How about you, Mabel ?" "What d'you mean, Jim ?" "Do you know a woman in Haifa ?" "Of course I do." "Well enough to expect a bed for the night at a moment's notice ?" "Certainly." Mabel's eyes were growing very bright indeed.

It was her husband who looked alarmed.
"Well, now, here's the point." Grim leaned back in his chair and lit a cigarette, not looking at anybody, stating his case impersonally, as it were, which is much the shrewdest way of being personal.
"Feisul's up against it, and he's the best man in all this land, bar none.

They've dealt to him from a cold deck, and he's bound to lose this hand whichever way he plays it.

To put it differently, he's in check, but not checkmated.

He'll be checkmated, though, if the French ever lay hands on him, and then good-bye to the Arab's chance for twenty years.
"I propose to save him for another effort, and the only way to do that is to convince him.