That night we attempted to read the map by torchlight, from time to time peering over the side at the dunes or at the magnificent stars as we tried desperately to determine our position. The stars were displayed as sharply as an astrologer’s chart with every pin-point an identifiable individual, every configuration perfectly defined, but neither of us could navigate by them. We were hoping to see a good-sized settlement where we could land and risk someone taking another potshot at us. Such problems beset the first balloonists in Europe, who whenever they landed were set upon by local peasants. We at least had the advantage of our Gatling and a couple of loaded Webleys as well as my Lee-Enfield. I felt a pang when I thought of my friend. He had been a fool not to come with us, yet, just as he was suffering the consequences of his decision, I would soon no doubt be suffering the consequences of mine. At Rosie von Bek’s persistent prompting, and with the help of some sustaining sneg, there was nothing to do but return to our habitual pursuits, praying that God was sufficiently well-disposed towards us not to let us perish in that blazing waste.
I had taken to telling her strange tales of the desert. She demanded the most complicated details, forcing me to draw more than I should have liked on my Egyptian experiences. Yet, by turning those horrors into a form of fiction, I managed further to restore myself. The knowledge I had gained at Bi’r Tefawi could, by some odd alchemy, be put to my advantage. Her own motives were purely sensual, yet she enjoyed a fantasy which she might never have dared bring to reality if we had not drifted unremarked above the surface of the earth. Yet over the next two days the raw truth of our predicament grew harder to avoid. Rosie von Bek’s manner became increasingly nervous as she darted from side to side of the basket, checking the balloon’s functions, making certain that the engine was working. Unable to be of assistance, I continued, when not at her disposal, to absorb myself in the adventures of Sexton Blake, Detective. She chose to see my fascination as part of the stoic nature of the Bedouin, but since there was no action I could take The Union Jack soothed my mind, helping me ignore the unpleasant likelihood of our deaths in the desert. I was surprised that she saw no parallels between my anodyne and her own addiction to my verbal confections. It was not surprising that I should seek the consolations of Zenith the Albino or The Master Mummer after my surfeit of sensuality and terror, just as she had doubtless meanwhile satisfied her appetite for the adventures of the famous detective, his plucky assistant Tinker and their bloodhound Pedro pitted against a thousand deadly villains. Upholding the high standards of a benign imperialism, wherever his cases led him, even Blake could not live by idealism and romance alone, though I should make it clear there was not a trace of smut in those stories.
My refusal to let anxiety take control of me was, it seemed, soon justified. I was about to begin Chapter Five of The Clue of the Cracked Footprint, featuring the international adventurer Dr Huxton Rymer at large in the Orient, when my companion raised a cheer like a schoolgirl at a hockey match. ‘The wind, my Sheikh! Al rih! It’s turning! We’re saved! Hurrah!’
Carefully, I replaced my Union Jack magazine in its locker and went to stand beside her. The wind had indeed changed, but had become erratic. The balloon was buffeted violently, then struck again and again. I noted the colour of the sky, the agitated sand below us. We were on the edge of some kind of storm. There came thunder from below the horizon and the sun turned a sickly yellow. The sand ran like mud. From where we looked, it might have been a flood. Rosie moved closer to me, her eyes agitated, her manner uncertain. ‘Is this something we should fear, my Hawk?’
‘We are always in the hands of Allah, sweet child.’ I had no notion of the cause of this phenomenon. For a while the basket began to swing like a pendulum, as if far above us somewhere was the face of an enormous clock. Then I realised we were not moving at all. We appeared to be frozen at the centre of a small whirlwind. Even as we watched, a spiral of sand rose around us and the breath was dragged from our bodies. The temperature dropped radically. We were both shivering. It was as if we were in the power of some fierce desert djinn furious at our invasion of his land. We found ourselves at the very Heart of Chaos.
Then, suddenly, it was as if we were being propelled through the muzzle of Verne’s gigantic cannon which fired the explorers from Earth to the Moon! Now the balloon was travelling rapidly upward, the warm air of our canopy acting, in the falling barometer, to draw us out of the storm like dew to the sun. We were all at once drifting in the safety of the upper atmosphere where, we discovered from our hastily consulted compass, we were travelling north. It was my turn to exclaim with pleasure! To the north lay Tangier, Algiers or Tunis! And north of these, on busy sea-routes, were the ports of Italy! We had been miraculously saved, as Rosie remarked, by nothing more than balloonist’s luck. So little was known in those days. The mapping of currents and pressures, examination of lighter-than-air crafts’ behaviour was scarcely a science then. Though we were the first to experience that desert phenomenon, we were by no means the last!
Meanwhile, it took us some time before we could accept that we were thoroughly secure from the elements. The wind was once again our friend, the sun no longer an implacable enemy.
The entire bizarre episode, from the moment I had put down my Union Jack in response to Rosie von Bek’s cries, had filled four minutes, yet it would be several hours before our nerves were calmed and our spirits restored. Still I gasp at the good fortune that took us towards the coast, to escape forever that anguish of isolation.
Below us the dunes disappeared, to be replaced by red drifts which in turn became orange sarira, the baked rock, sand and pebbles which made up the greater part of the Sahara. But now, here and there, we began to see glimpses of water, the occasional pool or tiny stream. Here too was cultivation; a few poor fields, some animals, huts, or the heavy felt tents of Berber nomads. We viewed these signs of humanity with much the same mixture of excitement and relief a European feels upon entering the suburbs of a new city. Gradually more and more signs of life greeted us. The balloon raced over a terracotta landscape towards far-off mountains. It became easy to make out the faces of those we passed, to note the details of their cottages and shrines. So delighted were we at our change of fortune that it was some time before we realised we were losing height faster than was safe and that we could not possibly regain enough lift to take us over the peaks. The air in our canopy had grown cool while the sun rose to zenith overhead. Hastily, we let loose our water ballast and some of the sandbags we had brought from Zazara. Rosie von Bek restarted the engine for a few seconds, only to discover that she had used the last of the methylated spirits. She could make no more steam.
Our descent became relatively gentle as we desperately tried everything possible to keep the balloon aloft, to continue on towards the Mediterranean coast. Eventually we realised we should have to land, but were unsure whether to aim for the relatively unpopulated semi-desert or head for one of the towns closer to the mountains where we would not necessarily be welcomed.
‘I am beginning to understand,’ declared my Rose, ‘how the arms of Italy, displaying a prominent cross, are not the most diplomatic for these parts.’
I suggested we try to find some relatively isolated spot in which to control our own landfall. We would note the next large township and then bring the balloon down in the desert a half-mile or so away.
Accordingly, Rosie von Bek operated her valves and lines with pretty expertise, gradually slowing the balloon’s momentum while casually whistling some old Cheltenhamian air. She wore black and pink satin pyjamas over which she had thrown a light gelabea. With her dishevelled hair, her wonderful violet eyes staring from that golden skin, she was a goddess of the air. We had reached a place where a wide wadi curved between groves of date palms and opened onto a small lake on the shores of which were built a tumble of houses, seemingly piled one on top of another like so many brick-red children’s blocks, their walls contrasting sharply with the rich greens of the palms, the pale, clear water. This oasis town was quite different in appearance to the ramshackle collection of huts and houses which made up their Egyptian equivalents. I was impressed by the decoration on so many of the mud walls. There were brightly painted patterns, geometrical decorative script, and always the name of God. More surprising were the primitive representations of animals and people. These Berbers practised only a few of the eastern Arabs’ cultural habits. Even from here we saw that all the women went unveiled.