Corsair (44 page)

Hector had fallen in with their plans because, in truth, he was uncertain where his own future lay. He had only his friendship to sustain him, his friendship with Bourdon and Karp, but above all with Dan. So when the three of them spoke of trying to reach the coast beyond Negritia, he had drawn a map, recalling details from the great map of Piri Reis. He had marked as many of the countries as he could remember and added the conjectured course of a substantial river curving through the interior. This river was reputed to join in one direction to the Nile of Egypt, he told his companions, while in the other direction it was known to empty into the sea at a place where the ships of many trading nations came to do business with the natives, carrying away gold, spices, elephants’ teeth and slaves. ‘Where do those ships return?’ Bourdon had asked. ‘From wherever they came – from England, France, Portugal, Spain, Brandenburg. We could take passage aboard them. You could go home to France,’ Hector had replied. ‘Do any of them sail onwards?’ the pickpocket had asked, his finger tracing a course directly out into the ocean. ‘That would take them towards the Americas,’ Hector answered, and his words had decided their mutual fate. With a grimace Bourdon had touched his galerien’s brand and murmured he would never be welcome back in France. Dan announced that he too would prefer to head westward and return to his own people. Finally Hector had looked across at Karp, who had been staring at the map and listening to their discussion. Karp had nodded his agreement without being asked. And so the decision was made.

Hector wiped his face again. He hoped that the ridge ahead of them would be the final one before they came in sight of Oued Noun. That was the name of the oasis which lay on the edge of the desert, according to Roberto. It was the last place where they would see real houses built of brick and stone. Everything beyond was nomad territory where people sheltered under tents. ‘Whatever you do, don’t try to cross the Great Desert on your own,’ the Spaniard had warned. ‘You wouldn’t stand a chance. You have to know the exact direction and distance of each waterhole, and whether you will find water at that particular season and in that year. Sometimes the waterholes fail. If they do, then you perish. Your best chance is to join a coffle, a caravan, which is properly equipped and has a reliable guide. Just hope you find one when you reach Oued Noun.’

Cresting the ridge, Hector found that the land sloped away as a barren, stony, dun-coloured plain dotted with clumps of thorn bushes and an occasional acacia tree. Among the thorn bushes were the ungainly shapes of camels, at least a hundred of them, foraging on the prickly vegetation. Even as he reined in his horse to take in the view, there was a startled shout. A small boy, evidently a camel herd, had been dozing in the shade of an acacia. He sprang to his feet and went running away towards the low roofs of a small settlement in the distance to carry a warning.

Taking care to stay in view they rode forward. At the outskirts of the cluster of flat-roofed mud-brick houses, they dismounted and walked, leading their horses. A reception committee of about a dozen men, traders by the look of them, was already waiting. They were heavily armed and unfriendly looking. Hector noted more armed men lurking in the alleyways behind them. ‘Salaam aleikom,’ he called out, and when he had received the stock response, he added, ‘If you are going south, we would like to join you.’

‘Where are your trade goods?’ demanded the group’s spokesman suspiciously. He was dressed in a faded red burnous, and eyeing the solitary packhorse and the array of weapons that Hector and his companions carried.

‘We have none. We ask only to accompany you,’ Hector replied politely.

‘And for what reason? We have prepared our coffle these past three months, fattened our camels, and shared our expenses. All our arrangements are made. We have no place for extra travellers.’

‘We would be willing to pay our share of any expenses,’ Hector offered. ‘We ask only to be able to ride with you.’

‘On those horses?’ The spokesman gave a sarcastic laugh.

Hector was about to ask whether the coffle would accept an additional payment when there was a stir among the merchants. Several reached hurriedly for their muskets. Out of the corner of his eye Hector detected a movement. He turned to see that Dan had brought his musket to his shoulder, and for a moment he thought the Miskito was about to shoot down the man in the red burnous. Then he saw that Dan was aiming high and to the left. He pulled the trigger. There was a report of the gun, a puff of black smoke, and a vulture which had settled on a nearby roof was thrown bodily backward by the force of the bullet, and fluttered untidily to the ground.

‘Tell them,’ said Dan quietly, ‘that we can protect the coffle from the desert marauders.’

There was a shocked silence from the merchants. Hector repeated Dan’s offer, and they conferred in low voices until their spokesman announced reluctantly, ‘Very well. You may join us, but on condition that you place yourselves wherever you may best protect the coffle, both by day and by night. As for the camels you will need, we have none to spare. You must arrange that with our guide. You will find him over there, by the village well.’

‘A
SSHEADS!
I don’t trust them for a moment. They’d sell their own grandmothers, given half a chance,’ Bourdon muttered angrily as he and the others led their horses in the direction of a herd of camels clustering around a watering trough. Amid the camel dung and smells and the continual bawling, groaning and grunting of the animals, a black slave was hauling a leather bucket up from the well. Hector asked where he might find the coffle’s guide, and the slave nodded towards a nearby thorn bush. Spread across its branches was a tattered scrap of cloth. In front a young man sat cross-legged on the dusty ground. He was bent forward, braiding a new girth to a camel saddle.

As Hector approached, he saw that the young man could not have been more than sixteen years old. He was barefoot and dressed only in a long and ragged gown. His unkempt black hair was so long and stiff and wiry so that it stood out from his head in a great bush. ‘Are you the guide for the coffle?’ Hector asked uncertainly. He spoke in simple Arabic, and the youth raised his head to reveal a cheerfully intelligent face and a ready smile. ‘No, that’s my grandfather. I am only his assistant. My name is Ibrahim.’ Without turning round he called out something in a language that Hector did not recognise. In answer something stirred in the patch of shade under the thorn bush. What Hector had taken to be a bundle of rags proved to be a very old man, who climbed very slowly to his feet and came forward. Great age had so shrunk his frame that he could not have been little more than four feet tall, and he walked with the aid of a stick. Most astonishingly of all, when he came close enough for Hector to look into the lined and weather-beaten face, he saw that both the old man’s eyes were filmed over with a milky glaze. The guide was stone blind.

Hector was about to speak up when, to his surprise, Dan greeted the old man politely. The response was a cluck of pleasure, and for several moments the two men talked together. Then Dan turned to his friend and said, ‘He also is amazigh. He speaks the same language I learned when working in the gardens of Algiers. His accent is difficult but I have been able to explain that we will be joining the coffle as guards.’

‘What was his answer?’

‘He says that he is pleased. We will be acting as an armed escort. There has been much difficulty this year with a people he calls the Tooarick. They live by banditry. He knows we have good muskets for he heard my musket shot. He says it was the sound of a good weapon.’

‘And can he provide camels?’

‘He offers to trade our horses for camels. They can be left behind here, and he has cousins who will come to collect them later. In exchange he will provide us with camels from Talifat – apparently they are famous for their stamina – and supply saddles and teach us how to ride them. Also he will arrange that we have proper clothing for the desert. We must wear loose cotton gowns and cover our heads with cloths to keep off the sun. He says it would also be wise to leave behind our boots and shoes, and wear sandals.’

‘I’m not giving up my boots,’ interrupted Bourdon. ‘Everyone knows that the desert is full of poisonous insects and serpents. I don’t want to get bitten or stung.’

Hector hesitated. ‘Ask him if we can’t keep our horses. We might need them again on the far side of the desert.’

Dan translated his request to the old man and relayed his reply. ‘He agrees that a horse is capable of crossing the desert, but only if accompanied by a camel carrying water. That means six water skins for every horse, plus another camel to carry dried grass, grain and blocks of dried dates as horse feed. Even so, the horse will die if it goes lame, or if the camel falls sick. He recommends we take only camels.’

‘Tell him that we will follow his advice.’

A
WEEK LATER,
with Oued Noun far behind them, Hector was regretting that he had accepted the old man’s counsel. Riding a camel was uncomfortable. The creature’s loose-limbed gait meant that he spent most of each day swaying back and forth awkwardly in an lurching rhythm. If he dismounted to walk beside the animal, he had to beware of the creature’s foul breath and moody temperament. Before leaving the village Ibrahim, the guide’s grandson, had shown them how to make the camels kneel, how to hobble them loosely so they could graze when there was any vegetation, and to tie them more closely by the knee when they camped for the night. ‘Place your trust in Allah, but tie up your camel,’ the young man had joked. But Hector still found the camels to be fractious and awkward to control. He would much have preferred to be mounted on a horse as he tried to ride at the flanks and rear of the coffle in case there was an attack from the mysterious Tooarick of whom the merchants were so fearful. He had expected the caravan to march as a long single column. Instead it advanced on a broad front, walking slowly across the bleak, flat landscape, each merchant and his slaves and servants attending to their own band of camels. Out in front rode Abdullah, the old guide, accompanied by his grandson. Each night when the caravan halted at a waterhole, Hector and the others would join the two amazigh at their campfire. The merchants completely ignored them.

‘My horse could have come this far without any difficulty,’ Hector confided to Ibrahim one evening. It had been natural to strike up a friendship with the cheerful and enthusiastic young man. ‘Each night we have arrived at a waterhole where the animals could drink. My arms are aching from trying to steer my camel in the right direction.’

‘There’s a saying that “the camel driver has his plans – and the camel has his”,’ was the light-hearted reply, ‘and this is only the early stage of our crossing. Later we will find water only every three days, or less often. And there are places where the surface of the desert is dangerous. The ground seems firm and hard, but it is only a thin crust. It gives way suddenly. A horse would break its leg in the hole, but a camel is more flexible. It can be pulled out with ropes, and continue on the journey.’ The young man tossed another dry branch from a thorn bush on to the fire and watched the sparks fly up into the night air. ‘Besides, my grandfather tells me that tomorrow we will have the irifi, the desert wind. He predicts that it will only last a few hours but it will make life difficult for our beasts. You should warn your companions that they will need their sheshs, their turbans.’

The sky dawned an ominous reddish grey. The caravan had barely begun its march when the first puffs of a gentle breeze began to lift the dust and sand into little spirals that skittered and twisted across the ground before collapsing and disappearing. By mid-morning the wind had increased until sand particles were blowing painfully into the men’s faces, making them sneeze and their eyes water. They were obliged to dismount from their camels, wrap cloths about their heads, and plod onward, heads bent low. Beside them the camels walked on, their nostrils narrowed and their eyes half-closed behind their long eyelashes. Until evening the irifi swirled around them, rising in strength to a full gale. Visibility fell to less than twenty paces, and the coffle huddled in a dense mass, fearful of losing touch with one another. A horse in such hostile conditions, Hector reflected, would have refused to advance and turned to stand miserably with its tail against the scouring wind.