_WELCOME TO SOBUL_
How we accomplished the descent is one of the mysteries that will
always be associated in my mind with the Valley of Sobul. Even for the
unhampered traveler, as I was to learn, the grades were perilous; but
for climbers impeded with the weight of a disabled man, they must have
been well-nigh impossible. Unfortunately, I have little recollection of
what happened on the way down; I believe that I was half delirious from
hunger and pain; I have indistinct memories of muttering and screaming
strange things, and at best I can recall that we trailed as in a dream
along endless spiral paths by the brink of bottomless chasms.
It was late twilight when I was aroused to a dim awareness of myself.
Evidently our party had halted, for I was lying on the ground; on all
sides of me, unfamiliar voices were chattering. Although still too
listless to care much what happened, I opened my eyes and observed a
crowd of dusky forms moving shadow-like through the gloom. In their
midst, perhaps a hundred paces to my right, a great golden bonfire
was blazing, casting a fantastic wavy illumination as it glared and
crackled; and by its light I thought I could distinguish a score or
more of little cabin-like structures.
In my feverish state of mind, I had the impression that I had been
captured by savages; tales of cannibals and cannibal feasts, in a
nightmarish sequence, streamed across my memory. Perhaps I cried
out in a half-witted way; or perhaps it was merely that I groaned
unconsciously at my wounds, for suddenly I found myself the focus of
attention for the dusky figures; a dozen pairs of eyes were peering at
me curiously. Among them were two which, even in the dimness, I thought
I could recognize: while the multitude were mumbling unintelligibly,
a feminine form bent over me, and a feminine voice murmured so gently
that I was reassured even though I did not understand the words.
And again I felt myself lifted by strong hands; and, after a minute, I
was borne through a doorway into the vagueness of some rude dwelling.
The room was a small one, I judged; in the sputtering candlelight
it appeared to me that my outspread arms could have reached halfway
across. Yet I took no note of details as the unseen hands placed me on
a mass of some stringy, yielding substance. So exhausted was I that I
quickly lost track of my surroundings in much needed sleep.
It may have been hours before I awoke, greatly refreshed, yet with
a sensation of terror. All about me was darkness; the silence was
complete. For an instant I had an impression of being back on the
mountain in the fog; then, as recollection came flashing upon me, I
understood that I was safe among friends. But all the rest of that
night I was tormented by dreams of lonely crags and mantling mists; and
when again I awoke it was abruptly and after a nightmare fall over a
precipice whose bottom I never reached....
To my joy, it was once more twilight. By the illumination of an open,
glassless window, I could distinguish the details of the room--and
singular details they were! The walls were of logs, great rough-hewn
pine logs standing erect and parallel, with the bark still clinging;
slenderer logs formed the flat low ceiling; and timbers crudely
smoothed and levelled constituted what passed for a floor. Scattered
masses of straw did duty as a carpet, while straw likewise composed
my couch; and I was lying so low that I could have rolled to the
floor without injury. I noted that the room had neither ornament nor
furniture; that the wide, open fireplace, filled with cold ashes,
seemed almost the only convenience; and that the door, while as
massively built as the walls, was apparently without lock or bolt.
But as the light gradually increased, it was not the room itself that
held my attention, but rather the view from the window. No painting I
had ever observed was so exquisite as that vision of a green and white
eastern mountain, rounded like a great head and aureoled with rose and
silver where the rays of sunrise fought their way fitfully through
serried bands of cloud.
The last faint flush had not yet faded from above the peak when the
cabin door creaked and slowly opened, and I caught a glimpse of auburn
hair, and saw two brown eyes peering in at me curiously. A strange joy
swept over me; and as the fair stranger stood hesitating like a bashful
child in the doorway, my only fear was that she would be too timid to
enter.
But after a minute she overcame her shyness; gently and on tiptoe she
stepped in, closing the door carefully behind her. I observed that she
had not come empty-handed; she carried not only a water-jug but several
odd little straw-colored objects. Approaching slowly, still with just
a hint of hesitation, she murmured pleasantly in the native tongue;
then, having seated herself cross-legged on the floor within touching
distance, she offered me the water, which was crystal-clear and cool.
The eagerness with which I drank sent a happy smile rippling across her
face; and the daintiest of dimples budded on both her cheeks.
After I had satisfied my thirst, she held out one of the straw-colored
objects invitingly. I found it to be hard and gritty of texture, like
some new kind of wood; but while I was examining it, turning it round
and round like a child with a new toy, my visitor was pointing to her
open lips, and at the same time revolved her gleaming white teeth as
though chewing some invisible food. I would have been dull indeed not
to understand.
A single bite told me that the object was a form of native bread. The
flavor of whole wheat was unmistakable; and, to my famished senses, it
was the flavor of ambrosia. Only by exercising unusual will power could
I refrain from swallowing the loaf almost at a gulp.
My greedy disposal of the food was evidently reward enough for my
hostess, who beamed upon me as if well pleased with herself. I even
thought--and was it but imagination?--that her shy glances were not
purely impersonal. Certainly, there was nothing impersonal in the
stares with which I followed her every motion--or in my disappointment
when after a time the great log door swung inward again to admit a
second caller.
Yet I did my best to greet my new visitor with signs of pleasure; for
I recognized him as one of my rescuers. He entered as silently and
cautiously as though on his best sick-room behavior; and after peering
at me curiously and returning my nod of welcome, he murmured a few
words to the girl, and as silently and cautiously took his leave.
Thenceforth, I was to receive visitors in a stream. The moments that
day were to be few when three or four natives were not whispering
in a corner of the room. A census of my callers would have been a
census of the village; no one able to stand on his own legs missed the
opportunity to inspect me. Children of all ages and sizes appeared in
groups; gaped at me as if I had been a giraffe in a menagerie; and were
bustled out by their elders, to be followed by other children, by men
in their prime, women with babes in arm, and tottering grayheads. But
most of my hosts showed that they were moved by warmer motives than
curiosity; many bore offerings of food and drink, fruit and berries,
cakes and cereals, bread and cheese and goats' milk, which they thrust
before me with such generosity that I could consume but a small
fraction.
While they swarmed about the cabin, I observed them as closely as my
condition permitted. Their actions and garb made it plain that they
were peasants; all, like yesterday's acquaintances, were dressed
in rude garments of red and blue, with colored turbans and striped
trousers and leggings, the feminine apparel differing from the
masculine chiefly in being more brilliant-hued. And all, men and women
alike, were robustly built and attractive. The majority had handsome,
well modelled faces, with swarthy skins and candid, expressive eyes,
at the sight of which I felt reassured; for here in the mountains of
Afghanistan, among some of the fiercest and most treacherous tribes on
earth, I might easily have fallen into less kindly hands.
During the day I was visited by two men who took a particular interest
in me. The first, who came early in the morning, was evidently the
local equivalent of a physician, for he examined me from head to foot
with a solemn and knowing air and caused me much annoyance by feeling
my limbs as if to see that they were whole. Of course, he did not
overlook my right arm; and I passed a miserable half hour while he
adjusted a crude splint and bound and bandaged the broken member with
stout vegetable fibres.
My second visitor performed less of a service. He was an old man, still
erect and sparkling-eyed, although he must have passed the traditional
three score years and ten; and his long white beard, drooping untended
as far as his waistline, gave him a Rip Van Winkle appearance. Upon
his entrance, the others made way with little bows of awe; and as he
sedately approached the straw where I was lying, five or six men and
women gathered to my rear, whispering in half-suppressed agitation.
These were quickly joined by others from without; and soon my visitors
were massed layers deep against all the walls, and the air became fetid
and hot with overcrowded humanity.
Meanwhile I felt like a sacrificial victim awaiting the priestly knife.
Had my hosts spared me only so that I might serve as an offering to
some pagan god? So I wondered as I watched the white-bearded one
gravely bending over me; watched him rubbing his hands solemnly
together as though in pursuance of a religious rite. And when, after
several minutes, he turned from me to smear a brown ointment on his
palms, my apprehension mounted to terror, which was not soothed when
he stooped down and dampened my forehead with the ointment, meanwhile
mumbling unintelligibly to himself. His next step, which I awaited in
the trembling helplessness of a vivisected animal, was to reach toward
my clothes and examine them fold by fold; after which he drew from his
pocket a sparkling object, a prism of glass, which he held up in the
sunlight of the window, shedding the rainbow reflection on the opposite
wall, and staring at it as though it were the key to some transcendent
truth.
Much to my relief, the ordeal was apparently over now; the old man
turned his back upon me as though I had ceased to matter, and began
sonorously to address his people. Not understanding a word, I could
not be much interested; but I did observe how reverentially his
audience stood regarding him, with staring dark eyes and gestures of
self-abasement, while hanging on his every syllable as if it embodied
divine wisdom.
His first remarks were evidently cheerful or even jocular; for they
evoked smiles and occasionally laughter. But soon, apparently, he
turned to graver subjects; and his listeners became serious and
thoughtful, as though spellbound by his eloquence. How long they
remained thus I do not know; my watch having run down, I had no way of
reckoning time; but it seemed to me that the speaker held forth for at
least an hour. And long before he had finished, my mind had drifted to
more interesting matters.
I was asking myself what had happened to Damon, and whether my fellow
geologists were searching the mountains for my corpse, when the old
man wheeled about abruptly, and with fiery eyes pointed at me as if in
accusation.
In high-pitched, staccato tones, almost like a cry of agony, he uttered
three sharp monosyllables, then became silent.
At the same time, suppressed cries burst from the spectators. It may
have been only imagination, but I thought they were eyeing me in alarm
and reproach, and that they were edging away from me; and I know that,
in a moment, those to the rear had crowded through the door. Soon only
three or four remained, and I was left to wonder whether my rescuers
were after all not the kindly mountaineers I had taken them to be, but
merely superstitious savages.