The Talbot Mundy Megapack. Talbot Mundy

in the least suspecting it I had gone straight into a blind trap, into which, it was true, I could not be followed by Noureddin Ali’s spy, but out of which there was no escape without being recognized. The moment I stepped into the deep shadow I heard an unmistakable massed movement behind me. Sure that I could not be seen, I faced about. A platoon of Sikhs had appeared from somewhere, and were standing at ease already, across the end of the street I had entered, with the moonlight silvering their bayonets.

      Well, most streets have two ends. So I walked forward, not taking much trouble about concealment, since it was not easy to walk silently. If the Sikh can’t see his enemy he likes to fire first and challenge afterwards. I preferred to be seen. The sight of those uncompromising bayonets had changed my mind about the choice of evils. The knife of a hardly probable assassin seemed a wiser risk than the ready triggers of the Punjaub. Half-way down the street Suliman tugged at my cloak.

      “That is the place where my mother is,” he said, pointing to a narrow door on the left.

      But I was taking no chances in that direction—not at that moment. The little stone house was all in darkness. There were no windows that I could see. No sound came from it. And farther down the street there was a lamp burning, whose light spelled safety from shots fired at the sound of foot-fall on suspicion. I wanted that light between me and the Sikh platoon, yet did not dare run for it, since that would surely have started trouble. It is my experience of Sikhs that when they start a thing they like to finish it. They are very good indeed at explanations after the event.

      The Sikhs must have seen us pass through the belt of gasoline light, but they did not challenge, so I went forward more slowly, with rather less of that creepy feeling that makes a man’s spine seem to belong to someone else. Toward its lower end the street curved considerably, and we went about a quarter of a mile before the glare of another light began to appear around the bend.

      That was at a cross-street, up which I proposed to turn more or less in the direction of the hotel. But I did nothing of the sort. There was a cordon of Sikhs drawn across there, too, with no British officer in sight to enforce discretion.

      Come to think of it, I have always regarded a bayonet wound in the stomach as the least desirable of life’s unpleasantries.

      So Suliman and I turned back. I decided to investigate that dark little stone house, after all; for it occurred to me that, if that was the centre of conspiracy, then Grim would certainly show up there sooner or later and straighten out the predicament. Have you ever noticed how hungry you get walking about aimlessly in the dark, especially when you are sleepy in the bargain? Suliman began to whimper for food, and although I called him a belly on legs by way of encouragement he had my secret sympathy. I was as hungry as he was; and I needed a drink, too, which he didn’t. The little devil hadn’t yet included whiskey in his list of vices.

      The side of the street an which the little stone house stood was the darker, so we sat down with our backs against its wall, and the boy proceeded to fall asleep at once. The one thing I was sure I must not do was imitate him. So I began to look about me in the hope of finding something sufficiently interesting to keep me awake.

      There was nothing in the street except the makings of a bad smell. There was plenty of that. I searched the opposite wall, on which the moon shone, but there was nothing there of even architectural interest. My eyes traveled higher, and rested at last on something extremely curious.

      The wall was not very high at that point. It formed the blind rear of a house that faced into a court of some sort approached by an alley from another street. There were no windows. A small door some distance to my left belonged obviously to the next house. On top of the wall, almost exactly, but not quite, in the middle of it, was a figure that looked like a wooden carving—something like one of those fat, seated Chinamen they used to set over the tea counter of big grocer’s shops.

      But the one thing that you never see, and can be sure of not seeing in Jerusalem outside of a Christian church, is a carved human figure of any kind. The Moslems are fanatical on that point. Whatever exterior statues the crusaders for instance left, the Saracens and Turks destroyed. Besides, why was it not exactly in the middle?

      It was much too big and thick-set to be a sleeping vulture. It was the wrong shape to be any sort of chimney. It was certainly not a bale of merchandise put up on the roof to dry. And the longer you looked at it the less it seemed to resemble anything recognizable. I had about reached the conclusion that it must be a bundle of sheepskins up-ended, ready to be spread out in the morning sun, and was going to cast about for something else to puzzle over, when it moved. The man who thinks he would not feel afraid when a thing like that moves in the dark unexpectedly has got to prove it before I believe him. The goose-flesh broke out all over me.

      A moment later the thing tilted forward, and a man’s head emerged from under a blanket. It chuckled damnably. If there had been a rock of the right size within reach I would have thrown it, for it is not agreeable to be chuckled at when you are hungry, sleepy, and in a trap. I know just how trapped animals feel.

      But then it spoke in good plain English; and you could not mistake the voice.

      “That’s what comes of suiting yourself, doesn’t it! Place plugged at both ends, and nowhere to go but there and back! Thanks for tipping off Narayan Singh—you see, we were all ready. Here’s a pass that’ll let you out—catch!”

      He threw down a piece of white paper, folded.

      “Show that to the Sikhs at either end. Now beat it, while the going’s good. Leave Suliman there. I shall want him when he has had his sleep out. Say: hadn’t you better change your mind about coming back too soon from that joy ride? Haven’t you had enough of this? The next move’s dangerous.”

      “Is it my choice?” I asked.

      “We owe you some consideration.”

      “Then I’m in on the last act.”

      “All right. But don’t blame me. Turner will give you orders. Get a move on.”

      I lowered Suliman’s head gently from my knee on to a nice comfortable corner of the stone gutter, and went up-street to interview the Sikhs. It was rather like a New York Customs inspection, after your cabin steward has not been heavily enough tipped, and has tipped off the men in blue by way of distributing the discontent. I showed them the safe-pass Grim had scribbled. They accepted that as dubious preliminary evidence of my right to be alive, but no more. I was searched painstakingly and ignominiously for weapons. No questions asked. Nothing taken for granted. Even my small change was examined in the moonlight, coin by coin, to make sure, I suppose, that it wouldn’t explode if struck on stone. They gave everything back to me, including my underwear.

      A bearded non-commissioned officer entered a description of me in a pocket memorandum book. If his face, as he wrote it, was anything to judge by he described me as a leper without a license. Then I was cautioned gruffly in an unknown tongue and told to “imshi!” It isn’t a bad plan to “imshi” rather quickly when a Sikh platoon suggests your doing it. I left them standing all alone, with nothing but the empty night to bristle at.

      The rest of that night, until half an hour before dawn, was a half waking dream of discomfort and chilly draughts in the mouth of the hotel arcade, where I sat and watched the spies, and they watched me. The third man was presumably still sleeping in the mosque, but it was satisfactory to know that the other two were just as cold and unhappy as I felt.

      About ten minutes before the car came the third man showed up sheepishly, looking surprised as well as relieved to find me sitting there. He put in several minutes explaining matters to his friends. I don’t doubt he lied like a horse-trader and gave a detailed account of having followed me from place to place, for he used a great deal of pantomimic gesture. The other two were cynical with the air of men who must sit and listen to another blowing his own trumpet.

      The car arrived with a fanfare of horn-blowing, the chauffeur evidently having had instructions to call lots of attention to himself. Turner came out at once, with the lower part of his face protected against the morning chill by a muffler. Being about the same height, and in that Syrian uniform, he looked