“If it weren’t for that harem habit of his,” said Grim, “some acquaintances of his would have blown up the Dome of the Rock about this time tomorrow.  As it is, they won’t get away with it.  Suliman came and told me one day that his mother was carrying food to Scharnhoff, taking it to a little house in a street that runs below the Haram-es-Sheriff.  I looked into that.  Then came news that two tons of TNT was missing, on top of a request from Scharnhoff for permission to go about at night unquestioned.  After that it was only a question of putting two and two together—­”

“Plus Narayan Singh,” said Goodenough.  “I still don’t see, Grim, how you arrived at the conclusion that Scharnhoff is not guilty of the main intention.  What’s to prove that he isn’t in the pay of Mustapha Kemal?”

“I’ll explain.  All Scharnhoff cares about is some manuscripts he thinks he’ll find.  He thinks he knows where they are.  The Chronicles of the Kings of Israel.  I expect he tried pretty hard to get the Turks to let him excavate for them.  But the Turks knew better than to offend religious prejudices.  And perhaps Scharnhoff couldn’t afford to bribe heavily enough; his harem very likely kept him rather short of money.  Then we come along, and stop all excavation—­cancel all permits—­refuse to grant new ones.

“Scharnhoff’s problem is to dig without calling attention to what he’s doing.  As a technical enemy alien he can’t acquire property, or even rent property without permission.  But with the aid of Suliman’s mother he made the acquaintance of our friend Noureddin Ali, who has a friend, who in turn has a brother, who owns a little house in that street below the Haram-es-Sheriff.”

“Strange coincidence!” said Goodenough.  “It’ll need a better argument than that to save Scharnhoff’s neck.”

“Pardon me, sir.  No coincidence at all.  Remember, Scharnhoff has lived in Jerusalem for fifteen years.  He seems to have satisfied himself that the Tomb of the Kings is directly under the Dome of the Rock.  How is he to get to it?  The Dome of the Rock stands in the middle of that great courtyard, with the buildings of the Haram-es-Sheriff surrounding it on every side, and hardly a stone in the foundations weighing less than ten tons.

“He reasons it out that there must be a tunnel somewhere, leading to the tomb, if it really is under the Dome of the Rock.  I have found out that he went to work, while the Turks were still here, to find the mouth of the tunnel.  Remember, he’s an archaeologist.  There’s very little he doesn’t know about Jerusalem.  He knows who the owner is of every bit of property surrounding the Haram-es-Sheriff; he’s made it his business to find out.  So when he finally decided that this little stone house stands over the mouth of the tunnel, all that remained to do was to get access to it.  He couldn’t do that himself, because of the regulations.  He had to approach the Arab owner secretly and indirectly.  That’s where Suliman’s mother came in handy.