The Mammoth Book of Travel in Dangerous Places (25 page)

’Abdul Rahman, the coffee-man, scion of the dour clans of Dhruma and usually too absorbed in his coffee-making to take much part in the general conversation, looked up with a snarl and
jerked out some offensive remark about my lack of consideration for others. I rounded on the assembled company and chid them. I came over to your tent, I said, to discuss the situation with you
that we may make plans for the future. I did not come to hear expressions of your ill-temper, and it astonishes me that you should all sit by and let such a remark as that be made in your presence
with impunity. I, at any rate, will not stand that from any of you. With that I tossed my untasted cup on the sand and rose to leave the tent. Ibn Ma’addi, doubtless remembering the
Sa’dan incident at Adraj, interposed with an olive branch. If you wish it, he said, we will give ’Abdul Rahman a beating for his insolence. No, I replied as I walked away, I do not wish
it; I have forgiven him. But if any of you wish to discuss matters with me, he must come to my tent. I come no more to yours. At such a crisis it was obviously undesirable to make enemies
gratuitously, while I also reflected that ’Abdul Rahman had probably had a gruelling day of it with the breakdown of the camels. He was perhaps also contemplating death from thirst as a very
real possibility. High words and ill-temper were inevitable in such circumstances, and I was full of sympathy for the unfortunate wretches though by no means disposed to yield to their clamour for
an ignominious retreat. So I left them to their talking, and fragments of their wild conversation floated over to my ears as I settled down to plot out our whole march from Shanna to this point. I
had had no time to do such work during the past five days and it was imperative that I should know roughly without delay our actual position in the great waterless desert. Sa’dan brought me
my customary pot of tea and the gossip of the enemy camp, whence emissaries came from time to time to resume negotiations with me about our future movements. By sunset I had finished my task and,
as soon as it was dark enough, I made and worked out the necessary astronomical observations to check the accuracy of my compass traverse. Our progress had been certainly a little disappointing
though I had discounted such a contingency in advance. Two-thirds of the desert journey lay before us – a matter of ten days, though these might be reduced to eight with a reasonable amount
of night-marching. Could the best of our camels do it? That was the great question, while there could be no doubt, whatever, that the baggage-animals must make with all possible speed for the
nearest water. There was little to choose in the matter of distance between Naifa and Shanna, but wild horses would not have dragged my companions back to the latter. They feared it as the plague,
and there was no reason why their preference should not be conceded. For the camels (and to a lesser extent for the personnel) it was literally a question of life and death. And four of the camels
lay there before us in a state of complete collapse. Nothing but water would revive them for further marching, and there was no water to spare if all claims had to be considered.

Meanwhile the stream of visitors to my tent had enabled me to devise a scheme which was at least feasible and acceptable though not acclaimed with the enthusiasm demanded by our parlous
situation. The absentees, Zayid and ’Ali, were to be encouraged to accompany the baggage back to Naifa, while I insisted that Ibn Suwailim should go with my party as guide for he alone knew
the general direction and conditions of the march before us well enough to act in such a capacity, though even he had never traversed the desert on any line southward of Faraja and Maqainama.
Sa’dan would, of course, go with me, for he both desired to do so and was indispensable for my work, and that made a nucleus of three, to which Salih adhered unconditionally, thus making
four. Farraj hedged, torn between fear and greed – and never have I met an Arab so vacillating and uncertain in temper – but eventually decided to throw in his lot with me. Humaid would
not be parted from Salih and that made six, while Suwid, who had publicly denounced the scheme as sheer madness, came to my tent alone and very mysteriously to indicate by wordless signs that he
too would be included in my party, which was duly completed by the inclusion of Abu Ja’sha, the indispensable handy man. On my part I agreed readily enough to a reasonable amount of
night-marching – a concession that I could scarcely refuse in the circumstances seeing that we should in any case have scarcely enough water to see us through to the end, for we should have
to spare some for the weariest of the camels and leave the baggage-party with sufficient to bring them to Naifa.

As the hours passed by with no sign of Zayid and ’Ali we agreed that the desert party should make a start with the first appearance of the moon, due sometime after midnight, as there was
clearly no time to be lost. The interval was spent in making the necessary dispositions to give effect to our plans. The available food supplies were divided up and the camels destined for our
party selected. In due course everything was ready and I had just completed my star observations when we heard afar off the grunts and chatter that portended the unwelcome return of Zayid and his
companions.

As I had anticipated with dread, all our carefully worked out plans collapsed with Zayid’s arrival in camp. He was quite naturally furious that any plans should have been concerted in his
absence, and neither he nor ’Ali was inclined to be communicative on the subject of the day’s hunting, which had at any rate provided no venison. They left it to be understood that they
had toiled all day in search of their lost camels and they had a colourable grievance in our decision to relegate them unconsulted to the returning baggage-party. From the first moment Zayid
declared himself against our scheme. After the inevitable cup of coffee which enabled him rapidly to take stock of the situation, as I could gather from the privacy of my own tent by the voluble
protests made in the other, he came over to discuss matters with me. He was charming as could be and honey-tongued in his protestations of devoted service. Look you, he said, I cannot desert you
thus; I will come with you myself, for my face would be blackened for ever if I left you now to your fate. The way is far and there is not sufficient water and the camels are dead. We will,
however, do what you wish. We will perish with you. We will take the best camels and all the water that can be spared and what matter? We will put our trust in God. If God so wills, we will reach
Sulaiyil alive, but blame not us if we all die of thirst in the desert. You saw today how many of the animals broke down. They cannot march without pastures to fill their bellies. There are but two
or three of them that are fit for the journey. Why, even my mount and ’Ali’s are more dead than alive. But whatever you wish we will do. I have done my duty in warning you of the danger
we shall be running, but the ordering is yours.

The advent of Zayid had clearly changed the situation. He could make or mar our enterprise, and I could not trust him to make arrangements that would give us a sporting chance of success. I felt
that I had lost my throw with Fate, and I turned to the only alternative – a faint hope of ultimate success to weigh in the balance against the certain failure of the plans we had made so
hopefully. Look you, Zayid, I said, your coming has spoiled my plans and you have turned my companions against me. Either let me go with my men and the camels we have chosen or give me your word of
honour here and now. If I agree to go back to Naifa now with all our party intact will you give me your word of honour that, when we have rested and refreshed our camels, you will ride with me
again across the Empty Quarter, even to Sulaiyil, as you gave me your word to do at Shanna? That was part of your charge from Ibn Jiluwi, and I warn you that Ibn Sa’ud himself will be wroth
with you and the rest of them if you fail in this matter. I cannot go back except across the Empty Quarter. I give you my word of honour to that, oh Shaikh Abdullah, he replied blandly, and the
matter is of God’s will. For a moment I wrestled with myself and saw that there was no reasonable alternative to putting my trust in any sense of decency that remained in him. The men were
all so obsessed with fear of Zayid that they could do nothing on their own initiative. Salih and Farraj, who had solemnly given me their hands in token of loyalty to the afternoon’s bargain,
cut but sorry figures in their sudden and complete collapse. And in the few moments that remained before a final decision was reached I listened to a loud altercation proceeding in the rival camp.
He cannot go, I heard, without a guide; so let Ibn Suwailim tell him straight out that he will not accompany him. Rise Salim and tell him that we may get back to the watering without delay. And a
moment later Ibn Suwailim was led into my tent by Suwid, repeated his lesson like a child and went his way.

Thus it was finally agreed that we should all return together to Naifa and that the baggage-train should start off as soon as the moon had risen. Of the whole nineteen of us, I alone was unhappy
that evening, while the rest set about their remaining tasks with a good will worthier of a better cause than ignominious retreat. The Empty Quarter had routed us. We had come about 140 miles
– a five days’ journey – into its inhospitable, drought-stricken wastes, and now we were to flee from its terrors.

TO THE EMPTY
QUARTER FOR A
DRINK OF WATER

Wilfred Thesiger

(1910–)

Thesiger, like Philby, was drawn to Arabia’s Empty Quarter and would make many journeys there. But he embraced the sands less as a geographical challenge and more as a
test of the human spirit. After a childhood in Addis Ababa and subsequent wanderings in Somalia, Sudan, Syria and the Sahara, he had come to think of the desert as his natural home. After World War
II he welcomed a move to Arabia, initially to work on locust control and then to make a series of remarkable journeys. He was particularly interested in how the beduin
(bedu)
had adapted to
their impossibly harsh surroundings, and he was deeply saddened that this unique lifestyle and its values were about to be eclipsed. More than any of his contemporaries, he lived as a
bedu,
suffering the pangs of thirst and hunger with them, enjoying their companionship, and making no concessions to comfort. His first crossing of the Empty Quarter in 1946 was made with just five
companions from the Rashid and Bait Kathir tribes.

A
fter the meal we rode for two hours along a salt-flat. The dunes on either side, colourless in the moonlight, seemed higher by night than by day.
The lighted slopes looked very smooth, the shadows in their folds inky black. Soon I was shivering uncontrollably from the cold. The others roared out their songs into a silence, broken otherwise
only by the crunch of salt beneath the camels’ feet. The words were the words of the south, but the rhythm and intonation were the same as in the songs which I had heard other Bedu singing in
the Syrian desert. At first sight the Bedu of southern Arabia had appeared to be very different from those of the north, but I now realized that this difference was largely superficial and due to
the clothes which they wore. My companions would not have felt out of place in an encampment of the Rualla, whereas a townsman from Aden or Muscat would be conspicuous in Damascus.

Eventually we halted and I dismounted numbly. I would have given much for a hot drink but I knew that I must wait eighteen hours for that. We lit a small fire and warmed ourselves before we
slept, though I slept little. I was tired; for days I had ridden long hours on a rough camel, my body racked by its uneven gait. I suppose I was weak from hunger, for the food which we ate was a
starvation ration, even by Bedu standards. But my thirst troubled me most; it was not bad enough really to distress me but I was always conscious of it. Even when I was asleep I dreamt of racing
streams of ice-cold water, but it was difficult to get to sleep. Now I lay there trying to estimate the distance we had covered and the distance that still lay ahead. When I had asked al Auf how
far it was to the well, he had answered, “It is not the distance but the great dunes of the Uruq al Shaiba that may destroy us.” I worried about the water which I had watched dripping
away on to the sand, and about the state of our camels. They were there, close beside me in the dark. I sat up and looked at them. Mabkhaut stirred and called out, “What is it,
Umbarak?” I mumbled an answer and lay down again. Then I worried whether we had tied the mouth of the skin properly when we had last drawn water and wondered what would happen if one of us
was sick or had an accident. It was easy to banish these thoughts in daylight, less easy in the lonely darkness. Then I thought of al Auf travelling here alone and felt ashamed.

The others were awake at the first light, anxious to push on while it was still cold. The camels sniffed at the withered tribulus but were too thirsty to eat it. In a few minutes we were ready.
We plodded along in silence. My eyes watered with the cold; the jagged salt-crusts cut and stung my feet. The world was grey and dreary. Then gradually the peaks ahead of us stood out against a
paling sky; almost imperceptibly they began to glow, borrowing the colours of the sunrise which touched their crests.

A high unbroken dune-chain stretched across our front. It was not of uniform height, but, like a mountain range, consisted of peaks and connecting passes. Several of the summits appeared to be
seven hundred feet above the salt-flat on which we stood. The southern face confronting us was very steep, which meant that this was the lee side to the prevailing winds. I wished we had to climb
it from the opposite direction, for it is easy to take a camel down these precipices of sand but always difficult to find a way up them.

Al Auf told us to wait while he went to reconnoitre. I watched him walking away across the glistening salt-flat, his rifle on his shoulder and his head thrown back as he scanned the slopes
above. He looked superbly confident, but as I viewed this wall of sand I despaired that we would ever get the camels up it. Mabkhaut evidently thought the same, for he said to Musallim, “We
will have to find a way round. No camel will ever climb that.” Musallim answered, “It is al Auf’s doing. He brought us here. We should have gone much farther to the west, nearer
to Dakaka.” He had caught a cold and was snuffling, and his rather high-pitched voice was hoarse and edged with grievance. I knew that he was jealous of al Auf and always ready to disparage
him, so unwisely I gibed, “We should have got a long way if you had been our guide!” He swung round and answered angrily, “You don’t like the Bait Kathir. I know that you
only like the Rashid. I defied my tribe to bring you here and you never recognize what I have done for you.”