Gold Dust

Начало книги

When Ukhayyad received the camel as a gift from the chief of the Ahaggar tribes, he was still a young colt. Back then, on moonlit nights, Ukhayyad liked to brag about the thoroughbred camel to the other young men of the tribe, taking pleasure in posing questions to himself and then answering them.

“Have any of you ever seen a piebald Mahri before?”

“Never!”

“Have you ever seen a thoroughbred so graceful, so light of foot and so well proportioned?”

“Not until now.”

“Have you ever seen a Mahri who could compete with him in pride, fierceness, and loyalty?”

“Not like this one.”

“Have you ever seen a gazelle who took on the form of a camel?”

“Of course not.”

“Did you ever see anything more beautiful or noble?

“No, no, no! Admit it — you’ve never seen such a thing before and you never will again!” He would leap into the open skipping like a dancing madman until, exhausted, he would collapse on his back on the sand. There, he would raise his voice, singing one of those bewitching songs, like charms against loneliness that riders take refuge in whenever they travel across waterless deserts. He would sing his sad ballad and close with well-known lines taken from the epic of Amud’s war against the French invasion of the desert:

Читать дальше →