can’t possibly have arranged that: ifs a piece of luck, a bonus. The officers were five yards from Wolff. The car across the street pullee out suddenly. It was a big black Packard with a powerful engine and soft American springing. It came across the roae like a charging elephant, motor screaming in low gear, regardless of the main road traffic, headiny for the side street its hom blowing continuously, On the comer, a few feet from where Wolff sat, it plowee, into the front of an old Fiat taxi. The two officers stood beside Wolff’s table and stared at the crash. The taid driver, a young Arab in a Western shirt and a fez, leaped out of his car. A young Greek in a mohair suit jumped out of the Packard. The Arab said the Greek was the son of a pig. The Greek said the Arab was the back end of a diseased camel. The Arab slapped the Greek’s face and the Greek punched the Arab on the nose. Ile people getting off the bus, and those who had been intending to get- on it, came closer. Around the comer, the acrobat who was standing on his colleague’s head turned to look at the Rot, seemed to lose his balance, and fell into his audience. A small boy darted past Wolfrs table. Wolff stood up, pointed at the boy and shouted at the top of his voice: “Stop, thief I” The boy dashed off. Wolff went after him, and four people sitting near Wolff jumped up and tried to grab the boy. The child ran between the two officers, who were staring at the f3ght in the road. Wolff and the people who had jumped up to help him cannoned into the officers, knocking both of them to the ground. Several people began to sbout “Stop, thief!” al- though most of them bad no idea who the alleged thief was. Some of the newcomen thought it must be one of the fighting drivers. Thecrowd from the bus stop, the acrobats! audience, and most of the people in the caf46 surged forward and began to attack one or other of the drivers–Arabs assuming the Greek was the culprit and everyone else assuming it was 64 Ken Follett
the Arab. Several men with sticks-most people carried sticks-began to push into the crowd, beating on heads at random in an attempt to break up the fighting which was entirely counterproductive. Someone picked up a chair from the caf6 and hurled it into the crowd. Fortunately it overshot and went through the windshield of the Packard. However the waiters, the kitchen staff and the proprietor of the caf6 now rushed out and began to attack everyone who swayed, stumbled or sat on their furniture. Everyone veiled at everyone else in five languages. Passing cars halted to watch the melee. the traffic backed up in three directions. and every stopped car sounded its horn. A dog struggled free of its leash and started biting people’s legs in a frenzy of excitement. Everyone got off the bus. The brawling crowd became bigger by the second. Drivers who had ;;topped to watch the fun regretted it. for when the fight engulfed their cars they were unable to move away (because everyone else had stopped too) and they had to lock their doors and roll up their windows while men, women and children, Arabs and Greeks and Syrians and Jews and Australians and Scotsmen, jumped on their roofs and fought on their hoods and fell on their running boards and bled all over their paintwork. Somebody fell through the window of the tailor’s shor) next to the cafe, and a frightened goat ran into the souvenir shop which flanked the caf6 on the other side and began to knock down all the tables laden with china and pottery and glass. A baboon came from somewhere-it had probably been riding the goat, in a common form of street entertainment- -and ran across the heads in the crowd, nimble-footed, to disappear in the direction of Alexandria. A horse broke free of its harness and bolted ,ilong the street between the lines of cars. From a window above the caf6 a woman emptied a bucket of dirty water into the melee. Nobody noticed. At last the police arrived. When people heard the whistles, suddenly the shoves and pushes and insults which had started their own individual fights seemed a lot less important. There was a scramble to get away before the arrests began. The crowd diminished rapidly. Wolff, who bad fallen over early in the proceedings, picked himself up and strolled across the road to watch the d6nouement. By the time six people had been handcuffed it THE KEY TO REBECCA 65