O Jerusalem - Laurie R. King [97]
I was halfway through our conversation with the abbot when Mahmoud abruptly interrupted with a loud question about the price of a mare in Nablus. When I hesitated, Ali stepped in with a comment about her cracked hoof, and then I heard the footsteps on the stairs. In came fragrant rice and new bread, lamb cooked tender with onions, nuts, and some tangy green leaf, little bowls of chopped salads as garnish, with fresh tea to slake our thirst and a pot of coffee to follow. We fell silent while applying ourselves to the serious business at hand.
Afterwards, Mahmoud poured out the coffee and set a plate of sticky sweetmeats in the middle of the carpet. He handed cups to Ali, then Holmes, and finally to me: This was the first time he had given a drink into my hand instead of laying it on the carpet in front of me. I met his eyes, nodded my acknowledgement, and sipped the tepid liquid with gratitude.
Ali sucked the honey from his fingers, then wiped them delicately on his robe. “Why do you think all this adds up to a false monk with a bomb?” He did not bother to conceal the doubt in his voice.
“It is the only theory which fits all the facts,” Holmes answered.
“Which facts are those?” Mahmoud asked.
“You’ve seen them. The Jaffa murders, Mikhail’s death and possibly that of the false mullah, Mikhail’s missing notebook, the candle in his pack and the salt smuggler’s odd customer, the attempt to torture information out of me, the widespread rumours that keep General Allenby busy, the strange visitor at Wadi Qelt, and the missing habits of the monks.”
“They are not necessarily related,” Mahmoud objected mildly. ”Strange things happen all the time here. You do not know the country, it all looks odd and probably sinister to you.”
“The country I know marginally; the criminal mind I know very well indeed.”
“Criminal mind,” Ali said with a snort.
“You do not believe that there is a threat,” Holmes said coldly.
“Threat? There is always a threat. This is a land of threats and blood feuds, your eye for mine, your brother to avenge my father.”
“And the ambush?”
“Oh, that was political, certainly. But Allah alone knows what the aim was.”
“And my… interrogation?”
“That was no interrogation,” Ali nearly shouted. “There are those in this country who do that sort of thing for pleasure, don’t you understand that, you stupid man?”
“Using insult instead of argument is the sign of a small mind,” Holmes said in a dangerously low voice.
“I apologise. But I do not see—”
“You do not, no. But you,” Holmes said, turning to Mahmoud, “you, I think, have your doubts.”
“ ‘Only God is sure,’ ” Mahmoud said after a minute. “But you may be correct. There may indeed be some sort of bomb plot in the works. However, it is unlikely to be immediate; we have heard nothing at all while we have been in the city.”
“What about the watchmaker, the one whose advertisement was in the papers you found?” I asked him. The ornate golden watch on Ali’s wrist was still not keeping time, but that did not mean they had not been to the watchmaker; as far as I could tell, he wore it solely as an ornament.
“He seems merely a businessman. We are having him followed.”
“General Allenby’s visit to Jerusalem is in little more than two weeks,” Holmes said half to himself.
“It has been moved forward to this weekend,” answered Ali, reaching forward for the beaker of coffee to pour himself another cup.
“What? In three days?”
“That is correct. I believe he—”
“But why? Why has he changed his plans?”
“He does not inform us of his reasons; one has learnt merely to be grateful for any prior notice.”
“Are the rest of his intentions the same?” Holmes asked. “Meeting with a few religious leaders, a tour of the Western Wall, the Temple Mount, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and then a gathering at Government House?”
“I believe so, although I suppose he will also go to a church service in the morning, he usually does, and he will probably have less formal conversations with the governor,