by Talbot Mundy
Catesby was only in the nick of time at that. Struggling to his knees, he was aware of something flashing brightly in the moonlight from behind the ruined cactus bush. He sprang into the shadow and caught Suliman’s kukri in the act of descending on the Arab’s undefended neck, whirled in both hands like an ax by the eight-year-old. He threw Suliman into the cactus to whimper and recover rectitude.
Then when they had trussed their prisoner and had picked most of the thorns out of him they sat and operated on themselves by moonlight, using pocket-knives and fingernails and hard words, giving the Arab time to get his breath and think up some lies to tell them presently.
It was no use trying to pretend they themselves were Arabs any longer, for they had sworn too lustily in English, to say nothing of Jim’s instructions anent the girdle, and Narayan Singh’s hoarse imprecations in another tongue.
“Perhaps it’s as well,” laughed Jim. “Here, Catesby, be a good chap and dig this thorn out from behind my knee. He’ll be so puzzled that perhaps he’ll lie less, if we can get him to say anything at all. Where’s Suliman?”
“I am here. I look for the kukri. It was not the act of a true khawaja (gentleman) to throw me in that cactus bush. If you are my mutahid (partner), Jimgrim, you will see that I have full vengeance!”
“I’ll avenge you. Wait and see. Let’s ask the prisoner what he thinks about it. Have you found the kukri?”
Suliman flourished it in the moonlight. Jim stooped over the prisoner and lifted him into a sitting attitude; at sight of the kukri whirling near his head he ducked and fell over again sidewise; for his hands were tied under his knees and one can’t keep balance as well as struggle in that position. Jim lifted him again.
“Now,” he said in Arabic, “this child vows you are an iblis; and he has sworn by the beard of the Prophet to kill the first iblis that he sees. We are his friends, here to help him do it. What do you say to that?”
“You have caught the wrong one. I am no iblis.”
“You fight like one, and you smell worse than one. What then are you?”
“I am a thief.”
The man threw such pride into the assertion that Catesby and Narayan Singh both laughed. But Jim was too intent on something else. He shifted his own position so that the moonlight shore directly in the man’s face — then nodded.
“Look at me carefully, Mahommed ben Hamza. Do you know me?”
“Jimgrim! Ilhamdilla! (Thank God!) Now I am all right.”
“No, you’re not, you scoundrel!”
“Man without virtue I may be, since Jimgrim says it, who knows so much; but not for nothing did I help thee at El-Kerak, when a word from me would have ended thy career. I say I am all right. Ilhamdilla!”
“You think I’m easy,” Jim answered, “but I tell you my friends here are ruthless.”
“Then you and I will fight them. I am not afraid.”
“What brought you from thieving in the Hebron suk (market)?”
“What were you doing yonder?”
Jim pointed to the hill two hundred yards away on which the leper had danced.
“What but obtaining magic against bullet and bayonet? What else could a dervish do for me? However, he forgot to bless me for ambushment by the way, or even you, Jimgrim, would not have been clever or strong enough to take me, with twice as many men.”
“Then you think his dance is efficacious?”
“Surely. All the thieves go to him, and how many get caught? A very few get shot, and a very few get stabbed, but those are the ones who scoffed at him. He is a driver of hard bargains, but his magic works.”
“Hard bargains, eh?”
“Leper’s bargains. A man must leave two-thirds of all he steals, or the equivalent at a place appointed, or suffer the curse. None dares fail him.”
“I drive still harder bargains,” Jim answered.
“Aye, and keep them. Loose my bonds, Jimgrim; thou and I are old friends.”
“Not so fast. Are your wife and child at Hebron, Mahommed ben Hamza?”
“Unless ill luck overtook them between yesterday and now.”
“And you still own the little vineyard — that profitable little vineyard beside the Jerusalem Road?”
“Surely. That was my father’s legacy to me, his firstborn.”
“And the stone house in the Haret el-Akkabi (the quarter of the makers of goatskin water-bags) — does that belong to you still?”
“Aye.”
“Since I have caught you red-handed on your way to steal from Ludd Camp, and you have confessed in front of witnesses, do you not see I am in position to drive a very hard bargain?”
“Between friends?”
“Between a thief and one who can get that thief fined so heavily that there would be no more orchard paying profits on the Jerusalem Road, and no more home in the Haret el-Akkabi to bequeath to an only son.”
“You would not do that, Jimgrim!”
“I spoke of a bargain.”
“Well?”
“Where is that leper to be found by daylight?”
“None knows. None dares inquire.”
“Where is the place appointed for his share of the plunder to be left?”
“It is never twice the same.”
“Where have you been told to leave two-thirds of what you proposed to steal tonight?”
“Ah-h-h!”
“My friend the Governor of Hebron keeps a nice, clean jail, it is true,” said Jim. “And my friend Moustapha Aziz the auctioneer obtains good prices, too. There might be a little something left to you after the fine is paid.”
“Jimgrim, if I though you were a liar I would take my chance. The court would never fine me all that much, for since the Turks left there is a law like mother’s milk. But you are such a devil that I think you could arrange it. I suppose you know of other charges you could lay against me, and who shall stand against your persistence? Moreover, you are my friend.”
“Answer my question then.”
“I cannot describe the place.”
“Is it near here?”
“Yes.”
“Then lead us to it.”
“Jimgrim, I am afraid. That dervish who has no name is a capable fellow. He can curse!”
“And I, who hold you prisoner, know all about your property. Which is the lesser evil — a curse that might miss—”
“Inshalla!”
“Or my flat promise to get after you in Hebron?”
Mahommed ben Hamza smiled as winningly as a child with a cause to plead.
“You I know of old, Jimgrim. The dervish is new and talks a lot, but his talking did not save me from being caught tonight. Besides, you are my friend. I will lead you to the place.”
“Loose his feet, Narayan Singh. Then tie his hands behind his back.”
“Nay, Jimgrim! Have I questioned your word once, or lied to you once? Did I lie to you at El-Kerak, when at a word from me they would have thrown you from the castle roof?”
Jim hesitated. He did not want to be hampered by a prisoner on his hands that night, yet he would have had to return to camp in order to lock him up. But on the other hand he did not want the responsibility of letting him go. The best plan seemed to be to make a stipulation with definite limits, which the man would probably observe implicitly and then vamoose.
“Just what do you promise?” he asked.
“I will lead you to the place where the dervish told us we must leave his bakshish.”
“All right. Swear to it.”
“By the holy mosque of El-Kalil — by the tomb of my father, on whom be blessings — by the—”
“That will do. Loose him, Narayan Singh — but keep a close eye on him.”
“Mashallah! I could not run if I were minded,” laughed Mahommed ben Hamza, stretching himself. “I would rather a camel knelt on my belly another time than that fellow of yours who gagged me. This way, your honors.”
* * * * *
He led them along the ridge toward th
e spot where the leper had danced, so brightly and at such an angle that whoever was abroad could hardly have helped seeing them the moment they should desert the scant cover of the scrub. Mahommed ben Hamza did not care; his own need of secrecy was at an end for that night, and his part of the bargain was to show the way; he deliberately chose the open path until Jim called a halt, midway along the ridge.
There he left Catesby and Narayan Singh, bidding Suliman mark the place carefully.
“Now down on your belly and crawl!” he ordered. “And if you make a noise or show yourself you shall surely wish I was only a camel; I’ll land on top of you like a troop of cavalry! You, too, Suliman — crawl!”
On hands and knees, picking out the shadows of the cactus and taking their chance of snake, centipedes and scorpions, they crept up to the spot where the leper had danced, and Jim went aside to examine it, wondering what sort of hollow his pirouetting must have scooped out of the sand. But in place of a hole was an ancient Moslem tombstone long since fallen flat, and now worn smooth in the middle where the man’s feet had rubbed it night after night.
“Come away, Jimgrim; the place is bewitched!” Mahommed ben Hamza whispered.
But Jim was not satisfied until he had worked his fingers under the stone and lifted it to see what might be underneath. For the next three minutes he was busy killing about a dozen of the little deadly vipers that infest the plains of Palestine, using the kukri snatched from Suliman’s hand.
“What did I tell you?” grumbled Mahommed ben Hamza. “Did not I say it is bewitched?”
After that they crawled downhill, scouting extremely carefully because the moon shone on a smooth surface of sand where cactus and shadow were scant. At the foot of the long slope was a winding nullah, and there, because of the shadow, they dared stand upright. Mahommed ben Hamza led along it to a sandy amphitheater a quarter of a mile away, and stopped in front of one of those open tombs with which all Palestine abounds.
“There, that is the place.”
“Inside or outside?”
“We were to lay the loot inside.”
“Go in and see if the leper is in there now.”
“Allah forbid! Besides, Jimgrim, my bargain is finished. I was to lead to the place, that is all.”
“True.”
“Having kept my promise I am now free.”
“Gee, that was foolish of me! I ordered Narayan Singh to keep an eye on you, and then left him behind.”
“So now I go. Good-by, Jimgrim. Don’t shoot, for the dervish might hear — and besides you are my friend!”
“But if I catch you away from Hebron before I visit the place,” Jim answered, “you shall wish I had shot you, do you understand? After all, I think — perhaps—”
He drew his automatic and cocked it very deliberately; but Mahommed ben Hamza was out of sight among the shadows almost before the spring of the pistol clicked.
CHAPTER V
“Aye, father of reprimands, but where?”
CATESBY and Narayan Singh waited interminably, watching the moon mount overhead and passing from mere impatient to restlessness to anxiety as more than an hour went by without any sign of Jim. Officer and enlisted man, Englishman and Sikh, they naturally kept their distance, each respecting the other’s prejudices; and they lay low for fear of scouting desert thieves. Once they heard a shot ring out somewhere in the direction of the camp, but that was nothing unusual since thieves had become so busy.
At last Narayan Singh crawled close to Catesby and with an upward jerk of his thumb toward the moon began to speak in that low voice which is so hugely better than a whisper.
“Sahib, I have orders to bring our Jimgrim back to Jerusalem alive!”
“What do you propose, Narayan Singh?”
“My orders to take care of him was from my own colonel, sahib. It is good to obey.”
“We’ll give him ten more minutes. If he doesn’t come then or send the boy for us we’ll try to find him.”
“Good.”
Narayan Singh spent most of the ten minutes examining his pistol and a long, keen knife that he carried under his tunic, arranging both so that he could reach them instantly with either hand. But there remained ninety interminable seconds.
“Let me see your pistol, sahib. I have known these automatics to jam. Sand in the fodder kills mules and horses, but I have seen officers die more quickly for lack of a man to detect sand in their pistol locks.”
Catesby laughed and handed the weapon over. It is only the raw subaltern who is too proud to be nursed by a war-wise enlisted man. Aware that his weapon was spotless clean, he was too wise to discourage the Sikh’s thoughtfulness.
“Now are the ten minutes not up?”
“Thirty seconds,” said Catesby, glancing at his wristwatch. “Pistol all right?”
“A little heavy on the pull. Is it a new one?”
“Yes.”
“Then take care to aim to the left, sahib, if it has to be used in a hurry. Now — ?”
“Yes, come on.”
Catesby led, but only for the sake of form. Narayan Singh’s low voice from just behind did all the counseling.
“Jimgrim went first to the place where the shaitan (devil) danced. I saw him.”
The shadows were shorter now, and it was not so easy to keep cover and make rapid progress. On the hilltop they abandoned all effort to conceal themselves. Catesby stooped to examine the tombstone, and discovered some of the snakes that Jim had killed with the kukri. But Narayan Singh had seen them first.
“Beware, sahib! A snake dies slowly; cut in halves they can bite yet for an hour or two.”
He fidgeted until Catesby came away from them.
Now the moon proved friend as well as enemy, for the Sikh’s keen eyes picked up the trail Mahommed ben Hamza made in the sand, crossed once in a while by those of Jim and Suliman hurrying from bush to bush. But at the bottom of the long slope where the footsteps turned into the narrow wady they were confused by those of six or seven more men hurrying in single file in the same direction. In the one spot where the moonlight shone on the bed of the wady Narayan Singh stooped and scooped up a handful of earth. It was sticky. He beckoned Catesby into a hollow on one side of the track.
“Strike a match, sahib. Carefully! A match can be seen for miles. Thus — ah — blood it is, and almost warm — scarcely begun to harden.”
They both examined every inch of the ground for ten or fifteen yards.
“There was no fight in this place. Whoever bled got his punishment elsewhere. Perhaps they carried a wounded man — who can tell in this dim light? See — there is blood again, sahib. Shall we follow?”
There was nothing else they could do in the circumstances. It was surely contrary to all the rules of warfare, civilized or guerilla, for two men in the dark to stalk seven down a narrow, winding wady, around any turn of which the seven might wait and pounce on them.
But Catesby was no whit behind Narayan Singh in eagerness to serve his friend; and to turn back was unthinkable, for instance, as to let the Sikh go first into danger, even if his were the keenest eyes. There are prerogatives that no man willingly relinquishes. Catesby strode forward.
* * * * *
Fifty-four paces down the wady, by his own count, he tripped and nearly fell over an Arab corpse.
For a minute they took cover near the corpse and listened. Then Narayan Singh knelt beside it and his long, brown fingers searched swiftly. Someone had covered up the face with the headdress and bound the covering fast. He tugged it off.
“God be praised, it is not Jimgrim!” he growled. “The body is quite warm — not dead ten minutes.”
His fingers searched inside the clothes and presently found the “emergency exit” through which the man’s life had fled.
“He died by a bayonet, sahib. Come and feel. There is no mistaking that wound. Likely a Sikh did it, for the thrust forced the middle rib apart and broke the lower one. These were camp-thieves returning from the night’s w
ork, and one got more than he bargained for.”
The fingers searched again, feeling skillfully for anything of value; but the man’s friends had taken that precaution first, and even the usual amulets and necklace of prayer-beads were missing. However, the father East a man is born the more meticulously detailed is his genius for looting (so that the Punjaubi and the Jew from Bokhara can thrive where the Arab starves, the Chinaman can fatten on what they leave, and the Japanese out-thieves them all).
Presently the Sikh covered the dead man’s face again and waited for Catesby to lead on, but the Englishman hesitated. Thieves (supposing that they were thieves) who took such trouble to cover up a dead man’s face were hardly likely to leave the body long at the mercy of jackals and hyenas.
There was apparently only one possible way they could take returning. They might send two men back for the body, or return in force. He might leave Narayan Singh in hiding there to watch, and scout forward alone. Narayan Singh could deal alone with two or three men; but six or seven would overwhelm him.
Finally he adopted the inevitable British compromise and, beckoning the Sikh to follow him, turned back a little way to avoid making more footprints on the sand. At the first place where the bank of the wady sloped fairly easily he began to climb it and discovered, as he expected, easy enough going at the top.
“Now, Narayan Singh, we’ll scout along together as far as the last point from which we can overlook the wady. There I’ll leave you and carry on. If I need you I’ll fire my pistol. If you need me, do the same.
“You won’t be able to see down into the wady, but if anybody comes along it you can hear; in that case scout closer. Shoot to kill if you want to, but mind you don’t shoot Jimgrim sahib by mistake!”
The Sikh’s disgust and disappointment were as plain as if he had dared voice them. A hound would have submitted as cheerfully. He approved neither of dividing forces nor of squandering his own trained senses on any passive form of usefulness.
