“Jimgrim, the world is full of it!” he answered in English with a laugh.  “But who are these?”

“My friends.”

“Your intimate friends?” Grim nodded.

“The lady as well?” Grim nodded again.

“That is very strong recommendation, Jimgrim!”

Grim introduced us, giving Jeremy’s name as Jmil Ras.

“Hah!  I have heard of you,” said Hadad, staring at him.  “The Australian who wandered all over Arabia?  I am probably the only Arab who knew what you really were.  Do you recall that time at Wady Hafiz when a local priest denounced you and a Sheik in a yellow kuffiyi told the crowd that he knew you for a prophet?  I am the same Sheik.  I liked your pluck.  I often wondered what became of you.”

“Put it here!” said Jeremy, and they shook hands.

For twenty minutes after that Hadad and Jeremy swapped reminiscences in quick staccato time.  It was like two Gatling guns playing a duet, and the score was about equally intelligible to anyone unfamiliar with Arabia’s hinterland—­which is to say to all except about one person in ten million.  It was most of it Greek to me, but Grim listened like an operator to the ticking of the Morse code.  It was Hadad who cut it short; Jeremy would have talked all the way to Damascus.

“And so, Jimgrim, do the kites foregather?  Or are we a forlorn hope?  Do we go to bury Feisul or to crown him king?”

“How much do you know?” Grim answered.

“Hah!  More than you, my friend!  I come from Europe—­London—­Paris—­ Rome.  I stopped off in Deraa to listen a while, where the tide of rumour flows back and forth across the border.  The English are in favour of Feisul, and would help him if they could.  The French are against him and would rather have him a dead saint than a living nuisance.  The most disturbing rumour I have heard was here in Deraa, to the effect that Feisul sent a letter to Jerusalem calling on all Moslems to rise and massacre the Jews.  That does not sound like Feisul, but the French agent in Deraa assured me that he will have the original letter in his hands within a day or two.”

Grim smiled over at Mabel.

“You might show him the letter?” he suggested.

So Mabel dug down into the mysteries beneath her shirtwaist and produced the document wrapped in a medical bandage of oiled silk.  Hadad unwrapped it, read it carefully, and handed it to Grim.

“Are you deceived by that?” he asked.  “Does Feisul speak like that, or write like that?  Since when has he turned coward that he should sign his name with a number?”

“What do you make of it?” asked Grim.

“Hah!  It is as plain as the ink on the paper.  It is intended for use against Feisul, first by making the British suspicious of him, second by providing the French with an excuse to attack him, third by convicting him of treachery, for which he can be jailed or executed after he is caught.  What do you propose to do with it, Jimgrim?”