by John Harris
Standing on the tower, neat and tidy despite the sudden summons from his bed, he stared across the stretch of open ground between himself and the first rocky outcrop leading to the hills. A line of horsemen was sitting silently beneath a green banner staring at the fortress.
‘Armed to the teeth, shouldn’t wonder,’ he observed to Fox. ‘Better rouse the rest of the chaps. My compliments to the officers and ask ’em to meet me here.’
As Fox turned away to send a messenger, Pentecost stared again at the silent line of horsemen just becoming visible in the dim half-light. There was a troublesome breeze stirring the dust into little whirls and he felt grit between his teeth. In the tower near him, one of the Toweida Levies had his rifle through the embrasure, staring at the silent figures, occasionally glancing at the neat figure of Pentecost as he wondered what to do.
Pentecost became aware of Fox reappearing at his side.
‘Message delivered, sir,’ the sergeant said. He nodded at the silent line about a hundred yards away. ‘Nasty-looking lot, sir. What do you reckon they’re up to?’
‘Perhaps they’ve called to ask if we’ll play ’em at football,’ Pentecost said with mild facetiousness. ‘Great ones for football, I’m told.’
‘The only football they’d play,’ Fox said grimly, ‘is with our ghoulies.’
Pentecost smiled his small careful smile. Fox was one of the old school of sergeants, wary, cautious and wily in the ways of conniving troops; never one to take any risk, big or small, unless he was told to; but utterly reliable and with the strange sort of honour that existed among the best NCOs of every army in the world, which allowed him to fiddle stores and get drunk but never permitted him to let the side down.
He stared at the silent line of men again. There was a certain amount of restless movement among them now, as horses jostled each other. Dark faces stared towards him, half-hidden by black burnouses. Lean bodies were swathed in ragged gowns and cloaks of black wool. Dark thin hands cradled rifles across ornamented saddles. These were men dedicated in their hatred of all things Western, and of the Sultan of Khalit in particular because he was considered a turncoat who allowed Western officials to tell him what to do. They were utterly ruthless, and cruel enough to castrate a captive or chop off his hands or cut out his tongue when they caught him. But only because they would just as easily and with as little thought disembowel their own wives if they found they’d been unfaithful.
‘Zihouni,’ he observed laconically. ‘Black headdress, black cloak, green girdle. The Black Men of Khusar. The nastiest of the lot.’
He noticed further movement among the group, then he realised there was a bunch of horsemen behind the line, arguing fiercely among themselves, and, even as he watched, the line parted and one of the arguing figures appeared before them, sitting silent and alone, huddled in his black garments, still staring towards the fort, as though prepared to attack it but wondering just how to set about it.
Pentecost nodded towards the Toweida alongside.
‘Just see that chap’s under no delusions,’ he said. ‘I’m not having him potting at the gent on the horse.’
‘He could do it easy,’ Fox grinned.
‘That chap out there’s as aware of that as we are,’ Pentecost said primly. ‘But he doesn’t think we will. That’s why he’s sitting there.’
Lack had arrived by this time and was staring through the embrasure with Pentecost.
‘Ugly bloody lot,’ he observed bluntly. ‘Straight out of a Khaswe knocking shop by the look of ’em.’
Minto appeared shortly afterwards and they stared at the line of men and the silent figure sitting a white horse in front. Pentecost threw away his cigarette. An idea was forming in his mind.
‘Think I’ll go out and see what they want,’ he said unexpectedly.
Lack stared at him as though he’d gone off his head. ‘Out there?’ he asked. ‘With that shower of night-shirted Khusar pimps? Sometimes, Billy, I think you’re not quite right in the head!’
Pentecost shrugged.
‘They could knock you off easy as w-w-wink,’ Minto said.
Pentecost shrugged again. ‘It’d be a rotten bad idea, Freddy, if they did,’ he pointed out. He turned to Fox. ‘Get ’em to shove up the Bren, Sergeant, and see that everyone’s loaded for bear. If anyone does knock me off, see that the compliment’s returned three-fold.’
Fox nodded. ‘OK, sir.’
‘No nonsense, though,’ Pentecost said. ‘If he’s come in peace, let’s have peace.’ He gave a little sigh, thinking of his vast responsibilities. ‘Because,’ he added fervently, ‘we need peace.’
They watched as the great wooden gates were hauled open a foot or two to allow him to pass through, and he strolled towards the solitary figure on the horse, carrying only a short cane and with no sign of a weapon about his person.
‘That bloody man never fails to surprise me,’ Sergeant Fox observed to Sergeant Chestnut as they watched the slight figure in the flapping shorts stalking in its neat stride from the fort. ‘Would you go out there, with that lot waiting for you?’
Sergeant Chestnut said nothing but it was obvious from the expression on his bleak Scots face that he wouldn’t.
As they watched, the man on the white horse set spurs to his mount, so fiercely it seemed to jump into the air. It came down on all four feet in a puff of dust and seemed to leap towards the solitary figure of Pentecost, who stopped and waited, his thumbs tucked into his belt.
The horse halted a yard or two from his peeling nose just when he was expecting to be trampled into the ground, slithering on its heels as its rider wrenched savagely at the reins. Pentecost forced himself not to back away as the horse came up on its hind legs, pawing the air, and dropped with a thud and a jingle of caparisoned equipment.
‘Impressive,’ he said aloud, more than anything else to keep his nerve steady.
The rider, a striking figure in dusty robes sitting a bright red metal-studded saddle, was wrestling with his spirited mount now, gazing down at Pentecost. A pair of fierce black eyes stared over a scimitar of a nose, then, with a gesture, the rider swung from the saddle and laid his rifle – a modern Mannlicher, Pentecost noticed, that could drill the eye from a chicken at five hundred yards – carefully on the ground behind him.
‘There is no need for that, Reimabassi,’ Pentecost said in the sharp Toweida tongue he had learned, choosing the word for ‘warrior-lord’ because it would do no harm to be flattering. ‘Dust is harmful. Keep it in your hand.’
The other man stared at him for a moment with arrogant merciless eyes, a little startled by his mild tones, then a fleeting grin flashed across the dark face and he hoisted the rifle under his arm again, butt-foremost as a token of friendship. ‘It is better,’ he agreed in English. ‘They are hard to obtain.’
Pentecost felt a little easier. All the way from the gates his heart had been thumping chokingly in his chest but he had been so certain that this man opposite wished to communicate with him he had been prepared to accept the risk he had taken.
‘You speak good English,’ he observed.
The other smiled. It looked like a hawk’s smile, disdainful and enigmatic. ‘It is better than thy Toweida,’ he said, and Pentecost nodded agreement.
‘Thou art the leader, Bin T’Khass?’ the other man said and it was a moment or two before Pentecost recognised the Hejri corruption of his name.
He nodded again, studying the dismounted reim, whom he saw now was a man of fifty-odd years, twice his own age and as lean and hard as coiled springs.
He gave a little bow, acknowledging the name, and the other swept his hands away from himself in a gesture that was half bow and half gesture of welcome. ‘I am Abd el Aziz el Beidawi,’ he said.
Two
1
There had been other occasions in the past when messengers had appeared outside the fort to make some impossible request, and Pentecost had all along half-expected the wild figure on the white horse to be one of
the Hejri chieftains, perhaps one of the Hassi or the Dayati leaders come to make some demand of him. But he had hardly expected it to be Aziz himself. Yet, with the idea that was slowly turning over in his mind and had been ever since the boy with the broken leg had been brought in, he found he wasn’t entirely surprised. He jerked his shoulders back, and held himself a little straighter. Aziz topped him by a whole head, lean and taut as piano-wire, staring into Pentecost’s smooth face as if he were a little puzzled.
‘Meha babicoum, Lord Aziz,’ Pentecost said loudly. ‘Welcome to our door.’
Aziz bowed again. He was a tall strong figure with a haggard, tragic face and a rich booming voice, an unbending feudal warrior – ruthless and strong. He was simply dressed after the fashion of the Hejri, scorning modern battle-dress for the old robes of a Hejri noble, with a black woollen cloak and a copper-dyed Mosul girdle containing a curved Moroccan dagger of gold and enamel. He was straight, spare and still clearly active.
Pentecost knew his eldest son had been hanged by the Sultan of Khalit and the sorrow seemed to show in wide dark eyes that were eloquent of suffering. His nose was thin and strongly hooked, but the mouth between the beard and the moustaches neatly trimmed in Zihouni style was wide and humorous. Beneath the black head-cloth, Pentecost could see he scorned modern styles and still wore his hair braided.
He was a magnificent-looking man who seemed not to mind Pentecost’s careful study of him. It was as though he had spent his whole life having people stare at him, and enjoyed the experience. The Zihouni were the master fighters of the Beidawi tribe – indeed, of the whole Hejri nation – and Aziz was a perfect example of their type. From what he had heard of him, Pentecost knew his hospitality was so overwhelming he had never amassed the fortunes of the other chiefs, but, despite this, he was obsessed also with a sense of his own superiority which was really all that kept him at the head of his people.
Pentecost became aware at last of the older man studying him with a puzzled frown.
‘You are not what I expected, Bin T’Khass,’ Aziz said. ‘You are very young.’
‘Early nights,’ Pentecost said. Then he smiled and lapsed into the flowery language Aziz favoured. ‘The men of my race do not dissipate their strength with women.’
‘You do not look like a warrior. Western warriors never do look like warriors. Sometimes they are fat. Sometimes’ – Aziz looked at Pentecost’s slender figure – ‘sometimes they are thin. The Americans wear spectacles in battle and have a fondness for ice cream.’ He still seemed puzzled, like a wolf wondering which end of the chicken he was about to devour to start on first.
‘You know me?’ he asked proudly.
‘By reputation,’ Pentecost said. ‘You send the Toweida Levies quaking to bed at night. At least,’ he added, ‘you did before I arrived.’
‘And now?’
‘They are afraid no longer. I have made them unafraid.’
‘I have heard so.’ Aziz stared at him. ‘It would be a bloody day for both of us if I decided to take the fortress of Hahdhdhah from your hands.’
‘I don’t advise it, Aziz el Beidawi,’ Pentecost said with a certain amount of self-conscious pride. He didn’t really yet believe in his Toweida Levies but it wasn’t a good idea to let Aziz know that.
‘There are three hundred of you,’ Aziz snapped. ‘No more. There are many times that number of Hejri reims.’
‘We have a few tricks up our sleeves.’
Aziz stared at Pentecost’s grave face, his eyes glittering. ‘Hahdhdhah is in Hejri country,’ he said.
‘Not according to my map.’
Aziz gestured. ‘Yours is a map drawn many years ago by men in Khaswe who knew nothing of this territory. Toweida is the name of a plain, not a people. Until the Khaliti administrators changed it, this was Hejri land.’
Pentecost smiled. ‘Nevertheless,’ he pointed out, ‘it would be foolish to fight over it. Many young men would die. Not only Hejri reims but Toweida men, too, whether they feel they are Hejri or not. Perhaps you. Perhaps me.’
‘Hejri reims are not afraid to die.’
‘Neither are Toweida men. Not now. Neither am I.’ Pentecost hoped that the lie wouldn’t show in his face because he knew his Toweida Levies were very much afraid and he certainly was himself. His wife and two children were waiting down in Khaswe, and the old days of dying for ideals had finished.
For a while there was silence and, wondering what the purpose of the meeting was, Pentecost fished out his cigarette case. From the silent line of men fifty yards away, the butt-foremost rifle and Aziz’s affability – the affability of a shark, he thought – it was clear that Aziz had come in peace.
He offered the cigarettes and Aziz accepted one without a word, holding it in lordly fashion for Pentecost to light it. Then, while Pentecost still waited, he looked up.
‘My smallest son, Ghani,’ he said. ‘The little frog of the family with the anger of a singed tomcat.’
Pentecost smiled again, knowing that the suspicion that had been growing in his mind had been well founded. ‘The boy in the fort,’ he said.
‘You have him prisoner,’ Aziz said.
‘Not prisoner,’ Pentecost corrected him. ‘He’s a child. He did us no harm. He has a broken leg. A lorry. Not one of ours.’
‘That I have heard.’
‘He is comfortable,’ Pentecost went on. ‘He is well fed. He is no longer in pain.’
Aziz paused. ‘I have come to bargain,’ he said quietly and with a strange humility. ‘He is the last of my line, the last gift of the One, the Merciful.’
Pentecost stuck his peeled nose in the air and gave him the look he gave the Toweida zaids when they suggested treating with the Hejri.
‘I don’t bargain with the lives of young boys,’ he said stiffly.
Aziz’s eyes swung to his face. ‘Thou art hardly more than a boy thyself, Bin T’Khass,’ he jerked out in surprise.
Pentecost ignored the insult. ‘Your son is free to go, Lord Aziz,’ he said.
‘You do not wish to make demands of me?’
‘Not over the broken leg of a boy.’
‘Other men would make demands.’
Again Pentecost ignored the comment. ‘You have means of transporting him?’ he asked.
‘We shall carry him.’
Pentecost stared at the hills. ‘All the way? By hand?’
‘All the way.’
Pentecost shrugged, thinking of the journey and the effort it would require.
‘He shall be brought to you here,’ he said.
‘So be it.’
Pentecost looked into the fierce dark eyes then he bent and drew a mark in the dust with his cane.
‘No Hejri reim shall come closer to Hahdhdhah than that line,’ he pointed out. ‘You are enemies in my territory. There are Toweida zaids in that fort, eighty Dharwa Scouts who have no love for Hejri reims, and two hundred and fifty Toweida Levies who are expected to fire on you.’
‘Allah take pity on them.’ Aziz grinned. ‘I could eat them.’
Pentecost gave a small twisted disbelieving smile, and indicated the line again. ‘You have your reims under control?’ he asked.
The answer came in a bark. ‘No Hejri defies Aziz.’
‘It is well, because my men are not afraid to fire and I am not afraid to order them to do so. Keep your reims well back. Only the litter-bearers may approach that line.’
‘It is so.’
As Aziz turned away, Pentecost stared alter him and smiled to himself, a little self-satisfied but aware deep down of the sheer luck of the thing. He had always been aware that the departure from Hahdhdhah could well, if the Hejri warriors were in a sour frame of mind, become a bloody shambles. He had voiced his fears to Lack and Minto as he thought of the damage that could be done by a few Hejri sharpshooters determined to make a nuisance of themselves. Always at the back of his brain had been the question, Would they make it? Or would Aziz el Beidawi decide that the operation was a matter o
f prestige and make a point of showing what a Hejri war-party could do when it got into top gear?
2
The boy vanished and the waiting went on. The sun swung in its slow implacable circle. Despite rumours that the Sultan, Tafas el Taif, in Khaswe, had reneged on his agreement and was now refusing to let the British off the hook, they were not confirmed by any altered orders, and the Khaswe Command’s instructions remained. As the days went past, Pentecost’s thoughts turned more often and with a new feeling of certainty to his wife.
The last time he’d seen her had been in Khaswe. They had swum from one of the beaches, so happy together they had staggered over the sand, their arms about each other, drunkenly and joyously content in each other’s company.
What was the old army joke? he thought. What will you do when you get home? Go to bed with the wife. And after that? Take off my pack. Pentecost’s narrow loins ached sometimes at the thought of the eager girl waiting for him in Khaswe.
Then, fifteen days after Aziz’s appearance and the departure of the boy, Sergeant Chestnut came running out of the wireless shack, flourishing a buff signal sheet and screeching in his thick Scots accent. ‘Sorr, Sorr’ – his excitement set heads turning round the whole fortress – ‘it’s come! It’s the instructions for leaving!’
They so made a point of celebrating the signal with their meagre stock of liquor that Lack woke next morning with a violent headache, but they were still euphoric about the thought of release and for several days moved about the place with gleaming eyes. Then the nightly news review from England that Chestnut managed to pick up for them started uneasy thoughts in their heads again. It seemed Sultan Tafas really was having second thoughts. Certainly nothing had been signed yet, and the British Government, caught on the horns of a dilemma, was beginning to issue ominous statements about the withdrawal that could be construed to mean anything or nothing, so they could be proved right later whichever way Tafas decided to jump.