Growing wild at the foot of the ridge against which the place nestled were clumps of blossoming azalea which attracted a variety of gaudy-hued butterflies. A couple of specimens among them were the largest and most beautiful butterflies I have ever seen and we stopped to look at them. Zaro made a half-hearted attempt to catch one, but little Kristina begged him not to. We made our camp in the shade of half-a-dozen small trees which from a few hundred yards away had looked like young oaks but which were, I think, camphor trees.
Thereafter vegetation became scarcer until only heather clung to the hillsides. We were heading into the desert, the extent and character of which we did not know. Had we been fully fore-warned of its formidable terrors, we might have made more prudent preparations. The word Gobi was just a word to us. We hardly discussed it. The sun rose on our left hand in the morning and we kept moving restlessly on until it sank on our right.
The last human activity I remember featured two Chinese fishermen between the willow-shaded banks of a river the water of which ran cool and clear over a pebbly bed. We had reached the river at midday, appropriately enough, and first saw the fishermen an hour or so after our arrival. One walked on our side, the other near the far bank, sometimes up to their waists in the stream, at other times barely managing to keep their chins above water. Each carried a long bamboo stave in one hand while the other hand was occupied in hauling on two ropes slung over the shoulders. They went forward with the current. The performance was new to all of us, so we stepped into the shallows for a close look as they drew up to us.
The pair had a net stretched out between them across the river. It consisted of two wings each about twenty yards long joined in the middle to a trap, wide-mouthed and roughly five feet square tapering almost to a point as it trailed out behind. The whole length of net and bag was buoyed along the top by oval floats of light wood. The device did not give the fish population much chance of survival. The Chinese vigorously beat at the water with their sticks, driving the fish out of the vegetation along the banks, and the only ones to escape were those which leapt over the top of the net. We were lucky that they chose to stop at the point where we stood. The fisherman on the far side crossed over to his partner, using his length of net to close the mouth of the bag. As they came together in the shallows I saw that the bottom of the net was weighted at intervals with stones and the tapering end of the bag was held down with a smooth rock. The ropes the men were holding were attached to top and bottom of the net and rove through the complete length.
One man now took over all four rope ends while the other waded out to take hold of a big floating cigar of a thing made of lengths of bamboo which had been twisting and turning lazily downstream well behind the net. This, we discovered, was the mobile storage tank for the catch. It had a square flap tied in position over the broadest part. Through the hole went the pick of the catch.
We made signs to indicate we would like to help. The Chinese seemed to be willing. Caught in the meshes of the net were dozens of small fish. One of the fishermen took hold of one and pulled it through by the head. He threw it wriggling on to the bank. He looked at us and pointed to the net. We followed his example, clearing the net of fish, bits of wood, grass and leaves.
The Chinese hauled the net bag with its shining, wriggling harvest of fish, just clear of the water. Skilfully and rapidly they removed the bigger ones one by one and slipped them into the floating bamboo chamber. When they had finished there were two stone of fine, medium and small fish left which they indicated we could have. Normally, I hope, these would have gone back to re-stock the stream. Some escaped through our unpractised fingers, but most were landed flopping and gasping on the grass above the water line. The Chinese ran their net out again and went on to fish the next stretch.
Here was more food than we could eat in many days, so we decided to eat what we needed there and then and dry the rest in the sun on flat stones to take with us. While Kolemenos chopped the heads off, holding his axe near the blade, I gutted them and the others, in turn, took them to the water to wash them. Kristina and Zaro got a fire going and a thin flat stone was cleaned to act as a hotplate. Soon there was the savoury smell of grilling fresh fish. There were about five varieties in the catch, among which I recognized perch by its characteristic spiny back.
Fish drying was a novel occupation for us, but we had often seen the finished product and now tried to achieve the same result. The gutted fish was opened flat and the spine removed. Then in relays we partially smoked and dried them round the fire. It took several hours and it was agreed we must stay the night and complete the job. Throughout the next morning the fish were laid out under the heat of the sun while we flapped with our fufaikas to keep the flies away. When we judged the process complete, we shared them out and stowed them away in our bags. Later we had reason to bless the success of the operation. We were to carry the last of this food into the Gobi Desert with us.
Not so pleasant was the experience of a day or two later. The time was afternoon when the hot sun in a vast blue sky was beginning its long decline to the west. Marchinkovas pointed out a couple of miles ahead a great brown moving cloud and asked what it could be. Not one of us could enlighten him. There was no doubt it was moving and I thought it might be a dust storm, except that the air was barely agitated by the lightest of breezes. This thing was covering ground rapidly, getting larger and larger as we looked.
‘It’s a locust swarm,’ Mister Smith called out suddenly. ‘It’s no good walking into it. We’d better stop here.’
We sat down on the hard-baked earth, slipping our jackets on and covering our heads with our food sacks. The glare of the sun was blotted out as the locust myriads reached us. We turned our backs to them and huddled down. The sound as they struck our clothes was audible. They were all over us, around us and above us. The air was alive with the throbbing hum of their beating wings.
‘Thank God they can’t eat us,’ said Zaro.
‘I wouldn’t be too sure about that,’ answered the American. ‘They’ll eat almost anything.’
Kristina turned a worried-looking face to him. ‘I am only joking, child,’ he reassured her.
It took at least two hours for the swarm to pass over us. The sun shone through again and the casualties of the great migration littered the ground about us. Some were moving, others appeared to be dead. We shook them in dozens from our clothes. They had found their way into our pockets, up our sleeves, inside our trouser legs. One consolation was that they had not got into our food sacks with their precious small store of dried fish.
To relate time and distance has been the greatest of my difficulties in recording the story of this bid for freedom. Particularly is this so concerning the passage through Mongolia, where we had no common speech with the inhabitants and where, even if we were given the names of rivers, villages or other landmarks, there was no means of setting the sounds down to help the memory in later years. But I believe our progress through inhabited Outer Mongolia to the wastes of Inner Mongolia occupied us from six to eight weeks.
This much I remember: The entry into the Gobi was not an abrupt transition. Twice we thought we were in it as we traversed long sandy stretches, but on each occasion a range of fairly tall hills intervened, and at the foot of the second range there was the boon of a shallow, sandy rivulet, beside which we camped for the night. That was our last drink of fresh water for a long, long time.
Towards nightfall of the next day we encountered a caravan trail at right-angles to our course, alongside which were seated four Mongolians watching over a steaming iron cauldron suspended from a metal tripod over a fire. They all appeared to be aged between thirty and forty, but the seniority of one was marked by the possession of a magnificent old rifle, long-barrelled, short-stocked, the almost black woodwork extending along the barrel and held to it by bands of gleaming brass. As he stood with the others to greet us the rifle showed as tall as the owner. The usual courtesies were exchanged but this time none of our guests knew
Russian. They motioned us to one side of the fire where we sat in a wide semi-circle while they faced us across the flames.
These were poorer travellers than those we had first met. I noticed that their jackets had been neatly patched in places. They had one mule between them on which the bare necessities for their journey were carried, including two water bags made, I think, from the stomach of camels. More water was added to the pot while we grinned and gestured futilely at the man with the gun to show our pleasure at the unexpected meeting. In deference to Smith’s grey-streaked beard, the Mongol directed his attention to the American, whom he obviously regarded as the senior and therefore the leader of our party.
Eventually Mister Smith used the magic word Lhasa and the Mongol, after a minute of deliberation, pointed our direction. From inside his coat he drew a contraption which I can best describe as a metal cylinder on a long rod. From within the cylinder he drew out a length of silk ribbon in the manner that a Westerner will produce a tape measure of the mechanically-retracting kind. The silk was covered with symbols in a series of frames like the separate pictures on a cine film. He spent some time tranquilly contemplating the ribbon and finally, with a spinning motion of the hand returned the roll within its case. This performance we took to mean a prayer for the happy completion of our pilgrimage. Mister Smith bowed his acknowledgment.
The man in charge of the cauldron produced a brick of compressed tea, black in colour, broke a piece off and fed it into the water. For several minutes he stirred the brew with a long-handled wooden spoon and the fragrance from the boiling pot assailed our noses most agreeably. Next was produced a wooden jar from which the lid was removed to reveal a substance that looked to me like honey but which later turned out to be butter. Spoonsful of the stuff were added to the brew and the stirring and simmering went on for some time.
Two mugs were produced and these were sufficiently unusual for me to ask to handle one before it was used for the tea. It was of burnished brass and had once been the lower part of the casing holding the explosive charge for a small shell. A strip of the same metal had been bent round and attached to the cup by bronze rivets to make a handle. I turned the cup upside down to see if there were the usual marks of origin on the base. There were a few faint imprints but they had been so worn away with use that I could make nothing of them. The Mongols seemed flattered by my interest and I was sorry that I could not have asked them where they picked up the mugs.
The procedure for passing around the tea was rather amusing, since it involved guessing our ages in order that the more senior on both sides should be first served. About Mister Smith they had no difficulty. The first two cups dipped into the brew went to him and the Mongol gun-owner. When we turned over our own mug to the cook, he filled it and passed it without hesitation to Paluchowicz. I saw the Sergeant make a face of great distaste at his first gulp, look at the American and then smack his lips as Smith was doing to show appreciation of what he was drinking. Smith sipped away with great composure.
Kristina and I were the last to be served. While we awaited our turn I teased her about the custom of a country that ruled ‘Ladies last’. She replied that placing her last might mean only that they recognized her as the youngest of us. The Mongols watched the laughing exchanges between us and I am sure they would have loved to know what we talked about. When our turn did come I could sense the others looking at us surreptitiously. The tea was comfortingly hot but it tasted foul. We kept our faces straight and avoided each other’s eyes. The savour of the fragrant leaves was overborne by the sickening tang of rancid butter which floated in glistening globules of fat on the surface. But we got through it and I had to exercise great self-control to stop laughing out loud as Kristina gave out a couple of decorous lip-smackings.
The Mongols’ hospitality was rounded off with the gift of a little tobacco and a few nuts. We all stood and made our farewells. We walked away and when I looked back from fifty yards away they were squatting down again, their backs towards us. In that short distance we had passed out of their lives and they out of ours.
I was to remember later that they thought our trail to Lhasa merited a special prayer. We were striding into the burning wastes of the Gobi waterless and with little food. None of us then knew the hell we were to meet.
16
The Gobi Desert: Hunger, Drought and Death
TWO DAYS without water in the hillocky, sand-covered, August furnace of the Gobi and I felt the first flutterings of fear. The early rays of the sun rising over the rim of the world dispersed the sharp chill of the desert night. The light hit the tops of the billowing dunes and threw sharp shadows across the deep-sanded floors of the intervening little valleys. Fear came with small fast-beating wings and was suppressed as we sucked pebbles and dragged our feet on to make maximum distance before the blinding heat of noon. From time to time one or other of us would climb one of the endless knolls and look south to see the same deadly landscape stretching to the horizon. Towards midday we stuck our long clubs in the sand and draped our jackets over them to make a shelter. Alarm about our position must have been general but no one voiced it. My own feeling was that we must not frighten the girl and I am sure the others kept silent for the same reason.
The heat enveloped us, sucking the moisture from our bodies, putting ankle-irons of lethargy about our legs. Each one of us walked with his and her own thoughts and none spoke, dully concentrating on placing one foot ahead of the other interminably. Most often I led the way, Kolemenos and the girl nearest to me and the others bunched together a few yards behind. I was driving them now, making them get to their feet in the mornings, forcing them to cut short the noon rest. As we still walked in the rays of the setting sun the fear hit me again. It was, of course, the fundamental, most oppressive fear of all – that we should die here in the burning wilderness. I struggled against a panicky impulse to urge a return the way we had come, back to water and green things and life. I fought it down.
We flopped out against a tall dune and the cold stars came out to look at us. Our bone-weariness should have ensured the sleep of exhaustion but, tortured with thirst, one after another twisted restlessly, rose, wandered around and came back. Some time after midnight I suggested we start off again to take advantage of the cool conditions. Everybody seemed to be awake. We hauled ourselves upright and began again the trudge south. It was much easier going. We rested a couple of hours after dawn – and still the southerly prospect remained unaltered.
After this one trial there were no more night marches. Makowski stopped it.
‘Can you plot your course by the stars?’ he asked me. The others turned haggard faces towards me.
I paused before answering. ‘Not with complete certainty,’ I confessed.
‘Can any of us?’ he persisted. No one spoke.
‘Then we could have been walking in circles all through the night,’ he said heavily.
I sensed the awful dismay his words had caused. I protested that I was sure we had not veered off course, that the rising sun had proved us still to be facing south. But in my own mind, even as I argued, I had to admit the possibility that Makowski was right. In any case, the seed of doubt had been sown and we just could not afford to add anything to the already heavy burden of apprehension.
So we went on through the shimmering stillness. Not even a faint zephyr of air came up to disperse the fine dust hanging almost unseen above the desert, the dust that coated our faces and beards, entered into our cracked lips and reddened the rims of eyes already sore tried by the stark brightness of the sun.
The severely-rationed dried fish gave out on about the fifth day and still we faced a lifeless horizon. In all this arid world only eight struggling human specks and an occasional snake were alive. We could have ceased to move quite easily and lain there and died. The temptation to extend the noonday halt, to go on dozing through the hot afternoon until the sun dropped out of sight, invited our dry, aching bodies. Our feet were in a pitiable state as the burning sand
struck through the thin soles of our worn moccasins. I found myself croaking at the others to get up and keep going. There is nothing here, I would say. There is nothing for days behind us. Ahead there must be something. There must be something. Kristina would stand up and join me, and Kolemenos. Then the others in a bunch. Like automatons we would be under way again, heads bent down, silent, thinking God knows what, but moving one foot ahead of the other hour after desperate hour.
On the sixth day the girl stumbled and, on her knees, looked up at me. ‘That was foolish of me, Slav. I tripped myself up.’ She did not wait for my assistance. She rose slowly from the sand and stepped out beside me. That afternoon I found to my faint surprise and irritation I was on my knees. I had not been conscious of the act of falling. One moment I was walking, the next I had stopped. On my knees, I thought . . . like a man at prayer. I got up. No one had slackened pace for me. They probably hardly noticed my stumble. It seemed to take me a very long time to regain my position at the head again. Others were falling, too, I noticed from time to time. The knees gave and they knelt there a few unbelieving seconds until realization came that they had ceased to be mobile. They came on again. There was no dropping out. These were the signs of growing, strength-sapping weakness, but it would have been fatal to have acknowledged them for what they were. They were the probing fingers of death and we were not ready to die yet.
The sun rose on the seventh day in a symphony of suffused pinks and gold. Already we had been plodding forward for an hour in the pale light of the false dawn and dully I looked at Kristina and the other shambling figures behind me and was struck with the unconquerable spirit of them all. Progress now was a shuffle; the effort to pick up the feet was beyond our strength.