"Well, then, suppose we speak of Ali Higg to begin with. Is his temper uneven? Is there any way to catch him in a specially good humor?"
"He's the most even-tempered man I know," she laughed. "He's always in a rage."
"So much the easier for us," Grim answered. "That kind always make mistakes. He must have counted on your brains exclusively to keep him on top; and now your brains are in my pocket, so to speak. How's his health? Boils? Indigestion?"
She nodded.
"Ah! Most angry men have indigestion. Dislikes European doctors, I dare say? Thought so; most fanatical Moslems do that. But an Indian hakim? Now, many an Indian hakim knows how to relieve indigestion—in between the bouts of rage. D'you suppose he'd entertain a hakim?"
She nodded again.
"Well, we'll fix it so a hakim can relieve his boils and indigestion. But let you and me understand each other first, Jael. I can be a mean man when I must, but I'll always take a heap of trouble to find a white man's way of accomplishing the same purpose. I can act mean toward you—sheer plug-ugly if you force my hand—but I'd sooner not; and I'd just as lief help you as hinder you, provided you don't upset what I'm seeking to build."
She laughed again, and not so bitterly.
"You're on the wrong side of the wall to build much," she answered. "You should come over into our camp. You're so like Ali Higg in certain lights and in some of your gestures, and so unlike him in other things, that if you came across the Jordan for good I think you could show us something."
Her eyes said far more than her lips did. She was studying him from a new angle—a thoughtful, speculative angle that vaguely excited her.