When it was Dark

by Guy Thorne

  "We must not quarrel now," he said in a swift, impatient voice. "Listen to me. We're on the brink of terrible things. Gertrude Hunt came back to me, as you know. She told me she was sick to death of her friends the priests, that the old life called her, that she could not live apart from me. She mocked her sudden conversion. I laughed and mocked with her. I trusted her as I would trust myself."

  He paused for a moment, choking down the immense agitation which rose up in his throat and half strangled his speech.

  Schuabe's eyes, attentive and fixed, were still uncomprehending, unable to see where Llwellyn was leading.

  "She's gone!" said the big man, all colour fading absolutely from his face. "And, Schuabe, in my mad folly and infatuation, in my incredible foolishness ... I told her everything."

  A sudden sharp animal moan burst from Schuabe's lips -- clear, vibrant, and bestial in the silence.

  His rigidity changed into an extraordinary trembling. It was a temporary palsy which set every separate limb trembling with an independent motion. He waited like this, with an ashen face, to hear more.

  Llwellyn, when the irretrievable fact had passed his lips, when the enormous difficulty of confession was surmounted, proceeded with slight relief:

  "This might, you will think, be just possibly without significance for us. It might be a coincidence. But it is not so, Schuabe. I know now, as certainly as I can know anything, that she came to me, was sent to me, by the people who got hold of her. There has been suspicion for some time, there must have been. We have been ruined by this woman I trusted."

  "But why ... how?"

  "Because, Schuabe, as I was walking down Chancery Lane not an hour since, I saw Gertrude come out of Lincoln's Inn with the clergyman Gortre. They got into a cab together and drove away. And more. I learn from Lambert, my assistant at the Museum, that Harold Spence, the journalist, who is a member of his club and a friend of his, left for Palestine several days ago."

  "I have just heard," whispered Schuabe, "that Sir Michael Manichoe has been buying large parcels of British government bonds."

  "The thing is over. We must----"

  "Hush!" said Schuabe, menacingly. "All is not lost yet. Perhaps only Gortre knows of this. Even if anything is known to others, it cannot be substantiated until the man in Palestine gets the opportunity to investigate more fully. Without this woman and Gortre, we're safe. I know a man who can resolve our problem. I think you understand."

  Llwellyn looked at him and understood. There was no terror in his face, only a faint film of relief.

  Five minutes afterwards the two distinguished men, talking easily together, walked through the vestibule of the hotel, down the great courtyard and into the roaring Strand.

  A hotel clerk explained the celebrities to a voluble group of American tourists as they went by.

  Chapter 28

  It was early morning, the morning after Spence's arrival in Jerusalem. He slept well and soundly in his hotel room, tired by the long ride -- for yesterday he had come here on horseback over the moonlit slopes of Ajalon at the foot of the Bethoron pass.

  When at length he awoke it was with a sensation of mental and bodily vigour, a quickening of all his pulses in hope and expectation.

  A bright sun poured into the room.

  He got up and went to the window. There was a deep, unspoken prayer in his heart.

  The hotel was in Acra, the European and Christian quarter of Jerusalem, close by the Jaffa Gate, with the Tower of Hippicus frowning down upon it.

  The whole extent of the city lay beneath the windows in a glorious panorama, washed as it was in the brilliant morning light. Far beyond, a dark shadow yet, the Mount of Olives rose in background to the minarets and cupolas below it.

  His eye roved over the panorama, marking and recognising the buildings.

  There was the purple dome of the great Mosque of Omar, very clear against the amber-primrose lights of dawn.

  Where now the muezzin called to Allah, the burnt-offerings had once been offered in the courts of the Temple. It was in that spot that the massive temple curtain had parted from the top to the bottom in symbol of God's pain and death, opening the way between man and God. It was in the porches bounding the court of the Gentiles that Christ had taught.

  Closer, below the Antonia Tower, rose the dark, lead-covered cupola of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

  Great emotion came to him as he gazed at the shrine, sacred above all others for so many centuries. He thought of that holy spot, now diminished in its ancient glory in the eyes of half the Christian world.

  Perhaps no more would the Holy Fire burst forth from the yellow, aged marble of the Tomb at Easter time.

  Who could say? Was not he, Harold Spence, there to try that awful issue?

  He wondered, as he gazed, if another Easter would still see the wild messengers bursting away to Nazareth and Bethlehem bearing The Holy Flame.

  The sun became suddenly more powerful. It threw a warmer light into the grey dome, and deep down, the cold, dark waters of Hezekiah's Pool became bright and golden.

  The sacred places focused the light and sprang into a new life.

  He made the sign of the Cross, wondering fancifully if this were an omen. Then with a shudder he looked to the left towards the ogre-grey Turkish battlements of the Damascus Gate.

  It was there, over by the Temple Quarries of Bezetha, the New Tomb of Joseph lay.

  Straight away to the north lay the rock-hewn sepulchre where the learned experts had sorrowfully pronounced the end of so many Christian hopes.

  How difficult to believe that so short a distance away lay the centre of the world's trouble. He could actually distinguish the Turkish guardhouse in the wall which had been built round the spot.

  Over the sad city -- for Jerusalem is always sad, as if the ancient stones were still conscious of Christ's passion -- he gazed towards the terrible place, wondering, hoping, fearing.

  When he had partaken the first meal of the day and was confronted with the actual fact of what he had to do, he was aghast at what seemed his own lack of power.

  He had no plan of action, no method. For an hour he felt absolutely hopeless.

  Sir Robert Llwellyn, so his friends believed, had secretly been in Jerusalem prior to the discovery of the New Tomb.

  The first duty of the investigator was to find out whether that was true.

  How was he to do it?

  He decided to go out into the city. He would call on various people he knew, friends of Cyril Hands, and trust to events for guiding his further movements.

  The rooms where he knew Hands had always stayed were close to the schools of the Church Missionary Society. He would go there. Down in the Mûristan area he could also chat with the doctor at the English Ophthalmic Hospice. He could call there on his way to the New Tomb.

  He set out, down the roughly paved streets, through the arched and shaded bazaars to the heart of the city where the streets were bounded by the vision of the distant hills of Olivet.

  The religious riots and unrest were long since over. The pilgrims to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre were less in number, and were mostly members of the Orthodox Church, who still accepted the Church of the Holy Sepulchre as the true goal of their desires.

  The Greeks and Armenians hated each other no more than usual. The Turks were held in good control by a strong governor of Jerusalem. Nor was this a time of special festival. The city, never quite at rest, was still in its normal condition.

  The Bedouin women with their unveiled faces, tattooed in blue, strode to the bazaars with the butter they had brought in from their desert herds. They wore gaudy headdresses and high red boots, and they jostled the "pale townsmen" as they passed them; free, untamed creatures of the sun and air.

  The sun grew hotter as he walked, though the purple shadows of the narrow streets were cool enough. As he left the European heights of Acra and dived deep into the eastern central city, the well-remembered scenes and smells rose up like a wa
ll before him.

  Harold Spence began to walk more slowly, in harmony with the slow-moving forms around. He had been to Omdurman with the avenging army, knew Constantinople during the Greek war -- the Middle East had meaning for him.

  As the atmosphere closed round him, his doubts and self-ridicule vanished. His strange mission seemed possible as he went on towards his destination.

  Not far from the missionary establishment was a building which was the headquarters of the Palestine Exploring Society in Jerusalem.

  Although Cyril Hands had always lived up in Acra among the Europeans, much of his time was necessarily spent in the Mûristan district. The building was known as the Research Museum, where Hands and his assistants had gathered a valuable collection of ancient curiosities.

  Here were hundreds of drawings and photographs of various excavations. Accurate measurements of tombs, buried houses, ancient churches, were entered in great books.

  Glass cases held fragments of ancient pottery, old Hebrew seals, scarabs, antique fragments of jewellery -- all the varied objects from which high scholarship and expert training was gradually, year by year, providing a luminous and entirely fresh commentary on Scripture.

  Attached to the museum was a library and drawing office, a photographic darkroom, and apartments for the curator, Ionides, and his wife. Ionides was the man who engaged the native labour required for the excavations, superintended the work of the men, and acted as general agent and intermediary between the European officials and all locals with whom they came in contact.

  The man was well known in the city -- a character in his way. In the reports of the Exploring Society he was often referred to as an invaluable assistant. A year ago his portrait had been published in the annual statement of the fund, and the face of the Greek in his turban now lay on the study tables of many a quiet English vicarage.

  Spence entered the courtyard of the building. It was quiet and deserted; some pigeons were feeding there.

  He turned under a stone archway to the right, pushed open a door, and entered the museum.

  There was a babel of voices.

  A small group of people stood by a wooden pedestal in the centre of the room, which supported the famous cruciform font found at Bîâr Es-seb'a.

  They turned at Spence's entrance. He saw some familiar faces of people with whom he had been brought in contact during the time of the first discovery.

  Two English missionaries, one in orders, the English Consul, and Professor Theodore Adams, the American archaologist who lived all the year round in the new western suburb, stood speaking in grave tones and with distressed faces -- so it seemed to Spence.

  An Egyptian servant, dressed in white linen, carrying a bunch of keys, stood with them.

  An enormous surprise shone out on the faces of these people as Spence walked up to him.

  "Mr. Spence!" said the Consul. "We never expected you, or heard of your coming. This is most fortunate, however. You were Cyril Hand's great friend. I think you both shared chambers together in London?"

  Spence looked at him in wonder, mechanically shaking the proffered hand. "I don't think I quite understand," he said. "I came here quite by chance, just to see if I could find anyone I knew."

  "Then you have not heard----" said the clergyman.

  "I have heard nothing."

  "Your friend, our distinguished fellow-worker, Professor Hands, is no more. We have just received a cable. Poor, dear Hands died of heart disease while taking a seaside holiday."

  Spence felt genuinely affected.

  Hands was an old and dear friend. His sweet, kindly nature, too dreamy and retiring perhaps for the rush and hurry of Western life, had always been wonderfully welcome for a month or two each year in Lincoln's Inn. His quaint, learned letters, his enthusiasm for his work had become part of the journalist's life. They were recurring pleasures. And now he was gone!

  Now it was all over. Never more would he hear the quiet voice, hear the water-pipe bubble in the quiet old Inn as night gave way to dawn....

  His brain whirled with the sudden shock. He grew pale, waiting to hear further details.

  "We know little more," said the Consul, with a sigh. "A cable from the central office of the Society has just stated the fact and asked me to take official charge of everything here. We were just about to begin sealing up the rooms when you came. There are many important documents which must be seen to. Mr. Forbes, poor Hands's assistant, is away on the shores of the Dead Sea, but we have sent for him by the camel garrison post. But it will probably be some weeks before he can be here."

  "This is terribly sad news for me," said Spence at length. "We were the greatest friends. The months when Hands was in town were always the pleasantest. Of course, lately we didn't see so much of each other because he'd become a public figure. He was becoming depressed and unwell. Terrified, I almost think, at what was going on in the world owing to his discovery. Yes, he was going away to recuperate. But I knew nothing of this."

  "I am sorry," said the Consul, "to have to tell you of such a sad business, but we naturally thought that somehow you knew -- though, of course, in point of time that would hardly be possible, or only just so."

  "I'm here," said Spence, giving an explanation that he had previously prepared if it became necessary to account for his presence, "on a mission for my newspaper, to ascertain various points about public opinion in view of all these imminent international complications."

  "Quite so, quite so," said the Consul. "I'll be glad to help you in any way I can, of course. But when you came in we were wondering what we should do exactly about poor Hands's private effects, papers, and so on. When he went on leave all his things were packed in cases and sent down here from his rooms in the upper city. I suppose they had better be shipped to England. Perhaps you would take charge of them on your return?"

  "I expect you'll be hearing from his brother, the Reverend John Hands, a Leicestershire clergyman, when the mail comes in," said Spence. "This is a great blow to me. I would like to pay my poor friend some public tribute. Maybe write something for English people to read: a sketch of his life and work here in Jerusalem, and his daily work among you all."

  His voice faltered. His eyes had fallen on a photograph which hung on the wall. A group of Arabs sat at the mouth of a rock tomb. In front of them, wearing a sun helmet and holding a ten foot surveyor's pole, stood the dead professor. A kindly smile was on his face as he looked down on the white figures of his men.

  "It would be a gracious tribute," said one of the missionaries. "Everyone loved him, whatever their race or creed. We can tell you about him as we saw him in our midst. It is a great pity that old Ionides has gone. He was the confidential sharer of all the work here, and Hands trusted him implicitly. Ionides could have told you so much."

  "I remember Ionides well," said Spence. "At the time of the discovery, of course, he was very much in evidence, and he was questioned by the committee. Is the old fellow dead, then?"

  "No," answered the missionary. "Some time ago, just after the Commission left, in fact, he came into a considerable sum of money. He was getting on in years, and he resigned his position here. He's taken an olive farm somewhere by Nabulûs, a Turkish city by Mount Gerizim. I fear we'll never see him more. He would grieve at this news."

  "I think," said Spence, "I'll go back to my hotel. I would like to be alone today. I'll call on you this evening, if I may," he added, turning to the Consul.

  He left the melancholy group, once more beginning their sad business, and went out into the narrow street.

  He wanted to be alone in the cool darkness of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

  Words written by the apostle Paul to the Church in Corinth came into his mind. How did it go?

  "So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality; Then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?"


  Always, all his life long he had thought these were perhaps the most beautiful of written words.

  He turned to the right, passed the Turkish guard at the entrance, and went down the narrow steps to the Calvary chapel.

  The gloom and glory of the great church, its rich and sombre light, the cool yet heavy air, saddened his soul. He knelt in humble prayer.

  When he came out into the brilliant sunlight and the noises of the city, he felt braver and more confident. He began to turn his thoughts earnestly and resolutely to his mission.

  He entered the yellow stone portico of his hotel with a sigh of relief. The hall was large, flagged, and cool. A pool of clear water was in the centre, glimmering green over its tiles. His eye rested on it with pleasure. He sank into a deckchair and clapped his hands. He felt exhausted, tired, and thirsty.

  An Arab boy came in answer to his handclapping. He brought an envelope on a tray.

  It was a cable from England.

  Spence went upstairs to his bedroom. From his kitbag he drew a small volume, bound in thick leather, with a locked clasp.

  It was Sir Michael Manichoe's private cable code -- a precious volume which great commercial houses all over the world would have paid great sums to see, which the great man in his anxiety and trust had confided to his representative.

  Slowly and laboriously Spence decoded the message.

  THE WOMAN HAS DISCOVERED EVERYTHING FROM LLWELLYN. ALL SUSPICIONS CONFIRMED. CONSPIRACY BETWEEN LLWELLYN AND SCHUABE. YOU WILL FIND FULL CONFIRMATION FROM IONIDES, THE GREEK CURATOR AND SENIOR ASSISTANT OF SOCIETY EXPLORATIONS. GET STATEMENT OF TRUTH BY ANY MEANS, COERCION OR MONEY TO ANY AMOUNT. ALL IS LEGITIMATE. HAVING OBTAINED, HASTEN HOME, SPECIAL STEAMER IF QUICKER. CAN DO NOTHING CERTAIN WITHOUT YOUR EVIDENCE. WE TRUST IN YOU. HASTEN. MANICHOE

  He trembled with excitement as he relocked the code book. It was a light in a dark place. Ionides! The trusted assistant for many years! The eager helper! The traitor bought by Llwellyn!

  It was afternoon now. He must go out again. A caravan, camels, and guides must be found for a start tomorrow.

  It would not be a very difficult journey to Nabulûs, a little over thirty miles, but it must be made with speed.