The Gobi Desert (9 page)

The Gobi Desert! In nine years of military life in the country east of Lake Baikal, I had heard the name mentioned more than once. In Sakhalin the prisoners lowered their voice when talking about it, at first so as not to appear to be planning an escape; and later, quite simply out of fear, since the most terrible stories about the Gobi were constantly going round. Those unfortunates who, out of despair or hopelessness went off into the desert, were in no danger of being recaptured, and for good reason. The taiga, the deadly forests of Manchuria, were like a holiday camp in comparison.

For me, any mention of the desert brought to mind the mournful, ghost-like caravans, which in the past I had seen arriving, either in snow storms or in sand storms, at Chita, which had been my first garrison. Somnolent men, gigantic camels with shaggy woollen manes, all laboured and sagged into the middle of the market square. Not a word or a moan. Nothing except wide-eyed looks indicating a sort of dark terror, a gloomy reflection of the hell from which they had just escaped.

‘Don't worry, you are among those of us who know it best,' replied Sanders when I confessed my ignorance of the frightening country which we were about to enter. ‘None of our Koreans has ever set eyes on it, nor for that matter has Ilichine. Welowski, who used to boast about having been there before, now seems much less sure of himself, now that we are ready to get down to work. That leaves Neratov. You never know with him. And he has the merit of not being boastful. I'm not talking about Nain-Sain, of course. I wouldn't have given tuppence for this business if I hadn't been sure of his involvement. So all in all, don't bother me with your worries. Stick to doing what you know about, in particular to doing your own little jobs. Otherwise you can turn back straightaway if we have the slightest problem!'

‘You don't need to worry, Mr Sanders.'

‘Wonderful! Don't you worry then, either. No dark thoughts, no complaints: that's our watchword! You know what I'm referring to, don't you?'

*

Yes, yes, I knew all right. As for the large safe which had been so jealously entrusted to my safe keeping, if you knew what was inside it, you would understand why Sanders had been so insistent in giving it to me. Imagine if you can a huge net, heavy and light at the same time, with a suppleness and a capacity to cope with any demands made on it, with a mesh seemingly made both of silk and of steel, fitted with hooks made of lead, like the claws of a sparrow hawk, and an extremely intricate system of ropes and cords, all of which gave it great flexibility and precision in whatever circumstances it might be used. You would have to be a bit slow-witted not to guess the purpose of this device. How many times had I seen Sanders, with Nain-Sain always at his side, examining it, feeling it, practising handling it, and repeating with a satisfied smile: ‘Look at this my friend, look at this! Without exaggeration this is something that could immobilise an elephant!'

They were very nice, instruments such as this, this one as well as all the others which we had to drag around with us. It was in vain that Nain-Sain tried to say, on the pretext of encouraging us, ‘As soon as you find yourself in the real Gobi Desert, you will soon forget any inconvenience which you might have experienced in the mountains.' Perhaps! But we still had to manage somehow in the desert. It was not every day that you came across a task like that.

*

‘I want to tell you something' said Sanders with a smile, ‘about a certain country called Ethiopia where there is monarch by the name of Negus. This man has a mania for hunting, but he's not too sure of what he is capable of shooting. So he usually has with him some lackey who is well accustomed to this sport, and who is responsible – not that anyone would notice – for standing in with his rifle, so that the animal being hunted should always be killed. I'm a bit like this monarch. So that's why I'm asking you dear Michel . . . well, it's a matter of resupplying our larder.'

While he was saying this he showed me, standing out against the dark sky, a strange chamois, looking down over the foothills which we were just about to climb, and which was considering us with a touching serenity. I nodded in agreement. Almost simultaneously two shots rang out. The little chamois fell to the ground. Sanders smiled.

‘I have too much of a sense of the ridiculous,' he said ‘and you left too much time between our two shots for me to be sure that without you he would not have run away.'

I kept quiet. He looked at me. I must have had an expression on my face that he didn't like one little bit. There was no doubt that he had just given me an opportunity to shine, to show a bit of spirit, of cheerfulness, whatever. He didn't consider himself at all rewarded for his effort.

He put his rifle back in his shoulder holster. Then in a dry tone he said: ‘When we stop this evening, let's have a little chat.'

*

When we stopped for the night, it was in one of those places that you wouldn't wish on your own worst enemy – or perhaps on the contrary it was where you would wish to see him. Already that morning, Nain-Sain had warned us about it. This was our seventh day on the march since we had left the river and our boats. Yes, you could say that we had done the easy bit first.

What was it that Nain-Sain had warned us about? It was that from the moment when a slender pale-pink flower, the
angola,
probably the
ancolie
in the Linne classification, began to be replaced by certain types of lichen, this would be a completely different world into which we were venturing. And good God, he wasn't exaggerating!

Even the animals were different. All those which had any sort of picturesque colourings had disappeared. Now all you could see were sad-looking birds with puffy and reddish feathers flying around. Here and there grey hares leaped about, like pebbles falling loose from the ravines and the mountains. As for the scenery, it was becoming increasingly pointless to stop and admire it. The vegetation was becoming rarer with a rapidity that was disconcerting. All traces of any vehicle had long since been erased. The nature of the soil, a sort of waterlogged clay, full of sharp, half-hidden rocks, was not made to help the progress of our convoy. Our Koreans did not say a word. Nor did the Russians. I sometimes happened to catch Ilichine and Welowski furtively exchanging ironic glances, indicating that those among us who did not like driving on flat ground would certainly get what they wanted.

As for Sanders, he continued to keep an eye on me, with an obstinacy which became annoying. He seemed worried, almost anxious. Perhaps he was straining to find in me some sign, however minute, of a bad mood or of tiredness. However on that day, as on every other day, I could honestly say that I didn't do or say anything in the slightest way to justify his suspicion. But one must realise that when you have been on the go since morning, thinking constantly of how to get the engines, which have given up completely, to work again, or of your feet freezing in the mud and of somehow getting them warm again, and all the while you're on the edge of a precipice, where if a vehicle has never yet slid over the edge it's only because no-one has yet had the crazy idea of coming to this region for fun – ah well, it is perhaps excusable from time to time to give a little sign of impatience, or to let slip some swear word. That happened even with Nain-Sain, Sanders' favourite. And there was someone else who I would not have been unhappy to see in my place either: that was our friend Otto Streep.

*

‘This will do!'

Nain-Sain had just jumped down from the leading vehicle. Behind it, our convoy came to a halt. Everybody got out.

Even Sanders sounded surprised. ‘Is this where we're going to spend the night?'

The Mongolian nodded. No doubt he had his reasons. Whatever they were, the spot was pretty frightening, a real chaos of rocks and the roar of nearby waterfalls. Clouds of insects, blown about in the wind, swarmed among the chasms and abysses in the mountains. Night was falling fast.

Welowski and I looked at each other. Of all the places we had passed since the morning, this was definitely the least reassuring.

‘Wouldn't it be better if we . . . ?' I began.

‘If we what?'

‘Perhaps,' I said hesitantly ‘perhaps if we went on a bit further. It's not completely dark yet, and I think . . . ‘

With just a glance Sanders consulted Nain-Sain, who seemed not to have even heard me. Leaning closely towards his boss, he muttered something in his ear. Then he began to get his rifle and his blankets out of the leading vehicle, and didn't take any more notice of me.

‘There isn't even a hollow in the ground where we can make a fire!' I said, a bit offended.

Sanders stopped me abruptly. ‘In less than quarter of an hour,' he said sharply, ‘the fog will have come down everywhere. You won't be able to see more than ten steps in front of you. That's what the clever people who don't know this country don't realise. Having said that, those who want to continue with their journey, please feel free to do so! Only not in the vehicles, of course . . . !'

*

The Koreans were snoring in their lorry, which was at the head of our convoy. We had just about managed to brew up some tea and cook some food.

The cold was less intense and the fog less opaque. There were even one or two stars shining in the sky. Nain-Sain had slipped away, no doubt in order to study our route for tomorrow. We were left, Sanders and me, together with the Russians, all five of us under a canvas sheet and sitting on boxes of biscuits. Ilichine and Neratov were dreaming. Welowski hummed some sort of song. I could feel in the dark Sanders' gaze still trained on me. He hadn't stopped looking at me all day.

‘Come on!' he ordered suddenly, as if he couldn't stand it any longer.

He got up, not taking any notice of the others. Without saying a word I followed him. We climbed up in to the second lorry, the one we used as our ‘residence'. Sanders shone his electric torch while we looked around. It was a strange setting for a meeting of that nature! The barrels of our rifles glowed in the dark. The back of the lorry, as I've said, was taken up completely by the cage intended for our unknown guest, and around which there seemed to reign a conspiracy of silence. For a moment you could make out the whole of the interior. Youen religiously ventilated it every evening while checking on one of the sliding sides. The idiot must have worried that if it got too hot it would spoil his canned food. Whatever the reason, the enormous cage, with its formidable bars through which you could glimpse a pile of boxes of corned beef and petit pois, had something about it which was quite mesmerising.

*

‘Well?' said Sanders after a silence.

Despite doing everything he could to prevent it, I sensed a quavering in his voice. Not of anger, but a sort of emotion, of fear even. I understood immediately. It was what I had dreaded. I would have preferred any reproach, on the pretext of whatever professional fault I might have committed, rather than the type of scene which was about to follow. I tensed up. A fit of rebelliousness took hold of me. I had had enough of this perpetual intrusion. What was Sanders up to anyway?

‘Well?' he repeated, in an even more jerky tone.

‘Well, Mr Sanders,' I said very calmly, ‘you want to talk to me, I suppose?'

‘Indeed I do!' he growled. ‘And
I
suppose that you must have some idea of what I have to say to you.'

‘I confess that I don't really see . . . ‘

‘Well, I do see, unfortunately. You think that I haven't noticed anything? You would have to believe that, if you haven't realised that with each day that passes how much you have changed. You don't have to be very bright, my friend, to notice that your mind is not for a moment on what you are doing.'

It was exactly as I had thought. Such was his obsession! He was always seeing me as absent-minded, worried, or whatever. Perhaps he wasn't completely wrong, after all. We are always such bad judges in matters concerning ourselves! But even admitting that he was right, again, what was he up to? As far as the services which I performed for him were concerned, my conscience was clear that I did my best, and he had no right to question me about my personal life, something which I'm certain he was jealous of. Of course, all these worries concerning myself could come from his better nature, and from his best intentions. But all the same Sanders might have been a bit less brutal and nit-picking in the way he showed the concern and friendship which he undoubtedly had for me.

‘I hope you have understood me,' he continued in a dull voice. ‘Do you really think that I am a fool? For example, if I was to ask you right now, how much money do you have on you, what would you say?'

‘I wouldn't allow you to, Mr Sanders. Twice a week I give you my accounts. Have you ever had occasion to . . . . ?

‘What do you mean by that?' he shouted. ‘Aren't you ashamed? Don't try to twist my question. I won't allow it. I'm not asking about my money, but about yours, the money which I advanced to you in Fouzan. How much have you got left? Do you want me to tell you? And do you also want me to tell you . . . ?

‘Stop right there!' I ordered. ‘Do I have the right to spend that money, or don't I?'

To comprehend fully the weird nature of this altercation, you have to remember that it was taking place in pitch darkness, in a place where it was impossible to move around for fear of knocking over a heap of all sorts of objects, and impossible also to raise your voice too much so as not to attract the attention of the good fellows who were hanging around outside, waiting to wish us goodnight before going off to bed.

Sanders sniggered. ‘Do you have the right to spend that money? Yes of course you do, you poor fool, you mug, you idiot. Meanwhile do you want me to tell you the name of the money-grubber who has got her hands on it?'

‘Mr Sanders,' I murmured, ‘listen to me! I have asked you to . . . ‘