Jimgrim Series. Talbot Mundy

Christian, become Jimgrim’s Jack-of-all-jobs was outside the pale of inflictions that pride could tolerate.

      “I am awake!” he retorted, rubbing his eyes to prove it.

      “Come here, then. D’you know where to find your mother?”

      “At the place where I went yesterday.”

      “Take her some of Mrs. Davey’s candy. Don’t eat it on the way, mind. Get inside the place if you can. If she won’t let you in try how much you can see through the door. Ask no questions. If she asks what you’ve been doing, tell her the truth: say that you cleaned my boots and washed Julius Cæsar. Then come back here and tell me all you’ve seen.”

      “Sending him to spy on his own mother, Jim?” asked Mrs. Davey as Suliman left the room with candy in both fists. She paused from stitching at the cotton bags to look straight at Grim.

      “His mother is old Scharnhoff’s housekeeper,” Grim answered. “Scharnhoff wouldn’t stand for the boy, and drove him out. The mother liked Scharnhoff’s flesh-pots better than the prospects of the streets, so she stayed on, swiping stuff from Scharnhoff’s larder now and then to slip to the kid through the back door. But he was starving when I found him.”

      Mrs. Davey laid her sewing down.

      “D’you mean to tell me that that old butter-wouldn’t-melt-in-his-mouth professor is that child’s father?”

      “No. The father was a Turkish soldier—went away with the Turkish retreat. If he’s alive he’s probably with Mustapha Kemal in Anatolia. Old Scharnhoff used to keep a regular harem under the Turks. He got rid of them to save his face when our crowd took Jerusalem. He puts up with one now. But he has the thorough-going Turk’s idea of married life.”

      “And to think I had him here to tea—twice—no, three times! I liked him, too! Found him interesting.”

      “He is,” said Grim.

      “Very!” agreed Goodenough.

      “If it weren’t for that harem habit of his,” said Grim, “some acquaintances of his would have blown up the Dome of the Rock about this time tomorrow. As it is, they won’t get away with it. Suliman came and told me one day that his mother was carrying food to Scharnhoff, taking it to a little house in a street that runs below the Haram-es-Sheriff. I looked into that. Then came news that two tons of TNT was missing, on top of a request from Scharnhoff for permission to go about at night unquestioned. After that it was only a question of putting two and two together—”

      “Plus Narayan Singh,” said Goodenough. “I still don’t see, Grim, how you arrived at the conclusion that Scharnhoff is not guilty of the main intention. What’s to prove that he isn’t in the pay of Mustapha Kemal?”

      “I’ll explain. All Scharnhoff cares about is some manuscripts he thinks he’ll find. He thinks he knows where they are. The Chronicles of the Kings of Israel. I expect he tried pretty hard to get the Turks to let him excavate for them. But the Turks knew better than to offend religious prejudices. And perhaps Scharnhoff couldn’t afford to bribe heavily enough; his harem very likely kept him rather short of money. Then we come along, and stop all excavation—cancel all permits—refuse to grant new ones.

      “Scharnhoff’s problem is to dig without calling attention to what he’s doing. As a technical enemy alien he can’t acquire property, or even rent property without permission. But with the aid of Suliman’s mother he made the acquaintance of our friend Noureddin Ali, who has a friend, who in turn has a brother, who owns a little house in that street below the Haram-es-Sheriff.”

      “Strange coincidence!” said Goodenough. “It’ll need a better argument than that to save Scharnhoff’s neck.”

      “Pardon me, sir. No coincidence at all. Remember, Scharnhoff has lived in Jerusalem for fifteen years. He seems to have satisfied himself that the Tomb of the Kings is directly under the Dome of the Rock. How is he to get to it? The Dome of the Rock stands in the middle of that great courtyard, with the buildings of the Haram-es-Sheriff surrounding it on every side, and hardly a stone in the foundations weighing less than ten tons.

      “He reasons it out that there must be a tunnel somewhere, leading to the tomb, if it really is under the Dome of the Rock. I have found out that he went to work, while the Turks were still here, to find the mouth of the tunnel. Remember, he’s an archaeologist. There’s very little he doesn’t know about Jerusalem. He knows who the owner is of every bit of property surrounding the Haram-es-Sheriff; he’s made it his business to find out. So when he finally decided that this little stone house stands over the mouth of the tunnel, all that remained to do was to get access to it. He couldn’t do that himself, because of the regulations. He had to approach the Arab owner secretly and indirectly. That’s where Suliman’s mother came in handy.

      “She contrived the introduction to Noureddin Ali. Innocent old Scharnhoff, who is an honest thief—he wouldn’t steal money— sacrilege is Scharnhoff’s passion—was an easy mark for Noureddin Ali. Noureddin Ali is a red-minded devil, so smart at seeing possibilities that he is blind to probabilities. He is paid by the French to make trouble, and he’s the world’s long-distance double-crosser. I don’t believe the French have any hand in this job. Scharnhoff needed explosives. Noureddin Ali saw at once that if that tunnel can be found and opened up there could be an atrocity perpetrated that would produce anarchy all through the East.”

      “As bad as all that?” asked Mrs. Davey.

      “That’s no exaggeration,” Goodenough answered. “I’ve lived twenty-five years in India, commanding Sikh and Moslem troops. The Sikhs are not interested in the Moslem religion in any way, but they’d make common cause with Moslems if that place were blown up and the blame could be attached to Jews. It’s the second most sacred place in Asia. Even the Hindus would be stirred to their depths by it; they’d feel that their own sacred places were insecure, and that whoever destroyed them would be protected afterwards by us.”

      “Gosh! Who’d be an Englishman!” laughed Davey.

      “I don’t see that it’s proved yet that the idea of an explosion wasn’t Sharnhoff’s in the first place,” Goodenough objected.

      “For one thing, he wouldn’t want to destroy antiquities,” said Grim. “They’re his obsession. He worships ancient history and all its monuments. No, Noureddin Ali thought of the explosion. He knew that Scharnhoff needed money, so he gave him French money, knowing that would put old Scharnhoff completely in his power. Then he tipped off some one down at Ludd to watch for a chance to steal some TNT. He had better luck than he expected. He got two tons of it. He didn’t have all the luck, though. His plan, I believe, was to time the fireworks simultaneously with a French-instigated raid from El-Kerak. But the raid didn’t come off.”

      “Scharnhoff will hang!” said Goodenough.

      “I think not, sir. He’ll prove as meek as an old sheep when we land on him.”

      “There, will the bags do?” asked Mrs. Davey.

      “What are they for?” Goodenough asked.

      “We’re supposed to have a slush fund in this room of a hundred thousand dollars,” Davey answered dourly. “My Oil Company is supposed to be buying up Mustapha Kemal! I see my finish, if news of this ever reaches the States—or unless my version of it gets there first!”

      Grim turned to me.

      “We’ve got to find two people to take your place and mine in the car tomorrow morning. Perhaps you’d better go in any case; you’ll enjoy the ride as far as Haifa—stay there a day or two, and come back when you feel like it. We’ll find some officer to masquerade as me.”

      But there I rebelled—flat, downright mutiny.

      “If I haven’t made good so far,” I said, “I’ll consider myself fired, and hold my tongue. Otherwise, I see this thing through! Send some one else on the joy-ride.”

      “Good for you!” said Davey.