Sahara

    As they moved on, and the passage of time in the Sahara unrolled across the rock, Giordino observed, 'About here it looks like the local artists stopped drawing cattle and the vegetation.'

    'Eventually the rains died away and the land began to dry out,' lectured Pitt, recalling a long forgotten course in ancient history. 'After four thousand years of uncontrolled grazing the vegetation was gone and the desert began to take over.'

    Giordino moved from the inner recesses of the cavern toward the entrance, stopping in front of another painting. 'This one shows a chariot race.'

    'People from the Mediterranean introduced horses and chariots sometime before 1000 B.C.,' explained Pitt. 'But I had no idea they penetrated this deep into the desert.'

    'What comes next, teacher?'

    'The camel period,' answered Pitt, standing in front of a long painting of a caravan depicting nearly sixty camels strung out in an S shape. 'They were brought into Egypt after the Persian conquest of 525 B.C. Using camels, the Roman caravans pushed clear across the desert from the coast to Timbuktu. Camels have been here ever since because of their incredible endurance.'

    In a more recent period in time the paintings with camels became more crude and rudimentary than earlier art styles. Pitt paused in front of another series of paintings in the rich gallery of ancient art, studying a finely drawn battle that was engraved into the rock and then painted in a magnificent red ocher color. Bearded warriors with square beards, lifting spears and shields in the air, rode in two-wheel chariots pulled by four horses, attacking an army of black archers whose arrows rained from the sky.

    'Okay, Mr. smart guy,' said Giordino, 'explain this one.'

    Pitt stepped over, his eyes following Giordino's gaze. For a few seconds Pitt stared at the drawing on the rock, mystified. The image was drawn in a linear, child-like style. A boat rode on a river bounding with fish and crocodiles. It was hard to imagine the hell outside the cave was once a fertile region where crocodiles once swam in what were now dry riverbeds.

    He moved closer, disbelief reflected in his eyes. It was not the crocodiles or the fish that gripped his concentration; it was the vessel floating in swirls that indicated the current of a river. The craft should have been a depiction of an Egyptian-style boat, but it was a totally different design, far more modern. The shape above the water was a truncated pyramid, a pyramid with the top chopped off and parallel to the base. Round tubes protruded from the sides. A number of small figures stood in various poses around the deck under what appeared to be a large flag stiffened by a breeze. The ship stretched nearly 4 meters across the coarse surface of the rock wall.

    'An ironclad,' Pitt said incredulously. 'A Confederate States Navy ironclad.'

    'It can't be, not here,' said Giordino, completely off balance.

    'It can and it is,' Pitt said flatly. 'It must be the one the old prospector told us about.'

    'Then it isn't a myth.'

    'The local artists couldn't have painted something they'd never seen. It's even flying the correct Confederate battle ensign that was adopted near the end of the Civil War.'

    'Maybe a former rebel naval officer wandering the desert after the war painted it.'

    'He wouldn't have copied local art style,' Pitt said thoughtfully. 'There is nothing in this painting that reflects Western influence.'

    'What do you make of the two figures standing on the casemate?' asked Giordino.

    'One obviously is a ship's officer. Probably the captain.'

    'And the other,' Giordino whispered, his face set in disbelief.

    Pitt examined the figure next to the captain from head to toe. 'Who do you think it is?'

    'I don't trust my sunburned eyes. I was hoping you'd tell me.'

    Pitt's mind struggled to adjust to a set of circumstances that was completely foreign to him. 'Whoever the artist,' Pitt murmured in bewildered fascination, 'he certainly painted a remarkable likeness of Abraham Lincoln.'

    Resting all day in the cool of the cave rejuvenated Pitt and Giordino to the point that they felt physically able to attempt a go for broke, nonstop crossing of the naked and hostile land to the Trans-Saharan Track. All thoughts and conjectures over the legendary ironclad in the desert were shelved temporarily in the recesses of their minds as they mentally prepared themselves for the almost impossible ordeal.

    Late in the afternoon Pitt stepped outside the cave into the unremitting fire from the sun to set up his pipe for another compass reading. Only a few minutes in that open oven and he felt as if he was melting like a wax candle. He picked out a large rock that protruded from the horizon about 5 kilometers due east as a goal for the first hour of walking.

    When he returned to the cool comfort of the cave of murals he did not have to feel the exhaustion and suffering or realize how weak he had become. His misery was all reflected in Giordino's hollow eyes, the filthy clothes, and grizzled hair, but especially in the look of a man who had come to the end of his rope.

    They had endured countless dangers together, but Pitt had never seen Giordino with the look of defeat before. The psychological stress was winning over physical toughness. Giordino was pragmatic to the core. He met setbacks and hard knocks with characteristic stubbornness, assaulting them head-on. Unlike Pitt, he could not use the power of his imagination to banish the torture of thirst and the screaming pain of a body begging to wind down from lack of food and water. He could not bring himself to sink into a dreamworld where torment and despair were substituted with swimming pools, tall tropical drinks, and endless buffet tables piled high with appetizing delicacies.

    Pitt could see that tonight was the last. If they were to beat the desert at its deadly game, they would have to redouble their determination to survive. Another twenty-four hours without water would finish them off. No strength would be left to go on. He was grimly afraid that the Trans-Saharan Track was a good 50 kilometers too far.

    He gave Giordino another hour of rest before prodding him out of a dead sleep. 'We have to leave now if we want to make any distance before the next sun.'

    Giordino opened his eyes into mere slits and struggled to a sitting position. 'Why not stay in here another day and just take it easy?'

    'Too many men, women, and children are counting on us to save ourselves so we can return and save them. Every hour counts.'

    The fleeting thought of the suffering women and frightened children down in the Tebezza gold mines was enough to wake Giordino from the heavy fog of sleep and bring him dazedly to his feet. Then at Pitt's urging, they feebly managed a few minutes of stretching exercises to loosen their aching muscles and stiff joints. One last look at the astounding rock paintings, their eyes lingering on the image of the rebel ironclad, and they set out across the great, sloping plateau, Pitt leading off toward the rock he'd pinpointed to the east.

    This was it. Except for short rest stops, they had to forge on until they reached the track and were found by a passing motorist, hopefully one with a hefty supply of water. Whatever happened, searing heat, sand driven by the wind that blasted skin, difficult terrain, they had to keep going until they dropped or found rescue.

    After having done its damage for the day, the sun slipped away and a swollen half moon took its place. Not a breath of air stirred the sand and the desert went profoundly still and silent. The desolate landscape seemed to reach into infinity, and the rocks protruding from the plateau like dinosaur bones still gave off shimmering waves from the day's heat. Nothing moved except the shadows that crept and lengthened behind the rocks like wraiths coming to life in the evening's fading light.

    They walked on for seven hours. The rock used as a compass point came and went as the night wore on and became colder. Dreadfully weak and wasted, they began to shiver uncontrollably. The extreme ups and downs in temperature made Pitt feel as if he was experiencing seasonal changes, with the heat of day as summer, the evening as fall, midnight as winter, morning as spring.

    The change in terrain came so gradually, he didn't realize the rocks and iron outcroppings had grown smaller and vanished completely. Only when he stopped to glance up at the stars for a heading and then looked ahead did he see they had come off the gradual slope of the plateau onto a flat plain cut by a series of wadis, or dry streams, carved out by long dead water flows or forgotten flash floods.

    Their progress slowed with fatigue and tapered to a plodding stumble. The weariness, the sheer exhaustion, were like weights they were forced to carry on their shoulders. They walked and kept on walking, their misery deepening. Yet they made slow and even progress toward the east on what little strength they could spare.