Adventure Magazine Cover — page 50: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

44 snoops around; for another, they'll be de- lighted not to have to let the French agent at Deraa into the secret, because oi the higher price they hope to get by holding on. They'll smuggle it over the border and not open it until they feel safe.” “Ves, but when they do look at it,” said I. ‘“‘We’ll be over the border, and they can’t send telegrams to anywhere.” “Why not?” “An Arab government precaution. If station-agents all along the line, were allowed to send telegrams every seditious upstart would take advantage of it and they’d have more trouble than they’ve got now. But I warn you fellows, after Deraa— somewhere between the border and Damas- cus—there’ll be a fight. The minute they discover that the letter is a fake they’ll come for the real one like cats after a canary.” “Let ’em come!” smiled Jeremy, but Grim shook his head. “I’ve been making that mistake too long,” he answered. ‘‘No defensive tactics after we leave Deraa! We’ll start the trouble ourselves. You watch, after Deraa the train crew will play cards in the caboose and leave Allah to care for the passengers.” “There’s only one thing troubles me,” said Jeremy. “What’s that?” “Narayan Singh got Yussuf Dakmar’s shirt night before last. I’ve had it in for Yussuf ever since we Anzacs went hungry on account of him. Any one who scuppers him has got to beat me to him. He’s my meat, and I give you all notice!” It isn’t good to stand between an Anzac and the punishment he thinks an enemy deserves. “All the same,” Grim answered, smiling, “Tl bet you you don’t get him, Jeremy.” “Pll bet you. How much?” “‘Mind you, when the game begins, you lave a free hand,”’ Grim went on. ‘All right,”? answered Jeremy, who loves freak bets, “if I get him you quit the army, soon as this job’s done and join up with Rammy and me: if I don’t I'll stay and help you on the next job.” ‘“That’s a bet,” said Grim promptly. So Jeremy went forward to play at being traitor, while Narayan Singh and I kept Mabel company. She fired questions at us right and left for twenty minutes, which we had to answer in detail instead of strain- ing our ears to catch what Grim and Jeremy Adventure might be saying to Yussuf Dakmar in the next compartment. Whatever they did say, they managed to prolong the interview until within ten minutes of Deraa, when the Syrian returned to his companions smiling smugly and Nara- yan Singh strode after him, to stand in the corridor and by ostentatiously watching them prevent their examining the letter. Grim and Jeremy, all grins, joined us at once in Mabel’s compartment. “Did you see the devil smirk as he went off with itr’ asked Jeremy. ‘‘Golly, he thinks we’re fools! The theory is that we two have betrayed you, Rammy, and swapped the letter against his bare promise to pay us in Damascus. He chucked in a little blackmail about sicking his mates on to murder us if we didn’t come across and I tell you we fairly love him! Lordy, here’s Deraa! If they open the thing before the train leaves, Grim says the lot of us are to bolt back across the border, send Mabel home to her husband, and continue the journey by camel. That right, Grim?” Grim nodded. It was Mabel who objected. ‘“T’m going to see this through,” she an- swered. ‘‘Guess again, boys! My hair’s gone gray. You owe me a real adventure now, and I won’t give up the letter till you’ve paid!” We had one first-class scare when the train drew up in the squalid station, where the branch line to Haifa meets the main Hedjaz Railway and the two together touch a mean town at a tangent; for a French officer in uniform boarded the train and stalked down the corridors staring hard.at every one. He asked me for a passport, which was sheer bluff, so I asked him in turn for his own authority. He smiled and pro- duced a rubber stamp, saying that if I wished to visit Beirut or Aleppo I must get a visé from him. “Je men bien garderail’”’ I answered. “I’m going to see my aunt at Damascus.”’ “And this lady? Is she your wife?” I laughed aloud—couldn’t help it. All the Old Testament stories keep forcing themselves on your memory in that land, and the legend of Abraham trying to pass his wife off as his sister and the three-cor- nered drama that came of it cropped up as fresh as yesterday. There was no need that I could see to repeat the patriarch’s mis- fake, any: more than there was reasonable basis for the Frenchman’s impertinence. MICLOOOK ial C©