The Seventeen Thieves of El-Kalil/Chapter 6

IEWED in the light of what subsequently happened it seems possible that Grim’s whole plan might have ended in disaster, if at that critical moment circumstances out of his control had not shaped themselves to aid him. But after a deal of blundering and being blundered up and down the world’s by-ways I have learned and know by heart now these two fundamentals: there is nothing so unprofitable as to speculate in terms of “might have been;” and fortune favors the man who favors fortune.

That last sounds like heresy, or one of those Delphic deliveries that can be read in any of a dozen ways. Well, so it is and so it can be. All accepted doctrine was heresy at some time; and since no two men are quite alike, no two interpretations match exactly. If you call fortune “luck,” luck is a chancy entity, and you will govern yourself and be governed accordingly.

I have heard of Washington and Lincoln both described as lucky, yet take leave to doubt that either of them gave a fig for luck. Both men, according to my reading of events, were fortunate. Fortune is fair and absolute and kind and generous. They favored her and so she favored them. In all the intimate and various relations that I had with Grim he never once referred to luck in terms of envy or esteem, but very often did describe himself as fortunate. Luck was the other fellow’s talisman—the enemy’s; fortune, his.

When luck came his way he laughed and mistrusted it. On the other hand, when fortune met him in the way he seemed to know the lady at the first glance, which is a rather rare advantage and accounts, I suspect, for some men being senators while others clean the streets.

So, as the old tale craftsmen used to phrase it in the days when men thought more and squandered less, it fortuned that those camel-men returned from Jerusalem while we were entering the Mosque of Abraham. They went first to the Governorate and it fortuned that de Crespigny advised them to keep the camels until morning for their better convenience in spreading the news. So they lost no time; and being Hebron men with an inborn understanding of the city’s ways, they came straight to the Haram where they felt sure in a time of excitement of finding the greatest possible number of men assembled in one place.

They gave their news to the crowd outside and entered the mosque by the south door exactly at the moment when the Sheikh at the opposite end turned into the center aisle with his mind made up to ascend the pulpit and tell his story of having seen a vision.

So he waited until they had done unburdening themselves of tidings to the swarm that closed around them. An Arab would rather have news to tell than a bellyful, and he likes his meal at that; so the two men made quite a ceremony of it, neither of them feeling inconvenienced or disappointed by being the center of attention. You could hear every word as they made the most of brief importance; and they were not unconscious of the obligation they owed to be accurate, since it was no small honor to have been selected to be witnesses of grave events.

“The story of a massacre by Jews is not true. There has been fighting. The Jews started it by insulting Moslems. A few were killed. Many hundred of both sides have been wounded. But the troops are now in control. There are barriers across the streets. The city gates are shut. We saw the administrator and he assigned an officer to show us all we cared to see. The Moslem holy places are intact and guarded by British troops.

“We asked the administrator whether troops would be sent to Hebron and he said no, there was no need; but we think that is because there are no troops that can be spared. He said there are plenty of troops, but we did not believe him; there are enough to hold the city quiet but no more. It is our belief that there is no further danger of the Jews massacring Moslems in Jerusalem. Moreover, that administrator is a man to be reckoned with, with whose wrath it is not wisdom to take chances.”

Grim began whispering to the Sheikh, who was stroking that sacerdotal beard of his in a conflict of emotions. It was a serious enough crisis in his affairs, for if he should give the wrong advice or make the unacceptable statement at that moment it was likely his own influence would be gone forever, and possibly the salaried position with it. It was by Grim’s urging that he mounted the ancient pulpit—a marvel of a thing, made of Cedar of Lebanon for a Christian bishop in crusader times.

We three squatted in darkness by the wall and watched him. I thought Grim looked worried. The worst kind of fool on earth and the likeliest to make irreparable blunders is the man who is thinking of his own position first, as that Sheikh was undoubtedly. He stood stroking his beard, sharp-eyed and hook-nosed as an eagle, peering this and that way into all the shadows until the crowd became aware of him and spread itself to squat down on the mats to listen to him.

There is a peculiar democracy about the Moslem faith. Their whole law is religious, and they recognize no other legislation if they can help it. Once let him convince them that a given course is indicated in the Koran and any one can do almost as he likes with them. Anyone can get a hearing; but they usually concede to their appointed officials the right to speak first, after which they are ready to argue endlessly, so that the first speaker does well to be primed with something solid that can stand the devastating discussion which is sure to follow.

The Sheikh was an old hand at making an impression. He let the silence settle down and grow intense before he spoke and then began acridly with an accusation.

“Ye listen to this and that man and the latest comer has your ear. The wind brings dust and ye call that news. A camel coughs in the suk, and ye say a prophet speaks. The breath of your mouthings fills the air like bad smells from a dung-heap, and ye call that wisdom. Ye pray, and to what end? That your vain imaginings may take form. Ye ask Allah, the all-wise, to change the universe to suit your foolishness, imagining that fools are competent to give advice to the Creator. It is written that the fool shall rue his folly, and the headstrong man shall dread the day of reckoning!”

He had their attention pretty thoroughly by that time, for nothing takes hold of the mind of a crowd so quickly as a string of platitudes, especially when they sting. Flattery is the weapon for the demagogue who seeks to stir a crowd to action; if he would rather hold them and win delay, a dozen acid generalities about their sins work wonders. But those are rules that all the mob-leaders understand.

“While ye looked for wisdom in the cesspools,” he went on scornfully, “I turned to the Book. And while I read and prayed there came an angel and I saw a vision—here in this place where the footstep of the Prophet is imprinted in the stone on which he stood. Here above the tomb of Abraham I saw a true vision!”

There was silence for a moment in which you could hear one man cracking the joints of his toes nervously. Then a voice cried out that Allah is all- powerful, and one after another repeated it until they were all chanting the first principles of Moslem faith, whose repetition seems to prepare them to believe anything—do anything—submit to anything.

“God is God. There is no God but God. Mahommed is his prophet.”

The great roof hummed with the chant for about two minutes, until it suddenly occurred to them that they had not heard the details of the vision yet, and they ceased as suddenly as the frogs cease piping when a stone is thrown into the pond.

“The angel who appeared to me was angry. I was afraid and my bones shook,” the man in the pulpit snarled; for he was one of those who take religion without sugar and grow nasal as they speak of sacred things. “He told me that the fire that came forth from the tomb of Abraham is in the hands of thieves, who took it in order to stir strife against the Jews. Because they are thieves,” said he, “they are unfit to return it; yet unless it be returned there will be a judgment on El-Kalil. So I laid my forehead on the floor and prayed to know by whose hand that fire may be returned, that the city may be saved from judgment. And he said, ‘Lo: against the Jews it was taken. Therefore let the Jews return it and they shall save themselves. For a day and a night let them have time given them; and if they return it, well, they have saved themselves and are reprieved. For a day and a night let not a Jew in El-Kalil be slain. But if they do not return it, then shall their blood be on their own heads.’

“Then the angel left me and my strength returned so that the bones of my legs no longer shook; but for a little while my eyes were still dazed by the brightness, so that I could neither see nor grope my way. After certain minutes my sight came again and then I lost no time, but came hither; and now ye know the vision I have seen. I have not kept it secret from you. As for him who chooses not to listen, let his blood be on his head. My hands are henceforth clean in this matter.”

“For a leader he’s easily led,” Grim whispered. “But for a liar he’s not half bad. Now if Ali Baba ben Hamza has only done his end of the talking too, we ought to manage nicely. Drat him! Is he going to read to them? This session’ll last all night if we don’t look out.”

░ THE Sheikh had opened a great illuminated copy of the Koran and was turning over the pages in search of some passage that would suit the occasion. But just as he began to roll his tongue around the opening syllables the south door opened and a man called into the mosque that the fire-gift was about beginning.

That was too much for the congregation. It was like announcing to a Sunday school that the circus was outside. Perhaps they would have sat still if the vision he had told of had not been related to the fire-gift. As it was they rose like one man and surged through the door to see this thing again that caused so much concern among the angels. We followed at the tail of the procession.

But it was hopeless to try to see from the steps. The men in front had been forced forward by those behind, who now blocked the door and stood jammed like herrings, while the men below tried to regain the vantage of the steps for a better view.

“Follow me!” said Grim suddenly and led us at a run back into the mosque, where we overtook the Sheikh at the north end and were just in time to get out through a side door after him before he locked it. Grim seemed to know the way perfectly, for he did not hesitate but led across a small court, and making use of a buttress in a corner climbed up on a wall built of gigantic blocks of dressed stone. It was three feet wide on top, and at the end of thirty yards or so it gave us a perfect view of the court of the Haram and the crowd that milled below.

That was a sight worth seeing, for the fitful light of two oil lanterns shone on a sea of savage faces and, except where an occasional lantern swung in a man’s hand, the rest was all black shadow. It was as if the night had a thousand heads. Not one body was visible from where we stood. Countless faces swam in a sea of darkness. And presently they sang, as the men of El-Kalil have always done when more than a dozen of them get together.

It would have been effective singing anywhere, at any time. The tune was as old as El-Kalil, which was a city in the time of Abraham. One man sang the words of a song that had no rhyme, but only a wavering, varying meter; and whenever they thought he had trolled out enough of it they suddenly thundered out the same refrain, bowing their heads together like pouter-pigeons making love. And the least apparent thing was its absurdity. It was the heart of El-Kalil responding to the voice of ages plucking at the strings of memory and stirring the racial passion.

That night I almost understood the ancient curse, or blessing—whichever it is—that has lived with the Arabs since Hagar, their first mother, was driven forth into the desert to face the fruits of jealousy alone. You can’t explain the Arab in any other way. In his heart and generally near enough the surface is the sense of being heir to the wrongs of ages, and a sort of joy in outlawry as birthright. It lives in his scant music, in the primitive, few measures of his dance, in his poetry, in his nomadic instinct; and it comes to the surface at the least excuse or without any, whenever a crowd gathers—simple, savage, manly, not easy to condemn.

The song was beginning to get dangerous. The desert centuries have taught the Arab that beauty and peace are but oases in the midst of cruelty; and just as he must leave the place of meditative calm to strive against hot winds and drought and bitterness before he can rest again, so his mind moves swiftly from delight in beauty to the thought of cruelty and death.

But a path was cleft suddenly down the midst of the sea of faces like the winding, narrow channel of black water when the ice breaks up in Spring; and down the middle of that came Ali Baba, prancing with his skirts tucked up and followed by his sixteen sons. Each one of them breathed orange-colored flame out of his mouth at intervals and danced between-whiles, swaying to right and left to belch fire at the crowd and frighten them.

It was weird—astonishingly well-staged. You could only see arms, legs, bodies for a moment when the fire flashed; then the velvet darkness of the night between walls swallowed all but faces that milled and surged as if borne on an inky river.

The seventeen thieves passed swiftly, too well-versed in the lore of trickery to give spectators time for keen inspection. They vanished through the outer gate into the night and the gap closed up behind them. Then the song began again, starting this time on the theme of blood and sacrifice. Swords began to leap out and a roar went up from the outer circles of the throng that gained in volume as infection grew, and at the end of about two minutes some one with a bull’s voice thundered:

“Now for the Jews! In the name of Allah, kill the Jews!”

“To the sword with them in the name of Allah!” another yelled from the darkness just below us. And a pause followed, of sudden, utter silence. They were wondering. They had heard strange things that night and seen strange sights. The yeast of uncertainty was working.

Then Grim took a long chance. We were thirty feet above them out of reach and there were no stones they could have flung; but the risk was infinitely greater than that. If he failed to touch the right chord of emotion; if he said the wrong word or overplayed the right appeal; if one ill-considered phrase should seize their fancy and fire imagination to take flight in violence, or one careless hint spur resentment, they would surge out of the Haram like a flood. The Governorate would be the first point of attack; then the Jews; then, perhaps, when the looting was over there would be a march on Jerusalem and a mess midway to the tune of stuttering machine guns.

Grim’s voice broke the silence like a prophet’s; for you have to speak in measured cadence if you hope to make an impress on the Moslem mind when the wild man heritage is uppermost and fierce emotion sways him. They could see only the outline of his figure against the deep purple setting of the stars and in those Arab clothes he looked enough dignified to be a true seer. Cohen and I drew away from him to give him the full dramatic force of loneliness.

“Brothers! The bones of Abraham lie under us. It is written that ‘They plotted, but Allah plotted and of plotters Allah is the best.’ When Abraham went forth to war with kings, he waited for the word that should send him forth, and he took no share of the plunder, lest one should say an enemy and not Allah had enriched him. Who are ye but sons of Abraham?

“We have heard and seen strange things this night,” continued Grim. “And it is written, ‘When ye prided yourselves on your numbers it availed you nothing.’ Is it wiser to be headstrong at the bidding of the rash or to wait for the appointed time and see? For all is written. ‘Who shall set forward by an hour the courses of the stars or change the contour of the hills or postpone judgment?’ Allah ykun maak!”

He had struck the right note. He had them. A murmur of low voices answered him and though the words were hardly audible the purport was plain; it was something about Almightiness and Allah. You can not separate the Moslem from his fatalism and it works either way, making him fierce or meek according to circumstance and the method of appeal. Unless some unexpected incident should occur to change their mood again it was likely they would cut no throats that night.

But the risk entailed by lingering another minute on the scene would have been deadly. Questions and answers might have produced the very spark needed to fire them to fanatical zeal again. The cue was to disappear at once, leaving the dramatic effect at its height and there was only one way to do that.

Black shadow lay behind us and beneath. I could just make out a suggestion of something solid that might be a roof and might not, but there was no time for investigation. Grim seemed to step off the wall into nothing and the darkness swallowed him. I jumped and Cohen lay down on the wall and rolled off, clinging to the edge with both hands.

░ THAT wasn’t a roof. Grim had landed feet-foremost on a lower wall that met ours at right angles and it was the shadow cast by that that looked like something solid. I fell for a life-time, wondering what death would be like when the earth should rise at last and meet me, and was disgusted—disappointed—maddened when the end came.

They cover up the water as a rule in Hebron; but that stone tank was open and the green scum floated on it inches thick. There were long green slimy weeds that clung and got into your mouth and eyes and if the water of the Styx tastes worse than that I’d rather live in this world for a while yet.

But it was not all bitterness. There was Cohen. He had to jump, too; and when I had scrambled out I told him all about it and then waited until his fingers lost their hold on the wall and he came catapulting down for his green bath just as I had done; and he liked it even less. He made remarks in Yiddish that I couldn’t understand and refused to apologize for having splashed me.

Then Grim came, cool and dry, having found some goat’s stairway down to terra firma.

“Both alive?” he asked. “Well—what’s the general impression? What do you think of it all?”

“Me?” said Cohen. “Think? God damn it all! I’ve got to follow them thieves down into Abraham’s cave or bust with curiosity!”

“You’ll bust then, for it can’t be done!” said Grim.