that if they were given money they could easily hire Damascenes to do
the dagger work, there being, as the sahib doubtless knows, a common
saying in these parts about Damascus folk and sharp steel. Whereat
Yussuf Dakmar suddenly assumed a sneering tone of voice, saying that he
preferred men for his part with spunk enough to do such work themselves,
and there was an argument, they protesting and he mocking them, until at
last this man, whose neck the glass cut, demanded of him whether he,
Yussuf Dakmar, was not in truth an empty boaster who would flinch at
bloodshed.

"He seemed to have been waiting for just that, sahib, for he smirked and
threw a chest. 'I am a man,' said he, 'of example as well as precept.
I have done what I saw fit to do! I make no boasts,' said he, 'for a
man who talks about himself sets others talking, and there are deeds
creditable to the doer that are best not spoken of. But I will tell you
other things, and you may draw your own conclusions.

"'Because Feisul refuses to attack the French, having promised those
promise-breakers that he will not; and because Feisul has promised to
protect the Jews and is likely to try to keep that promise to the
promise-breaking English, certain of his intimates in Damascus, in whose
confidence I am, have determined to force both issues, taking steps in
his name that will commit him finally. Feisul's army of fifty thousand
men is as ready as it will ever be. There is no money in the Damascus
treasury, and therefore every moment of delay is now a moment lost. The
time has come for action!'"

Our three prisoners were listening to the recitation spellbound, and so
were we all for that matter. The mere memory feat was amazing enough.
Few men could listen in hiding to a stranger's words, and report them