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 him 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 piastres 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 damned him 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.”
(*Arrangement)
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 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 she would have looked well in the front row of a chorus, by the way, for she had a splendid figure and could show her teeth.)
Narayan Singh returned and sat down beside her. He looked amorous, the ability to do that being part of his equipment as a soldier. His great black beard was a little bit unkempt, and his turban slightly awry, but liquid brown eyes and a flashing smile made up for all that.
“Father of bristles, what do you want?” she demanded; for he sat so close that she had to pay attention to him.
“Sweetheart,” he answered, “you know I have loved you since the moment we first met!”
“As a hog loves truffles!” she retorted.
I thought that was a pretty poor beginning, but Narayan Singh is one of those soldiers who are only spurred to greater daring by defeat in the first few skirmishes.
“Nay, but as the bright sun loves a flower!” he boomed. “Consider destiny, and wonder at it! Here was I born half a world away, hurled into wars and plucked forth with only a wound or two, sent on the wings of fortune into foreign lands and preserved by endless miracles from death and marriage, simply that I might meet thee, O lady with the eyes of a gazelle!”
Experts I have talked with say that all women should be carried by direct assault. I don’t profess to know. But could you make love to a woman that way, with nearly twenty people looking on? Our Arabs had started a game with dice, since the prospect of death had lost immediate interest; but they left off to watch and listen. Realizing that he had an attentive audience, Narayan Singh began to show his real paces.
He did not propose, though, to admit he was a Sikh in that land of Moslem fanatics. Our men all knew his true religion and nationality, but that was no reason why Ayisha should.
“We Pathans,” he boasted, “understand the royal road of love! Our hearts burn within us and our spirits blaze when we at last meet the women of our destiny. And oh! what fortune for the woman who is loved by one of us! For we are men—strong, fiery-blooded men, whose arms are a comfort for our women and a terror to our foes! Hah! Lady Ayisha, smile and bless Allah, who has brought a Pathan of the Orakzai to lay his fortune at your feet!”
“Pig!” she answered. (Possibly she had overheard him say just now that his fortune amounted to nine piastres; that would be, say, forty-five cents at the old rate of exchange.)
“Nay, lady, call me lover! Never was such burning love as mine! You doubt it? For a smile of yours I would pull the King of England off his throne and take the jewels of his crown to make a necklace for you! Behold: we march today against this braggart at Abu Lissan who calls himself the Avenger. A bold one is he? A captain of eight hundred men? What do you covet of his? His ears? His nose? His head—wife for a servant? Say the word and see! Test my love, beloved! Put it to the proof!”
His avowal was saved from entire absurdity by the fact that he had made the same sort of advances to her most of the way from Hebron; so she had a right to consider that he meant it, even if the proposal did not charm. She who had deliberately laid her net for Grim, in a land where all except the properly negotiated marriages are affairs of sudden fancy and violent abduction, could hardly doubt his earnestness. And, as I have said, all she was watching for