Song of the Nile

by Fielding, Hannah

  From that day, Phares had been a recruit for the British Embassy. Now that Alastair made him aware of what was going on, it was as if he noticed illegal transactions being made everywhere. One time, a turbaned official had come to pay the hospital a visit and seeing in his office a few framed papyruses representing images of the Ancient Egyptian world, had warned against forgeries, hinting at genuine treasure to which he alone possessed the key to acquiring. Another time, at a gahwa baladi, old Egyptian café where he stopped after visiting a patient, an effendi, gentlemanly native, sitting next to him had, just by chance, possessed a wonderful scarab in his pocket for sale.

  Phares drove for a few hours more to Assiut, where he booked into a hotel for the night. He was due to meet the patrol at dawn. They would ride by Jeep to Kharga Oasis and from there, would continue their journey by camel to Dakhla.

  He didn’t sleep well, aware that he’d had little time to prepare for this mission. It had been thrust upon him so suddenly, and he was aware of his own lack of experience. There would be guns involved and although he had once shot his ageing, rheumatic horse to put him out of his misery, an exchange of fire with other men would be an altogether different matter. Not only was he in the business of preserving lives, he was also concerned that his relative lack of experience might be fatal as he had no doubt the smugglers were properly equipped.

  It was still very early when Phares finally decided to get up. The moon had long since paled to a wan ghost with the approach of day and a chill, almost cold breeze blew freshly from the desert. He bathed, shaved and dressed before ringing for the hotelier to bring up a cup of coffee, a few slices of shamsy bread and some gibna adima, a type of feta cheese. He ate standing at his bedroom window, waiting for the sunrise, preparing himself mentally and physically for the long, strenuous journey.

  As he drove in his Jeep to the meeting place, somehow the sight of the broad river, brightening slowly beneath the rosy sky, brought him a small measure of tranquillity. For so many centuries the Nile had flowed between the palm-fringed banks, once the highway of a great civilisation and now the waterway for the agricultural commerce of his country. To Phares, the river was the symbol of eternity; as he watched the water move endlessly but without haste, he sensed death was not the end for man.

  The call of the muezzin sounded from the minarets and rooftops of the city, while the boats began to move up and down the broad waterway. Big ones laden with grain floated downstream or tacked from side to side against the stiff breeze of early morning. The more cumbersome rafts began to move about slowly, clumsily, here and there.

  Just as the last lingering call died away from some distant minaret, Phares glanced across at the river and saw a felucca carrying a group of men skim past, hugging the bank. The occupants looked to be white-robed Sudanese and he guessed immediately who they were. They must be on their way to picking up their Jeep and the two guides. A shiver of apprehension mixed with excitement ran up the young doctor’s spine: the adventure was beginning.

  Phares met with the remainder of the patrol outside Assiut, on the edge of the desert. The tallest of the white-robed men, the scarf of his turban covering the lower part of his face, introduced himself as Captain Charles Montgomery. Phares could see he was roughly the same age as himself, with lightly tanned skin over high cheekbones and a long aquiline nose, the whiter crow’s feet around his alert blue eyes suggesting a temperament normally quick to laughter. There was something in his face that Phares found trustworthy and part of him relaxed slightly. The guides, also dressed in white galaleeb, had joined the Sudanese and he bowed to the assembled group with a greeting, ‘Salam aleykom.’

  Montgomery shook Phares’s hand firmly. ‘Good to meet you, Doctor Pharaony. We appreciate your help.’

  ‘It’s been quite an education so far,’ Phares murmured. ‘Though, to be frank, I’m keener on using a scalpel than I am a gun.’

  Montgomery laughed robustly, a reaction that had a further calming effect on him. ‘Hopefully, it won’t come to that, old chap. We’re not expecting you to fight like an army pro.’

  ‘Good to know. And if anyone gets wounded, you can be sure I’ll be able to stitch them up satisfactorily.’

  Another boisterous laugh from Montgomery. Grinning, he slapped Phares on the shoulder. ‘Right, we’d better get moving. Let me introduce you to the rest of the party, then we can go over the details of the mission.’

  Ten minutes later, as they climbed into the back of the Jeep behind the two guides, Montgomery handed Phares a rifle: ‘I know I said you can leave the firepower to us, but you’d better have one of these just in case.’

  Phares merely nodded, and they started on the long journey to Kharga.

  * * *

  The sun, high in the sky, was beating down on the eight figures on camels as they wound their way through the huge rocky spurs punctuating the desert sands on the last stretch of their journey.

  Having swapped their Jeeps for camels, which had been waiting for them at Kharga, Phares and his men were finally nearing Dakhla. This was a place that had been used by smugglers for centuries. The Dakhla Oasis had been an important transit point for the desert caravans for over three thousand years. It had always been considered the southern and western Gate of Egypt, connecting it to southern Africa through Darb El Arbeen, the Forty-Day Way, a long caravan route for the transportation and trade of ivory, spices, gold, wheat and slaves, which took forty days to traverse through the desert.

  Phares watched the passing sand dunes, his earlier weariness now replaced by adrenaline, knowing every track of man and beast on the few existing caravan roads interested the guards. He had learnt by mixing with the Bedouins that all tracks in open wastes where there was neither grazing nor water were significant. It was an axiom in the desert that the camel is slow and the Bedouin disdainful of time, therefore the least indication of speed in the tracks raised suspicion. Furthermore, it made sense that smugglers would only choose the caravan road because they’d know that in using it, their movements would soon be obliterated by the tracks of subsequent caravans.

  A whistle went up as one of the guides suddenly brought his camel to a halt, pointing to some discoloured lines in the sand fifty yards away. He slid off the beast and went over to inspect them more closely, then beckoned the others over.

  ‘Old tracks of a convoy,’ the guide said. Phares and Montgomery were down on one knee, peering at the sand. ‘Camels that have been watered here very quickly.’ The guide pointed to faint pits in the sand. ‘A lot of Bedouins too.’

  The tracks themselves were almost completely covered by a dusting of sand, but Phares could see here and there straight lines of different hues only just visible. He and Montgomery, with the guide, followed the lines to the lee of the hill.

  ‘You can tell by the tracks that it came this way a few weeks ago,’ the guide told them, ‘probably on their way to Qena. A very large convoy, over twenty men and twice as many camels.’

  ‘And now they’ll be on their way back.’ Montgomery cursed quietly. ‘That’s more than we bargained for.’

  ‘Well, at least we’ll have the element of surprise,’ said Phares dryly. ‘And look,’ he pointed to an old tower standing near a ridge of rocks not far away, ‘we’ve got cover. What more could we ask for?’

  The old tower, built no doubt by some chieftain of olden days as a stronghold from which to espy his enemies riding over the desert, was surrounded by a low wall made of mud hardened by the harsh desert sun into a rocklike substance. The men walked through the enclosure to the tower. Phares pointed, drawing Montgomery’s attention to the crumbling masonry. By exercising a little care, it would surely be possible to climb up the outside walls to the remains of a flat platform near the top, from which could be obtained a good view of the desert beyond the sandhills and rocky outcrops.

  The guards split up and chose the best spots to crouch in, vantage points behind the low enclosure wall or among the rocks, either of which would offer not on
ly cover from enemy fire but a view of the track. Phares climbed cautiously up the ruined tower, armed with a pair of powerful field glasses through which he gazed eagerly southwards, in the wild hope of spotting the illicit caravan on its way into the heart of the desert.

  Now it was a case of waiting.

  Less than an hour later, Phares spotted a dark line of figures on the horizon, moving towards them. Scrambling down the tower to alert the others, he ran to join Montgomery, who had his back against a low ridge of rock, his gaze fixed on the track and the approaching camel train.

  ‘It’s them, got to be,’ Montgomery murmured.

  As the convoy grew closer, Phares counted twenty-six men riding on camels, the lower half of their faces covered by their turbans. Almost all had rifles slung across their backs. Interspersed among the riders, the rest of the dromedaries were laden with packs.

  At Montgomery’s signal, shots rang out as the guards fired continuous rounds at the convoy, sending the riders leaping from their camels on to the sand and running for cover behind rocks. Some were shielded by their animals as they ran with them, while others fired shots in retaliation.

  Under the cover of fire from the Sudanese guards, Phares and Montgomery led two others with them, zigzagging across the boulder-strewn sand in the direction of the rocks behind which the smugglers had retreated.

  Phares threw himself down as a bullet streaked past his ear. Montgomery grabbed his shoulder and pulled him behind a small sandhill. Raising their rifles to their shoulders, together they joined the other guards, firing at anything that moved in and around the outcrop of rock. Phares found it all too easy once he got started; it didn’t feel that different from a game shoot, as long as he didn’t think about their quarry being human.

  Eventually all was quiet. Two camels lay dead in the sand, but the smugglers had completely vanished into the desert as though they had never been there.

  Phares and Montgomery returned to the abandoned convoy of camels – thirty animals stood laden with antiquities, rifles and ammunition. Only now did Phares sling his rifle across his back. ‘We didn’t get a single one of them,’ he told Montgomery, wiping the sweat from his brow.

  Montgomery squinted into the distance, patting Phares on the back. ‘Oh, they’ll be back, don’t you worry. We’ll just have to be ready for them.’

  ‘We’ll be heavily outnumbered,’ answered Phares, ‘though at least we have most of their rifles.’

  ‘In the meantime, we’d better get this lot moving. The longer we hang about, the quicker they’ll be able to regroup. Once they put the word out, who knows how many others in their operation will come to boost their numbers.’

  Phares noticed a furrow of worry had crept between Montgomery’s brows. It was the first time he’d seen anything disturb the officer’s otherwise habitually cheery countenance. Needing no further prompting, he set to work with the guards efficiently to gather the scattered camels to form a movable train.

  Once they were ready to leave, Montgomery came to stand beside him. ‘Hard to get things done in this heat,’ he observed, wiping his brow. ‘These white robes are a godsend. Can’t see how you could survive in the desert wearing anything else.’

  Phares leaned over and scrutinised the map while the officer outlined the route they’d have to take. ‘The most dangerous bit is this gorge,’ he said, pointing it out to Montgomery. Being familiar with the seven oases of the Western Desert, he knew this was the quickest route back. ‘You realise this will take us a couple of hours to reach?’

  Montgomery glanced at him, his frown deepening. ‘We’ll just need to be on our guard. The rock face either side of that gorge gives us nowhere to hide if they were to ambush us there.’

  It was clear there was no other way of proceeding. Montgomery clearly knew the risk, but staying put was not an option.

  Phares nodded grimly. ‘Right, let’s go. We need to get out of there before dark. Let’s get on with it.’

  * * *

  The first part of their journey had been uneventful. The camels were biddable and there had been little sign of life along the sun-baked desert track. Phares scanned the landscape of wind-worn rock formations and felt its barren beauty. Fluttering above, he watched vultures circling, marring the glass-blue sky like swirls of ash, their cawing the only sound in this immeasurable expanse.

  Awaiting their next meal, he thought grimly to himself. Most probably some animal carcass lying not too far away.

  He consoled himself that at least they had plenty of water. Along the way, he and Montgomery had spoken little and now they lapsed into uneasy and watchful silence as their caravan moved towards the limestone gorge. Its walls grew taller as they progressed into it, until at some point it seemed to Phares that the heights were bearing down on them. The sharp rock scintillated in the sun, accentuating the dizzying effect as he looked from left to right, his gaze attempting to follow the line at the top of the great escarpment on both sides, as well as the cracks and crevices in the limestone walls.

  They heard the men before they saw anything. A rock dislodged, the scuff of a heel against the scree, a flash of white clothing, but it was enough. Realising they were sitting ducks, in an instant reflex Phares gestured to their Sudanese companions, waving them down. A warning swiftly followed by Montgomery’s peremptory command:

  ‘Get down! Find cover!’

  Other than small knee-high ridges of rock and the odd boulder, there was little cover to be had. Phares instantly dismounted from his camel and ran for it, following Montgomery to a buttress-like rock protruding from the side of the gorge. Barely six-foot wide and only shoulder height, it would be enough for the moment, Phares thought as he crouched behind it, cocking his rifle. Even so, it was clear that they were trapped in the neck of a bottle, unable to go forward or retreat. At least Montgomery had checked that each man had a belt well stocked with ammunition.

  As soon as the thought flitted into his mind it was met by a loud volley of gunfire coming from both sides of the gorge. Their assailants had the advantage of looking down on them from a height, but Phares and Montgomery were tucked into the cliff face, making them difficult targets to access. Their attackers would need to descend the rockface to come closer and then it would be up to their own small group to pick them off, one by one. At least, that was the hope. There was little point in firing wildly if they couldn’t see their opponents: it would only use up bullets they could ill afford to waste.

  Phares was surprised to find that he was icy calm. It wasn’t the first time he had been under pressure – his training in emergency rooms had prepared him well for that, though his own life had never actually been at risk. His ears and eyes were sharpened by the extreme danger they faced now. Adrenaline gave him a feeling almost of invincibility.

  ‘I can see one of them,’ hissed Montgomery in a low whisper. ‘Cover me, will you? I’ll head for that next rock, I’ll have visibility from there.’

  Phares gave a curt nod and his companion took off, zigzagging as he ran, bent almost double, while Phares fired again and again, covering the officer.

  Moments later, Montgomery’s new position having been secured, Phares had the grim satisfaction of seeing their assailant tumbling down the rocky scree, killed with a bullet to the head. Montgomery must be a crack shot, he thought to himself, relieved that the British had at least thought to send one of their best marksmen on this mission.

  Just at that moment, out of the corner of his eye he saw a swift movement. One of the smugglers had moved soundlessly into a position whereby he had a view of Montgomery’s back. Without time to think, Phares ran out into the open, firing as he went. He saw his friend’s startled face flick round, just as his assailant took a shot at him, but Phares got there first, his bullet catching the man in the shoulder, forcing him to shoot wide so that he missed Montgomery, his own bullet ricocheting off the rock. Another shot from Phares, and the man keeled over backwards.

  This time it was Montgomery’s turn to cover h
im as three or more assailants turned their fire on Phares. Shots whistled past his head as he hurtled full tilt back to the jutting limestone rock that he was fast beginning to think of as his friend and saviour.

  Ears ringing, Phares didn’t at first notice that the noise of gunfire had amplified. When he did realise it, he had only one thought: More smugglers have come to join them. We’re done for …

  He mentally prepared himself to go down fighting – keep it up for as long as he could – but then as he reached for his ammunition belt, he realised with a sickening sense of dread that he was out of cartridges. His mind frantically sought a next move, and then he saw Montgomery leave his position. Running in a crouch, the officer ran back in the direction of Phares, who was astonished to see a grin plastered over the man’s face.

  ‘We’ve got them on the run, old chap! One of our patrols – must have heard the gunshots and come to investigate.’

  Indeed, Phares could hear the rifle fire receding audibly as the smugglers started to scatter. His spirits surged as reality hit him. All being well, he’d live to see the end of this; he’d live to take Aida in his arms. Relief washed over him and with it, a deep exhaustion. So far, adrenaline had kept him alert, but without it now, he felt in an imminent state of near-collapse.

  ‘You go and check out what’s happening. It’s imperative we don’t let them get away this time,’ he told Montgomery. ‘I’ll join you, but first I need to pick up more ammunition. I’m completely out.’

  ‘Righto. Though watch yourself, there may be one or two smugglers still lurking around.’

  Phares headed into the open, making his way cautiously towards the camel train, which amazingly was still intact, the dromedaries waiting patiently for the return of their masters. The Sudanese guards had lived up to their indomitable reputation and were now in hot pursuit of the smugglers, determined not to let them get away a second time. For now, Phares was alone.