The ghari, its canvas roof decked in gay colours, the bells along it jingling merrily, clip-clopped down the avenue which led from Alexandria’s European quarter into the seedy, rundown area inhabited by the. Here the population, although most of them wore some sort of European clothing, was basically brown or black. But there was a fair sprinkling of what Commander Doyle called the ‘Levantines’, portly gentlemen, whose skin colour was olive-brown and who exuded a cheerful, welcoming air, accompanied by a constant rubbing of fat palms, as if they were only too eager to shake hands with you – and take your money.
‘Those are the chaps who made the Middle East,’ Doyle commented cheerfully, as they passed a group of them seated in cane chairs outside a café, sipping tiny cups of Turkish coffee and idly whisking their fly catchers back and forth. ‘They are invariably humble and polite, eager to do you any service you might require, legal or illegal. But they can buy and sell in half a dozen languages. Not just goods, mind you, but people too. Generals, politicians, judges, policemen. Oh yes,’ he concluded with a wry grin, ‘your Levantine knows the price of everything – and everybody.’
Smith and Dickie Bird, seated opposite him in the open horse-drawn carriage grinned. Old Doyle, they told themselves, was a bit of a world-weary cynic himself.
‘So why is this Mr – er – Sammy Kahn prepared to help us, Commander?’ Smith ventured.
Doyle made a gesture with his thumb and forefinger, as if he were counting banknotes. ‘That’s on the surface the reason why, Smith,’ Doyle said. ‘For all the gold you can afford to pay him. Of course if you asked him directly, he’d tell you something like this.’ Doyle adopted a pose, head on one side, hands spread out, palms upwards, rolling his eyes expressively as he did so. ‘A man has to live, Meester Smith,’ he mimicked. ‘As a friend, you understand, I would do this thing for nothing. But think of my many children, my aged mother, all my poor relatives in Palestine—’ Doyle’s voice resumed its normal robust Australian tone. ‘But there’s more to Sammy Kahn than that. Think of all those rich Greeks who will soon be fleeing Turkey. Where are they to go? Greece? No, that country’s bankrupt already. It’s ready for civil war and the rich Greeks are not going to put their gold in a place like that. Besides, Greece is impoverished. Most Greeks don’t have a pot to piss in! Nothing to be made there. But Egypt is another matter entirely. Here you can make heaps of money off the backs of the Egyptian peasants, who are born in debt to the money-lenders – and die that way, too. But how will the Greeks get passes, visas, work permits and all the rest of it? To obtain those sorts of necessary documents, someone has to use the squeeze—’
‘And Mr Kahn is the gent who’ll do it?’ Dickie interjected quickly.
‘Exactly. Kind-hearted old Sammy’ll help to get them out, and once they’re here, he’ll squeeze them, too, till the pips squeak.’
Smith grinned. He told himself he was looking forward to meeting the old rogue as Doyle had portrayed the businessman. Suddenly his grin vanished. Out of the corner of his eye he caught a glimpse of an old Ford tourer speeding to catch up with the horse-drawn ghari. He frowned, as the car swerved and narrowly missed a donkey then came charging forwards again, scattering a group of civilians. Why the hurry? he asked himself, puzzled.
An instant later he found out. A dark villainous face appeared at the side of the speeding car as it came level with the ghari. In the man’s hand he held a big automatic.
‘Duck!’ Smith yelled.
Next moment there was a burst of firing. The bullets slammed into the driver in front of them. He opened his mouth stupidly. A line of crimson-red holes had just been stitched the length of his robe. One second later he fell, slumping over the steaming rump of his horse.
The horse whinnied with sudden fear. It reared up in the traces, as the man in the speeding car fired again. The horse’s side suddenly flushed scarlet. It went down on its forelegs, whinnying with pain, eyes frantic and wild.
Doyle reacted first. Although he was twice the age of the other two, he pushed Bird to one side, tugging out his pistol as he did so. ‘Look out!’ he yelled urgently. Next moment he fired.
Three feet away the killer screamed with absolute agony. The second slug hit him in the face. Suddenly his features disappeared in a mess of red gore and shattered white-gleaming bone. The revolver dropped from abruptly nerveless fingers and toppled to the road.
Doyle fired again. He missed. But the swarthy-faced driver of the Ford had had enough. Desperately he hit the brake and swerved at the same time. The Ford’s tyres squealed in protest as he turned, the dead man still hanging out of the side of the car, dripping blood. For a moment the old Ford seemed to balance on two wheels. Then it hit the road with a metallic thud. The driver, his face contorted with fear, pressed the accelerator. The Ford started to pull away. But the driver hadn’t reckoned with Doyle.
Coolly, as if he were back at the firing range, the big Australian stood up in the stalled ghari, one hand behind his back. He squinted along the barrel to where the sight dissected the fleeing Ford. The car was just about to disappear around the bend. Doyle pressed the trigger. The right rear tyre exploded.
Desperately the driver tried to keep the Ford under control. To no avail. A camel escaped being hit by shedding its load and fleeing out of the way. Shimmying crazily from side to side, the frantic driver fought to avoid the pedestrians who were scattering on all sides. But he was out of luck. Next instant the Ford slammed into the side of the mosque where worshippers, their robes tucked up about their waists, were busy washing their private parts.
‘Quick,’ Doyle yelled. ‘Let’s nab the bugger!’
They sprang out of the wrecked ghari. They pelted towards the wrecked taxi, the air suddenly full of the cloying stench of escaping petrol. Women screamed at them. Men shook their fists. The three Britishers didn’t care. They were intent on getting the driver before he escaped. They wanted to find out who had just attempted to murder them.
That wasn’t to be. Suddenly there was a blinding flash. A burst of searing heat struck them in the face. They reeled back as the car went up in bright scarlet flame, against which the trapped driver was outlined a stark, screaming, struggling black.
‘A bloody lash-up,’ Doyle cursed, using the old naval slang. ‘Damnation, I’d—’ The rest of his words were drowned by the explosion as the Ford went up.
A few minutes later they were on their way again, reluctantly. Their faces were bitter with the knowledge that they had survived, but that there had been an attempt to kill them. It seemed that there would never be any let-up. From Britain to here in Egypt, it appeared that every man’s hand was against them. Doyle broke the heavy, menacing silence as he thrust his way through the natives who looked at them, their dark eyes full of hatred, with ‘Come on, let’s see what Sammy’s got to say. He knows everything…’
Sammy Kahn, all glittering gold teeth, heavy paunch and permanently smiling face – though his dark eyes remained wary and guarded – said immediately, ‘Could be Germans, Russians, Turks, even Egyptians. They are all interested in setting the Middle East aflame and are not particular in the methods they use.’ He shrugged his fat shoulders, took another puff at the bubble pipe that squatted next to the spitoon at his right and said, ‘So Doyle Pasha wants to return to the scene of his wartime triumphs, eh.’ He changed the subject immediately.
‘Hey, how the devil did you get hold of that?’ Doyle protested.
Sammy dismissed the matter with an airy wave of his pudgy, beringed hand, ‘It is of no consequence,’ he said, still smiling. ‘Tut, tut, at your age, Doyle Pasha, I was more interested in women and the delights of the flesh than risking my fat neck. Still, gentlemen, let us discuss this tricky business of getting into the Dardanelles undetected.’
Smith and Bird leaned forwards expectantly. Now at last they were going to hear of a way to dodge the Turks.
‘You know the problem. On the right bank there is first the fort of KumKale and thereafter there are forts and batteries at regular intervals all along the seventy miles of waterway. In essence any craft is under observation all the way along and can, at the same time, be taken by artillery fire. There is little fog in that region so we can’t hope for that means of dodging the Turks.’
‘Well, we did it last time, Sammy,’ Doyle urged, tugging at his eye patch, as if to remind himself that his successful penetration of the Dardanelles had also cost him an eye. ‘Now the question is, can we get away with it once again, eh?’
Sammy Kahn laughed, a thick rumbling sound that seemed to come from the depths of his ample stomach. ‘Of course, we can, Commander! The Turks might be brave, cruel, greedy, etc. Fortunately they are very stupid. They see only what they want to see. So we shall let them do just that.’
‘What do you mean, Mr Kahn?’ Smith asked hastily.
‘They shall see one craft sailing down the Dardanelles – harmless sort of fishing vessel. But they will be unable to see the other one that will sail with it.’
Smith looked puzzled and Sammy laughed once more. ‘It will cost a trifle,’ he went on, making that counting gesture with his fat thumb and forefinger with which Smith and Bird had become familiar by now.
‘We’ve got the money, Mr Kahn,’ Dickie reassured the other man. ‘Oodles of it.’
‘Excellent.’ Kahn beamed, obviously well pleased by the response. ‘So let me explain.’ He took a quick draw at his waterpipe, making the liquid bubble and belch, then lowering his voice, as if afraid of being overheard, he began…
Ten minutes later he stopped speaking and sat back, plump hands resting on his belly, as if waiting to see their reaction to his scheme. Doyle waited, too, eyeing the two young officers in silence. From outside came the muted noise of the street traffic and somewhere in the big rambling Turkish-style villa, an old clock ticked away the seconds of their lives with metallic inexorability.
Finally Smith broke the heavy brooding silence. ‘Well, Mr Kahn, it is a very ingenious scheme. But can I trust your man? After all he is a Turk, working against the interests of his own country by helping us.’
‘I think so, Smith Pasha,’ Khan replied easily. ‘It will be dangerous for both parties, and he would get a reward if he turned you over to his own people. But the Turkish pound is worthless and he knows it. The Horsemen of St George are more important to him than Turkish patriotism, believe you me. I know him well.’
Smith nodded, his mind racing electrically. The scheme was daring, as Sammy Kahn had outlined it, but it had worked before for Doyle. With luck it would work for the Swordfish nearly a decade later.
Sammy Kahn nodded encouragingly, then his fat face grew serious. ‘But let me advise you of one thing, Smith Pasha. You have seen yourself this afternoon that there are killers at work. Sooner or later they might well make another attempt on your lives – or something similar. So please accept this advice. Sail as soon as possible for your rendezvous. Each hour now that you spend in Alexandria increases the risk.’ He took another suck of his pipe, and looked at Doyle a little expectantly.
Doyle got the message. He reached in his tunic and fetched out a small leather bag. ‘A contribution from a grateful His Majesty’s Government,’ he said.
Sammy Kahn beamed. ‘Ah, diamonds I see. Much more interesting than banknotes and not as easily traced. Thank you, Doyle Pasha.’ He palmed the little bag neatly, and raised his other hand in a final salute. ‘God’s blessing on you both, young gentlemen.’
Smith didn’t know whether to laugh or to be serious. Kahn, he told himself, would be the last one he imagined to invoke the deity.
So they passed out into the hot Egyptian afternoon, minds full of what was to come. Soon they would start on the final leg of their long journey. Now everything depended upon an obscure Turk, whose name surprisingly enough was ‘Abdul the Terrible’. Why, Sammy Kahn had not enlightened them.
Doyle hailed another ghari and they set off for naval headquarters, each man cocooned in his own thoughts, until finally Doyle broke the silence, with ‘You sail on the night tide, Common Smith, VC.’
Dickie Bird’s face lit up. ‘Damn fine show, Commander!’ he said excitedly. ‘But one thing, sir.’
‘What?’ Doyle asked.
‘Don’t give us your blessing, sir. I simply couldn’t stand another one after old Sammy’s.’
He laughed and the big Australian did the same. ‘All right then, you shall go, unblessed by me.’ His grin vanished. ‘But remember this. Last time it cost me an eye. Right. Take care that this time around it doesn’t cost you any more.’ And with that he relapsed into a sudden sombre silence. Thus it was – in silence – that they made their way back to naval HQ.