The Talbot Mundy Megapack. Talbot Mundy

of you; but I shall insist on your going. Then either the Lion or Jael will probably give you another letter with secret orders to Ibrahim ben Ah to capture Yussuf, kill him or bribe him, and take his letter from him.

      “They’ll very likely bribe you; in that case accept the bribe, but don’t do what they say. Tear their letter up, or burn it in the desert. I think Yussuf will get through; at any rate, I’ve given him his chance.”

      “And if not?” I interrupted.

      “Then, as Ali Baba remarked, the crows will eat him.”

      “That’s Yussuf’s end of it,” said I. “But how about us? There’ll be nothing then to keep the Lion and Jael from turning on us. They’ll have that precious letter to the bank back, and—”

      “Not they,” Grim answered, smiling. “That letter to the bank is still in my pocket. If by some accident they happen to capture Yussuf all they’ll find out is that I didn’t give it to him after all. If they don’t capture him—as I hope they won’t—they’ll still think he had it.

      “They’re likely not to turn on us until they’ve got that piece of paper back, but they’d surely try to murder me if they believed it was on my person. I’d sooner they had it in for Yussuf. And at that, we’ve given Yussuf a better chance for his life than he’d have had if we left him here with Ali Higg.”

      He said all that in English to me in a low voice, and Ali Baba, leaning past me to listen, picked only a word out here and there. I had to translate it for him; and when I had finished he sat meditating for a minute or two with an expression on his wrinkled old face like that of a man watching a motion picture—as if somewhere in the distance he were visualizing all the details on a screen.

      “Wallahi! That is good,” he said at last. “I am an old man. I lack sleep; and my bones are weary. But a man can play such a part proudly. There is cunning in it. Allah! What a thief was lost when Jimgrim took to soldiering!

      “I will carry word for him to Ibrahim ben Ah if it is my last ride, and if they crucify me at the other end! But I am an old fox and, inshallah, no fool follower of Ali Higg shall suspect me of a trick.”

      He was so enamored of the plan that he had to get his sons and grandsons in a circle on the ledge and explain it all to them, pointing out the pros and cons of it, and delivering a final lecture on the general art of practicing deception.

      “None of us would ever have been in jail if we had known as much as Jimgrim,” I heard him say. “Observe: Jimgrim has their order on the bank for fifty thousand pounds. Let us suppose that Ali Higg and his wife Jael are the police. They know he has it. Does he bury it? Does he run away? He is no such fool. He lets them see him give it to another; he provides as far as possible that the other shall get safely away; and all the while he keeps the order in his pocket!

      “Remains nothing but to provide a messenger for the police, who will surely not deliver their message; and he thinks of that too! Learn, ye dullards! Learn from Jimgrim, and there shall be no such thieves as ye in Asia!”

      * * * *

      It All worked out exactly as Grim had foreseen. He wrote out a letter in Arabic to Ibrahim ben Ah in the oasis, ordering him to take those hundred and forty men of Ali Higg’s to a point nearly due south, about half-way between Petra and Abu Lissan. Then he interrupted Ali Higg and Jael in the cave where they were whispering together, and requested the Lion to sign it. The Lion took his time, reading the letter two or three times over, and Jael offered to go down to the camp below and find a man who would carry it.

      “I will send one of my men,” answered Grim, and it seemed she had already learned better than to argue with him.

      So while the Lion gained time by studying the letter and asking Grim a lot of random questions Jael went out and, taking care to turn her back to me, asked in a low voice who was the man who would carry a letter for Jimgrim.

      Ali Baba stood up at once. She walked past him and signed to him to follow her just out of sight around the corner of the cliff. Whatever took place there must have agreed with Ali Baba’s appetite, for he came back with his old eyes gleaming. He watched her return into the cave and then turned to his sons.

      “I drove a good hard bargain with the daughter of corruption!” he remarked, and they all nodded.

      I never found out how much she gave him, but dare wager that he extracted every sou the traffic would stand.

      A minute after that Grim came out with the order for the “army” and sent the old man packing; after which Narayan Singh had a word to say. Grim always listens alertly when Narayan Singh speaks; for that long-headed Sikh would be fit to command an army if it weren’t for one little peculiarity. About once in six months he is as likely as not to parade without his pants, and until the fumes of whisky die away the things he will say to his beloved colonel wouldn’t get past any censor. He doesn’t get punished much because he’s such a splendid soldier; but they can’t very well promote him.

      “As I understand it, sahib, the purpose is to clip this Ali Higg’s claws and yet save him from being wiped out by his enemies.”

      Grim nodded.

      “He has two little armies. One, of a hundred and forty men under Ibrahim ben Ah, is to work with us?”

      Grim nodded again.

      “The other, of four and forty men, is up somewhere in the hills hereabouts?”

      “Somewhere near the Beni Aroun village. They’ve been raiding it.”

      “And all the men that are left to Ali Higg are old ones and weaklings—sick, wounded and what not?”

      “True. What of it?”

      “This Ali Higg is a devil, Jimgrim sahib. He has a bad name. The enemies of such as he will be swift to take advantage. If you wish to see the last of him, good; leave him here with his handful.

      “I have nine piasters in my pocket; that would be a too high price to pay for a lease on the Lion’s life in that event. If you wish him to continue to hold Petra, better let him call in the other four-and-forty.”

      Grim laughed curtly.

      “We’ll not only let him have those men, Narayan Singh, but we’ll provide him a good reason, too, for keeping them in Petra and not clapping them on our trail to pounce on us while we sleep.”

      “Shall we sleep here?”

      “Not if I know it!” answered Grim.

      Having nothing better to do, and rather liking to exercise my wits with puzzles, I watched the eagles and tried to figure out what Grim might do to keep the Lion of Petra and his four-and-forty occupied. I thought of a hundred and one obviously futile stunts, but not one that would have fooled me if I had been Ali Higg. I asked Narayan Singh what he would do in the circumstances.

      “That will be a simple matter, sahib,” he answered.

      So I bawled him out suitably, not seeing why a Sikh should put on airs with me.

      “Any ignorant fool can say a thing looks simple,” said I. “You know no more than I do what the answer is.”

      “Seeing it is I most likely who must do the bandobast, that may be true,” he answered patiently, “for many an ignorant man has served a purpose in his day. I will see now if our Jimgrim thinks as I do.”

      And instead of telling me his plan he went and talked with Grim in undertones. Grim nodded.

      Meanwhile Ayisha had returned and was sitting quietly by, with her back to the wall of the cliff and an expression of masked alertness. They talk a lot about the fatalism of the East, and especially of its women, but in the sense in which the word is usually understood I have not seen much of it. I suppose you might call a cat watching a mouse-hole a fatalist.

      Ayisha was watching points, and as alert for opportunity as ever was the brightest Broadway chorus lady. Given the right garments and a little training,