”Allah ysabbak bilkhair! (God give you a happy morning!)” the old Arab began as soon as he could get a word in.
”Ahlan wasah’lan! (A thousand times welcome!)” said de Crespigny. “What is it, Yussuf?”
“You young men go! Go to your mothers! Go home and marry wives!”
“Why this sudden interest in our future, Yussuf?”
“It is not sudden. I am an old man, and have seen many young men die. I have yet to see the good that came of killing them. Go home.”
“Men die when their time comes,” said de Crespigny. “Moreover, they don’t marry wives in my land until the woman is willing. I’ve got no money and the girls won’t look at me.”
“It is not good to answer with jests when an old man speaks in earnest. I, who must see death soon in the natural course of things, advise you as a father speaking to his sons. Go home. It is better to beget sons than to die young.”
“You old raven! What are you croaking about?”
The Arab stroked his gray beard and thought a minute before he answered. Then:
“I have seen the blood flow in the runnels of the streets of El- Kalil like red storm-water. I was here when the Turks took vengeance on the city for certain matters. I have seen the seven districts of the city at war with one another and the executions afterwards. All those are as nothing in comparison to what comes! It is written that not one Jew shall remain alive in El-Kalil!”
“Any date to that prophecy?” asked de Crespigny quite calmly.
“They are whetting the swords now!”
“They’ll have us to reckon with before they begin on the Jews.”
“Truly, my son. Therefore go, before the sacrifice begins! What can you few do against so many? Can you send for help? I think not. I am told the wire is cut. Could a horseman or man on foot get through to Jerusalem alive? Not he! They would let you escape, but not your messenger; and if you stay, you die!”
“Supposing I chose to run away, they’d be fools to let me,” de Crespigny answered. “There’d be lorry-loads of Sikhs here two or three hours after I reached Jerusalem.”
“And the Sikhs will bury the dead Jews! Listen, my son. You British are not Turks. Who in this place is afraid of British vengeance, after living under the Turk’s heel so many years? The Sikhs will come and shoot a handful. There will be a trial, at which every witness will tell lies. Those who have the fewest friends will be convicted; some will be hanged and some imprisoned. For four thousand Jews slain will forty Moslems hang? Better go before the sacrifice begins!”
“You go back into the city,” said de Crespigny, as calmly as if he were ordering the streets cleaned, “and tell your friends this: There’s only one authority in this place, and that’s me! Say they have me to deal with before they can start on the Jews!”
“You and these few and ten policemen!” The old Arab smiled and spread out his hands in a gesture of something like despair. “They will go first to the jail, pillage it and set the prisoners free. Next they will come here, for there are rifles here and cartridges. In less time than the muezzin needs to cry his summons they will slay you and take the rifles. After, the Jews! And after that, if it is written that the Sikhs shall come, then that is written, and who shall stay the hand of God?”
“Go and tell them to come here first before they try the jail,” said de Crespigny calmly. “That is all I have to say. Go and tell them.”
”Allah ysallmak! (God save you!)” said the Arab sadly.
”Allah yihfazak! (God keep you!)” de Crespigny replied, and the old man turned and went.
“Doc,” said de Crespigny, turning toward the Scotsman, “there are two camels outside. Better take them. Put Miss Gordon on one and you and she make a break for Jerusalem. This situation looks none too good.”
Doctor Cameron laughed dryly, wrinkling up his eyes as he looked keenly at each of us in turn. He was a big man, with a powerful head and a firm, good- tempered mouth under a scraggly gray moustache. He looked like an old soldier, but had never actually worn any other uniform than the mask and apron of the operating-room.
“Five-and-twenty years I’ve been here,” he replied. “Can you see me running away?”
“But the nurse—Miss Gordon?”
“She’s a fine girl. She’ll stand by. Ask her if you’d rather. I’ll not interfere.”
“Better send her to this place, then.”
“You young Hector! She’s safer in my hospital. They’ll do no murder there; we’re far too useful to them. I stood by them through the war as a Turks’ prisoner; they’ll remember that. There’s hardly a man in Hebron hasn’t been to me for help at one time or another. But what do you lads propose to do?”
“Brazen it out,” said de Crespigny.
“You’ll need all your brass, I’m thinking.” He looked hard at Jones. “That boy’s in no fit state to give the best that’s in him. I brought my bag with me. Let me see that lower jaw.”
He took Jones’ head in capable, enormous hands and tilted it toward the light.
“Open. Wider. Um-m-m! Sit on that stool. Reach me the bag, de Crespigny.”
He unwrapped a lancet and a pair of ugly forceps, then got behind Jones and gripped his head firmly between his knees.
“By rights ye ought to have an anaesthetic for a job like this, but your mother had to endure a lot worse when ye came into the world. We’ll see if you’re half as good a man as your mother. Now!”
It was a bloody business and not convenient to watch, but we all looked on like spectators at a play, pretending not to feel the skin creep up our spines. It was several minutes before the last piece of a broken tooth was tossed into the brass basin that a servant brought.
“Now lie down. If I ever meet your mother I’ll tell the lady that her labor was worthwhile. Ye’ll feel finely by and by. He might have an ounce or two of whisky.”
He wrapped up his tools, turned down his shirt-sleeves, and started for the door.
“If I can be of any further use, my boys, ye’ll know where to find me. The best advice I can give is, always let the Arab know you’re not afraid of him, and make him suspect ye’ve something in reserve. And by the way—ye’d better all join me at the hospital, if things look too bad. I think the rascals will respect that place. There’ll be bad news from Jerusalem before night or my name isn’t Cameron.”
De Crespigny glanced swiftly at Grim. Grim nodded. That was puzzling, for there had been no signs of disturbance that I could see when we came away that morning.
Cameron jerked his head and snapped his fingers in the doorway. “They’d never talk so bold here if they didn’t know of trouble brewing in Jerusalem to keep the troops occupied,” he said, and strode out as if any sort of trouble were the merest commonplace.
I found it utterly impossible, sitting in that quiet room, to believe that we were in imminent danger; but that may have been because I had no official job to lose if everything should go wrong. A man doesn’t fear for his life as a rule until the raw facts stare him in the face; it is economic and administrative problems that cause terror in advance. I thought that even Grim, who hardly ever shows more emotion than the proverbial red Indian in times of stress, looked serious.
And