He Shall Thunder in the Sky - Elizabeth Peters [79]
I began, “He said his name was—”
“He lied. It must be Farouk, the description fits, and Aslimi has no cousins named Said. Damnation!”
“There is nothing you can do about it now,” I said uneasily. “Perhaps the explanation is perfectly innocent. If Aslimi fell ill, your—Wardani’s—people could not allow a stranger to take over the management of the shop. Let us hope so, for things are complicated enough already. There, I have finished; you can unclench your teeth. I don’t believe you have done much damage, but the incident was certainly unfortunate. Was it an accident?”
“It couldn’t have been anything else,” Ramses said slowly. “The child certainly acted in all innocence.”
“With whom was she talking just before she ran to you?” I inquired.
“I didn’t notice. It might have been Mrs. Fortescue. She is what you would call a highly suspicious character. I wonder if anyone has thought to check her story.”
“She has been a professional singer,” I said.
Neither of them questioned the assessment; I had not been the only one to observe the clues. Emerson grinned. “And we all know that singers are persons of doubtful virtue,” he remarked. The grin faded into a scowl. “Pinckney is now attached to the staff. Woolley and Lawrence are members of the intelligence department. Several others have contacts with the military. There has been a leak of information, hasn’t there? Someone is in the pay of the enemy.”
Ramses said a bad word, apologized, and turned a critical stare on Emerson. “Is that an informed guess, Father?”
“A logical deduction,” Emerson corrected. “You would not go to such lengths to maintain your masquerade if you didn’t suspect there was a spy in our midst.”
“We must assume there are several agents of the Central Powers still at large,” Ramses said. “One at least has had access to information that was known only to a few. There have been a number of leaks, some of them involving the Canal defenses.”
“You’ve no idea who it might be?” Emerson asked.
“Russell suspects Philippides. He knows everything that is known to Harvey Pasha, which is why I won’t . . . Mother, what do you think you are doing?”
“Pay no attention to me,” I said, removing his shoe and starting to unlace the other one.
“How would the head of the local CID know about the Canal defenses?” Emerson inquired.
Ramses sighed. “The devil of it is that all these departments are interconnected in one way or another. They have to be, since their functions overlap, but that makes it damned difficult to trace the source. Philippides is in a particularly useful position; it is his responsibility to identify and remove enemy aliens. If he is as venal as rumor makes him out to be, the individual in question could be paying him to ensure his silence.”
“You think there is a single individual in charge of operations here?” Emerson asked, his keen eyes fixed on Ramses’s face.
“If it were our lot, I’d say no. We take a perverse pride in our famed British muddle. However, I give the Germans credit for better organization. They’ve been planning this for years, while we scampered around arresting harmless radicals and arguing about whether or not to formalize our bizarre position with regard to Egypt. Their man has probably been here for years, leading a normal life and ready to act when he was needed. Wardani’s little revolution is a side-show—not a negligible part of the whole, but only one of several operations, including information gathering and subversion.”
“Hmm,” said Emerson. “If we could identify this fellow—”
“Yes, sir, that would be useful.” Amusement warmed Ramses’s black eyes for a moment, to be replaced by a look of consternation. “No, Father! Don’t even think of it. We may get a lead to the man through our show, but tracking him down isn’t my job or yours. Leave him to Maxwell and Clayton.”
“Certainly, my boy, certainly. You had better get some rest now. Come along, Peabody.”
“Can I get you anything more, Ramses?” I asked. “Whiskey and soda? A few drops of laudanum to help you sleep? A nice