Hammond Innes - The Doomed Oasis

The camel caravan down by the palm-tree fringe finished loading. I watched the heavily-laden beasts move off through the date gardens, headed north into the desert. The whole oasis shimmered in the heat, and beyond it stretched the sands, a golden sea thrusting yellow drifts amongst the palms. The sun climbed the sky. The heat became unbearable, the talk spasmodic, and Sheikh Abdullah sat there, his heavy eyelids drooping, not saying anything, just waiting.

I was half asleep when I saw the dust trail of the vehicle. It was coming through the date gardens from the south, driven fast, and when it emerged into the open I saw it was a Land-Rover packed with Arabs, all shouting and waving their guns in a frenzy of excitement. And as it reached the outskirts of the village they began firing into the air.

A few minutes later Yousif burst through the retainers standing at the head of the stairs. He went straight up to Sheikh Makhmud, interrupting the deliberations with that extraordinary lack of respect that seems a contradiction almost of the feudalism of the Bedou world. He was excited and Arabic words poured from him in a flood as he handed the Sheikh a folded slip of paper.

As soon as Sheikh Makhmud had read it his whole manner changed. His eyes lit up. He became re-vitalized, a man suddenly in command of the situation. He said a few words, speaking softly and with great control. The name of Allah was repeatedly mentioned, presumably in praise. And then he rose to his feet. The effect was remarkable.

The place was suddenly in an uproar, everybody on their feet and all talking at once. There was a general movement towards the stairs and Sheikh Makhmud swept out ahead of his elders, moving fast and with a light, soundless tread, so that he seemed to flow like water from the rooftop.

Khalid followed him, the others crowding after them, and in a moment there was only myself and the Emir’s representative left. He looked unhappy, his arrogance undermined by this development which had clearly affected his embassy. I smiled at him, waving him to the staircase ahead of me, and was amused at the childish way he turned his back on me in a huff.

From the rooftop I could see men running. The news seemed to have spread round the oasis in a flash. And south, beyond the palms, another dust trail moved across the desert. By the time I had found my way down to the great courtyard the whole male population of Saraifa seemed gathered there. And when the Land-Rover, driven by Colonel Whitaker himself, turned slowly through the gateway, forcing a passage through the crush to where Sheikh Makhmud stood waiting, a great shout went up: Haji! Haji! In the passenger seat beside Whitaker sat Erkhard, as cool and neat and spotless as when I had seen him last.

The greetings over, the Company’s General Manager was taken into the palace, I had a glimpse of Whitaker’s face as he walked beside Sheikh Makhmud, towering over him and all the Arabs round him. He wasn’t smiling and yet it expressed his elation; a secret, almost violent emotion. Twenty years was a long time, and this the culmination of his life, the moment of victory. It seemed a pity David couldn’t be here to share it.

Nobody took any notice of me now. I walked out through the main gate, down into the shade of the palms, and sat by the steaming waters of the shireeya. Gorde, Whitaker, Erkhard, Entwhistle — those three women; my brain reeled with the heat. Unable to fix any pattern to my thoughts, I returned finally to my turret room. It was cooler there, the shadowed interior peaceful, and I took my siesta to the lazy buzzing of flies, the distant murmur of people wild with joy.

I must have slept heavily for when I woke the sun was low and there was a little pile of freshly-laundered clothes beside me — a tropical suit, shirt, tie, pants, socks. There was also a note from Whitaker: The concession is signed and there is a feast to celebrate. I thought you might like a change of clothes. Yousif will call you at sunset. As soon as I started to put them on I knew the clothes weren’t his, for he was much taller and these fitted me reasonably well. They were obviously David’s and it seemed to me strange that I should be attending this feast in his clothes.

The acid smell of wood smoke permeated the room and the hubbub of sound from the village square drew me to the embrasure. The whole beaten expanse was full of people and cooking fires. The carcases of sheep and goats hung by their hind legs, their slashed throats dripping blood into bowls. Chickens were being prepared and blackened pots of rice simmered over the fires. Half Saraifa was in the square and there was a great coming and going of the Sheikh’s armed retainers who carried the cooked dishes into the palace. The sun sank and the sky blazed red for an instant and then died to purple and light greens.

‘You come now, sir, please.’

Yousif stood at the head of the stairway almost unrecognizable in clean clothes and spotless turban, a curved khanjar knife gleaming silver at his waist. He took me down to a central courtyard that I hadn’t seen before. It was packed with retainers, the silver and brass of guns and cartridges gleaming in the shadows. The Sheikh and his guests were already gathered in the long, colonnaded room on the far side, and dishes lay in lines in the dust.

Khalid came forward to greet me. He was beautifully clad in long robes of finest cashmere, a brown cloak gold-embroidered, and his eyes, newly made-up with kohl, I

looking enormous, his beard shining and silky with some scented lotion. Whitaker was seated on one side of Sheikh Makhmud, Erkhard on the other. And next to Whitaker sat Sheikh Abdullah of Hadd. ‘You sit with me,’ Khahid said.

As I passed Erkhard, he looked up. ‘Grant!’ I couldn’t help being amused at his surprise. They told me in Sharjah that you’d left with Gorde, but I didn’t expect to see you here.’ He frowned. ‘Where is Gorde, do you know?’

‘I think he flew back to Bahrain.’

He nodded. ‘Good.’

As I took my place beside Khalid, retainers were already moving among the guests with ewers of water. We rinsed our hands and the first great platters were moved forward on to the rugs. The occasion was very formal. Nobody talked unless the Sheikh himself was talking. The result was that conversation went in disconcerting leaps — one moment bedlam, the next a silence in which the only sound was the coming and going of the retainers in the courtyard.

The feast was a monstrous, gargantuan affair — mutton, goat’s flesh, young camel, chicken, gazelle. The platters came on and on and kept on coming, the meat nestled on piled-up heaps of rice, eggs floating in a spiced gravy like little yellow balls, omelettes piled in tiers, flat and leathery like girdle cakes, flat discs of bread, liquid butter and cheese. Half the dishes never got beyond the colonnades, but remained outside in the dust, enough to feed an army. Like all Bedouin feasts it was intended as a meal for the Sheikh’s bodyguard who were waiting on us, for all the palace retainers, and finally for the people of Saraifa themselves so that they should all feel that they had shared in the event.

The cooking was rough desert cooking, the meat overdone and swimming in fat, the dishes lukewarm at best. But I was so damned hungry I scarcely thought about what I was eating. Khalid kept plying me with delicacies — the tongue of gazelle I remember and something that I popped into my mouth and swallowed whole, hoping it wasn’t what I thought it was. An old man sat in a corner playing intermittently on what I can only describe as a lute. The palace poet, I was told. Later he would unburden himself of a poem in praise of the guests and of the occasion. ‘It will be a long poem,’ Khalid said and his eyes smiled whilst his face remained quite serious. There was a sudden silence and into it the man next to me tossed a belch of impressive loudness. There was a great deal of belching. It was a mark of appreciation and before we were halfway through the meal I found myself doing the same, so quickly and easily does one fall into the other people’s conventions. Also my stomach was by then very full.