exhausted sleeping men, crowding the roads outside the city beyond the pyramids, transports rolling in from the wreckage of the long campaigns in the Western Desert.
And smoke above the British Embassy where documents were being burned. And huge crowds in front of the British Consulate where refugees waited silently, hoping for transit visas to Palestine. And rumors that the British fleet was already preparing to sail from Alexandria to the harbors of Haifa and Port Said, to escape Rommel's advancing panzers.
Unmistakable signs, thought Joe. The fingerprints of war. And everywhere in Cairo the same whispered question.
When will he arrive? When will he get here?
***
But Joe had no thoughts for Rommel. It was Bletchley's melancholy remarks that obsessed him, the failure of the special operation behind enemy lines which Bletchley had talked about. For that must have been the mission that was going to have kept Stern away from Cairo for two weeks, and its collapse meant that Stern's last mission for the Monastery had officially ended.
Hours ago? Days ago?
In any case, Stern was now due back in Cairo so far as Bletchley was concerned, and whatever Stern had been secretly doing was now finished and at an end. Bletchley would see to that. Bletchley who did his job well, and who seemed to have arrived at a new sense of calm despite the news from the front. So for Joe there was very little time left. And sadly, as he had known all along, the outcome would be the same for Stern no matter what he learned now.
Indelibly the same, Stern's passage, Stern's fate, the mysterious weaving of Stern's journey over the years. Even Liffy had finally come to realize that when he had found Joe limping down the alley to the Hotel Babylon that morning, before daybreak. Liffy rushing up to help Joe after having waited all night in the shadows for Joe to return from his visit to the Cohens, fearful and more, frantic that something might have gone wrong.
As indeed it had. Dreadfully wrong. A small cry escaping Liffy then, when he had learned what had happened.
And then he had fixed Joe with his eyes there in the alley, gripping Joe and whispering urgently and looking for all the world like some tormented prophet of antiquity who had just seen a vision of the coming destruction of his beloved Jerusalem.
Whatever Stern has done, Joe, you must prove it's right for the sake of all of us. It doesn't even matter if you and I are the only ones who ever know the truth, or if just one of us does, even that would be enough. For I have this haunting feeling that unless Stern's right in what he's done, with all
-15-
The Sisters
Ahmad raised his head and solemnly sniffed the air, considering the matter further.
Or better yet, take two nosegays, he said to Joe. They may be twins and they may be in their nineties, but that doesn't mean they've always gotten along in every respect. They've had their differences over the decades and I suspect there's still a certain sisterly sense of competition, especially when a man comes to call.
On second thought, why not let me prepare your nosegays? Although it's been awhile, I'm familiar with their tastes and also with the color schemes on the houseboat. I did their interior decorating, you know, the last time they had it done, which must have been around the turn of the century. I don't recall exactly when it was, but one of them would surely remember. Between the two of them they remember everything. In fact there used to be a popular saying in Cairo which was a great favorite among boatmen, particularly.
In other words, mused Ahmad, see all . . . hear all . . . speak what? In some respects, you might say, these two old dears are rather like the Nile itself.
And with that Ahmad's massive face swayed majestically with the beginnings of a smile.
Two nosegays.
A darkened dilapidated houseboat, a rambling pleasure barge of yesteryear, where memories included everything.
Two tiny ancient women, twins, whose shadowy floating realm on the Nile had gradually come to be Joe's ultimate destination in his search for the truth about Stern.
The prospect of Joe visiting the legendary Sisters had even caused Liffy to emerge from his somber mood. Either that or Liffy had brought all his acting abilities to bear for Joe's benefit and was staging a bravura performance, laughing and joking and dipping into a variety of roles to encourage Joe.
The three of them, Ahmad and Liffy and Joe, had met for a strategy session in the narrow courtyard behind the Hotel Babylon, late in the afternoon as the sun was sinking. There amidst the creeping vines and the hanging flowers, the rustling old newspapers and the heaps of debris crumbling in the corners, they sat beneath the single palm tree as the shadows gathered in the slums of Old Cairo, Ahmad solemnly serving tea from a heavy silver tea service that had once belonged to old Menelik, the tea service resurrected by Ahmad from the epic clutter of his dusty little closet especially to mark the occasion.
Ahmad's manner had never been more dignified. Obviously to him an official visit to the Sisters, a social call by Joe or anyone, was an event of the most profound significance.
Ahmad poured.
Teatime, he announced in his ponderous voice, gesturing at the cups. Tea in time and need I point out that vast empires have risen and fallen on just such queer civilized rituals as this? Now then, mates, who will take what?
