Tuareg Read online

  Gazel had not been to that particular salt lake, but he had heard other travellers talk about it and he could see nothing remarkable about it, except perhaps in terms of its size, from all the others that he had come across in his lifetime.

  Many, many years ago when the sea, that is now the Sahara, withdrew, it left behind it pools like this one, which later dried up, slowly creating layers of salt, sometimes several meters thick in their centre. When it rained, an underground stream of saltpetrous water would feed into them, turning the banks into damp, spongy, sand mounds that the sun’s harsh rays would dry into a hard crust, like a piece of bread, fresh from the oven. These crusts were treacherous and could cave in at any time underfoot, throwing the victim into a quagmire that looked like half-melted butter, then slowly swallowing him up. They were even more dangerous than the “fesh-hesh” sand, a type of quicksand that rider and camel could fall into and disappear, in a matter of seconds

  The unpredictable “fesh-fesh” scared Gazel because there was never any warning, although at least, Gazel reflected, they finished off their victims quickly. By contrast, the moving sand found at the edges of the saltpans would ensnare its prisoners like flies in honey, drowning them slowly, with no means of escape, in the most agonising way imaginable.

  Bearing these dangers in mind, he advanced slowly north, circling the white and seemingly edgeless area, conscious that this was another barrier between him and his pursuers that nature had provided them with, as the lake would be sure to swallow up any vehicle that dared to enter it.

  ‘Mubarrak is dead. That bastard killed him with his sword. Almarik said it was a clean duel and that the Sal would not initiate a tribal war because of it. They consider it a closed chapter.’

  ‘Unfortunately we cannot do the same. Keep your eyes peeled until you receive further orders.’

  ‘Roger, sergeant. Over and out.’

  Malik turned to the black man.

  ‘We need to speak with the Tidiken outpost. Get me Lieutenant Razman. Tell me when you get through.’

  He walked off into the night, contemplating the stars and the moon and the high dunes that threw out long, golden shadows behind them. He realised that despite the fact that the days ahead of him would be incredibly tough, he was happy to be there, on the edge of the erg, in pursuit of a man who knew the desert intimately and who would play a hard game of cat and mouse with them. But he was on the trail of someone and this alone made him feel alive again. He felt active and young, just as he had been in the days when he would lie in wait at the edges of the Kasbah for French officials to pass by, only to stick a knife in their belly and run away, back into the quarter’s myriad of windy alleyways; or when he had thrown a bomb into a café in the European quarter, on the day that they had declared open warfare, certain that victory was within their grasp.

  That had been a wonderful life, full and exciting, so different from the monotony of life in the barracks after independence, and so different to the horror of his exile in Adoras and his useless, eternal struggle against the invading sands.

  ‘I want to catch that dirty Targui,’ he said. ‘And I want him alive so that I can rip off his veil and see his face and make him realise that I’ll be the one to have the last laugh.’

  He had spent a whole night tossing and turning on the hard straw mattress, dreaming about accompanying him to the “Lost Land” in search of the “great caravan,” imagining the adventures they would have together. He had been excited by the prospect of spending time with a Targui and by the things he could have taught a man like him, a Targui who had crossed the “lost land” not once, but twice. In that one night the Targui had become his friend, he had given him hope of a future once again and then in the space of just a few hours, that very same man had dashed his dreams twice over, refusing to take him with him, then slitting the throat of his captain who he had just convinced to let him go.

  No. That son of wind was going to pay for it with his life.

  ‘Sergeant! The lieutenant’s on the line.’

  He ran over.

  ‘Lieutenant Razman?’

  ‘Yes, sergeant. Have you caught the Targui yet?’

  ‘Not yet, lieutenant. But I think he’s crossing the erg south of Tidiken… If you send in your men they could cut him short before he gets to the Sidi-el-Madia mountains…”

  There was a silence. Then the lieutenant’s voice finally came through, his tone cautious.

  ‘But that’s about two hundred kilometers from here, sergeant…’

  ‘I know,’ he admitted. ‘But if he gets into the Sidi-el-Madia then we’ve lost him for sure. Not all the armies in the world could catch him there. It’s a labyrinth.’

  Lieutenant Razman thought for a minute before replying. He despised Sergeant Malik as much as he had despised Captain Kaleb-el-Fasi, whose death he had celebrated. In fact he disliked anyone who ended up at Adoras, they were the dregs of an army that he wanted to be an honourable and upstanding unit and that scumbag Malik had no place in it, not even to keep that godforsaken outpost up and running.

  If a Targui had been brave enough to go into that hellhole, kill a captain and disappear into thin air, then deep down he was on his side, whatever the reason behind his actions. But he also realised that the honour of the army was at stake and if he refused to help and the Targui escaped, the sergeant would make sure in his report that he was the one that took the blame for it before his superiors.

  In two years time he would be promoted to captain making him the highest authority in the region. If he managed to capture the murderer of an official — however much of a scumbag he might have been in real life- his promotion might well be fasttracked. He sighed and nodded his head as if the other man could see him.

  ‘Alright, sergeant,’ he said finally. ‘We’ll leave at dawn. Over and out.’

  He put the microphone down onto the table, switched it off and sat there very still, contemplating the transmitter as if it might provide him with the answer to his questions.

  Souad’s voice brought him back to reality.

  ‘You don’t like this mission do you?’ she asked from the kitchen, barely lifting her head up.

  ‘No, not really,’ he admitted. ‘I didn’t set out to be a policeman, or to pursue a man through the desert just because he did something that, according to his laws, was the right thing to do.’

  ‘That is no longer the law and you know it,’ she said pointedly, sitting down at the other end of the long table. ‘We are a modern and independent country and we are all now equal. What would become of us if we all went about according to our own rules? The country would be ungovernable. How can you reconcile the customs of the people from the coast or from the mountains with those of the Bedouins or the Tuareg from the desert? You have to start with a clean slate in order for a common legislation to be set down or we go to the dogs. Do you not see that?’

  ‘Yes, if you’ve studied in a military academy like I did or in a French university as you did.’ He paused to take down a curved pipe from the dozen or so that were hanging from a wooden shelf and started to fill it up calmly. ‘But I doubt that someone who has spent their entire life in the furthest confines of the desert would understand that, unless we’d bothered to go and tell him that the situation had changed. Do we have the right to make him accept, overnight, that his way of life, the lives of his parents and their ancestors for over two thousand years are no longer valid? And why? What have we given them in exchange?’

  ‘Freedom.’

  ‘Is freedom the right to force your way into someone’s house, kill their guest and take the other one away?’ he said in a tone of astonishment. ‘You’re talking about the kind of freedom you might hear a student on campus discussing in a bar, not the kind a man who has always considered himself to be free anyway might think about it. He doesn’t care whether it’s the French in government, the fascists or the communists in power… Even Colonel Duperey, who despite being a “colonist” would have had much mor
e respect for the Targui’s traditions than that pig Captain Kaleb has, despite everything he did during the fight for independence.’

  ‘You can’t use Kaleb as an example. He was a loser.’

  ‘But it’s these types of wasters that they send in to deal with the purest people of our race, people who we should be protecting as living proof of the best examples of our history and our people. Now it’s the likes of Kaleb and Malik and the governor Ben-Koufra that rule the desert, compared with the French, who always put their best officials in charge here.’

  ‘Not everyone was like Colonel Duperey and you know that. Have you forgotten the Foreign Legion and its murderers? They also wreaked havoc with the tribes, decimating many of them, stealing their wells and their pastures and pushing them out onto the stony plains.’

  Lieutenant Razman lit his pipe, glanced over to the kitchen and remarked:

  ‘You’re burning the meat. No…’ he said and then added: ‘I haven’t forgotten the brutality of the Legion. But it seems to me that they were only behaving like that because they were locked in a war with the rebel tribes and wouldn’t stop until they dominated them. It was their mission and they achieved it in the same way that tomorrow I will do my job and catch that Targui because he has rebelled against the established authority, whatever that might mean.’ He paused and watched her as she took the meat out of the oven and put it on to two plates, which she brought over to the table. ‘What’s the difference then? During the war we behaved like the colonists, but in peaceful times we are incapable of imitating their behaviour.’

  ‘You do though,’ Souad said gently, her voice brimming with love. ‘You make an effort to help them and to understand the Bedouins. You worry about their problems, you even give them your own money.’ She shook her head incredulously. ‘How much do they owe you and when will they pay it back? I haven’t seen any of your pay for months, even though we thought we’d be able to save some while we were here.’ He went to say something, but she stopped him short with her hand and continued: ‘No. I’m not complaining. I am happy with what we have. I just want you to realise that it’s not your job to figure out all of these problems. You’re only the lieutenant of an outpost that doesn’t even show up on the map. Relax and when you’re governor of a territory like Colonel Duperey was and an intimate friend of the President of the Republic, then maybe you can do something.’

  ‘I doubt there’ll be anything left to protect by then,’ he replied, chewing slowly on the meat, which was hard and leathery, having come from an old camel that had been sacrificed before it died naturally. ‘And we will have annihilated, in just one generation of being an independent nation everything that has been around for centuries. How will history judge us then? What will our grandchildren say when they see how we used our freedom?’ He went to say something else, but a discreet knock at the door interrupted him and he turned to face it. ‘Come in!’ he called out. Silhouetted in the doorway was the imposing figure of Sergeant Ajamuk, who stood to attention, his hand on his turban. ‘At your command lieutenant!’ he saluted. ‘Good evening ma’am,’ he added respectfully.

  ‘Nothing to report from the post. Did you have an order?’

  ‘Yes, but come in please,’ the lieutenant said.

  ‘We leave at dawn for the south. Nine men, in three vehicles. I’ll go in front and you remain in charge here. Get everything ready please.’

  ‘How long will you be away for?’

  ‘Five days, a week at the most. Sergeant Malik thinks that the Targui is crossing the erg and heading towards Sidi-el-Madia.’ He noticed that the other man’s expression had changed into a grimace. ‘I don’t like it either, but it’s our job.’

  Sergeant Ajamuk knew his place but he also knew Lieutenant Razman well and that his opinion would be heard. ‘With all due respect, sir,’ he said. ‘We really shouldn’t get involved with that riffraff from Adoras or for that matter, their problems.’

  ‘They are part of the army, Ajamuk,’ he pointed out, ‘whether we like it or not. Please sit down! Won’t you have a sweet?’

  ‘Thank you, but I don’t want to put you out…’

  Souad had already gone into the kitchen with the plates, their food only half-finished since the meat had been virtually inedible and returned with a tray of homemade sweetmeats that made the eyes of their guest widen in appreciation.

  ‘Go for it sergeant!’ she laughed. ‘Try them. They only came out of the oven two hours ago.’

  His hand shot out towards them as if they had a life of their own.

  ‘Please forgive me ma’am,’ Ajamuk said. ‘My wife never manages to get them quite like this, however much she tries.’ He dug his enormous and incredibly white teeth into the almond paste and munched on it, savouring it carefully. With his mouth still full he added: ‘With your permission lieutenant, I think you should let me come with you. I know the area better than anyone else.’

  ‘Someone’s got to remain in charge here.’

  ‘Mohamed can be trusted with that. And his wife can work with the radio.’ He paused to swallow. ‘Nothing much is going to happen here.’

  The lieutenant thought about it while Souad served them some hot, sweet aromatic tea. He liked the sergeant, he enjoyed his company and he knew that of all his men he was probably the only one who would be able to catch the fugitive. Maybe that was why, almost unconsciously, he had wanted to leave him behind, because deep down he was still on the Targui’s side. They looked at each other over the rims of their teacups and it was as if they had read each other’s thoughts.

  ‘If anyone has to catch him then it’s much better that it’s us rather than Malik. As soon as he’s got him he’ll shoot him there and then to settle the issue and make sure no one else gets involved.’

  ‘Do you think so too? That’s what I was afraid of.’

  ‘Do you think he has a brighter future then if we hand him over to the governor?

  He did not receive a reply, so continued: ‘Captain Kaleb would not have dared to kill that man unless he’d had Ben-Koufra’s backing. What I find strange is that orders weren’t given to kill Abdul-el-Kebir as well.’ He turned to his wife who was giving him a stern, worried look from the kitchen and he sighed as if the subject matter suddenly tired him.

  ‘Ok!’ he muttered. ‘It’s not our problem. Alright…’ he finally said. ‘You come with me. Wake me up at four o’clock.’

  Sergeant Ajamuk sprang up from his chair, stood to attention barely managing to hide his glee and walked towards the door. ‘Thank you lieutenant! Goodnight ma’am and thank you for the sweetmeats.’

  He went out closing the door behind him. Lieutenant Razman followed him out a few minutes later and sat on the porch staring into the night and the infinite desert that stretched out before him, as far as the eye could see.

  Souad came out to see him and they remained there together, in silence, enjoying the clean, fresh air after the insufferable heat of the day.

  She spoke finally:

  ‘I don’t think you should worry. The desert is a big place. It’s quite unlikely that you’ll find him.’

  ‘If I do find him, maybe they’ll promote me,’ Razman said, without looking at her. ‘Did that cross your mind?’

  ‘Yes, it crossed my mind,’ she admitted casually.

  ‘And?’

  ‘Sooner or later you’ll get a promotion and it’s better that you achieve that for something you’re proud of rather than by playing the police dog. I’m not in a hurry, are you?’

  ‘I’d like to give you a better life.’

  ‘What’s the point of an extra star and an increase in salary when you never wear a uniform and you give most of your salary away? You’ll just end up lending more money.’

  ‘They might send me elsewhere. We could go back to the city. To our world.’

  She chuckled as if amused by his comment.

  ‘Oh come on Razman. Who are you trying to kid. This is your world and you know it. You’d stay here whateve
r level they promote you to. And I’ll stay here with you.’

  He turned round to look at her and smiled.

  ‘You know what?’ he said. ‘I’d like to make love like we did the other day…in the dunes.’

  She disappeared into the house and reappeared with a rug in her arms.

  The sun was already high in the sky by the time he had reached the edge of the salt lake and the ground was getting hotter, forcing the mosquitoes to seek refuge under the stones and bushes.

  He stopped and looked across at the white expanse that glistened like a mirror some twenty meters below his feet. The white of the salt threw the harsh light back aggressively and even though he was accustomed to the blinding light of the desert sands, this was a different kind of glare that hurt his eyes and forced him to squint as it almost burnt his pupils.

  He looked for a big stone and threw it in using both hands and waited as it sunk to the bottom. As he had expected the stone broke up the crust that had been dried by the sun on impact and almost immediately afterwards a creamy, brown liquid filled up the hole.

  He carried on throwing stones onto it, each time a little further away, until they started to bounce off the surface without piercing it. He then leaned over the bank carefully and looked for areas that might be damp. He stayed there studying the edge of the saltpan meticulously for some time, trying to work out which bit would be the safest to climb down on to.

  Once he was totally sure that he had chosen the correct spot, he made the camel get down on to its knees, put three handfuls of barley in front of him, set up camp and went straight to sleep.

  Four hours later, as the sun began its timid descent, he opened his eyes as if an alarm clock had gone off suddenly at his side.

  A few minutes later he was up and standing firmly on the camel’s back, surveying the desert behind him. This time he did not make out any column of smoke rising into the air, but he knew that the heavy gravel in the erg would remain undisturbed as the vehicles struggled slowly through that rocky terrain.