The Count of the Sahara

by Wayne Turmel

“Yeah. I hate camels. My legs are too damned short to really get a good grip.” Both men paused, then allowed themselves a snorting laugh of relief.

  Byron’s relief at their rescue was only momentary. He approached the Americans and quietly asked, “Where’s everyone else? Is everything okay?”

  Pond nodded. “The supplies came three days ago but Reygasse was away on some damned fool errand, and one of the trucks has a cracked oil pan. Denny and I threw everything on camels and came as fast as we could. Maurice should be here with the cars and the rest of the gear… wait. What day is it?”

  There was a momentary clamor as everyone tried in vain to recall the day of the week. Finally, Pond counted them off on his fingers. “We left Saturday, I think, so that makes today… Monday? He should be here late today, tomorrow for sure. Assuming he got back on time, that is.”

  “Fine, fine…” Now that things were on the upswing, de Prorok couldn’t wait to share the really important news. “Lonnie, Hal, guess what? We found her. Tin Hinan. We found the tomb. Really, come and see, it’s quite…”

  “Byron, don’t you think that can wait a bit?” Tyrrell motioned with his head to the rest of the team who were practically chewing through the crates to get to the food and water inside.

  “Of course, yes. Apologies. Monsieur Martini, prepare the feast, if you please.” As everyone but Hal Denny scrambled to assist, de Prorok rattled on to the only person who couldn’t get away. “Seriously Hal, the Times will be beside themselves. The greatest discovery in the history of the Sahara. We did it.”

  Once throats had been soothed and stomachs appeased, the team swapped stories. Pond listened skeptically as de Prorok told his version of events. To hear him tell it, things had been tight but not dire. The gauntness of his face, and the embarrassed glances of the other men suggested otherwise, but Pond didn’t push. Brad would give him the skinny later on.

  Denny was the storyteller, so Pond let him relate the rescuers’ tale. The message from Abalessa arrived late Friday night, and the supplies arrived soon after. The problem was, there was no way to get to the tomb site; Reygasse and Hot Dog had gone on some mysterious mission and wasn’t due back til Monday. The other car, Sandy, was down with a damaged oil pan, and it would take two days to fix, so Pond and Denny decided to take as much as they could throw on a couple of camels, and head out. The others would catch up when they could.

  Of course their guide, Yeddir, spoke no English, so they had no real idea how far it would be, when they’d arrive, or what shape anyone would be in by the time they got there. Two greenhorns and a guide who couldn’t communicate with them carried gas, oil, water and food across eighty miles of Sahara in hopes of finding the right needle in an impossibly large haystack.

  Denny warmed to the tale with the telling, convinced it was front-page stuff if he lived to tell it. He’d already written it in his head. His injuries weren’t to the part of his body required for typing.

  Chapuis looked worried. “Did you pass anyone, or tell them where you were going?”

  Pond knitted his brow. “Not really. A couple of Arab traders, but that’s it. Why?”

  “Because if Akhamouk gets word of what we’re doing here, we’re in hot water.” The party members looked at each other, half of them not understanding just how much hotter the water could get.

  De Prorok didn’t want them becoming fixated on the negative, now that things were finally looking up. “Lonnie, care to take a look at what we’ve found?” He bounced on the balls of his feet, eager to share the find with someone who could really appreciate what he’d… they’d… managed to do.

  Pond sighed and tried to ignore the burning in his thighs. “Of course, let’s get a look at the lady. Can’t think of anything I’d rather do.”

  Pond’s short legs had trouble keeping up with de Prorok at the best of times, and after three days on a camel these were hardly the best of times. The Count would scamper up the hill, then turn back and wait impatiently, then dash ahead some more and wait, all the while keeping up a constant stream of chatter. “Wait til you see the chamber. It’s worked stone…. But not Arab or Tuareg. I swear, it looks Roman… can you imagine Romans this far south? Really extraordinary…. And the gold… real gold, Pond, like the stuff I pulled out of Utica. And gemstones… Carmelite mostly but I’m sure there’s more…”

  Pond grunted appropriately, hearing only half what was said. He was too busy concentrating on not having a heart attack or falling off the mountain.

  De Prorok continued his manic monologue, “…and here we are, home sweet home.” With a triumphant sweep of his arm, the Count indicated the chamber opening.

  “What’s all this?” Pond asked, pointing to a crate covered in blankets. De Prorok flung back the blanket.

  “Ta da. This is the best stuff we’ve pulled out so far.” His long fingers gently lifted the gold necklace for inspection, then scooped up a dozen or so colored stones, letting them slowly filter through his hands, his face ablaze with the fever of discovery.

  Pond thought he’d seen that same look on a housecat that drops a mouse at her master’s feet, expecting praise for such a fine offering. If the son of a gun expected oohs and aahs, he was going to be as disappointed as the cat. “Have you catalogued all this?”

  “Not yet. Haven’t had time, have we? Too busy digging…”

  “For Chrissakes, Byron, you know you have to document everything in real time… Oh for… Let me take a look. Pond ducked into the darkened chamber, allowing a few seconds for his eyes to adjust. The afternoon sun came in over his shoulder, striking the back of the chamber and offering just enough light to confirm his worst fears.

  What he saw both excited and horrified him. The front half of the chamber had been shoveled or swept clean of dust. On the floor were dried remains of the animal skins that once carpeted the tomb. Against the far wall was a platform of decomposing wood, still covered in a thick layer of sandy grit. On top of the platform, sleeping under a blanket of silt was a body. The skull, neck and most of the chest lay exposed along with a few bones that must have been feet and toes. Crowning the skull was a metal circlet, probably a crown, but it was too dark to tell what it was made of.

  That was the exciting part, and he couldn’t deny the hot tingly rush of excitement building, but he wasn’t going to let that get the best of him. The scientist in him was horrified at what wasn’t there; markers and notations for each artifact should have been everywhere. “Damn it, Byron. Haven’t you documented anything?”

  De Prorok suppressed an urge to scream. Did the little bastard always have to be so tight-assed about everything? Can’t he see what we have here? He took a deep, calming breath before responding. “Well yes, photographic documentation, I mean. Brad had his movie camera, and he and I both have our little Kodaks. We’ve been taking snaps as we go, best as the light lets us. We figured we’d restage everything when Barth gets here and… What’s wrong?”

  “What’s wrong? Honestly? You know better than this. I mean, Brad has no clue, he’s an amateur, but you… You’ve corrupted the site. Jesus… we don’t even know what all this really means.”

  “What it means, Pond, is that we have discovered a Roman burial chamber deep in the desert, with the remains of a real queen that many thought was just a myth. We’ve got Carthaginian gold and…”

  “You don’t know any of that. You’ve got worked stone, I grant you, but we don’t know, really know, who worked it yet. You have a body of someone important, but you don’t really know who…”

  “Of course we know…”

  “No, we don’t,” Pond found himself shouting. “You don’t know, you’re guessing. Do you even know that’s a woman lying there?”

  “Of course it is,” Byron frantically tried to wedge himself in beside the fusspot American. “Look at that crown, the necklace. Would a man wear those?”

  Pond forced himself not to take the bait. Egyptians buried their dead with belongings of both sexes. Tuaregs were a complete
gender mystery, with the men going veiled and kohling up their eyes while the women ran the show. Since no one really knew how old this tomb was, or whose body they were looking at, nobody—especially a pea-brain like de Prorok could be really sure. It was a great story. It was piss poor science.

  Pond flinched as de Prorok clapped him on the shoulder. “And now you’re here to add a little rigor to the proceedings. Now we’ll have her dug out in no time, eh?”

  “Yeah, well… we’ll have to get started, I suppose. But everything has to be by the book.”

  “That’s a lad. I’ll get everyone rounded up and back at it.” Pond was older than de Prorok by two years, and it galled him to be treated like a child, especially by that overgrown adolescent. Still, if this place turned out to be what it seemed, well he’d have to just swallow his pride and get on with it.

  Sweep by sweep, handful by small handful, the body was revealed. The pages of Pond’s notebook slowly filled with each entry: wood (unkn) segment from platform (?) 6 in. Then the piece of rotted wood was dusted, marked and set aside.

  As they worked into the next day, Pond became increasingly excited, and de Prorok’s enthusiasm waned. Pond began to feel the familiar rhythm of the work: dig, dust, analyze, record, then dig some more. The Count, on the other hand couldn’t help but be disappointed.

  No carved sarcophagus, no golden images. The bracelets, armbands and crown were made of brass or some other lesser metal. A few glasslike beads, their faces roughly formed, provided most of what little glitter there was. The only thing someone could really call treasure was one tarnished gold necklace and a pile of semi-precious stones—mostly Carmelite and polished agate—not much return on all their suffering.

  The only statuary was that silly round female figure—most likely a fertility fetish of some kind. Interesting enough in her way, but it was hardly Tut’s death mask. As a purely anthropological discovery, it had value, no argument. As a career-making treasure trove, it stank of disappointment. Again.

  He ducked low to see inside the cavern. Pond was bent over the body, examining the skull with calipers, muttering to himself, lost in his work.

  De Prorok harrumphed loudly. “What are you doing?”

  Pond adjusted the screw, double checked the numbers and noted them in his book. Looking up, de Prorok could see his forehead wrinkled in confusion. Brown dust mixed with sweat left muddy streaks across his brow. “Byron, how sure are you this is Tin Hinan?”

  De Prorok knew that tone, and he didn’t much care for it. It was the sound of a professor laying a trap for an obtuse student. Still, he pasted on a casual smile. “Well, every source says she’s buried here. This mound has been a holy site for fifteen hundred years or so. Who else would it be?”

  “I don’t know… it’s just… Look, the body is shorter than most Tuareg males, so it’s easy to assume it’s female. The cranium…” He went on as if explaining to a reluctant freshman. He held the calipers against the exposed skull, “…is consistent with a female. That’s all good.”

  Then he moved down the body. “But the pelvis… it’s too narrow. What if this is a teenage boy, rather than a woman?”

  De Prorok shook his head. “No. Unh-uh. I mean, I’m not doubting your measurements…” He hoped his voice sounded more convincing than it sounded in his own ears, “Not at all. But consider this.” He scrunched his eyes shut for a moment, gathering his scattered thoughts as he so often did before launching into one of his theories. “We know that Tin Hinan died young, and childless, far as we know. Yes?” Pond nodded patiently. “So… we have someone shorter than a Tuareg male. Lots of body jewelry… like the dowry necklaces we saw in the camp.” His eyes lit up. “The figurine…”

  He grabbed the fetish statue and practically shoved it under the other man’s nose. His long fingers traced the breasts and the scratches indicating a rather prodigious vulva. “Don’t you see? This is probably some kind of, I don’t know, fertility goddess, judging from the… breasts and… what if this was buried with her to help her bear children in the next life?” He nodded, expecting a similar nod from Pond but got a winkled forehead and a shaken head instead.

  “It’s possible, sure. But…”

  “There you go, then.” De Prorok felt better. There was nothing like converting a skeptic to get the blood racing again. Of course, it all fit if you wanted it to. It was just a matter of squashing those pesky doubts that could paralyze you if you let them. Occam’s razor, lex parsimonaie, was one of the cardinal rules of science after all. The simplest answer was usually right. He believed that, when it suited him. Why ask a lot of inconvenient questions? No one else would.

  He still heard some of those doubts in Pond’s voice, although weaker. “There’s something about her pelvis that bothers me…”

  The academic in Pond was frustrated by the haphazard nature of the entire operation. De Prorok seemed awfully sure of himself, but then he thought Atlantis might be under their feet, too. Was he right, or just lazy? It would be a whole lot easier if he was right. If.

  When the sun sank too low for the light to enter the tomb, Pond and de Prorok headed back to camp. They passed Chapuis, cradling his rifle in his arms and chewing what was left of his finger nails. “Louis, something wrong?” De Prorok felt obliged to ask, although he wasn’t sure he could stand hearing the answer.

  Chapuis looked up at the Count. “The drums have started up again.” De Prorok just nodded.

  “What’s that about?” Pond wanted to know, or pretended to. The knot in his stomach told him he already did. It tightened a bit when they neared the bottom of the hill. Martini, Brad Tyrrell and Hal Denny were loading gear into Lucky Strike.

  “Lonnie. Great. We’re going back to Tamanrasset to see if we can find Reygasse, and maybe get some assistance out here. Denny needs to file his story, so he’s coming with. We’ll be back in the morning if everything goes right.”

  “Yes, God knows everything’s gone right so far.” Pond wasn’t entirely sorry he let that slip, but de Prorok didn’t hear him. He was too busy in conference with Hal Denny.

  “Byron, take a look at these stories…. Which do you like best?” The reporter held three pieces of paper out for the Count’s inspection. De Prorok read each in turn.

  Daring Rescue on Camels Saves Prorok Expedition

  Tomb Yields Proof of High Civilization in Sahara

  Jeweled Skeleton Found by Prorok in Tomb of Goddess

  A long, slender finger pointed to the last one. “That one’s rather hard to resist, isn’t it? Well done, Hal.”

  “I like that one, too. Almost makes coming out here worth it.” He placed extra emphasis on the ‘almost.’ “I’m not looking forward to sitting in the car for eighty miles, but it beats the hell out of a camel. They’ll eat it up at home. This is huge, Byron. It’ll be the making of you.”

  Chapter 19

  Near Abalessa, Hoggar Province, Algeria

  November 13, 1926

  That night nothing happened, but they couldn’t have slept much worse if it had. The drums from the village thrummed steadily all night, drifting over the still desert like a faraway radio station. There was no sign of incursion—Chapuis’ rifle and his willingness to use it proved a strong deterrent, and now that the white men were no longer starving and thirsty they made a less tempting target.

  Alonzo Pond slept well as he always did outdoors. Years of camping in open spaces meant he could make himself comfortable and nod off almost anywhere. He did lay awake for a while, hands clasped behind his head and dreaming of speaking fees and a girlfriend suitably grateful for his safe return. He also mentally composed his report to Dr. Collie and the Museum, and hoped he could strike the right balance of excitement and scientific neutrality.

  The discovery of Tin Hinan, if indeed it was her up there, was icing on an already rich cake. From a strictly anthropological standpoint, the paleolithic discoveries they made along the way were more important, if not nearly as glamorous. He just couldn’t share d
e Prorok’s enthusiasm, not without a lot more study. He liked the man, who wouldn’t? But his abundant charm couldn’t cover up his complete lack of professionalism. How could anyone go through life that completely sure of himself? It wasn’t natural. Pond envied the man despite himself.

  Byron de Prorok slept less than the others. Conflicting emotions battled in his head: pride at the discovery, impatience to tell the world, fear that he might be wrong. More than anything that night, the voices in his head told him he’d wind up like Gordon at Khartoum—lauded, respected, remembered as a hero, but not there to enjoy his own fame.

  He accomplished the obvious goal. After all, the tomb was here, even if the actual treasure was less than he’d hoped for. It was an important find, and he’d milk it for everything he could. After all, he had the ear of the world’s most important newspaper and that would shut up the doubters at the Royal Geographic Society—let them deny him membership now—and the Renault vehicles had survived the trip. Maybe they’d give him one of those new luxury models the drivers were raving about, a Vivasix. Alice would love that. But first he had to get everyone home safely. The nagging voice in his head, the one that sounded like his Grandmama, told him he was damned lucky no one had died. Yet.

  Unable to sleep, he arose and joined Louis sitting like a gargoyle above the camp on a thumb-like outcrop of rock. The stones groaned and popped as the heat of the day turned to chilly night. De Prorok jumped at every noise. Chapuis was an old hand, though, and could separate the normal sounds of night from real danger.

  “Monsieur, you should get some sleep,” he said once he lowered the rifle he had aimed at the Count’s chest.

  “Mmmm, yes I suppose so.” De Prorok swept a spot clean and sat down heavily. “What do you think he’ll do? Akhamouk, I mean?”

  “He won’t be happy, that’s for sure.”

  “I don’t imagine so. But he wouldn’t actually come after us, would he? It’d bring the whole Foreign Legion down on him. Beaumont doesn’t strike me as the kind to let them get away with it.”