‘There is a mail-truck comes through every morning about ten o’clock. You would have it tomorrow.’
The man had all the answers. He never even had to think before replying.
This bastard, I thought, has cut fan-belts before.
I was very alert now, and watching him closely.
‘They will not have a fan-belt for a machine of this make in Ismailia,’ I said. ‘It would have to come from the agents in Cairo. I will telephone them myself.’ The fact that there was a telephone gave me some comfort. The telephone poles had followed the road all the way across the desert, and I could see the two wires leading into the hut from the nearest pole. ‘I will ask the agents in Cairo to set out immediately for this place in a special vehicle,’ I said.
The Arab looked along the road towards Cairo, some two hundred miles away. ‘Who is going to drive six hours here and six hours back to bring a fan-belt?’ he said. ‘The mail will be just as quick.’
‘Show me the telephone,’ I said, starting towards the hut. Then a nasty thought struck me, and I stopped.
How could I possibly use this man’s contaminated instrument? The earpiece would have to be pressed against my ear, and the mouthpiece would almost certainly touch my mouth; and I didn’t give a damn what the doctors said about the impossibility of catching syphilis from remote contact. A syphilitic mouthpiece was a syphilitic mouthpiece, and you wouldn’t catch me putting it anywhere near my lips, thank you very much. I wouldn’t even enter his hut.
I stood there in the sizzling heat of the afternoon and looked at the Arab with his ghastly diseased face, and the Arab looked back at me, as cool and unruffled as you please.
‘You want the telephone?’ he asked.
‘No,’ I said. ‘Can you read English?’
‘Oh, yes.’
‘Very well. I shall write down for you the name of the agents and the name of this car, and also my own name. They know me there. You will then tell them what is wanted. And listen … tell them to dispatch a special car immediately at my expense. I will pay them well. And if they won’t do that, tell them they have to get the fan-belt to Ismailia in time to catch the mail-truck. You understand?’
‘There is no problem,’ the Arab said.
So I wrote down what was necessary on a piece of paper and gave it to him. He walked away with that slow, stamping tread towards the hut, and disappeared inside. I closed the bonnet of the car. Then I went back and sat in the driver’s seat to think things out.
I poured myself another whisky, and lit a cigarette. There must be some traffic on this road. Somebody would surely come along before nightfall. But would that help me? No, it wouldn’t – unless I were prepared to hitch a ride and leave the Lagonda and all my baggage behind to the tender mercies of the Arab. Was I prepared to do that? I didn’t know. Probably yes. But if I were forced to stay the night, I would lock myself in the car and try to keep awake as much as possible. On no account would I enter the shack where that creature lived. Nor would I touch his food. I had whisky and water, and I had half a watermelon and a slab of chocolate. That was ample.
The heat was pretty bad. The thermometer in the car was still around 104°. It was hotter outside in the sun. I was perspiring freely. My God, what a place to get stranded in! And what a companion!
After about fifteen minutes, the Arab came out of the hut. I watched him all the way to the car.
‘I talked to garage in Cairo,’ he said, pushing his face through the window. ‘Fan-belt will arrive tomorrow by mail-truck. Everything arranged.’
‘Did you ask them about sending it at once?’
‘They said impossible,’ he answered.
‘You’re sure you asked them?’
He inclined his head to one side and gave me that sly insolent grin. I turned away and waited for him to go. He stayed where he was. ‘We have house for visitors,’ he said. ‘You can sleep there very nice. My wife will make food, but you will have to pay.’
‘Who else is here besides you and your wife?’
‘Another man,’ he said. He waved an arm in the direction of the three shacks across the road, and I turned and saw a man standing in the doorway of the middle shack, a short wide man who was dressed in dirty khaki slacks and shirt. He was standing absolutely motionless in the shadow of the doorway, his arms dangling at his sides. He was looking at me.
‘Who is he?’ I said.
‘Saleh.’
‘What does he do?’
‘He helps.’
‘I will sleep in the car,’ I said. ‘And it will not be necessary for your wife to prepare food. I have my own.’ The Arab shrugged and turned away and started back towards the shack where the telephone was. I stayed in the car. What else could I do? It was just after two thirty. In three or four hours’ time it would start to get a little cooler. Then I could take a stroll and maybe hunt up a few scorpions. Meanwhile, I had to make the best of things as they were. I reached into the back of the car where I kept my box of books and, without looking, I took out the first one I touched. The box contained thirty or forty of the best books in the world, and all of them could be reread a hundred times and would improve with each reading. It was immaterial which one I got. It turned out to be The Natural History of Selborne. I opened it at random …
… We had in this village more than twenty years ago an idiot boy, whom I well remember, who, from a child,
