Donovan Pasha And Some People Of Egypt, Complete - Gilbert Parker
"Behold, my friend, to tell the whole truth as God gives it, it is time
you have come. Egypt has waited for you--the man who sees and knows. I
have watched you for two years. I have waited, but now the time is ripe.
You shall stretch your arm over Egypt and it will rise to you. You shall
have paper for plans, and men and money for travel and works-cuttings,
and pumps, and sand-bags for banks and barrages. You shall be second in
your department--but first in fact, for shall not I, your friend, be your
chief? And you shall say 'Go there,' and they shall go, and 'Come here,'
and they shall come. For my soul is with you for Egypt, O friend of the
fellah and saviour of the land. Have I not heard of the great reservoirs
you would make in the Fayoum, of the great dam at Assouan? Have I not
heard, and waited, and watched? and now . . ."
He paused and touched his breast and his forehead in respect.
Dimsdale was well-nigh taken off his feet. It seemed too wonderful to be
true--a free hand in Egypt, and under Imshi Pasha, the one able Minister
of them all, who had, it was said, always before resisted the irrigation
schemes of the foreigners, who believed only in the corroee and fate!
Dimsdale rejoiced that at the beginning of his career he had so inspired
the powerful one with confidence. With something very like emotion he
thanked the Minister.
"Yes, my dear friend," answered the Pasha, "the love of Egypt has helped
us to understand each other. And we shall know each other better still
by-and-by-by-and-by. . . . You shall be gazetted to-morrow. Allah
preserve you from all error!"
III
This began the second period of Dimsdale's career. As he went forth from
Cairo up the Nile with great designs in his mind, and an approving
Ministry behind him, he had the feeling of a hunter with a sure quarry
before him. Now he remembered Lucy Gray; and he flushed with a delightful
and victorious indignation remembering his last hour with her. He even
sentimentally recalled a song he once wrote for her sympathetic voice.
The song was called "No Man's Land." He recited two of the verses to
himself now, with a kind of unction:
"And we have wandered far, my dear, and we have loved apace;
A little hut we built upon the sand;
The sun without to brighten it-within your golden face:
O happy dream, O happy No Man's Land!
"The pleasant furniture of spring was set in all the fields,
And sweet and wholesome all the herbs and flowers;
Our simple cloth, my dear, was spread with all the orchard yields,
And frugal only were the passing hours."
A wave of feeling passed over him suddenly. Those verses were youth, and
youth was gone, with all its flushed and spirited dalliance and reckless
expenditure of feeling. Youth was behind him, and love was none of his,
nor any cares of home, nor wife nor children; nothing but ambition now,
and the vanity of successful labour.
Sitting on the deck of the Sefi at El Wasta, he looked round him. In the
far distance was the Maydoum Pyramid, "the Imperfect One," unexplored by
man these thousands of years, and all round it the soft yellowish desert,
with a mirage quivering over it in the distance, a mirage of trees and
water and green hills. A caravan lounged its way slowly into the waste.
At the waterside, here and there devout Mahommedans were saying their
prayers, now standing, now bowing towards the east, now kneeling and
touching the ground with the forehead. Then, piercing and painfully
musical, came the call of the Muezzin from the turret of the mosque a
quarter of a mile away. Near by the fellah worked in his onion-field; and
on the khiassas loaded with feddan at the shore, just out of the current,
and tied up for the night, sat the riverine folk eating their dourha and
drinking black coffee. Now Dimsdale noticed that, nearer still, just
below the Sefi, on the shore, sat a singing-girl, an a'l'meh, with a
darkfaced Arab beside her, a kemengeh in his lap. Looking down, Dimsdale
caught their eyes, nodded to them, and the singing-girl and the
kemengeh-player got to their feet and salaamed. The girl's face was in
the light of evening. Her dark skin took on a curious reddish radiance,
her eyes were lustrous and her figure beautiful. The kemengeh-player
stood with his instrument ready, and he lifted it in a kind of appeal.
Dimsdale beckoned them up on deck. Lighting a cigarette, he asked the
a'l'meh to sing. Her voice had the curious vibrant note of the Arab, and
the words were in singular sympathy with Dimsdale's thoughts:
"I have a journey to make, and perils are in hiding,
Many moons must I travel, many foes meet;
A morsel of bread my food, a goolah of water for drinking,
Desert sand for my bed, the moonlight my sheet. . . .
Come, my love, to the scented palms:
Behold, the hour of remembrance!"
For the moment Dimsdale ceased to be the practical scientist--he was all
sentimentalist. He gave himself the luxury of retrospection, he enjoyed
the languorous moment; the music, the voice, the tinkle of the
tambourine, the girl herself, sinuous, sensuous. It struck him that he
had never seen an a'l'meh so cleanly and so finely dressed, so graceful,
so delicate in manner. It struck him also that the kemengeh-player was a
better-class Arab than he had ever met. The man's face attracted him,
fascinated him. As he looked it seemed familiar. He studied it, he racked
his brain to recall it. Suddenly he remembered that it was like the face
of a servant of Imshi Pasha--a kind of mouffetish of his household. Now
he studied the girl. He had never seen her before; of that he was sure.
He ordered them coffee, and handed the girl a goldpiece. As he did so, he
noticed that among several paste rings she wore one of value. All at once
the suspicion struck him: Imshi Pasha had sent the girl--to try him
perhaps, to gain power over him maybe, as women had gained power over
strong men before. But why should Imshi Pasha send the girl and his
mouffetish on this miserable mission? Was not Imshi Pasha his friend?
Quietly smoking his cigarette, he said to the man: "You may go, Mahommed
Melik; I have had enough. Take your harem with you," he added quickly.
The man scarcely stirred a muscle, the woman flushed deeply.
"So be it, effendi," answered the man, rising unmoved, for his sort know
not shame. He beckoned to the girl. For an instant she stood hesitating,
then with sudden fury she threw on the table beside him the gold-piece
Dimsdale had given her.
"Magnoon!" she said, with blazing eyes, and ran after the man.
"I may be a fool, my dear," Dimsdale said after her; "but you might say
the same of the Pasha who sent you here."
Dimsdale was angry for a moment, and he said some hard words of Imshi
Pasha as he watched the two decoys hurry away into the dusk. He thought
it nothing more serious than an attempt to know of what stuff he was
made. He went to bed with dreams of vast new areas watered for summer
rice, of pumping-stations lifting millions of cubic metres of water per
day; of dykes to be protected by bulrushes and birriya weeds; of great
desert areas washed free of carbonates and sulphates and selling at
twenty pounds an acre; of a green Egypt with three crops, and himself the
Regenerator, the Friend of the Fellah.
In this way he soon forgot that he had remembered Lucy Gray, and the
incident of the girl ceased to trouble. His progress up the river,
however, was marked by incidents whose significance he did not at once
see. Everywhere his steamer stopped people came with backsheesh in the
shape of butter, cream, flour, eggs, fowls, cloths, and a myriad things.
Jewels from mummy cases, antichi, donkeys, were offered him: all of which
he steadfastly refused, sometimes with contumely. Officials besought his
services with indelicate bribes, and by devious hospitalities and
attentions more than one governor sought to bring his projects for
irrigation in line with their own particular duplicities.
"Behold, effendi," said one to whom Dimsdale's honesty was monstrous,
"may God preserve you from harm--the thing has not been known, that all
men shall fare alike! It is not the will of God."
"It is the will of God that water shall be distributed as I am going to
distribute it; and that is, according to every man's just claim,"
answered Dimsdale stubbornly, and he did not understand the vague smile
which met his remark.
It took him a long time to realise that his plans, approved by Imshi
Pasha, were constantly coming to naught; that after three years' work,
and extensive invention and travel, and long reports to the Ministry, and
encouragement on paper, he had accomplished nothing; and that he had no
money with which to accomplish anything. Day in, day out, week in, week
out, month in, month out, when the whole land lay sweltering with the
moist heat of flood-time, in the period of the khamsin, in the dry heat
which turned the hair grey and chapped the skin like a bitter wind, he
slaved and schemed, the unconquerable enthusiast, who built houses which
immediately fell down.
Fifty times his schemes seemed marching to fulfilment; but something
always intervened. He wrote reams of protest, he made many arid journeys
to Cairo, he talked himself hoarse; and always he was met by the
sympathetic smiling of Imshi Pasha, by his encouraging approval.
"Ah, my dear friend, may. Heaven smooth your path! It is coming right.
All will be well. Time is man's friend. The dam shall be built. The
reservoirs shall be made. But we are in the hands of the nations. Poor
Egypt cannot act alone--our Egypt that we love. The Council sits
to-morrow--we shall see." This was the fashion of the Pasha's speech.
After the sitting of the Council, Dimsdale would be sent away with
unfruitful promises.
Futility was written over the Temple of Endeavour, and by-and-by Dimsdale
lost hope and health and heart. He had Nilotic fever, he had ophthalmia;
and hot with indomitable will, he had striven to save one great basin
from destruction, for one whole week, without sleeping or resting night
and day: working like a navvy, sleeping like a fellah, eating like a
Bedouin.
Then the end came. He was stricken down, and lay above Assouan in a hut
by the shore, from which he could see the Temple of Philoe, and Pharaoh's
Bed, and the great rocks, and the swift-flowing Nile. Here lay his
greatest hope, the splendid design of his life--the great barrage of
Assouan. With it he could add to the wealth of Egypt one-half. He had
believed in it, had worked for it and how much else! and his dreams and
his working had come to naught. He was sick to death--not with illness
alone, but with disappointment and broken hopes and a burden beyond the
powers of any one man.
He saw all now: all the falsehood and treachery and corruption. He
realised that Imshi Pasha had given him his hand that he might ruin
himself, that his own schemes might overwhelm him in the end. At every
turn he had been frustrated--by Imshi Pasha: three years of underground
circumvention, with a superficial approval and a mock support.
He lay and looked at the glow, the sunset glow of pink and gold on the
Libyan Hills, and his fevered eyes scarcely saw them; they were only a
part of this last helpless, senseless dream. Life itself was very far
away-practical, generous, hot-blooded life. This distance was so ample
and full and quiet, this mystery of the desert and the sky was so
immense, the spirit of it so boundless, that in the judgment of his soul
nothing mattered now. As he lay in reverie, he heard his servant talking:
it was the tale of the Mahdi and British valour and hopeless fighting,
and a red martyrdom set like a fixed star in a sunless sky. What did it
matter--what did it all matter, in this grave tremendous quiet wherein
his soul was hasting on?
The voices receded; he was alone with the immeasurable world; he fell
asleep.
IV
When he woke again it was to find at his bedside a kavass from Imshi
Pasha at Cairo. He shrank inwardly. The thought of the Pasha merely
nauseated him, but to the kavass he said: "What do you want, Mahommed?"
The kavass smiled; his look was agreeably mysterious, his manner humbly
confidential, his tongue officially deliberate.
"Efendina chok yasha--May the great lord live for ever! I bring good
news."
"Leave of absence, eh?"--rejoined Dimsdale feebly, yet ironically; for
that was the thing he expected now of the Minister, who had played him
like a ball on a racquet these three years past.
The kavass handed him a huge blue envelope, salaaming impressively.
"May my life be thy sacrifice, effendi," he said, and salaamed again. "It
is my joy to be near you."
"We have tasted your absence and found it bitter, Mahommed," Dimsdale
answered in kind, with a touch of plaintive humour, letting the envelope
fall from his fingers on the bed, so little was he interested in any
fresh move of Imshi Pasha. "More tricks," he said to himself between his
teeth.
"Shall I open it, effendi? It is the word that thy life shall carry large
plumes."
"What a blitherer you are, Mahommed! Rip it open and let's have it over."
The kavass handed him a large letter, pedantically and rhetorically
written; and Dimsdale, scarce glancing at it, sleepily said: "Read it
out, Mahommed. Skip the flummery in it, if you know how."
Two minutes later Dimsdale sat up aghast with a surprise that made his
heart thump painfully, made his head go round. For the letter conveyed to
him the fact that there had been placed to the credit of his department,
subject to his own disposal for irrigation works, the sum of eight
hundred thousand pounds; and appended was the copy of a letter from the
Caisse de la Dette granting three-fourths of this sum, and authorising
its expenditure. Added to all was a short scrawl from Imshi Pasha
himself, beginning, "God is with the patient, my dear friend," and ending
with the remarkable statement: "Inshallah, we shall now reap the reward
of our labours in seeing these great works accomplished at last, in spite
of the suffering thrust upon us by our enemies--to whom perdition come."
Eight hundred thousand pounds!
In a week Dimsdale was at work again. In another month he was at Cairo,
and the night after his arrival he attended a ball at the Khedive's
Palace. To Fielding Bey he poured out the wonder of his soul at the
chance that had been given him at last. He seemed to think it was his own
indomitable patience, the work that he had done, and his reports, which
had at last shamed the Egyptian Government and the Caisse de la Dette
into doing the right thing for the country and to him.
He was dumfounded when Fielding replied: "Not much, my Belisarius. As
Imshi Pasha always was, so he will be to the end. It wasn't Imshi Pasha,
and it wasn't English influence, and it wasn't the Caisse de la Dette,
each by its lonesome, or all together by initiative."
"What was it--who was it, then?" inquired Dimsdale breathlessly. "Was it
you?--I know you've worked for me. It wasn't backsheesh anyhow. But Imshi
Pasha didn't turn honest and patriotic for nothing--I know that."
Fielding, who had known him all his life, looked at him curiously for a
moment, and then, in a far-away, sort of voice, made recitative:
"'Oft I had heard of Lucy Gray,
And when I crossed the wild,
I chanced to see at break of day
The solitary child.'"
Dimsdale gasped. "Lucy Gray!" he said falteringly.
Fielding nodded. "You didn't know, of course. She's been here for six
months--has more influence than the whole diplomatic corps. Twists old
Imshi Pasha round her little finger. She has played your game
handsomely--I've been in her confidence. Wordsworth was wrong when he
wrote:
"'No mate, no comrade Lucy knew;
She dwelt on a wide moor:
The sweetest thing that ever grew
Beside a human door--'
"For my wife's been her comrade. And her mate--would you like to know her
mate? She's married, you know."
Dimsdale's face was pale. He was about to reply, when a lady came into
view, leaning on the arm of an Agency Secretary. At first she did not see
Dimsdale, then within a foot or two of him she suddenly stopped. The
Secretary felt her hand twitch on his arm; then she clenched the fingers
firmly on her fan.
"My dear Dimsdale," Fielding said, "you must let me introduce you to Mrs.
St. John."
Dimsdale behaved very well, the lady perfectly. She held out both her
hands to him.
"We are old, old friends, Mr. Dimsdale and I. I have kept the next dance
for him," she added, turning to Fielding, who smiled placidly and left
with the Secretary.
For a moment there was silence, then she said quietly: "Let me
congratulate you on all you have done. Everybody is talking about you.
They say it is wonderful how you have made things come your way. . . . I
am very, very glad."
Dimsdale was stubborn and indignant and anything a man can be whose amour
propre has had a shock.
"I know all," he said bluntly. "I know what you've done for me."
"Well, are you as sorry I did it as I am to know you know it?" she asked
just a little faintly, for she had her own sort of heart, and it worked
in its own sort of way.
"Why this sudden interest in my affairs? You laughed at me when I made up
my mind to come to Egypt."
"That was to your face. I sent you to Egypt."
"You sent me?"
"I made old General Duncan talk to you. The inspiration was mine. I also
wrote to Fielding Pasha--and at last he wrote to me to come."
"You--why--"
"I know more about irrigation than any one in England," she continued
illogically. "I've studied it.
"I have all your reports. That's why I could help you here. They saw I
knew."
Dimsdale shook a little. "I didn't understand," he said.
"You don't know my husband, I think," she added, rising slowly. "He is
coming yonder with Imshi Pasha."
"I know of him--as a millionaire," he answered, in a tone of mingled
emotions.
"I must introduce you," she said, and seemed to make an effort to hold
herself firmly. "He will have great power here. Come and see me
to-morrow," she added in an even voice. "Please come--Harry."
In another minute Dimsdale heard the great financier Arnold St. John say
that the name of Dimsdale would be for ever honoured in Egypt.
GLOSSARY
Aiwa, effendi----Yea, noble sir. Allah----God. Allah-haly 'm
alla-haly----A singsong of river-workers. Allah Kerim----God is
bountiful. Allshu Akbar----God is most Great. A'l'meh----Female
professional singers Antichi----Antiquities.
Backsheesh----Tip, douceur, bribe. Balass----Earthen vessel for carrying
water. Basha----Pasha. Bersim----Grass. Bimbashi----Major. Bishareen----A
native tribe. Bismillah----In the name of God. Bowab----A doorkeeper.
Corvee----Forced labour.
Dahabeah----A Nile houseboat with large lateen sails.
Darabukkeh----A drum made of a skin stretched over an earthenware funnel.
Doash----(Literally) Treading. A ceremony performed on the return of the
Holy Carpet from Mecca.
Dourha----Maize.
Effendina----Highness. El aadah----The ordinary. El Azhar----The Arab
University at Cairo. Fantasia----Celebration with music, dancing, and
processions. Farshoot----The name of a native tribe. Fatihah----The
opening chapter of the Koran, recited at weddings, etc.
Feddan----The most common measure of land--a little less than an acre.
Also dried hay.
Fellah (plu. fellaheen)----The Egyptian peasant.
Felucca----A small boat, propelled by oars or sails.
Fessikh----Salted fish.
Ghaffirs----Humble village officials.
Ghawdzee----The tribe of public dancing-girls. A female of this tribe is
called "Ghazeeyeh," and a man "Ghazee," but the plural
Ghawazee is generally understood as applying to the female.
Ghimah----The Mahommedan Sunday.
Gippy----Colloquial name for an Egyptian soldier.
Goolah----Porous water-jar of Nile mud.
Hakim----Doctor.
Hanouti----Funeral attendants.
Hari-kari----An Oriental form of suicide.
Hashish----Leaves of hemp.
Inshallah----God willing.
Jibbeh----Long coat or smock, worn by dervishes.
Kavass----An orderly.
Kemengeh----A cocoanut fiddle.
Khamsin----A hot wind of Egypt and the Soudan.
Khedive----The title granted in 1867 by the Sultan of Turkey to the ruler
of Egypt.
Khiassa----Small boat.
Khowagah----Gentleman.
Koran----The Scriptures of the Mahommedans.
Kourbash----A stick, a whip.
La ilaha illa-llah----There is no God but God. Mafish----Nothing.
Magnoon----Fool. Malaish----No matter. Mamour----A magistrate.
Mankalah----A game. Mastaba----A bench. Mejidieh----A Turkish Order.
Mirkaz----District. Moghassils----Washers of the dead. Moufetish----High
steward. Mudir----A Governor of a Mudirieh or province. Muezzin----The
sheikh of the mosque who calls to prayer. Mushrabieh----Lattice window.
Naboot----Quarter staff. Narghileh----The Oriental tobacco-pipe. Nehar-ak
koom said----Greeting to you. Omdah----The head of a village.
Ooster----One of the best sort.
Ramadan----The Mahommedan season of fasting. Reis----Pilot.
Saadat el basha----Excellency.
Sais----Groom.
Sakkia----Persian water-wheel.
Salaam----A salutation of the East; an obeisance, performed by bowing
very low and placing the right palm on the forehead and on the
breast.
Sarraf----An accountant.
Shadoof----Bucket and pole used by natives for lifting water.
Sha'er----A reciter. (The singular of Sho'ara, properly signifying a
poet.)
Sheikh-el-beled----Head of a village.
Shintiyan----Very wide trousers, worn by the women of the middle and
higher orders.
Sitt----"The Lady."
Tarboosh----Fez or native turban. Tarah----A veil for the head.
Ulema----Learned men.
Waled----A boy. Wekeel----A deputy. Welee----A favourite of Heaven;
colloquially a saint.
Yashmak----A veil for the lower part of the face. Yelek----A long vest or
smock, worn over the shirt and shintiyan.
Zeriba----A palisade.
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