The Medusa stone (13 page)
Authors: Jack Du Brul
They passed through small villages, rough clutches of adobe and brick roofed with thatch or metal. Many of the buildings were round, cone-topped structures called
agdos.
The few people on the dusty streets were thin and drawn, dressed in long plain shifts similar to Egyptian
galabia.
agdos.
The few people on the dusty streets were thin and drawn, dressed in long plain shifts similar to Egyptian
galabia.
Two hours later, they reached Keren, a city smaller than Asmara but possessing the same colonial charm with low bungalows and palm-lined streets. The majority of the population was Muslim, so many of the women were draped in long black
chadors
that absorbed the heat brutally. Habte parked the Toyota behind the Keren Hotel, a rambling building with a covered verandah screened by bougainvillea. "We need to get food and fuel here before continuing north."
chadors
that absorbed the heat brutally. Habte parked the Toyota behind the Keren Hotel, a rambling building with a covered verandah screened by bougainvillea. "We need to get food and fuel here before continuing north."
"Okay, but I don't want to be here long." Mercer unlimbered himself from the truck.
"Agreed," Habte nodded. "Gibby and I will get what we need in the market. I have a lot of friends here. It shouldn't take too long."
Selome turned to Mercer. "No offense, but we'd better keep you out of sight. Whites don't make it to Keren very often, and it's best if no one sees you."
The cargo rack atop the Land Cruiser was loaded with boxes and jerry cans by the time Selome led Mercer back to the steps of the hotel. They'd waited in a nearby alley. Gibby was sitting in the backseat, but there was no sign of Habte. Mercer leapt into the vehicle and asked Gibby to duck into the Keren Hotel's bar to make a few purchases. Habte was in the driver's seat when the lad returned.
"I spoke to some people." Habte cranked the engine. "If any Sudanese come through here from Asmara in the next few days, they're going to find it difficult to continue." There was a smirk on his face.
Mercer pulled a map from the glove compartment. "That takes care of one interested party and now it's time to throw off the other. According to this, there's an airport in Nacfa and I bet the Europeans may try to leapfrog us and meet us there. Why don't we swing west?" Mercer pointed to the map for Habte to see. "This road here bypasses Nacfa and meets up with the main tract again at Itaro."
"The rains haven't come yet, so it should be passable," Habte agreed. "But what about the excavator waiting in Nacfa?"
"We won't need it for a while. Once we're in open country, no one will be able to find us. If I can pinpoint the pipe's location in the next few weeks, Selome can use her contacts in the government to get us some proper protection and then we'll call for the excavator."
Habte's military experience mo show for their efforts except a dangerously low fuel gauge. The attitude of the team was going sour with frustration and tedium. They were feeling the effects of the Land Cruiser's bone-jarring suspension, the molten air that beat down with the intensity of a blast furnace, and the swarms of stinging insects that found them the moment they stopped. Habte and Selome rarely spoke to each other, and since Gibby idolized his older cousin, he too had gone quiet around her. The silences in the stifling truck were draining.
Only Mercer seemed not to notice any of this. He was in his element and had managed to put everything out of his mind except the geology and geography of the area. Using the Medusa photographs, Habte's recollections, and his own sense of the earth, he guided them almost randomly, never losing his good spirits.
Even after ten days of fruitless searching, his dedication hadn't faltered. In fact, he seemed to move with ever greater assurance as the days passed. But the task was still daunting. He felt like a grizzled Forty-niner who had opened California's gold rush with little more than a pick and high hopes. Used to being part of a well-financed expedition, he had only his years of experience and his innate intuition to rely on.
At least twenty times a day since reaching the Barka Province, Mercer ordered Habte to stop the truck so he could race across the hardpan, a pointed geologist's hammer in his fist. He would scramble up some nameless hill, chip away at the stone, examine it for up to half an hour, using his tongue to moisten some samples to change their reflective properties. Sometimes he asked Gibby to join him with two shovels, and for an hour or more, they dug trenches in the scaly soil. Wordlessly, they returned to the Land-Cruiser. Mercer would point in a new direction, and off they would go again.
They established primitive camps at night. Habte had managed to pack only two tents before their flight from Asmara. He and Gibby shared one, Mercer had the other to himself, and Selome slept on the Toyota's rear bench seat. Their meals were equally crude: millet cakes, turnips or potatoes, and canned meat. The highlight of every day was the seemingly endless bottles of brandy Mercer produced from his luggage, some brought from the United States and a couple purchased for him by Gibby at the Keren Hotel. The three Eritreans usually fell into a death-like sleep soon after their meal, but Mercer worked deep into the night. A hurricane lantern hissed in his tent as he scribbled in a thick notebook, the satellite pictures spread on his knees.
Mercer had intended to use the truck for about a week of exploratory sorties and then return to Asmara to charter a plane and study the terrain from the air, cross-referencing the aerial view with his ground observations and the Medusa pictures. That was now, of course, impossible. It would be suicide for any of them to return to the capital. He was limited to what he could see from the ground and forced to match it to the surface topography from the photos.
At dawn on the eleventh day, the sun was diffused by banks of clouds. Far to the east, the rains had come. The sunrise cast a rose hue on the desert, rouging the sand and casting bizarre shadows on the western mountains. Mercer emerged from his tent before the others awoke, enjoying the solitude of the early morning. They were camped on the bank of one of the rare streams. For the first time in days, water was readily available. Mercer took a few minutes to strip and wash the sweat and grit from his body, dressing again in the same clothes but changing into a fresh pair of socks and boxer shorts. His skin cooled quickly in the dawn chill, and goose flesh rose along his armm b size="3">Habte emerged from his shared tent with a cigarette already smoldering between his thin lips. He kicked life back into the embers of their fire and heated a pot of water for coffee.
Mercer accepted a mug gratefully, cupping his hands around the warm container. They drank in contented silence. Gibby and Selome awoke a short time later, she going off to perform her morning ablutions and Gibby and Habte falling into a conversation in Tigrinyan, leaving Mercer to watch the grotesque shapes of distant outcrops materialize from the gloom.
"We must return to Badn today," Habte said when Gibby went off into the desert to relieve himself.
They had negotiated with a group of nomads staying around the village of Badn to travel to Nacfa and purchase gasoline. Their camel caravan would have returned by now, and even with extended tanks, the Toyota would just make it to town.
"I know," Mercer replied absently, watching Selome's sinuous return to the camp. Despite the harsh conditions, each morning she managed to look fresh and beautiful. She wore ballooning jodhpurs and a man's large overshirt. Her hair formed a dense halo from under the wide brim of a straw hat, its fuchsia band adding a touch of feminine color to the ensemble. Her lightweight clothes were better suited to the desert than the jeans she had started out wearing.
She curled into a cross-legged position on the ground across the fire from Mercer. There was a trace of blush on her cheeks. She'd been aware of his gaze.
"We're heading back to Badn this morning," Mercer announced, and he could see relief in her eyes. The pace he had set for the past days had been brutal, and they all anticipated at least a small break in the tiny hamlet. "I want to hire those nomads again to return to Nacfa and have them guide the excavator here."
Both Habte and Selome gaped at him. It was Selome who found her voice first. "You found the mine?"
Mercer looked at her sharply, then dashed her hopes with a quick shake of his head. "No, not yet, but the rains are coming soon, and if we don't get the excavator across the Adohba River now, we may never be able to. There aren't any bridges across it strong enough to take the weight of the tractor trailer and crawler." Disappointment made her face collapse. "However, I do have good news."
He went to his tent and returned with his notebook and the now dog-eared photographs. He spread the material on the ground, anchoring the corners of a rolled-up map with fist-size rocks. Habte and Selome clustered over his shoulder while Gibby made himself busy breaking down their camp. "Since my Global Positioning Satellite receiver was left in Asmara, all the reference marks on the map are just estimates. They could be off as much as a mile or two, and a margin of error that big doesn't help our cause."
He pointed at a spot twenty miles north of Badn. "We're roughly here now. The asterisks on the map represent sites where I've taken samples." There were dozens of such notations. Despite the seemingly random route Mercer had taken, the marks were laid out in perfect symmetry, each about half a mile from its neighbor in every direction. Habte and Selome were impressed by his orienteering skills. "The marks in red show where I discovered traces of garnet and ilmenites that may or may not mean the presence of diamonds. The problem is their quantity. There doesn't seem to be enough for me to believe the kimberlite pipe ever reached the surface to be eroded down and its contents spread by these ancient water courses." He pointed at several twisting lines he'd drawn on the map, certain the others was SelThe Eritrean thrust a brass cup into Mercer's hand and toasted him with a drink of his own. Mercer recognized the smell of
tej,
a delightful honey wine made only in Ethiopia and Eritrea, and he drank down the tumbler in one quick toss. Unlike the polished, sweet wine he'd enjoyed in Washington's Ethiopian restaurants, this fiery brew was as smooth as sandpaper, with the subtlety of a stick of dynamite and twice the kick. It took all of his will not to cry out as the liquor exploded in his stomach. He finally caught his breath. "Oh, fuck."
tej,
a delightful honey wine made only in Ethiopia and Eritrea, and he drank down the tumbler in one quick toss. Unlike the polished, sweet wine he'd enjoyed in Washington's Ethiopian restaurants, this fiery brew was as smooth as sandpaper, with the subtlety of a stick of dynamite and twice the kick. It took all of his will not to cry out as the liquor exploded in his stomach. He finally caught his breath. "Oh, fuck."
It took four more shots of
tej
for Mercer to get into the spirit of the party. He took the bottle of brandy Gibby had been holding for him and handed it ceremoniously to the chieftain. The nomad prince opened it gleefully and tossed the cap over his shoulder, where it landed unerringly in one of the cooking pots. Disdaining his cup in his desire to drink such a delicacy, he tilted the bottle to his lips, his throat pumping. He handed the bottle to Mercer. Hoping the brandy would kill whatever swam in the Eritrean's mouth, he, too, took a long gulp. "Oh, fuck," he muttered again. It was going to be a long night.
tej
for Mercer to get into the spirit of the party. He took the bottle of brandy Gibby had been holding for him and handed it ceremoniously to the chieftain. The nomad prince opened it gleefully and tossed the cap over his shoulder, where it landed unerringly in one of the cooking pots. Disdaining his cup in his desire to drink such a delicacy, he tilted the bottle to his lips, his throat pumping. He handed the bottle to Mercer. Hoping the brandy would kill whatever swam in the Eritrean's mouth, he, too, took a long gulp. "Oh, fuck," he muttered again. It was going to be a long night.
The women finished preparing the meal and tipped the cooking pots directly into the three brass bowls around the giant platter. The assembled tribesmen went at the food like a pack of wild dogs. They tore off slabs of
injera,
dunking them into the bowls so their hands came away smeared to the wrist with stew, clots of meat, and vegetables dripping onto the huge plate as they bent forward to cram the mass down their throats. Habte and Gibby ate with equal gusto, though Selome showed a bit more decorum with the size of the bites she took. The
wat
in the bowl closest to Mercer was made of lentils, chickpeas, and oily mutton. The bread helped absorb some of the grease, but he could feel his arteries hardening with every bite. The only thing that cut through the food's spicy edge was the
tej
that the women encouragingly refilled every time his cup was only half emptied.
injera,
dunking them into the bowls so their hands came away smeared to the wrist with stew, clots of meat, and vegetables dripping onto the huge plate as they bent forward to cram the mass down their throats. Habte and Gibby ate with equal gusto, though Selome showed a bit more decorum with the size of the bites she took. The
wat
in the bowl closest to Mercer was made of lentils, chickpeas, and oily mutton. The bread helped absorb some of the grease, but he could feel his arteries hardening with every bite. The only thing that cut through the food's spicy edge was the
tej
that the women encouragingly refilled every time his cup was only half emptied.
Unbelievably, the huge amount of food was eaten in just a few minutes, and no sooner had the last of the three bowls been emptied than the women approached and poured fresh
wat
for the men and replenished their stacks of
injera.
wat
for the men and replenished their stacks of
injera.
"How are you doing?" Selome asked, wiping her hands on her pant leg. Her eyes were bright and glassy with wine, and the food had brought a flush to her perfect skin.
Mercer could see she was enjoying herself as much as he. He wondered what this was like for her, to sit with her people after so many years of isolation and enjoy the simple pleasure of a communal meal. "A few more cups of
tej
and I'll forget that my stomach lining has been burned away."
tej
and I'll forget that my stomach lining has been burned away."
Selome suddenly leaned across and kissed him full on the mouth, catching Mercer by surprise. He could feel the spicy heat from the
wat
on her lips and felt a deeper warmth that had nothing to do with the food. The uncharacteristic intimacy shocked her as much as it did him, and she turned away, flustered.
wat
on her lips and felt a deeper warmth that had nothing to do with the food. The uncharacteristic intimacy shocked her as much as it did him, and she turned away, flustered.
Again the three huge bowls were emptied and again they were refilled, fresh steam rising up in dangerous tendrils that burned like acid. The headman dipped a piece of
injera
into the fresh stew and palmed a chunk of meat the size of his fist. He handed it to Mercer with another grin. "Fuck?"
injera
into the fresh stew and palmed a chunk of meat the size of his fist. He handed it to Mercer with another grin. "Fuck?"
"Oh, no problem." Mercer emptied his
tej
and jammed the fatty hunk into his mouth with the relish of a native.
tej
and jammed the fatty hunk into his mouth with the relish of a native.
Four more times the poped. The few die-hards still eating were making a significant dent in these leavings. The Eritreans were doused with grease from their mouths to the tips of their ubiquitous beards and from their fingernails to their forearms. The meal was finally winding down, and Mercer thought it a good time to ask his host a favor. He had kept his notebook with him, sitting on it during the banquet to keep it from either being ruined by grease or accidentally eaten by one of the clansmen. He opened the book to his sketch of the valley and mountain around the kimberlite pipe and asked Selome to translate.
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