Adventure, February 20, 1922 — page 39: what you’re looking at

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

The Seventeen ‘Thieves of El-Kalil - conceal himself. After that, though, he took to hiding behind rocks and running forward in spurts when he dared. But all that trouble turned out to be unnecessary, for before long we saw all eighteen men disappear behind a scrawny olive-tree in ~ such extraordinary fashion that a cave at that spot was the only possible explanation. It was two thirds of the way up the op- posite hill, about a mile, or something less, from where we watched. So the policeman shooed me off the roof as if I were a goat out of bounds—grumbled at me for taking so much time on the ladder and at the old dame downstairs for not having breakfast ready for us—dnd panted behind me down the hill with a running comment on the weight of .his rifle and the absurdity of racing when a sensible man might walk. He was a perfectly good police- man, raised in the don’t-do-it school, and faithful as an old work-horse, with a horse’s sense of what is due him on the grades. We found Grim waiting for us behind a big rock and when the Arab had recovered breath enough to swear with we got orders to engage. “Can you see the back of a man’s head just beyond the olive-tree? No, not that; that’s a hawk feeding; look ten feet to the left. There. See him move? Mahommed ben Hamza keeping lookout. Never oc- curred to the fool to look this way, or he’d have seen you two experts ppaceawring! Now there’s just a chance ‘they’ll prove ugly. One of us may go West this trip. Spread, and come on them from three sides; then if they cut up rough there’ll be at least one of us to break back with the news. I'll snoop up this side and approach first. You two get over the brow of the hill and watch what happens to me. Reenforce me as required or when I beckon.” So we made a short circuit and ran and lay a hundred yards apart on top of the hill, The policeman raised his rifle and as soon as Grim caught sight of it he left cover and walked straight forward, singing a shepherd song. But quite as clearly as Grim’s voice I could hear the drumming of an airplane flying low from the direction of Ludd; and the man outside the cave was watching that intently, so that he neither saw nor heard Grim until he was close up. The plane circled twice ovér Hebron and departed. Grim went closer and spoke. ‘I couldn’t hear what he said, but Mahom- * - . . . - i, PS _ _ ~ a ~ é - . = ~ - . —_ ~ ‘at .* med at the-cave-mouth jumped and then | put his hands up. Grim ordered him down — into the cave and beckoned to us. I did not know until then that Grim had as much — as a pistol with him. The cave was the usual thing. All that country is full of caves and every one of thém has been a sepulcher until another generation or any army came and robbed it. There was a low, hewn entrance that you © had to stoop to get by, and a short dark you could imagine anything you liked. You ee | passage with a sharp turn, beyond which S could enter at your peril; a man couldn’t | re: possibly defend himself in the gut where the - passage turned. “They know now who’s here,” said Grim. “I’m going to take a chance. They’ve had time to make their minds up. You’d better — = stay outside.” But I had not had that run on an empty stomach just to cool my heels outside a cave and told him so. “All right,” he laughed. We'll leave Mustapha.” “Suit yoursele But the policeman wouldn’t hear of it either and got point-blank mutinous. He asked what sort of figure he would cut going | back to the Governorate to report that we had had our throats cut while he looked on. - He said he did not mind getting killed, since that was likely toehappen just now at any time, and demanded to go in first. So Grim let him fix his bayonet and follow me, with — strict orders not to start anything unless _ we were attacked first. : And after all that fuss there was not any opposition, although there well Might have been. where all eighteen men sat solemnly around | a lighted candle. tarboosh wrapped in calico—looked like a lunatic. knees—and two of the sons—the giant and the fellow with the long arms—were sitting — one on either side of him, leaning inwards, with the obvious purpose of seizing him if he tried to move. re looking devil. He had a lean, mean face with scars on it and loose lips iike’a an animal’s that seemed to have been given him for the purpose of hurling-in- _ centive language at a crowd; they made = + comic IOOKS They had taken his long knife _away—old Ali Baba had it laid across his Twenty feet beyond the turn thee passage opened into an egg-shaped cave, _ \] I HAVE never seen a moreferocious- — ‘- The eighteenth—he of the 2 + io hi, rt ; 5 ay to } hg ite Be a 4h ad : aceagey — Gee fg th Be + At We a at » 4 - < 4 oe é AAR apa? Behe q hed Y » HAs ; bit bis - . ~— = oto 8 OS ” oa Rae 4 @ —