196
CAIRO TO DAMASCUS
I talked it over with Faris that night. Moustafa had entrusted him with six hundred dollars, borrowing from his relatives by pledging them his share of his father's estate. "Give
me £20," Faris said. "I will buy the gun and have it delivered
to Jerusalem."
"A gun is like a suit of clothes," I said. "I must see it and
like it."
The next morning he took me in a taxi to a native quarter,
entered a house and walked through it to a shed in the backyard. Here were all kinds of weapons: I inspected them, but
professed not to like their condition. We took a taxi to a carpenter shop. In the rear were half a dozen Sten guns. I chose
one.
"Eighteen pounds," the gun merchant said, expecting to
get fifteen.
"That is cheap," Faris whispered. "Buy it." He expected a
commission.
"Ten pounds," I offered.
"Sixteen and it is yours."
"Ten," I said.
"It cost me fifteen, I swear by Allah."
"It's worth no more than ten pounds," I insisted, and made
a move to leave.
I finally bought it for eleven pounds.
AT THE MUFTI'S HIDEOUT
"I'LL store this with our other guns," Faris said as soon as we
left the shop.
"I must come with you and store it personally," I insisted.
Faris had brought along a Sten and a revolver. We all got
in a taxi, and laid the armaments on the floor. "Yallah!"
We drove to the outskirts of Cairo. The taxi stopped in
front of a secluded, run-down house buried behind a fence