A Kiss of Adventure
Page 27
The darkness around her was total. Was this the bottom of the well? or a ledge? It was so dark she began to think she saw spots of light. She rubbed her eyes, released the rope with one hand, and knelt to let her fingers slide across the sandy surface. When they touched something hard and cold, she jerked her hand to her mouth.
“The lamp,” she whispered. “It’s the lamp.”
Again she ventured out, letting her fingers wander over the smooth, cold surface of the brass lantern. “Relax, Tillie,” she told herself. “Uncurl those legs.”
Her heart hammering in her temples, she took her other hand from the rope. Beads of sweat popped out on her forehead. The hair on the nape of her neck rose to attention.
Where was the treasure chest?
Her fingers roamed across every inch of the narrow floor. The sand was smooth and even. Her hands moved over the untouched ground, around the perimeter, up the craggy walls. Nothing. No sign of disturbance. Nothing lived here, no monitor lizards, no snakes, not even a scorpion. There was no trace of water, as if even the most essential element of life had been swept away by the desert.
Frustrated, she clamped her teeth shut. Where was it? She sat back on her heels. What would Graeme have done? How would he have reasoned it out? Unless she had been mistaken in her reading of Mungo Park’s note, the chest had to be here.
“Ahmadi Fatouma, where did you hide that chest?” Her question echoed upward and sent a trickle of sand drifting onto her head. A chill washed through her.
That was it. Sand. It had been two centuries since the chest had been placed at the bottom of this well. Two centuries, with more than a thousand sandstorms and more than a hundred rains. The chest was buried.
She sank her hands into the sand. Her fingers tore at grit and stones and shoved them away. How deep would it be? How far would she have to dig to find it?
After ten minutes of digging, her fingertips grazed something hard. She paused, heart racing; then she began to brush back the sand. A straight, hard edge emerged. Smooth wood studded with nails. Carvings. She scrabbled with her bare fingers until she had exposed one whole side of the box.
After a minute’s rest, she resumed digging. She found a clasp—the same kind of clasp Graeme had opened on the first chest. This was it. She had found the chest.
She clawed at the sand until she could slide her bleeding fingers under the wooden box. With a grunt, she lifted the chest onto her lap. Breathing hard, she sat alone in the darkness and realized her cheeks were wet. She’d been crying as she dug. Crying over Graeme. He should be the one holding Mungo Park’s final legacy.
Crying for herself, too. She had given herself into God’s hands the moment she had tumbled into Graeme’s Land Rover. She had pledged herself to trust God one moment at a time, but she had failed him in so many ways.
With Khatty, she had tried to set an example. She had encouraged the Targui woman in her simple, childlike quest. Yet it was Khatty—forced to live in a Muslim world, the wife of a man who had rejected, abandoned, and humiliated her—who had been compelled to admonish Tillie in the end. “You find happy,” Khatty had said.
Happy? How could she be happy when she had failed so miserably with Graeme?
God had allowed him into her life, a man she could care about, perhaps even lead toward the Lord. Instead—against all she knew was right—she had fallen in love with him. Even though she had told Graeme they could have no future, she had never stopped loving him. And now he was dead, without God. For eternity. Sharp grief washed over her, and she wondered if life would ever be the same.
Find happy? It seemed impossible.
She brushed the heel of her palm over her damp cheek. It was time to bring this to an end.
Fumbling with the clasp, she felt it give. The lid swung open. Sightless, she peered into the blackness. A dry, musky smell rose from the chest, the odor of an attic closed up too long. Her fingers trailed over two items inside the chest. Under her left hand lay a small, thin book. She slid her hand around it and held it to her nose, breathing the rich leather scent. The journal of Mungo Park. Graeme’s Holy Grail.
Under her right hand lay a large pouch made of dry, crusty fabric. She could feel small round lumps inside it. Gold nuggets, she supposed, or coins. The treasure of Timbuktu.
She could close the box, jerk the rope, and carry the treasure up to Ahodu Ag Amastane. It might help his people. Or it might set up a tradition of greed. She imagined it sending the Tuareg into Timbuktu to trade, to start selling their trinkets and broadswords to fat, pink tourists. They had been desert nomads for centuries. Long before Mungo Park’s time and long after. Did they really need his treasure to survive?
What about Arthur? His instructions sifted down like the sand that trickled into her hair. Hidden in blackness, she could open the pouch. No one would see. She could take out some of the gold and hide it under her burnous. The gold would help give Arthur the life he thought he wanted.
A prayer formed on Tillie’s lips. She curled on her knees and touched her forehead to the sand. “Father, I love you. I see you working all around me. In Khatty’s life. Through Robert and Mary McHugh. Through Hannah. Maybe you were working in Graeme’s life, too. I want to join you in your work. Work through me, Father. Amen.”
She lifted her head and took a deep breath. Now what? The gold. The journal. The amenoukal. Arthur. Who should have what?
“Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.”
The answer was easy after all.
She took the journal out of the chest, snapped the lid shut, and fastened the clasp. The small book slipped easily under her burnous and inside Graeme’s shirt. Robert McHugh would know what to do with it.
Tillie shifted the chest into the crook of her arm and adjusted the rope around her hips. With a tug, she signaled her readiness to leave the well. Immediately the rope tightened.
Ascending was harder than going down had been, but she hardly felt the bumps and scrapes. Her heart was light, and a song played at her lips.
“Come, oh, desert lion.” Tillie whispered the lilting tune as she rose through the darkness. “Son of the waran, man of strength and mighty wisdom. Come, oh, desert lion. . . . Come, oh, desert lion. . . .”
Hands reached down to pull her from the well. When her head lifted into the fresh air, she saw the last rays of the sun sliding beneath the horizon. Pale stars were scattered like random cross-stitch on a blue-gray cloth. A full moon smiled overhead.
Tillie climbed over the lip of the well and stood on solid rock. “Ahodu Ag Amastane, the tree-planting woman has returned from the Well of Waran.” She handed him the chest. “Take this. It is the treasure of Timbuktu.”
She walked past him down the rock. As she brushed by Arthur, he grabbed her arm. “Did you do what I told you?” he hissed. “Did you get the treasure? the journal?”
“The amenoukal has the gold, Arthur. You and I don’t need earthly treasure, remember? Our wealth is in heaven.”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Matilda! You gave it all to him? What about the journal? On the black market it’ll fetch a small fortune.”
She turned back slowly. “The black market, Arthur?”
Suddenly Hannah’s cryptic message on the telephone made sense. Like a mango growing on a banana stalk, things were not as they ought to be. Arthur was the thing in Tillie’s clothing that would sting her. Hannah had seen into his heart, and she knew.
“You’ve been stealing the books from the Sankore Mosque, haven’t you, Arthur?”
The answer was written in his expression. His eyes washed a pale empty blue as her words registered. The color drained from his face, and he grabbed for her arm. His Tuareg guards jerked him back. The Englishman struggled and called her name, but she turned away.
Tillie could see the amenoukal surrounded by his men. They were carrying the chest to a higher platform of rock to open it in view of the whole caravan. Khatty was at her husband’s side, where no doubt she would remain.
She was free. They had all forgotten her, Tree-Planting Woman. Even Arthur had struggled into the mass of swarming Tuareg, hoping for a glimpse of his lost dreams. In silence, she surveyed the deserted well. Her focus fell on the box that had held Mungo Park’s hat. The little chest lay abandoned, so she picked it up.
The thunder was louder now, and she stared at a low formation of silver-lined clouds that billowed over the horizon. Wanting to feel the desert breeze wash away the memory of the well, she climbed onto one of the two stone fingers that formed the waran’s open mouth. She threw off her burnous and gripped the jagged rock, her well-worn boots finding sure footing.
When she had climbed to the tip of the peak, she looked down at the bustling hive of Tuareg. Blue-clad backs pressed and writhed; turbaned heads craned to see. She smiled, the weight of the search lifted from her shoulders.
Thank you, Father. Thank you for showing me the real treasure.
She tucked Mungo Park’s hatbox under her arm. Suddenly the amenoukal leapt to his feet, his shrill cry piercing the air. He raised his broadsword and brought it down on the wooden chest. It shattered into a hundred fragments across the stone. He flung the treasure pouch into the air, and its contents spilled out in the fading light.
It wasn’t golden nuggets that flew in every direction. Or gold coins. It was seashells. Cowrie shells. Ahmadi Fatouma’s treasure was nothing more than hundreds upon hundreds of cowrie shells.
“Mansong, the king of Segou,” Tillie whispered. “Graeme said Mansong gave Mungo Park five thousand cowrie shells. That’s the treasure of Timbuktu!”
A laugh bubbled up in her throat. She tossed back her head, and the breeze caught her hair. Cowrie shells! Thunder rolled over her laughter, drowning out the sound.
“Tillie!” someone shouted.
She swung around toward the voice. It had come from the west, across the desert. Was she imagining the djenoun again? Peering into the setting sun, she shielded her eyes against the glare. A loud rumble roared toward her. That sound . . . it wasn’t thunder at all. It was the roar of an airplane’s engines.
A wing dipped as a battered old two-seater with a single propeller flew past the rock. A hand shot out of the open cockpit. She saw a ripple of black hair and the flash of a boyish grin.
“Graeme!” she shouted.
“Hang on, Tillie-girl. I’m coming to get you.”
SEVENTEEN
The airplane circled the Well of Waran and began a descent to the desert. Heart racing, Tillie slid down the stone. Loose rocks scattered under her feet. She fell, her ankle twisted, her palm split. She rolled onto her knees and leapt back to her feet. The old wooden chest tucked under her arm, she ran on. She jumped over a crevice and slid on her bottom down a narrow ravine.
Behind her, the Tuareg spotted the plane and gave chase. The enraged amenoukal raised his spear and led his men over the stone away from their scattered treasure. Shouting, screaming, they raced after her.
The rusty old airplane came to a stop on the strip of level road. Graeme rose out of the cockpit to beckon Tillie. His black hair blew away from his face, and she could see a strip of cloth tied around his head. He was wounded, but he was alive. Alive.
Her feet hit the sand. Racing up one dune and down the next, she glanced to her side as the amenoukal’s spear dug into the sand. The tattered banner of her skirt flapped in the breeze. The spear’s shaft swung back and forth and then toppled over.
Graeme climbed half out of the cockpit, and Tillie could see that the propeller was still humming. He stepped out onto the wing. She smelled diesel fuel, hot metal, smoke. Tillie reached the aircraft and lifted her hands. Graeme leaned toward her. In a replay of their first meeting, his arm swung out over the edge of the wing and snapped around her waist like an iron band. Lifted horizontally into the air, she saw the blue-black sky sprinkled with stars spin overhead, the dunes whirl below. Her breath was knocked from her lungs, and her hair floated over her face like a fan. Mungo Park’s box tumbled from her arms into the cockpit. She followed it into a tiny space where her knees met her chin.
The airplane’s engine thunk-thunked from idle to full rev. In the seat ahead of her Graeme worked the controls. The plane rolled forward over the sand, a deathly slow start. The Tuareg poured over a dune and swarmed toward them.
“Keep ’em busy!” Graeme shouted.
Tillie tore off a boot and hurled it at a Targui who reached for the plane’s wing. Stunned, he stumbled backward, but another warrior took his place. Tillie’s second boot glanced off his chin, tangled in his veil, and made him lose his grip.
“I got it now,” Graeme shouted. “Hang onto your hat. We’re going for a ride.”
The plane’s forward thrust pressed Tillie against the brown leather seat. Graeme accelerated as the aircraft bounced across the sandy road, dipped and surged and half floated into the air before slamming onto the road again. Behind them, the Tuareg swarmed over the plane’s tracks as they tried to keep up.
When Tillie was sure her eardrums would burst from the engine’s roar, the plane lifted into the cobalt sky.
“Graeme!” she cried. “You did it.”
“We did it.” His voice was filled with elation. “Look at our pal down there.”
She leaned over the side of the airplane and saw the amenoukal standing on a dune. His spear was at his side again; his broadsword hung loose in one hand. “Look, Graeme. There’s Khatty.”
Graeme hung one arm out and waved at the two figures. “Maktoub!” he shouted. “Maktoub.” It was God’s will.
Khatty pulled off her turban and waved it in farewell. Then the tall, blue-veiled Targui beside her lifted his spear in salute.
“Did you see that?” Tillie called. “The amenoukal waved at us.”
“He’s saying we were worthy adversaries.”
“So was he.” She slumped back in the crumbling leather seat. How could this all be happening? Graeme had been killed. But here he was. Alive.
The plane veered into a sweeping turn. “There’s Arthur,” he called over one shoulder.
Below the plane, the Englishman sat dejected at the lip of the Well of Waran. The splintered chest and the treasure pouch lay beside him. He was running his fingers through the piles of tiny round opalescent shells that were the legacy of Mungo Park’s guide, Ahmadi Fatouma.
“Shall we go get him?” Graeme yelled.
Tillie considered for a moment. “No,” she shouted back. “He got what he wanted. Leave him with it.”
He turned to her. “The journal? Did he get his hands on it?”
“No.” She touched the slender book hidden under her shirt. “Graeme, at the Sankore Mosque, I saw—”
“There they come!” He let out a whoop that cut off Tillie’s words. The plane swooped down to buzz a line of Land Rovers headed for the wadi of the Well of Waran. Police Land Rovers.
The officials smiled and waved as the airplane blasted over them. When Graeme lifted the plane’s nose again, Tillie slid forward and draped her arms around his neck. His black hair blew across her cheek, and she laid her head against his.
Despite the breeze, the night was warm. The stars seemed brighter from up here; the full moon began a gradual ascent. Bright silver-white, it lit up the sand until each grain glittered like a diamond and each dune wore a shining halo. The flight was not long, and as the plane began to lose altitude, Tillie spotted what looked like an alabaster snake winding across the desert.
“What’s that?” she called.
“The Niger.”
“Mungo Park’s river.” She gazed down at the curling channel and smiled. From here it was the stuff of dreams. “And that glittering spot in the sand?”
“Timbuktu.”
The plane descended, and the lights g
rew closer, changing from silver to gold and red and blue—the colors of lamp flames, cooking fires, coals warming thick black coffee, braziers roasting kabobs of goat. The river rippled in the wind, drifting shoreward to lap at the banks where egrets stood. Hippos rose from the water and waddled out to munch on reeds and papyrus, while crocodiles crawled along the shore in search of a stretch of warm sand.
As the plane bumped down onto an expanse of barren, moonlit track between the river and the town, Tillie drank in the dry smell of the sand she had come to know so well. The breeze died to a gentle caress as Graeme eased the plane to a halt and cut the engine. The propeller slowed to a tired whirl and stopped.
He climbed out of the cockpit and helped Tillie across the wing. The amulet tumbled from her shirt and clanked on the cool metal. When she dropped into Graeme’s arms, he held her close against his chest, and she could hear his heart thudding against his ribs.
“I was scared to death for you,” he whispered. His breath warmed her cheek. “I was sure I’d lost you.”
“But I thought the amenoukal had killed you. In the mine—I saw his broadsword. You were down in the water, and he swung it at you.”
“You thought I’d been killed?”
“The last thing I saw before they knocked me out was the sword coming down on your neck.”
He groaned and looked up into the sky. “I thought you knew what happened. We were on a ledge, remember? At the last instant, I dove off it into the water. The amenoukal grabbed me and nicked my head with his sword. I squirmed between his feet and swam underwater. I was sure he wouldn’t follow me. You know how the Tuareg feel about water. I was swimming blindly, down one tunnel after another, and when I finally came up, I was lost. It took me hours to find my way back to the entrance of the mine— I’m still not even sure how I did it. By that time, the police had arrived. I guess you were gone by then?”