I
After Jean had thus rid himself of Fatou-gaye, he was conscious of a
deep feeling of relief at having carried out this act of vengeance. When
he had neatly arranged in his soldier’s wardrobe the small quantity of
baggage he had brought with him from Samba-Hamet’s house, he felt freer
and happier. He seemed to have advanced a step nearer to his departure,
to that blissful, “final discharge” which was now only a few months away.
At the same time he was sorry for Fatou. He had intended to send her his
pay once more, to enable her either to set up house anew or to leave the
town.
But as he preferred not to see her again, he had entrusted the spahi
Muller with this errand.
Muller had visited Samba-Hamet’s house and had seen the woman griot. But
Fatou had gone.
“She was in great trouble,” said the little slave girls in Yolof, forming
a circle round him and all talking at once. “In the evening she would not
eat the _kouss-kouss_ we had made for her.”
“During the night,” said little Sam-Lélé, “I heard her talking aloud in
her sleep, and even the Laobé dogs yapped, which is a very bad sign. But
I could not understand what she was saying.”
She had undoubtedly gone away a little before sunrise, with her
calabashes on her head.
A macauco woman, Bafoufalé-Diop by name, the woman griot’s chief slave,
a person of a very inquisitive disposition, had followed her from a
distance, and had seen her turn off by the wooden bridge, over the narrow
arm of the river, in the direction of N’dar-toute.
“She had the look of knowing quite well where she was going.”
It was thought in the quarter that she must have sought a refuge in the
house of a certain old and very rich Marabout in N’dar-toute, who admired
her greatly. Christian or not, she was good-looking enough to be free
from all anxiety as to her future.
For some time to come Jean avoided passing Coura n’diaye’s dwelling, and
it was not long before he had dismissed the matter entirely from his
thoughts.
It seemed to him, moreover, as if he had recovered his white man’s
dignity, which had been sullied through contact with that black flesh.
Now, when he looked back, that feverishness of senses, abnormally excited
by the African climate, inspired in him nothing but deep disgust. And he
constructed for himself a new scheme of existence, based upon continence
and integrity.
In future he meant to live in barracks, like a sensible man. He would
save money in order to take back to Jeanne Méry a collection of souvenirs
from Senegal—fine mats, which would some day adorn their home, the
subject of his dreams; embroidered _pagnes_, whose rich colours would
evoke the admiration of his countrymen, and which would serve for
splendid tablecloths in their household; and above all, earrings and a
cross in fine Galam gold, which he would order especially for her from
the most skilful native craftsmen. She would wear them for ornament on
Sunday when she went to church with the Peyrals, and certainly no other
young woman in the village would possess such beautiful jewellery.
* * * * *
This tall spahi, poor fellow, who had so grave an air, was nursing in his
uncultured brain a multitude of almost childish projects, simple dreams
of happiness, of family life and tranquil goodness.
At this time, Jean was nearly twenty-six. He looked older than his years,
as is usual with men who have led a hard life in the fields, on the sea,
or in the army.
He had changed greatly during these five years in Senegal.
His features were more pronounced; he was swarthier and thinner, and
had acquired a more soldierly bearing and more of the Arab look. His
shoulders had expanded, while his waist had remained slender and supple.
His manner of wearing his fez and turning up the ends of his long
moustache had a soldierly smartness, which became him to admiration.
His strength and remarkable physical beauty inspired in all who came
in contact with him a kind of involuntary respect. They distinguished
between him and his comrades in the manner in which they spoke to him.
A painter might have selected him for a consummate type of noble charm
and manly perfection.
II
One day Jean received two letters in a single envelope, bearing the
postmark of his village. One letter was from his dear old mother, the
other from Jeanne.
Letter from Françoise Peyral to her son.
My dear son,—Since my last letter many things have happened
which will surprise you very much. But do not worry about them
yet. You must do as we do, pray to the good God, and hope for
the best.
I will begin by telling you that a new attorney has come into
these parts, a young man called M. Prosper Suirot, who is
not very much liked with us, being hard on poor people, and
underhand by nature. But he is a man with a fine position,
that cannot be denied. Well, this M. Suirot has asked your
Uncle Méry for Jeanne’s hand in marriage, and has been accepted
as his son-in-law. Now Méry came here one evening and made
a scene; he had applied to your colonels for information
about you without telling us, and it appears that he received
bad accounts of you. They said that you were living with a
negro woman out there; that you kept her, in spite of the
remonstrances of your commanding officers, and that it was this
that prevented you from becoming quartermaster, that there are
bad reports of you out there; many things, my dear son, that
I could never have believed, but it was written on a piece of
stamped paper, with your regimental crest on it.
Then Jeanne came running to us in tears, vowing that she would
never marry Suirot, or be wife to any one but you, my dear
Jean, and that she would rather go into a convent.
I enclose a letter which she has written to you, in which she
lets you know what you ought to do. She is of age, and very
level-headed. Do exactly as she tells you, and write by return
of post to your uncle, as she bids you. You will come back to
us in ten months’ time, my dear son. If you behave well till
you obtain your discharge, and pray constantly to the good
God, without doubt everything will come right. But we are much
worried, as you may imagine. We are afraid, too, that Méry may
forbid Jeanne to come and see us again, and that will be a
great pity.
Peyral joins me, my dear son, in embracing you, and in begging
you to write to us as soon as possible.
Your old mother, who will love you as long as she lives.
FRANÇOISE PEYRAL.
Jeanne Méry to her cousin Jean.
My dear Jean,—I am so unhappy that I wish I could die on the
spot. It is a great grief to me that you have never returned,
and that you do not talk of coming back soon. And now my
parents, backed up by my godfather, want to marry me to that
horrid Suirot, of whom I have told you. People din into my ears
that he is rich, and that I ought to feel honoured because
he has made me an offer. I say no, you may be sure, and I am
crying my eyes out.
My dear Jean, I am very unhappy, because everyone is against
me. Olivette and Rose laugh when they see me always with red
eyes; I think they would be very glad to marry that big booby
Suirot, if he would only have them. As for me, the mere
thought of it makes me shudder; and I will positively never
marry him. If they drive me to it, I will run away from them
all, and go into the convent of St Bruno.
If only I could sometimes pay your people a visit, it would
cheer me up to have a talk with your mother, whom I love and
respect as if I were her daughter. But as it is, I am given
black looks, because I go there too often, and who knows if I
shall not soon be forbidden to go at all.
My dear Jean, you must do exactly what I am going to tell you.
I hear there are wicked rumours about you; I say to myself that
people spread them for the sole purpose of influencing me.
But I do not believe one word of all these stories. They are
impossible, and no one here knows you as well as I do. All the
same, I should be happy if you would say one little word on
this subject, and if you would tell me of your affection for
me; you know that it is always pleasant to hear about it, even
if one is sure of it. And then, write to my father immediately
and ask for my hand in marriage, and be sure to promise him
that when you are home and my husband, you will always behave
like a sensible, steady man, against whom nothing can be said.
And then I will beg him on my knees.
The good God pity us, my dear Jean!
Your betrothed for life,
JEANNE MÉRY.
In country places young people are not taught to express in any way the
sentiments of the heart. Girls brought up on the land sometimes feel very
deeply, but they have no words to utter their emotions and thoughts; the
subtle diction of passion is unknown to them. They cannot explain their
feelings, save by the help of simple unimpassioned phrases. Therein lies
the whole difference.
Jeanne must have felt very keenly to have written such a letter, and
Jean, who spoke the same, simple language, recognised all the firmness
and love that underlay it. The fervent loyalty of his betrothed inspired
him with confidence and hope; he put into his reply all the tenderness
and gratitude that he was able to express. He addressed to his Uncle Méry
a formal request for Jeanne’s hand, accompanied by very sincere promises
of steadiness and good conduct, and then he awaited, without undue
anxiety, the return mail from France....
M. Prosper Suirot was a young attorney, narrow-chested and
round-shouldered; moreover, a rabid free-thinker, bespattering with
atheistic nonsense all the holy things of old; a short-sighted scribbler,
whose small, red eyes were protected by smoked glasses. This rival
would have appeared an object of pity to Jean, who felt an instinctive
repugnance for persons who were plain and of poor physique.
Attracted by Jeanne’s dowry and beauty, the little attorney imagined
in his foolish conceit that he was doing the peasant girl an honour by
the offer of his ugly person and infinitesimal social position. He had
even made up his mind that after their marriage, in order to rise to his
height, Jeanne, having become a lady, should wear a hat.
* * * * *
III
Six months had passed. The mails from France had brought poor Jean no
very bad news, certainly, but on the other hand none that were very good.
Uncle Méry remained inflexible, but Jeanne no less so, and she always
slipped into old Françoise’s letter a few loyal and loving words to her
betrothed.
Jean himself was full of hope, and never doubted but that everything
would be settled without difficulty as soon as he arrived home.
He lost himself more and more in delicious imaginings.... After these
five years of exile his return to the village glowed with all the colours
of an apotheosis. All the dreams of the poor, forlorn soldier centred
around that radiant moment. He would take his seat in the village
diligence, wearing the big burnoose of his spahi’s uniform, and watch
the Cevennes coming into sight once more, the familiar skyline of his
mountains, the well-known road, the dear old clock-tower, and at last his
father’s cottage by the roadside. With what rapture would he embrace his
beloved old parents!
Then the three of them would go together to see the Mérys. The good
people of the village, all the girls, would come running out of their
houses to watch him go past. They would admire him in his foreign dress,
with the glamour of Africa upon him. He would show Uncle Méry his
quartermaster’s stripes, which had at last been awarded him, and they
would have an irresistible effect. After all, Uncle Méry was kind. True,
he had often scolded Jean in former days, but he had been fond of him,
too; Jean had a very plain recollection of this now; he was very sure of
it. (To the exile, far away, those who remain at home are always painted
in softer colours; they are remembered as affectionate and kind; their
defects, their hardness and rancour, are forgotten.)
And so it seemed impossible that Uncle Méry should not suffer himself
to be moved when he saw his two children pleading together. He would
surely relent and place Jeanne’s trembling hand in Jean’s. And then, what
happiness, what a life of joy and peace, what a Paradise on earth!...
At the same time, Jean did not find it so easy to picture himself in
the dress worn by the men of his village. Especially he baulked at the
unpretentious headgear of a peasant. This transformation was a subject
on which he did not care to dwell. It seemed to him that he would no
longer, by himself, be the proud spahi he had been, in the accoutrements
of former days.
It was in this red uniform that he had learnt to know life. It was on
African soil that he had become a man, and more of a man than he guessed.
He had an affection for all this—for his Arab fez, his sabre, his
horse—this vast, God-forsaken country, this desert of his.
* * * * *
Jean did not know what disillusion sometimes awaits young men—sailors,
soldiers, spahis—when they return to the village which has so often
inspired their dreams—left when they were children, and beheld from afar
through magic prisms.
Alas! what sadness, what dreary monotony, often awaits these exiles on
their return home.
Other unfortunate spahis, like himself acclimatised and enervated in
this land of Africa, have sometimes regretted the desolate banks of the
Senegal. The long expeditions on horseback, the freer life, the larger
light, the boundless horizon—all these things are missed when, having
grown accustomed to them, one is cut off from them. In the quiet of
home life one feels as it were a craving for the devouring sun, the
never-ending heat, a yearning for the desert, and a home sickness for the
sand.
IV
In the meanwhile, Boubakar-Ségou, the great negro chief, was making
trouble in Diambour and the country of Djiargabar. A rumour of an
expedition was in the air; it was discussed at St Louis in the officers’
mess; debated and commented upon in a thousand aspects by the soldiers,
spahis, riflemen, and marines. It was the talk of the day, and every man
had his hope of distinguishing himself, of gaining some advantage, a
medal or a step.
Jean, who was approaching the end of his service, resolved to avail
himself of this opportunity to make amends for whatever might have been
reprehensible in his past behaviour. He dreamed of fastening in his
buttonhole the yellow ribbon of the Military Medal, the reward of valour.
He longed to signalise his eternal farewell to the black country by some
splendid deed of bravery which would immortalise his name in the spahis’
barracks in that corner of the world, where he had lived and suffered so
intensely.
Each day there was a rapid interchange of correspondence between the
barracks, the naval authorities, and Government. Large sealed covers
were delivered at the spahis’ quarters, giving the red jackets food for
thought. A long and important expedition was anticipated, and the moment
was drawing near. The spahis sharpened their great fighting swords,
and furbished up their accoutrements with much talk and bravado, much
drinking of absinthe, and a great flow of cheerful comment.
V
It was the beginning of October. Jean, who had been on duty since early
morning, going from place to place distributing official documents right
and left, was on his way to Government House with a large official
envelope to deliver as his final charge.
In the long straight street, empty and deserted as a street of Thebes or
Memphis, he saw another man in red coming towards him in the sunshine,
holding up a letter for him to see. He felt a mournful presentiment, a
vague foreboding, and he hastened his step.
It was Sergeant Muller bringing the spahis the French mail, which had
arrived from Dakar by caravan an hour ago.
“Here, Peyral, this is for you,” he said, handing Jean an envelope
bearing the postmark of the humble village he loved.
VI
This letter, which Jean had been expecting for a month, burned in his
hands, and he hesitated to read it. He resolved to wait until he had
completed his errand before opening it.
He arrived at the railing surrounding Government House; the gate was
open, and he entered.
The garden displayed the same lack of animation as the street. A large
tame lioness was stretching herself in the sun with the airs of an
amorous cat. Ostriches were sleeping on the ground near some stiff,
bluish aloes. It was noon—not a soul visible—a silence like that of a
necropolis. Yellow palm trees cast never-wavering shadows upon the great,
white terraces.
Jean, in his search for someone to speak to, reached the office of the
Governor himself, whom he found surrounded by the heads of the various
departments of the colonial service.
There, strange to say, they were working strenuously. Serious matters
seemed to be under discussion at this hour traditionally consecrated to
the repose of the siesta.
In exchange for the cover he delivered, Jean received another addressed
to the spahis’ commanding officer.
* * * * *
It contained definite marching orders, which were communicated officially
that afternoon, to all the troops in St Louis.
VII
When Jean found himself once more in the deserted street he could
restrain himself no longer, and with trembling hands he opened the
envelope.
This time it contained only his mother’s handwriting—handwriting that was
shakier than usual, and stained with tears.
He devoured the lines—dizziness seized him, poor fellow—clasping his head
in his hands, he leaned against the wall.
* * * * *
The packet entrusted to him was very urgent, the Governor had said. He
kissed old Françoise’s name piously, and went on his way like a drunken
man.
* * * * *
Was this thing possible? It was over, over for ever. They had taken from
him, the poor exile, the betrothed of his childish days, whom his old
parents had chosen for him.
“The banns are published. The marriage will take place before the month
is over. I had been fearing this, my dear son, even since last month; for
Jeanne no longer came to see us. But I did not dare to tell you just then
for fear of distressing you, since there was nothing that we could do in
the matter.
“We are in deep despair. Now, my son, a thought struck Peyral yesterday
which has alarmed us; it is that you may not wish to come home again now,
but to remain in Africa.
“We are both very old. My good Jean, my dear son, your poor mother begs
you on her knees not to let this prevent you from being sensible and from
coming back to us soon, as we had expected. Otherwise I would rather die
at once, and Peyral too.”
* * * * *
Incoherent, tumultuous thoughts rushed through Jean’s brain.
He made a rapid calculation of dates. No! It was not all over yet, it
was not yet an accomplished fact. Telegraph! No! What possessed him?
There was no telegraphic communication between France and Senegal.
And after all, what could he have said? If he could have gone away,
leaving everything behind, gone away on some very swift ship, and still
have arrived in time, he might have thrown himself at their feet, with
supplications and tears, and have yet succeeded in moving them to relent.
But so far away! What futility! What impotence! All would be consummated
before he could even reach them with his message of grief.
And he felt as if his head were crushed by iron hands, and his breast in
the grip of a remorseless vice.
He halted again and reread the letter, and then remembering that he was
the bearer of urgent orders from the Governor, he folded up the letter
and went on.
* * * * *
Around him all things were lapped in the profound stillness of noon. The
old Moorish houses stood ranged in straight rows, milk-white beneath
the intense blue of the sky. At times, behind their brick walls, the
ear of the passer-by might catch some negress’s plaintive, drowsy song,
or perhaps the eye might light on a small, coal-black negro asleep on a
doorstep, lying on his back in the sun, quite naked, with a necklet of
coral, forming a dark patch in the midst of universal radiance. On the
smooth sand of the streets, the lizards were chasing one another with
curious little swaying movements of the head, drawing their tails along
the ground and tracing an infinity of fantastic zig-zags, complicated
like an Arabic design. A distant noise of _kouss-kouss_ pounders, in its
monotonous regularity almost a form of silence, came from Guet n’dar,
deadened by the hot, heavy strata of the noontide atmosphere.
It seemed as if this tranquillity of prostrate nature were seeking to
make mock of poor Jean’s emotion, and to intensify his sufferings. It
oppressed him like a leaden winding sheet.
Of a sudden this country appeared to him as a vast tomb.
The spahi awoke as if from a heavy sleep that had lasted five years.
He felt himself in fierce revolt, revolt against everything and everyone.
Why had they taken him from his village, from his mother, to bury him, in
the prime of life, in this country of death?
By what right had they made of him that anomalous being called a spahi,
a swashbuckler, half African, an outcast, forgotten of everyone, and at
last disowned even by his betrothed.
He felt his heart possessed with frantic rage; he was conscious of a
desire to wreak his wrath on some person or some object; a desire to
torture, to seize, to crush in his mighty arms a fellow man.
And all around him there was nothing, nothing but silence, and heat, and
sand.
* * * * *
Alas! he had not even one friend in this whole country, not one devoted
comrade to whom he could confide his sorrow. Good God! he was indeed
forsaken, indeed alone in the world.
VIII
Jean hastened to the barracks and threw the packet entrusted to him to
the first person he met. Then he turned away and set off haphazard for a
rapid, aimless walk—it was his own method of stifling his sorrow.
He passed the bridge leading to Guet n’dar and turned southwards in the
direction of the Point of Barbary, just as he had done that night four
years ago when he had fled from Cora’s house in despair....
But this time his despair was the deep, supreme despair of a man ... and
his life was wrecked....
For a long time he went southwards, losing sight of St Louis and the
negro villages. He sat down exhausted at the foot of a sandy mound
overlooking the sea....
His ideas had no sequence. The day’s excessive sunshine had disordered
his mind....
He noticed that he had never been in this place before, and he began to
glance absently about him.
The whole mound bristled with tall posts of a grotesque appearance,
bearing inscriptions in the language of the priests of Mahgreb. Bleached
bones lay strewn pell-mell upon the ground, unearthed long ago by
jackals. There were likewise a few sprays of greenery, lost, as it were,
in the midst of absolute aridity. These were garlands of convolvulus,
exquisitely fresh, opening here and there their large pink calyces,
trailing among old skulls, old arm and leg bones.
At intervals other funereal mounds of grim aspect rose above the level
plain.
Great flocks of pelicans, their white feathers tinged with pink, were
stalking about the beaches. Seen in the distance through the evening
mirage, their forms assumed weird and unnatural proportions....
Evening had come. The sun had sunk down into the ocean, and a cooler
breeze had set in from the sea.
Jean took out his mother’s letter and began to read it again....
* * * * *
“Now, my son, a thought struck Peyral yesterday which has alarmed us. It
is that you may not wish to come back again now, but to remain in Africa.
“We are both very old. My good Jean, my dear son, your poor mother begs
you on her knees not to let this prevent you from being sensible and from
coming back to us soon, as we had expected. Otherwise I would rather die
at once, and Peyral too.”
* * * * *
Then poor Jean felt his heart break—sobs rent his bosom, and his spirit
of revolt dissolved in tears.
IX
Two days later all the warships required for the expedition were
assembled to the north of St Louis, in the bend of the river near
Pop-n’kior.
The embarkation was carried out in the midst of a great throng of people
and a tremendous hubbub. All the women and children of the black riflemen
were massed on the banks, screaming to heaven, as if bereft of reason.
Moors who had come by caravan from the interior of the Soudan stood
round in circles looking on, with their camels, leather sacks, piles of
miscellaneous baggage, and their pretty young wives.
Towards three o’clock the whole flotilla, which was to proceed up the
river as far as Dialdé in Galam, was groaning under its freight of men.
It got under way in appalling heat.
X
St Louis was receding into the distance.... Its level outlines sank
lower, fading away until they were mere bluish streaks upon the
golden sand.... On either side of the river, stretching away until
lost to sight, lay vast, unhealthy desert plains, everlastingly hot,
everlastingly dreary....
And these tracts were but the approach to this great God-forsaken
country—the vestibule of the immense solitudes of Africa....
Jean and the other spahis were embarked on the Falémé, which led the
flotilla, and was presently a two days’ voyage ahead of the other vessels.
In the very moment of departure Jean had written a hurried reply to poor
old Françoise. After consideration, he had decided that he would not
deign to write to his betrothed, but in his letter to his mother he had
put his whole soul into the task of comforting her, and restoring peace
and hope to her mind.
“After all,” he had written, “she was too rich for us. We shall have no
difficulty in finding some other girl at home who will have me. We will
arrange to live in our old house, and then we shall be nearer to you
than ever. My dear parents, I think of nothing all day long but the joy
of seeing you once more, and I swear that I will never, never leave you
again....”
Such, to be sure, was his intention, and it was true that he thought of
his dear old parents every day. But the idea of sharing his life with a
woman other than Jeanne took the brightness out of everything. It was a
terrible thought, which cast a dense, mourning veil upon the joy of his
return....
Do what he would to regain his courage, it seemed that he had no longer
an object in life, and that the future was a blank wall to him for ever
and ever.
Beside him on the bridge of the Falémé was seated the gigantic
Nyaor-fall, the black spahi, to whom, as his most faithful friend, Jean
had confided his troubles.
Nyaor did not attempt to understand these sentiments—Nyaor, whom no one
had ever loved, whose thatched roof harboured three purchased wives, whom
he intended to sell as soon as they ceased to please him.
Nevertheless he realised that his friend Jean was unhappy. He smiled
at him kindly, and to distract him told him negro stories irresistibly
soporific.
XI
The flotilla sailed up the river with all possible speed, making fast at
sunset and getting under way again at dawn.
At Richard-Toll, the first French outpost, more men, negresses, and
material were taken on board.
At Dagana, a two days halt was made, and the Falémé received orders
to continue her voyage alone as far as Podor, the last outpost before
reaching Galam, where several companies of riflemen had already been
concentrated.
XII
The Falémé continued on her way through the vast desert; she plunged
swiftly into the interior, sailing up the yellow waters of the narrow
river which separates Moorish Sahara from the great mysterious continent
with its black population.
Jean, in melancholy mood, saw one desolate region succeeding another.
His eyes followed the ever-receding horizon—the winding ribbon of the
Senegal lost in the infinite distance that lay behind him. These
accursed plains, unfolding themselves endlessly before his gaze, made a
painful impression upon him. He felt a tightening of the heart, as if all
the time this whole country were closing in upon him, and he were never
to return.
Here and there on the desolate banks great, black vultures stalked
solemnly, or bald-headed marabouts, with a suggestion of something human
in their profiles.
Sometimes an inquisitive monkey would spring out from the mangrove
thicket to watch the ship glide past—or a splendid white heron would rise
from the reeds, or a kingfisher in its sheen of emerald and lapis lazuli,
disturbing in its flight a sluggish crocodile asleep on the mud.
On the south bank—the bank pertaining to the sons of Ham—an occasional
village would appear, lost in the midst of this vast region of desolation.
The existence of these human habitations were advertised from a great
distance by two or three gigantic palm trees, with fan-shaped leaves,
huge fetish trees, as it were, keeping watch over the towns.
In the midst of the great bare plain, these palm trees had the appearance
of giants lying in wait in the desert. Their perfectly straight, highly
polished, greyish pink trunks were thickened like Byzantine columns, and
displayed at the top scanty bunches of leaves, as stiff as if cut from
iron plate.
Presently, as one drew nearer, one could discern a negro anthill, huts
with peaked roofs, grouped in compact masses at the foot of the palm
trees, producing a general effect of greyness against the unvarying
yellow of the sands.
Some of these African cities had a large population; all were surrounded
by thick, gloomy _tatas_—walls made of earth and wood, and erected as a
protection against enemies and wild beasts. A tattered piece of white
cloth, floating from a roof loftier than the rest, marked the dwelling of
the chief.
At the gates of their ramparts sombre figures showed themselves, aged
chiefs, aged priests covered with amulets, their long, black arms
contrasting with the whiteness of their flowing robes. They watched the
Falémé pass, her rifles and guns ready to open fire at the slightest sign
of hostile intention.
One might well ask what means of subsistence these men possessed,
what lives they led, what occupations they pursued behind those grey
walls—these beings who knew nothing of the outer world, nothing beyond
the solitudes and the merciless sun.
On the north bank—where the Sahara lies—there was more sand, more
desolation, but of a different aspect.
In the distance, very far away, shone out great fires of grass kindled
by the Moors, with columns of smoke rising straight up in the still air
to an incredible height. On the horizon, chains of hills showed up,
intensely red, like burning coals, resembling, amid these columns of
smoke, an unlimited succession of furnaces.
And there, where there was nothing but arid ground and scorching sand,
a perpetual mirage produced the semblance of great lakes, wherein the
whole conflagration was reflected and reversed. Little wisps of quivering
vapour, such as rise from a furnace, wove above all this a shifting web.
The delusive landscapes shimmered and vibrated in the intense heat, and
then could be seen changing shape and dissolving like visions. The eyes
were dazzled and wearied by the sight of them.
From time to time on this bank appeared groups of men of pure white
race—wild-looking and bronzed indeed, but with features of regular
beauty, and with long curling hair, which gave them a look of Biblical
prophets. They went bare-headed under that terrible sun, arrayed in
flowing robes of dark blue. These were Moors of the tribe of Braknas
or Tzarzas, bandits to a man, plunderers, robbers of caravans—the most
lawless of all the tribes of Africa.
XIII
The east wind, which is like the mighty respiration of the Sahara, had
sprung up, gaining strength by degrees as the distance from the sea
increased.
This parching wind, hot like a blast from a forge, now blew across the
desert. It covered all things with a fine sandy dust, and brought with
it the burning thirst of _Bled-el-Ateuch_. The awnings that sheltered
the spahis had to be continually watered by a negro, whose hosepipe
traced rapid arabesques which disappeared as quickly as they were made,
evaporating almost immediately in the parched atmosphere.
And now the ship was approaching Podor, one of the largest towns on the
river, and the Sahara bank began to show signs of life.
This was the entrance to the country of the Douaïch, shepherds grown rich
through cattle raids upon the negro territory.
These Moors used to swim their long caravans across the Senegal, driving
before them the stolen cattle. Presently camps came into view, pitched
upon the never-ending plain. The camelskin tents, stretched between
wooden stakes, resembled huge bats’ wings spread out upon the sand; they
formed weird patterns of an intense black in the midst of a country
that was of a uniform, unvarying yellow. Everywhere there were somewhat
increased signs of animation, of activity and life.
On the banks larger groups of people came running to see the ship.
Moorish women, beautiful, copper-coloured creatures, half dressed, with
frontlets of coral, trotted up, sitting astride their small, hump-backed
cows; and often there were children scampering along behind them on tiny
frisky calves; naked children, their heads shaven, except for great tufts
of flowing mane, their bodies tawny and muscular as those of young satyrs.
* * * * *
XIV
Podor is an important French post on the southern bank of the Senegal,
and is one of the hottest places in the world.
It is a strong fortress, fissured by the heat of the sun. A street,
tolerably shady, runs alongside the river; it consists of a few houses
that are old already and sombre of aspect. You may see there some French
farmers of revenue, yellow with fever and anæmia; Moorish or negro
pedlars squatting on the sand; all the costumes and amulets known to
Africa; sacks of ground nuts, bales of ostrich feathers, and elsewhere
ivory and gold dust.
Behind this semi-European street lies a large negro town built of thatch.
The town is divided into sections like honeycomb, by wide straight
streets. Each of its quarters is bounded by thick wooden palisades, and
fortified like a citadel.
In the evening Jean wandered about the town, with his friend Nyaor for
companion. The mournful songs that floated to his ears from behind those
walls, those strange voices, that unfamiliar aspect of things, that
hot wind, ceasing neither day nor night, inspired him with a kind of
vague terror, an inexplicable anguish, compounded of home sickness and
loneliness and hopelessness all in one.
Never, not even in the distant outposts of Diakhallémé had he felt so
completely alone, so utterly forsaken.
Podor was surrounded by fields of millet; a few stunted trees grew there,
some brushwood, some scanty grass.
On the Moorish bank opposite lay absolute desert. Yet at the entrance to
a road, of which scarcely the beginnings existed, and which soon lost its
identity in the sands to the north, stood a signpost with this prophetic
inscription: “_To Algiers_.”
XV
It was five in the morning; the red lustreless sun was rising over the
land of the Douaïch. Jean returned to the Falémé, which was preparing to
resume its voyage. The negro women who were travelling by the Falémé were
already lying on the deck, rolled in their variegated _pagnes_, packed
together so tightly that nothing could be distinguished on the ground but
a confused heap of drapery, gilded by the morning light, with here and
there a black, heavily braceletted arm waving in the air.
Jean, who was making his way between them, suddenly felt himself seized
by two supple arms that wound themselves like two serpents around his
legs.
The woman was hiding her head and kissing his feet.
“Tjean! Tjean!” ... said a queer little voice, well known to him. “I have
followed you for fear you should gain Paradise (be killed) in the war.
Tjean, won’t you look at your son?”
And the two black arms lifted up a bronzed child and held him towards the
spahi.
“My son? my son?” repeated Jean in his brusque soldier’s way, yet in a
voice that trembled nevertheless, “my son? What nonsense are you talking,
Fatou?”
* * * * *
“But it’s true all the same,” he added, strangely moved, bending down to
look at the child, “It’s true all the same; he is nearly white.”
The child had none of his mother’s blood in his veins; he was Jean’s
son entirely. He was bronzed, but essentially white like the spahi; he
had the same deep eyes, the same beauty. He stretched out his hands
and looked about him, knitting his little brows with an expression of
precocious seriousness, as if wondering what fate had in store for him,
and how, his Cevennes blood came to be mingled with that of this impure
black race.
Jean felt himself vanquished by some strange inner force, a troubling and
mysterious emotion; he bent down and kissed his son gently with silent
tenderness. Sentiments hitherto unknown penetrated to the very depths of
his soul.
The voice of Fatou-gaye, moreover, had awakened in his heart a host
of sleeping echoes. The fever of the senses, the habit of possession
had linked them together with those strong and enduring bonds which
separation can scarcely destroy.
And then Fatou, at least, was faithful to him in her own way, and besides
he was so abjectly forlorn, poor fellow....
So he let her hang an African amulet round his neck, and then shared his
day’s ration with her.
* * * * *
XVI
The ship continued her voyage. The river flowed in a more southernly
direction, and the aspect of the country began to change.
Shrubs now grew on both banks, slim gum trees, mimosas, tamarisks with
delicate foliage, grass and green sward. There were no signs of tropical
flora; one might have fancied it the less luxurious vegetation of
northern latitudes.
Apart from this excessive heat and silence there was nothing now to
suggest that it was the heart of Africa—one might have imagined oneself
on some peaceful European stream.
However, from time to time some idyll of negro character could be
witnessed. In groves that might have served as a setting for a Watteau
pastoral, the eye would light upon an amorous negro pair, decked with
grigris and bead necklaces, pasturing lean zebus or herds of goats.
Further on were other herds that no one shepherded, herds of grey
crocodiles, hundreds of them asleep in the sun, submerged belly-deep in
the warm waters.
And Fatou-gaye would smile. Her eyes would light up with a strange joy,
for she recognised the approach of Galam, her native land.
None the less there was one thing that kept her uneasy. When she passed
great, grass-grown marshes, wide, gloomy pools, bordered with mangroves,
she would shut her eyes for fear of seeing the black muzzle of a
hippopotamus (n’gabou) emerging from the stagnant waters. For her and
hers, such an apparition would have been an omen of death.
It would be impossible to describe the ruses, the importunity, the
ingenuity she had brought to bear in order to secure a passage on this
ship on which she knew Jean had embarked.
Where had she taken refuge when she left the house of the griot? In what
lair had she hidden herself to bring the spahi’s child into the world?
Now, at any rate, she was happy. She was on her way back to Galam, and
Jean was with her; her dream had come true.
* * * * *
XVII
Dialdé was situated at the confluence of the Senegal and a nameless
stream, a tributary which flowed in from the south.
The post consisted of an unimportant negro village and a small protecting
blockhouse of French construction, resembling the isolated forts of Upper
Algeria.
It was the nearest point to the country of Boubakar-Ségou, and here in
the midst of tribes that were still friendly, the French forces were to
effect a junction, and to camp with the allied army of the Bambaras.
The flat country surrounding the village had the same monotony and
aridity that characterised the banks of the lower Senegal.
None the less clumps of trees, or forests even, were already to be seen,
indicating that this was the threshold of the land of Galam, the wooded
regions of the interior.
XVIII
It is the first reconnaissance made in the tract of country to the east
of the encampment of Dialdé, towards Djidiam, and it is carried out by
Jean, Sergeant Muller, and tall Nyaor.
According to the report of timid old women of the friendly tribe, fresh
tracks of a large body of foot soldiers and mounted men, who could be no
other than the army of the great black chief, had been seen on the sand.
For two hours the three mounted spahis patrolled the plain in all
directions, but discovered no human footprint, nor any trace of the
passage of an army.
On the other hand, the ground was covered with the spoor of all the
fauna of Africa—from the great round pit made by the heavy foot of
the hippopotamus to the dainty little triangular hoofprint of the
light-stepping gazelle. The sand, hardened by the last showers of the
winter season, preserved faithfully all the impressions made upon it
by the denizens of the wild. The paws of monkeys, the great straggling
stride of giraffes, the tracks of lizards and serpents, the pads of
tigers and lions were visible. One might have traced the stealthy comings
and goings of jackals, the prodigious leaps of hunted deer. There were
suggestions of all the terrible vitality which darkness unchains in these
deserts—deserts that lie so silent under the burning eye of the sun. One
could form a picture of the saturnalia of wild life bursting forth under
cover of darkness.
All the wild fowl lurking in the brushwood rose up, startled by the
three spahis’ horses. It was miraculous shooting country. Red partridges,
guinea fowl, blue jays, pink jays, sheeny blackbirds, and huge bustards
flew across the very muzzles of their rifles. But the spahis let them all
go, still continuing their vain search for human tracks.
It was nearly evening, and dense vapours were gathering on the horizon.
The sky had that heavy, torpid aspect, such as the imagination pictures
at the setting of antediluvian suns—at the period when the atmosphere,
more torrid, more heavily charged with vital essences, was maturing on
primitive earth the monstrous germs of the mammoth and the pleiosaurus.
The sun sank slowly down among the strange veils; it grew lustreless,
livid, rayless; distorted and disproportionately magnified; and then at
last its light was quenched.
Nyaor, who until that moment had followed Muller and Jean with his
customary insouciance, remarked that it would be imprudent to pursue the
reconnaissance further, and that the two _toubabs_, his friends, would be
unnecessarily rash if they persisted.
Actually there was a possibility of every kind of surprise attack, and
danger might be lurking all around them. Moreover, there were everywhere
fresh spoor of lions; the horses began to stop dead and to sniff at the
five claw marks so clearly defined on the level sand, and to tremble with
terror....
After consultation, Jean and Sergeant Muller decided to turn, and soon
the three horses were racing like the wind in the direction of the
blockhouse, the white burnooses of their riders floating behind them. In
the distance, that awe-inspiring cavernous voice, which the Moors liken
to thunder, began to make itself heard: the roar of the hunting lion.
They were brave men, these three, galloping there, yet they experienced
that kind of vertigo which is produced by excessive speed; the contagion
of that dread which was spurring on their maddened beasts. The reeds
which bent under them, the branches that whipped their legs, seemed to
them troops of lions of the desert, bounding in pursuit of them....
Soon they were within sight of the stream which separated them from the
French tents, the inhabited world, and the little Arab blockhouse of the
village of Dialdé, still glowing with the last red rays of sunset.
They swam their horses across and re-entered the camp.
XIX
It was the evening hour, with its atmosphere of intense melancholy.
Sunset awakened this obscure village to a kind of animation all its own.
The black herdsmen were driving home their flocks; the warriors of the
tribe, busy with their preparations for battle, were sharpening their
fighting knives, and furbishing up their prehistoric guns. The women
were making _kouss-kouss_, to serve as provisions for the army, and were
milking their ewes and lean zebu cows. A confused murmur of negro voices
arose, mingled with the querulous bleating of goats and the plaintive
yelping of Laobé dogs....
Fatou was there, seated at the door of the blockhouse with her child,
in the humble, suppliant attitude she had continued to adopt since her
return.
And Jean, his heart oppressed with solitude, came and sat beside her, and
took the child on his knee with a feeling of tenderness towards his black
family in its happiness, and of finding at Dialdé in Galam someone who
loved him.
Near them the griots were rehearsing their warlike songs. They were
chanting softly, in mournful, falsetto voices, accompanying themselves
on small primitive guitars, consisting of two strings stretched upon
serpent skin, producing a faint sound like the stridulation of crickets.
They were singing these African airs that harmonise so well with the
desolation of their country and have a charm of their own, with their
elusive rhythm and their monotony....
Jean’s son was a delightful baby, but very solemn, and was seldom seen
to smile. He was dressed in a blue bou-bou and a necklace, like a Yolof
child, but his head was not shaved or ornamented with little tails of
hair, as is usual with children of the country. As he was a little
“white” boy, his mother had let his curly hair grow, and one lock fell
across his forehead, as with Jean.
Jean remained there a long time, seated at the door of the blockhouse,
playing with his son.
The last rays of daylight fell upon this singular picture; the child with
his angel face, the spahi with his soldierly beauty, playing together
alongside of those sinister dark minstrels.
Fatou-gaye was seated at their feet contemplating the pair with adoring
eyes, crouching on the ground before them like a dog at its master’s feet.
Poor Jean had remained very much of a child, as is commonly the case
with young men who have led a hard life, and whose precocious physical
development has endowed them early with a mature and serious manner.
He dandled his son on his knees with soldierly awkwardness, constantly
bursting into peals of fresh, youthful laughter. But the child, the
spahi’s son, did not laugh much; he put his chubby arms round his
father’s neck and nestled close to his breast, looking about him with a
very solemn air....
When night fell, Jean disposed of them both safely in the interior of the
blockhouse; then he gave Fatou all the money he had left, three _khâliss_
(fifteen francs)....
“See,” he said, “to-morrow you will buy _kouss-kouss_ for yourself and
good milk for him.”
* * * * *
XX
Then he made his way towards the camp, so that he, too, might lie down
and sleep.
To reach the French tents, he had to pass through the camp of the allied
Bambaras. The night was of a luminous transparency, and everywhere the
whirring noises of insects were audible; one grew aware that there were
thousands and thousands of crickets and cicadas under every blade of
grass, in each little hole in the sand. Sometimes the concerted effect
of all these whirring sounds was strident and deafening, as if the whole
vast country were covered with an infinite number of tiny bells and
rattles, and then momentarily the whole din would seem to die down, as
if all these crickets had passed the word for silence, and there was a
sudden hush.
Lost in thought, Jean went his way. He was very dreamy this evening....
And as he mused, without looking where he was going, he found himself
engulfed suddenly in a great circle of men, who kept revolving around
him in the rhythm of a dance. (The circular dance is the form specially
favoured by the Bambaras.)
The dancers were men of lofty stature, wearing long white robes and high
turbans, likewise white, with two black horns.
And in the transparent night the circle revolved almost noiselessly; the
movement was slow, but light-footed as a spirit dance. The sweep of the
draperies gave forth rustling sounds like the feathers of great birds....
And the dancers, all in unison, assumed various poses, poised on tiptoe,
swaying backwards or forwards, flinging out in one simultaneous movement
their long arms, and thus spreading out, like transparent wings, the
innumerable folds of their muslin robes.
There was a soft accompaniment of tom-toms, as if muted; the wailing
flutes and the ivory horns sounded muffled and remote. This monotonous
music, which gave the tune to the circular dance of the Bambaras,
resembled a magical incantation.
And all the dancers, as they passed the spahi, bent their heads towards
him as a sign of recognition, and smiled as they said to him,
“Tjean, come into our dance.” ...
Jean also recognised most of them in their festal robes; they were black
spahis or riflemen, who had donned the long white _bou-bou_ and the
_temba-sembé_, the ceremonial headdress.
Jean smiled and greeted them as he made his way through,
“Good evening, Niodagal; good evening, Imobé-Fafandou; good evening,
Dempa-Taco and Samba-Fall; good evening, big Nyaor,” for Nyaor was there,
too, one of the tallest and handsomest....
But nonetheless Jean quickened his step, anxious to shake off these long
coils of white-robed dancers, ever winding and unwinding themselves
around him.
All this was affecting him—the night, the dance, and the music, which
seemed to be that of another world.
* * * * *
And ever they repeated, “Tjean, come into our dance,” and they continued
to flit around him like visions, sportively encircling him, purposely
extending their winding chain to prevent him from making his escape....
XXI
As soon as Jean had lain down in his tent, he set himself to work out a
whole host of new plans for the future.
He was certainly going back first of all to see his old father and
mother. Nothing should induce him to postpone this visit. But after that
he would undoubtedly have to return to Africa, now that he had a son. He
realised clearly that he already loved this little child of his with all
his heart, and that no consideration on earth could induce him to abandon
him.
* * * * *
Without, in the Bambara encampment, could be heard at regular intervals
the voices of the griots, chanting on three dismal notes the sacred war
cry. They cast this owl-like chant over the slumbering tents, and lulled
the black warriors into their first sleep with exhortations to be brave,
and to load their carbines with several bullets at once on the day of
battle.
Everyone was aware that the day was close at hand, and Boubakar-Ségou not
far off.
* * * * *
What should he do at St Louis when he came back after his leave and
reclaimed his little son? Should he re-enlist? Or would it be better to
try his fortune in some independent adventure?...
He might perhaps become a farmer of revenue on the river. No, he felt an
invincible repugnance to any other professions than those of agriculture
and arms.
* * * * *
All sounds of life were now hushed in the village of Dialdé, and the
encampment itself was silent. From afar could be heard the lion’s roar,
and every now and then the most dismal sound in the world, the howling of
jackals, a dirge-like accompaniment to the poor spahi’s dream....
* * * * *
From every point of view the existence of that small child was making
a complete change in all his plans, rendering the difficulties of the
future infinitely more complicated....
“Tjean, come into our dance!”
Jean, worn out by the day’s long expedition, was half asleep, and even
as he planned for his future, he saw in a dream the Bambara dance ever
slowly revolving around him. The dancers flitted past with smooth
movements of the limbs, languishing attitudes, to the strains of a vague
music wherein there was something unearthly.
“Tjean, come into our dance!”
Their heads, inclining towards Jean in greeting, seemed to be bent
under the burden of their lofty ceremonial headdress. And now again
he saw grinning faces, death-like, leaning towards him with an air of
recognition, and saying very softly with phantom smiles,
“Tjean, come into our dance.”
* * * * *
Finally, little by little, Jean was completely overcome by weariness, and
fell into a deep, dreamless sleep. But he had decided nothing....
XXII
The great day, the day of battle, had come.
At three in the morning the whole encampment of Dialdé was astir—spahis,
riflemen, Bambara friendlies, were getting ready to set out on their
march, with their arms and ammunition.
The Marabouts had prayed at great length; numbers of talismans had been
distributed. By order of the chiefs the black warriors, according to
their custom on the occasion of great battles, had loaded their carbines
with powder half-way up the barrel and with bullets up to the muzzle.
With such thoroughness had they carried out the order that most of the
firearms burst at the first discharge, not an infrequent occurrence in
negro warfare.
The orders were to make for the village of Djidiam, where, according to
the report of the native scouts, Boubakar-Ségou had ensconced himself
with his army behind thick palisades of timber and mud. Djidiam was the
principal fortress of this personage, who had become almost legendary,
the terror of the country—a sort of fabulous hero, whose strength lay
in retreat, in hiding himself always in the recesses of his murderous
country, and in baffling discovery.
They were to camp during the afternoon in the great woods adjoining
the enemy headquarters, and finally to fall upon Djidiam by night, to
set fire to the village, which would burn in the moonlight like an
_auto-da-fé_ of straw. Then they were to return victorious to St Louis,
before fever should have had time to decimate the expedition.
On the eve of battle Jean had written a very affectionate letter to his
old parents—a poor, pencilled letter! It went down the river by the
Falémé on that very day, and must have soothed the heart of his old
mother, in that far country....
A little before sunrise he kissed his child, who lay asleep in the arms
of Fatou-gaye. Then he mounted his horse.
XXIII
In the early morning Fatou-gaye, with her son in her arms, likewise
took the road. She made her way to Nialoumbaé, a village belonging to
a friendly tribe, the dwelling place of a famous Marabout, a preacher
renowned for the arts of prediction and sorcery.
She asked her way to the hut of this centenarian, whom she found
prostrate on his mat, muttering, like a dying man, prayers to his deity.
They had a long interview, and it resulted in the priest putting into the
girl’s hands a small leather pouch, seemingly containing something very
precious; and this pouch Fatou secured carefully in her waistband.
Then the Marabout administered a sleeping draught to Jean’s child, and
in exchange Fatou offered the priest three large silver coins, the
spahi’s last _khâliss_, which the old man put away in his purse. Then
Fatou tenderly wrapped her son, already sunk into a charmed sleep, in an
embroidered _pagne_, fastened the precious burden on to her back, and
had herself directed to the woods, where the French were to camp that
evening.
XXIV
It is seven in the morning, the scene a forlorn spot in the country of
Diambour, a grass-covered marsh, surrounding a small sheet of water.
To the north a low hill bounds the horizon. Southwards as far as the eye
can see stretch the great levels of Dialakar.
All is still and desolate; the sun mounts tranquilly into an azure sky.
In this African landscape, which would have fitted equally well into some
solitary tract of ancient Gaul, horsemen come into view. They sit their
horses proudly, handsome fellows all of them, in their red jackets, blue
pantaloons, large white hats slouched over their bronzed faces. There
are twelve of them, twelve spahis sent out as scouts in charge of an
adjutant, and Jean is one of them.
The air holds no presage of death, no foreboding of ill-omen, nothing but
the calmness and purity of the heavens. In the marshes the tall grasses,
still wet with the dews of night, are sparkling in the sun; dragon flies
are hovering on their long, black-flecked wings; waterlilies are opening
their large white calyces.
The heat is already oppressive; the horses stretch their necks to drink,
their nostrils wide, sniffing the stagnant water. The spahis halt for a
moment to take counsel; they dismount in order to moisten their hats and
bathe their foreheads.
Suddenly in the distance dull sounds are heard, like the noise of
enormous drums all beaten simultaneously.
“It is the big tom-toms,” said Sergeant Muller, who had some experience
of negro warfare.
Instinctively all the men who had dismounted made for their horses.
But a black head had just raised itself above the herbage. An old
Marabout had made with his skinny arm a grotesque signal, like a magic
order addressed to the reeds of the marsh. A hail of lead showered down
upon the spahis.
* * * * *
The shots, steadily and carefully aimed from the shelter of the
ambuscade, had all told. Five or six horses had dropped. The remainder,
startled and maddened, reared and threw their wounded riders. Jean, also,
had sunk to the ground with a bullet through his loins. At the same
time, thirty sinister faces emerged from the grass; thirty black demons,
covered with mud, bounded out, gnashing their white teeth like enraged
monkeys.
O heroic combat, such as Homer might have sung, but which will remain
unrecorded, unknown to fame, like so many of these far-away African
frays. The poor spahis, in their fight to the death, performed prodigies
of strength and valour. Fighting had on them the infuriating effect,
which it produces on all such as are brave by nature. They sold their
lives dearly, these men, all of whom were young, vigorous, and inured to
war. In a few years they will be forgotten, even at St Louis. Who will
ever mention their names, the names of those who fell in the land of
Diambour, on the plains of Dialakar?
* * * * *
Meanwhile the sound of the great war-drums was drawing ever nearer.
Suddenly, while the mêlée was still proceeding, the spahis saw as in a
dream, a great company of negroes passing by over the hill; warriors half
naked, covered with grigris, were doubling in the direction of Dialdé in
disorderly hordes. They had with them enormous war-drums, which four men
together could hardly drag along. Their lean desert horses, seemingly
full of fire and fury, were decked with tawdry harness, spangled with
copper, their long tails and manes stained blood-red. It was a fantastic,
demoniac procession, an African nightmare, swifter than the wind.
Boubakar-Ségou was passing.
He was on his way to hurl himself on the French forces.
He passed, paying no attention to the spahis, leaving them to the body
of men who had lain in ambush for them, and were completing the work of
exterminating them.
The spahis were being driven steadily back, away from the grass and water
on to the arid sands, where a more overwhelming heat and an intenser
glare would the sooner exhaust them.
No one had had time to reload. They fought with knives, sabres, nails,
and teeth; there were many gaping wounds and bleeding bodies.
Two negroes had made a ferocious attack on Jean. He was stronger than
they. In his fury he hurled them to earth time after time, but they
always came back at him.
In the end his hands, slipping in blood, could no longer obtain a grip
on the black, oily naked skins, and all the time his strength was ebbing
because of his wounds.
He had a confused perception of these final impressions; his dead
comrades, fallen by his side; the main body of the negro army ever
hastening onwards, and now almost out of sight; handsome Muller near
him, with the death rattle in his throat, and the blood pouring from his
mouth; and further over, already at some distance, tall Nyaor cutting his
way through towards Saldé, mowing a path with great sweeps of his sabre
through a group of negroes.
* * * * *
And then three of them felled Jean to the ground, threw him on his side,
holding his arms, while one of them pressed a large iron knife against
his chest.
... For one terrifying moment of anguish Jean felt the pressure of this
knife against his body. And there was not one human being to help him.
All were dead, not a man was left.
The red cloth of his jacket, the coarse fabric of his soldier’s shirt,
and his flesh formed a triple layer which offered resistance, and the
knife had been badly sharpened.
The negro leaned more heavily. Jean uttered a loud, hoarse cry, and of a
sudden his side was pierced. The blade, with a horrible little sound of
slicing, plunged into the depths of his chest. The negro turned it in the
wound, then tore it out with both hands, and kicked away the body with
his foot.
* * * * *
Jean was the last to fall. The black demons raised their shout of victory
and ran on without a moment’s delay, speeding like the wind in pursuit of
their army.
The spahis were left alone; and the stillness of death descended upon
them.
* * * * *
XXV
The main shock of the two armies took place further away, and was very
bloody, although little was heard of it in France.
These minor battles, fought in a country so remote, and engaging a
comparatively small number of soldiers, escape the notice of the general
public; only those remember them who have lost a son or a brother.
The little French force was wavering when Boubakar-Ségou received, almost
point-blank, a charge of slugs in the right temple.
The brains of the negro chief were scattered abroad. To the sound of
the tabala and the iron cymbals he fell, surrounded by his priests, and
entangled in his long strings of amulets. For his tribes, his fall was
the signal for retreat.
The negro army resumed its march towards the impenetrable tracts of the
interior, and no obstacle was opposed to its flight. The French army,
indeed, was no longer in any condition to pursue them.
The red head-band of the great rebel chief was brought back to St
Louis. It was all singed and riddled with shot holes. A long festoon of
talismans was suspended from it, consisting of little pouches covered
with various sorts of embroidery, and containing mysterious powders,
cabalistic drawings, and prayers in the Maghreb tongue.
Boubakar-Ségou’s death produced a far-reaching moral effect upon the
indigenous population. Inasmuch as the battle was followed by the
submission of several insurgent chiefs, it might fairly be considered a
victory.
The expeditionary force returned to St Louis immediately. Promotions and
decorations were conferred on all the participators, but there were many
gaps in the ranks of the poor spahis.
XXVI
Jean dragged himself under the scanty foliage of the tamarisks, sought a
shady spot for his head, and disposed himself there to await death.
He suffered from thirst, burning thirst, and presently his throat was
convulsed by slight, spasmodic movements.
He had often witnessed the death of comrades in Africa, and he recognised
this distressing indication of the approaching end, which people call the
death sob.
The blood was trickling from his side, and the arid sand drank it as if
it were dew.
But his sufferings diminished. Indeed, apart from this burning thirst, he
was now in little pain.
Strange visions passed before poor Jean’s eyes: the mountain range of
the Cevennes, the well-known haunts of his childhood, his cottage in the
mountains.
Above all he saw visions of leafy landscapes, full of shade, mosses,
coolness, and running water; his dear old mother, who took him gently by
the hand to lead him as she had done in his childhood.
He felt his mother’s kiss! O, his mother, there she was, smoothing his
brow with her poor old trembling hands, bathing his burning head with
cool water. Could it be? Never more to feel a mother’s kiss, never more
to hear her voice? Never, never more? Was this the end of everything?
To die there alone, all alone, in the burning sun of the desert! And he
half-raised himself, unwilling to die.
* * * * *
“Tjean, come into our dance!”
In front of him, like a whirlwind, like a furious gale, swept the circle
of phantom dancers. The fierce gyrations of this vortex seemed to strike
sparks from the burning pebbles.
And these spectral dancers, rising in swift spirals, like smoke before a
rushing wind, faded away on high, in the fiery crucible of the blue ether.
Jean had the sensation of rising with them, of being borne aloft on
terrible wings, and it came to him that this was the climax, the very
moment of death.
But it was merely a convulsion of the muscles, a horrible pang of pain.
The red blood gushed from his mouth, and again a voice, whispering at his
ear, said,
“Tjean, come into our dance.”
He grew calmer; his sufferings abated, and once more he sank down on his
bed of sand.
* * * * *
Thronging memories of childhood came to life again in his mind, with
singular clearness. He heard an old folksong, wherewith his mother used
to lull him to sleep when he was a baby in his cradle; then suddenly, in
the midst of the desert, the village chime rang out the evening Angelus.
Tears coursed down his bronzed cheeks. The prayers of long ago returned
to his memory, and the poor soldier set himself to praying with the
fervour of a child. He took between his hands the medal of the Virgin,
which his mother had hung round his neck. He still had sufficient
strength to raise it to his lips, and he kissed it with immeasurable
love. He prayed with all his soul to Our Lady of Sorrows, to whom his
simple-minded mother was wont to pray on his behalf each evening. He was
steeped in the splendour of those radiant hallucinations that surround
a deathbed; and aloud, in the overwhelming silence of these solitudes,
he repeated, in a fast-failing voice, the inevitable adieu, “Farewell,
farewell, until we meet in heaven.”
It was close on noon. Jean’s sufferings were diminishing. The desert in
the intense tropical light seemed to him like a great brasier of white
fire which no longer had power to burn him. And yet his bosom heaved as
if to breathe more deeply; his mouth opened as if to plead for water.
* * * * *
At last his lower jaw dropped; his mouth fell open for the last time, and
Jean passed peacefully away in the dazzling sunshine.
* * * * *
XXVII
When Fatou-gaye returned from the village of the great Marabout, bringing
with her a mysterious article in a leather wallet, the women of the
friendly tribe informed her that the battle was over.
Anxious, panting, exhausted, she made her way back to camp, hastening
with feverish step over the hot sand, and carrying on her back her
still-sleeping baby, wrapped in a piece of blue cloth.
The first person she met was the Mussulman, Nyaor-fall, the black spahi,
who, as she approached, looked at her gravely, telling the beads of his
long Maghreb rosary.
In the language of the country, she jerked out the words,
“Where is he?”
With a restrained gesture, Nyaor stretched his arm towards the south of
Diambour, the open plains of Dialakar.
“Yonder!” ... said he. “He has gained Paradise.” ...
XXVIII
All day long Fatou-gaye traversed with feverish step thickets and
sand, still carrying her sleeping baby on her back. She went to and
fro, sometimes breaking into a run, with the distracted movements of a
pantheress that has lost her young. Ever she pursued her search under the
burning sun, exploring the thickets, groping in the thorny brushwood.
* * * * *
About three in the afternoon, as she was crossing an arid plain, she
caught sight of a dead horse, then of a red jacket, then another, and yet
another.... It was the scene of the defeat. It was there that the spahis
had fallen....
Here and there a sparse growth of mimosas and tamarisks cast upon the
yellow soil slender shadows, sun-chequered....
In the remote distance, at the end of this vast plain, the skyline of
a village of pointed huts could be seen against the deep blue of the
horizon.
Fatou-gaye had halted, trembling and terrified.... She had recognised
him, Jean, yonder, stretched out in the sun, with stiffened arms and open
mouth. She muttered some obscure, heathen invocation and touched the
grigris round her ebony neck.
With haggard, bloodshot eyes, she stood there a long time, muttering
softly to herself....
From afar she caught sight of some old women of the enemy tribe, who were
making for the corpses, and a horrible surmise flashed upon her....
These hideous old negresses, their skins glistening under the tropic sun,
diffused an acrid odour of soumaré. With a jingling of grigris and beads
they approached the young soldiers. They stirred them with their feet; as
they desecrated them with obscene touch they laughed and uttered mocking
ejaculations, resembling the gibbering of monkeys. They profaned these
corpses with gruesome buffoonery....
And then they stripped them of their gilt buttons, which they stuck in
their frizzled hair; they took from them their steel spurs, their red
jackets, their belts....
Fatou-gaye was crouching behind her clump of brushwood, holding herself
back, like a cat about to spring. When it came to Jean’s turn, she leaped
out, her nails in readiness, uttering cries like a wild beast, and
reviling the negro women in a strange tongue....
And the baby, who had woken up, clung to the back of his raging,
terrifying mother....
The negro women were afraid and drew back....
Besides, their arms were full enough of booty, and they thought they
could come back again on the morrow. They exchanged some words, which
Fatou could not understand, and took their departure, turning round,
however, to insult her with savage laughter and the mocking gestures of
chimpanzees.
* * * * *
When Fatou-gaye was alone, she crouched close to Jean and called him by
his name. Three times she cried, “Tjean! Tjean! Tjean!” in shrill tones,
which echoed in these solitudes like the voice of a priestess of old who
invokes the dead....
There she lay, crouching under the implacable African sun, with unseeing
gaze fixed on the distance on the parched and desolate landscape. She was
afraid to turn her eyes on Jean’s face.
The vultures swooped down insolently towards her, beating the heavy air
with their great dark pinions....
They hovered near the corpses, not yet daring ... it was too soon.
* * * * *
Fatou-gaye caught sight of the medal of the Virgin in the spahi’s hand,
and understood that he had been praying when death came to him. She, too,
had medals of the Virgin and a scapulary among the grigris round her
neck. She had been baptised by Catholic priests at St Louis, but it was
not in them that she put her trust.
She took a leather amulet, which formerly in the land of Galam a negro
woman, her mother had given her. This was the fetish she loved, and she
kissed it with ardour.
Then she bent over Jean’s body and raised his head.
Blue flies kept coming out from his open mouth, between his white teeth,
and from the wounds in his thorax trickled a fluid already fetid.
* * * * *
XXIX
Then she seized her baby with the intention of strangling him.
Dreading to hear his cries, she first filled his mouth with sand.
Nor could she bear to see his little face in the paroxysms of
suffocation. Frenziedly she dug a hole in the ground, buried his head in
it, and heaped more sand upon it.
Then she gripped his neck with her two hands and squeezed it—squeezed
it hard, until his active little limbs, which were stiffening under the
influence of pain, were relaxed in death.
When the child was dead, she laid him on his father’s bosom.
So died the son of Jean Peyral.... A mystery! What god had thrust him
into life, the spahi’s child? What had he come to seek on this earth, and
whither did he return?
Then Fatou-gaye wept tears of blood—her piercing lamentations echoed
over the plains of Dialakar. And last of all, she took the Marabout’s
leather wallet and swallowed a bitter paste contained therein. Her death
throes began, a lingering and cruel agony. For a long time she lay in the
sunlight shaken by death rattle and death sob; she tore her throat with
her nails, and plucked out handfuls of hair mingled with amber.
Round her were the vultures, awaiting her last moment.
* * * * *
XXX
When the yellow sun set over the plains of Diambour, her struggles were
over; her death agony at an end.
She lay, stretched out upon Jean’s body, clasping with rigid arms her
dead son. Hot and starry, the first night of their death descended upon
them—bringing with it the saturnalia of wild life, with its hushed
mysterious beginning, in every corner of this sombre continent of Africa.
* * * * *
That same evening, in that far country at the foot of the Cevennes,
Jeanne’s wedding procession was passing in front of the cottage of the
old Peyrals.
XXXI
APOTHEOSIS
At first it is heard as a distant moaning, rising from the furthest
limits of the desert; then the gruesome chorus approaches through the
luminous obscurity: the doleful howling of jackals, the piercing wails
of hyenas and tiger-cats.
* * * * *
Poor mother, poor old woman!... This human form, vaguely discernible in
the darkness, lying in the midst of these solitudes, its mouth gaping
under a sky all strewn with stars, sleeping there at a time when the wild
beasts awake—this form which will never rise again—poor mother, poor old
woman!... this corpse that lies forsaken is your son!...
“Jean, come into our dance.”
The ravenous pack glides softly through the night, stealing through the
thickets, creeping among the lofty grasses. By the light of the stars
they fall upon the corpses of the young soldiers, and begin the repast,
which has been ordained by blind nature. All that is alive draws its
nourishment, in one form or another, from that which has died.
* * * * *
The man ever grasps in his dead hand the medal of the Virgin, the woman
her leather grigris. Watch well over them, O precious amulets.
* * * * *
To-morrow, great, bald-headed vultures will carry on the work of
destruction—the bones of the dead will be strewn upon the sand, scattered
hither and thither by the beasts of the desert—their skulls will bleach
in the sun, to be the sport of winds and grasshoppers.
* * * * *
Aged parents by the chimney corner, aged parents in your cottage; father,
bowed under the weight of years, you who dream of your son, the handsome
young soldier in his red jacket—aged mother! you who pray each evening
for the absent one—aged parents, long will you await your son, long await
the spahi!