Grim nudged me sharply in one shadowy place, where the street went down in twenty-foot-long steps between the high walls of windowless harems.  Another narrow street crossed ours thirty feet ahead of us, and our two guides were hurrying, only glancing back at intervals to make sure we had not given them the slip.  The cross-street was between us and them, and as Grim nudged me two men—­a bulky, bearded big one and one of rather less than middle height, both in Arab dress—­passed in front of us.  There was no chance of being overheard, and Grim spoke in a low voice: 

“Do you recognize them?” “I shook my head.

“Scharnhoff and Noureddin Ali!”

I don’t see now how he recognized them.  But I suppose a man who works long enough at Grim’s business acquires a sixth sense.  They were walking swiftly, arguing in low tones, much too busy with their own affairs to pay attention to us.  Our two guides glanced back a moment later, but they had vanished by then into the gloom of the cross-street.

There was a dim lamp at one corner of that crossing.  As we passed through its pale circle of light I noticed a man who looked like an Arab lurking in the shadow just beyond it.  I thought he made a sign to Grim, but I did not see Grim return it.

Grim watched his chance, then spoke again: 

“That man in the shadow is a Sikh—­Narayan Singh’s sidekick—­ keeping tabs on Scharnhoff.  I’ll bet old Scharnhoff has cold feet and went to find Noureddin Ali to try and talk him out of it.  Might as well try to pretty-pussy a bob-cat away from a hen-yard!  Poor old Scharnhoff’s in the soup!”

Quite suddenly after that we reached a fairly wide street and the arched Byzantine gateway of the Haram-es-Sheriff, through which we could see tall cypress trees against the moonlit sky and the dome of the mosque beyond them.  They do say the Taj Mahal at Agra is a lovelier sight, and more inspiring; but perhaps that is because the Taj is farther away from the folk who like to have opinions at second-hand.  Age, history, situation, setting, sanctity—­the Dome of the Rock has the advantage of all those, and the purple sky, crowded with coloured stars beyond it is more wonderful over Jerusalem, because of the clearness of the mountain air.

In that minute, and for the first time, I hated the men who could plot to blow up that place.  Hitherto I had been merely interested.

Because it was long after the hour when non-Moslem visitors are allowed to go about the place with guides, we were submitted to rather careful scrutiny by men who came out of the shadows and said nothing, but peered into our faces.  They did not speak to let us by, but signified admittance by turning uninterested backs and retiring to some dark corners to resume the vigil.  I thought that the Sikh sentry, who stood with bayonet fixed outside the arch, looked at Grim with something more than curiosity, but no sign that I could detect passed between them.