Lost trumpet

THE LOST TRUMPET
6?
waiter. And up in Transjordan he punched the
head of a British sub who had hit an orderly. . . .
And I must say the orderly was only getting what
was coming to him.,,
I followed out this circumlocution, but it lessened
the puzzle of Marrot but little. I had not associated
such passionate humanitarianism with his cold,
sardonic being. “Surely this is no part of the
orthodox Marxian creed ?”
“Communism ? Oh, he’s a communist more
from sentiment than economics, I guess. Best
archaeologist in the Near East—if only he’d give
himself to the job in hand. His failing is that he
lacks a purpose.”
“Eh ?”
“A purpose. Colonel. If he could see through the
fogs of time and circumstance the real purpose he’s
intent on he’d make it bald-headed though it cost him
his life.”
Subchapter Hi
South we went towards Abu Zabal, past deserted
Helmieh and its lost block-houses in the sand, into
that quiet, pale country on the desert fringe, flat and
sad and steaming a little, with its squares of fields
vanishing to right and left in the haze, and the mud-
walled villages creeping up from each horizon in a
glitter of white mosque and dovecote. Near ’Ain
the lorry stopped to provide leisure for the labourers
to descend and lunch. We saw the halted dot two