Jimgrim and Allah's Peace

by Talbot Mundy

Chapter Twelve

"You know you'll get scuppered if you're found out!"

Two days passed again without my seeing Grim, although I called on him repeatedly at the "Junior Staff Officers' Mess" below the Zionist Hospital. Suliman, the eight-year-old imp of Arab mischief, who did duty as page-boy met me on each occasion at the door and took grinning delight in disappointing me.

He was about three and a half feet high—coal-black, with a tarboosh worn at an angle on his kinky hair and a flashing white grin across his snub-nosed face that would have made an archangel count the change out of two piastres twice. Suliman and cool cheek were as obvious team-mates as the Gemini, and I was one of a good number, that included every single member of that unofficial mess, who could never quite see what Grim found so admirable in him. Grim never explained.

Taking the cue from his master, neither did Suliman ever explain anything to any one but Grim, who seemed to understand him perfectly.

"Jimgrim not here. No, not coming back. Much business.
Good-bye!"

Somehow you couldn't suspect that kid of telling the truth. However, there was nothing for it but to go away, with a conviction in the small of your back that he was grinning mischievously after you.

Grim had found him one day starving and lousy in the archway of the Jaffa Gate, warming his fingers at a guttering candle-end preparatory to making a meal off the wax. He took him home and made Martha, the old Russian maid-of-all-work, clean him with kerosene and soft soap—gave him a big packing-case to sleep in along with Julius Caesar the near-bull-dog mascot—and thereafter broke him in and taught him things seldom included in a school curriculum.

In the result, Suliman adored Grim with all the concentrated zeal of hero-worship of which almost any small boy is capable; but under the shadow of Grim's protection he feared not even "brass- hats" nor regarded civilians, although he was dreadfully afraid of devils. The devil-fear was a relic of his negroid ancestry. Some Arab Sheikh probably captured his great-grandmother on a slave-raid. Superstition lingers in dark veins longer than any other human failing.

I think I called five times before he confessed at last reluctantly that Grim was in. That was in the morning after breakfast, and I was shown into the room with the fireplace and the deep armchairs. Grim was reading but seemed to me more than usually reserved, as if the book had been no more than a screen to think behind, that left him in a manner unprotected when he laid it down. I talked at random, and he hardly seemed to be listening.

"Say," he said, suddenly interrupting me, "you came out of that El-Kerak affair pretty creditably. Suppose I let you see something else from the inside. Will you promise not to shout it all over Jerusalem?"

"Use your own judgment," I answered.

"You mustn't ask questions."

"All right."

"If any one in the Administration pounces on you in the course of it, you'll have to drop out and know nothing."

"Agreed."

"It may prove a bit more risky than the El-Kerak business."

"Couldn't be," I answered.

"You can't talk enough Arabic to get away with. But could you act deaf and dumb?"

"Sure—in three languages."

"You understand—I've no authority to let you in on this. I might catch hell if I were found out doing it. But I need help, of a certain sort. I want a man who isn't likely to be spotted by the gang I'm after. Get behind that screen—quick!"

It was a screen that hid a door leading to the pantry and the servants' quarters. There was a Windsor chair behind it, and it is much easier to keep absolutely still when you are fairly comfortable. I had hardly sat down when a man wearing spurs, who trod heavily, entered the room and I heard Grim get up to greet him.

"Are we alone?" a voice asked gruffly.

Instead of answering Grim came and looked behind the screen, opened the door leading to the pantry, closed it again, locked it, and without as much as a glance at me returned to face his visitor.

"Well, general, what is it?"

"This is strictly secret."

"I'll bet it isn't," said Grim. "If it's about missing explosives I know more than you do."

"My God! It's out? Two tons of TNT intended for the air force gone without a trace? The story's out?"

"I know it. Catesby sent me word by messenger last night from
Ludd, after you put him under arrest."

"Damn the man! Well, that's what's happened. Catesby's fault. They'll blame me. The truck containing the stuff was run into a siding three days ago. Through young Catesby's negligence it was left there without a guard. Catesby will be broke for that as sure as my name is Jenkins. But, by the knell of hell's bells, Grim, more than Catesby will lose their jobs unless we find the stuff! Two tons. Half enough to blow up Palestine!"

"Too bad about Catesby," said Grim.

"Never mind, Catesby. Damn him! Consider my predicament! How can I go to the Administrator with a lame-duck story about missing TNT and nothing done about it?"

"Nothing done? You've passed the buck, haven't you? Catesby is under arrest, you say."

"What do you mean?"

"I know Catesby," Grim retorted quietly. "He made that fine stand at Beersheba—when the Arabs rushed the camp, and you weren't looking. He took the blame for your carelessness, and never squealed. You took the credit for his presence of mind, and have treated him like a dog ever since. You expect me to try to save your bacon and forget Catesby's?"

"Nonsense, Grim! You're talking without your book. Here's what happened: the stuff arrived at Ludd in a truck attached to the end of a mixed train. The R.T.O.* sent me a memorandum and stalled the truck on a siding. I gave the memorandum to Catesby." [*Railway Traffic Officer.]

"He tells me in the note I received last night that you did nothing of the kind."

"Then he's a liar. He forgot all about it and did nothing. When the Air Force sent to get the stuff the truck was empty."

"And you want me to find it, I suppose?"

"Yes. The quicker the better!"

"And be a party to breaking Catesby? I like my job, but not that much!"

"You refuse then to hunt for the TNT?"

"I take my orders straight from the Administrator. He expects me in half an hour. You want me to smooth the way for you with Sir Louis. I'm much more interested in Catesby, who would face a firing party sooner than soak another fellow for his own fault. Catesby assures me in writing that the first he ever heard of that TNT was when you ordered him arrested after discovery of the loss. His word goes, as far as I'm concerned. If you want me to help you, find another goat than Catesby. That's my answer."

There followed quite a long pause. Perhaps Brigadier-General Jenkins was wondering what chance he would stand in a show-down. Whoever had heard the mess and canteen gossip knew that Jenkins' career had been one long string of miracles by which he had attained promotion without in any way deserving it, and a parallel series of even greater ones by which he had saved himself from ruin by contriving to blame some one else.

"You want me to white-wash Catesby?" he said at last. "If you pounce quickly on the TNT, no one need know it was lost."

"If you court-martial Catesby, the public shall know who lost it, and who didn't, even if it costs me my commission!"

"Blast you! Insubordination!"

"Is your car outside?" Grim answered. "Why don't you drive me up to the Administrator and charge me with it?"

"Don't be an idiot! I came to you to avoid a scandal. If this news gets out there'll be a panic. Things are touchy enough as it is."

"Yes."

"Well—if I drop the charge against Catesby—?"

"Then I shall not have to fight for him."

"I'll see what I can do."

"Be definite!"

"Damn and blast you! All right, I'll clear Catesby."

In that ominous minute, like the devil in an old-time drama,
Suliman knocked at the door leading from the outer hall. Grim
opened it, and I heard the boy's voice piping up in Arabic. The
Administrator was in his car outside, waiting to know whether
Major Grim was indoors.

"Where's your car?" I heard Grim ask.

"I sent the man to get a tire changed," Jenkins answered.

"Then Sir Louis needn't know you're here. Do you want to see him?"

"Of course not."

"You can get behind that screen if you like."

I thought Jenkins would explode when he found me sitting there. He was a big, florid-faced man with a black moustache waxed into points, and a neck the color of rare roast beef—a man not given to self-restraint in any shape or form. But he had to make a quick decision. Sir Louis' footsteps were approaching. He glared at me, made a sign to me to sit still, twisted his moustache savagely, and listened, breathing through his mouth to avoid the tell-tale whistle of his hairy nostrils. I heard Grim start toward the hall, but Sir Louis turned him back and came straight in.

"It occurred to me I'd save you the time of coming up to see me this morning, Grim, and look in on you instead before I start my rounds. Any new developments?"

"Not yet, sir. I'll need forty-eight hours. If we move too fast they may touch the stuff off before we get the whole gang in the net."

"You're sure you'd rather not have the police?"

"Quite. They mean well, but they're clumsy."

"Um-m-m! All the same, the thing's ticklish. There are rumours about all ready. The Grand Mufti* came to me before breakfast with a wild tale. I've promised him some Sikhs for special sentry duty. He'd hardly gone before some Zionists came with a story that the Arabs are planning to blow up their hospital; I gave them ten men and an officer." [*The religious head of the Moslem community.]

"Is the city quiet?" Grim asked him.

"Fair to middling. The Jews refused to take their shutters down this morning. I had to issue an order about it. I hear now that they're doing business about as usual, but I've ordered the number of men on duty within the city walls to be doubled. At the first sign of disturbance I shall have the gates closed. Are you quite sure you're in touch?"

"Quite. sure, sir. I'm positive of what I told you last night.
Will you be seeing Colonel Goodenough?"

"Yes, in ten minutes."

"Please ask him to hold his Sikhs at my disposal for the next two days. You might add, sir, that if he cares to see sport he could do worse than lend his own services."

"I'll do that. You can count on Goodenough. That's a soldier devoid of nonsense. Anything else?"

"That's all."

"Keep me informed. Remember, Grim, I'm responsible for all you do. I've endorsed you in blank, as it were. Don't overlook that point."

"I won't, sir."

Sir Louis walked out. Almost before his spurs ceased jingling in the tiled hall, Brigadier-General Jenkins strode out in a towering rage from behind the screen.

"'Pon my soul, a spy's trick!" he exploded. "Had an eavesdropper, did you? Listening from behind a screen while you tricked me into a promise on Catesby's account!"

"Sure," Grim answered, folding the screen back, and letting his face wrinkle in smiles all the way up to the roots of his hair. Very comical he looked, for his eyebrows were only partly sprouted again. "Had two of you to listen in on the Administrator!"

"Endorses you in blank, eh? How long would he let the endorsement stand if he knew I was behind that screen while he was talking to you?"

"Try him!" Grim suggested. "Shall I call him back? He doesn't want to break you—told me so, in fact, last night—but he could change his mind, I daresay. My tip to you is to get back to Ludd as fast as your car can take you, release Catesby, and say as little as possible to any one!"

"Damn you for a Yankee!" Jenkins answered. "You've got me cornered for the moment, and you make the most of it. But wait till my turn comes! As for you, sir," Jenkins turned and looked me up and down with all the arrogance that nice new crossed swords on his shoulder can give a certain sort of man, "don't let me catch you trying to interfere in any Administration business, that's all!"

I offered him a cigarette, grinning. There was no sense in picking a quarrel. No man likes to discover that a perfect stranger has overheard his intimate confessions. His annoyance was understandable. But he hadn't nice manners. He knocked the cigarette case out of my hand and kicked it across the room. So I got into one of the deep armchairs and laughed at him in self- defense, to preserve my own temper from boiling up over the top.

"To hell with both of you!" Jenkins thundered, and strode out like Mars on the war-path.

"Poor old Jinks!" said Grim, as soon as he had gone. "As Sir Louis said last night, he has a wife and family besides the unofficial ladies on his string. All they'll have to divide between them soon, at the rate he's going, will be his half-pay. He has fought for promotion all his days, to keep abreast of expenses. What that string of cormorants will do with his four hundred pounds a year, when he oversteps at last and gets retired, beggars imagination! However, let's get busy."

Business consisted in dressing me up as an Arab with the aid of Suliman, and drilling me painstakingly for half-an-hour, both of them using every trick they knew to make me laugh or show surprise, and Grim nodding approval each time I contrived not to. More difficult than acting deaf and dumb was the trick of squatting with my legs crossed, but I had learned it after a fashion in India years ago, and only needed schooling.

"You'll get scuppered if you're caught," he warned me. "If Suliman wasn't so scared of devils I wouldn't risk it, but I must have somebody to keep an eye on him when the time comes; that'll be tomorrow, I think."

"Suppose you tell me the object of the game," I suggested. "I'm sick of only studying the rules."

"Well—your part will be to sit over those two tons of TNT and see that nobody explodes them ahead of time. There's a conspiracy on foot to blow up the Dome of the Rock."

"You mean the Mosque of Omar?"

"The place tourists call the Mosque of Omar. The site of
Solomon's Temple—the Rock of Abraham—the threshing-floor of
Araunah the Jebusite. Next after the shrine at Mecca it's the
most sacred spot in the whole Mahommedan world."

"Good lord!" I said. "Are the Zionists so reckless?".

"No, the Arabs are. Remember what old Scharnhoff said the other day about the new fanaticism?"

"Is Scharnhoff mixed up in it?"

"He's being watched. If the Arabs pull it off, they'll accuse the Jews of doing it, and set to work to butcher every Jew in the Near East. That will oblige the British to protect the Jews. That in turn will set every Mohammedan in the world—'specially Indians, but Egyptians, too—against the British. Jihad—green banner—holy war—all the East and Northern Africa alight while the French snaffle Syria. Sound good to you?"

"Sir Louis knows this?"

"He, is paid to know things."

"And he lets you play cat and mouse with it?"

"Got to be careful. Suppose we draw the net too soon, what then? Most of the conspirators escape. The story leaks out. The Jews get the blame for the attempt, and sooner or later the massacre begins anyhow. What we've got to do is bag every last mother's son of them, and suppress the whole story—return the TNT to store, and swear it was never missing."

"The Administrator has his nerve," I said.

"You'll need yours, too, before this game's played," Grim answered. "D'you see now why I picked on you for an accomplice?"

"I do not."

"You're the one man in Jerusalem whom nobody will suspect, or be on the look-out for. The men we're up against are the shrewdest rats in Palestine. They've got a list of British officers, my name included, of course. They'll know which men are assigned to special duty, and they'll keep every one of us shadowed."

"Won't that—I mean, how can you work if you're shadowed?"

"Me? I shall catch my spur in the carpet, fall downstairs and break a leg at ten-fifteen. At ten-thirty the doctor comes, and finds me too badly hurt to be moved. He sends word of it to Sir Louis by an orderly who can be trusted to talk to any one he meets on the way. I leave by the back way at ten forty-five. However, here's a chance for you to practise deaf-and-dumb drill. There's some one coming. Squat down in that corner. Look meek and miserable. That's the stuff. Answer the door, Suliman."