80
CAIRO TO DAMASCUS
students of Fouad University. This gave me an idea. Might
not Gamal be a member—Gamal, one of the two bearded
students who had followed me the second time I had been
arrested for taking pictures? I had put his address aside with
little thought that it would ever be useful.
I called upon him in one of the native residential sections
of the city, and he greeted me warmly and ceremoniously.
"Ahhh, welcome, American friend who loves the Arab cause,"
he intoned. "Allah yaateek el-afiah. Mit ahlan wa sahlan. May
God grant you good health. Welcome a hundred times."
"Moutta shakker. Allah yebarek feek. Thank you. May God
bless you," I said, using the Arab phrases Moustafa had been
teaching me. "I have come to ask your help to meet Sheikh
Hassan el Banna, who I have heard is a great and noble man.
I wish to bring the Moorshid the greetings of Americans who
are one with the Arab cause."
My hunch was right. Gamal was a member of the Ikhwan.
He would be happy, he said, to arrange matters. Would I meet
him the following night at nine p.m. at Ikhwan headquarters?
This seemed perfect, for Green Shirt scouts would be less
likely to see me going there at night.
The next evening a taxi brought me noisily to a large twostory white house, its ornate Moorish architecture etched in
the moonlight. There was a guardhouse at the corner. A high
iron fence surrounded the building. All about were dark,
bearded figures in gallabiyas and others in the garb of El
Azhar (Moslem Theological Seminary) students. Two uniformed policemen with rifles stood at the entrance. The dim
light from a corner street-lamp made t