Siege of Khartoum (Simon Fonthill Series) Page 2

  On their way up the Nile, Fonthill had worked hard to imitate the unhurried lope of the Arab, and dressed as he was in dusty and anonymous clothing, he seemed to attract little attention as he made his way slowly down what appeared to be the main avenue of the hamlet. He was half hoping that some distinct trail would lead out into the desert to the south-east, showing that the main route across the wasteland to the loop of the Nile started from there, but the street petered out merely into a beaten patch. And then the flat, gravel-strewn desert stretched out before him, featureless except for a little scrub and the occasional tree of the desert, a large-leafed shrub that was useless to thirsty travellers in that, when cut, it oozed a milk-like substance that was poisonous to drink.

  Fonthill sighed. The horizon far away was indistinct, perhaps a purple smudge of hills, but more likely to be the edge of a heat haze filled with dust. He knew that the country was vast, the biggest in Africa, larger than France, the new Germany, Austria, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, Greece, Great Britain, Holland and Belgium combined; and yet only some three million people lived out there. He was aware that they were plagued by sleeping sickness, guinea worm, malaria, yellow fever and leprosy and that their life expectancy was no more than twenty-five or thirty years. No wonder they flocked to the Mahdi’s green and white banners! He offered them escape, however intangible, from their misery. Fonthill waved away the flies from his eyes and recalled something that General Gordon, who had previously served time here as governor general on behalf of the Egyptian government, had written about the country: ‘No one who has ever lived in the Sudan can escape the reflection what a useless possession is this land. Few men can stand its fearful monotony and dreadful climate . . .’

  He turned to make his way back, selecting this time a different but still quite similar street. His nostrils twitched as they were assailed by a familiar smell, and at a turning to the right in a small square, he saw dozens of camels tethered, with white-robed men of the desert milling around between them. He caught a glimpse of Ahmed in earnest conversation with a man. Ah, good. A camel market. They were in luck! This little village was not as dead as it seemed. He hurried away, for he had no wish to interfere with Ahmed’s bargaining. Despite Ahmed’s protested hatred of the desert, the little man was a born negotiator; an Egyptian fellaheen of the river, who had escaped the whips of the Turkish tax collectors to set up his small hotel in the native quarter of Cairo, from which he had emerged two years before to accompany Fonthill and Jenkins as scouts for General Wolseley’s successful campaign against the revolt of the Egyptian Colonel Arabi. No, Ahmed would do better without him - and anyway, Simon did not want to draw attention to himself. They had been lucky up till now. Best not to press that luck too far.

  He walked on, back towards the river, and followed the street as it veered away to the right, so that he realised he would emerge away from the village a little, further downriver. Indeed, the Nile’s influence immediately manifested itself in the form of a few scattered cultivated patches emerging from the now muddy sand: peas and a little corn and sorghum, which he knew the natives ground into a flour to become the principal ingredient of an unleavened bread called durra. It was refreshing to see a flash of colour enlivening the pervading ochre. Nevertheless, Fonthill realised that he was becoming increasingly uneasy as he walked. The heat and flies? No, he was used to both now. He swivelled his head. No one was following and the street was empty, except for the inevitable mongrel dogs sniffing at the accumulated filth piled against the mud walls of the houses. Whatever it was, it seemed intangible and yet quite persistent; again that sense of evil - a sourness, like a taste in the mouth. No, more a smell. Yes, a smell.

  Yet he had no time to discover its source, for ahead of him, as though by magic, had appeared two men, walking towards him with a sense of purpose not displayed by the few children and adult loungers he had encountered so far. Had they doubled up a side street to get ahead of him and cut him off? They were dressed in the loose folds of Sudan, but, thank God, their dress showed no obvious signs of allegiance to the Mahdi, although their eyes glowed black and they paused, waiting for him. Ah! It was to be an encounter.

  Fonthill forced himself to maintain his steady, leisurely pace and approached the pair, his left hand resting lightly on the curved dagger at his waist. His mind raced. The men seemed to be villagers, unshod and with mud-caked beards, yet they too had daggers tucked into their waistbands. Despite his efforts to appear nondescript, Simon was clearly not of the region. He had dressed, of course, as a trader and must appear to be a man of more substance than was to be found in this fly-infested village on most days. Rich pickings in this seemingly deserted back street. Casually, he looked behind him. No one. If he shouted now, his companions on the filuka would not hear him, for he had wandered too far. If this was to be a fight, there would be no Jenkins to help him this time. He cursed inwardly his stupidity in walking alone in this baking heat, but he maintained his steady pace and the two men moved slightly apart so that he would be forced to walk between them.

  Abreast of them at last, he nodded his head and gave the conventional Arab greeting, ‘As-salaam alaykum,’ but received no response. Instead, one of the two men addressed him in quick Arabic. Fonthill shook his head and replied in his Pushtu, ‘Alas, I am from Syria and do not speak your tongue.’ This produced only a frown. The other man now stepped forward, fingered Simon’s jibba and put out his other hand, rubbing his thumb and forefinger together in the universal request for money. His breath was heavy and carried the smell of food highly seasoned.

  Fonthill thought quickly. He had a little money in his purse, but to present it meekly would be no guarantee that his throat would not be cut afterwards. Even if he was spared, so servile a capitulation could encourage an attack on the whole party, perhaps tonight, while they slept on the filuka. There could be further loot to be plundered from the boat. No. He had to resist. But how? Both men were tall and armed with the ubiquitous dagger, but they were also slim and, by the look of it, undernourished. At least Simon was stronger.

  As the baksheesh gesture was repeated, Fonthill’s mind raced. He had to attack while he had the advantage of surprise, for these two would think that they had the Syrian at their mercy. But how? Unlike the redoubtable Jenkins, he had no skill with a knife, and there were two of them. Then, from years ago, he recalled the tactics of Osbert Wilkinson. Wilkinson, the sixth-form bully at Shrewsbury school, when Simon was a first-former, a humble fag or servant to the prefects. Osbert, the great Osbert, had a technique with small boys whom he thought were being cheeky. Could it possibly work here?

  Simon allowed his face to light up in recognition at the request for money. He nodded, and gently dislodged the man’s hand from his garment, as though to thrust his own inside to find his purse. Then, in one swift movement, in a recall of Osbert’s technique, he placed both of his hands on the other’s wrist and twisted it fiercely, whirling the man around as though quickly winding a wheel, so spinning his arm behind his back. He then pulled the Man’s little finger out and backwards so that it broke. Osbert, of course, had never gone that far, but here it was clearly necessary, and the Arab howled in pain. The other assailant had advanced hesitantly, but Simon pushed the first man fiercely towards him, so that the two fell backwards into the dust in a welter of arms and legs. The second man was the first to recover, and as he scrambled to his feet, Simon spun around and kicked the heel of his sandal into the man’s groin; then, as he doubled up in pain, kneed him in the face.

  The action took only a matter of a few seconds, and Simon suddenly found himself the master of the situation, standing wide-legged, looking down on the two men at his feet. Slowly he withdrew the dagger from its scabbard and reached down to the throat of the man who lay still clutching his broken finger and whimpering. The man’s jaw dropped as, wide-eyed, he shook his head in terrified denial. But Simon merely cut a few inches off his beard and blew it into his face. Then he withdrew the Arab’s dagger from i
ts sheath and threw it far over his shoulder.

  The other would-be assailant had regained his feet but showed no sign of fight. He backed away, one hand clutching at his bleeding nose, and then turned and fled. Simon gestured after him to the man with the broken finger in an unmistakable gesture, and he too shuffled to his feet and ran.

  Sweat pouring down his face and breathing heavily, as much from the narrowness of his escape as his exertions, Simon watched them go. Would they return with reinforcements? He was still far from the filuka and had no clear idea of the way back. He would have to risk that, for to repeat his steps through the village would be asking for trouble and might indeed prejudice Ahmed’s negotiations with the camel dealers. No, better to find the Nile and walk back to the boat along the river bank, hoping that news of his obvious ability to defend himself would spread and deter other robbers. He blew out his cheeks as he tried to regain his breath and discovered that he was trembling. He was glad that he had not had to use the dagger in earnest. God bless dear old Osbert, the Bully of the Sixth! At least no one had been killed, and he doubted, on reflection, if retribution would fall on the boat party. Would the two men admit that they had been beaten in unarmed combat by one seemingly effete Syrian? Unlikely. Even so, this village was no place to linger. The warnings he had received in Cairo about the dangers that stalked this primitive land had already been demonstrated.

  He lengthened his stride, and as the street ended abruptly and he emerged on to the Nile river bank, the source of the persistent smell was revealed. Crocodiles! At least a dozen of them, lying on the sand below the rocks and exuding a smell that Fonthill could only equate with rotten fish. He wrinkled his nose and took an involuntary pace backwards. His brain told him that he was in no danger, for he was far enough away - twenty-five, thirty feet? - to edge past the reptiles without prompting an attack. Yet he had read that crocodiles could charge at up to twelve miles an hour over short distances, faster than he could run, and at least two of the larger animals nearest to him had now turned their great heads to regard him with yellow, malevolent eyes. Below them were smaller reptiles, lying somnolently - females nurturing their buried eggs, with the bigger males protecting them? A jumble of further half-forgotten statistics suddenly thrust their way into his brain: the jaws of a crocodile contained up to sixty teeth and could exert a pressure of - what was it? - three thousand pounds per square inch, or something like that. And in Egypt alone they were said to cause about two hundred human deaths a year. God knows what depredations they were responsible for in this desert land, where they were more plentiful and no statistics were kept. Simon had boasted to Jenkins that crocodiles didn’t bother him. But that was then and this was now. He must be careful, very careful.

  Taking deep breaths, he edged away to his left, back towards the main part of the village, keeping his eyes firmly on the great beasts nearest to him, who followed him with their heads. They must be used to humans, he reasoned, living so close to the village, and therefore would be unlikely to attack unprovoked. Or did they live close to the village because it was a good food source? He lengthened his sideways step, keeping his eyes locked on to those of the male crocodiles.

  At last he had made enough ground to be out of danger, and he turned to make his way back to the boat, which he could see some quarter of a mile away. Then a movement to his right and a little ahead caught his eye. Down by the river, a young boy was walking slowly back from the water’s edge, carrying a long line at the end of which wriggled a small fish. The look of immense joy on the face of the urchin brought an answering smile from Simon, for it immediately triggered the memory of the sense of triumph that had surged through him when he landed his own first trout on the banks of the River Wye, near his home, many years ago.

  The boy, perhaps eight years of age, was dressed - or half dressed - in a makeshift garment of old sacking that trailed to the ground behind him from one shoulder, leaving the other bare. His hair was black and curly and he looked thin and undernourished, although his eyes were bright as he concentrated near the water’s edge on unhooking the fish from his line. His back was to the river and he was completely absorbed in his task and unaware of the strange swirl of water that moved just behind him.

  Fonthill just had time to scream a word of warning before the crocodile struck, flashing from the water in a grey, gleaming mass of watery scales. The shout startled the boy so that he jumped forward, causing the crocodile’s jaws to miss his leg by a couple of inches. Instead, its teeth caught in the rough weave of the sacking, tearing it from the boy’s body and then waving it in the air, in an attempt to free it from its jaws.

  ‘Run!’ screamed Fonthill to the boy. And he ran towards him, waving an arm in a pathetic attempt to distract the crocodile while fumbling under his jibba with his other hand to extract his Colt. Then he remembered that he had left the revolver in his pack on the filuka, anxious that it should not protrude from his gown and attract attention. He only had his dagger.

  The boy, however, did not run. He had retrieved one end of his sacking and, pathetically, was pulling at it, for what reason Fonthill, still some twenty feet away, could not perceive. Still running, Simon recalled a little of what he had read about crocodile attacks.

  ‘The tail!’ he screamed, forgetting that the boy would not understand a word. ‘The bloody tail,’ he shouted again.

  As if prompted, the monster - it seemed all of twenty feet long - suddenly swung its great tail from the water in a glittering arc, intending to knock the lad into the river and probably breaking his legs or back in the process. But the boy jumped nimbly over the tail and then jumped again as it swung back, as though he was playing skipping in a school playground. With immense courage, the lad flipped his end of the sack across the crocodile’s eyes and then darted to his right, his hand going to the ground.

  Fonthill suddenly realised what the boy was doing. He was trying to rescue his fish, which now lay by the side of the great reptile!

  It was at this point that the crocodile became aware of Simon, who stood panting a few feet away, his knife pathetically in hand. Simon became aware of an intense stare from the reptilian eyes and that awful, musky smell. From the corner of his own eye he saw the boy retrieve the fish, almost from under the belly of the crocodile, pull again at the cloth, so tearing it free, and jump away. At least he would be safe now, if he ran. But how would the croc attack his new enemy? A quick heave of those stubby forelegs and the frightening charge, or the swing of that deadly tail again? Fonthill realised that perspiration was pouring down into his eyes and blurring his vision, but that his mouth was completely dry. Running meant turning his back on the monster, who could outpace him over the short distance to the rocks anyway. He had to face it and be ready. Whatever the first attack, he had to evade it. After that . . . he was probably finished. Once again there was no resourceful Jenkins to come to his aid here, as so often in the past.

  It was the tail, in fact. But the giant reptile was still half in the river, and the water was just deep enough to retard slightly the great sweep of the tail as it sent up a high plume of spray. This gave Fonthill a split-second warning, and somehow he was able to jump over the scales, as the boy had done. But he knew as he did so that he would not be able to evade the second, reverse sweep, for he lacked the agility of the urchin and the sweat was half blinding him.

  The boy, however, had not fled the scene. Clutching his fish in one hand and his rag in the other, and now completely naked, he danced back towards the reptile on twinkling feet, waving the cloth to distract the great head. For a second the crocodile was bewildered, not knowing at which target to strike. Then the tail, half coiled now on the sand, flicked out at the urchin. He jumped again, but this time just a little too slowly, and the end caught his ankle, spinning him over in mid-air and landing him a few feet higher up the beach. Immediately, the crocodile lurched forward.

  But Fonthill was even quicker. He ran up behind and beside the body of the beast and, aware that he had
no choice, flung himself astride it, his knife poised. He knew it would be useless to try and penetrate the armour-like scales, and so he plunged the blade into the eye of the crocodile, sinking it as deeply as he could to reach the brain and then twisting to retrieve it, as the Zulus did with their assegais.

  The animal flung up its head and a great primeval roar came from its throat. Simon was immediately thrown away, half into the water, as the crocodile writhed, its head tossing from side to side and blood pouring from its eye. It seemed unaware of its tormentors as it swung in pain, the tail thrashing the water and the huge jaws gnashing abortively. Then, slowly, as man and boy watched in awe, the head sank to the ground and the tail began to move, perhaps reflexively, sliding the body gradually back into the water until it disappeared, leaving a thin trail of blood rising to the surface.

  Fonthill lay gasping for a second and then, realising the danger, splashed to his feet and ran up the beach. Gathering the boy, fish and all, under his arm, he ran to the safety of the path above the sand and the rocks. There the two lay for perhaps half a minute, trembling and sucking air back into their lungs.

  Sitting up, Simon looked down at the urchin and summoned up a grin. ‘Bloody close shave I’d say, wouldn’t you?’ he gasped, feeling the need to communicate, although realising he could not be understood. ‘Just as well old 352 wasn’t here, eh? He would have wet his breeches.’ His grin widened at the thought. ‘My word, lad, you’re a plucky young devil. I’m not sure whether I saved your life or you saved mine. Bit of both, I think.’