The Count of the Sahara (6 page)

“So why me?”

“I need to focus on my presentation. That’s what I’m good at… it’s what people come to see. When the projector goes down, or the trucks are upside down—although that was a good line, maybe we’ll keep it in—the audience gets restless and disappointed. The smoother everything runs, the better time the audience has, and the smarter I look. The better I look the more people ask me to lecture, and the more money I can charge. I literally can’t afford to look like an idiot.”

“And,” his tone became conspiratorial, “a big-shot Count shouldn’t be lugging his own equipment around like some kind of…stevedore. I am not paying you to run a projector. I’m paying you to keep me out of hot water and make me look good.”

My confusion must have been obvious, and he was getting exasperated at my thick-headedness. I knew the tone well. “Look. It’s like with that cord. You knew that if you wound it a certain way, and handled it right, it would work when I needed it. You can see those things and you just do them. I don’t see them, and when I do them, it’s half-arsed. It bites me in the backside every time. It’s the same with people. Understand?”

I knew it was that way with machinery, but I’d never heard the idea applied to human beings. Going cheap on a projector, or bad carbons for the lamps, meant you’d spend more time replacing them than watching movies. Everyone knew that, or should. I was unconvinced real people worked the same way, and I wasn’t entirely sure I was a good investment, but what the hell. It was his money.

“So a couple of stops, we’ll finish up in Moline, and you bring the car back here. Then we’ll meet up the twentieth of February. After that it’s two weeks… so far. Chicago, Muhwaukee, Madison, probably Saint Louis, and I have a very important stop in Beloit…”

He had me at St. Louis, even if he pronounced it Saint Looey. Given that Cedar Rapids was the farthest I’d ever been from home the idea of even Beloit and Madison sounded exotic. To think he went all over the world—even to Atlanta and St. Louis—like it was nothing. The job sounded better and better.

He set the hook with the final question. “Will your aunt and uncle mind if you left tomorrow?”

They’d probably do a jig. They weren’t the problem. The hole in the schedule left me with two weeks or so with no work. I’d have to go home, but after that I’d be gone for good. Mama could probably buy me that much time. It wouldn’t be fun, but I could tough it out, especially when I knew I’d be able to make my escape permanent.

“N-n-nope, it’s fine.” I stuck out my hand, bandages and all, and he used a two-hand shake on it.

“Done. Okay, we leave tomorrow for the bustling metropolis of Des Moines, Ioway,” he said in a surprisingly convincing Hawkeye accent. “What do we need to get up and running?”

I’d have to realign those slides, and maybe put a lock on the box so he couldn’t muck them up anymore. None of the boxes was properly labeled, that would make things a whole lot easier. We’d need some stuff from the hardware store.

“Not much. I can get most of it at Martinek and Son’s, it’s just down Third Avenue.”

“Great, make a list and we’ll get it while we’re having lunch. I believe I’ve recovered fully from last night. I’m starving.”

Chapter 4

Batna, Algeria

October 13, 1925

Pond gave his ankle an early morning scratch through his sock, then his arm through his sleeve. Then his nails scraped over most of the rest of his body. The mosquitoes they’d been so worried about were merely decoys for the fleas that ambushed him while he slept.

It was barely dawn, and everything in the room was bathed in a cool grey. Tyrrell snored away on one cot under a mound of blankets. Martini, like any other old desert hand, lay on top of the blankets, sleeping the sleep of the just and uneaten.

Pond got out of bed, slopped some water from a pitcher into a chipped white bowl, then palmed it against his face. He combed his fingers through his hair in a vain attempt to tame it and quietly slipped out of the room. He always enjoyed early mornings. Whether it was the North Woods of Wisconsin or the hills of southern France, there were few things he loved more than being alone with Mother Nature at sunrise. He was in a hurry to experience the feeling of dawn over the desert, but there were at least two more nights of flea-bag inns before then. No sense complaining about it.

He took his notepad and writing stationery to the lobby. He had time to dash off a short letter to Dr. Collie at the Logan Museum, and hoped it sounded professional. He’d calmed down a little since yesterday, but only a little. Running out of fuel on the first day was annoying. If it happened out in the true desert it could be fatal.

Surprisingly, de Prorok was already awake, if a little the worse for wear from the brandy he’d consumed. Hungover or not, he was fully operational, sitting slouched in a raggedly upholstered chair with his back to the rest of the lobby, jotting notes in a leather-bound notebook. The Count gestured to the silver urn on the table in front of him.

“Ahh, Pond, good morning. Everything up to scratch?” He chuckled at his own joke as his nails raked at his own shirt sleeve.

“Funny,” Pond grunted, and gestured towards the coffee. He always thought cowboys and loggers back home drank thick coffee, then he’d gone to Europe. And even that sludge couldn’t prepare him for how the Arabs drank it. It was so thick and strong, you could use it for medicinal purposes rather than recreation. There was no way you could spend the morning lingering over these little thimbles that passed for cups. A good American diner mug of this mud would have you awake and crapping for a week. Thank God sugar was in good supply.

Taking that first scalding sip, Pond studied the other man. The Count was two years younger than he was—they celebrated the Count’s thirtieth birthday in Constantine—and the nearness in age was about the only similarity between them. Pond was short. At best he was five two or three depending on who he was talking to and how straight he stood, while the other man towered over him, literally looking down at him most of the time. While the American was stocky, Byron de Prorok was wiry, and deceptively strong.

Pond blew a stray wisp of hair from his face. That was another thing that bothered him. De Prorok’s dark hair was always molded into a crest of wavy perfection at any time of the day or night. Even when the Count removed his pith helmet after a day in the sun, it was still pristine, not a hair out of place. Pond hated those stupid hats, preferring a floppy safari-style, but it didn’t seem to matter what he put on, his hair would fly about and stand on end. Sometimes that made him look taller. Mostly it made him look like he’d just crawled out of bed.

De Prorok’s booming voice shook him from his thoughts. “I’m awfully sorry about yesterday. Not the most auspicious start was it?”

“No, I suppose not. What happened?”

“I had the cans filled and loaded as soon as Rouvier granted permission for us to leave. I’m afraid I underestimated the amount of evaporation they’d undergo in such a short time. I’ve seen it happen before. I remember one time outside Carthage…”

“Evaporation? You’re telling me the gas was there and just, uhh, poof? There’s no chance you underestimated what it would take?”

This drew a smiling shrug in response. “Oh, it’s possible, of course. Math isn’t exactly my strong suit, and ultimately, of course, it’s on me. Still the boys from Renault told me what they needed and they should know, so that’s what I ordered. Reygasse’s people assure me we have plenty of supplies for the trip. I mean, it’s basically a walk in the park isn’t it? Especially this first leg.”

Pond thought his derisive snort at the mention of Reygasse had been kept to himself, but de Prorok obviously caught it. “Lonnie, what is your issue with Reygasse?”

“That toy general routine gets on my nerves.”

“I understand. He does look a bit like a Gilbert and Sullivan character doesn’t he? But without him and the Musée we wouldn’t be able to dig here at all. And his contacts with the government and the local tribes have secured our supplies all along the route. I don’t know what I’d do without him.”

Pond just took another sip of coffee. One thing they’d do, he thought, is save a lot of money. Every time they turned around he was renegotiating some detail of the trip, usually placing the blame on the local officials or the tribes. “Greedy bastards,” he’d say while extorting yet more cash for the permits, extra materiel or whatever else they needed.

“What happened back in Tangiers with you two?”

“I don’t like the way he treats his wife,” Pond said simply.

“You’re not… I mean it’s not a…”

“No, oh Christ no. I have a girl, and…. It’s just, he….” Pond tried to find a diplomatic way out of this. Maybe he needed more coffee after all. The trouble started when the poor mousey little woman had dared to correct Monsieur le Marshall on some detail in a story he was spinning, and Reygasse would have none of it. He grabbed her roughly by the arm and escorted her to the door to the accompaniment of some of the vilest language Pond ever heard directed at a respectable woman. Being in the ambulance corps, he knew most of the really good French epithets, but he learned a few more that night. “He manhandled her, in front of people. I don’t trust a man who treats a woman that way.”

“Quite right. Still, not ours to judge what goes on in a marriage is it?”

“No, I suppose not. But there’s the way he’s treating the College. Did you hear that nonsense with Brad’s expenses?”

“Yes, something about what they’d pay for and what they won’t. That’s all between the Logan and the Musée of course, not exactly our business. I try to keep my nose out of it.”

“You mean you don’t want to tick him off, and so you take his side, no matter the cost to the College or to Brad.”

“Without Maurice Reygasse, we have no digging rights. We need to remember that.” Sometimes Byron wished he could forget himself, but the reality was omnipresent, and made cooperation between the Logan and the authorities absolutely imperative.

“Oh, he manages to bring it up occasionally.” Pond was getting worked up again. Since the War it was like there was a rich American surcharge on everything. If, like Brad Tyrrell, you actually were a rich American, you were fair game. Pond was not rich, and frequently used local intermediaries to get the things he needed at a fair price.

“Have some coffee, Lonnie. We’re underway now. Smooth sailing from here on out.” Byron toasted him with his tiny coffee cup. Pond poured himself some and toasted back with considerably less enthusiasm.

The two men silently wrote in their journals as the coffee burned its way through the morning fog, the scratch-scratch of pencil on paper interspersed with the more muted scratching of fingernails through cloth.

Pond’s writing was small and precise, although much neater than the man himself. De Prorok’s notebook was full of what could have been hieroglyphics – a mix of French and English, his script large, full of curlicues and swooping “L”s and “S”s.

The hotel began to stir around them as staff and travelers emerged, blinking and scratching, into the sunlit café. Hal Denny, already sweating and looking like he hadn’t slept more than a few minutes, came in from outside. The Count called him over with that honking voice and a broad smile. “Ahhh, our Boswell. Did you get your story filed, Hal?”

“Well, it’s written. Whether it will get out of here in one piece is another question.” Byron knew he had to do something. The reporter had been singularly pessimistic and miserable since the moment he arrived in Algeria. An unhappy reporter was likely to write unflattering stories, and that was no good for business.

He certainly wasn’t the movie version of a foreign correspondent, either. Denny wasn’t much taller than Pond, and looked like he’d spent the night fully clothed and wadded into a ball, rather than in a semi-comfortable hotel bed. He seldom smiled, and seemed to consider sighing heavily a natural part of the respiratory process.

Soon the whole party was caffeinated, fed and packed. On the Count’s signal, Barth ran outside to set up his tripod and camera to capture their glorious departure to the half-hearted cheers of a handful of sullen hotel employees. No sooner were they off then they stopped, waited for Barth to catch up and climb aboard the lead vehicle, and took off again. Sandy led the parade, as always, followed by Hot Dog with Lucky Strike bringing up the rear.

Byron looked out the window. So far, the trip had been a disappointment, especially to the Americans. Instead of a dangerous adventure in the mighty African desert, they were in comfortable automobiles, leaving one hotel on the way to another, on roads that wouldn’t have been out of place in most of America outside the big cities. Every few miles they’d pass another hamlet, usually containing a gas station, a market of some kind, an inn, and the life-giving town well. True, the pictures could be manipulated, but somehow all this was missing the sense of drama he and his audiences craved.

The terrain rose slightly as they neared a ridge up front, and Martini cursed.

“What is it?” Pond asked. “They can’t be out of gas again, can they?”

De Prorok stood beside Sandy happily waving his walking stick. The occupants of the other trucks got out, stood and stretched, curious as to the source of the excitement. “Everything okay?” Tyrrell shouted.

“Couldn’t be better, but I thought you’d want to see this.” The road peaked at a narrow gap between two stones, then dipped sharply downwards. The Count stood atop the rock to the left, making a majorette’s twirling baton out of his walking stick.

“Get your good first look at the real Sahara gentlemen.” He spread his arms wide in welcome. The clicking of Barth’s camera drifted by them on the breeze, almost drowned out by the dull grumble of the three engines. Byron noticed that Reygasse chose not to share in the moment, staying in Hot Dog, feigning sleep and moping.

Pond, Tyrrell and Denny came forward to look over the crest of the hill. Ahead of them lay a vast, flat plain. Despite what the travel books said, the first expanses of the Sahara from the North weren’t sandy, but rock strewn and brown, broken up by small patches of light colored sand. The plain lay two hundred feet below them and stretched infinitely southward.

“Isn’t it wonderful, Pond?” De Prorok prodded for an elusive sign of happiness from the American.

Alonzo wasn’t sure he could provide it. “It doesn’t look very, I don’t know, Sahara-like, does it?”

Byron wondered what it would take to make the American happy. “Oh, you’ll get your sand and your camels. Not to worry. The rain will stop, too.”

Along the southern and western horizons, Pond could make out the green blots indicating a well or spring, surrounded by date trees. Some of those trees grew over eighty feet tall, but from their vantage point they were smudges of green on an unending flat, tawny canvas.

Looking directly past de Prorok and down the mountainside, Alonzo could see a thin, curved goat track of a road carved in the side of the mountain. A steep switchback led downwards and, assuming they survived that, a single straight line led southwest towards the horizon and El Kantara. It looked for all the world like God, or Allah, or whoever ruled here simply dragged his finger in the dust to show the way.

The little ceremony over, they jumped back in the cars and Sandy disappeared over the ridge first, followed closely by Hot Dog. Martini and the Lucky Strike sat for a few minutes. Pond and Tyrrell shot silent questions back and forth until Tyrrell couldn’t take it anymore.

“Martini, why aren’t we moving?” Martini turned with a sly grin.

“I’ve driven this road before. They haven’t. They’re going to go down too slowly, and maybe burn out their brakes. That one in the lead, Escande? He’s probably pissing his pants right now,” and he chuckled a little harder than Pond thought tasteful or appropriate.

“I give them a head start so we can do it right and spare the brakes.”

“So you’re actually going to go down faster than they are?” Pond was delighted Martini was looking after the brakes but then thought about the sharp turns snaking down the mountainside. The part about doing so faster than everyone was considerably less comforting.

At long last, Lucky Strike lurched into action and they headed up the hill, then sharply down and to the right. The view out the right window by Pond was a sheer wall of crumbling grey and brown rock and the occasional sere bush. On Tyrrell’s side, there was a lot of air, then the brown expanse of the desert floor.

The big truck slowed, maneuvered a sharp left turn, and the passengers traded views. Pond watched Martini nervously. The driver’s left hand locked onto the wheel, the right alternated between the gear shift and the hand brake. His eyes were fixed on the dusty track ahead of him and the herculean task of keeping all twelve tires on the ground at the same time. For the most part, he succeeded.