Ibrahim al-Koni - Gold Dust

The camel rose to his feet. He rubbed his muzzle against Ukhayyad’s arm. He licked Ukhayyad’s cheeks behind the dark veil that covered them.

Ukhayyad delivered his last will and testament to the animal with their mantra, “Patience. Just be patient. Don’t forget the power of these magic words. Patience is life.”

The Mahri stared at the horizon where the barren waste stretched forever. Then he headed off on the long journey.

The despondence in the camel’s eyes was something Ukhayyad had never seen before.

Ukhayyad retreated into the most rugged part of the region. There he took refuge in an unusual cave. It was actually more a cleft that crept all the way up the wall of stone to the mountain’s summit. He avoided the lower caves, since they would be the first place the mercenary herders would look. The desert of the Hamada was now surrounded — from the north, the Italians sought to rush in, and from south, the tribes of Aïr sought to violate its pristine wastes. He was trapped. Even God’s vast wilderness could be transformed into a prison — one more impenetrable than the Ottoman jail whose ruins he had seen in Adrar. Ukhayyad felt suffocated. He was completely stranded — and nothing good comes to a person once he is cut off from everyone and everything.

The bastards pursuing him knew this: not even his own tribe would rush to his defense. Their timing was perfect. First, he had fallen out with his father, then he had been expelled from his tribe, and then, with the gold dust outrage, there had been a final break. When his tribe heard the story of his shame, they would wash their hands of him forever. The conditions for pursuing him were ideal and his pursuers would hunt him down, not to extract revenge for their murdered kinsman, but solely to remove the block that stood between them and the division of Dudu’s wealth. When rich men are murdered, it is the brutes and monsters who race fastest to extract revenge. A sense of love or the desire to avenge spilt blood are merely the excuses they invent in order to lay their hands on the spoils.

Dudu had suffered and fought the devils of the Bambara. He had put his body in the path of their poison arrows in order to seize their gold. And yet, when the man died, all his riches would fall into the hands of these cowards. That is the way of this world. It is the cowards who always remain to sweep up the spoils, and it was Ukhayyad’s bad fortune to have placed himself in their way. They would not sleep a single night until they had torn him limb from limb, until they had blotted him out for good. Flecks of gold dust were all they desired. That vile gold dust. It was the cause of everything that had happened. It was gold dust that had murdered Dudu, not Ukhayyad. But was there anyone sane enough to understand this? The reasonable people had stayed at home in Aïr. Would sane people travel for months on end to chase after gold and to hunt a single man across the heights of Jebel Hasawna?

Before settling himself in the crevice, he gazed across the magnificent mountain. From the west, its body stretched out, bowing toward Mecca in the east. The living glow of the desert dawn wrapped a blue turban around the mountain’s lofty peak. It was sunrise, and the mountain held its tongue. Rather than disclosing the mysteries it had learned by heart during the night from the mouth of God, it chose to write them down for posterity. The mountain’s sublimity was the gift of such secrets. Is there anything more exposed or more concealed than the desert?

There are some things you can feel and never touch. Such are these mysteries, these strange ideas floating across the void, and these vague sensations now folded themselves into shadow and silence. Ukhayyad now prostated himself before them in worship. That evening, he had said farewell to the piebald and watched the animal as he shimmered over a silvery mirage before sinking below the horizon. At that moment, he asked these mysteries to deliver him from the envy and spite that now sought him. He prayed that he would meet the piebald again soon. In this silent prayer, he kept his innermost wish to himself: that their reunion should take place under happy circumstances.

But he forgot to seal his plea with the Throne Verse, or any sura of the Qur’an for that matter. He did not seek refuge from the malice of Satan during his prayers. Thus, when the mysterious powers of the desert convened in hasty consultation with one another, the Devil knew how to interfere, agreeing to speed their reunion, though under circumstances of his own making. Without hearing an answer to his prayers, Ukhayyad secured himself within the impregnable rock. He blocked up the mouth of the crevice with rocks, and squeezed his body into his new jail. He entered it in the evening and slept sitting — knees bent to chest.

It was only in the morning that he noticed the colorful drawings of the ancients. The towering walls were covered with them. To his right, a herd of buffalo spread out across a field, grazing at their leisure — some of their heads bent to the ground as they crop the grass, another group raises their heads lazily, giving the impression they are chewing on cud. To his left, the ancient sorcerers had carved an enchanting scene. A group of herdsmen chase a moufflon crowned with enormous horns. The animal runs toward a distant mountain. Some of the hunters wield spears, while others shoot with bows at their prey.

It was hard to divine the outcome of the hunt: the distance between the moufflon and the hunters does not suggest that he will get away, despite the mountain that lies at the end of his path. The painter had drawn the mountain on the horizon so as to place hope before the poor moufflon. The mountain is its sole hope for salvation. The animal knows this — and hastens with all his strength. It is clear that the moufflon is exhausted, his outline shows that. The animal’s figure is heavy, yet he somehow derives strength from the unknown — the unknown that drives creation to love life. The hunters also know that he will escape if he takes refuge in the mountain — and their pursuit intensifies. They aim their spears and arrows so very precisely, yet the moufflon remains unscathed. Despite all this, there is little chance that the animal will escape.

Ukhayyad did not know how he was so sure that the moufflon would perish. He could not understand how the sorcerer artist had been able to impart that disturbing conclusion. Nor did he know why this revelation made him feel so despondent.

They arrived two days later.

Ukhayyad heard their chatter at dawn and thought it was just the murmurings of jinn. These spectral voices are well known on Jebel Hasawna. All who have ever stopped for the night beside the mountain are familiar with them. All who have ever passed through the mountain’s foothills at night also know them well. Cowards dread passing through this mountain range — supposing, like fools, that jinn are more wicked than men! Yet, for his part, Ukhayyad had never known anything more pernicious than humans. Fearful men are best off fearing men. He who supposes people are kind is bound to be injured. He who entrusts his affairs to men will be disappointed. But he who puts his neck in the hands of men is the sorriest of all!

Ukhayyad had experienced what it meant for a man to pawn his head to a human being. He alone possessed the right to sound the warning. Who would dare to condemn humanity other than he who has learned about humans through hard experience? What person would raise his voice against humanity but one whose feet had once been in the fire? How miserable that person is! How tough his heart must be!

Then the murmurings ceased.

He stayed in his hiding place until the late afternoon. In this kingdom of silence, he heard nothing but the ringing in his ears. Had they gone? Had he been imagining things? Or was it really just the muttering of jinn? But jinn chattered to one another only in the dead of night, never at dawn. Dawn was their holy sanctuary. In the Hamada, the break of day meant that everything became mute, and jinn returned to their underworld.