The Talbot Mundy Megapack. Talbot Mundy

Think We’ve Got the Lion of Petra on the Hip!”

      Grim is one of those fellows who tell you their principles as grudgingly as they let out facts. He would make the poorest sort of propagandist or politician, for he doesn’t advertise, and hates long arguments. What he knows he knows is so because it works; and he proceeds to put it to work.

      Nor is he much of a teacher. He takes people as he finds them and adapts his plans accordingly. So it is only from observation extended over a considerable period in all sorts of circumstances that I can say I believe his first and underlying principle is to look for the positive, concrete usefulness in any one with whom he is associated, whether friend or enemy. And this I have heard him say several times.

      “In secret service you limit yourself if you make plans. The game is to listen and watch. Presently the other fellow always tells his plans or else betrays them.”

      And he is no such fool as to be caught in the act of listening, or to forewarn his enemy by seeming to wish to listen.

      He gave the order to march at once. Some of the men doubled up uncomfortably on the riding-camels, because of the three that had been killed, and the Bishareen fell to me.

      I ranged alongside Jael Higg, with Narayan Singh on the other side of her. At that we were off, Grim leading, well in advance, with Ali Baba and six men in attendance.

      The moon was a bit behind us by that time, so that I did not have much chance to observe Jael Higg narrowly until she turned her face to speak to me. But she was not long about doing that—say fifteen minutes—nine hundred seconds; suppressed curiosity can work up a pretty high pressure in that time.

      “Who is this man who looks like Ali Higg?” she asked me suddenly, and I had a good look at her face; you don’t have to answer questions without thinking, just because they are asked by a woman in a friendly tone of voice.

      Her nose was Roman and very narrow, and her dark eyes looked straight at you without their pupils converging, which produced a sensation of being seen through. She had splendid teeth; and her mouth, which was humorous, turning upward at the corners when she smiled, had nevertheless a certain suggestion of stealthy strength—perhaps cruelty. Her chin was firm and practical. So were her freckled hands. I decided that the less I said the better.

      “He is a sheikh,” said I pretty abruptly.

      She turned that empty information over in her mind for a minute, and decided to turn her guns on me. Conversation was not easy, for we were swinging along at a great pace, and my camel was a lot smaller than hers.

      “And you are an Indian? How is it that you speak English?”

      “Many of us speak it. We pass our college examinations in English.”

      “How do you come to be with that—that sheikh?” she asked next.

      “It pleases me to follow him. Inshallah, I may help him in case of sickness.”

      “You are a hakim?”

      I admitted that, although secretly pitying any poor devil who might pin faith to the claim.

      “Ali Higg—the real one, who is known as the Lion of Petra—believes in Indian hakims, like all these Arabs who have no use for European doctors. And this big man on my left, who is he?”

      “My servant.”

      “An Afghan?”

      “A Pathan.”

      She turned that over in her mind, too, for several minutes.

      “And how does Ayisha come to be with you?” she asked at last.

      At that Narayan Singh broke silence, and although he denied it afterward I know that his only motive was to get a little preliminary vengeance on Ayisha for the names she had called him. He maintains that he was “casting a stone, as it were, into a pond to see which way the ripples went.”

      “Few women will refuse to follow a Pathan when honored by his admiration,” he boomed.

      I could not see her face then, because she was staring at Narayan Singh.

      “Do you realize whose wife you are tampering with?” she asked him.

      “Hah! Where I come from a man must guard his women if he hopes to keep them.”

      “Where you are going to, such a man as you will find his own life hard enough to keep,” she retorted.

      “Bismillah! I have kept it thus far,” said Narayan Singh.

      She turned to me again.

      “What does the sheikh of yours call himself?”

      “Hajji Jimgrim bin Yazid of El-Abdeh.”

      “Jimgrim. Jimgrim. Where have I heard that name?”

      “The stars have heard it,” roared Narayan Singh loud enough for the stars to hear him boast. “He has taken the Lion of Petra’s shape. He has taken his name. He has taken his wife. And now he will take his den. Akbar, Jimgrim Ali Higg of Petra!”

      Mahommed the poet was riding two or three behind us in the line, and heard that. He took the cue and began his song. In a minute the whole line was roaring the refrain, and it broke like volleys on the night:

      “Akbar! Akbar! Jimgrirn Ali Higg!”

      Jael Higg laughed. “He has a fool’s luck and a lusty band of followers,” she said. “It was only because Ayisha called out that he caught me. But a fool’s luck is like a breath of wind that passes—”

      Suddenly she sat bolt upright and raised her right hand.

      “Oh, this night! This madness! Of all the dreams, of all the hallucinations, this is the wildest! I warned Ali Higg! I told him my foreboding, and he laughed!”

      She looked down at me again, and studied me for half a minute.

      “Tell me,” she went on, “is that Sheikh Jimgrim of yours mad, or am I mad?”

      “If you ask my opinion, as a hakim,” I answered, “you were mad to sit your camel alone, with only two men, within reach of our Jimgrim.”

      “What does he think he will do with me at Petra?”

      “He thinks silently,” said I.

      Whereat she too was silent for a few minutes, and then broke out into a new tirade of exclamations, but this time in a language of which I knew not one word—perhaps Russian, or Slovak, or Bulgarian. I think she was praying in a sort of wild way to long-neglected saints.

      She gave me the impression of being mentally almost unhinged by the sudden anticlimax of helplessness after over-confidence. Yet when she spoke again her voice was calm, and not without a ring of rather gallant humor.

      “I suppose he thinks he has stolen the queen bee, and so has the swarm in his power. But the swarm can sting, and will come for the queen bee.”

      “So they bring their honey with them, who minds that?” Narayan Singh retorted.

      He was enjoying himself, acting the part of a bandit’s follower with perfect gusto.

      “Oh, so it is honey you are after? And you two are Indians—a Pathan and—”

      “From Lahore,” said I.

      “Five thousand pounds would buy your services?”

      “Five thousand promises would make us laugh,” said the Sikh.

      “How much will your sheikh ever pay you? In an hour I will show you a wady down which we three can escape. Agree to that and you shall have five thousand each the same hour that we reach Petra.”

      “Wallahi! Doubtless!” laughed Narayan Singh. “Five thousand bastinados each from Ali Higg, while the queen bee laughs at us for fools! Nay, lady Jael, you are Jimgrim’s prisoner.”

      “Jimgrim!”