Part 18 (2/2)

'That's all right,' said Sandy 'My fellows are on the stair and at the gate If the Metreb are in possession, you may bet that other people will keep off Your past is blotted out, clean vanished away, and you begin toot to thank for that He was pretty certain you'd get here, but he was also certain that you'd arrive in a hurry with a good ed that you should leak away and start fresh'

'Your name is Richard Hanau,' Blenkiron said, 'born in Cleveland, Ohio, of Gerineers, and the apple of Guggenheim's eye You arrived this afternoon from Constanza, and I met you at the packet The clothes for the part are in your bedroouess all that can wait, for I'et to business We're not here on a joy-ride, Major, so I reckon we'll leave out the di to hear them, but they'll keep I want to kno our ave Peter and ars, and we sat ourselves in ared on the hearthrug and lit a foul old briar pipe, which he extricated froan that conversation which had never been out of in,' said Blenkiron, 'it's because I reckon entlemen, that I have failed'

He dren the corners of his mouth till he looked a cross between a music-hall co for soe, you wouldn't want to scour the road in a high-speed autoet a bird's-eye view in an aeroplane That parable about fitson the pikes, but what I anting was in the ditch all the ti stunt, Major I was too high up and refined I've been processing through Europe like Barnuenerals and transparencies Not that I haven't picked up a lot of noos, and got so I was after wasn't to be found onto tell In that kind of society they don't get drunk and blab after their tenth cocktail So I guess I've no contribution toSir Walter Bullivant's ht Yes, Sir, he has hit the spot and rung the bell There is afloated in these parts, but the pro in round-floor'

Blenkiron stopped to light a fresh cigar He was leaner than when he left London and there were pouches below his eyes I fancy his journey had not been as fur-lined as he , and that is, that the last dream Germany will part with is the control of the Near East That is what your statesiuive up the road to Mesopotamia till you have her by the throat and ht-eyed citizen, and he sees it right enough If the worst happens, Kaiser will fling overboard a lot of ballast in Europe, and it will look like a big victory for the Allies, but he won't be beaten if he has the road to the East safe Ger's in her tail, and that tail stretches way down into Asia

'I got that clear, and I alsoto be dead easy for her to keep that tail healthy Turkey's a bit of an anxiety, as you'll soon discover But Gere it, and I won't say she can't It depends on the hand she holds, and she reckons it a good one I tried to find out, but they gavebut eyewash I had to pretend to be satisfied, for the position of John S wasn't so strong as to allow hihbrows he looked wise and spoke of the anization and Geret enthusiastic about these stunts, but it was all soft soap She has a trick in hand-that much I know, but I'm darned if I can put a name to it I pray to God you boys have been cleverer'

His tone was quite lad He had been the professional with the best chance It would be a good joke if the amateur succeeded where the expert failed

I looked at Sandy He filled his pipe again, and pushed back his skin cap froh-boned face, and stained eyebrows he had the appearance of soht to Smyrna,' he said 'It wasn't difficult, for you see I had laid down a good many lines in former travels I reached the town as a Greek money-lender from the Fayum, but I had friends there I could count on, and the saipsy, a me been a member, and I'm blood-brother of the chief boss, so I stepped into the part ready made But I found out that the Company of the Rosy Hours was not what I had known it in 1910 Then it had been all for the Young Turks and reforime and was the last hope of the Orthodox It had no use for Enver and his friends, and it did not regard with pleasure the beaux yeux of the Teuton It stood for Islaht be described as a Conservative-Nationalist caucus But it was uncommon powerful in the provinces, and Enver and Talaat daren'tabout it was that it said nothing and apparently did nothing It just bided its tiine that this was the very kind of crowd for my purpose I knew of old its little ways, for with all its orthodoxy it dabbled a good deal in ic, and owed half its power to its atmosphere of the uncanny The Companions could dance the heart out of the ordinary Turk You saw a bit of one of our dances this afternoon, dick-pretty good, wasn't it? They could go anywhere, and no questions asked They knehat the ordinary ence department in the Ottoman Empire-far better than Enver's Khafiyeh And they were popular, too, for they had never bowed the knee to the Ne out the life-blood of the Osmanli for their own ends It would have been as much as the life of the Committee or its Gerether like leeches and ere not in the habit of sticking at trifles

'Well, you ine it wasn't difficult for me to move where I wanted My dress and the pass-word franked me anywhere I travelled froot there just before Christmas That was after Anzac and Suvla had been evacuated, but I could hear the guns going hard at Cape helles Fro steaot torpedoed

'It must have been about the last effort of a British subave us ten hted old packet and a fine cargo of 6-inch shells to the bottoet ashore in the shi+p's boats The sub us, as ailed and howled in the true Oriental way, and I saw the captain quite close in the conning-tower Who do you think it was? Tommy Elliot, who lives on the other side of the hill froave Tommy the surprise of his life As we bumped past him, I started the ”Flowers of the Forest”-the old version-on the antique stringed instru the words very plain Tolish to knoho the devil I was I replied in the broadest Scots, which no man in the submarine or in our boat could have understood a word of ”Maister Tammy,” I cried, ”what for wad ye skail a dacent tinkler lad intil a cauld sea? I'll gie ye your kail through the reek for this ploy the next tiaither wi' ye on the tap o' Caerdon”

'Tohed till he cried, and as we e to ”pit a stoot hert tae a stey brae” I hope to Heaven he had the sense not to tell my father, or the old man will have had a fit He never ht I was safely anchored in the battalion

'Well, to ot to Constantinople, and pretty soon found touch with Blenkiron The rest you know And now for business I have been fairly lucky-but nonor anything like it But I've solved the first of Harry Bullivant's riddles I know the ht, as Blenkiron has told us There's a great stirring in Isla on the face of the waters They ious revivals come in cycles, and one was due about now And they are quite clear about the details A seer has arisen of the blood of the Prophet, ill restore the Khalifate to its old glories and Islas are everywhere in the Moslem world All the orthodox believers have the poverty and preposterous taxation, and that is why their youngwithout complaint in Gallipoli and Transcaucasia They believe they are on the eve of a great deliverance

'Now the first thing I found out was that the Young Turks had nothing to do with this They are unpopular and unorthodox, and no true Turks But Germany has How, I don't know, but I could see quite plainly that in soarded as a collaborator in the i The ordinary Turk loathes the Committee, but he has some queer perverted expectation fro on their shoulders the unpopular Teuton; it is a case of the Teuton carrying the unpopular Coof the new deliverer

'They talk about the thing quite openly It is called the Kaaba-i-hurriyeh, the Palladium of Liberty The prophet himself is known as Zimrud-”the Emerald”-and his four ministers are called also after jewels-Sapphire, Ruby, Pearl, and Topaz You will hear their naes as you will hear the naland But no one knehere Zih every week caes to the faithful All that I could learn was that he and his folloere co from the West

'You will say, what about Kasredin? That puzzled me dreadfully, for no one used the phrase The Holand soht call itself the Church of Christ Only no one seemed to use it

'But by and by I discovered that there was an inner and an outer circle in this mystery Every creed has an esoteric side which is kept from the common herd I struck this side in Constantinople Now there is a very famous Turkish shaka called Kasredin, one of those old half-co which they call orta oyun, and which take a week to read That tale tells of the co of a prophet, and I found that the select of the faith spoke of the new revelation in ter is that in that tale the prophet is aided by one of the feoy of Islam That is the point of the tale, and it is partly a jest, but ious mystery The prophet, too, is not called Emerald'

'I know,' I said; 'he is called Green his pipe drop in the fireplace

'No on earth did you find out that?' he cried

Then I told them of Stumm and Gaudian and the whispered words I had not beenme the benefit of a steady stare, unusual from one who seemed always to have his eyes abstracted, and Sandy had taken to ranging up and down the room

'Gerht If we're to find the Kaaba-i-hurriyeh it is no good fossicking a the Committee or in the Turkish provinces The secret's in Germany dick, you should not have crossed the Danube'