(Bazaar) afterwards against his orders, arguin’ with a lot o’ knifers? Eighteen-carat— twenty-two jewels—breguet spring—say: get me that watch back an’ I’ll give you twenty U.S. dollars for yourself!”
“Don’t want ‘em,” said Grim, smiling down placidly from the superior height of the camel.
“What—you don’t want dollars? Quit your kiddin’! There’s nobody in this land don’t want dollars.”
“How badly d’you want that watch?”
“Oh, all right—twenty-five, then: but that’s the limit.”
“Dollars won’t do. I know you for a good scout, Aaron Cohen, or I’d let you lose your watch for abusing young de Crespigny. That boy’s got his hands full. How’d you like to be Governor of Hebron?”
“Not bloody likely! I’d sooner be King of the Irish! He’s not a bad feller at that, only too thick with Arabs. He gave me a drink after I’d done criticizing. But say: what do you know about me?”
“And your emigration business? Nearly as much as you do!”
“Who are you, anyway?”
“My name is Grim.”
“What? Him they call Jimgrim? Pardon me! Somehow I thought you didn’t talk like an Arab. Well, you’re the very man I’m looking for. I want my watch back, Major Grim. I’ve got no money in my pocket or I’d give it to you, but there’s fifty dollars you can use however you please, and I’ll pay it on your say-so—no questions asked. Could anything be fairer than that?”
“D’you want it badly enough to turn back?”
“What—to that nest o’ thieves? To Hebron? To El-Kalil? Um-m-m! I got no money for one thing.”
“I’ll lend you whatever you need.”
“Your risk! If they skin it from me, it’s your money!”
“All right.”
“You must have some mighty strong reason for wanting me back in Hebron!”
“I have. You’ll be all right for a day or two. There’s a hotel.”
“Yey—I been there. The bugs in it have red-hot bear-traps on their feet and the food ain’t fit for niggers!”
“Well, d’you want the watch?”
“You’ll get it for me?”
“Yes, if you turn back.”
“Uh! If you were English I wouldn’t trust you; I’d say you were kiddin’ yourself or kiddin’ me. Go on, I’ll take a chance.”
“See you at the hotel then.”
Grim and I rode on and in five minutes hardly the dust of Cohen’s carriage was visible behind us.
We rode side by side, but it is not easy to talk from camel-back, although the beasts’ feet make hardly any noise; I’ve a notion that the habitual reticence of the desert-folk is partly due to enforced silence for long periods on the march, when the swing and sway of the camels and the cloth over the rider’s mouth make conversation next to impossible. Grim’s information came in snatches.
“Good fellow, Cohen. Clever devil. Zionist. Thinks he can provide land here for Jews by encouraging Arabs to emigrate. Money behind him. Settle ‘em on land in Arkansas and Tennessee. Kind fellow. Hot-air merchant. Good at bottom. Shrewd. Strange mixture of physical fear and impudent courage.”
“What makes you so sure you can recover the watch?”
“Experience of Hebron. I was governor there once.”
* * * * *
For an hour after that we padded along in silence through a country dotted with enormous herds of black goats in charge of patriarchal-looking shepherds. The only trees in sight were occasional ancient olives; but as we drew near Hebron the hillsides were all divided by stone walls into orchards and we passed between miles of grape-vines, interspersed with mishmish, as they call their apricots.
You don’t see Hebron until the road begins to descend into it, and then the first view is of a neat modern village with the German influence predominant; for there, as everywhere else in Palestine, the Germans had not been content with making plans; they built good stone houses. The ancient city lies beyond all that, utterly untouched by science—a chaotic jumble flaunted in the face of discipline.
We stopped in front of the Governorate, and that, of course was a German building, a neat little residence with a garden in front and a stone wall all about it, in sight of the jail which, equally of course, was Turkish. The Turks built nothing so good as their jails and the Germans strengthened them, but it took the British to clean them of vermin, and filth and untried prisoners.
The Hebron jail is outside the city for more good reasons than one. Where ninety-nine per cent of a city’s population is eligible for rigorous confinement on one ground or another and the cleverest thieves on earth are trained besides, no mere iron bars within the city limits would serve the purpose; you need open spaces all around for rifle and machine-gun fire— except of course, in famine time, when most of the population plans to be arrested and fed two square meals a day, at the foreign tax-payers’ expense.
Captain de Crespigny came out of the Governorate to greet us, smiling all over as a man should whose only dependable assistant has the tooth-ache.
“You know the wire is down behind you?” he said pleasantly.
“Since when?”
“An hour ago. I’m rather worried about a Jew named Cohen. I let him start for Jerusalem this morning. ‘Fraid now he may get scuppered on the way.”
“It’s all right; we met him. He’s on his way back.”
“Oh, did you get wind of trouble here?”
“Not a thing. Wanted Cohen here for a special reason. What’s up?”
“I tried to phone through to Jerusalem for a machine gun. There’s nobody to send. We’ve a motor-cycle, but it’s napoo. That fellow Cohen lost his watch and I arrested a local Arab on suspicion soon after Cohen had gone. He’s over there in the jail now and four thousand of his friends have sworn an oath to take him out again by force. I’ve ten policemen—one first-class man and nine with the wind up them.”
“Are you sure the wire’s down?” Grim asked him.
“Perfectly. I’d call that luck, only now you’ve come. They couldn’t exactly have blamed me for bluffing the business through without orders and I think I could have tackled it. However, I suppose you take over?”
“Not if I know it!” Grim answered. “Make over to me when you’ve had enough, but no sooner.”
“Thanks. Come in and have a drink. Who’s your friend?”
“Ramsden—a countryman of mine.”
Grim
