Away to the south the valley opened out, vanishing into the morning haze as though running straight out into the sands of the Sahara: it was like a broad estuary, and on the far side - ten, maybe fifteen miles away - the containing hills were ruler-straight as though cut from the bed of an ancient sea. The sky was palest blue, the earth almost yellow in the clear, dry air. The piste leading to Foum-Skhira was a faint line drawn across the valley floor like the tracing of a Roman road in an aerial photograph.
We swung down in sharp curves until we came to a crumbling cliff and looked down a thousand feet into the black depths of a gorge. The piste seemed to hang on the very edge of the drop and as we rounded the cliff, we came upon a road gang cutting their way through a fall of rock. ‘Look!’ Jan gripped my arm, pointing down towards the entrance to the gorge. A walled kasbah with four mud towers, two of which had crumbled away, was picked out in the slanting sunlight. And beyond it, on the edge of a stream bed, was a little cluster of tents.
Kasbah Foum! It couldn’t be anything else, standing like that in the entrance to the gorge. And those would be Ed White’s tents. I glanced at Jan. Though his face looked tired under the dust-white stubble, his blue eyes gleamed with excitement. ‘We’re almost there,’ he breathed.
But it was half an hour before we were driving into Foum-Skhira. The Post consisted of two large forts with a big, open space like a parade ground between them and a single European house. One of the forts was white, with adobe roofs that made it look like a mosque. I learned later that it had been built by the Legion. The other, built by native Goumiers, was of mud with embrasured walls and little square towers like a kasbah. They were both of them empty and as we drove past they had the silent, deserted look of lost cities. A Tricolour fluttered from a white flagstaff outside the European house.
I suggested to Jan that we make contact with the French officer in charge of the Post first. But he said. ‘No. Drive straight on to Kasbah Foum. If those were White’s tents, I’d like to find out what he’s doing before I talk to the French.’
I drove on, past the European house, down towards the palmerie where ruined mud walls marked the site where the souk had been. There were camels hobbled there and mules, and there was a large crowd of people who stood and stared at us, not curiously and not hostilely, but with a strange air of waiting for something. It was the same when we skirted the walls of Ksar Foum-Skhira, the village of the kasbah. The place teemed with people who stood and watched us go by in silence. The women, clustered round the well holes, let go of the ropes so that the long poles for lifting the water stood curved against the sky like the gaffs of dhows. But all the palmerie seemed deserted and the cultivated patches had a neglected look, the little earthen banks to contain the water flattened almost to the ground.
Dust rose in choking clouds through the floorboards as we ran along the edge of the palmerie. Gradually the trees thinned and fell away so that we could see the dried-up stream bed we were following. ‘There it is!’ Jan cried, leaning forward. ‘Right at the entrance to the gorge. And there’s the old city and the watch tower just as Marcel described it to me.’
I screwed up my eyes, seeing for the moment only the white glare of the piste and the black bulk of the mountain slope down which we had come. And then I saw it - the little kasbah with its two ruined towers standing out yellow against the black, shadowed immensity of the gorge. I could see the watch tower, too, and all the hill below it was strewn with the debris of an old city. In places the walls still stood, a yard thick and some twelve feet high, and one stone archway remained intact. But all the rest of it had been thrown down as though by some natural upheaval. And yet it was impressive, for this was a land of mud buildings, and I wondered who these people were who had built in stone.
Just short of the kasbah was the huddle of tents we had looked down on from above. We were very close now. A flash of light momentarily dazzled me. It was a mirror reflecting the sun. A man stood, watching us, a razor in his hand and half of his face white with shaving soap. He wore a singlet and green-khaki trousers tucked into half-length boots.
‘He looks American,’ Jan said, and then his gaze switched to the mouth of the gorge.
I pulled up outside the tent and we got stiffly down, our clothes white with the coating of dust we’d picked up crossing the valley. My eyes felt gritty and tired. It was hot already and there were flies and the smell of bacon frying.
The man who had been shaving came towards us. He was tall, broad-shouldered, slim-hipped, with a young, rather square face and a crew cut. He was undoubtedly American - his features, his clothes, everything about him. He was wiping the soap from his face as he came.
‘Are you Mr White?’ Jan asked.
‘Yeah.’ He waited, watching Jan uncertainly.
‘I believe you were recently in touch with a firm of French lawyers in Rouen.’
‘That’s right. You must be Wade, I guess.’ There was interest, but no enthusiasm in his voice.
‘Wade was in touch with you then?’ Jan’s tone had sharpened.
The man frowned. ‘You mean you’re not Wade?’ He sounded puzzled.
‘No. I’m not Wade.’ Jan said, and then he nodded towards the ruined fort. ‘Is that Kasbah Foum?’
‘Yeah.’
There was a short, awkward silence. The two of them stared at each other. Jan’s gaze shifted to the tented camp and then followed the broad track that ran up into the entrance of the gorge. The track looked as though it had been made by a bulldozer, for where it passed below the kasbah it had been levelled out by thrusting aside the stones and rubble of the old city.
‘Well, what do you want?’ White’s tone had hardened. He looked very young with his fair, cropped hair and freckled face - very young and very Nordic.
‘Would you mind telling me what you’re doing up there?’
‘What business is it of yours?’
Jan reached into his breast pocket and brought out the crumpled envelope. ‘I hold the deeds to this property,’ he said.
White stared at him. His mouth had opened in an expression of surprise. But he shut it suddenly and his whole face hardened, so that he looked big and tough and a good deal older. ‘Is that so?’ He seemed to tower over Jan as he took a pace forward. ‘What the hell goes on here? Is everyone screwy? Yesterday it was a Greek telling me the land belonged to him. Now you come here and tell me — ‘
‘Was the Greek’s name Kostos?’ I asked.
White seemed to notice me for the first time. ‘Yeah, that was his name. Kostos.’ The name seemed to bring the anger that was in him to a sudden head. He swung round on Jan. ‘Now you get the hell out of here. Both of you. D’you hear? I got a concession from the Sultan’s Government. That’s good enough for me. If you think you own the land, then you go an’ tell them so. Okay?’
‘I have the documents here,’ Jan said quietly. ‘All I want to know is what you’re doing up there. You’re a prospector, aren’t you?’
‘Goddammit!’ the other exploded. ‘I’m not interested in documents. The guy who came yesterday had documents. You go an’ sort it out with the authorities.’ His voice was excited, nervous. ‘Jesus! I got enough trouble, what with the Ay-rabs bellyaching because I use bulldozers instead of employing them and Captain Legard at the Post getting scared I’ll upset the water. Now you and this Greek telling me I’ve got no right to operate here.’
‘I didn’t say that,’ Jan put in mildly.
‘All right. You didn’t say it. But that’s the inference, isn’t it? Now suppose you get out. I’ve work to do.’
Jan stood there, uncertain what to do next. The man seemed oddly belligerent. ‘Why don’t you talk it over,’ I suggested to White. ‘You haven’t looked at the documents yet.’
‘I looked at enough documents yesterday.’
‘If Kostos showed you any documents they were forgeries,’ Jan said. His voice had risen slightly and his shoulders were beginning to move excitedly. ‘Kostos is a crook and if y
ou — ‘
‘You’re all crooks as far as I’m concerned,’ White cut in.
‘That’s not a very nice thing to say.’ It was Julie. The American looked at her, screwing up his eyes against the sun. I don’t think he’d noticed her before.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said. And then he turned to Jan again and added, ‘I don’t know who you all are, and I don’t much care. I’m telling you the same as I told the Greek yesterday - go and sort it out with Caid Hassan and the authorities.’
‘If you’d just look at these deeds,’ Jan began, but the other cut him short.
‘What sort of fool do you take me for?’ he cried. ‘Do you think I’d start work here, spending my own dough, without finding out who owns the place? It belonged to a man called Duprez. It was given him by the Caid here. And Duprez is dead. I found that out from his lawyers. He’s dead and he passed the deeds on to a guy called Kavan. Now, according to the Greek, Kavan’s dead, too. Anyway, he never got his title to the property confirmed by the Caid, which he had to — ‘
‘But I am Kavan,’ Jan said.
White opened his mouth to say something and then stopped.
‘You’d better know our names,’ I said. This is Dr Jan Kavan, the man to whom Duprez gave the deeds of Kasbah Foum.’
‘I don’t believe it,’ he said. ‘Wade wrote me he’d be bringing the deeds out with him. Why should Kavan come here and not Wade? Kavan never took any interest in the place. The lawyers didn’t even know where he was. And the Greek said he was dead.’
‘Well, he’s not dead,’ I said a little irritably. ‘This is Dr Kavan, and he has the deeds with him. And this is Miss Corrigan.’
He stared at her for a moment and then turned back to me and said, ‘And what about you?’
‘My name’s Philip Latham.’
‘I mean, what’s your interest in this?’
‘I haven’t any,’ I told him. ‘I’m an English missionary out here.’
‘A missionary!’ He stared at me, open-mouthed.
‘There’s a most delicious smell of bacon,’ Julie said. pointedly sniffing at the air.
He stared at her, still frowning. ‘Oh, sure - yeah.’ He I looked at the three of us uncertainly. He was bewildered and a little uneasy.
‘We’ve been travelling all night,’ Julie said.
That was something he could understand. He ! seemed to relax and a gleam of warmth came into his eyes. ‘If you haven’t had chow…’ His friendly nature asserted itself. He turned and shouted, ‘Abdul!’ And then he laughed awkwardly and said, ‘I forgot. I’m cook this morning, I guess.’ And he glanced a little angrily-round the camp.
‘Are you on your own?’ I asked. There was accommodation for at least four in the tents.
‘Yeah. Yeah, I guess so.’
‘Where’s the rest of your party?’ I was thinking of the Arabs with their jeep parked beside that fire in the mountains.
‘Oh - they left this morning….’ He stared at us and then added quickly, To get stores and things, you know.’ He turned back to the mirror. ‘I’ll just finish shaving: then I’ll see about some food.’ He gave a little laugh for no apparent reason except that he seemed nervous. There was a streak of blood on his chin where he had cut himself. He slapped irritably at a fly that was trying to settle on it.
‘Would you like me to cope with breakfast for you?’ Julie asked hesitantly.
He glanced at her and then nodded. ‘Sure. Go ahead. There’s tinned bacon, biscuits, jam and coffee.’ He watched her disappear into the cook tent, glanced quickly at us and then turned back to the mirror again.
‘You’re mining up here, aren’t you?’ Jan asked.
‘I told you - I’ve got a concession from the Sheriffian Government.’
‘What are you mining?’
‘That’s my business.’
Jan started to ask another question, but then stopped and stood staring up the newly-made track to the entrance to the gorge. An uneasy silence developed between us. The morning was very still. There wasn’t a breath of wind and the air was clear and crisp with that freshness that occurs in desert country before the sun bakes the land to arid heat.
‘What about a wash?’ I suggested.
Jan looked at me and nodded. ‘Yes. A wash would be good.’ We got our things and scrambled down the steep bank where a few dwarf palms thrust dusty fronds above the sand. Then we were in the rock bed of the stream and the only vegetation was the feathery sprays of the tamarisk and the needle-pointed tufts of the reeds. A heron rose from the edge of the muddy-flowing stream, its wings beating slowly, cumbersomely. Occasional banks of dark sand were white-crusted and marked by the feet of birds and when I rinsed out my mouth I found the water was slightly salt.
‘He was expecting Wade,’ Jan said suddenly. And then, after a pause, he added, ‘He doesn’t believe I’m Kavan.’
‘He’ll get used to the idea,’ I said.
He bent down and washed his face. As he stood up he said, ‘I was right, you know.’
‘What about?’
‘Wade was going into partnership with him.’
‘You mean he was double-crossing Ali?’
He nodded.
‘You may be right,’ I said as I towelled my face. ‘The point is, what do we do now?’
‘First I’m going up to have a look at the gorge.’ He was standing with his towel slung round his neck, staring towards the entrance which was a black canyon of shadow.
‘Well, you’d better have breakfast first,’ I said.
‘Yes, of course.’ He nodded, laughing excitedly. Then he turned to me, his expression suddenly serious. ‘Philip. You’ve no idea what this means to me; to be actually here, at Kasbah Foum. It was like a dream come true. Back in England, as things became more difficult, I thought of nothing else. It was my dream - a sort of El Dorado.’ He laughed a little self-consciously and, in a more practical tone, added, ‘After we’ve looked at the place, perhaps you’ll come with me to see Caid Hassan?’
‘Of course,’ I said. ‘But I think we’d better see this Capitaine Legard first. You don’t want to upset the French.’
Julie joined us then. ‘Breakfast is ready,’ she said. She washed her hands and face and then came and stood beside us. ‘It’s a queer, wild place.’ She said it a little breathlessly, as though she was uneasy about it. ‘Why do you think the others left him?’
‘How do you mean?’ I stared at her and saw that her eyes were troubled. ‘They went to get stores. You heard what White — ‘
But she shook her head. ‘I’ve been inside the big tent. All their things are gone. And there are three empty beds there. You remember those men sitting round that petrol fire on the other side of the mountain?’
‘The three Arabs with the jeep ?’
‘Yes. They came from here. I’m certain of it. That was his jeep. They were frightened. They stole the jeep because they were frightened and wanted to get away.’ She stared up at the entrance to the gorge. ‘I don’t like it, Philip. He’s frightened, too. I can feel it. He’s trying to hide something, but he’s frightened.’
‘Who? White? Nonsense,’ I said. ‘You’re imagining things.’
‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘I’m not imagining things. There’s a queer atmosphere about the place. And those people down by the souk.’ She hesitated and then said, ‘A little boy came into the tent while I was cooking. Apparently Abdul used to give him scraps to eat in the mornings. He told me he sleeps up in the ruins of that kasbah. His father keeps his flock of goats there. He daren’t bring them down into the palmerie in case they get stolen. Since the souk was destroyed they’re very short of food here.’
‘Why?’
‘I don’t know.’ Her voice trembled slightly. ‘There’s a feeling of…” She didn’t seem able to put it into words.
‘Oh, come on,’ I said. ‘You’re tired and you need some food.’
She looked up at me uncertainly. Then she smiled and, with a sense of relief, I saw
the smile spread from her lips to her eyes. ‘I expect you’re right. Let’s go and have breakfast. Maybe I’ll feel differently afterwards.’
We. breakfasted under the extended fly-sheet of the larger tent and from where I sat I looked through into the tent, to the three empty camp beds. I, too, began to feel Julie’s sense of uneasiness. It wasn’t only the fact that the tent looked deserted. It was White himself. He was oddly talkative. And once started, he talked quickly, eagerly, as though he had to go on talking to keep his mind off other things. He talked about himself, about North Africa - about anything that came into his head. He was from the Middle West and he had worked with Atlas Constructors for eighteen months, building the big American bomber base at Sidi Slimane near Fez. ‘Hell! That was a tough job. But I needed the dough. That eighteen months made it possible for me to come down here with my own outfit.’
‘You’d been prospecting here before, I suppose?’ Jan said.
‘Prospecting?’ White frowned. ‘No, I hadn’t been prospecting.’
‘But you knew the place? You’d been down here — ‘
‘No. I’d never been here before.’
Jan stared at him. ‘But how did you know? …’ He stopped, a puzzled expression on his face.
But White didn’t want to talk about Kasbah Foum. He slid quickly away from the subject and began talking about Morocco. He talked about it with an odd disregard for the French as though he had no idea what the country must have been like before they came. And yet he knew more about the history of the Berbers than I did, and when Julie asked him about the old city that lay in ruins on the slopes above us, he talked with authority. ‘I’d say it was six or seven hundred years old,’ he said. ‘Maybe more.’ And he went on to describe the ruins in detail, a sudden enthusiasm in his voice as though they touched him personally.
The Strange Land Page 15