Fiddler Fair (anthology)

Allenby had convinced himself somehow that Aurens was going to simply, meekly, hand over his conquests to his rightful leader.

Kirkbride had the feeling that Allenby was not going to get what he expected.

Damascus was another Deraa, writ large. Only the Turkish holdings had been looted; the rest remained unmolested. There were no fires, no riots. High-spirited young warriors gamed and sported outside the city walls; inside, a stern and austere martial order prevailed. Even the hospital holding the wounded and sick Turkish prisoners was in as good order as might be expected, for a place that had been foul when the city was in Turkish hands. There was government; there was order. It was not an English order; organization was along tribal lines, rather than rank, to each tribe, a duty, and if they failed it, another was appointed to take it, to their eternal shame. But it was an order, and at the heart of it was the new Arab Government.

Allenby had laughed to hear that, at the gates of the city. As they were ushered into that government’s heart, he was no longer laughing. There were fire brigades, a police force; the destitute were being fed by the holy men from out of the looted German stores, and the sick tended by the Turkish doctors out of those same stores. There were scavenger-gangs to clear away the dead, with rights to loot the bodies to make up for the noisome work. British gold ­became the new currency; there was a market already, with barter encouraged. Everywhere Kirkbride looked, there was strange, yet logical, order. And Allenby’s face grew more and more grave.

Aurens permitted him, and the envoys of the other foreign powers, into his office, commandeered from the former Governor. The aides remained behind. “My people will see to us, and to them,” Aurens said, with quiet authority. A look about the room, at the men in a rainbow of robes, with hands on knife-hilts, dissuaded arguments.

The door closed.

Kirkbride did not join with the others, drinking coffee and making sly comments about their guardians. He had the feeling, garnered from glances shared between dark faces, and the occasional tightening of a hand on a hilt, that all of these “barbarians” knew English quite well. Instead, he kept to himself, and simply watched and waited.

The hour of prayer came, and the call went up. All the men but one guarding them fell to praying; Kirkbride drew nearer to that one, a Circassian as blond as Aurens himself.

“You do not pray?” he asked, expecting that the man would understand.

And so he did. He shrugged. “I am Christian, for now.” He cast his glance towards the closed door, and his eyes grew bright and thoughtful. “But—perhaps I shall convert.”

Kirkbride blinked in surprise; not the least of the surprises of this day. “What was it that the caller added to the end of the chant?” he asked, for he had noted an extra sentence, called in a tone deeper than the rest.

The man’s gaze returned to Kirkbride’s face. “He said, ‘God alone is good, God alone is great, and He is very good to us this day, Oh people of Damascus.’ ”

At that moment, the door opened, and a much subdued delegation filed out of the door. Allenby turned, as Aurens followed a little into the antechamber, and stopped. His white robes seemed to glow in the growing dusk, and Kirkbride was astonished to see a hint of a smile on the thin, ascetic lips.

“You can’t keep this going, you know,” Allenby said, more weary than angry. “This isn’t natural. It’s going to fall apart.”

“Not while I live, I think,” Aurens said, in his crisp, precise English.

“Well, when you die, then,” Allenby retorted savagely. “And the moment you’re dead, we’ll be waiting—just like the vultures you called us in there.”

If anything, the smile only grew a trifle. “Perhaps. Perhaps not. There is wealth here, and wealth can purchase educations. In a few years, there will be men of the tribes who can play the politicians’ game with the best of them. Years more, and there will be men of the tribes who look farther than the next spring, into the next century. We need not change, you know—we need only adopt the tools and weapons, and turn them to our own use. I would not look to cut up the East too soon, if I were you.” Now he chuckled, something that surprised Kirkbride so much that his jaw dropped. “And in any event,” Aurens concluded carelessly, “I intend to live a very long time.”

Allenby swore under his breath, and turned on his heel. The rest, all but Kirkbride, followed.

He could not, for Aurens had turned that luminous blue gaze upon him again.

“Oxford, I think,” the rich voice said.

He nodded, unable to speak.

The gaze released him, and turned to look out one of the windows; after a moment, Kirkbride recognized the direction. East.

Baghdad.

“I shall have need of Oxford men, to train my people in the English way of deception,” the voice said, carelessly. “And the French way of double-dealing, and the German way of ruthlessness. To train them so that they understand, but do not become these things.”

Kirkbride found his voice. “You aren’t trying to claim that ‘your people’ aren’t double-dealing, deceitful, and ruthless, I hope?” he said, letting sarcasm color his words. “I think that would be a little much, even from you.”

The eyes turned back to recapture his, and some­where, behind the blue fire, there was a hint of ­humor.

“Oh, no,” Aurens said, with gentle warmth. “But those are Arab deceptions, double-dealings, and ­ruthlessness. Clever, but predictable to another Arab; these things are understood all around. They have not yet learned the ways of men who call themselves civilized. I should like to see them well-armored, before Allah calls me again.”

Kirkbride raised an eyebrow at that. “You haven’t done anything any clever man couldn’t replicate,” he replied, half in accusation. “Without the help of Allah.”