ACROSS THE DESERT.
It was an endless journey, that journey across the Algerian mountains to Biskra. Cyrus Vanrenen had ample time on the way to reflect about the fate of the Cincinnati pork trust, and the Fifth National Bank failure. More than once on the road, indeed, weary with delays of the true Oriental pattern, he said to himself with a sigh that for anyone less high-toned than Psyche Dumaresq he wouldn’t have undertaken such a wild-goose chase. Which, to say the truth, was doing himself an injustice; for that honest soul would have done as much, any day, for any one else so unhappy and so lovable.
Still, the trip was undoubtedly a trial of patience. The line, in those days, went no further than Constantine, whose beetling crags Cyrus and Corona reached, tired out, at eleven at night, after a weary day’s ride in a dusty, dirty, slow African railway carriage. They had no time, however, to look at the wonderful old town, perched like a robber fortress on its isolated crags, nor at the river running deep in its riven gorge a thousand feet below; for the diligence for Biskra left by five in the morning; and after a short night’s rest they found themselves at that hour in the chilly gray dawn crossing the antique Devil’s Bridge that spans the profound ravine, and ‘lighting out,’ as Cyrus graphically expressed it, for the desert.
It was their first experience of desert travelling; and they didn’t like it.
For four long days they jolted on in suspense, across the mountains and the sand-flats, ever up and up, towards the oasis at Biskra. The road was indeed a wild and weird one, winding steadily upward, between arid hills of white powdery limestone, towards the high plateau of the Great Sahara. Few trees or flowers diversified the way; and those few were dwarfed and scrubby and dusty in hue, as if developed on purpose to match the grim gray highroad. Dust and rock, indeed, formed the staples of the scenery. They halted for lunch at a grimy auberge by two desolate salt lakes; and then up into the grimy diligence once more, and across the arid hills again, full pelt for Batna.
They were well into the heart of Africa now. Black Arab tents dotted the hillsides, and caravans of camels, in long weary strings, stepping slow and faint, passed them, ever going seaward. Trot, trot, trot, at a dreary jog, they rattled along all day; and late in the evening they pulled up short, with uncomfortable brusqueness, in front of a dismal green-blinded hotel, in a fifth-rate Frenchified colonial village of barracks and cafés. And this was Batna.
Next morning the same routine began over again. Day after day they rolled on and on, through sand, and dust, and rock, and sun, in the same aimless, hopeless, forlorn fashion. At dawn they started among bare sunburnt hills; at night bare sunburnt hills stretched still for ever in long perspective before them. They seemed to go all the time from nowhere to nowhere. Only, as they went, the desert grew drearier and ever drearier, and Corona’s heart sank deeper and deeper. By the third day the abomination of desolation spread everywhere around them. The soil gaped in great valleys of sand. Deep in the fissures below they could see the dry beds of prehistoric streams that drained into seas now dead and forgotten. The caravans here passed more and more frequently; but Cyrus and Corona cared little to observe the tall gray sheikhs in their white burnouses, or the women with their faces picturesquely tattooed, and their arms and throats heavily laden with barbaric jewellery. Not even the little children, playing naked in the sand with their bronzed limbs, could tempt them to look out any longer from those dusty windows. They had fallen into the lethargy of desert travel, and cared only to hurry on at such full speed as weary horses could effect to Biskra. Their one wish was to relieve Psyche from that terrible strain of suspense and agony.
At last the very road itself failed them. The diligence began to thread its way by some strange instinct across a trackless sandy plain, covered with naked brush, and strewn here and there with monstrous rounded boulders. On, and on, and ever on, starting in the morning from the middle of Nowhere, and pulling up at night in the self-same spot, to all appearances, they trudged through that monotonous sea of sand till the fourth day was fairly over. The fourth night came on, but still the sea of sand spread everywhere limitless around them. Corona leaned back in her place and dozed. How long, she knew not. She woke with a start. What was this? A jolt, a jerk, a stoppage! She jumped up, half expecting to find they were upset in the desert. Had Bedouins come to demand their money or their life? But no. Strange change! They were rattling along a broad paved street. Around were lights, noises, human habitations. Cyrus put out his head at the door. Yes — no mistake this time. It was really Biskra. The diligence drew up with a sudden pull at the door of a hotel, simple, but European-looking. The transition was marvellous. They had crossed for four days the outskirts of the desert, and they woke up now to find themselves still within touch of civilization on the tiled vestibule of the Hôtel du Sahara.
All the way along, as they dashed and jolted over the desert plain, one thought alone had been uppermost in their minds — would they find Linnell when they got to Biskra? And now, as they descended, weary and dusty, from that rumbling stage-coach into the cool white corridor, the first question that rose instinctively to Cyrus’s lips, in very imperfect French, as the landlord advanced, bowing and scraping, to meet them, was the gasped-out phrase, delivered with the utmost anxiety and emphasis:
‘Y a-t-il un M. Linnell à la maison?’
The landlord smiled and bowed and retreated.
‘This way, messieurs et dames — this way to the salle-à-manger. Table-d’hôte is over, but the restaurant à la carte is still open. No, monsieur, we have no gentleman of that name at present at Biskra. What will monsieur and mademoiselle require for supper after their long journey?’
Eating and drinking were nothing now to Cyrus. He waved the man aside with his hand impatiently.
‘No gentleman of that name!’ he cried in his despair. ‘Perhaps, though, he’s staying at some other hotel. I’ll go out and search for him.’
‘Monsieur,’ the landlord replied, with offended dignity and a profound bow, ‘there is no other hotel at Biskra. Cabarets, if you will, estaminets, cafés — fonduks where Arabs and camels herd together — but no hotel: no other house where a gentleman of the distinction of monsieur and his friends is at all likely for one moment to establish himself. Will monsieur come this way to see his rooms? The hour is late. To-morrow the administration will willingly charge itself with the duty of making all possible inquiries for the friend of monsieur.’
‘Stop!’ Cyrus cried, unable to rest till he had cleared up this uncertainty. ‘Haven’t you heard whether an Englishman, a refugee from Khartoum, is crossing the desert in a caravan from Ideles and Ouargla?’
‘Monsieur,’ the landlord said, still polite and impressive, but growing impatient, ‘do I not assure you that to-morrow we will make all possible inquiries? Monsieur your friend is not in the town. Accept my assurances. But as soon as we can we will discover his whereabouts.’
That closed the matter for the moment. It was no use arguing. The landlord, good man, was bland, but imperative. Cyrus was compelled in the end to retire, vanquished, to his bedroom.
Supper, to their surprise, was clean, neat, and simple. The hotel, though rough, seemed pleasantly cool and quiet; and they found the beds soft, fresh, and excellent. French civilization stood clearly on its mettle, resolved to create a miniature Paris in the oases of Sahara. But Cyrus hardly slept a wink that night for all that. He seemed to have come the whole way in vain, and to be as far from the object of his search as ever.
Towards morning he dozed, and awoke with a start — to find at last it was broad daylight. The desert sun was pouring in at the window in one fierce blaze of light. He rose and looked out. The beauty of the scene fairly took his breath away. It was a paradise of palm-trees. Great graceful stems rose by thousands on every side, waving their long lithe arms in the air to their own slow music. He dressed in haste, swallowed down a cup of morning coffee, and sallied forth alone into the one long street of Biskra. There he made his way straight to the Mairie of the commune, and proceeded to ask for such information as he could gain about the rumoured English traveller.
His heart gave a jump when the courteous official, who received his request with a smile, motioned him into a chair, and proceeded to overhaul with the usual deliberation a well-worn bundle of green-tape-bound letters. Nothing in France or any French colony without abundant green tape. Cyrus waited and listened eagerly.
At last the courteous official, after much hunting, found the particular docket of which he was in search.
‘Monsieur,’ he answered, consulting it, with his most consequential air, ‘we learn in effect that on the 20th of this month a caravan from the desert did really arrive, much distressed, at Ouargla. In that caravan, as our agents advise us, was a person, supposed to be a European, and giving his name as Linn or Linnell, whom we conjecture to be an English refugee from Khartoum; but on this subject, mark well, our Government has as yet no official information. This person Linnell — as we believe him to be named — is now seriously ill with fever at Ouargla. He will proceed by caravan to this station as soon as our agents consider him in a fit condition for desert travelling.’
‘Ouargla!’ Cyrus cried. ‘Where’s that? Can I wire along? Is there any telegraph there?’
The official smiled once more, a provoking smile.
‘Monsieur,’ he answered blandly, ‘here the world ends. Civilization stops dead short at Biskra. Ouargla is merely a frontier post. No mails, no telegraph.’
‘Well, but how did you get this news then?’ Cyrus asked in despair.
‘There are missionary brothers at Ouargla village,’ the official responded in the same bland voice. ‘They took charge of the invalid, and forwarded the news to us.’
‘How can I get there?’ Cyrus asked, determined at once to go on and meet his man in the midst of the desert. ‘Is there any diligence?’
The official smiled still more broadly than before.
‘You can go on foot,’ he answered. ‘Or you can go on a camel. But there are no roads, no vehicles. For myself, I advise you to await your compatriot here in Biskra.’
In a moment Cyrus’s mind was made up. The Western American does not debate: he acts instinctively. Off without a second’s delay he rushed to the telegraph office, and sent a despatch to Sirena at the Orangers:
‘Man supposed to be one of the Linnells lies dangerously ill at a place called Ouargla. Am crossing the desert on a camel to find him. Mean to reach him, dead or alive. Shall wire again when I have anything to communicate.’
Three hours later, Corona and he were making their trial trip on the ship of the desert, outward bound, with a rolling sea, from Biskra to Ouargla.
Camel-riding is by no means an easy art for a stranger, and they were both beginning to get terribly tired of the pitching and tossing under that burning sun, when, some miles from Biskra, they descried in front of them a long line of patient beasts threading their way with slow and stately tread to meet them over the desert. Cyrus’s heart came up into his mouth as he pointed towards the distant line eagerly, and exclaimed in French, with a gulp of surprise:
‘What do we see over yonder? A caravan from Ouargla?’
The Arab by his side caught at the words quickly, and, summoning up all his French, replied at once, with many shakes and nods:
‘Oui, oui: caravan: du côté d’Ouargla!’
There’s something inexpressibly solemn about the stillness and silence of the great desert. Even Cyrus’s Western-American mind felt awed for a moment at sight of that long string of gaunt-limbed beasts silhouetted in black against the pale sky-line of that gray desolation. He looked and wondered. The caravan advanced to meet them very slowly. Its camels, Corona could see for herself, as she clung to the projecting pommels of her own saddle, were weary and footsore with their long tramp across the burning sand from their distant station. Most of them were laden with heavy bales, and led by drivers, who walked by their sides with the free bold step of the untamed Bedouin. Their humps were shrunken away to mere bags of skin, that lopped over and fell on their bare sides — the sure sign of a long and tedious journey. But what attracted Cyrus’s attention more than anything else was a sort of litter or palanquin, that occupied the midst, borne by four bare-legged M’zabite bearers, and apparently containing some stranger of importance. His heart beat quicker for a moment at the sight. That litter must surely contain — the mysterious Englishman.
‘Halt here!’ he cried aloud to his Arab driver; and the Arab, accepting the tone for what it meant, with a sudden jerk brought the camel to a walk, and then by slow degrees to an unwilling standstill.
‘Does any one of you speak French?’ Cyrus called out in the nearest approach he could make to that language from his uncertain perch on the camel’s back.
The foremost Arab of the caravan bowed politely in answer.
‘Monsieur,’ he answered, in what even Cyrus recognised at once for the pure Parisian of an educated gentleman, ‘I am a Frenchman myself. What can I do for monsieur?’
‘You a Frenchman!’ Cyrus cried, surprised, scanning his Arab dress from head to foot attentively.
‘Yes, monsieur. We missionary priests of Our Lady of Africa dress always thus in Arab costume,’ the stranger answered quietly. ‘For that, they call us the White Brothers. We have come from Ouargla in charge of an English refugee from Khartoum. We are taking him for a European doctor to see at Biskra.’
In his eagerness and anxiety Cyrus scrambled down boldly from his seat on the camel, and approached the missionary with a perfect torrent of inquiries.
‘Do you know his name?’ he cried. ‘Is he ill? Do you think he’ll recover?’
‘Monsieur, we do not know his name, because he is far too ill to be questioned yet; but the name on a paper he carried in his pocket is Linnell, we notice.’
Cyrus could hardly restrain himself from crying out aloud in his delight and surprise. But which Linnell? That was now the question.
‘I have come in search of him,’ he cried, all eagerness; ‘I came from Algiers on purpose to look for him. Is he in the litter here? Can I see him, monsieur?’
The missionary beckoned to the M’zabites by the litter, who had halted to observe the upshot of this curious rencontre. One of them, obedient to the unspoken command, lifted up with his big black hand the corner of the curtains that concealed the patient. There, on a mattress, with closed eyes and bloodless cheeks, lay stretched, half dead, a man with a long dark beard, the growth of a year spent in the tropical African interior. The man, who had once been tall and handsome, and who still bore on his face something of the type of the English aristocrat, was evidently very ill indeed. He never opened his eyes even when they halted, nor gave the faintest sign of life or motion. To Cyrus, this suspense was terrible indeed. To think he had found the very man Linnell, whoever he might be, and yet could not solve that last awful question — for Psyche’s sake — whether it was the artist himself or his soldier cousin!
The man looked like a soldier. And yet there was something of the artist, too, in the cut of the features, so Cyrus fancied.
‘How did he get to Ouargla?’ the young American asked again with profound interest.
Corona leaned over from her saddle in breathless anxiety to hear the answer.
‘There’s some mystery about it,’ the missionary replied, letting drop the flap of the litter once more. ‘All we know is this, from what we can gather — there were two of them at first, but one was murdered. So much he managed to tell us in brief when he tottered, more dead than alive, into Ouargla. They seem to have struggled across the desert with a passing caravan; but some difficulty arose, we don’t know what, and they got separated from their party, we imagine, some way from Ideles, though we know nothing yet for certain. Then there was a fight — a fight or a pursuit. At any rate, this poor fellow staggered in at last to a friendly caravan, alone and wounded, his burnous stained and clotted with blood, and a couple of flesh-cuts on his shoulder unhealed; and all the account he could give of himself was merely what I tell you — that he had lost his camel two days before, and had come on on foot, for many kilometres, in the direction of Ouargla.’
‘He was wounded!’ Cyrus exclaimed, aghast.
‘Yes, seriously wounded. And from what he mumbles now and again in his delirium — for he’s very delirious — one of our brothers, who understands a little English, believes there was some fight either with Arabs on the way, or with a fellow-Englishman.’
‘Corona,’ Cyrus cried, ‘this is our man, of course. We must go back to Biskra, and telegraph to Miss Dumaresq. Will he ever get any better, Father? If possible, before he dies, I must manage to have a few words at least with him.’
The missionary shook his head slowly.
‘He may,’ he says, ‘or he may not. Who knows? Le bon Dieu disposes it. But in any case I think it would be dangerous to question him.’
Cyrus mounted his camel in silence once more. It was painful to remain in such suspense so long; but there was no help for it. They rode back solemnly with the caravan to the hotel at Biskra. There the invalid was lifted with care from his litter, and laid in comfort on a European bed — the first he had slept upon since he left Khartoum in fear and trembling a twelvemonth earlier.
Late that night, as Cyrus sat in the bare small salon, endeavouring to spell out with much difficulty a very dog-eared, paper-covered novel in a foreign tongue by a person bearing the name of Daudet, the White Brother came in with an anxious face, and laid his hand authoritatively on the young man’s shoulder.
‘Come, mon fils,’ he said; ‘the Englishman is conscious. He would like to speak with you for a few short minutes. He seems to be in a very critical state, and would perhaps wish before he dies to unburden his soul — to make some statement or entrust some commissions to the ear of a compatriot.’
Cyrus rose and followed the priest eagerly into the sick-room. He would now at least learn which of the two it was. In five minutes more poor Psyche’s fate would be sealed for ever. He would learn if it was the artist, or his soldier cousin.