A STORM AND A LULL
The men were still very quarrelsome; the whole day their grating voices
never stopped. They seemed, however, quite anxious to row now, and
proposed at sunset that we should not moor to the shore as usual but,
as the night was not very dark, keep on and make up for lost time. We
had been in bed a little while and were dropping off to sleep in spite
of the ceaseless quarrelsome voices, when a worse out-break than usual
thoroughly awakened me.
"They are having a fight on board," said X, sleepily; "I suppose we
must leave them at it."
I peered through the chinks of the door. Jedan had taken off all his
clothes and was trying to jump off the raft into the middle of the
river. Hassan and Ali were holding on to him for dear life, and the
Evil One sat at the oars screaming with rage. Arten was offering him
the remains of our dinner. Jedan seemed finally to yield to the other
men's entreaties and sat down on the raft, the tears rolling down his
cheeks. Ali sat beside him, holding his hand and murmuring soothing
words. The Evil One occupied himself with devouring the dinner. General
peace seemed, in fact, restored, and our slumbers were not again
disturbed.
Next morning we threatened them both with dismissal at Tekreet, where
we hoped to arrive that day, and which we knew was the seat of a Mudir,
to whom we could make a show of appealing if the worst came to the
worst. The cause of the disturbance was put down to Jedan, whose native
village was close by, and who had threatened to leave the raft
altogether if the Evil One bullied him any longer. Jedan begged to be
allowed to visit his home, and it so happened that the wind rose again
to such a pitch just opposite the place itself that we were compelled
to put to shore. It was another Arab encampment, a collection of black
tents with maize enclosures. Jedan at once disappeared amongst them,
and, later on, as we strolled round the village, we came across him
seated just inside a tent with two small children on his knees. He
invited us to come in and sit down. The tent was full of his kindred.
In the far corner a child shared with a bleating kid the quilted
covering which constituted the bed of the establishment. A woman beside
him was spinning wool and another one at the door was grinding dari for
bread. A grown-up son sat opposite, industriously working the wool from
his mother's wheel on to a leather sole for sandals.
Jedan appeared in quite a new light in the centre of his family circle;
he suddenly seemed endowed with a dignity becoming his present position
as monarch of all he surveyed. The children on his knee clung to him
and stroked his head, and he softly patted their heads. All the gruff
surliness and cringing hatred of the expression with which he regarded
the Evil One on the raft had disappeared, and he smiled with benign
content on his domestic surroundings. He sent the boy out into the
village with orders to get some delicacy in our honour. In a few
minutes the lad returned with a raw turnip, which was cut into chunks
and offered to us with much ceremony. Then a bowl of youart was
produced, and we felt compelled to drink out of the common stock.
At midday the wind had subsided and we insisted on starting off at
once, with the hope of reaching Tekreet before evening. It was five
days since we had left Mosul, and we had scarcely covered one hundred
miles. As we had counted on reaching Baghdad in that time, our supply
of provisions had got very low. The river was now deep and broad, and
the strong current carried us along at a good pace. Jedan's visit to
his family had put him in a very good humour, and even the Evil One,
who had participated in the feast of raw turnip, worked quietly at the
oars. Every moment took us further from the snow mountains and the
bleak country of the north and nearer the sunny south. Already the
sun's hot rays poured down soothingly, and everybody was in that state
of quiet contentment known as "kief" in the East. Hassan, seated
cross-legged with his back against the hut, dozed at intervals. Ali was
rolling up long, fat cigarettes by the door, and Arten, stretched full
length inside, was making up for his disturbed slumbers of the past
night. X lay on a rug at the edge of the raft and I sat beside her,
reading aloud the Prophetic utterances on Nineveh. The Bible is one of
the few books that one can read in this sort of wandering life. This
is, perhaps, because we are in the land where people live in rock
houses, and hew their tombs in rocks, and wear girdles, and say "Aha,"
eat honey a lot, and go out to desolate lands, and say their prayers on
the housetop. We were living with the shepherds who divided the sheep
and goats at nightfall and watered their flocks at sundown; with the
women who came down with their pitchers to the wells, and with the
elders sitting at the gates. One felt that any other book made too
great a demand on one's mental powers. Even now the sound of one's own
voice was disturbing, and for some time we sat listening to the silence
and imbibing the sun. A sudden chill crept into the atmosphere and a
blackness covered the face of the waters. I looked up at the sky. A
line of angry, black clouds had overtaken the sun, gathering up the
scattered white fleeces in its path, and was advancing rapidly over our
heads. An ominous sound of rising winds seemed to herald its approach.
In less than three minutes we were swept up in the arms of a howling
gale; sudden gusts caught the walls of the hut and swirled us round,
the playthings of a merciless, raging force, at one moment tearing us
into the middle of the stream, and the next dashing us with redoubled
vigour against its rocky sides. The rain came down in blinding
torrents, and the waves, breaking over the surface of the raft, made it
seem as if we were being submerged altogether under the water. Then we
rose on the crest of a wave once more, which dashed us against a wall
of rock rising precipitously at the side, with a force which seemed as
if it must shatter asunder all the bending, creaking poles of the raft.
Ali and Hassan stood on the edge, trying to break the force of the
blows with the butt end of their rifles, while the kalekjis struggled
fruitlessly at the oars. The lowering black sky, the raging black
waters, the unyielding black walls of rock gave a grim setting of
darkness to this struggle, which proved to be no less than a fight with
death itself. Our companions, the birds, clung huddled up with fright
to sheltering walls of rock, or crept into niches, where they cowered
together, hiding their heads under their wings. Even the noise of the
wind and waters could not drown the wild, terrified shriek of startled
crows when we were dashed against their hiding places, and they flew
close past our heads to seek a fresh shelter.
This, then, was to be the end of our interlude of peace. It seemed as
if the jealous gods, conscious of our forgetfulness of their authority,
were proclaiming our powerlessness against their decrees. They tossed
us ruthlessly about until we were reduced to a state of subordination,
and then, as if repenting of their anger, they caused the wind to lull
and shot out a gleam of sunshine through the dark clouds. We passed out
beyond the walls of rock, on which the wet drops now gleamed like bits
of silver, and drifted in a broad, slow stream with low, shelving
banks. On the last ledge, with downcast heads, sat three great
vultures, disappointed of their prey.
Hassan thoughtfully rolled some cigarettes; he lit one and handed it to
me; then he lit another and handed it to X. She shook her head.
"Smoke," he said sternly. X took the cigarette and, all need for action
being over, we resumed our attitudes of contemplation. But the
atmosphere of lazy indifference seemed to be dispelled. Where were we
drifting to? Were we at any moment likely to be snatched from this
state of peaceful acquiescence in our surroundings, and be hurled to
destruction with no word of warning or choice in the matter?
"Ah, well, kim bilior?" (Who knows?) I said out loud.
"Who know what?" said Hassan.
"What is going to happen to us?" I said.
"Kim bilior?" repeated Hassan. "Allah bilior" (God knows), and then,
after a minute's silence, he repeated:
"Kim bilior? Allah bilior!"
I looked up at him.
"It is so," he said, nodding his head solemnly; "Kim bilior? Allah
bilior!"
The influence of the Eastern mind asserted itself; the future had no
interest for them. Allah had arranged their destiny; it had nothing to
do with them, and no thought or effort on their part would make any
difference. Nor had the past any interest for them. They lived in the
present, enjoying the pleasant places and accepting the unpleasant ones
with no fear or resentment.
The storm was over, and they set about drying their clothes and making
preparations for the evening meal. Jedan slowly unwound his keffiyeh
and wiped his head all over, then he spread the coloured rag out to
dry. Ali and Hassan rubbed their rifles carefully and hung them up
inside the hut. Then Ali spread out his cloak on the far corner of the
raft and went through the midday prayer; this over, he borrowed a
needle and thread from me and began darning a tear in his ragged
uniform.
The sun shone brightly and our clothes were soon dry. Birds appeared on
the bank shaking their feathers and stretching out one limb after
another. The lull that follows a great storm reigned over everything;
all nature seemed resting after her exertions. Ali Chous finished his
darn and began to sing; the kalekjis joined in the chorus, clapping
their hands. An element of cheerful carelessness established itself on
board. I went inside and began to invent a pudding for dinner. Arten
was not enlightened in his profession as cook, and I was trying to
supplement his deficiencies by the light of nature, for Arten did not
seem to have that sort of light. I tied the mixture up in a
handkerchief and set it to boil in a pot on the brazier. One by one the
men came in and sat round the fire, gazing silently at the pot as they
smoked away. After a time I took the lid off and examined its contents.
"Is it really going to be a pudding?" said X, with an agonized
expression.
I tried to recall what puddings looked like in England, and then
remembered that I had never seen one at this stage.
"I cannot say till it is finished," I said.
The pudding still clung ominously to the handkerchief; I had greased it
well and have since heard that you only grease pans. I gave it a few
minutes longer, then, as we were all hungry, I fished it out of the pot
and untied the handkerchief.
"Bak!" (Look) said Arten.
"Bak!" said Hassan.
"Bak!" said Ali.
"Bak!" said the kalekjis.
It was a moment of extreme tension.
I slipped it on to a plate.
"Now look," said Arten.
"See now what a cook she is!" said Hassan, "a wonderful cook."
"Mashallah," said Ali.
"Mashallah," said the kalekjis.
"It _is_ a pudding," said X, "a real pudding."
We all gazed at it for several moments in ecstatic excitement. I handed
X a spoon and we each took a mouthful; then we looked at one another.
"It is a pudding," said X again.
It almost seemed as if she were trying to persuade herself of the fact
against the dictates of reason. When we had finished, the men shared
our spoons in turn; each one cautiously raised a spoonful and smelt it,
then they swallowed it, very much as one remembers swallowing jam in
the nursery when one knew there was a powder inside.
"Ehe" (Good), they said very deliberately, nodding their heads, and
then, as they handed the spoon to their neighbour, "Inghiliz" they
added. One felt that the first word was Turkish politeness; the second
was a veiled warning to their brethren.
But on the whole it seemed a success; we had a sense of repletion; how
often had we not swallowed bowls of rice and been only conscious of a
great internal void.
The men carried our rugs outside and we stretched ourselves lazily out
on the open end of the raft. I began to reflect upon Time and Destiny.
No shadow of a cloud appeared to disturb the horizon, no obstruction in
the river affected our steady onward course down the slow, wide stream;
we took the current where it served, and so were not delayed in the
shallows where the waters dallied about the banks; they in due course
would arrive at their destination and pour themselves, unquestioning
and unquestioned, into the oblivious sea. But what would Time, that
unremitting, relentless current, do with us? Was it going to hurl us
too into oblivion? Whatever it had to give was ours, and yet, because
we could not stop it, we were not master of it. We could moor to the
shore and let the river go on without us; the current did not wait for
us, but we could pick it up again when we were ready for it and go on
without loss; but in the current of Time, when we stay on one side and
let the moments go past us, we have lost for ever what those moments
had to give, and our arrival at our destination has not been delayed;
it is so much the nearer.
"X," I said, "where do you think we are floating to?"
"Baghdad," said X.
"I wasn't thinking geographically," I answered, "I was thinking whether
it was Eternity or Oblivion. Being hurried along by this current gives
me an uncomfortable feeling of not being allowed any choice as regards
time, which I resent. Do you mind it at all?"
"No," said X, "I feel that I have lost all conception of time, and that
we are floating on, as it were, to Eternity."
"Do you?" I said dubiously; "I feel it's Oblivion we are getting to."
"But we are only three days off Baghdad," insisted X.
"Well," I answered, "I devoutly pray that we may get there first."
We arrived at Tekreet just before sunset, and at once sent Ali up to
the Mudir with the request that he would help us in the dismissal of
the Evil One.
"Tell the Mudir," we said, "that we cannot sleep for the noise he makes
at night, and our heads ache from the noise he makes in the daytime,
and that he has guided the raft so badly that we have spent five days
getting here from Mosul."
Ali obediently disappeared. He first communicated the substance of our
remarks to the kalekjis, who, after putting their heads together,
landed and strolled down a rambling street of Arab huts. We also went
on shore with Hassan, and wandered about along the rocky paths amongst
labyrinths of tombs which ran down to the water's edge. Tekreet boasts
of one palm tree, the first we had seen on the river, and an old
castle, the ruins of which stand on a rock above. The town is a
tumble-down sort of place, inhabited chiefly by Arabs, who ply rafts
with merchandise between Mosul and Baghdad. Ali returned with the news
that the Mudir had given orders for new kalekjis to be ready in the
morning. He apologised in the name of the Sultan for the discomfort we
had experienced in his Highness's domains. We asked what had become of
the others, and were informed that they were frightened of being
punished and had run away.
"That's curious," I said, "I should have thought that no Eastern would
put fright before baksheesh, or mind what a Mudir said in this
district."
Later on an emissary arrived from the Mudir with a piece of sheep and a
message that he would travel with us the next day as far as Samarah.
Accordingly we sent back word that we were starting at sunrise.
We went to bed that night with a greater sense of security then we had
felt since leaving Mosul. We came, moreover, to the conclusion that
there was, perhaps, a slight advantage in being under Government
patronage, when we really had to apply for that protection which his
Highness the Sultan so anxiously proffers to all travellers in his
well-regulated country.