Invasion of the Sea. Jules VerneЧитать онлайн книгу.
way to the end of the passage. If the boat was there, he would get in at once. If it had not arrived, he would wait until the first light of dawn, and then—who knows?—perhaps he would try to swim to freedom, even at the risk of being dragged away by the currents into the Gulf of Gabès. It would be his last and only chance to escape a death sentence.
Hadjar went out to make sure no one was approaching the courtyard. Then, wrapping his clothing tightly around his body, he slipped into the passage.
The passageway was about thirty feet long and just wide enough for a man of average size to squeeze into it. As Hadjar crawled along it, some folds of his clothing caught and were torn on its jagged sides. But slowly and with great effort, he finally reached the grating.
This grating, as mentioned, was in very poor condition. The bars had come loose from the stone, which crumbled at a touch. After five or six good tugs, it gave way. Hadjar set it back against the side of the passageway, and the way was clear.
The Tuareg chieftain had only two more meters to crawl to reach the opening. This was the hardest part of all, since the drain became extremely narrow at the end. He managed to push through, however, and did not need to wait long.
Almost at once, these words came to his ears: “We’re here, Hadjar.”
With one final exertion, Hadjar emerged half way out of the opening, ten feet above the surface of the water.
Harrig and Sohar stood up and reached out to him. But just as they were about to pull him out, they heard footsteps. Their first thought was that the sound had come from the little courtyard, that a guard had been sent to get the prisoner and take him away earlier than planned. Now that the prisoner was gone, the alarm would be sounded in the fort!
Hadjar’s escape
Fortunately, this was not the case. The sound had come from the sentinel, walking on the prison’s parapet. Perhaps the approach of the boat had attracted his attention, but he could not see it from where he was standing. And, in any case, such a small boat would be invisible in the darkness.
However, they needed to be very cautious. Sohar and Harrig waited a few moments, then seized Hadjar by the shoulders, gradually pulled him free, and lowered him into the boat with them.
A strong pull on the oars propelled the boat seaward. Wisely, they decided not to row along the walls of the bordj or along the beach, but rather to proceed up the gulf as far as the marabout. In doing so, they could avoid the little boats that were moving in and out of the port, for the calm night made for good fishing. As they passed the Chanzy on their beam, Hadjar stood up, crossed his arms, and stared for a long time at the cruiser, his eyes full of hatred. Then, without saying a word, he sat down again in the stern of the boat.
Half an hour later they disembarked on the sand and pulled the boat onto dry land. The Tuareg chieftain and his two comrades headed for the marabout, and reached it without incident.
Djemma came to meet her son, took him in her arms, and spoke only one word: “Come!”
Rounding the corner of the marabout, she rejoined Ahmet and Horeb. Three horses were waiting, ready to dash off into the night with their riders. Hadjar quickly swung up into his saddle, and Harrig and Horeb did as well.
“Come,” Djemma had said when she saw her son. Now, with her hand pointing toward the shadowy regions of the Djerid, she again spoke a single word: “Go!”
A moment later, Hadjar, Horeb, and Harrig disappeared into the darkness.2
The old Tuareg woman stayed in the marabout with Sohar until morning. She had ordered Ahmet to return to Gabès. Had her son’s escape been discovered? Was the news already spreading through the oasis? Had the authorities sent out detachments in pursuit of the fugitive? In what direction across the Djerid would they go looking for him? And would the campaign against the Tuareg chieftain and his followers, which had earlier led to his capture, now be resumed?
“Go!” said Djemma.
That was what Djemma desperately wanted to know before starting out toward the chotts region. But Ahmet could learn nothing as he prowled around the outskirts of Gabès. He even went within sight of the bordj, stopping at the bazaar merchant’s house to tell him that the rescue had succeeded—that Hadjar was free at last and was now fleeing across the solitary wastes of the desert.
The merchant had heard no gossip of the escape and, if there had been any, he would certainly have been one of the first to know.
But the first glimmers of dawn would soon light up the eastern horizon of the gulf, and Ahmet did not wish to tarry any longer. It was important for the old woman to leave the marabout before daybreak. She was well known to the authorities and, next to that of her son, her own capture was of highest priority. While it was still dark, Ahmet returned to her and guided her onto the road to the dunes.
The next day, the cruiser sent a launch to the port to pick up the prisoner and take him back to the ship.
When the prison guard opened the door to Hadjar’s cell, all he could report was that the Tuareg chieftain had disappeared. A glance down the drain, from which the grating had been removed, made it only too obvious how the escape had been carried out. Had Hadjar tried to swim to safety? If so, had the current dragged him out into the gulf? Or, rather, did he have accomplices who might have taken him somewhere along the shore in a boat?
There was no way to know for certain. A search of the area near the oasis brought no results. Not a trace of the fugitive, living or dead, was to be found—either on the plains of the Djerid or in the waters of the Gulf of Gabès.
iv
Mr. de Schaller extended a warm welcome to everyone who had accepted his invitation and thanked the officers, the French and Tunisian officials, and the leading citizens of Gabès who had honored the meeting with their presence.
“There is no denying, gentlemen,” he began, “that the progress of science has made it more and more impossible to confuse history and legend. In the final analysis, they are mutually exclusive. Legend belongs to the poets, history to the scientists, and each has its own special following. Although I fully recognize the merits of legend, today I am obliged to relegate it to the realm of the imagination and come back to realities proven by scientific observation.”
The new hall in the Gabès casino could hardly have found an audience more willing to follow the lecturer in his interesting demonstrations. Since the project that would be the topic of his lecture already had their full support, his words were greeted from the very beginning by a flattering murmur. A few of the natives in the crowd were the only ones who seemed to maintain a cautious reserve, and that was because the project Mr. de Schaller was preparing to review had been looked on with disfavor for half a century by the sedentary and nomadic tribes of the Djerid.
“We will readily admit,” continued the speaker, “that the people of the ancient world had vivid imaginations, and that historians skillfully catered to their tastes by repeating as history what was in fact only tradition. The inspiration for these tales was purely mythological.
“Bear in mind, gentlemen, what Herodotus, Pomponius Melas, and Ptolemy have to say. In his History of Peoples, Herodotus tells of a land that extends as far as the River Triton, which empties into the bay of the same name. He recounts an episode in the journey of the Argonauts, when Jason’s ship, driven by a storm onto the coast of Libya, was cast back westward as far as the Bay of Triton, whose western shore could not be seen. From this account it must be concluded that the bay in question was at that time connected to the sea. That is, in fact, what Scylax, in his Journey around the Mediterranean, says about a large lake whose shores were inhabited by various Libyan peoples. It must have covered the present-day