Tracks (20 page)

Ibrahim strained to
hear.  “He says to slide down.”

“You
sure?”
  Black Jack exclaimed.

Ibrahim nodded then once again
listened carefully as more instructions came from far below.

“Says
there’s a pool down there that cushioned his fall.
 
He’s OK.”

“I’ll go,” Ibrahim
volunteered, climbing into the shoot.

“After me,” Clair said,
tugging at his clothes, pulling him back out.  The boy did not
argue.  Clair slid into the chute hesitantly sliding on her stomach until
she suddenly plunged like Faraj and disappeared.  Seconds later they heard
a splash and a thump accompanied by a shocked squeal.

Clair’s voice came faintly
from below.  Both Jack and Ibrahim strained to hear.  She spoke in
French.

“She’s OK,” Ibrahim said, his
worried look turning bright.  He climbed into the shoot again without
hesitation.  Jack had no choice but to let him go.  The boy slid
carefully then plunged like his predecessors.  When Jack heard reassurance
from below that the boy had made it safely he climbed into the shoot and began
to slide.  He felt the rock turn slippery and wet before he lost his grip
and felt his body gain speed towards the abyss below.  He saw himself
glide through a small tunnel which spewed him into the air before he hit water
and felt himself plunge through and hit bottom.  His legs hit first,
crumpled and his chin hit his knees causing his head to jerk.  He lost his
bearing for a fraction, feeling his body submerge in water.  Then three
pairs of hands were pulling at him.  He looked up and around and saw
worried looks from his companions straining to pull him out.  He tried a
reassuring smile and felt a warm liquid fill his mouth and trickle down his
cheeks.    

They laid him on his back by
the side of the pool. Clair produced a rag to wipe his face from the water and
blood that was drooping from his mouth.  Faraj forced his mouth
open.  The tongue was bleeding profusely.

“He has bitten his tongue,” he
stated to Ibrahim who translated.  “His teeth look OK”.

Faraj took the rag from Clair
and stuffed it into Jack’s mouth.  “We need to stop the bleeding.”

Black Jack looked
around.  In the afternoon glow of the setting sun he saw they were in an
enclosed alcove secluded by granite walls.  Trickles of water were coming
down the walls from several directions converging into the pool.

He sat up and saw they had
been lodged on a wide ledge, the open side of the pool trickling down a sheer
cliff drop to a gorge below.  The shoot they had come down through was a
natural duct along the rock face made by the trickling water from invisible
springs spurting along the rocky facade.

It seemed there was no way up
or down.

He felt a sudden pain shoot in
his mouth.  He pulled out the rag and felt his tongue.  His fingers
came out bloody.

“Wash it in the water,” Clair
suggested, taking the rag and washing it clean.

He rolled over and put his
face in, bloodying the water. He kept his faced submerged for several minutes,
the blood slowly trickling with the flow of the water over the cliff then
pulled out and allowed Clair to stuff the rag back in his mouth.

A few minutes later he was
able to talk.

“We can’t stay here” he said
lamely, his tongue swelling in his mouth, Clair and Ibrahim translating to
Faraj. “We need to put a good deal of distance between us and this place or
they'll catch us in the morning.”   

Faraj looked around. 

“We stay here tonight,” he
declared.  “No one can see us.”

Jack looked around noting it
would be impossible for the helicopter to spot them.  Even if it hovered
directly in front of the alcove’s open side they still had plenty of rock face
to hide behind.

“We’ll be trapped,” he
contended.  “They’ll know we’re here somewhere.  They’ll just sit and
wait.”

“We leave tomorrow,” Faraj
said decidedly.  “They will not be here.  No one has ever reached
this pool.  We are the first.”

The pain was distracting
Jack’s thoughts.  He probed in his mouth again.  The tongue was
swollen but the blood had ceased.  He could not continue discussion.

“How do we climb down?” 
Clair asked.

Faraj smiled as if keeping a
secret.  “There are many legends regarding this spring no one had ever
reached.  It supplies water to tribes far below.  This pool has never
been visited though many claimed to have seen it.  According to the legend
there’s a secret passageway which should lead us not down but rather back up to
the ridge.”

“Looks like sheer rock face to
me,” Clair remarked, looking around.

“Look closer,” Faraj
said.  He turned and scooped something off the ground.  They all
stared at his palm as he revealed small round brown droppings.

“Goats come here,” he said
knowingly. “Their trail will lead us out.”

They prepared for the night, keeping
as far away from the ledge as possible.  Two blankets for padding, two for
cover. 
Jack and Faraj on the ends, Clair and the boy in
the middle.

Jack could not sleep.  He
turned and tossed on the hard surface, his mouth ablaze.  He finally went
to the pool hoping the cool water will help sooth his pain.  When he
returned, he found Clair awake, staring at him.  She looked
concerned.  When he slid between the blankets next to her, she silently
reached for his hand and weaved her small fingers within his, snuggling with
her back against him.  He hugged her, feeling her small body relax then
her breathing become regular before falling asleep.   

CHAPTER
TWENTY-ONE

The Egyptian patrol approached
the Bedouin camp trailing sand and dust.  They parked their two Jeeps and
went to join the men around the central campfire where tea was being served in
small clay cups.

They paid no mind to the
Bedouin women who sat at arm’s length bunched together, Christine among
them.  She did not dare move, eyeing the Egyptians from under her hood,
her pulse quickening.

For five days Ahmed had led
her down the Katarina ridge through a maze of canyons and slopes only goats
ever climbed.  They traveled in the relatively cool mornings and evenings,
resting at night and during the blistering daytime heat.  It was
impossible to manage such landscape in the dark. 

The Black Canyon presented a
challenge all its own.  It was a narrow gorge of black granite that
traversed steeply down long sections of sheer rock face that could not be
overcome but for a foundation of ropes and metal ladders planted by previous
climbers.  Having no climbing experience and no ancillary climbing
equipment left them exposed to extreme danger as they carefully descended the
notorious canyon, known to have taken the lives of more than a few hikers.

On more than one occasion
Christine felt her arms and legs no longer supporting her and had to take long
rests hinged on ledges high above the ground.  To her amazement she found
she was not afraid of heights but her body was not conditioned to such
prolonged strain.  Ahmed was patient with her, supporting her where he
could and conforming to her slow progress.  When they finally reached safe
ground she needed several hours of rest before she could go on. 

Further down was the Red
Canyon, a gorge not as steep as the Black but hazardous nevertheless. 
Formed from clay type sediment, giving it its red appearance, it had a series
of steep narrow chutes, which had to be negotiated.   These chutes
were dark, tunnel like shafts, several meters long, extremely slippery and
barely able to contain a person.  It had no slits or hinges to grip and
one had to simply slide through and hope to grab on to something at the end so
as not to let the momentum carry through and propel a person further down to
hit boulders and rocks. 

Ahmed hurt himself through the
very first tunnel.  He was barely able to stop himself, hitting his head
on a rock and cutting a gash, which bled for quite a while.  Christine
found the dark chutes terrified her and had to overcome claustrophobic fears to
dare enter them.  The first was at least five meters long and by the time
she shot out of there she could have continued another fifteen but for Ahmed
stopping her forward progress.

She dressed his head wound,
tearing off part of her Bedouin robe and they waited until the bleeding
ceased.  They had to slide through three more shafts, shorter but steeper
than the first, Ahmed fearlessly leading the way.  By the time they were
through the clothes on their backsides were streaked and torn.

Two days past the Red they
reached a sandy plateau, which guided them to the coast.  The Bedouin
encampment was a short distance from the coastal road and vehicles could be
heard going by now and again.

The six Egyptian soldiers took
their time drinking their tea.  Nothing was ever urgent in the Sinai,
Christine observed as she kept eyeing the men, praying some fool would not give
her away.  There was small talk between the men, whom she could not
understand and it was an anxious hour before they finally left.

The Bedouin men remained in
their place long after the Egyptians had left and it was another hour before
Ahmed came over.  She was helping the women prepare salads when Ahmed
tugged at her clothes and signaled for her to follow him.  They stooped
near two men.  One spoke decent English.

“The soldiers bring bad
rumors,” the Bedouin said, taking a lungful of smoke from his cigarette.

Christine studied him
attentively.

“They say a foreigner died in
Dahab.”

“Died how?”  Christine
asked.

“They did not say.”

Christine went silent, not
sure where the discussion was leading.

“They say the man was involved
with kidnapping a boy.”

Christine felt an inkling of
panic grip her conscious.  She took a quick peek at Ahmed who was
crouching next to her, seemingly unconcerned, his eyes half shut. 

“We took the boy,” she said
bravely.

The Bedouin smiled.  “I
know.  The man was looking for you.” 

Christine’s heart skipped a
beat.  It had to be Sam, unless they recruited someone else.  She had
to know.

“Did they say who he
was?  Where he was from?”

“No,” the Bedouin said evenly.

“Could we find out?” 
Christine pleaded.

“We could try.”

“Please, I must know.”

“Ahmed will take you to Nueba
tonight.  There are people there who could help you find out.”

He gestured at Ahmed and
blurted some words in Arabic.  Ahmed nodded remaining crouched.  The
two Bedouins strolled over to join the crowd of men by the central
campfire.  Christine went back to join the women.

She and Ahmed set out after
dark.  They walked east crossing the main road and walked parallel to the
road in the stretch of land between the road and the gulf waters sometime
getting very close to the beach, other times touching the highway, being
careful not to be out in the open, in view of passing cars.  Along the
beaches they gave wide berths to any settlements or resorts peacefully nestling
by the waters.  They walked all night covering roughly half the distance
to Nueba and found refuge in a secluded beach, surrounded by cliffs and
boulders, empty of human presence.  Ahmed found a shady spot on a patch of
sand among the rocks and went to sleep.  Christine waited a while then
stripped bare and waded carefully into the water.  The morning waters were
cool and refreshing, engulfing her, waking her. She swam out reaching the coral
reef observing the band of colorful fish and plants, wishing she had diving
gear.  Careful not to step on corals and risk being nipped by sea urchins,
she swam along the reef as far as she could without losing sight of the beach,
then swam back and lay in the emerging sun feeling energized yet concerned.

A hand was caressing her and
she woke up with a start.  Ahmed was standing over her, her nakedness
exposed at his feet.

“You will get burned,” he said
matter-of-factly, eyeing her with interest.  She lurched up realizing she
had dozed and went to fetch her clothes.  Ahmed crouched where he was and
looked out to sea.

“Thank you,” she said to him
after she had dressed and came to crouch by his side.  The Bedouin did not
respond.  He kept staring through half-closed eyes out to sea.

She was angry with herself for
letting her guard down that way, knowing she had put him on the spot.  He
could have interpreted her motives differently and done her harm.  She had
thanked him for remaining gracious.

They intermittently slept the
rest of the day, continuing their journey at sunset.  Several times they
had to cross the main highway or walk along it, at places where it went
adjacent to the waters, but managed to remain unseen.