ragged files of trudging figures, bowed in the rain, their heads
covered with their shammas, their bare feet sliding and slipping in the
mud. Hungry, cold and dispirited, they toiled onwards, carrying
weapons that grew heavier with every painful step still they kept on.
The rain had hampered the Italian pursuit. Their big troop-carriers
were bogged down helplessly in the treacherous mud, and each engorged
mountain stream, each ravine raged with the muddy brown rain waters.
They had to be bridged by the Italian engineers before the transports
could be manhandled across, and the pursuit continued.
The Italian General Badoglio had been denied a crushing victory and
thirty thousand Ethiopian troops had escaped him at Aradam.
It was Lij Mikhael's special charge, placed upon him -personally by the
King of Kings, Baile Selassie, to bring out those thirty thousand men.
To extricate them from Badogho's talons, and regroup them with the
southern army under the Emperor's personal command upon the shores of
Lake Tona. Another thirty-six hours and the task would be
accomplished.
He sat on the rear seat of the mud-spattered Ford sedan, huddled into
the thick coarse folds of his greatcoat, and although it was worn and
lulling in the sedan interior, and although he was exhausted to the
point at which his hands and feet felt completely numb and his eyes as
though they were filled with sand, yet no thought of sleep entered his
mind. There was too much to plan, too many eventualities to meet, too
many details to ponder and he was afraid. A terrible black fear
pervaded his whole being.
The ease with which the Italian victory had been won at Araoam filled
him with fear for the future. It seemed as though nothing could stand
against the force of Italian arms against the big guns, and the bombs
and the nitrogen Mustard. He feared that another terrible defeat
awaited them on the shores of Lake Tona.
He feared also for the safety of the thirty thousand in his charge. He
knew that the Danakil column of the Italian expeditionary force had
fought its way into the Sardi Gorge and must by now have almost reached
the town of Sardi itself. He knew that Ras Golam's small force had
been heavily defeated on the plains and had suffered doleful losses in
the subsequent defence of the gorge. He feared that they might be
swept aside at any moment now and that the Italian column would come
roaring like a lion across his rear cutting off his retreat to Dessie.
He must have time, a little more time, a mere thirty-six hours more.
Then again, he feared the Gallas. At the beginning of the Italian
offensive they had taken no part in the fighting but had merely
disappeared into the mountains, betraying completely the trust that
the
Harari leaders had placed in them. Now, however, that the Italians had
won their first resounding victories, the Gallas had become active,
gathering like vultures for the scraps that the lions left. His own
retreat from Aradam had been harassed by his erstwhile allies. They
hung on his flanks, hiding in the scrub Laid scree slopes along the
Dessie road, awaiting each opportunity to fall upon a weak unprotected
