by Talbot Mundy
To Jimgrim: whose real name, rank, and military distinctions,
I promised never to make public.
Contents
I. "Look for a man named Grim."
II. "No objection; Only a stipulation."
III. "Do whatever the leader of the escort tells you."
IV. "I am willing to use all means—all methods."
V. "D'you mind if I use you?"
VI. "That man will repay study."
VII. "Who gives orders to me?"
VIII. "He will say next that it was he who set the stars in the
sky over El-Kerak, and makes the moon rise!"
IX. "Feet downwards, too afraid to yell"—
X. "Money doesn't weigh much!"
XI. "And the rest of the acts of Ahaziah—"
XII. "You know you'll get scuppered if you're found out!"
XIII. "You may now be unsafe and an outlaw and enjoy yourself!"
XIV. "Windy bellies without hearts in them."
XV. "I'll have nothing to do with it!"
XVI. "The enemy is nearly always useful if you leave him free to
make mistakes."
XVII. "Poor old Scharnhoff's in the soup."
XVIII. "But we're ready for them."
XIX. "Dead or Alive, Sahib."
XX. "All men are equal in the dark."
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"Look for a man named Grim."
There is a beautiful belief that journalists may do exactly asthey please, and whenever they please. Pleasure with violeteyes was in Chicago. My passport describes me as a journalist.My employer said: "Go to Jerusalem." I went, that was in 1920.
I had been there a couple of times before the World War, when theTurks were in full control. So I knew about the bedbugs and thestench of the citadel moat; the pre-war price of camels; enoughArabic to misunderstand it when spoken fluently, and enough ofthe Old Testament and the Koran to guess at Arabian motives,which are important, whereas words are usually such stuff as liesare made of.
El Kudz, as Arabs call Jerusalem, is, from a certain distance, asthey also call it, shellabi kabir. Extremely beautiful.Beautiful upon a mountain. El Kudz means The City, and in acertain sense it is that, to unnumbered millions of people.Ludicrous, uproarious, dignified, pious, sinful, naivelyconfidential, secretive, altruistic, realistic. Hoary-ancientand ultra-modern. Very, very proud of its name Jerusalem, whichmeans City of Peace. Full to the brim with the malice ofcertainly fifty religions, fifty races, and five hundred thousandcurious political chicaneries disguised as plans to save oursouls from hell and fill some fellow's purse. The jailsare full.
"Look for a man named Grim," said my employer. "James SchuylerGrim, American, aged thirty-four or so. I've heard he knowsthe ropes."
The ropes, when I was in Jerusalem before the war, wereprincipally used for hanging people at the Jaffa Gate, after theyhad been well beaten on the soles of their feet to compel them totell where their money was hidden. The Turks entirely understoodthe arts of suppression and extortion, which they defined asgovernment. The British, on the other hand, subject their normalhuman impulse to be greedy, and their educated craving to begentlemanly white man's burden-bearers, to a process of compromise.Perhaps that isn't government. But it works. They even carrycompromise to the point of not hanging even their critics ifthey can possibly avoid doing it. They had not yet, but theywere about to receive a brand-new mandate from a brand-newLeague of Nations, awkwardly q