The Laughter of Carthage (93 page)

We stopped only once, at a farmhouse, to buy some bread and olives and to relieve ourselves. By afternoon we were climbing again into cool hills while the road became steadily worse and more than once we had to stop or swerved to avoid a hole. The bimbashi would sometimes admonish the chauffeur, sometimes apologise to me. He sat upright throughout the journey, occasionally lighting a cigarette, or reaching out to hold the silk cord near the window. Twice he pronounced the name of a town which I did not recognise. He pointed out the ruins of a Classical temple, a Crusader tower, the more modern remnants of a recently demolished village. Towards evening we descended into a narrow rocky valley containing a river and some stunted oaks. The car was forced to halt at a narrow track. Through clouds of gnats, the bimbashi led me down beside a stream, then across a shuddering, creaking bridge to a wooden house resembling a rundown Russian dacha. Originally it had been white, but most of the paint had peeled. The boards of the veranda were as unstable as the bridge and I thought the whole thing must fall as we went inside. The dusty rooms were sparsely furnished; they had not been lived in for years. As we progressed we heard murmuring voices towards the back, then we came into a low covered courtyard surrounding a brick well. Beyond it were quarters occupied by several horses and close to the well itself sat or squatted three of the bimbashi’s henchmen. They were not unfamiliar to me. With slight variations of features and dress they might have been Hrihorieff’s bandits, the sort now calling themselves Cossacks. They had the same wolfish, aggressively challenging, appearance. They did not bother to stand as the bimbashi and I came into the courtyard, though they showed respect for a man who now crossed from the stables, grinning at Hakir, lifting an eyebrow at me as if we were old friends. From the way he held himself, this leader had obviously been a soldier; now he was almost as ragged as the others, who had never been anything more than third-rate brigands, self-styled ‘irregulars’: bazhi-bazouks. They wore sheepskin caps, bandoliers criss-crossed their bodies, cartridge pouches bulged at chest and hip. and their belts were crowded with knives, swords, pistols, most of which were rusty. Crouching like apes beside the well they tried to light a fire under a cooking pot. The leader grunted something, offering to share the congealed contents of the pot with us, but we shook our heads. Eventually we accepted some pieces of bread torn off a grey, communal loaf. Outside, the stream rushed over rocks with such a din, I thought it must flood and wash the house away, but this amplified sound was merely a feature of the courtyard. As soon as Major Hakir and the chief bazhi-bazouk led me into another room, there was relative silence. Hakir and the bandit talked for a while in their own language. I could only understand a few words, mainly to do with military matters. At last Hakir turned to me. ‘We shall rest for an hour or two, then press on, although there’s very little daylight left. Can you ride a horse, M’sieu Pyatnitski?’

Reluctantly, I told him I could, though my experience was limited. The car, said Hakir, must return to Scutari. It was too conspicuous now. Besides, it was not really capable of crossing this sort of terrain. An intense depression slowly crept through me as I realised I was severing yet another important connection with the civilised world. Now, as I had been in Ukraine, I was reduced to a pony. I consoled myself with remembered reports of Greek gains in Anatolia. There was a good chance Kemal and his bandits would be overrun in another day or so. I might soon be rescued. My main consideration therefore must be to avoid becoming mixed up in the shooting and accidentally killed. I forced myself to forget my worries and attain that sort of trance, almost a coma, which had served me well in the past. I was virtually able to anaesthetise my brain, becoming hardly conscious of what I said or did. Meanwhile I retained at all times the will and capacity to escape as soon as an opportunity arose. Soon I was like an automaton, mounting with the others, riding slowly up the valley floor, through a narrow defile and out again into that awful, barren landscape.

Under a desert moon, astride an ill-fed, badly smelling pony, I trotted across terrain so ugly, so unkempt and worthless, I could not believe anyone would wish to fight for it, let alone die for it. Perhaps, I thought, they were so deluded they could see lush fields where there was only lifeless dust.

In answer to my casual questions Bimbashi Hakir told me we were ‘some distance from Karagamous’, which was absolutely meaningless to me. In any case, my attention was soon divided for I recognised the bite of my first louse. I began to re-experience all the familiar miseries of bandit life. It remained ironic, I thought, that once again I had aimed for an enlightened future and landed in the ignorant past. In my document case my plans for a marvellous new flying machine could change the nature of twentieth-century life. Yet, here I was riding with men whose habits and attitudes had not progressed in a thousand years, who, in every detail save for more sophisticated weapons, resembled their savage ancestors. Plainly, Kemal had fallen into the same trap as Lenin, summoning up atavistic forces, peasants and bandits, to turn the battle in his favour. Consequently exaggerated power now belonged to the people most likely to resist change. I was reconciled a little by the observation that Bimbashi Hakir fared little better on horseback than I. He was horribly uncomfortable, attempting to keep up-wind of his ‘irregulars’, avoiding as much as possible direct contact with their unbelievably filthy bodies. They in turn were plainly amused by our discomfort, stroking their greasy moustaches, staring at us from beneath thick, black brows, mumbling and grinning. Once we stopped amongst gnarled dwarf pines and watched a big locomotive shriek through the night, lights blazing, only about a hundred yards below. I noticed they did not look directly at the train but slightly away from it, as if they felt it would only attack if they made eye contact.

By the small hours of the morning, when we rested the horses, I was reduced to hoping the promise of rebel gold meant more to these cutthroats than their curiosity about what I carried in my bag. We travelled a few more miles until dawn, when we came upon a small, mephitic village. Here we breakfasted off bread and kid’s meat, under the eyes of residents scarcely distinguishable from their dung-coloured houses and their straw-coloured streets. All, including dogs and goats, seemed designed to blend with the surrounding countryside. I was able to sleep in relative peace as the Osmanlis attended to their prayers, but we were soon on our way again. Now yellow grass and sticky mud clung to our ponies’ feet, sometimes making it almost impossible for them to walk. It drizzled for a while, then grew humid under a grey sky. Once or twice we passed an ancient ruin, weather-worn, its origins lost. The plain seemed infinite. We came upon lone herdsmen with flocks of black and white sheep. Big tawny dogs ran at us, barking and baring fangs, until they were called off. For a few hours that night we camped in the open, with nothing to eat but figs and olives. Then we were on our way again. Without a map or compass I could not understand how anyone could not get lost in this wilderness. Every so often we crossed the railway track, but the bandits were not using it to find direction. Rather, it seemed an inconvenience to them. The sight of the railway, however, always cheered me. It meant there was a link with civilisation after all, though the rebels evidently preferred to travel more discreetly. On the third day, as we watered our horses beside a small lake, a De Havilland with grubby markings, either French or American, flew low overhead, plainly interested in us. The bimbashi was barely able to stop his bandit companions from dragging out their rifles and firing at it. This, more than anything, reminded me we were in a country still at war.

Later that same afternoon the ground began to rise sharply, then a high ridge appeared in the distance and behind it a range of tall mountains. Major Hakir seemed relieved and smiled at me (I believe now he had feared himself lost). He pointed ahead. ‘Ankara,’ he said.

The town came into sight on the crest of the ridge; a broken outline of weather-beaten roofs with a few minarets lifting above them. The outline ended abruptly at the southern edge where a huge, square featureless fortress stood. On the steep face of the ridge I saw fire-blackened ruins and took these as indication of recent attack. When I voiced my guess, Hakir was amused. He shook his head. ‘Oh, no,’ he said. ‘It was the damned Armenians. They wouldn’t leave.’

Behind the ridge the peaks of jagged volcanic mountains formed a backdrop of intense blue for the brown and ochre of the pathetic town. Ankara was as timeless as any of the other settlements I had seen on the way. Here and there on the outskirts were ruins plainly Roman; elsewhere the remains of Anatolia’s ancient Greek conquerors. Below the original town modern buildings had been erected, but they were little more than two-storey shacks. Over the largest flew a red and yellow flag, standard of that modern Hannibal who even now gathered another horde from the plains and mountains of Asia Minor, to ride once more against Rome and all she stood for. I made out artillery emplacements, trenches, sandbags. Obviously the town was well defended. Half the weapons guarding Kemal’s New Carthage were of recent Christian manufacture. I saw neat rows of army tents, then makeshift shelters, large marquees, pavilions of silk and cotton which might have come straight from some Arabian desert. There were lorries, motor cars, at least two dismantled aeroplanes, yet horses still predominated.

The camp was chaotic, evidently in preparation for battle. Large mounted bands of brightly clad bazhi-bazouks raced in every direction, whooping and yelling; over this were the ululations of the imams and an occasional shot, fired into the air. For all its immediate confusion the camp was well run. It had the air of discipline I only once witnessed before, in the anarchist stronghold of Nestor Makhno. The odour of woodsmoke was pervasive, mingling with the stink of oil and cordite, issuing from hundreds of small fires burning in dugouts on the outskirts of Ankara. Bimbashi Hakir was awkwardly proud of his citadel but the force still looked far too small to withstand the Greeks. Again I consoled myself that perhaps all I had to do was sit tight and wait to be captured. Guards allowed us through the first ring of defences and into the town until, on the northern side, we arrived at the large nondescript wooden villa flying Kemal’s standard. It stood on its own, some distance from a cluster of barrack-houses, had evidently been painted recently and was in considerably better condition than most. We dismounted. With his hand on my elbow, Hakir led me inside.

We were not stopped by the uniformed guards at the first archway. Coming to attention, they saluted Bimbashi Hakir, staring curiously at me. They looked like men who had been fighting for too long yet were neurotically impatient to begin again. My dark overcoat was layered with dust and mud. My Homburg hat was wrecked. It was impossible to see anything of my patent-leather spats. I had set off dressed carefully, to meet a great financier, but would have been more suitably costumed in the rags and Phrygian cap of the Mob. I was not happy with the condition of my clothing, though I continued to curb my temper, smiling enthusiastically at whoever was introduced to me, nodding here, bowing there. We must have shaken hands with half the bimbashis in the Kemalist army before we got to a little anteroom and closed the door. A large, yellow-bladed fan cooled the air overhead. At first I was surprised, assuming it to be electric. Then I realised it was worked by a hidden slave: an apt image of their new ‘modern’ Turkey. The room was whitewashed and had lattices at the windows, but no glass. On the wall furthest from the door was a large map of Anatolia, one corner of which flapped in the draft of the erratically turning blades. It was almost twilight, but still miserably hot. In front of the map several tables had been arranged, like school desks, and at the nearest of these, his chair turned to face us, sat a tall, slender individual smoking a cigarette in a holder. He had discarded his fez in favour of a French-style képi, but otherwise his uniform, though stylishly cut, was Turkish. He apologised in Parisian accents that he had never learned Russian and smiled ironically to acknowledge his people’s ancient feud with mine. Then he got up quickly, shook hands, and offered me a chair. I was impressed by his manners, if not his attitude, and in other circumstances might have found him charming. His green eyes betrayed far more intelligence than those of Bimbashi Hakir who saluted, murmured something in Turkish, then bowing to me said he was at my service but in the meantime would leave me with this gentleman. He closed the door carefully behind him as he went out and I was alone with the elegant Turk.

‘Are you hungry or thirsty, sir?’ he asked.

I shook my head. ‘Not particularly. But you have the advantage of me. Am I in the presence of Kemal Pasha?’

This amused him. ‘Unfortunately the great general is still on his way to Ankara. His time is increasingly taken up with civilian politics rather than military matters. I am Orkhan Pasha. You know my friend Count Siniutkin, I believe?’

I agreed I was acquainted with the Count, ‘I am very flattered by your interest in my designs.’

‘I must apologise for having to ask you to travel all this way, and in such rough company. But we are in the middle of a war, m’sieu. As I’m sure you understand, it is not as easy for me to come and go in Constantinople as I would wish. Our friends in the city have not yet achieved the necessary power. However, like our President and Commander-in-Chief, I am dedicated to modernising my backward country. When Turkey is restored to her proper dignity, we shall be able to invite men of science from all over the world, to help us fulfil our great dream.’