The Masks of Nyarlathotep: Egypt part 1
The Private Diary of John Jamil Zwaiter
March 2007
My
application for posting to Cairo has been successful, and starts in May. I’m looking forward
to moving on from Morocco. Our Embassy in Rabat is doing some great work, and has given me
opportunities to lead and develop that would have been fewer in busier places.
The result is that I’ve been able to put ideas I’ve learnt about into action
and found that some work, others don’t. It’s been great experience. I’m now
ready for the challenge of working for the UK in the leading African and Middle Eastern
country, Egypt. I haven’t been there since my teens and I
wonder how much it differs from my holiday memories. Mamma has mixed feelings
about this posting. I must make sure that I take advice before any family
visits.
December 2007
Work
at Cairo continues to be interesting and very
varied. Antiquities are a regular feature, although they haven’t come across my
desk much yet. One week I’m putting together a position paper for the
Ambassador about trends in tourism from the UK to Egypt, while in another I’m trying to trace a
child who has probably been abducted by his father. There’s
a surprisingly large number of them, and since Egypt hasn’t signed up to the Hague Convention
they are always difficult (and our bilateral agreement with Egypt since 2005, the Cairo Declaration, has not
helped the return of a single child). I’ve realised that I find them
particularly distressing because of the contrast with my own very close family.
Mamma and Papa would never act like some of the people I’ve had to talk with.
Another
difference from Rabat is that there are frequent visits from
military personnel as well as the usual stray tourists and regular business
delegations. We have a small security detachment with us, of course, and
regular drills of what to do if there is a bomb threat, civil unrest affecting
the embassy or other readily imagined scenarios.
There
are also some men, and women, who visit with rather vague reasons. Some are
involved with small businesses, others with cultural matters or as special
advisors or rapporteurs to the Ambassador or his
aide, Brian Wherhan. I rapidly learnt that it was
correct form to ignore these visitors unless specifically asked to do something
that involved them. I’m very pleased that I’ve been asked to contribute to some
of their missions – accompanying one woman on a shopping trip in Cairo, find out about a few people and
companies, and once act as interpreter for one of the men. It all seems very
innocent, but Mr Wherhan says he’s pleased with how
well I’ve done in this role that makes explicit use of my languages and
cultural knowledge. He’s asked me whether I’d like to have a formal attachment
as a liaison officer. I’ve agreed to do so for six months, and will have an
option to continue, contingent on his evaluation of my performance. He’s also
asked about my firearms training, and suggested that I take a refresher from a
member of the security detachment. Of course, my role is entirely civilian, but
I find it reassuring that if it all goes pear-shaped, I could have options
other than waiting for rescue.
15 September 2008 and subsequent week
I’ve
been assigned to find out about three people. Brian gave me the handwritten
names and the little information already available on flimsy slips of paper,
with a look that said ‘don’t ask why, be discreet and don’t stir things’.
Faraz Naji: The Street of the
Jackals, Old City, Cairo. Seller of antiquities
and curios.
It
took me a few days to find the street, between other duties. I walked the full
length and back without finding his shop, although two other curio shops were
very obvious. I finally found a man in a coffee shop who gave me the story,
because he was across the street from where Faraz Najir’s shop had been. The site is now occupied by a shiny
new mobile phone shop, run by two brothers. The curio shop had burnt down a few
months ago and Najir’s body was found in the ruins,
identified from dental records. The café owner told me that Najir
had a brother somewhere but no close family. There was no reason to think the
death and fire was anything but an accident. The shop had been rented, so I
spoke with the landlord, located thanks to the mobile phone brothers. He
confirmed the story.
Warren Besart: dual US – French nationality
The
French were more helpful than the Americans. He had family in both countries,
although none here in Egypt where he worked as an agent ‘helping’
those who wanted to export antiquities. He evidently worked the black market
and had been fined several times. The Egyptian police were able to tell me what
had become of him. He’d been killed in a particularly brutal mugging in 2004,
identified by dental records. The police contact showed me some
stomach-churning photos that could have been a man. The autopsy had gone to the
trouble of working out that he had been beaten to a pulp in a prolonged attack
by being hit repeatedly with a club that had a 2 inch flat hook. The police
view of the reason for this unusual and torturous death was either a debt or
black market deal gone sour, or a woman’s family, although they had no evidence
for either. The investigation had had stopped due to lack of any easy leads.
Jan van Heuvelen: US citizen, student at University of Liverpool, UK
He’d
been at the Clive excavation in Giza that discovered an intact first dynasty
sarcophagus in May 2008, but was dismissed for incompetence on 18th
June. The activity of these archaeologists had been gossip in the Embassy
because they seemed to have managed to obtain permits from the Egyptian Supreme
Council of Antiquities with surprising ease. Following the announcement on 26
June that the sarcophagus had been stolen two days before, the project leader,
Dr Henry Clive, had hinted that van Heuvlen was
involved with the theft. The police were not making any effort to find him or
the sarcophagus, though. Since it was an expedition from the UK, we had information about it at the
Embassy. I rapidly established that van Heuvlen had
not returned to Liverpool and obtained his family’s phone number in
the USA. His mother told me that he’d phoned her
only a few days before from Cairo, saying how much he was enjoying working at the excavation. Surprised,
I thanked her and put down the phone before asking either where he was staying
or his phone number. Still, it looks like he’s alive, unlike the other two.
Brian
turned up a few days later with another name, with instructions to find out
about the man, then phone the number on the slip and tell everything to
‘Hawk-eye’.
Masoud Sawalha, Egyptian.
He
was a 19-year old digger who was taken on by the Clive dig when they re-located
from Giza to Memphis to get away from the media once they went
public about the sarcophagus. The police told me what had happened to him. He
had parents and a brother, so when he went missing unexpectedly from the dig
there was an effort to find him. He had been mugged and killed by the same
brutal method as Besart. Since he had no history of
criminal association, the police thought it could be a killing over a girl.
I
phoned the number for ‘Hawk-eye’, and got a man who spoke Arabic, like a
Syrian. He thanked me for the information. I later discovered he was Sgt. Syed Hussain, a marine I’d seen
around the Embassy.
Thursday 2nd October 2008
I
met the latest group of three men and a woman at the airport, accompanied by
Sgt. Hussain who was driving. They were the most
unconventional people with diplomatic credential that I’ve met so far. The
woman, Stephanie McQueen (Eliza), was a real head-turner. Of the men, Robert Sayle (Captain Sandy Wood) acted as if he was military and
was soon deep in conversation with Sgt. Hussain.
Edward Thorn (Adam) looked like a New-Ager who’d
smartened himself up for this occasion while Daniel Wiltshire (Alec) was
professional with the manner of someone who expects to take charge. After I
greeted them on behalf of the Ambassador, checked their credentials and
escorted them through the Egyptian border formalities, we collected their
luggage and then Sgt. Hussain drove us to the
Majestic, the hotel that we normally use for official guests. It is in the city
centre, near the Old
City.
On
the drive there, the conversation between Robert Sayle
and the sergeant confirmed my impression that ‘Mr’ Sayle
was actually military, and ranked above Syed, who had
been working under cover recently. I heard the definitive time-line of events
at the Clive dig. The announcement about the sarcophagus of the 6th
dynasty Pharaoh, tentatively identified as the woman
Pharaoh Nitiqreti, in Giza was made in May but it wasn’t until 18
June that Jan van Heuvelen was sacked. The theft
happened on Tuesday 24 June but it wasn’t announced until Thursday 26th.
Media interest had been intense and the party had packed up and moved to Memphis on 29th July. I learnt that Syed had joined as a labourer on 1st August. I
told them what I knew about van Heuvelen and the
other two men I’d been asked to find out about.
Robert
Sayle phoned Jan’s family and got his mobile number,
as I should have done, but it was ‘out of service’. That was not good news.
The
new-ager, Edward, went off to meet someone at the Museum of Antiquities. Daniel wanted to visit the Old City. He said he wanted to see cats, which I
thought a bit strange, but we humoured him and both Syed
and I accompanied him. He walked round in a purposeful way, for a few hours but
didn’t find whatever he was after so we headed back to the hotel.
It
was now quite late in the day, and I returned to my apartment, having arranged
to meet with them next morning. Today was the most interesting day I’ve had in Egypt so far and I’m looking forward to
tomorrow. There is a definite mystery about these people; they know much more
than they’ve said.
Friday 3rd October 2008
I
can’t work out why they are here. Obviously, they aren’t sharing everything
with Syed and myself but
they’ve dropped some very strange comments. Their attention is on the Clive
expedition. It turns out that Syed was undercover at Memphis for weeks and left when he thought Masoud Sawalha was about to
introduce him to the central people in the dig, but then was found dead.
However, I don’t understand what is wrong with the expedition. I imagined that
there was something irregular – smuggling antiquities, drugs, an immigration
scam, maybe terrorism – but it isn’t any of these. From what they say, I’d
think they were concerned about something supernatural, except they are
official visitors and the supernatural isn’t real.
We
drove south to the Great Pyramid at Giza, reaching it mid-morning. We all went into
it then Edward went all New Agey and said he could
sense evil foci and raw energy within it, from the direction that had recently
been excavated by the Clive expedition. He was particularly perturbed by
‘something’ underground, in a space beneath the pyramid. Then we drove on the
Red Pyramid, a few miles away, arriving lunchtime.