“Surely.  Remember, Jimgrim, when I climbed the wall of El-Kudz (Jerusalem) to escape from the police!”

“Bring your men into the moat between dark and moonrise.  Have a long rope with you—­a good one.  You and two men climb up here and hide.  The remainder wait below.  Oh, yes; and bring a wheat sack—­a new, strong one.  You may have to wait for several hours.  When you see me, take your cue from me; but whatever happens, no murder!  You understand?  Nobody’s to be killed.”

Ben Hamza grinned and nodded.  He seemed to be one of those good-natured rogues who ask nothing better than the sheer sport of lawless hero-worship.  He would have made a perfect chief of staff for any brigand, provided the brigand took lots of chances.

“You’ll be killed, if anybody finds you up here after dark!  You realize that?”

“Trust me.”

Grim nodded.  He was good at trusting people, when he had to, and when the selection was his own.

“Affairs seem to be drifting nicely,” he said, turning to me.  “It’s best not to let Anazeh know who I am just yet, if that can be helped.  But if you must, when the time comes, you’ll have to tell him.  Do keep him sober.  After the evening prayer there’ll be a banquet; if he gets drunk we’re done for.  I’m going to make you out an awful leper, if you don’t mind.  They may yell for your hide and feathers before I’ve finished, but Anazeh will protect you.  If he leaves the hall in a huff, don’t make any bones about going with him.  Let him ride out of town and wait for me about two miles down the track, at the point where that tomb stands above a narrow pass between two big rocks.  Do you remember it?”

“What if he won’t wait?”

“He must!  Tell him I’ll have a prisoner with me; then he’ll be curious.  But you can bet on old Anazeh when he’s sober.  But things may turn out so that it’s simpler for you to stay and see this through with me.  In that case you must persuade him to go without you, after explaining to him just where he’s to wait.”

“How shall I do that?” I said.  “I haven’t enough Arabic.”

“I’ll write it,” he answered.  “Give me that pencil.”

“Say something, too, then about his keeping sober.”

Grim nodded, and wrote quite a long letter in Arabic on a page of my notebook.

“The next move,” he said, as I pocketed the letter, “is for me to get Abdul Ali’s goat:  I think—­and I hope—­he’ll try to bribe me.  If he does, he’s my meat!  The whole question of raid or no raid hangs on their confidence in him.  If I throw suspicion on him, and he disappears directly afterwards, they’ll abandon the plan, confiscate his goods and chattels, and quarrel among themselves instead of raiding Palestine.  Get me?”

“Um-n-yes.  I’ve sat on a horse I was warned against—­felt safer—­and gone to hospital at that.”

He laughed.