Gold Dust

16

Two days later, the sacks were stolen from the cache. In the sand above where they had been stored, a sign had been left for him by the thief — the clear outline of a triangle traced in dry dates. The shape puzzled Ukhayyad and he asked the blind old woman from Tiba to read its hidden meaning. The soothsayer asked, “You said it was a triangle? Did you ever promise something to the goddess Tanit?”

His head split, and he leaped like someone who had been stabbed. “Tanit?” He remembered his pledge. He recollected the saint and the pyramid-shaped tomb. But he had eaten the animal and fed the offering to his bride. He had completely forgotten about his earlier promise. Was this a sign from Tanit? That was her mark. It was the same shape that was branded on the forearms of men and tattooed on the women’s abdomens. In the darkness of night, he had even seen it on Ayur’s belly. The same design was carved into sword handles and engraved on leather saddle horns and satchels. It was etched into gun barrels and embroidered into clothes. Tanit’s mark appeared everywhere and on everything. Was the disappearance of the two bags a cautionary reminder? Have mercy, Tanit! I did forget — I failed to recognize your sign on the pyramid pedestal! In my weakness, I neglected my promise!

After war broke out along the northern coasts, the movement of caravans through the interior of the continent began to falter, then stopped. The famine intensified and spread across the entire desert. At first, this did not affect desert commerce. But as the war went on, it drove peasants to raise the price on grains and dates. Later, many began to bury their harvests in secret caches, and refused to barter or buy. Those two sacks had disappeared at the very moment Ukhayyad had needed them the most. That only increased his rage and self-loathing. And his contempt for women.

He despised women because, now, he looked at things with his eyes rather than his heart; and as his feelings melted into cool reason, Ayur’s magic began to dissipate. He had once thought that her charm would last forever. Once upon a time, he had thought it was as powerful as the vision of fate he saw during his tumble into the well. Now, he was certain that to draw near to love was to bury oneself in a grave. Now he knew that the passing of time was a kind of magical charm as well, one that broke love’s spell and scattered its poetry.

It was this woman who had brought calamity on the piebald; she had driven Ukhayyad to break his promise. He had never before broken an oath in his life. Now, without thinking, he had done so. And with whom? With the hieroglyphs of the ancients, with the goddess Tanit herself. He wished he had known it was her shrine, or he would not have forgotten. But truth only shows itself after time has passed. This is the law of truth, on the authority of the elders who repeat it over and over.

He concealed his secret from the soothsayer and stepped out into the open desert. He sat until midnight, unable to arrive at a solution to his problem. Since he had realized the truth only after the fact, and only after famine had come to reign in the desert, there was no way to fight fate’s prescription. Where would he find a healthy, strong, and sane camel after these lean, dry years? How would he acquire a camel when he himself went without food and when his wife and child were nearly starving? He recalled an incident in a sandy region of the desert a few weeks earlier when he had cooked his leather sandal and eaten it. Ukhayyad had been following the tracks of a camel he had purchased back in easier times and then left to pasture in a valley between the northern and southern deserts. Along the way, he met one of the herders there who told him that he had seen the camel weeks before toward the east. He rode on the back of the piebald until he arrived at Zurzatin, and the herders of the Kel Abada there told him that they had seen thieves taking the animal with a herd of stolen camels across the eastern desert toward Ghadamès where they would be sold. Their stories contradicted one another and did not make sense. Others claimed that bandits had slaughtered and eaten the camel right where they found him. In a daze, Ukhayyad wandered about, hungry and miserable. He had not tasted real food in days. Despite that, he refused the invitation of the Kel Abada to eat with them. The sandy parts of the desert promised nothing. They were treacherous and devoid of herbs, scrub brush, and game. The desert of the Hamada was paradise compared to this heartless place. In the Hamada, if you did not find a gazelle or moufflon, it would offer you a rabbit. If you did not find a rabbit, it would give you a lizard. If it was not the right season for reptiles, the Hamada would set you a green table garnished with wild herbs. If the heavens held back their rains, the Hamada would show you mercy, providing you with the fruits of the lote tree left over from the previous year. My God — how merciful the Hamada was! In contrast, this desert fed you nothing but sand, dust, and the scorching southern winds.

When he could stand it no longer, he took off his leather sandal. He gathered wood and lit a fire. He roasted the leather on the fire until it became soft and puckered — then he devoured it. It was delicious, not any different from the camel skins he had eaten many times before. He opened his eyes after the meal. He began to stare at the piebald’s profile. It seemed to him that the camel was smirking. His eyes were smiling, laughing at him. He stood up and shook his finger at him, warning, “You better not tell anyone what you saw here. Do you understand? This is my secret.”

He removed the other sandal and studied it in his hands. Collapsing on the ground, he spoke to his friend as if he were addressing himself: “Don’t laugh at me. A warrior is also a pitiful creature — someone who might eat his sandal when he’s dying of hunger. Don’t measure me by your standards. Unlike you, God didn’t give me a place to store water and food. Hunger strikes down even the noblest of creatures. Starvation can bring even sultans to their knees and force them to grovel like slaves. Show some mercy!”