‘And that’s the other thing,’ Arwa jabbed a stubby finger at him. ‘You always answer a question with another question.’
‘It’s a bad habit, I’m sorry. You said she was close to Ramy?’
‘Like I said, there were a lot of malicious whispers.’ She gave another sniff. ‘Not that I had anything to do with that.’
‘Of course not.’
‘No, she was a decent person. Worked harder than anyone else. She was in here first thing in the morning and didn’t leave until last.’
‘What exactly did Ramy do to be sent away?’
‘Oh, he’s not a bad person, but he’s young and not too good about keeping away from trouble.’ She picked at a thread on her sleeve, as if absenting herself from this conversation for a moment, before bouncing back. ‘It’s that Rocky from downstairs.’
‘Rocky?’
‘You know, like the film? Honestly, anyone would think you had been living in a cave. I don’t know why they call him that, but everyone does. He’s the one who runs the ’ahwa downstairs. He’s up to all kinds of mischief that one.’ Arwa lowered her voice to a whisper. ‘If you ask me, that’s why she was killed.’
‘Because of Rocky?’
‘No.’ Arwa glanced around her briskly. ‘Hashish.’
‘Hashish?’
‘Rocky sells it and Ramy smokes it ’til it comes out of his ears.’ She nodded as she spoke as if agreeing with herself. ‘Also I heard he was messing with some of the clients. Women.’
‘Women? Tourists, you mean?’
‘I mean the kind young men have shameful thoughts about.’
‘How do you know this?’
‘Because men are all the same. No better than animals, most of them.’
‘No, I mean about Ramy being involved with them.’
‘I hear a lot of things,’ Arwa said confidently. ‘So did Meera. Maybe she told Faragalla. You think that’s why she was killed? That’s the other thing you do. Either you answer a question with a question or you go all silent. Where’s the fun in that?’
Before Makana could manage to process what Arwa had just told him, Yousef swept in. As usual, wearing his leather jacket and carrying the briefcase that seemed to go everywhere with him.
‘I thought we were going to clear this out?’ he snapped, staring at the heap of flowers.
‘Spoken like a man with a stone for a heart.’
Yousef turned to her. He looked as though he were about to say something, but then changed his mind.
‘We just had a tragedy here, a real tragedy,’ she went on, fiddling with the flowers.
‘That’s no reason for the whole world to stop, is it? Tragedies happen every day.’ Yousef marched over to his desk, shrugged off his jacket and began rolling up his shirt sleeves. ‘Unless you happened not to notice, this company is fighting for its survival. Now, I advise you to stop thinking about the past and concentrate on your future, because without this company you don’t have one.’
Arwa stared at Yousef’s back for a time and then idly started turning sheets of paper over. She exchanged a long glance with Makana, as if to say, this is how I pretend to be working.
Faragalla appeared and summoned Makana into his office immediately, closing the door quickly behind him.
‘You see now what I told you?’
Makana watched him trying to slide himself behind the desk, dislodging another avalanche of folders and papers, which fell to the floor and were instantly forgotten. The heavy bags under the sunken eyes seemed more swollen. Faragalla leaned his hands on the desk.
‘I was right. It was a warning.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘This, the killing. They shot that woman as a warning to me.’ Faragalla straightened up and moved over to peer out through the dirty, broken wooden shutters. ‘We have no idea who they are, or what they look like.’
‘I don’t think we need to panic.’
‘Oh, you don’t, eh? Then what should I do? I mean, have you found anything?’
‘It’s too early to say. The counter-terrorism unit are onto it, under a Lieutenant Sharqi.’
‘I know all that. That’s not why I am paying you. They’ll never find anything. You know what they are like. Like anyone working for the government, they do the least they can without getting fired. I hired you to get to the bottom of all this.’
‘I can tell you that there were more letters.’
‘More?’ Faragalla seemed to stagger. He put a hand to the desk to steady himself. ‘More of the same you mean? Where were they? Why didn’t I know about this?’