'Kalulu, explain to me how this has happened.'
'There are no words to explain it. When we reach the Red Stones you will see for yourself. I cannot describe these events to you. Mere words fall short of such a task.'
'I will contain my impatience.'
'Impatience is a young man's vice.' The dwarf smiled, his teeth gleaming in the gloom. 'And sleep is an old man's solace.' The plash of the waters under the canoe lulled them, and after a while they slept.
Taita woke to a soft cry from the leading canoe. He roused himself and leant over the side of the vessel to splash a double handful of water into his face. Then he blinked the drops from his eyes and looked ahead.
He made out the dark loom of land ahead.
At last they felt the drag of the beach under the hull as they ran aground. The rowers dropped their oars and leapt ashore to pull the canoes higher. The horses found their footing and lunged ashore, streaming water.
The women lifted Kalulu in his litter and carried him up the beach.
'Your men must have breakfast now,' Kalulu told Taita, 'so that we can march at first light. We have a long road to travel before we reach the Stones.'
They watched the rowers embark in the canoes and push off into the lake. The silhouettes of the swift craft merged into the darkness, until the white splash of oars was all that marked their position. Soon those, too, had vanished.
By firelight they ate smoked lake fish and dhurra cakes, then in the . dawn they set off along the lakeshore. Within half a league they came to a dry white riverbed.
'What river was this?' Taita asked Kalulu, although he knew what the answer would be.
'This was and is the Nile,' Kalulu replied simply.
'It is completely dried up!' Taita exclaimed, as he looked across the riverbed. It was four hundred paces from bank to bank, but no water flowed between them. Instead, elephant grass, like miniature bamboo that stood twice the height of a tall man, had filled it. 'We have followed the river two thousand leagues from Egypt to this place. All the way we
have found at least some water, standing pools, even trickles and rivulets, but here it is as dry as the desert.'¦ 'The water you encountered further north was the overflow from the lake Semliki Nianzu, which ran in from its tributaries,' Kalulu explained. 'This was the Nile, the mightiest river on all the earth. Now it is nothing.'
'What has happened to it?' Taita demanded. 'What infernal power could have stopped such a vast flow?'
'It is something that defies even an imagination as all-encompassing as your own, Magus. When we reach the Red Stones you will see it all before you.'
Fenn had been translating what was said for the benefit of Meren, and now he could no longer contain himself. 'If we are to follow a dry river,'
he demanded, 'where will I find water for my men and horses?'
'You will find it even as the elephants do, by digging for it,' Taita told him.
'How long will this journey take?' Meren asked.
When this had been translated, Kalulu gave him an impish smile and replied, 'Much depends on the stamina of your horses and the strength of your own legs.'
They moved fast, passing the stagnant pools of once brimming lagoons and climbing through dry, rocky gorges where waterfalls had thundered.
Sixteen days later they came upon a low ridge that ran parallel to the course of the Nile. It was the first feature that had relieved the monotony of the forest for many leagues.
'On that high ground stands the town of Tamafupa, the home of my people,' Kalulu told them. 'From the heights you can see the great waters of Nalubaale.'
'Let us go there,' Taita said. They rode up through a grove of fever trees with bright yellow trunks, which covered the slope above the dry riverbed. For lack of water the trees had died back, and their branches were leafless and twisted like rheumatic limbs. They came out on top of the ridge, where Windsmoke flared her nostrils and tossed her head.
Whirlwind was equally excited: he gave a series of bucks and jumps.
'You bad horse!' Fenn struck him lightly on the neck with the switch of papyrus she carried. 'Behave!' Then she called to Taita, 'What is exciting them, Magus?'
'Smell it for yourself,' he called. 'Cool and sweet as the perfume of Kigelia flowers.'
'I smell it now,' she said, 'but what is it?'
I
I
'Water!' he answered, and pointed ahead. To the south stood a silver cloud, and beneath it lay a curve of ethereal blue that stretched across the breadth of the horizon. 'Nalubaale, at last!'
A sturdy palisade of hardwood poles dominated the crest of the ridge.
The gates stood open and they rode through into the abandoned village of Tamafupa. Evidently it had once been the centre of a prosperous, thriving community - the abandoned huts were palatial and magnifi'
cently thatched - but the brooding silence that hung over them was eerie. They turned back to the gates and called up the rest of the party.
In response to their halloo, Kalulu was borne up to them on his litter by the panting and perspiring bodyguards. They were all solemn and contemplative as they gathered before the gates of Tamafupa and stared at the distant blue waters.
