There is yet another development. I have received word that Tamrit ag Amellal is among those joining the amenokal at In Salah. I have never spoken of him to you before. It was not important, because I thought he had disappeared forever. He is a man who tried to do harm to your father. It is said that he has joined with the Senussi, and that they mean to prevent the expedition of Colonel Flatters. I do not know the truth of it, but Tamrit is a man whose spirit is hard and filled with hate. He knows only treachery. Nothing good can come from his involvement in this.
I sense that much is happening around the French expedition that cannot be seen or heard. I have never known such secrecy among the Ihaggaren. If you can learn of their route, I believe you will learn much of our intentions. If the French are turned to the west, it will be a good sign. They will pass near Abalessa and then freely to the south. But if they are turned to the east, toward Serkout, it means they are doomed.
How I wish the amenokal were alive! Your Abba would know how to counsel you in this. I must confess I do not. If there is trouble, the fact that it is the French themselves who bring it does not make it less painful. That our Paul might be among them makes me afraid for him. It may already be too late to do anything.
I think of you always. May you travel in safety.
Moussa sat down and reread the letter.
Paul!
His heart leapt with joy at the thought of his cousin. A flood of memories and excitement washed over him. So long he had wondered what had become of Paul, so often he had thought of him. For him to be here, in the desert! It was extraordinary. He looked at the date on the letter. Three weeks had passed since it was written. Damn the amenokal for keeping him from the French! He knew immediately what he must do.
“Rest your mehari, Lufti. Then return to the ariwan,” he said, lashing his belongings into place on the saddle. “Tell no one you have seen me.”
“Not even the demon Kel Asouf could pry it from me,” Lufti promised. “But sire, where are you going?”
“I don’t know exactly. To find the French.” Moussa had a sudden thought and withdrew the oilcloth packet from his pouch. He sat down with a paper and pen and wrote quickly.
Daia—
May it please you to read to the children from this book, and bring them its light. Perhaps one day you might teach this child as well, the life in its words. I wish you much happiness in your marriage.
Moussa
There was much more he wanted to say, but he didn’t know how to say it. It was all too delicate. Thewould have to do. Then he shook his head and tore it up. On a second piece of paper he wrote the same message, except that this time he left out the words in your marriage. Perhaps his mother was right. Perhaps his heart was not yet ready to yield.
“Give this to the Mistress Daia,” he said, folding the paper and slipping it under the string of the oilcloth.
“Yaya, sire.”
Moussa urged his mount quickly to the northeast. Lufti watched until his master was but a speck, and then the speck was gone.
CHAPTER 24
The sunlight danced on the water as it sloshed down the rock trough, its reflection diffusing into vague yellow shimmies on the golden necks of the animals who stood side by side above it. They drew in liter after liter, sucking noisily, greedily, the muscles in their long throats rippling in tandem with the sunlight in a journey up their sloping necks. Two noisy red Bengali birds were playing games in the branches of the tamarisk trees, swooping among the leaves, undisturbed by the activity below them.
The Frenchmen sat in the shade of the trees facing the well of Tadjenout. They watched the Shamba sweat through their labors, filling the trough and the goatskin bags. The well was deep. A Shamba dropped a bucket tied to a rope into the blackness, waiting until it slapped the bottom, then shaking the rope to tip the bucket until its edge dipped below the water, feeling the heavy pull as it filled and sank, then raising it up fist over fist, muscles bulging under his dirty robes until he had it, and draining it off into the goatskin bags held open by a helper. As he did so, another Shamba took his turn, dumping his wet cargo into the trough for the animals. They worked quickly together, but it would be another hour before they finished. Thirsty camels were still filing down the steep hill to take their turn. The horses were watered right away. They were impressive thoroughbreds, but unable to survive the heat like camels and therefore always watered first. Attici’s guides had led them off when they finished, to graze on the rare tufts of grass scattered about the floor of the rock valley.
Captain Masson set down his tin cup. He had been absently watching the entrancing flicker of sunlight on the camels’ necks and nursing his water, lost in thoughts of soft Paris nights. Something disturbed his reverie. Something didn’t feel right. The nape of his neck felt warm and tingly, as if someone were lightly touching his hair. He was certain of the feeling, having had it before, but uncertain of the source. He looked around quickly.
The colonel was engaged in conversation with Doctor Guiard and the engineers Beringer and Roche. He was sipping some tea he’d ordered prepared as they waited for the Shamba to finish. The tirailleurs were relaxed, chattering quietly in scattered groups, leaning on their rifles. Remy Cavour and the others were up over the ridge, seeing to the procession of camels, which seemed to be coming to an end at last. He could see Remy’s figure at the top; the man gave no sign of any problem. The camels were calm and the Bengali birds played on.
The captain shrugged inwardly, and lost himself in the clang of the buckets and the sloshing of the water.
* * *
Remy Cavour followed the last of the camels up the hill. The sergeant was on foot, leading his mount behind. As he topped the east ridge, he looked down onto the camels milling below, some drinking, some just standing, some kneeling on all fours as only camels could. The colonel and the others were sitting near the well. He saw Captain Masson turn to look at him, then turn back. It was hot but peaceful. He saw two of the guides leading the horses away from the well. The horses were trying to graze, but the guides kept yanking at their reins, not letting them stop to eat. It was odd, he thought.
He started down the steep winding path that zigzagged down the slope to the floor below. In rocky country like this he wished for a horse. The wretched camels carried themselves with an ungainly grace on flat sand, but in rocks their grace vanished, leaving them just ungainly. As his mount was stepping over a large stone, Remy’s eyes were drawn to a movement below and to his left. He looked up and saw one of the guides riding his mehari hard, toward where the two guides were now disappearing with the horses into some boulders that obscured the west side of the bowl. Is there a passage? he wondered. Are they stealing the horses and abandoning the group here? He dropped the reins, cupped his hands over his mouth, and shouted. The guide looked over his shoulder at him and whipped his camel for more speed. Should he shoot? Uncertainly, confused, he unshouldered his carbine. He glanced at the officers below. They’d noticed nothing, their vision blocked by the camels milling about the well. The tirailleurs, damned fools, had their backs turned. No one heard him yell.
He raised his rifle.
* * *
Doctor Guiard smiled at something one of the engineers had said. He hoped it was funny. He hadn’t really been listening. His mind was preoccupied in a battle with his intestines, which had been cramping for days. It was the water, of course; and he, the wise doctor, had not been boiling it. He deserved the torment his bowels were bringing him. The tea hadn’t soothed him at all. He grimaced. He’d have to go behind one of the rocks.
He was holding his cup in front of his knees, which were drawn up to his chest to help the cramps. He leaned forward on the balls of his feet and started to set the cup down. As he was looking at it, the cup seemed to explode in his hands. It jerked away and flew backward, toward his chest. His forward motion stopped, and he reversed. He’d heard nothing, nothing at all. He thought someone had slammed his sternum with a board. He couldn’t imagin
e why they’d do that. He had no idea what on earth had happened to the cup.
* * *
Paul was just above the midpoint between the base camp and the well. He’d ridden the route twice, top to bottom. The going was tough, as the Targui had said it would be, but Paul’s mount seemed steadier than most, and was sure, if slow.
Floop was everywhere, running free, exploring the natural caves and following scents and racing over the terrain, dashing underneath Paul’s mehari whenever he thought he might get away with it. He’d been kicked once by the camel for the offense, but had learned nothing from the lesson except to increase his speed.
Paul stopped to talk to El Madani, who, with the other four tirailleurs, had found a perch just above the midway point on the trail from which they had a commanding view. Paul liked the crafty old tirailleur. The man was nearly fifty, but was as wily and tough as any man in the caravan. He’d been two decades in French service and was full of desert stories and tales of the old days in Akabli. And he was the only Algerian who seemed to like Floop’s personality, or notice it. He had kind brown eyes, and normally was quick with a smile. But he had not smiled for days.
“Á votre santé, Lieutenant.”
“Sante, Madani. Anything?”
“No, but I don’t believe it,” he growled, his eyes searching the countryside. “Things don’t feel right. The day is too quiet.”
Paul laughed. “I would think you’d be glad for the quiet.”
“I’ll be glad when these mountains are but a memory,” Madani said. “These Tuareg are vile sons of whores. You can trust the ones who live in graves. In Akabli they used to trade what they’d stolen from the men they’d butchered. Whole caravans. Then other caravans would pass through and buy what the Tuareg had traded. Later the same merchandise would appear back in Akabli – again in the hands of the Tuareg.” He shook his head. “And those caravans stayed together, too. Not like this one.” He spat and kept watching.
“Well, things look all right so far.”
“No, they don’t. Look there.” El Madani pointed to the south of camp, where a mehariste was riding at full speed, the expedition’s Saluki dogs running behind. It was the guide who was to have remained at the base camp.
“What’s he doing here?” Paul wondered.
“They don’t ride like that in this heat for exercise,” Madani said. “He’s running.”
“I think you’re right. We’d better alert the colonel.”
As they turned to leave Floop trotted out from behind some rocks, a lizard’s tail dangling from between his teeth, like a tongue.
“The bag, Floop!” The dog hesitated and whined, pleading.
“The bag!” Paul’s voice cut sharply; his camel was moving. The dog dropped the lizard and scrambled forward, leaping upward when he got to the right position. They’d gotten good at it. Paul caught his front feet in one hand and used Floop’s momentum to swing him up, turn him around, and drop him into the bag. Floop wriggled into position, and stared sullenly from between his paws at the retreating lizard.
As the camels started moving and found their stride, Paul heard shots, and a sound like the low rolling thunder of a distant storm.
* * *
Mahdi smiled. His rifle was the newest, and he’d been practicing, but he knew the truth of it: it was a lucky shot.
Attici had given him the honor of beginning it. The tirailleurs were the closest, simple targets leaning on their guns, but they were believers as well. He preferred one of the infidels drinking tea.
He chose the tin cup as the target. The infidel was holding it just right, its rounded edge catching the sunlight, like a beacon pointing the way. He smiled under his shesh, and pulled the trigger.
Doctor Guiard crashed backward, the bullet deflecting off his sternum and spending itself in his heart. There was little blood from the wound, for there was no heart left to pump it. His arms were flung out behind him, his legs splayed awkwardly. He stared at the sky through lifeless eyes, a puzzled expression on his face.
At Mahdi’s shot the tranquil valley suddenly roared with the noise of a score more shots and the shrill screaming of a hundred Tuareg throats as they poured out from their position on the west end. Their camels’ hooves rumbled, their frenzy fired by the deep, rhythmic beat of the tobol, the drum of war, echoing down from its station hidden atop the ridge. Each of the sounds, intimidating by itself, built with the others into a wall of sonorous terror, amplified by the rock walls of the valley.
Colonel Flatters and Captain Masson reacted instantly when the doctor was hurled back, their long training and instincts taking over from the more natural inclination to freeze at the terrible sound of the attacking Tuareg. They rolled away from the body, grabbing at their rifles and ending in a kneeling position, already firing into the howling blue mass riding toward them. They looked for their horses, to fight mounted and mobile, but saw no trace of them. It would be like this, then, their backs to the well, on foot. Their hands were sure, their motions smooth, their aim deadly, but the number of Tuareg was overwhelming, pressing forward through the raging fire. As fast as the officers could shoot, the Tuareg came faster, camels and men falling at their feet. Those fallen in front brought down others behind, their riders leaping off and over the massive jam, hurling themselves at the Frenchmen, who fired, and fired, and fired again.
The colonel paused slightly, reaching for more ammunition in its pouch on his belt, wrenching furiously at the metal snap. It was too long. From over the top of the mass of bodies in which he stood, a Targui flew at him, shoving his lance before him, driving it hard until it found the gray shoulder, piercing it through. Flatters felt no pain, just a heavy thud that wrenched the carbine from his grasp. He staggered, tripping over the bodies at his feet. He recovered his balance, reaching for his sword with his good arm, and then he had it out, slashing, stabbing, parrying at the Targui before him. As the man fell another was in his place, and another, and the colonel was overwhelmed. A great sword flashed and found his neck. Less than three minutes had passed since the doctor had fallen.
Captain Masson had also run out of ammunition, but had reached his pistol and was firing point-blank into the press of Tuareg. The jumble of bodies was almost a hill, but he knew it was hopeless. He’d seen Sergeant Dennery fall, and the tirailleurs near him were being overrun. The Shamba at the well behind him had been dead almost as quickly as the doctor, caught in the fire of the fierce Tuareg volley. Still, he fired. There was no time to aim for the slits in their sheshes anymore, but there was no need, either; he could hear their panting and the rustle of their robes, and their horrid shrilling sound as they were upon him. A sword smashed into his collarbone, ripping a great gaping hole across and down his chest. Stunned, he felt another blow behind him. It had done something to his back. There was no pain to tell him what, just a heavy tug and then some awful internal sound of cutting. He kept squeezing at the trigger and smelled the blood and the powder and fell over something soft, his head hitting the ground. His eyes looked past the blue and found the tamarisk trees. The Bengali birds had gone.
* * *
Remy fired almost simultaneously with Mahdi, bringing down the fleeing guide. He prayed he’d done the right thing. But then he heard the rumble and saw the blue stream cascading out from behind the same boulders where the horses had disappeared, and he knew.
He found a small flat area and tried to get his camel to kneel, but the pandemonium below had the animal’s nostrils flared in terror. The beast wouldn’t budge and started pulling at the reins to get up the hill. The animal nearly lifted Remy off the ground. As he clung to the leather, he heard a sharp ring on a rock somewhere behind him. He needed cover.
He pulled his pistol from its holster and shot the camel dead, jumping out of the way as it collapsed. Its massive body hit the ground hard and slid downhill, coming to rest against a small shelf of rock. Remy was crouching behind it the instant it stopped.
He tugged at his belt buckle, unfaste
ned it, and pulled his ammunition pouch off, throwing it on the ground. He worked the bolt of his rifle, turned to the slaughter below him, and opened fire. At first it was easy. Most of the Tuareg were mounted, riding much higher than the camels around them, and effortless shots to his practiced aim. He fired steadily, accurately, grunting with satisfaction at the falling targets, counting them off to himself, six, sept, huit, stopping only to grab more cartridges. Some of the Tuareg below saw him and charged up the hill but he took them easily, almost casually. He was alone, but on good high ground. He thought he could stay like that for hours, until all the godless blue bastards were dead.
* * *
In the first ten seconds, the expedition’s camels massed in the valley went mad with fright. They howled and bucked and ran in every direction, retreating at the echoes or running from some new advancing mayhem, finding no way out of the terror. They ran into each other, some falling, bellowing when others trampled over them, snapping their legs. One fell partway into the well, its front legs dangling in the blackness, throat just over the edge, chin resting precariously on the rock ledge opposite. Frantically it tried to free itself, front legs kicking for a hold, but another camel ran over the top, stepping just behind the fallen camel’s head, snapping its neck and forcing it down into the well. Its hindquarters dragged on the rocks until they were gone, and the dead mehari splashed heavily into the water below. The second camel plunged down after the first, howling as it went.
Some tried to run up impossible inclines, legs pumping furiously at the rocks until they lost their footing and fell backward, running into others climbing behind them and toppling them too, legs entwining with other legs, bodies colliding and sliding and falling, until they were a great golden avalanche of terrified fury. Two of the tirailleurs, kneeling and firing at the Tuareg, were caught in one of the mass rushes, their weapons flying, their bodies crushed to the ground.
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