The Lost City

by Carrie E. Gruhn

  Paul climbed stiffly from the station wagon, but Ahmed already was talking with swift urgency. The forbidding scowls deepened. Then abruptly the wild gamin-grins were back again, and motioning us to follow, the men swept ahead of us, yelling and waving their long slender guns.

  “Well, thank goodness you seem to know your people pretty well, Ahmed.” Paul was filled with elation; and singing to ease the thought of our tired feet, we fell in line behind the car and trudged wearily, yet with lighter hearts, into the welcoming Bedouin village.

  Women’s soft, shy hands led us into their side of the biggest tent. Soon we fell asleep drinking the warmish milk and eating the queer-tasting biscuits which they had forced upon us.

  The sun was still well up in the sky when the same hands shook us awake. Aching and stiff I thought it impossible that we go on before recuperating. But Paul was adamant.

  “Originally, I had intended crossing to one of the small railroad stops, but I’m afraid to risk that now. All the passengers will be checked. That means we’ll have days of travel, so we have to push on. Even if these people would let us stay it would not be fair to them. They can flit from waterhole to waterhole and keep out of the way of Damon’s men, but encumbered with us they would find it harder to do. No, they have offered to let us use enough of their camels and horses to travel more easily. We will have to push on.”

  I had thought it would be wonderful riding, but I had not ridden either a horse or a camel before. I soon discovered my mistake. It seemed impossible, but new spots took punishment, and the old bruises and hurts were aggravated more deeply! Before long the camels and the horses bore only bundles and rolls—we were with one accord glad to stumble along and blindly follow. Mother did not walk. A sort of hammock had been slung between two animals and she swung rather unevenly as they moved forward.

  The storm had left small pockets of water in hollows and on the hard rocks where the animals greedily drank, and a little was gathered in the fast-emptying waterbottles by ever-watchful Ahmed. It was well that he had been alert to the danger for when it became known that we could not go any farther there still was no sign of a waterhole. Camp was made in the already dusky desert, and then the gathered water was carefully boiled for tea. Water was carefully doled out, giving little relief from the thirst which seemed greater than the aching of our bones and the weariness of our spirits.

  Heat rose in waves from the hard barren rocks, leaving no storm moisture for us to gather the next day. Days were lost in the nightmare of that journey. We traveled from waterhole to waterhole instead of from day to day. Finally, we learned to sit on the rocking beasts and to hunch, hopelessly, while shutting our eyes to the wild ugliness of the terrain through which we seemed to be going in ghastly never-ending circles. A slender Bedouin joined us. We scarcely knew that we had come close to his camp, but he offered to guide us and certainly we needed it. But how could we be sure he was not purposefully leading us around and around making mock of our weaknesses and our inability to cope with his land?

  “He is taking us right, Tanya,” Paul answered when I could keep silent no longer. “Sometimes we do backtrack. But it is necessary for the finding of open waterholes. Other Bedouins have crisscrossed the desert with tracks and messages readable only to our guide and to Ahmed perhaps. Sometimes we are almost to one waterhole when he reads the signs and knows that if we keep going we will find it dried up or closed, then he does turn us around. Without him we would all perish beside some clogged and worthless well.”

  I knew that Paul must be right, yet I could not keep from eyeing our guide with suspicion. The others grumbled, too, yet we were helpless without him and he had managed to find water for us more than once in the nick of time perhaps, but he had found it. So whether we trusted him completely or not we followed meekly where he led.

  I was too preoccupied with trying to keep intact and to shield Toni as much as possible to pay too much attention to the others. Simon, I knew was caring for mother. I went to her often at first, but she seemed to be in a stupor, neither noticing nor caring. I think perhaps that she was more comfortable in her swinging hammock than any of the rest of us because she was shielded from the sun and somewhat from the dust.

  However, the girl carrying a burden new to her and a sick body could not be dismissed from our thoughts. She bravely refused to let us stop on her account. She cried when it was suggested and threatened to run away across the desert, if we let her damage our chances. To all it was apparent that she was getting weaker. Paul administered what drugs he could from the small store he had brought but had not expected this sort of emergency. So we were not surprised when one morning she could not be moved.

  I went with other mothers to help while the older children played with Toni. But Paul shook his head bitterly and I knew that there was nothing any of us could do. The strain was too much and the girl also recognized that fact.

  “I’m glad,” she whispered simply. “I have been a hindrance to you. But I didn’t want to leave my baby. I won’t have to, will I, Doctor?”

  Startled I looked across at Paul as the purport of her words reached my heart. A smile of encouragement was on Paul’s lips though his eyes were wet.

  “No, it looks as if you won’t have to leave him. Of course you know you are sort of running out on us?” he leaned closer and took her hand.

  “I know that I am but—but you’ll all be coming along sometime. And I am so tired of running away.” She was still for a moment then wistfully, “I would like to have taken a gift to Him—”

  “What better gifts could you be carrying to Him than your heart and the babe?”

  “My heart and my baby!” her eyes brightened and a lilt seemed to come to her voice, an awed, adoring lilt, “My heart and my baby—they are all I have, my Messiah and my Redeemer, but I give them gladly to Thee—my heart and my babe—” and so she went away to be with the Saviour, our Lord and Messiah. And the smile on her lips was sweet as she laid her gifts at the feet of her King.

  19

  THE CITY OF REFUGE

  SOMETIMES WE RODE on high plateaus with endless other plateaus climbing, climbing into the distance, all troweled and roughened into a hopeless, meaningless jumble before our smarting eyes. Sometimes we rode down into cooler wadies whose steep walls narrowed us in. On top, the dust rose in acrid clouds choking us. Along the wadi bottoms there were often green growing things, cooling pools of water, bright flowers like oleander which made the way pleasant. When we climbed smooth, frightening inclines we would come up into the heat where a brazen sky seemed to laugh at our smallness.

  Two more storms threatened to destroy us before the journey ended. We were deep in the shelter of one narrow wadi when a small black wisp of cloud appeared above. Our guide shouted us back and I was rebellious, but Paul did not let me argue. Even then the last horse was nearly swept from his feet by the roaring torrent that rushed through the pleasant bottoms where we had been passing over dry parched stones only moments before. Lightning struck; thunder crashed, until the eardrums threatened to break. The very earth was shaking and grinding hideously beneath us. Clouds moved low to pour out their overabundance of water; a plushlike wetness weighted us down where we clung. Then, as quickly as it had come, the storm fled and the sun shone hot upon us. Water still roared, but we could not see it because the earthquake had leveled the walls.

  Paul said not a word. His eyes turned instantly heavenward and as one we sank down to offer humble praise to God who had spared and kept us.

  The second storm was not quite so violent or so near to us, but there was evidence that both had left strange marks on the earth for miles. Our guide often paused in perplexity when he found first one then another landmark erased. At last he traveled more by instinct than by landmarks, yet we knew his guidance was better than ours would have been.

  Before the first storm we had carefully avoided the Arab encampments. There was still the feeling that we had been presumptuous when we had gone into that first o
ne and again when we had accepted the present guide’s offer. Days went by without sight of tents, until across the yellow and blue, that was giving way to a rosier color, we descried a cluster of tents and more permanent buildings.

  “The outpost,” Paul whispered, as if his voice could carry to the villagers.

  “That’s right,” Ahmed was sober, too.

  “Well, what about it?” I questioned because Paul seemed undecided.

  “I think we should chance it.” Ahmed spoke slowly but with a certain surety, nevertheless. “There will be water and fresh fruits there, and perhaps we can trade animals for others. Let us go forward and prepare them for these coming.” He nodded toward our guide.

  Paul bade us dismount and await their return. It seemed so long, but eventually they came, and with them men on mangy horses that were more wiry than our weary beasts.

  “Others have gone in already,” Ahmed reported. “The village is blind to what is happening.” The grin belied his words for I knew that these Arabians, long our enemies, had been knit together at last with our cause under Damon’s threat.

  Closer inspection proved the small hovels to be storehouses, the tents only temporary quarters. There was water, fresh fruit, and vegetables and never had anything tasted so good after our haphazard diet of the past days.

  Limestone rocks formed slippery pathways for the horses’ feet as we reluctantly left the friendly, almost permanent village. The new horses were used to the way and needed only to be given their heads to pick their precarious way. The valley deepened and narrowed until it seemed it must end in one of the turns. Snakelike, the narrows went endlessly on deeper and deeper between walls that towered straight above us. We passed through an ancient city where dark faces peered at us from various openings so we knew it was not a dead city.

  “It seems like going back into the beginning of the world,” I commented.

  “A little bit that way, Tanya. This is part of the oldest portion of the world, and it was, at one time, a very busy part. We did not see it but we were not far from the well Moses called forth from the rocks. Wait, there will be a real surprise for you soon.”

  Small altars and shrines were cut in the walls, and fascinated, I saw signs of life. There had been a paved highway through this wadi at one time. Rough pavings remained to show it. Great boulders had fallen, often clogging the way.

  “This is so different from the other parts,” I remarked, riding for the moment beside Paul.

  “It is different. It was once traversed by caravans bearing their wealth of spices, silks, gold, and precious ornaments. For long centuries it has lain forgotten—preparing for this day.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “In a way I am only guessing for God did not say this was to be the haven or city of refuge to which we should flee. Others before me thought that it was. See these high walls? They are practically unscalable and where they are they dead-end. They would offer good posts for defending the city to which we are coming. But I do not want to spoil it for you; let it be enough for you to remember that God told us to flee to the mountains. I believe this city was God-given to us for a refuge. I am sure you will be safe.”

  “I?” I looked fearfully into Paul’s face. “But—but of course you are included.”

  “Why, little Tanya? Would you have me hide safely while out there countless others, who do not know our Messiah, are without hope, ready to hear the truth and with eyes ready to be opened?”

  There was no answer, except the one, to his questions, but though pride swelled anew within me, there was almost a wish, too, that he had less need for being so kind, so wise, and so far-seeing! I shook off that wish and looked into his eyes with a smile that brought a proud shining look into his face. Our horses brushed so that our hands touched briefly, then we were forced into single file.

  There was something awe-inspiring about these walls that rose above us and that seemed to close in behind us. They served to turn my thoughts away from self and the anxiety which later I would feel for Paul. My eyes seemed filled with the mighty works of God, when suddenly a new turn appeared to cut sharply across our vision. It seemed it must be a mirage like no other that I had ever seen. It was a fairy castle, unreal and shimmering,—ready to vanish with too close inspection. Yet, after the first pause, we pushed forward and coming into the cross ravine found that it still hung, a perfect cameo carved from the solid rock. Rosy red and shimmering white, an opalescent dream, it was too beautiful, too strangely shocking to the senses so long accustomed to the endless barrenness of ageless and aging chaos. If the towering walls had dwarfed us, this temple to an unknown God did not add anything to our stature.

  Fairies or giants would inhabit such a dream castle, but disillusionment broke my dream. A challenge came down and stayed our feet. Paul’s voice was exultant as he flung back his answer. A heavy door swung open and Paul dismounting, strode away to disappear within the palace or temple.

  “Where’s Daddy?” Our small son’s eyes were wide with questions as he looked at the castle into which his father had disappeared.

  “He’s gone for a minute, blessed baby, but he will come for us.”

  “To go in that pretty house?”

  “I don’t know. Here comes Daddy! He will tell us.”

  Paul was not alone. He walked between two men who chatted and laughed, pulling Paul’s beard, while circling admiringly around him.

  “I wonder if his face is as dirty under those false whiskers as it is where we can see it,” one man jibed as they came close to us.

  “Fastidious Paul! I still think it’s a fake—but you talk like him, you walk like him,” still circling the tattered figure who, indeed, hardly resembled Paul.

  “Rub it in, you fellows but beauty’s only skin deep you know. It’s what’s underneath that counts.”

  They all laughed again then soberly left off the by-play to welcome us to the haven they were jealously guarding.

  “Glad you made it, old man. It’s getting plenty tough out there.”

  “I can guess,” Paul replied, quietly. “We’ve been out of touch since we left our village. Lots must have happened since then.”

  “You’re right, and lots more is happening all the time.” There was grim fierceness in the man’s words as he waved us on. “Go on inside. There are surprises for you, Paul. Your city isn’t dead anymore. It’s very much alive, thanks to you.”

  “No thanks to me—give all thanks to God. Thank God and pray for those out there who are still blind to their need, that their eyes may be opened.”

  And so we came to our City of Refuge. Beyond the cameo-like temple the rock walls suddenly gave way before a spreading panorama, beautiful and wonderful. There was a wide and blooming valley where the oleanders were thicker and more brilliant than in any wadi through which we had passed. There were young trees and even-rowed vineyards whose tender branches told of recent planting. There were contented flocks on the little hills, but where were the habitations? Where were the tents?

  “Does that look good to us!” one and all exclaimed. Paul nodded without speaking. He led us toward one of the many less ornate and beautiful temples.

  The valley had been so vast that we had failed to see people, but there were people working in the fields and vineyards, and children at play. Paul led us directly to one of the massive doors set in the mountain side, and taking out a key unlocked it. I was as wide-eyed as Toni. Paul seemed familiar with everything so he must have been here often. Pushing the door back he turned to us with a triumphant ring in his voice.

  “Inside there is safety at last—it is home until we are ready to quit it. No one will drive us out!”

  Little Toni was straining at my hand but I could not resist looking back once more. It seemed I was always looking back, but when I turned I saw that the others were looking toward the valley, too. Around and around the towering heights my eyes swept, stopping here and there to examine age-old altars and temples and shrines standing high on the
summits or else wrested from the rock walls. Down along the slopes I let my eyes follow sweet running streamlets that tumbled and hurried to meet at the bottom to go flowing—where? There seemed other valleys opening into this one or this one widened and spread into the mountains which marched away into the distance.

  My eyes strained to see the top of the mountain or to the top of the massive temple or dwelling hewn from its side. What tremendous effort had gone into its building! How had it lain uninhabited and neglected, until our need drove us to it? Surely God was all-merciful, all-kind, and His wisdom past understanding!

  “How much of this are you responsible for, Paul?” Simon asked softly. All eyes turned to him as if the same question had been hovering on all lips.

  “Oh, I carved these temples out of the rocks bare-handed,” Paul glibly answered. Quietly then he spoke, his fingers reaching into his pocket to touch the small, worn, black Book I knew always reposed there, “Dal’s was the vision—we only followed what God gave him to see. At least I think there could be no other place like this.”

  “I doubt very much if there could be another quite like it,” one man affirmed. “But Dal’s were not the only eyes opened, Doctor, whether you will admit it or not. We would still be blind and this place closed to us without someone getting it ready and showing us the way.”

  I recalled some of the things I had, as it were, thrown in my mother’s face—that Paul would lead us and bring us to safety, if there was safety for us. But remembering, my heart knelt humbly before God who had opened Paul’s eyes in time,—and to thank God for Dal, now receiving his rewards for having striven mightily that Paul might see God’s truth. How could he have led us here if he had continued blind?

  20

  UNDER THE ROCK

  WE SCATTERED, presently, to examine our new home. It was amazingly massive and though carved out of the rock seemed dry and clean. The ceilings disappeared high overhead, yet we had seen evidences that there were rooms above. Inside there was a desk which Paul must have brought here and a folding chair or two, but otherwise no furniture at all. Small rooms opening off the first one were unfurnished yet were piled high with boxes and crates and bundles. However, we were too tired and too happy to explore further. All we wanted was a chance to rid ourselves of the dirty rags and wash in the cool, sweet waters that invited us.