Jimgrim and Allahs Peace | Page 8

what's this bunk about Americans being welcome anywhere?"

"Perfectly true. All the way from Aleppo down to Beersheba. Men like
Dr. Bliss* have made such an impression that an occasional rotter
might easily take advantage of it. Americans in this country--so
far--stand for altruism without ulterior motive. If we'd accepted the
mandate they might have found us out! Meanwhile, an American is
safe." [*President of the American College at Beirut. Died 1920,
probably more respected throughout the Near East than any ten men of
any other nationality.]
"Then I think I'll go to El-Kerak."
Again his eyes grew speculative. I could not tell whether he was
considering me or some problem of his own.
"Speaking unofficially," he said, "there are two possibilities. You might
go without permission--easy enough, provided you don't talk
beforehand. In that case, you'd get there and back; after which, the
Administration would label and index you. The remainder of your stay
in Palestine would be about as exciting as pushing a perambulator in
Prospect Park, Brooklyn. You'd be canned."
"I'd rather be killed. What's the alternative?"
"Get permission. I shall be at El-Kerak myself within the next few days.
I think it can be arranged."
"D'you mean I can go with you?" I asked, as eager as a schoolboy for
the circus.
"Not on your life! I don't go as an American."
Recalling the first time I had seen him, I sat still and tried to look like a
person who was not thrilled in the least by seeing secrets from the
inside.
"Well," I said, "I'm in your hands."
I think he rather liked that. As I came to know him more intimately

later on he revealed an iron delight in being trusted. But he did not say
another word for several minutes, as if there were maps in his mind that
he was conning before reaching a decision. Then he spoke suddenly.
"Are you busy?" he asked. "Then come with me."
He phoned to some place or other for a staff automobile, and the man
was there with it within three minutes. We piled in and drove at totally
unholy speed down narrow streets between walls, around blind
right-angle turns where Arab policemen stood waving unintelligible
signals, and up the Mount of Olives, past the British military
grave-yard, to the place they call OETA.* The Kaiser had it built to
command every view of the countryside and be seen from everywhere,
as a monument to his own greatness--the biggest, lordliest, most
expensive hospice that his architects could fashion, with pictures in
mosaic on the walls and ceilings of the Kaiser and his ancestors in
league with the Almighty. But the British had adopted it as
Administration Headquarters. [*Headquarters: Occupied Enemy
Territory Administration.]
All the way up, behind and in front and on either hand, there were
views that millions* would give years of their lives to see; and they
would get good value for their bargain. Behind us, the sky-line was a
panorama of the Holy City, domes, minarets and curved stone roofs
rising irregularly above gray battlemented walls. Down on the right
was the ghastly valley of Jehoshaphat, treeless, dry, and crowded with
white tombs--"dry bones in the valley of death." To the left were
everlasting limestone hills, one of them topped by the ruined reputed
tomb of Samuel--all trenched, cross-trenched and war-scarred, but
covered now in a Joseph's coat of flowers, blue, blood-red, yellow and
white. [* This is no exaggeration. There are actually millions, and on
more than one continent, whose dearest wish, could they have it, would
be to see Jerusalem before they die.]
There were lines of camels sauntering majestically along three hill-tops,
making time, and the speed of the car we rode in, seem utterly unreal.
And as we topped the hill the Dead Sea lay below us, like a polished
turquoise set in the yellow gold of the barren Moab Mountains. That

view made you gasp. Even Grim, who was used to it, could not turn his
eyes away.
We whirled past saluting Sikhs at the pompous Kaiserish entrance gate,
and got out on to front steps that brought to mind one of those glittering
hotels at German cure-resorts--bad art, bad taste, bad amusements and a
big bill.
But inside, in the echoing stone corridors that opened through Gothic
windows on a courtyard, in which statues of German super- people
stared with blind eyes, there was nothing now but bald military
neatness and economy. Hurrying up an uncarpeted stone stairway
(Grim seemed to be a speed-demon once his mind was set) we followed
a corridor around two sides of the square, past dozens of closed doors
bearing department names, to the Administrator's quarters at the far end.
There, on a bare bench in a barren ante-room, Grim left me to