The Brides of Solomon by Geoffrey Household

am an old campaigner and I had need of sleep.
What better than to take it, hiding under the bed? Sometimes I heard callers, and once Helena led a woman into the room and sat talking, being careful to wake me up lest I should snore. I did not
care. I fell asleep again. The floor of my own home caressed my body.
    Then John Douaihy arrived. Helena led him to our room so that I might know who had come and that he was unaccompanied. I assure you that he was telling Helena she should not remain alone in the
house.
    ‘God grant you more brains in your fat head, O my father!’ I said to him from under the bed.
    I could only see him from feet to knees. They trembled like those of a Syrian dancing girl. I poked out my head and told him not to be a fool.
    ‘But you killed Zeid,’ he stammered.
    They are a feminine folk, the Arabs. After a while they are taken in by their own lies. By now John Douaihy himself had begun to believe I might be mad—it is possible that he had not
forgiven me the salad—and if Helena had not laughed at him I think he would have backed out of the room. To be giggled over by a daughter—there’s nothing like that for bringing a
man back to common sense.
    Yes. I had killed Zeid, and I told him why. He had only time to lean down—for I was still under the bed—and take my hand between his and promise to tell his people that it was
shameful to hunt a citizen of Ferjeyn, whether mad or not, and that they must not shoot so long as my rifle was slung. And then the gendarmerie were at the door.
    There were two of them. They came with the news that I must be lying up close to or on our mountain. The goatherds of the Jebel Sinjar had seen a man with a rifle hiding among the rocks at dusk
and looking down into the saddle between the main range and the hill of the Christians. It was true that for a few minutes I had been careless. But the first sight of Ferjeyn pastures was full of
emotion.
    All the doors from the guest-hall were open. In so fresh and empty and windswept a house the gendarmes could see at once I was not there. And both Helena and her father were calm. John Douaihy,
from the moment of the knock on the door, had become the dignified headman of his commune. In spite of his appearance the old owl could surrender himself to his feelings like a child. During a mere
five minutes he had been overcome by the demands of terror, of affection, and now of duty. He led the gendarmes away. As a father-in-law he was worth many more civilised. I should like to hold his
hand again.
    I was encircled, M. le Consul. And no means of breaking through. Two Syrian troopers were not much of a force against a sergeant-major, but what about my fellow-townsmen and, beyond them, the
Moslems of the plain? I had no wish to start a battle with either. It looked as if I had only two alternatives: to give myself up or to remain in the house until the search for me slackened. But
the latter was impossible. The oldest of my boys was only seven. At that age children can act a part for a few hours, but not day after day.
    The tactical position was simple enough even for a gendarme. There were a dozen routes by which I could leave my house, but if I went up I must somewhere cross the pastures on top of the hill;
and if I went down I must go through Ferjeyn. So I knew more or less where the pickets would be. True, they were expecting my arrival, whereas I was trying to get away. But that made no
difference.
    I asked Helena to go out at dusk and try to report to me where the gendarmes were and what was the organisation of the people of Ferjeyn. All the same, I had not much confidence. She would be
closely watched for her own safety, or because it might be thought that she was trying to find me.
    ‘That is what I should do,’ she cried. ‘Nothing could keep me from going to find my husband.’
    ‘But he is difficult to find,’ I laughed. ‘Since he ran away from you, he has learned too much from bad