by Roger Bax
“Well, all sorts of wild rumours began to circulate—it was sufficiently dark and dangerous inside for anything to be possible. One of the suggestions was that in addition to the gold and silver vessels and the jewels of Solomon, the Ark of the Covenant itself was somewhere cunningly concealed beneath the site of the temple. The quarries became the mecca of treasure hunters, and a stimulating problem for serious investigators. They were all unsuccessful. Several people broke their necks by falling over frightful precipices, and one man was discovered accidentally in the last stages of starvation after being lost for over a fortnight. In the end the search was given up.”
“H’m.” Garve seemed disappointed. “It doesn’t sound so hopeful, does it?” He looked curiously at Hayson. “What makes you think you may be more successful?”
“I hate to be beaten,” said Hayson slowly, his eyes on Esther. “Indeed, I’m rarely beaten. The Ark of the Covenant has never been found. If it had been destroyed some record of its destruction would surely have survived. If it still exists, it must be in the quarries. In any case, I intend to explore the caverns so thoroughly that I shall be able to say definitely, one way or the other, whether it is there or not.”
“Surely you’ll need some help?”
“Later on, yes. At the moment I’m fully occupied with a discovery I’ve already made. Deep down in the lower workings I’ve found some remarkable signs carved on one of the walls. I have a feeling that they may have something to do with the ark. In any case, they have a real antiquarian interest, and I’m going to get them deciphered.”
Hayson’s dark face was flushed with enthusiasm, and Garve caught the infection. “I’d like to go down with you one day,” he said. “Maybe I could get a flashlight of the carvings?”
“You might,” said Hayson dubiously. “I don’t know how well they’d come out. But I’ll be glad to show you round if you’ve a good head for heights.”
“For yawning chasms, you mean,” said Esther. “Do remember you’re talking to a newspaper man. I hope you’ll include me in your subterranean expedition?”
Hayson leaned slightly towards her, and gave her a glance so bold and full of meaning that Garve shuddered at his audacity.
“I’ll take you by yourself, Miss Willoughby. I really couldn’t be responsible for two people at once.”
“Have you been working in the quarries very long?” asked Garve.
“Nearly three months now. I’m afraid none of the big men—the really big men—take the enterprise very seriously. The scientific papers humour me because of Luxor, but they don’t believe I’ll succeed.”
“Do you have any trouble with the Arabs?”
“Nothing to speak of. There’s a man at the entrance who looks after tourists, and I sweeten him with a few piastres now and again. He’s even helped to keep people away occasionally when I didn’t want to be disturbed.”
Garve nodded. “I only hope nothing happens to prevent the completion of your work.”
Hayson looked interested. “Trouble with the Arabs, you mean? You don’t really think there’s any serious danger, do you?”
Garve shrugged his shoulders. “You’ve been in Jerusalem longer than I. Do you sense nothing in the air?”
Hayson smiled rather superciliously. “I’m afraid I only work on data,” he said. “I’m not a politician—or a journalist. I try to take an intelligent interest when people start talking about ‘The Situation,’ but all these squabbles bore me.”
“Do the train wrecks and the assassinations and the bombings bore you?” asked Garve with some heat.
“I’m shocked, of course,” said Hayson calmly, “but I find it very difficult to believe that they mean serious trouble. These Arabs behave so childishly. Their secret societies are schoolboy stuff—with a trace of real horror, I admit, but infantile all the same. When I hear that a corpse has been found with a knife through it, and that a piece of paper has been attached to the handle with the word ‘Revenge’ inscribed on it in Arabic, and signed ‘The Black Hand Gang,’ or words to that effect, I refuse, as a scientist, to take the thing seriously. I’m sure that dangerous secret societies don’t strike so melodramatically.”
“And yet,” observed Garve reflectively, “we know that they strike in a very deadly way. Dozens of Arabs, probably hundreds, have already paid with their lives for refusing to keep in step with the extremists. No one is safe, not even the leaders themselves. Death, as you know, is the immediate penalty for the slightest sign of weakness. Such intimidation may drive cautious men to rash deeds.”
Hayson’s face was clouded and his voice irritable. “I refuse to be troubled by their quarrels, anyway. My only concern is to be left in peace in the quarries. Very selfish, no doubt, but an important scientific discovery matters far more than a few lives.”
“At least,” said Garve unkindly, “you’ve a safe retreat down below if a revolt does break out suddenly. With a little food and plenty of patience you could live in the quarries for days. I suppose there’s water?”
“Water? Yes, there’s water!” His tone was so grim that Esther felt her spine creep. “I shouldn’t like to be alone down there without a light. It’s—well—eerie, to say the least of it.” Garve had a sudden idea. “I suppose there’s no possibility that the Arabs store their arms there?”
“I’ve never seen any traces, but it would be an incomparable hiding-place. The thought never occurred to me.”
“We might keep our eyes skinned when we go down together,” said Garve. “Tell me, isn’t there supposed to be another entrance to the quarries somewhere?”
“I believe there is. I seem to have read somewhere that there’s a way in from the temple area. Yes, of course—it was through that entrance that the Ark of the Covenant was supposed to have been carried. But I never heard of anyone who knew anything definite.”
“Did you ever know anyone who’d been through Hezekiah’s Tunnel?” asked Garve.
Hayson blew a smoke ring and watched it uncurl and vanish. “Hezekiah’s Tunnel? No. I don’t think I ever did. I’m a bit vague, but it isn’t exactly a health resort, is it? I always understood it was an extremely messy and almost impassable underground water-course.”
“That’s right. Hezekiah cut it to provide the city with water when the Assyrians came down like a wolf on the fold. It’s about the only place in Jerusalem I haven’t scrutinized, and I’d like to see it.”
“Aren’t you carrying your passion for knowledge rather far?” asked Hayson. “Personally, I wouldn’t go near the place. Why, you’ll be wanting to take a dip in the brook Kedron next.”
Garve grimaced horribly, for the stench of the brook was still in his nostrils. “Thanks, I draw the line there. Seriously, though, I can’t see that exploring the tunnel is any more dangerous than prowling about in the quarries.”
“Mr. Hayson,” Esther reminded him, “is serving the interest of science. You are merely proposing to satisfy your vulgar curiosity.”
“On the contrary, I spend all my time trying to satisfy the vulgar curiosity of the great British public, which adores anything subterranean. Seriously, do you think I could get a guide?”
“Surely,” said Esther, still teasing, “a newspaper man doesn’t have to have a personally conducted tour?”
“Sensible people don’t take unnecessary risks,” Garve reminded her, with an unsuccessful attempt at severity.
Esther made a wry face. “I should have those words set to music, Mr. Garve. They occur in your conversation like a refrain.”
Garve refused to be put off. “There must be someone in Jerusalem who’s been through the tunnel. Look here, Hayson, you’ve been in the city a good while. Have you really never heard anyone speak of it?”
“I tell you, Garve, it’s a foolish project,” said Hayson with more heat than the occasion seemed to warrant. “I wouldn’t send my worst enemy through it.”
His brooding eyes met Garve’s, and each knew what the other was thinking. Garve flushed a li
ttle. “I wouldn’t let that worry you,” he said earnestly. “I should regard myself as under a real obligation to you if you could give me any assistance.”
Hayson hesitated and pondered. “Well—Hezekiah’s Tunnel? Yes, there was a man—but it’s absurd, Garve—the place is little better than a sewer.”
“Please,” said Garve stubbornly.
“Well, don’t say I haven’t warned you. Esther will be my witness.” (“Esther!” thought Garve. “Damn the fellow’s nerve!”) “I remember now—I did once run across an Arab who had been through the tunnel—or said he had. It was soon after I first came here, and I wanted a guide to show me round the Holy Sepulchre. I picked a man up at a little Arab café just inside the Jaffa Gate on the left as you enter the city. A villainous looking fellow he was, with only one eye and a face pitted by some horrible disease.”
“He probably caught it going through the tunnel,” said Esther cheerfully.
Hayson ignored the flippant interruption. “He told me if I ever wanted to go anywhere else he could always be found at the café in the early morning. He was a good guide, but his face frightened me, and I always avoided him afterwards.”
“I believe I’ve seen him,” said Garve, “though one cut-throat is very like another.”
“He’ll probably try to knife you in the tunnel,” said Hayson gloomily. “Take my advice and keep away.”
5. Enter Jameel
Before he returned to his hotel, Garve called at police headquarters to report his discovery of the arms dump. Baird, the young and able officer with whom Garve had already had many dealings, took full particulars and instructed two reliable men to go down to Bethany at dusk and keep watch all night.
Garve stayed for a brief chat, sent off a wire to London, together with a request for more money and a hint of good stories to come, and went home to nurse his bruises and recoup his vigour with a good night’s sleep. He preferred living in an hotel, if only because there was always a commissionaire on duty to keep an eye open for possible intruders. Garve, who could no longer walk by daylight in the streets with any certainty of safety, was in no mind to come home late at night to a dark and lonely apartment, with an Arab possibly lying in wait behind a curtain to stab him in the back. His hotel was solid and European, and catered primarily for tourists.
A hot bath greatly relieved his aching limbs, and half a tumbler of whisky made a good night’s rest a certainty. As soon as his head touched the pillow he sank dreamlessly to sleep, and knew nothing more until the chambermaid woke him at nine next morning with hot water and orange juice.
The sun was shining brilliantly and he whistled a cheerful tune as he dressed. He was just going down to breakfast when the telephone rang by his bedside.
“Hallo, hallo,” said a voice impatiently as he lifted the receiver. “Is that Garve? This is Baird.”
“Morning,” said Garve. “Anything wrong?”
“I don’t know. You weren’t drunk the night before last, were you?”
“The night before last—let me see, that was when I found the machine-guns, wasn’t it? No, not incapably. Has somebody said I was?”
“One of the men I sent down to Bethany last night has just been on the phone. He says they found your cache, but there aren’t any arms there of any sort—plenty of hoof marks and that’s all. Are you sure you didn’t dream it?”
“I was wide awake and quite sober,” said Garve. “What time did your men get there?”
“After midnight. They ran into an Arab fight three miles outside the city and had to bring two men back, one of them dead. When eventually they got to Bethany it was quite dark and they had some difficulty in following your directions. What do you make of it?”
Garve pondered. “Well, it seems incredible, but the Arabs must have moved the stuff. I suppose they discovered that we knew, though I can’t imagine how. Do you think when they saw your men they put two and two together and gave the alarm?”
“It’s possible, but unlikely. I suppose no-one saw you when you were prowling round the night they dumped the stuff?”
“I don’t think so—I should never have got away alive. Damned funny altogether. I’ll have a talk with you about it later … I’m going to be fully occupied this morning.”
“More sleuthing?”
“Something of the sort. By the way, is there any news of Ali Kemal?”
“Nothing to his discredit. He’s sitting pretty in the desert and pretending to be a good boy—in the daytime. It’s impossible to keep track of him at night. I wish we’d got him under lock and key.”
“So do I. Never mind, perhaps he’ll forget to pay his income-tax! So long.”
Garve hung up and stood for a moment, puzzling over the new development. This wasn’t the first leakage there’d been in recent months. Perhaps some of the police themselves weren’t incorruptible. They were a mixed lot, some of them Arabs who no doubt had nationalist sympathies. Besides, the secret societies had lots of money, and they would pay highly for information. And money was more than usually persuasive in Palestine.
After breakfast, Garve walked quickly down to the Jaffa Gate. As always, the immediate neighbourhood of the gate was thronged with people, most of them selling things. Several guides nodded to him, but they had given up offering their services long ago. He stopped to have a brief talk with one of the policemen on duty, and then slipped into the little café on his left, which Hayson had mentioned the day before. A swarthy Arab was smoking a hookah near the door, and took no notice at all of Garve’s entry. A guide whom Garve knew was sipping coffee by himself in a corner, and the proprietor, a fat and rather elderly Arab with gold earrings and jewelled fingers, sat half asleep against a small counter. The café was dark after the glaring sun, and pleasantly cool. Garve took a chair with his back to the wall and facing the door. He called for coffee, lighted his pipe, and prepared for a long wait.
The time passed pleasantly enough, for Jaffa Gate was always thronged with picturesque people. Garve amused himself trying to pick up little snatches of Arab conversation, but men talked in whispers in Jerusalem now, unless they were bargaining or squabbling, and he learned nothing but the price of oranges and lace. A whole hour passed. Customers came and went, but no-one appeared who remotely resembled the man whom Hayson had described. Garve began to feel that he was wasting a beautiful morning. He wondered if Hayson were in the quarries or making love to Esther in his bold fashion. Of course, the guide would not come—they never did when you needed them. Garve did not want to publish his interest in Hezekiah’s Tunnel or he would have approached some of the other guides. He was just contemplating a stroll over to the Willoughbys’ house to break the monotony of the morning when two more customers came in. They were both Arabs, and the one nearest to Garve was young and keen-eyed and was wearing European clothes. The other wore the long gown and white head-cloth of a countryman, and as soon as Garve saw his features his spirits rose.
The man was hideously disfigured, sightless in one eye, and heavily pockmarked down the whole of one side of his face. At once Garve became a different being. He had been a little bored, a little lackadaisical—now he was keyed-up and wary. He waited until the guide turned full face and quietly beckoned him over. The man came, salaamed, and waited.
“Sit down,” said Garve quietly. “Tell me, what’s your name?”
“Jameel,” said the guide. He was short and powerful, with forearm muscles which swelled and rippled under the light brown skin. His face, till disease attacked it, might well have been handsome. His single eye gazed stolidly now, waiting.
“Jameel,” said Garve, “have you ever been through Hezekiah’s Tunnel?”
The eye glanced fearfully to left and right, as though anxious to see that no Arab was within earshot.
“Hezekiah’s Tunnel, excellency? Yes, once I went through it.”
“Would you like to do it again?”
“No, excellency. It is not a pleasant place. But if you would like to see the Holy Se
pulchre, the Wailing Wall, the Dome of the Rock, the Via Dolorosa—I can show you all these. For thirty piastres—the whole day. I am the best guide in Jerusalem. I know all the history. I will show you where Jesus Christ placed His hand. I will show you His footprints.…”
Garve shook his head. “I’ve seen them all. I want one thing and one thing only. I will give you a hundred piastres to take me through the tunnel.”
“It is just a wet hole in the ground,” said Jameel. “It is easy to fall and get hurt. It is narrow and dangerous. I am the only guide in Jerusalem who has been through it.” He spat in disgust. “And you offer me a hundred piastres.”
“It will take you a long while to earn a hundred piastres showing tourists the Wailing Wall,” said Garve. “How many clients have you had this week?”
“There are no tourists,” said Jameel sulkily. “But the tunnel—no. I would sooner starve in comfort. It is an evil place. And it would be necessary to pass through it at night.”
“At night!” exclaimed Garve. “Why?”
“In the daytime, excellency, the women of Siloam wash their clothes in the Virgin’s Fountain where the tunnel starts. If you stirred up the water then, there would be very serious trouble.”
“Did you go through at night?”
“Yes—alone.”
“How long does the journey take?”
“An hour, if all goes well. But it is a journey which might have no ending, as I have told you. The pools in the tunnel are deep.”
Garve sat back and regarded the stolid staring eye. The more he saw of it, the less he liked it, and the less he liked the idea of the trip.
“I’ve never known a guide so indifferent about earning a hundred piastres,” he said irritably.
“We should need special boots and lanterns,” said Jameel. “And they would have to be carried to the tunnel and carried back.”
“Lazy devil,” thought Garve. Aloud he said, “Say a hundred and fifty piastres altogether, including thigh boots for the night and lanterns.”