XIX.
FROM GOMUSHTEPE TO THE BORDER OF THE DESERT.
We left Gomushtepe on the following day at noon. We were accompanied by Khandjan and our other friends and acquaintances. They remained with us for an hour, and no matter how often I begged of Khandjan to turn back, I could not induce him to do so. He insisted upon rigorously observing the laws of Turkoman hospitality, lest he might give me cause for complaining of him. It was truly with a heavy heart that I exchanged with him a last farewell embrace, for I had learned to love him as one of the most noble-minded men, who, unselfishly and without the least self-interest, had for a considerable time most hospitably entertained myself and five others. I felt sorry at not being able to make some suitable return for so much kindness, but what I regretted most was my having been compelled to practise deception upon this trustiest of friends by my disguise and compulsory concealments.
We proceeded in a north-eastern direction through an endless plain. Our small caravan, consisting of Ilias's camels and six horses, moved on in close order, we having been informed by Kulkhan that there were such karaktchis in this part of the country who did not acknowledge his authority, and would feel no hesitation at attacking himself, if they thought themselves the stronger party. Ilias gave me as far as Etrek the use of a horse he had got from Kulkhan in order to save me the discomfort of riding on a camel. But whenever we came across a puddle I had to share my saddle with one of our companions, on foot, and he would clutch at my clothes with such violence, that he nearly pulled me from my seat. THREATENED BY THE WILD BOAR.On one occasion we had to pass through a marsh covered with rushes, which served as a cover for an immense herd of wild hogs or boars. Kulkhan and Ilias had ridden in advance in order to discover some roundabout path, by means of which the caravan might steer clear of these wild animals. As I was cautiously feeling my way with a companion in the saddle, my horse gave a sudden start; and before I well knew what had happened, we were both of us sprawling on the ground. Midst roars of laughter coming from my companions, I heard something like a cross between a squeal and a howl, and turning to discover the place whence these sounds issued, I saw before me two young wild pigs over which I had stumbled. Their mother had frightened my horse, and hearing the squeal of her litter she drew quite near us in a rage, showing her tusks; and she would have made a rush upon us if Shirdjan, the brother of Ilias, had not perceived our perilous position and placed himself with his lance raised high between us and the infuriated animal. The young pigs had, meanwhile, scrambled off, and their mother turned tail and went back to her lair. Kulkhan's son caught the runaway horse and brought it back to me with the remark that I was a lucky man to have escaped being killed by a wild hog, for he who receives his death from such an animal enters the next world in a state of uncleanness, no matter how pious a life he had led, and must suffer the fires of hell for five hundred years before he can be purified again, and even then not completely.
We passed the first night in a group of tents at a cousin's of Kulkhan. They knew already of our coming, and my hungry hadji friends interpreted the smoke rising above the tents, which we saw upon drawing near, as a sign of coming good cheer. The other hadjis and myself were quartered in the narrow tent of Allah Nazr. This aged Turkoman, poor and needy as he was, grew wild with joy at Heaven sending him guests to entertain. A goat was all he possessed, but he killed it to do honour to his guests. The following day he succeeded in getting some bread for us, a thing which had not been in his house for weeks; and upon seeing us surrounding the plate filled with meat and falling to with our tremendous appetites, our host and his aged helpmate, who had seated themselves opposite to us, shed tears of joy, in the literal sense of the word. Allah Nazr would not retain for himself any part of the animal thus offered up to us; its horns and hoofs, which if burnt to powder are used with effect on the galled sores of camels, he gave to Ilias; for me he destined the skin to serve as a vessel for water, having first rubbed it well with salt, and then carefully dried it in the sun.
Next day we resumed our march. At this station I took for the first time possession of my basket, having sacks of flour placed as a counterpoise in the other basket; for my friend Hadji Bilal wished to deny himself this luxury on that day. We had been going onward for scarcely two hours when we lost sight of green fields and came upon a melancholy soil emitting the pungent smell of salt. We were in the desert. The nearer we approached the mountain ridge called Kara Sengher (black wall) the softer did the soil get under our feet, and it became quite a bog when we came quite near the mountain. The camels, with their legs stretched apart, had every trouble to keep from sliding, and I was threatened every minute with being upset and left on the ground, basket and all. I deemed it wiser to dismount of my own accord, and after a dreadful scramble of one hour and a half succeeded in climbing the Kara Sengher, from whence we shortly afterwards reached Kulkhan's ova (tent).
AN ANXIOUS MOMENT.When we arrived there I was rather startled at being immediately conducted by Kulkhan into his own tent, and being told by him with great emphasis that I should not stir out of it until I was called. A few minutes later I heard him without, scolding his wife and reproaching her with never being able to find the chains when they were needed, and ordering her to find them for him immediately. Upon hearing this I began to suspect that something was wrong. Several times he entered the tent looking about him with gloomy looks, but never addressing a syllable to me. My suspicions increased, and all at once it struck me as strange that Hadji Bilal, who but rarely left me to myself, had not been near me for a considerable time. The most dreadful misgivings overwhelmed me; that fatal clanking of the chains outside the tent still continued. At last I saw that my fears were unfounded, for the chains being forthcoming I found that they were intended for the poor Persian slave who had been dragged with us to this place. Kulkhan afterwards prepared tea, and when we had partaken of it he beckoned to me to follow him to a new tent, adjoining his, especially erected for my use. This was to have been a surprise, and hence came the mysterious manner which had given me such a scare.
I must confess that this was neither the first nor the last time that the grim look and suspicious doings of the Turkomans, who afterwards turned out to be my best friends, filled my mind with all kind of horror. I never felt quite safe as to my future, and the only consolation left to me was my lameness, which made me quite valueless in the eyes of the slave-dealers. Of course, as the time went on, I began to be accustomed to this perpetual anxiety, and in spite of the constant danger in which I found myself, I regained my good humour, and my wit and jokes not only exhilarated my hadji fellows, but even the surliest son of the desert, and the usual remark of the Turkomans was, "That lame hadji of Roum (Turkey) is a jolly fellow; he would make a capital merry-maker."