to the common level and are
known from Spitzbergen to the Horn.

"He is no liar!" he exclaimed in Arabic. "A cunning man with the
brain of three, who can use the truth for his own ends! A keeper
of secrets! An upsetter of plans! But he is no liar, and I will
not hear him called one by a woman! Peace, thou fool! It is
written that a woman's tongue is worse than water dripping
through a roof!"

It is manners in that country to sit silent while an old man
speaks, and even Jael Higg did not offer to rebuke him for the
interruption. When he had quite finished Grim took up the
argument again.

"Now let's know where we stand. Are you and I to be friends, Jael?"

She nodded.

"I'm no half-way adventurer. I'll make your fortune," she said,
"if you'll come the whole way with me, and stay this side
of Jordan."

He shook his head and smiled back at her.

"You've your work cut out to keep Ali Higg off the rocks, Jael."

"There's no room for two of you," she answered darkly.

"I guess not."

She looked hard at me, and back from me to Grim. I don't know
yet whether she was setting a trap for us or really in earnest
about what she said next. Grim thinks she was drawing a bow
at a venture.

"Is this the _hakim?_ One of the two respectable persons you have
with you? Hm! Respectability is a mask--often a safe mask, often
an offensive one, always a lie. All really dangerous criminals
are respectable people.

"And a _hakim,_ eh? An Indian physician? I have heard of Indian
physicians being poisoners--although, of course, they're
respectable people and give the poison by mistake! Now if he
should go to Ali Higg and poison him, while pretending to cure
boils and indigestion--"

"But he won't," said Grim, "so why suppose?"

"Of course he won't, unless you tell him to!" she snapped.

"I dare say he's as much in your power as I am. But suppose you
tell him to--"

"I won't, Jael."

"Now don't you be a fool, James Grim! You can't deceive me into
thinking you're above such things. That haughty attitude is
British, not American; you've been defiled by contact with
them. Come out into the open like an unhypocritical American.
Talk business.

"I've tried to make a man of Ali Higg, but he's only an animal
after all. The best I can ever do with him will be failure
compared to what I could make of you, James Grim. You look enough
like him to make it possible to substitute you with care. Go
ahead and send your _hakim."_

Gr