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Updated: June 8, 2025
Right there in the very jaws of death, within a mile of the lair of Ali Higg, in possession of two of the tyrant's wives, with an army at our rear that might at that minute be following old Ali Baba into the gorge to cut off our one possible retreat, he told them the old tales that Arabs love, and soothed them as if they were children.
We had all her baggage, for one thing, and it represented more wealth than any Bedouin woman would let go willingly. Now if she were to reverse what she had said, and refuse to advertise Grim as Ali Higg, these five men and probably others would surely denounce her to her real husband. She had no choice. But she was sharp-witted, and made the most of the situation even so.
What tickled their fancy most was Ali Baba's cleverness in egging on Ayisha to advertise Grim as Ali Higg. Again and again on the march that day, in spite of the grilling heat, and thirst and flies, they burst into roars of laughter over it, chaffing Ayisha's four men unmercifully.
"Lo, the good camels! It was easy to make a wide circuit, and reach this place a day ahead of me; but what is Your Honor's purpose? What do you want with me, O Lion of Petra?" "Nevertheless," said Grim, "I am not Ali Higg, who styles himself Lion of Petra." "Is that not the lady Ayisha?" he retorted. "True, I have only seen you in the dark, but have I not seen her at the least ten times?
"You're on the wrong side of the wall to build much," she answered. "You should come over into our camp. You're so like Ali Higg in certain lights and in some of your gestures, and so unlike him in other things, that if you came across the Jordan for good I think you could show us something." Her eyes said far more than her lips did.
I gave her my name, you comprehend, in exchange for her own odious one. She was Miss Higg. Do you know the family Higg of Manchesterre in the comte of Lancastre? She was then a person of a ripe age. The Vicomtesse is now ah! it is fifteen years since, and she dies not.
You've got it all fixed up between yourselves to stick with me until Ali Higg is mafish* and then bolt for the skyline with the plunder. Not a bit of use arguing I know. You shouldn't talk your plans over in coffee-shop corners if you don't want me to hear of them." * Lit., nothing corresponds to "na-poo" in Army slang. "Jimgrim, you are the devil!" "Maybe. But let's understand each other.
And more and more frequently as the song grew lurid and they warmed to the refrain they made their point by changing the third Akbar into Jimgrim: "Akbar! Akbar! Jimgrim Ali Higg!"
He tried to see how much more he could impose on the Sikh, and suggested such matters as pitching tents, cooking, gathering firewood, cleaning pots and pans, leading the pack-camels, and a host of other necessary evils. "I shall issue all needful orders to each man," Grim told him bluntly at last. "And what is to be done to Ali Higg?" "That remains to be seen." "He is a devil with a cold face."
The surest sign that Ali Higg was either over-confident or seriously engaged elsewhere was that there was no guard in the ravine. Ten men properly placed could have destroyed us. Even the great Alexander of Macedon could not force that gorge, and suffered one of his worst defeats there.
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