violence without risk of incurring it.

So Yussuf permitted a rumour to gain ground that he, too, was a
malcontent and that the British had deserted his coffee shop for
that reason. He gave out that Djemal Pasha's name over the door
stood for reaction and political intrigue. So his place began to
be frequented by effendis in tarboosh and semi-European clothes,
who could chew the cud of bitterness aloud between walls that the
crusaders had built four feet thick. The only entrance was
through the narrow front door, where Yussuf inspected every
visitor before admitting him.

So Yussuf's "Cafe Djemal Pasha" was the place to go to for
politics, of the red-hot, death-and-dynamite order that would
make Lenin and Trotsky sound like small-town sports. But first
you had to get by Yussuf at the door.

Suliman led me by the hand down David Street, through the smelly-
yelly moil of flies and barter, past the meat and vegetable
stalls, beneath the crusader arches from which Jewish women
peered through trellised windows, across three transversing lanes
of the ancient suku,* and halted at Yussuf's door. [*Bazaar]

He rapped on it three times. When Yussuf's wrinkled face
appeared at last Suliman demanded to see Staff-Captain Ali Mirza.
Yussuf's blood-shot eyes peered at me for a long time before he
asked a question.

"Atrash!--akras!--majnoon!!" [Deaf!--Dumb!--Mad!!] said Suliman.
Describing me as mad seemed to give him particular delight. He never
overlooked a chance of doing it.

"Staff-Captain Ali Mirza is not here. What should a Madman want
with him?"

"He is not very mad--only stupid. He carries a message for
the captain."

"But the captain is not here. He has not been here."

"He will come."

"How should a deaf-and-dumb man deliver a message?"

"It is in writing."

"Very well. He may leave the writing with me. If the captain
comes I will deliver it."

"No. The message is from Esh-Sham (Damascus). He will give it
only into the captain's own hand."

"What is your name?"

"Suliman."

"What is his?"

"God knows! He came with another man by train; and the other
man, who is much more mad than this one, gave me five piastres to
bring this one to your kahwi!" [Coffe-pot]

Yussuf shut the door, and discussed the proposition with his
customers. At the end of two or three minutes his head
appeared again.

"You say Staff-Captain Ali Mirza is expected here?"

"So said the man at the station."