On the third day, if conditions were right, Paul and Hakeem would get a glimpse of the blankets or the sheep or the stores in question, but the owner would tolerate no discussion beyond the compliments he required. That night the buyers would be left to ponder the proper value of such treasures. Only on the fourth day would price be discussed, in long tea-drenched sessions where laughter mingled with accusations of bad faith or questions of parentage. Hakeem handled most of the negotiations. He was born to haggle, delivering passionate speeches in rapid-fire Arabic. Paul was reasonably certain that with Hakeem’s help France was spending only twice what everything was worth instead of four or five times.
Another full day or two might be required to arrive at a price. Then new arguments would crop up about quantities or terms. The merchant would groan and rub his hands and bewail the impending poverty to which the transaction was consigning him and his descendants. After a price had been finally settled, the buyers would return to make final arrangements for delivery, only to discover that the merchant had heard of a better price fetched in some other souk for the same merchandise, and – this was the only thing that happened quickly in the entire business – the original deal was off. The colonel would explode in anger at the wretched pace of the caravan’s acquisitions, and Paul would start over. There was a certain maddening predictability to the process, in which endurance counted more than cunning. Impatience was never rewarded with results. The more he sought to hurry, the more he slowed things down.
One afternoon he complained that Hakeem had spent nearly half an hour buying a handful of dates for them to eat while they shopped.
“Oui, Patron,” Hakeem agreed amiably, “but the dates are better now that they’re older, don’t you think?” Paul grimaced and Hakeem laughed at his annoyance. “You will please forgive me for saying so, Patron, but you must learn to think more slowly. Does a dune form overnight?”
“Not if an Arab of Wargla builds it,” Paul agreed.
One evening after their work was done Paul and Remy were following Hakeem through the market when Hakeem pulled on Paul’s sleeve. Regardez!” he said eagerly, pointing. In one corner a performer had drawn a large crowd. They drew near and watched as the man turned his face upward while two scorpions climbed over his forehead and cheeks, heading for the soft cover of his bushy black beard. They moved delicately, a little off-balance. Suddenly the man gave a great yell. In a blur of motion he yanked the scorpions off his face, throwing one down near the crowd, which scattered quickly. At the same instant he tore the tail and claws off the second one and put the squirming body into his mouth, eating it with obvious pleasure. It was at once thrilling and revolting, yet no man could look away. What Paul did not notice was that the first scorpion had scurried to where he stood. Remy saw, and a grin crossed his face. He said nothing and took a few steps back, to leave the scorpion to the lieutenant. Even in panic Paul moved with a certain grace, but he still fell hard in his effort to get away. The arachnid hurried off, its tail high but harmless, its stinger having been removed earlier by the performer. Delighted that a kafer had been added to the entertainment, the crowd roared its delight, led by Remy. Paul picked himself up and dusted himself off, laughing and blushing, while the performer scooped up the wayward scorpion and popped it into his mouth.
“Tell me again how they made you an officer,” Remy laughed. “Someday I want to be one too, but I think I’ll take different courses.”
When they could, Paul and Remy explored the huge gardens beneath the palmerie, strolling along the paths built on top of low dikes built for irrigation. Water bubbled softly through the small water channels, which were kept cleared by slaves, men with broad shoulders and bent backs who sang and chanted while they worked. Their music blended with the chirping of the birds and the flutter of the wind against the palm leaves. The oasis was alive with sound, a perfect place to pass the heat of the day while the markets were closed.
They never saw women in the open, only quiet shrouds huddled together in darkened doorways or on private rooftops, figures that shrank away quickly if a man glanced their way.
“I’ve been from Mexico to Italy in this army,” Remy mused. “Never a place where I couldn’t get beneath a woman’s skirts with twenty minutes and a bottle of rum. But these women seem almost like lepers.”
“They are not for the eyes of man.” Hakeem shrugged politely. “For you they are best forgotten.”
* * *
One day Paul found Floop.
He’d gone into a shop, ducking his head to clear the low doorway, greeting the storekeeper and bargaining for some of the chickens cooped behind the shop. He began by himself, determined to practice his primitive Arabic without Hakeem.
The merchant seemed agitated and didn’t want to sell him anything. Paul understood only a few words and had to turn to Hakeem. The aide asked questions and at times argued with the man, which seemed to drive the merchant into further obstinacy. Finally the man slapped his palm with his fist and rose to his feet, signaling that the discussion was over. Clearly uncomfortable, Hakeem turned to Paul. “I am sorry, Patron,” he said, embarrassed. “He doesn’t wish to sell his chickens.”
“I know that already, Hakeem. Why doesn’t he wish to sell them?”
Hakeem could think of no suitable deception at the moment, as would have been polite. He was stuck with the truth. “He says there is no point in feeding dead men, Patron. Chickens are too scarce in Wargla.”
“Tell him I’m not feeding dead men,” Paul commanded. “I’m trying to feed the colonel’s caravan.”
“I did, Patron.”
“And?”
“He says it’s the same thing.”
This was not the first merchant to express such an opinion. All over Wargla one could hear murmurs of doom about the expedition. In the souks bets were made as to how many days’ journey to the south the last man would die. While rumors ran rampant, most merchants cared not for the fate of their merchandise, but for how much might be made selling it.
“We need the chickens, Hakeem. Offer him more money.”
“I tried that, Patron. But the fool is as stupid as his fowl. He said he’d rather have his birds than your money.”
Seeing it was futile to press the issue, Paul shrugged and turned to depart. At that moment there was a great racket behind the store: a hundred chickens in panic. “Floop!” The merchant uttered the name like a curse. He jumped up and rushed out the back, Paul and Hakeem fast after him, their curiosity aroused.
Bedlam reigned in the walled yard. Feathers flew everywhere amid clouds of thick dhst stirred by panicked wings. The merchant fairly dove into the center of it, pushing the birds out of his way, cursing the whole while. There was a yelp and a moment later up came the merchant holding a scrawny mutt puppy. Its tail wagged wildly, and its mouth was clamped firmly around a chicken twice its size.
The merchant gave the pup a vicious whack across its face. With a yelp of pain the puppy let go. The merchant spied a wicker stick propped in the corner. He picked it up and raised it to strike the thief.
“Arretez!” Paul stepped forward. The merchant hesitated. The look the man saw in Paul’s eyes decided the issue. Holding the puppy by the scruff of its neck, he said something to Hakeem and threw the dog at Paul. The dog was shaking and flea bitten and looked up at Paul with wide eyes.
“What did he say?” Paul asked Hakeem.
“He said, Patron, that since he was going to kill the dog anyway, there was no better way to do it than give it to a dead man. You still may not buy any chickens, but you can keep the dog for nothing.”
Paul laughed and held the terrified animal up before him. “Well, Floop,” he said, “at least one of the condemned needs a bath.”
Floop was an ungainly thing, a pretty gold color but with ears too floppy and paws absurdly big. He was thick with grunge and tolerated the bath with a wounded look. He followed Paul everywhere through the streets, climbing into baskets and food bins and needing rescu
e more than once. Floop was a favorite with the members of the expedition, who spoiled him with handouts and scratched him behind the ears. But the dog had nearly done him in with Colonel Flatters, who was difficult enough to get along with as it was.
The colonel had invited the agha of Wargla, Abd-el-Kader ben Amar, key members of the agha’s retinue, and the captain of the local garrison to dine with him in his tent. His preparations were thorough. There was to be music and exquisite tea. The colonel himself chose the sheep to be slaughtered and gave detailed instructions to the cook. Brame, the colonel’s batman, set a beautiful table considering the limited materials with which he had to work.
Toasts were made and the colonel and his guests were seated. The cook entered with a great flourish, the aroma of the steaming roast irresistible. The colonel lifted it to look and permitted himself a rare smile. He dismissed the cook with thanks, adding that he was sure no more tender mutton could be found outside France.
Sometime during the late afternoon Floop had decided the colonel’s tent was the finest shelter in camp. He slipped past the sentry and through the flaps, settling on a spot just beneath the colonel’s cot. He was used to various comings and goings in Paul’s tent, so nothing disturbed his nap. But when the cook produced the mutton, the fragrance was too much to ignore.
Engaged in conversation with his guests, the colonel didn’t notice the dog, whose training by Paul did not yet include table manners. Big for a puppy, his front paws could just find purchase on the top of the dinner table, and he was up, nose over the top, tail hard at work in lively anticipation.
Startled, the colonel stood up too rapidly, banging his thighs against the table. The interrupted momentum was enough to make him lose his balance. He staggered backward, half-sitting, half-standing. He fell against the wooden pole that supported the roof of his tent. The pole snapped, bringing the tent, the agha and his retinue, the captain and the batman, and everything else, down with it.
Outside the tent, the terrified cook, thinking that somehow his meal had been to blame, frantically searched to find where the door had been. In the darkness all was confusion. At last he found it, and shouted to the sentry for help. Together they lifted the edge.
Floop shot through the opening and fled into the night, the colonel’s mutton clenched firmly between his teeth.
Both Paul and Floop had lain low for the next few days – Paul, because he thought it prudent, and Floop, because he was chained in Paul’s tent. Paul wasn’t sure that the colonel even knew whom the dog belonged to, but in a small camp such as theirs word of such things had a way of traveling quickly. The colonel, however, seemed no more sour than usual.
It was only days later, after the two had been discussing the progress of provisioning, that the colonel referred to the matter. Flatters had dismissed him, and Paul was leaving the tent.
“By the way, Lieutenant,” the colonel said. Paul stopped and turned.
“Sir?”
Flatters was scribbling a note, and left the junior officer waiting until he had finished. He put his pen down, and raised eyes that smoldered like cinders.
“If ever I should see that dog again,” Flatters said, “I shall have it shot.”
Paul fidgeted, not knowing exactly what to say. Finally he nodded. “Excellent, sir.”
Of course, Paul had no intention of getting rid of the animal. It was simply a matter of training. At night he would leave his tent, saddle his camel, and give the dog his bag lessons. Paul would set him hind feet first into the pouch that hung on the side. Floop hated it, squirming out as Paul rode and dropping to the ground with an exaggerated squeal of pain. Paul would patiently pick him up each time and put him back in, and give him pieces of dried meat and then, as they rode, pet him and talk softly, reassuringly, until the cadence of his voice calmed the dog down.
At last Floop decided he liked it in the bag. The camel’s side was warm, its motions fluid and perfect for naps. He finally worked out a comfortable position. He sat on his rear, like a human, back legs folded up, front paws just over the top of the bag, making a cradle where he could rest his chin. It worked rather well, Paul thought, for unless he closed the flap, all that could be seen of Floop from the outside was a black nose, resting between two paws.
Hakeem watched Paul’s patient training with confusion. Such trouble for a mere dog! The patron threw a stick as far as he could, and then gave the dog a perfectly good piece of meat for bringing it back. The first time he saw it happen, Hakeem couldn’t restrain his curiosity. Nonchalantly, he wandered over and stole a closer look, to see what was so special about the stick. It was nothing but a worthless palm frond. He could only shrug, as he did whenever he saw the dog getting meat for lying down and failing to move when Paul walked away. This perplexed Hakeem most of all; if one rewarded the dogs he knew for lying down and failing to move, there would be nothing left for the people of Wargla to eat.
Once Paul asked the Shamba what he thought of the dog. Ever polite, Hakeem thought for a moment, and replied in solemn earnest. “As Allah is my witness,” he said, “this will be a wonderful dog, indeed a truly great dog someday.” He paused, looking at Floop. “But for now, Patron, he is merely a mouth on big feet.”
Late at night, when Paul’s business and Floop’s bag lessons were finished, the two of them would take long walks. By moonlight they explored the dunes, struggling through the soft cold sand to the top, to rest and look in silence at the beauty of the other dunes around them, quiet and silken under the moon, then run and tumble down the steep lee sides in a mad race to the bottom.
Paul had never known a fuller time, although he learned to avoid the garrison as much as possible. The garrison of Wargla was farther south than any other maintained by France. The strain of isolation showed on the men, who were tough and vulgar, their discipline lax, their uniforms as crude as their manners. There was unease between the men of the expedition and those of the garrison, an eerie tension bordering on hostility. Paul had to visit the quartermaster on business at least once a day, and found the man’s attitude discomfiting. He reeked of palm wine and regarded Paul with glazed pity in his eyes, or else averted his gaze altogether whenever Paul came near.
“Is there something wrong, Sergeant?” Paul finally asked. “Have I done something to offend you?”
“Wrong? Nothing at all, Lieutenant. It’s just that I get this way every time I see a man napping beneath the blade of a guillotine. Worries me something might go wrong.” He slurred his words, laughing at his own humor. “If I were you, I would forget these boxes and blankets and pack more bullets instead.”
“You are so certain we’ll have trouble?”
“Trouble? Merde, your death warrants have already been signed by the Turks and stamped by the Tuareg. Every piss-ant in the desert seems to know it but your colonel.”
“You’re drunk,” Paul snapped. “I could see you court-martialed for this kind of insolence.”
The man whooped in derision. “That’d be a brilliant response, sir. Learned that in St. Cyr, I’ll wager. Discipline and form, fuck the facts.” He laughed to himself. “Anyway, I’m not drunk yet, Lieutenant, not near as drunk as I’ll be in another hour. And an hour after that I’ll be thoroughly stinking. Hardly walking. After that – well, if I’m unlucky enough to wake up in the morning, I’ll start over. I’ll admit I fancy death from drink in this godforsaken place. It’s better than a Tuareg spear in the belly. One thing is certain, Lieutenant, neither of us will die of old age.”
“The Tuareg haven’t the strength to touch us.”
“Hah! They don’t care about your riflemen. You can’t shoot what you can’t see. They’ll wait until your guard is down, until you’re looking the other way. You’ll think they’re in front of you, but they’ll be behind you. Or you think they’re coming in the night, only they come at noon. The only thing you can count on from the bastards is they’ll find a way to gut you, Lieutenant, without getting in the way of your mighty rifles.”
> “Le cafard,” Remy said later when Paul repeated the conversation. “The desert madness.” He’d never been to Africa, but he’d seen plenty of remote places and what they did to men. “Lots of them get it. They’ve nothing to do but brood. Time treats them badly. It stretches worse here because the liquor stinks and there aren’t any women. The place just uses them up. Even their assholes get raw from the sand.”
“I’ll never let the desert affect me as it does them,” Paul said. “I’ll go home first.”
Remy couldn’t help mocking Paul gently for his naïve enthusiasm. “I think you take it a bit far the other way. Let me see if I understand your point of view. In the market there are clouds of flies competing with swarms of beggars for the pleasure of eating camel shit mixed with rotting vegetables. What they can’t stomach the cook picks up. He spices it up nicely with some old spit and smears it on top of a mixture of couscous, pebbles, and sand. Then he dishes it back to you, at six times the price he’d charge anyone else. You know what you’re eating – you watch him prepare it – but all the same you enjoy it, because it’s exotic.”
“That’s about it.” Paul smiled. “L’haute cuisine d’Afrique.” Remy roared.
The desert Paul saw from atop the dunes was not the desert of the garrison, but the desert of his aunt Serena’s stories, a vast tableau of valiant warriors and grand destiny. Perhaps more than any man helping to assemble the great caravan taking shape on the plain outside the town, Paul felt the fortunes of France resting on his shoulders. He could hear the glories in the cold wind blowing off the winter sands, glories that would be forever lost to the sad men of the garrison they were leaving behind.
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