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  He stayed there watching patiently and his patience was rewarded as soon enough he saw a sun’s ray reflected off a metal object that was, he calculated, still very far away. He guessed it would take them about six hours to reach his current location.

  He jumped down and took the animal’s halter, despite his grunts of protest and led him to the edge of the saltpan, where they climbed down very carefully, step by step, paying attention so as not to fall, but also watching every stone and slab of rock with caution, because he knew that hidden underneath them were thousands of scorpion nests.

  He let out a sigh of relief as he reached the bottom, then stopped and studied the crust that was some four meters away from him. He went over to it and tested it with his foot. It seemed hard enough so he let the halter out as much as possible, tying the end of it round his wrist, aware that if he were to sink, the camel would pull him to safety.

  He felt the first mosquito bite his ankle. The heat was diminishing with the setting sun and soon the place would become unbearable.

  He started to walk on it and the salt crust creaked under his weight as bits and pieces sunk beneath him, but it held from giving way completely.

  The mehari followed him obediently, but after four meters it smelt danger and stopped indecisively, bellowing angrily, clearly reluctant to cross the never-ending expanse of salt that lay before them, with not a bush in sight.

  ‘Come on you stupid creature!’ he growled.

  ‘Don’t stop here!’

  The animal bellowed once more, but a sharp tug and a few curses soon had it moving again. They walked for another ten meters and the animal seemed to calm down as the crust hardened and they were firm of foot once again.

  They carried on walking slowly, always towards the setting sun. When night fell he mounted the camel, aware that he would not stray from their route now. He fell asleep there, curled up on the high seat, swaying around like a ship on a stormy sea, but as safe and happy as he would have been were he asleep under the ceiling of his jaima, next to Laila.

  It was the quietest of nights. The wind did not howl, the camel’s padded feet made no sound as they stepped across the salt flat and there were no hyenas or jackals howling for their prey to break the silence out there in the middle of the sebhka. The moon rose, full, bright and clean, making the endless plain sparkle with a million silvery mirrors, as the mehari and its rider glided over it, like an unreal and ghostly apparition that would appear out of nowhere only to disappear back into the night again. There was surely not another human being more alone in the world at that moment than the Targui, whose image, crossing the saltpan in the thick of night, was one of utter solitude.

  ‘There he is!’

  He held out his binoculars to Sergeant Ajamuk who lifted them in the direction that he was pointing and adjusted their vision in order to make out the rider, who was advancing slowly under a strong morning sun.

  ‘Yes,’ he admitted. ‘He’s there alright, but I think he’s seen us. He’s stopped and he’s looking over here.’

  Lieutenant Razman took the binoculars and peered through the shimmering haze of the saltpan at Gazel Sayah, who was looking across at them on the edge of the sebkha. He was aware that the falcon eyes of a Targui, accustomed to taking in long distances, could see as a far as a normal man could with the help of binoculars.

  They looked at each other and even though he could only make out the silhouette of the beast and its rider, shimmering in the haze, he would have loved to have known what he was thinking at that moment, as it dawned on him that he had been caught in the middle of a salt trap from which there was no escape.

  ‘This was much easier than we’d expected,’ he commented.

  ‘We haven’t got him yet…’ Ajamuk pointed out.

  He turned round to face him.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Exactly what I said,’ the sergeant replied casually. ‘We can’t take our vehicles down onto the saltpan. Even if we found a way to get down, we’d sink into the salt. And we’ll never catch him on foot.’

  Lieutenant Razman realised he had a point, stretched out his hand and grabbed the radiotelephone’s microphone.

  ‘Sergeant!’ he shouted. ‘Sergeant Malik! Can you hear me?’ The apparatus crackled and screeched until finally the voice of Malik-el-Haideri came through loud and clear.

  ‘I can hear you, lieutenant.’

  ‘We’re on the west side of the sebkha and we’ve located the fugitive. He’s coming towards us, but unfortunately I think he’s seen us.’

  He could almost hear the sergeant cursing the news silently and after a pause he said:

  ‘I can’t go on any further. I’ve found a way to get down but the saltpan won’t take the weight of the jeep.’

  ‘I don’t think there’s anything we can do but wait at the edge until he’s dying of thirst and is forced to give himself up.’

  ‘Give himself up…?’ his voice was a mixture of surprise and disbelief. ‘A Targui who has killed two men will never give himself up.’ Ajamuk nodded his head in agreement. ‘He might stay there and die but he’ll never hand himself in.’

  ‘Maybe…’ he admitted. ‘But we clearly can’t go after him. We’ll wait.’

  ‘You’re in charge, lieutenant!’

  ‘Stay in radio contact. Over and out!’

  He flicked the switched off and turned to Ajamuk

  ‘What’s wrong with you?’ he muttered. ‘Do you suggest we just go down there and run after a Targui just so he can play games with us and take a few pot shots…?’ He paused and then turned to one of his soldiers.

  ‘Make me a white flag,’ he said.

  ‘You’re not going to try and negotiate with him?’ said Ajamuk in a tone of surprise. ‘What will you achieve by doing that?’ He shrugged his shoulders: ‘I don’t know. But I’m going to do everything in my power to avoid any further bloodshed.’

  ‘Let me go,’ the sergeant begged. ‘I’m not a Targui, but I was born here and I know the area well.’

  He shook his head decisively. ‘I’m the highest authority south of Sidi-el-Madia,’ he said. ‘Maybe he’ll listen to me.’

  He picked up the spade by the handle, to which the soldier had attached a dirty handkerchief, removed his gun and started to climb carefully down the dangerous bank.

  ‘If anything happens to me, you’re in charge,’ he stressed. ‘Malik must not assume that position under any circumstances. Is that clear?’

  ‘Don’t worry.’

  Lurching forward unsteadily, the lieutenant stumbled down the bank precariously, almost throwing himself into the abyss at one point, before finally reaching the bottom. He looked across nervously at the thin, salt crust and aware that his men were watching him, took a deep breath and started walking towards the distant silhouette of the rider, praying to the heavens that the ground would not open up beneath him.

  Once he felt a bit safer he held up the rather pitiful flag in front of him as he walked. The sun started to beat down relentlessly and he soon realised that within the confines of the saltpan, where there was not even a hint of a breeze, the temperature was probably another five degrees higher and it started to scorch his lungs with each new breath.

  He watched as the Targui made his camel kneel down and how he remained upright at its side with his rifle at the ready. Half way there he suddenly regretted his decision as the sweat ran off every part of his body, soaking through his uniform and his legs threatened to give way beneath him.

  That last kilometre was without doubt the longest kilometre of his life and when he had got within ten meters of Gazel, he stopped in order to regain his strength and composure before asking:

  ‘Have you got any water?’ The other man shook his head, his rifle still pointing directly at Razman’s chest:

  ‘I need it. You can drink when you go back.’

  He nodded his head and ran his tongue over his lips that only tasted of the salt from his sweat

  ‘You’re r
ight,’ he admitted. ‘I’m an idiot for not bringing my water bottle. How do you cope with this heat?’

  ‘I’m used to it… Have you come here to talk about the weather?’

  ‘No, I’ve come to ask you to give yourself up. You cannot escape!’

  ‘Only Allah will decide that. The desert is a big place.’

  ‘But the saltpan isn’t. My men have you surrounded.’ He looked over at the nearly empty gerba hanging around the animal’s neck. ‘You haven’t much water left. You won’t last long in here…’ He paused. ‘If you come with me I promise you a fair trial.’

  ‘Why should I be put on trial,’ Gazel said casually. ‘I killed Mubarrak in a duel, in accordance with the rules of our race and I killed the military man because he was a murderer who had failed to respect the sacred rules of hospitality. According to the

  Tuareg laws I have not committed any crime.’

  ‘Why are you running away then…?’

  ‘Because I know that neither the Rumi infidels or yourselves, who have adopted their absurd rules, will respect mine, despite the fact that we meet in the desert. To you I’m just a dirty son of the wind who has killed one of your own men, not an inmouchar of the Kel-Talgimus, who only acted according to a law that has been in place for thousands of years; many years before you even dreamed of setting foot in these lands.’

  The lieutenant lowered himself down carefully and sat down on the hard salt crust, shaking his head:

  ‘You’re not a dirty son of the wind to me. You are an Imohag, noble and brave and I understand your reasons.’ He paused. ‘I share them. I would probably have reacted in the same way had someone done that to me.’ He sighed deeply. ‘But I am obliged to hand you over to the authorities and avoid any further bloodshed. Please,’ he begged, ‘don’t make things any more difficult than they already are.’

  He could have sworn that the other man was laughing at him under his veil as he replied sarcastically:

  ‘Difficult for whom?’ He shook his head. ‘For a Targui things only start to get really difficult from the moment he loses his freedom. Our lives are hard, but our freedom compensates for this. If we lose our freedom we lose our will to live.’ He paused. ‘What will they do to me? Condemn me to twenty years?’

  ‘There’s no reason it should be for so long.’

  “How many then…five…eight! I have seen your prisons, they have told me how they live there and I know that I would not last a single day.’ He waved his hand aggressively, in a gesture that seemed to dismiss his visitor. ‘If you want to catch me, come and get me…’

  Razman stood up clumsily, horrified by the idea that he had to retrace his steps under a sun that beat down more furiously by the minute.

  ‘I won’t come looking for you. Of that you can be sure,’ he said, before turning his back to him.

  Gazel watched him as he moved away slowly, holding himself up with the spade that he had previously used as a flag, unsure of whether he would reach the edge of the sebkha, before dying of exposure.

  The Targui stuck his tabuka and his rifle into the hard salt, set up some shade and crawled underneath it, ready to sit out the day’s harshest hours.

  He did not sleep and his eyes remained fixed on the vehicles that reflected the sun from their metallic bonnets. He felt the heat of the saltpan getting thicker by the minute as it rose up from the ground and threatened to boil his blood. It was a heat so dense, suffocating and heavy that even his mehari, who was accustomed to the highest of temperatures, had started to complain.

  He would not survive for too long out there, in the heart of the saltpan and he knew it. He had enough water left for one day.

  Soon delirium would overtake him and then death; the most horrific of all deaths and a way of dying that every Tuareg feared most of all, from the moment he was born: to die of thirst.

  Ajamuk looked up at the sun to check its height then turned

  round to look at the banks of the saltpan. ‘In half an hour the mosquitoes will eat us alive,’ he said. ‘We have to get away from here.’ ‘We could light some fires.’ The sergeant shook his head. ‘No, not a fire nor anything else

  for that matter will protect you from this plague,’ he insisted.

  ‘As soon as they start to attack, the soldiers will run off and I won’t be able to stop them,’ he smiled, ‘because I’ll be running too.’

  He went to say something else, but one of the soldiers inter

  rupted him, pointing towards the saltpan. ‘Look,’ he shouted. ‘He’s leaving.’ It was true; the Targui had taken down his ridiculous camp

  and was heading off, leading his animal by the halter. He turned around to his assistant pensively: ‘Where will he go?’ Ajamuk shrugged his shoulders: ‘Who knows how a Targui’s mind works. But I don’t like it.’ ‘Neither do I.’ The lieutenant meditated for a few moments, visibly worried. ‘Maybe he’ll try and get out at night,’ he ventured. ‘You go

  north with three men. Saud, south… I’ll cover this area and Malik and his people the west…’

  He shook his head. ‘If we keep our eyes peeled he won’t get past us.’

  The sergeant did not reply and it was clear that he did not share his superior’s optimism. He was a Bedouin and knew the Tuareg well; he also knew his soldiers well, who were mountain people forced to carry out their national service in a desert they did not understand, nor wanted to.

  He admired Lieutenant Razman for the efforts he had made to adapt to the desert lands and his stoic determination to become an expert on them, but he also knew that he still had a lot to learn. You could not expect to understand the Sahara and its people in just one year, not even ten and you would never really understand the minds of the people who lived in it; the sons of the wind who appeared to live a simple life but who were, in reality, profoundly complicated people.

  He picked up the binoculars that were on the seat and focused them on the man who was getting smaller by the minute, followed by his swaying mount.

  He could not fathom what on earth he was doing by going back into that abominable oven, but he knew for certain that he was up to something. If a Targui with only a little water left was on the move and his mount too, then there would have to be a very good reason why.

  There was a sudden whizzing noise in his ear and he gave a start.

  ‘Lets go!’ he shouted. ‘The mosquitoes!’

  They jumped into their vehicles, already swiping the insects away from their faces with their hands and sped away as fast as they were able to on the rocky terrain, putting as much distance between themselves and that godforsaken place as was physically possible. Then they split up, each going a different direction.

  Lieutenant Razman ordered the men that he had with him to set up camp and prepare the supper, then he got in touch with Sergeant Malik-el-Haideri to inform him of the fugitive’s movements.

  ‘I’m not sure what he’s up to either,’ admitted Malik. ‘But he’s smart, that’s for sure.’

  He paused. ‘Maybe it would be better to go in and look for him…’

  ‘That’s probably what he’s hoping for,’ he replied. ‘But remember that he’s famous for his marksmanship. With a camel and a rifle in there we’d be at his mercy.’

  ‘We’ll wait!’

  And so they waited all night, thankful of a bright moon, their guns at the ready, alert and prepared to respond to the slightest sound or movement.

  But nothing happened and when the sun came up above the horizon they went back to the edge of the saltpan and there, in the middle of the saltpan, they could make out the kneeling camel and a man sleeping peacefully under his shade.

  Equidistant from each other and positioned at the four compass points, four pairs of binoculars watched him throughout the day, but the rider and his mount made no perceptible movement whatsoever.

  As afternoon fell once again and just before the mosquitoes started up, Lieutenant Razman opened a contact line with all his men.

  ‘He hasn
’t moved,’ he told them.

  ‘What do you think?’

  Sergeant Malik remembered his words: ‘You must live like a stone and not make any movement that uses up water… Even at night you have to move slowly like a chameleon and only then do you become resistant to the heat and the thirst; above all you must overcome any panic and remain calm. Only then will you have the remotest chance of survival.’

  ‘He’s saving his strength,’ he said.

  ‘He’s about four hours away from the edge of the sebkha,’ Ajamuk interjected. ‘And it’ll take him another hour to get up in the dark and get to where we are,’ he calculated mentally. ‘We’ll have to be on our guard at around midnight. If he waits any longer he won’t have enough time to get much beyond us, although he may be able to reach us.’

  ‘The camel will bolt if they try and get out here,’ Saud said, from the extreme south. ‘The mosquitoes form a cloud here. There’s a water opening and if they come near it they’ll drown immediately.’

  Lieutenant Razman was quite convinced that the Targui would rather drown in the sands than be caught alive, but he kept his thoughts to himself and continued to give out orders.

  ‘Four hours of rest,’ he said, ‘but after that everybody must be fully alert.’

  They passed another long, tense night under a strong moon that lit up the plains, and by dawn they were all ravaged with tiredness, their eyes red from staring into the darkness and their nerves destroyed.

  When they returned to the saltpan that morning he was still there, in the same place and in the same position, as if he had not moved a muscle all night.

  The lieutenant’s voice came across the microphone nervously.

  ‘What do you think is going on…? Is he mad,’ Malik asked bad-temperedly. ‘He can’t have any water left… How is he going to stand another day in that oven?’

  Nobody had an answer. Even for them, outside of the basin and with plenty of water in the huge water drums, the idea of staying there under that relentless sun was too much to bear. The Targui, however, seemed quite predisposed to spending another day in there, without moving.