POLICE WORK
Having to dress for dinner on a certain evening, I took off my
money-belt, and quite forgot to put it on again. It happened to
contain twelve English pounds. I left it lying on the table in the
hotel bedroom. When I came back in the small hours of the morning it
was gone. Rashîd--who slept out at a khan in charge of our two
horses--came in at eight o'clock to rouse me. Hearing of my loss, he
gave me the worst scolding I have ever had, and then went out to blow
up the hotel proprietor.
It was, for once, a real hotel with table d'hôte, hall-porter, and a
palm-lounge--everything, in fact, excepting drains. The owner was a
fat, brown individual, whom I had generally seen recumbent on a sofa
in his office, while someone of his many sons did all the work. But
that he could show energy upon occasion I now learnt. Hearing from
Rashîd that I, a guest in his hotel, had suffered robbery, he sprang
on to his feet and danced with rage.
When I arrived upon the scene, which was the palm-lounge--an open
courtyard shaded by an awning--he was flourishing a monstrous whip,
with dreadful imprecations, literally foaming at the mouth. I begged
him to do nothing rash, but he seemed not to hear me. With the squeal
of a fighting stallion, he rushed off to the servants' quarters,
whence presently there came heartrending shrieks and cries for mercy.
His sons, in fear of murder, followed him, and added their
remonstrance to the general din. The women of his house appeared in
doorways, weeping and wringing their hands.
Rashîd seemed gratified by this confusion, regarded as a tribute to
our greatness, his and mine.
'Be good enough to go away,' he told me. 'The scene is quite unworthy
of your dignity. I will take care that all is done to raise your
honour.'
I remained, however. Presently, the host returned, perspiring freely,
mopping his brown face with a crimson handkerchief. He smiled as one
who has had healthy exercise.
'It is no use,' he told me, with a shrug. 'I beat them well, and every
one of them confessed that he alone, and not another, was the thief.
Each, as his turn came, wished to stay my hand at any cost.'
He sank down on a sofa which was in the court. 'What further is your
Honour's will?' he asked. 'I will beat anyone. The story is so bad for
the hotel. I should be ruined if it reached the ears of Cook or
Baedeker.'
The cries of those unhappy servants having shamed me, I told him that
I was content to count the money lost rather than that harmless folk
should suffer for my carelessness. Rashîd protested, saying twelve
pounds was no trifle, although I might, in youthful folly, so regard
it. He, as my servant, had to guard my wealth.
'The gold is lost. It is the will of Allah. Let it be,' I answered
irritably.
'Thou wilt not tell the English consul?' cried the host, with sudden
eagerness. 'Thou wilt refrain from saying any word to Cook or Baedeker
to bring ill-fame and ruin on the place? Our Lord augment thy wealth
and guard thee always! May thy progeny increase in honour till it
rules the world!'
'But something must be done,' Rashîd remonstrated. 'A crime has been
committed. We must find the culprit.'
'True,' said the host, 'and I will help with all my strength. The
consul would not help at all. He would but frighten the police, with
the result that they would torture--perhaps hang--a man or two, but
not the man who stole your belt of money. Our police, when not
alarmed, are clever. Go to them and give a little money. They will
find the thief.'
'I go this minute,' said Rashîd.
I bade him wait. Knowing his way of magnifying me and my possessions,
I thought it better to be present at the interview, lest he should
frighten the police no less than would the intervention of a consul.
We went together through the shady markets, crossing here and there an
open space of blinding sunlight, asking our way at intervals, until at
last we entered a large whitewashed room where soldiers loitered and
a frock-coated, be-fezzed official sat writing at a desk. This
personage was very sympathetic.
'Twelve pounds!' he cried. 'It is a serious sum. The first thing to be
done is to survey the scene of crime. Wait, I will send with you a
knowing man.'
He called one of the soldiers, who stepped forward and saluted, and
gave him charge of the affair.
'You can place confidence in him. He knows his business,' he assured
me, bowing with extreme politeness, as we took our leave.
With the soldier who had been assigned to us we sauntered back to the
hotel. The man abounded in compassion for me. He said it was the worst
case he had ever heard of--to rob a man so manifestly good and amiable
of so great a sum. Alas! the badness of some people. It put out the
sun!
At the hotel he spent a long while in my room, searching, as he said,
for 'traces.' Rashîd, the host and all his family, and nearly all the
servants, thronged the doorway. After looking into every drawer, and
crawling underneath the bed, which he unmade completely, he spent some
minutes in debating whether the thief had entered by the window or the
door. Having at last decided for the door, he turned to me and asked
if there was anybody I suspected. When I answered 'no,' I saw him
throw a side-glance at Rashîd, as if he thought him fortunate in
having so obtuse a master. As he was departing, Rashîd, at my command,
gave him a silver coin, for which he kissed my hand and, having done
so, said:
'I know a clever man, none like him for such business. I will send him
to your presence in an hour.'
Three hours passed. I had finished luncheon, and was sipping coffee in
the lounge, when a sleek personage in gorgeous robes was brought to
me. He had a trick of looking down his nose at his moustache, the
while he stroked it, with a gentle smirk.
'Your Excellency has been robbed,' he murmured in a secret tone, 'and
you would know the robber? There is nothing simpler. I have
discovered many thieves. I think it likely that I know the very man. I
will disguise myself as an old woman or a begging dervish. There are
many ways. But, first, your Honour must bestow on me an English pound.
That is my fee. It is but little for such services.'
I answered languidly that the affair had ceased to thrill me; I wished
to hear no more about the money or the thief. He stayed a long while,
wheedling and remonstrating, depicting his own subtlety in glowing
terms; but in the end departed with despairing shrugs and backward
glances, hoping that I might relent.
Rashîd, who had been out to tend the horses, came presently and asked
if I had seen the great detective. When I described our interview, he
nearly wept.
'The people here think me the thief,' he told me. 'They say nothing,
but I feel it in their bearing towards me. And now you give up seeking
for the culprit! Am I to bear this shame for evermore?'
Here was a new dilemma! No way out of it appeared to me, for even if
we did employ the great detective, our chance of finding the
delinquent seemed exceeding small. I was thinking what could possibly
be done to clear Rashîd, when a familiar figure came into the court
and strolled towards us. It was Suleymân! I had imagined him three
hundred miles away, at Gaza, in the south of Palestine. Loud were our
exclamations, but his calm rebuked us. I never knew him show
excitement or surprise.
He heard our story with deliberation, and shook his head at the police
and the detective.
'No use at all,' he scoffed. 'The one man for your purpose is the
Chief of the Thieves. I know him intimately.'
'Ma sh'Allah! Is there then a guild of thieves?'
'There is.'
'The Sheykh of the Thieves must be the greatest rogue. I do not care
to have to do with him.'
'You err,' remarked Suleymân, with dignity. 'Your error has its root
in the conviction that a thief is evil. He may be evil as an
individual; all men are apt to be who strive for gain; but as a
member of a corporation he has pride and honour. With Europeans, it is
just the opposite. They individually are more honourable than their
governments and corporations. The Sheykh of the Thieves, I can assure
you, is the soul of honour. I go at once to see him. He can clear
Rashîd.'
'If he does that, he is the best of men!' exclaimed my servant.
An hour later one of the hotel men, much excited, came to tell me that
some soldiers were approaching, who had caught the thief. The host and
all his family ran out into the hall. Rashîd and all the servants came
from kitchen purlieus. Four soldiers entered with triumphant
exclamations, dragging and pushing forward--Suleymân!
The prisoner's demeanour had its usual calm.
'I have regained the belt,' he called to me. 'These men were watching
near the house, and found it on me. They would not hear reason. The
man who stole the belt--a Greek--has left the city. He gave the Sheykh
the belt, but kept the money.'
The soldiers, disappointed, let him go.
'How dost thou know all that?' inquired their leader.
'The Headman of the Thieves informed me of it.'
'Ah, then, it is the truth,' the soldier nodded. 'He is a man of
honour. He would not deceive thee.'
I do not claim to understand these things. I but relate them.