him stolidly endeavouring over a drink to explain the inexplicable.
He ate a dish of eggs in the canteen, and then took his seat in the back of an open truck with three British constables of the Palestine police who were returning to Jerusalem from escort
duty.
Their conversation startled him. The contrast between these bitter mercenaries and his late companion in the fifteen-hundredweight was depressing. That driver believed in nothing, but hated
nothing; he had the resignation, the inner discipline of the soldier, and an appreciation of vitality and comedy wherever they might be. The police loathed both their service and Palestine. Indeed,
Prayle suspected, they would have loathed anywhere but the suburbs of a large town.
His comments and questions could never elicit what they did appreciate, never once during the whole journey. When the road passed through Qiriat Mozkin, lined on both sides by Jewish light
industries, there was not a word of interest in the passion that had made toothpaste and textiles grow in the desert, only stories of the gangsterism of Jewish labour. At Jenin, sore and scowling,
they laughed in the faces of the passing Arabs. In lovely Nablus they told how the police had at last taught the army to put down the Arab rebellion by bothering no longer with the laws of
evidence. Their windy epic of patrol, assassination and reprisal showed that at least they admired the desperate courage of their leaders. Over the hills where the Kings of Judah and Israel had
carried on their private warfare, they cursed the fields, windswept and glorious to Prayle, because they were not green; and at the sight of Jerusalem, tip-tilted towards the traveller from the
north so that the roofs and streets within the walls were defined as in a medieval map, they damned its opportunities and longed for the stews of Tel Aviv where in the tactful control of vice or
traffic a man could make a bit of money.
Much of their talk Prayle discounted—after all, a first sight of Jerusalem would soon cease to be any more enthralling than a sight of Manchester—but he was weary of their hatred of
the Jews, the more remarkable since all three of them appeared to have Jewish mistresses, and of their contemptuous liking for the Arabs. Lord! And the whole world was open to the humble!
The police dropped Sergeant Prayle in Allenby Square, and directed him to the Field Security Office. The sun had gone down behind the tall, stone houses. The pale and very distant sky, ringed
with clouds on the horizon, seemed to give out a soft wind that blew from no definite quarter. His first impression of Jerusalem was that the English, shamed by the Holy City into thinking, had
been inspired to control and design beauty of architecture that they had not produced in their own country for a hundred years. His second impression was that he felt remarkably well. That, he
reflected, might be the cause of a few thousand years of trouble. Too many people had felt too full of beans.
Prayle entered the billet. The was a light in the section officer’s room. In the main office there was no one but a Scots sergeant sitting in front of a typewriter and fighting with a
ferocious black kitten. Prayle introduced himself and asked for the sergeant-major.
“The sergeant-major is in Tel Aviv, and we are careful not to disturb him in his meditations,” said the sergeant sardonically. “It’s myself and the skipper do the
work.”
“His nibs very busy too?” asked Prayle, nodding to the kitten.
“His nibs is providing me with diversion while I wait for the skipper to complete his weekly report,” said the sergeant. “As nothing whatever has happened, he will be thinking
up a few dir-rty cracks for the amusement of a headquarters that verra strongly appreciates us both.”
Sergeant MacKinnon rose majestically from his typewriter, deposited the kitten in the waste-paper basket and put his head through the officer’s door.
“Will ye hold the
He ate a dish of eggs in the canteen, and then took his seat in the back of an open truck with three British constables of the Palestine police who were returning to Jerusalem from escort
duty.
Their conversation startled him. The contrast between these bitter mercenaries and his late companion in the fifteen-hundredweight was depressing. That driver believed in nothing, but hated
nothing; he had the resignation, the inner discipline of the soldier, and an appreciation of vitality and comedy wherever they might be. The police loathed both their service and Palestine. Indeed,
Prayle suspected, they would have loathed anywhere but the suburbs of a large town.
His comments and questions could never elicit what they did appreciate, never once during the whole journey. When the road passed through Qiriat Mozkin, lined on both sides by Jewish light
industries, there was not a word of interest in the passion that had made toothpaste and textiles grow in the desert, only stories of the gangsterism of Jewish labour. At Jenin, sore and scowling,
they laughed in the faces of the passing Arabs. In lovely Nablus they told how the police had at last taught the army to put down the Arab rebellion by bothering no longer with the laws of
evidence. Their windy epic of patrol, assassination and reprisal showed that at least they admired the desperate courage of their leaders. Over the hills where the Kings of Judah and Israel had
carried on their private warfare, they cursed the fields, windswept and glorious to Prayle, because they were not green; and at the sight of Jerusalem, tip-tilted towards the traveller from the
north so that the roofs and streets within the walls were defined as in a medieval map, they damned its opportunities and longed for the stews of Tel Aviv where in the tactful control of vice or
traffic a man could make a bit of money.
Much of their talk Prayle discounted—after all, a first sight of Jerusalem would soon cease to be any more enthralling than a sight of Manchester—but he was weary of their hatred of
the Jews, the more remarkable since all three of them appeared to have Jewish mistresses, and of their contemptuous liking for the Arabs. Lord! And the whole world was open to the humble!
The police dropped Sergeant Prayle in Allenby Square, and directed him to the Field Security Office. The sun had gone down behind the tall, stone houses. The pale and very distant sky, ringed
with clouds on the horizon, seemed to give out a soft wind that blew from no definite quarter. His first impression of Jerusalem was that the English, shamed by the Holy City into thinking, had
been inspired to control and design beauty of architecture that they had not produced in their own country for a hundred years. His second impression was that he felt remarkably well. That, he
reflected, might be the cause of a few thousand years of trouble. Too many people had felt too full of beans.
Prayle entered the billet. The was a light in the section officer’s room. In the main office there was no one but a Scots sergeant sitting in front of a typewriter and fighting with a
ferocious black kitten. Prayle introduced himself and asked for the sergeant-major.
“The sergeant-major is in Tel Aviv, and we are careful not to disturb him in his meditations,” said the sergeant sardonically. “It’s myself and the skipper do the
work.”
“His nibs very busy too?” asked Prayle, nodding to the kitten.
“His nibs is providing me with diversion while I wait for the skipper to complete his weekly report,” said the sergeant. “As nothing whatever has happened, he will be thinking
up a few dir-rty cracks for the amusement of a headquarters that verra strongly appreciates us both.”
Sergeant MacKinnon rose majestically from his typewriter, deposited the kitten in the waste-paper basket and put his head through the officer’s door.
“Will ye hold the
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