Judith

by Lawrence Durrell

  “Money for jam,” said Donner.

  “So we think. They are not armed, or hardly.”

  “Perhaps an automatic rifle at most. I have been over the place three times with a fine-tooth comb.”

  “I know.” The Prince puffed for a moment and wrinkled his brow. “That’s all, I think. You can take yourself off.”

  Donner saluted smartly and did a regimental turn. Under his breath he said to himself: “The bastard!”

  But if the Prince was a source of disappointment to Donner, His Majesty’s Equerry was even more infuriating; he wore an Old Etonian tie and a monocle on a length of black tape. And he lisped.

  •

  From the central State Tent of the Prince Daud, with its brilliant hangings and vast acreage of carpets, its forest of inlaid tables and elaborate chairs and cushions all spread upon the smooth sand dunes, came screams of laughter in a high register. They were all seated upon the ground. Daud himself, the Vizier, the three State Councillors and old Abu Taib. The cause of their merriment was the little toy train which Colonel Towers had brought back from his last leave as a present for Daud. It rolled unerringly round and round the skilful cobweb of railway lines until it reached the little red station where it stopped once more. But this time in doing so it had seemed to be about to pass under Abu Taib’s robes, and the old man had leaped back with a shriek, like a school-child pursued by a mouse. Hence the merriment. The slim wand-like figure of Daud was bent double. The tears ran down that beautiful and gentle face. He struck his thigh with his palm. It was a capital joke. When the paroxysm had ended, as it always did, in a burst of hoarse coughing — to remind him bitterly of his illness — Daud sprang up impulsively, tears still wet on his cheek. “No, but by God he is right, this Towers,” he cried, “It is certainly as beautiful as a poem by Hafiz, this little machine. He is right!” His large benign eyes bloomed with affection and gratitude. His was a face and figure of extraordinary inbred refinement. Daud was as slender as a stag and as emotional and impulsive as a girl. The ivory skin of his features — helped perhaps by the hereditary consumption of his family — was of a beautiful, almost unearthly pallor. Now as he debated, staring at the engine, his long slender fingers picked at the tassel of his belt. “Once more,” he said, “and I will go and thank him. Just once more.” This time the merriment was even greater, due to an unforeseen interruption by Daud’s cheetah, which had watched the manoeuvres of the train in silence up to now; but on this next occasion — as if it could no longer resist the moving toy, any more than a cat can resist a mouse — it advanced in a single bound and stood like a heraldic animal with its paw raised. As the engine stopped, it touched it once, twice, lightly with its velvet paw and then went off to its corner again with a disappointed air. This was a marvellous joke.

  Daud burst out of his tent and swept across the smooth dunes to where the little circle of British Mission tents had been pitched. He moved with a flame-like swiftness and grace, still laughing, his lips still moving with unuttered speeches. He threw back the flap of Towers’ dusty old bell-tent and cried, “Thank you, Towers, thank you! You are quite right.” There was no answer and Daud peeped in.

  The old colonel lay snoring on his camp-bed, with an empty bottle of whisky standing upright on the canvas floor beside him. Daud gazed at him with affection, almost with passion. The black patch which normally shielded Towers’ right eye had come away a little, to expose the shrapnel-torn socket. His uniform jacket, neatly placed upon a coat-hanger, swung slowly in a corner of the tent, vaunting its long triple row of decorations. His soiled undervest was stained violet at the armpits with sweat. He snored softly and dreamed: he was just driving off the third tee at Lyme Regis into a westerly wind which forced one to bear down slightly to avoid slicing... Daud placed a finger on the wrist of the sleeper and said: “You are a good man, Towers. I will write to your master and have you ennobled.” Then he turned back abruptly and walked slowly back to his tents, his bent head hanging, deep in thought.

  Towers slept on softly. He was a most popular figure in his command, not only because of his knowledge and respect for Arab forms of courtesy, but also for an appealing vein of idiosyncrasy in his character, which made him seem to them something of an original. He was the only British officer they had seen carry a chamber-pot on active service — blue flowers on a white ground. Then too, every afternoon when he was off duty, he took a driver and practised swinging for half an hour, as religiously as a Muslim answering a call to prayer. This little ritual always ended by him producing from a green baize bag a number of battered repaints which he drove, slowly, thoughtfully, majestically into the desert, where the delighted children fielded them, knowing that he always gave baksheesh to those who brought them back. “I like my Arab,” Towers used to say sometimes after dinner when he was mellowed by whisky. “And I think he likes me.” The Arabs did love him, and paid him the compliment of conferring on him the title of “father”. “Not that I have anything against the Jews,” Towers would add whenever the vexed question of Palestine cropped up. “Far from it. Fine fellers all. But in next to no time they’ll turn the whole country into a Manchester suburb, what?”

  It was among such simple formulations that he moved, but of recent months even he had begun to feel the shape and form of things changing around him; new issues with sharp edges were coming to light on all sides. It was consoling in a way to be able to take refuge in his soldier’s role and leave all the rest to the invisible politicians who would shape the destinies of the future.

  He was awake and dressed now, however, by the time Donner piloted in his convoy of squat armoured cars amidst great rejoicing that evening. He acknowledged Donner’s salute briefly, rather admiring its professional finish. “Well, Captain,” he said, “come into the Command Tent for a brief drink of welcome.”

  They transacted their business over a glass of whisky, and Donner handed over his despatches, together with the ornate pigskin pouch in which the Prince’s private despatches had been placed. “I don’t want to be pessimistic,” said Towers, “but I feel bound to confess to my staff that I think things are blowing up. We’ve made too many promises to too many people. We can’t keep them all. I’m no politico, but I’ll lay you short odds that H.M.G. will funk it and try and crawl into the skirts of UNO for a vote on the Mandate.”

  Donner coughed and nodded vaguely. He hardly knew or cared what the issues were, provided they permitted him to earn a living as a mercenary. It all sounded faintly anti-British in tone. He pursed his rosy lips and put on a slightly unwilling expression, as though such trenchant remarks were in some way wounding to his finer sentiments. “And if we do,” said Towers, banging his hand down on the Daily Telegraph, “in my view we’ll lose the day.”

  He was more explicit that night at a Staff Conference lit by a swinging hurricane lamp. The little group of Mission officers listened to him thinking aloud with various expressions of polite scepticism. “In such an event the place would flare up and I have no doubt that we’d be ordered over the border — ordered to seize Ras Shamir and perhaps move up on the road near us here. Fortunately, the operation would be a simple one against unarmed people; but the cars would give us mobility. However, we can’t afford to take it easy; our infantry training is still groggy. A good regiment, gentlemen, matures slowly, like a good wine. You can’t rush it. And we haven’t had time. So I personally hope that everything will stay quiet. But if they tell us to move we shall have to. Anyway, that’s all for now. In the morning Captain Donner is going to give us a shoot; these cars carry quite a hefty pom-pom he tells me... And so forth.

  Later he walked for a while with Donner to examine the cars and meet the crews. “You’d better give the Prince and his entourage a ride tomorrow after the shoot,” said Towers. “These little gestures go down very well — anyway, he is nominally C-in-C. Ach!” Donner looked at the colonel, wondering what the expression signified. Towers smiled. “I’m tired, Donner,” he said mildly. “That’s all. Ju
st tired. I’m within three months of retirement anyway, thank goodness. Got a little cottage down Lyme Regis way waiting for me, and I can’t wait. I’m harness-weary.”

  “Funny old bugger,” said Donner later in the mess tent, as he drank a glass of beer among his compeers. “I hope he knows what he’s at.” By his standards, Towers was going to be “tricky” — too much of a gentleman by half, and a wog-lover obviously. That evening Daud sent for Towers. He was seated in a veritable sea of papers thrown about in higgledy piggledy fashion. The Palace pouch lay before him. “My brother says there will be war and we will have to take Ras Shamir,” he said, his face registering a strange mixture of emotions, joy, confusion and sorrow all at once.

  “Your brother may be right,” said Towers soberly.

  “Come,” said Daud abruptly, “come and walk.” It was as if he needed to sort out these conflicting emotions. They walked in silence along the rosy cliffs for a while; below them slumbered the silent valley of Ras Shamir, deep in violet mist. The lights of the mountain settlements twinkled like stars across the unguarded border. Daud was at a loss to understand why his heart sank at every mention of his brother’s name; it was not jealousy, for he loved Jalal deeply. It was something else. Jalal had been away, abroad, and this had somehow changed everything between them. He, Daud, had always been sickly, confined to his bed for long terms, too ill to risk a life in cold climates. He had never left his country. Indeed, it was much to his credit that he had learned as much as he had from the Palace tutors. His English was good though imprecise, and he could stumble in French. But Jalal! When he came back it was a different sort of Jalal. He was impatient and contemptuous of the old easy-going ways of his own people. He preferred foreign friends and foreign ways; he preferred the life of the court, with its intrigues, to the life here among the tents of the clan. Daud sighed heavily and took Towers’ arm. He pointed to the valley below them and said with a sudden little access of emotion: “Ach, Towers! Ras Shamir! We must have it again — we must have it.” He bit his white knuckle with whiter teeth. “You know it,” he said, almost pleadingly, his fine eyes swollen with a facile emotion. Towers delivered himself of a grunt. “My ancestors were born there,” continued Daud with a flowing gesture, “my family and line sprang from there. Now the Jews have it and we are here.” With his other arm he described an arc which followed out the contours of the desert, covered by day with their grazing flocks and brilliant tents. It was a surprising contrast: the brilliant moonlit valley below and the bare rufus cliffs on which they stood — stone shaling away immediately into sand and wave-worn rocky foothills.

  “It was a swamp before,” Towers reminded the young man softly. Daud stood sunk in thought. “Now all the nations will be speaking about it with your leaders,” pursued Towers. He had had great difficulty in getting Daud to understand the workings of UNO and the nature of its deliberations. Daud nodded, solemnly biting his knuckle until it hurt him, until tears came into his eyes. “They will understand the Arabs’ feelings,” he said. “How great we are! Did the Arabs not invent mathematics? You yourself have said so, Towers, and you do not lie.” Towers agreed solemnly. But Daud was troubled. “But now they are speaking of a jihad, a holy war. The old King has told us to be ready — my brother says so. He has made you give us these wonderful cars.” He turned his great sentimental liquid eyes upon Towers. “And the astrologers say that in war I shall be invincible this year. But war, Towers... how could I think of war with them — with Aaron, my friend? That is what troubles me.” He hung his head and pulled at his lip. Then his face lit up with a smile. His white teeth flashed under his silky moustache and he struck his knee with his hand. “I have it. I shall ask Aaron to visit me, and we can speak of the matter like old friends. He will understand my feelings, Towers. He above all will understand.”

  Towers looked quizzical but he did not reply directly. Indeed, there was nothing to say. He put his arm out and touched Daud’s wrist; a gesture of affection. They returned in silence.

  “Well,” said Towers to himself as he got into bed, “I trust that I shall have retired before they start any jihad nonsense here. I think H.M.G. must be mad, quite mad. Broken promises on every side and a complete lack of any clear-cut policy. Never seen such a mess in a long career of soldiering. Never!”

  •

  The shoot the next morning was a great success, as indeed was the triumphal progress of Daud and his entourage by armoured car. Daud was flushed with pleasure and excitement and lost in admiration for these glorious instruments of war. But when, at a signal from Donner, they fired a few ranging shots with the heavy anti-tank guns they carried, he fairly pranced with joy. His clansmen clustered about them like honey bees; and when the machine guns opened up a rapid fire in concert they rolled on the ground with joy. The children fell down like snipe shocked by close gunfire, but screamed with laughter and rolled over and over in the sand. Daud pressed Towers’ calloused hand and then put it briefly to his cheek. “What wonders these are,” he said with his vivid, innocent smile. “They will make me invincible in battle, Towers.”

  Then he added with a change of expression: “I have sent them to ask Aaron to come. I must see him, Towers. I know he will understand me.”

  Indeed, that morning the lean figure of Abu Taib had crossed the border on his elegant black Arab, accompanied by an escort of two horsemen bearing pennons with white flags. They moved with speed and discretion down the defile, surprised and relieved to find that there were no guards and no checkpoints. Once on the greensward by the river, they let their steeds out and thundered across the water-meadows to bear Daud’s invitation to Aaron. The escort reined in and waited some five hundred yards from the perimeter, while the old man, with his spiky whiskers blowing, raced on up to the kibbutz. He was in luck, for Aaron happened to be there, and he was able to deliver his invitation couched in the correct terms — neatly turned phrases full of archaic flourishes. Aaron thanked him but hesitated. He looked serious, undecided, doubtful. He stared at the ground. “Well?” said Abu Taib with a hint of disappointment in his glance. “Will you come?” At last Aaron sighed and said he would.

  It took a little time to saddle up a horse and accompany the old man back to the defile, a journey which they accomplished in silence. The jingle of harness must have alerted Daud, for he appeared in the doorway of his tent with his dark eyes wide with expectation and delight. The two men stood for a long moment looking at each other, then each cried the other’s name as they rushed into an embrace. It was almost like man and wife meeting, so tender was Daud’s embrace, so genuine the emotion of Aaron. Arms round each other, they turned back into the tent to complete the civil formalities of their meeting by an exchange of coffee, fruit and bread dipped in salt. Daud was like a child, beside himself with delight. “Oh Aaron, I knew you would come. I knew it. I knew it.” He stroked his friend’s arm, pinched his cheek. “So we could speak of everything and settle everything without anger. Before God, how could I have anger for you, my friend? Oh Aaron, you understand, don’t you?” And, before Aaron could reply, he placed a sugar-dusted loucoum between his lips. “The nations are speaking of us Arabs,” went on Daud incoherently. “They will grant us back... Aaron, the valley I must have once more. Come.” Impulsively he led his friend across the dunes towards the steep cliffs which overlooked Ras Shamir. “I am to be invincible in war and games of skill. Oh Aaron, is it not marvellous, my friend? But we will arrange everything in peace and amity. Your people shall go in peace, with presents, and not a hair of the head harmed. I promise you. Do you see, my dear friend?”

  It was difficult to know how to reply to this torrent of disconnected phrases, and while Aaron was still hunting for words, Daud clapped his hands and signalled to his servants.

  “Now a surprise for you, which will make you smile, give you pleasure. We will play the old game we have not played since childhood. Then you always won, but today, my dear friend... He squeezed Aaron’s arm affectionately. As if from nowhere
two big box-kites had materialized, carried onto the scene by grinning Arabs; they were beautifully made, slender and vivid, with long tasselled tails. One was blue and one was black. Aaron smiled as he saw them. “Still the same old Daud!” he said.

  “Still the same old Daud,” echoed the prince with a giggle, obviously delighted at his own ingenuity. “You have forgotten, Aaron?”

  “No,” said Aaron, grinning at his friend. “Of course not!” “Shall we play?”

  Their horses had been led to them, and mounting now they galloped across the dunes, trailing the kites behind them until these rose gracefully into the air; then, reining and turning about, they began to play them. The mild currents of air drew the kites over the cliffs and they let them out to their full extent now, to swim and tremble in the sky over the silent valley. They were all but knee to knee as they played. Daud chuckled with excitement and pleasure. He began to talk profusely, never taking his eyes off his kite. Aaron’s black kite was some way behind. Daud said: “Aaron, when the valley is ours again we shall often play, eh? But this year I shall win every time. Next year perhaps you will, old friend. Did you see the wonderful cars they have sent me?”

  Aaron sighed and nodded. “Yes,” he said. “Four.”

  “No, six, six!” cried Daud. “They are so...

  Aaron cut him short impatiently, “Daud,” he said, “this can never be, for the valley is ours now and forever will be, for we have worked it with our hands. We bought it lawfully — remember?” Daud pouted and looked at him cajolingly. “Come, friend, be reasonable. You will spoil everything,” he said. Aaron said: “I am speaking the truth.” Daud said: “But if our King says I must take it, you will have to give it, do you see?”