Complete Works of Talbot Mundy

by Talbot Mundy

  “So, if Jimgrim should get to the Avenger’s ear, he might listen on the score of friendship?” I suggested.

  “Wallahi! That might be. The point is, what will Jimgrim say to the Avenger?”

  I nodded; but I knew that wasn’t the point. If there was one dead certainty on earth, it was that the Lion of Petra, whether or not disguised as Grim, would never dare trespass into the Avenger’s camp, for fear of recognition and the inevitably gruesome death that would certainly follow. An Arab doesn’t dub himself “Avenger” and then forgive the mortal enemy detected in the act of tricking him. However, my job seemed to be to keep Ibrahim on tenterhooks.

  “Jimgrim is in league with the Lion,” I said, quite truthfully. Following that, I drew hard on imagination. “Jimgrim’s plan is to take camels away from the Avenger for a change. There are men in the Avenger’s camp who will desert at Jimgrim’s bidding, driving off the camels with them.” And having known a little frankness on occasion to leaven a prodigious lot of lies, I added: “The Lion suspects you of intending treachery.”

  “Allah!” he exclaimed, trying to cover up alarm with a display of indignation.

  “By Allah, yes!” said I. “And if Jimgrim should return from Abu Lissan with a couple of hundred of the Avenger’s best men, it would fare badly with any traitor in this camp.”

  At the word traitor the irascible old bandit made a motion as if to draw one of his weapons. But he thought better of it. Narayan Singh’s revolver was too obviously pointed straight, and my own pistol was equally in evidence.

  The deuce of it was that, though we held him helpless for the moment, the situation was going to be reversed the moment we should try to escape. We could prevent his men from coming to his assistance easily enough, by threatening to shoot him unless he ordered them away again; but either we had got to sit there watching him until we all starved, or until the god of all improbabilities should produce Grim on the scene, or else I had got to take a one-in-a-hundred-thousand chance.

  I took a silver five-piastre piece from the purse in the fold of my waist- cloth, and spun it in the air. It fell on the mat tails uppermost. The long chance had it.

  “Will you sit here,” I said to Narayan Singh, “and keep the old bird company, while I take a turn outside.”

  Ibrahim ben Ah did not understand a word of that, but he dropped his jaw at hearing me speak English. But surprise gave place to baffled anger as the Sikh answered me in Arabic.

  “Surely. I will keep his honor company. Moreover, I speak for his honor Ibrahim, who will sit quietly, as becomes a courteous host, to wait for your return — seeing he is averse to having three holes shot through him with this revolver!” he added meaningly.

  Ibrahim ben Ah said never a word. I don’t see what there was he could have said. Barring unforeseen contingencies, we had him corralled for the moment. I got up and left the tent with the notion first of all of finding out just how far Ibrahim’s intention of betraying Ali Higg had taken root among the men.

  Seeing one come out leisurely where two had entered the men who happened to be watching drew no conclusions that troubled them. They lay under their improvised shelters, eyeing me with lazy interest, more curious than suspicious. There wasn’t any of that sullen look about them that most Easterns, and all African peoples, wear when they think of betraying their salt. It was a long shot — the longest I ever risked — but I made up my mind to behave as if I knew they were loyal to the last man to the Lion their master.

  Don’t forget: I was dressed and shaven for the part of a darwaish — the politico-religious fanatic, who is privileged more or less to air his opinions on any subject, and whose person is theoretically sacred from assault. No theories are fool-proof, and no darwaish should strain his immunity too far, but he had privileges that are more likely to be respected by the ignorant than by their leaders. There was nothing outrageous, or even surprising, in my assumption of an air of superior wisdom and arrogance. Besides, coming straight out of Ibrahim’s tent, it was presumable that I had his authority for whatever I might say or do. They would reason that he would have ordered me to be beaten or murdered otherwise.

  There was a big pile of flour-bags in the middle of the bivouac that made a first-class pulpit. I mounted it, with as much of an air of frenzy as a man of my temperament can assume without looking foolish, and stood glaring about me until curiosity brought most of them to their feet.

  “Allaho Akbar!” I roared then at the top of my lungs; and that being a subject on which all Moslems are unanimous, they shouted back at me that God was very great indeed. The phrase being their favorite war-cry as well as a statement of doctrine, they began to gather around me. I had my rifle in my right hand, and shook it violently by way of further stimulating curiosity, and in less than two minutes pretty nearly every member of the force was elbowing for standing room. You couldn’t have gathered a crowd more easily in New York City.

  When you’re broke it’s no use figuring on the pile you should have; then’s the time to use nickels for all they’re worth. And in a desperate situation it isn’t any good worrying about what you don’t know; the thing is to act on what you do know. Then, if circumstances get the upper hand in spite of energy and courage, nobody can blame you. At least, they’ll blame you, but they haven’t any right to, which is different.

  I knew one or two things for a fact. One was that Grim has genius, that he stands by his friends, and that he was keener than anybody on finding a solution of the general mess. Another certainty was that Ali Baba had gone to tell him the facts of the situation. It wasn’t going to help me or anybody else to take into the reckoning just then the possibility of Ali Baba failing to find Grim. That was up to providence and Ali Baba.

  A third indisputable fact was that Grim had stated his intention of putting Ayisha in command of these hundred and forty men. That made three things that I knew, which the men in front of me did not. It didn’t look easy to build a compelling argument out of them, but I could try. And a fourth fact — that they imagined Grim was Ali Higg, and Ali Higg was Grim, but that I knew the truth of the matter — provided an element of confusion, which any professional spell-binder could easily turn to advantage. Not being a trained orator gave me no right to lie down on the job, and I waded in.

  “Allaho Akbar!” I roared again. (I can bellow like a mad bull on suitable occasion.)

  “Allaho Akbar!” they answered. We were getting on finely. A common platform was established. It was as if a soap-box orator in Union Square had started his speech by asserting that the Stars and Stripes is a first-class flag; whoever didn’t think so in the audience would have to pretend to agree for his hat’s sake. There was no fear of opposition now for a minute or two.

  “Ye followers of the Lion of Petra,” I thundered out, “Heroes of the desert — faithful followers of the true Prophet, on whom be peace — I bring word to you from Ali Higg, your leader.”

  “Akbar!” they began to shout. So I had guessed right. It was only their commander who was disaffected.

  I held up the rifle again for silence, and kept them waiting, having often noticed that the pauses are the best part of a speech.

  “Ali Higg the terrible, the Lord of the limits of the Desert and the Waters, had declared against Saoud in the name of Allah. Saoud, who dares to call himself Avenger, shall lie low!”

  “Akbar! Akbar Ali Higg!” they shouted; for shouting cost nothing in any language, and commits nobody as long as reporters are not present.

  “This fellow who calls himself Avenger has eight hundred men,” I went on. “But what are numbers? Had the Prophet numbers when he marched against his enemies? Allah makes all things easy!”

  “Allaho Akbar!” they agreed.

  “This Avenger fellow is a jackal, but he of Petra is a Lion. And like a lion he has taken to the desert, where cunning and craft win the day against numbers, even as the wind can blow the sand.”

  I was far from being certain of that simile; but my audience were n
ot pedagogues. They were men who wanted to listen to optimism, and didn’t care whether sand or wind resembled a lion’s cunning, or otherwise.

  “And does a lion hunt in company?” I demanded, glaring about me as if I had propounded a problem such as only a sage could answer. “Nay! He hunts alone! He stalks. He lies in wait. He strikes at the unexpected moment. And who can stand against him? He is terrible in his wrath, and his enemies are confused, not knowing the path he took nor the direction of his coming. Woe, then, to the lion’s enemies!”

  That part of the speech had such a good effect on them that I paused again to let the emotion work; and glaring this and that way with a rolling eye, as I have seen the professionals behave, I got a chance to observe Ibrahim ben Ah’s tent. The old man was still sitting in there, cursing steadily, I should say, by the way his beard moved; and Narayan Sing was so well placed that you couldn’t possibly tell from outside the tent that he held a cocked revolver in his hand. The two seemed to be deep in conversation.

  “But how about the Lion’s friends?” I roared, as soon as there was perfect silence. “Does he desert them? Never! Does he leave them to their own resources? No! Does he leave them at the mercy of an old man, whose days all numbered, whose marrowless bones might quake at the thought of facing the Avenger? Do ye think that the Lion would do such a thing?”

  I paused once more, and as they did not know what was coming they held their breath.

  “What think ye of the Lion’s wife?”

  “Jael! Jael!” they began to shout, and I didn’t contradict them. I didn’t dare mention Ayisha yet, because the news of her divorce might possibly have reached them. The main point was to establish the thought in their minds that Ali Higg was going to send a woman deputy to override, and perhaps replace altogether, old Ibrahim ben Ah.

  “The Lion’s wife knows all his plans,” I went on. “She keeps his secrets. She understands the craft with which he hunts. She had courage, and guile, and ability. Are ye afraid to follow a woman? Has a woman never led you to victory?”

  They made no secret of the fact that they preferred a woman. Possibly even Jael’s discipline was less fierce than Ibrahim ben Ah’s or Ali Higg’s.

  “Good! We will follow his wife!” they shouted.

  “He had more than one wife,” I countered then. “What does it matter to you which wife he sends?”

  They said it made no difference. I think they rather hoped a junior wife would come, whose hand would fall less heavily than Jael’s on offenders. They were just as feckless in the hour of uncertainty as any other crowd of men — the usual human mixture of emotions, fierce and sheeplike alternately — accustomed to be led, and consequently afraid of nothing so much as to be left to their own resources.

  Can you think of one crowd of rebels since history was written that in a climax wasn’t eager for a change of captains? They were still full of confidence in Ali Higg, because he had always held himself as much as possible aloof from them. He was a sort of mystery, who led them once in a while in person on some whirlwind foray, and who imposed his drastic punishments more often than not by deputy. So Ibrahim ben Ah, the deputy, was a weariness to the flesh, while Ali Higg remained a hero in their imaginations.

  I dare say that in that minute I could have led a mutiny against Ibrahim ben Ah. It would only have called for a little mouthing of religious platitudes — quotations from the Koran — any of the pabulum with which all agitators fool the crowd into believing it has justice on its side (for you can’t do much, even with a crowd of pirates, unless you make them think the issue is a moral one.)

  But, setting aside the fact that mutinous troops are useless to anybody, and Grim, as far as I understood the situation, wanted a force in being to maneuver against the Avenger, there is something in my make-up that rebels against that sort of thing. It strikes me as playing off-side, and I don’t enjoy to win my point, earn money, or resolve a difficulty that way.

  To trick an opponent is one thing. To take him by surprise, catch him napping, cause him to deceive himself, and, if he is a man of violence, feed him his own medicine, is all in the game, as I see it. But to defeat even a bandit by deliberately stirring mutiny among his men seems to me to put you in the class with Trotzky and Lenin; it’s no white man’s business.

  So I didn’t say one word further about Ibrahim ben Ah. For all I cared, and if they chose to submit to it, he might lead them to the devil once that hand was played; that was their affair, and his. Old Ibrahim got much the worst of the transaction; but I’d enjoy to meet him tomorrow and talk the matter over. That’s one of the reasons why Grim and I got on so well together in spite of his uncommunicativeness; I have never known him play cards under the table. He plays good poker. He can bluff like a Down-East Yankee, drawing nothing to a pair of Jacks and winning by the glitter in his eye. But he plays a white man’s game; and I’ve never known him spiteful.

  However, there I was on a pile of flour-bags in the baking sun, wondering what to say next. As I have explained, the bivouac rested in the curve near one end of a boulder-strewn hill. You couldn’t see around the corner, but in front and to the left was empty desert, smirched here and there with sand-clouds driven by the scorching wind. The only men on watch that I could see were half a dozen posted on the lower end of the spur that cut off the right-hand view, although there may have been one or two others hidden among the boulders on the top of the hill behind me.

  For lack of any better entertainment I was about to tell them of the plunder there might be in Abu Lissan, that being a subject that would have amused them without committing me in any way, when I detected symptoms of excitement among the watchers on the spur of the hill to my right. That could only possibly mean that somebody was coming. The crowd was facing me. I waved my rifle in the direction of the lookout, and they all faced about to see. That gave me time to think, and I thought first of Narayan Singh.

  If anyone except Grim were coming, the Sikh and I were as good as dead men; for visitors would certainly be taken straight to Ibrahim ben Ah’s tent, and you could trust that old opportunist to turn the tables on us promptly at the first chance. We would have to shoot in self-defence, and it would be all over in a minute.

  So it wasn’t the least use speculating on that contingency. The only possible chance of safety lay in the arrival of Grim, and in his being mistaken for Ali Higg. I must bet on that; and being so constituted that I habitually use the last shot as determinedly as the first one, I went the limit.

  “Aho!” I roared. “The Lion of Petra comes! To your camels! I go to tell Ibrahim ben Ah!”

  At the first suggestion of anything doing the Bedouin thinks of his camel in any case. Each man rushed away to where his beast lay hobbled. (They tie a rope around his folded fore-leg after the camel has been made to kneel, and that prevents his getting up until the rope is loosed again.) I jumped off the pile of bags and strode, as slowly as I could contrive in the state of excitement I was in, toward Ibrahim ben Ah’s tent, where Narayan Singh still sat motionless with his back toward me.

  The lookout on the spur began shouting before I was half-way to the tent. I couldn’t hear the words, but the men nearest to them did, and passed the news along. Instantly the bivouac was in an uproar, and camels began rising to their feet in twos and threes and dozens as the hobbles were untied.

  “Akbar Ali Higg!” they roared in greeting. So Grim was coming!

  But as I reached the tent old Ibrahim ben Ah seemed to me to be wearing a rather too confident smile for a man in his predicament. I think he counted on a dozen or more men running to the tent with news, in which case we should be overwhelmed. He probably argued that, in view of Ali Higg’s arrival, we would hesitate to shoot first. “Between promise and fulfilment a man may marry off his ugly daughter” is a proverb with which every Arab in extremity consoles himself; and I knew as well as he did that between the moment of Grim’s turning the corner of the hill and his reaching the tent a hundred things might happen. If we should be
killed in the interval, whether we were the Lion’s friends or not, and whether or not he set high value on us, as dead men we should never be able to explain the incident or deny any made-up yarn of Ibrahim’s.

  So I enlightened him on one point, to begin with. I stood in the tent opening, with my pistol leveled straight at him.

  “What is written is written,” I said, “and none knoweth any outcome before it cometh to pass. But I know this pistol is a good one, and is loaded. If it is written that blood shall flow now, of us three you die first, friend Ibrahim ben Ah!”

  He decided to sit still, luckily for him. But it was an uncomfortable minute. There is nothing pleasant about holding a pistol at an old man’s head, or in the possible necessity to shoot him, for that matter.

  But luckily for us Grim was at the top of his form that morning. He had taken his time about following us across the desert, reserving all his speed for the last lap, when speed and nothing else could count. There wasn’t a chance in a million of his being able to keep up the pretense of being Ali Higg if he lingered among the men, or once came within eye-shot of Ibrahim. He had to pull off one swift, convincing bluff, or else we were all in the discard together.

  I got behind Ibrahim ben Ah, so as to see what was going on without losing the upper hand of him. I touched the back of his head with the muzzle of my pistol, and watched as if Babe Ruth were making a home run.

  Suddenly Grim swooped around the corner at full gallop, followed by Ali Baba and his sixteen rascals with Ayisha in their midst, and I nodded to Narayan Singh to get to his feet, as the bandits shook their rifles in the air and thundered out their greeting:

  “Akbar Ali Higg!”