The Salt Road by Jane Johnson

Author:Jane Johnson [Johnson, Jane]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Anchor Canada
Published: 2011-01-04T07:00:00+00:00

21

We ate a basic but delicious meal of goat’s cheese and bread and almonds and dates, the sort of meal that thousands of travellers must have eaten here beneath the palms for centuries. Shading my eyes against the bright land beyond, I could easily imagine a caravan of camels silhouetted against the pale sky, wending their weary way out of the cauldron of the Sahara, relieved by the proximity of the end of the desert and the promise of shade and water. But it was not camels that appeared on the skyline as we were finishing our picnic, but what looked like an army jeep, the sort you see in black-and-white war movies, its khaki sides pitted and dented and covered in dust. It looked almost as if a part of the desert had grown wheels and was rolling towards us. Should we be concerned? I had read in the guidebook alarming stories about tourists attacked and robbed in the desert, their vehicles stolen, the passengers left for dead. I shot a look at Taïb, but he was on his feet, a little half-smile on his lips. Then he started to loop his turban cloth around his head.

The jeep pulled in beside our vehicle and three men got out. They wore the same odd combination of East and West as Taïb: jeans and shirts topped by turbans; but where Taïb wore his loose around his face, all I could see of these men were their eyes, dark and glittering, out of a narrow slit in the fabric. Were they hiding their identities? I felt myself tense and turned to say something to Taïb, only to find that he now wore his own head-covering in a similar fashion. Two of the men came forward and greetings were exchanged: head nods and a sort of tentative handshake that seemed a mere touching of fingers and palms, very different from the effusive greetings I’d seen in the Berber villages. The third man hung back, keeping his distance. His eyes slid to me, then to Lallawa. He waited for a pause in the conversation, then addressed Taïb loudly and abruptly. Taïb gestured towards me in a dismissive manner – just a tourist – and, as if mollified, the man nodded and turned to take something out of the back of the jeep. By craning my neck I could see that it contained stacks of large olive jerrycans. Three of these were hefted out, money exchanged hands, and the third man counted it carefully while the other two helped Taïb refuel our vehicle. Then polite farewells were made, and the men got back into the jeep and drove away.

‘Well, that’s the most unusual petrol station I’ve ever visited,’ I said laughingly as we made our own way south from the oasis.

‘That’s how we do things here,’ Taïb said quietly. He had pulled the turban loose so that his nose and chin were visible again. He was smiling.

I looked at him suspiciously. ‘Who were those men?’

‘It’s probably better not to ask.

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