Дэвид Гудис - Caravan to Tarim

“I do not believe it,” Mezar said. “I will tell you, Kelney, I expected that at some time you would try to trick me, but I did not suppose that you would be so foolish as to enlist the help of Bedouins. You are working with them now, is it not so?”

“Don’t be a fool.”

“The Englishman, too. And all the rest of the caravan. All working with the Bedouins. And you arranged it. Tell me with your own lips. Say it now!”

“All right,” Kelney said. “Go to hell.”

Then he squirmed and tried to get away, knowing that it was a crazy idea, knowing it would be a tough process from here on in. The violent part of it lasted about a minute. Afterwards they were able to half carry him out of the room, and he felt himself going down some corridor. And then he got the feeling of metal clamps fastened around his wrists, and he was vertical and his boots and socks were being pulled away; his naked feet just about tagged the floor.

“You will be alone for a while,” Mezar said. “I will grant you complete darkness and silence. In an hour I will be back here with gifts of agony. It is my hope that you will tell the truth.”

Footsteps were going away, a door was closing, and Kelney was calling himself the same names he had called Mezar. It occurred to him that perhaps he had deserved this sort of thing for a long, long time and now there was nothing to do but take it with philosophy.

Blank cartridges, he was thinking. That was a lovely arrangement and for that deal alone he deserved to get his head kicked in. Even though he hadn’t been given the opportunity to go through with the transaction, the fact remained that he had agreed to it and he certainly would have gone through with it to soften his own mattress. And that made him a thousand varieties of louse and he was lower than any Bedouin.

He had to grin. It was so easy to feel this noble remorse, this inner cleansing, when the four surrounding walls were walls of odds. Give him a chance to get out of this and he would go back to the strategy, the fencing, the scummy bargaining that he always engaged in when he was bargaining with what he recognised as scum.

But was Nadi scum? What about those Bedouins? Were they really scum? He gave himself a picture of them, their rags, the food they ate, the sad faces of their children. On another canvas he was seeing fat Mezar with a mouthful of figs, and gems against fleshy fingers and all the silk. He thought about the good Arabians, honest and fairly decent men crawling across sand and dying of thirst because a noble soul named Kelney had placed blank cartridges in their rifles. He heard the door again, and then the footsteps.

Slanting light straightened itself out as Mezar placed a torch in a wall bracket. Mezar was alone and breathing hard.

This is going to be good, Kelney thought.

But he hadn’t dreamed it would be this good, because Mezar was unfastening the clamps and saying, “I am humble.”

Kelney rubbed his wrists. “Say it again.”

The fat Arabian said it again.

“So what brings about the change of heart?”

“Tiggs is here.”

“You can say that again, too.”

“Tiggs has been brought in. He was picked up by another caravan coming this way from the coast. He was dying. They had a physician with them, a famous man from Charfa. An operation was performed in the desert, and a bullet was taken from Tiggs’s body. He is recovering fast. And he has told me what happened with the Bedouins. I know now that you spoke the truth.”

“Thanks,” Kelney said, “for nothing.”

“Let us forget this unpleasant affair,” Mezar said. “In a short time Tiggs will be well again. You will take out another caravan-“

“I want more payment,” Kelney said.

“Of course. You are a good tradesman, Kelney, and I am happy to reward my best workers.”

“I don’t work for you,” Kelney said. I only deal with you. Remember that. And here’s another thing. I don’t want to wait around for Tiggs to get back on his feet. I’ll take out the next caravan as soon as you make out your buying schedule.”

“But Tiggs knows the route better-“

“I’m in a hurry.”

“Yes, but Tiggs-“

“The buying is the important thing.” Kelney was thinking of the blank cartridges, calling himself a skunk even as he called himself a nice guy for making this attempt to save Tiggs.

“You say that you do not work for me.” Mezar’s tone was level. “I tell you that you are wrong and that my word is the last. You will wait until Tiggs recovers and he will go with you on the next caravan.”

All at once Kelney was very tired. He shrugged and said all right, he would wait for Tiggs.

It was an ordeal in itself, counting the days, pacing them in ratio with Tiggs’s recovery. The day when Tiggs sat up. The day when he walked around. The day when he was able to eat and drink as a normal man. Kelney watched him come back to full life and realised that it would not be long before Tiggs was back there with death. The bargain with Nadi must be kept, otherwise Nadi would come creeping. And Nadi would find him.

There came a day when the caravan set out across the desert, aiming at the string of ports on the Red Sea coast. Kelney and Tiggs walked ahead of their camels. And following were thirty Arabians, whom Kelney had supplied well with water and food and rifles and cartridges. The cartridges were blank.

“I’d like to meet the Bedouins again,” Tiggs said.

“A bullet can’t settle an issue.”

“In a way you’re right,” Tiggs said. “But I’ve had a lot of pain. I’d like to make at least one Bedouin go through what I’ve been through.”

Kelney glanced to the side and saw that Tiggs’s lean, dry face was working slightly. Tiggs’s lips were drawn like expanded rubber and his eyes aimed ahead like rifle muzzles.

The caravan reached the coast in eleven days. It had been slow going. On the trip northward however, along the coast, Kelney made good progress. His negotiating was more clever than it had ever been. When the caravan was headed back towards Tarim, the packs were loaded with quality that would make Mezar smile.

They moved onto the desert, and the big sun was there to greet them. They watched it as it floated along with them. There was half a day of this, and hardly any talk, and then during a rest period Tiggs was lighting a cigarette and saying, “Well, we have our treasure. Now let the Bedouins try to take it away from us.”

Kelney leaned his head towards the match in Tiggs’s fingers. “Maybe we shouldn’t talk about it too much.”

For a while Tiggs was quiet. Then he said, “I’ve been wondering about something. That mute Bedouin who guided you back to Tarim. Rather odd that any of them would do something like that, don’t you think?” And when there was no reply, Tiggs went on, “They’re clever as well as mean, those buzzards. You’ve got to be careful.”

“All right,” Kelney said. “What’s on your mind?”

They looked at each other, and Tiggs said, “What’s on yours?”

“I’m not worrying about a thing,” Kelney said.

They had moved another mile or so when Tiggs suddenly darted ahead. Something was on the sand, writhing out there in front of them.

It was a dying camel, left there by another caravan. They looked it over and Tiggs said it was no use, there was no saving the beast. And then Tiggs lifted his rifle, pointed it at the camel’s head.

Kelney knocked down the rifle.

“Why not?” Tiggs said. He didn’t move. There was no expression in his eyes. Kelney was rolling invisible dice, telling himself that Tiggs had examined the cartridges in his rifle. Anyway, there was a quick means of finding out for sure. “All right,” he said, “if you think you’re being merciful, go ahead and give it a bullet.”