Hammond Innes - The Doomed Oasis

‘If he’s still there,’ Berry said. The thing was sent now and we were sitting in the truck waiting for the BBC news. More questions in the House, and the Opposition had attacked the Government for refusing to grant newspaper correspondents visas for any Arabian territory except Bahrain. They were accused of trying to hush up an ugly situation.

And then, in the morning, when we picked up the BBC newspaper round-up I was staggered to find that virtually the whole national press had carried a story obviously based on the report I had sent to Ruffini. Somehow he had got it through uncensored and the result was a fantastic perversion of the facts, so colourful, so written up as to be almost unrecognizable from the sad spectacle we had witnessed; and yet it was all there, the heroic quality of David’s stand magnified a thousand-fold to give jaded townspeople the best breakfast-table reading for weeks. And the story had spread from the front pages right through to the leader columns, an angry, outraged demand for Government action.

And when the last editorial flag had been waved by the BBC announcer and the last exhortation of the Government to act immediately had been read. Berry and I looked at each other in astonishment. I think we were both of us quite dazed by the violence of the reaction at home. It was only twelve hours since Berry’s wireless operator had laboriously tapped out in Morse my long report and in that short time David’s situation had been put before the highest tribunal in the land — the British public. Moreover, something had obviously roused the press to anger — the secretive attitude of Whitehall presumably. As one paper put it: Up to a late hour last night, despite a barrage of phone calls, nobody in authority appeared to be in a position to confirm or positively deny the story. The only comment was: ‘We regard the source as highly unreliable.’ This is either stupendous arrogance, or stupendous ignorance. We suspect both and we demand that the Foreign Secretary take immediate action. The country is deeply disturbed. On the strength of that Berry cancelled his orders to move, and within half an hour his action was confirmed. Colonel George, acting on a hunch that political decisions would now have to be reversed, and entirely on his own initiative I gathered later, had already turned Berry’s Company round and ordered it to drive with all possible speed to the Hadd border. ‘I’m to wait here until they arrive,’ Berry said. ‘By then the Colonel hopes to be here himself to take command.’

‘How long before they get here?’ I asked.

‘If they keep going without being stopped in the dunes they’ll arrive sometime after midnight, I imagine.’ He started to go back to the wireless truck, but then he stopped. ‘It might interest you to know that Signer Ruffini was appointed Reuter’s Correspondent with the full knowledge of the Political Resident yesterday afternoon. But for that very odd appointment I imagine your report would have been passed to Bahrain. In which case I’ve no doubt it would now be rotting in some pigeon-hole in the Residency instead of making the world’s headlines.’

The official attitude was obvious. By agreeing to Reuter’s request — perhaps even instigating it — they could justify their refusal to grant visas to correspondents by saying that the press already had coverage from an accredited agency correspondent, and that the very man from whom the story had originated. No doubt they took the view that as a foreigner Ruffini would be more amenable to control than a British correspondent and therefore unlikely to cause them further embarrassment. It was a little ironical that in their hurry to appoint him they had given me almost direct and immediate access to the whole of the British press.

‘I am to tell you,’ Berry added with a thin smile, ‘that no further messages for Ruffini will be accepted through military channels. A matter of bolting the door after the horse has gone.’

‘What about that raiding party headed for Whitaker’s camp?’ I said. I hadn’t mentioned it in my report to Ruffini the previous night. ‘Somebody ought to be told.’

‘Already done,’ he said. ‘It won’t be passed on to Ruffini. but the PRPG will be notified and so will Sir Philip Gorde. He’s in Sharjah now.’

So that was that, and nothing to do now but wait. The day passed slowly. No sound from the direction of Jebel al-Akhbar. Not a single shot all day. The hill seemed suddenly dead. The heat was very bad. The wireless operator was on constant watch on the headquarters waveband. We switched only once to the BBC news. A Foreign Office spokesman had stated that whilst there was no official news, there was reason to believe that press reports were substantially correct and that a young Englishman had instigated some sort of guerilla activity against the Emir of Hadd. The whole matter was under urgent review. There were rumours of reinforcements standing by in readiness to be flown to Bahrain and two destroyers had left Aden, steaming north along the Arabian coast. Cairo Radio had stepped up its propaganda offensive.

Late in the afternoon I was woken from a stifling sleep in the shadow of the W/T truck with the news that the Hadd raiding force was returning. ‘And there’s been no sound from the fort at all.’ Berry passed me the glasses as I stood with slitted eyes gazing at a dust cloud right in the path of the sun. Thirty-three of them now,’ he said. The dust made it difficult, but as they passed to the south of us and I could see them more distinctly, I confirmed his count. They must have been travelling all night and moving very fast.’ The figures flickered indistinctly in the heat. The Emir will have picked up the Arab news,’ he added. ‘He’ll know he hasn’t much time. Had Whitaker a radio, do you know?’

‘I don’t think so.’

Then he probably doesn’t know what’s happening at home — that the Government’s being forced to take action. Oh well,’ he added, ‘if he goes up to the fort and his son’s still alive. Colonel Whitaker will learn from him what we were able to tell him yesterday. It might make some difference.’

I thought of that scene; father and son facing each other in the shambles of that fort. Watching the Emir’s force move past us, men and camels all lifted bodily off the ground by a mirage and turned into strange, distorted shapes by the heat rising from that sea of sand, I felt once again the cruelty of this desert world. It was so hard, so empty, so casual of human life — a crucible to transmute the flesh to skin and bone, the mind to something as distorted as those shapes dancing in a mirage. I had a premonition of disaster then; but not, I think, of tragedy — certainly not a tragedy quite so grim.

I watched them until they disappeared beyond the shoulder of Jebel al-Akhbar, and shortly afterwards the sun set. One more night. But there was still no news, no certainty of action. ‘Better turn in and get some sleep,’ Berry suggested. ‘I haven’t even got an ETA from the Colonel yet.’

‘Will we move in the morning, do you think? David can’t last out much longer.’ And in the morning he might be faced with his father’s desperate situation. ‘For God’s sake! It’s got to be tomorrow.’

‘You’d better pray then,’ he snapped back irritably. ‘For only God and the Foreign Office know what action will be taken and when.’ And he added angrily, ‘I don’t even know whether the Colonel’s order to my Company has been officially confirmed.’

I took his advice then and went to my camp bed. But sleep was out of the question. The night was hot and very still, the stars bright. Time dragged and I dozed, to be jerked awake by the distant sound of engines. It was 0155 hours and Berry’s Company was motoring in, dark shapes moving in convoy across the desert without lights. An officer reported all present and correct, but warned that the only orders he’d received were to wait for the Colonel and not to cross the border.