Taken to the Desert
The merchants shouted their warnings and women wailed and hid their children away. The desert thieves rode in their horse to rob them. A dozen thieves dropped to the ground dismounting from their horses. They had swords in hand and moved from store to store; some threatened and pushed merchants and shouted at them demanding their money. Peter hid behind a large bag of spices.
His mother and Sarah hid a few feet from him; both squatted down behind big sacs of cinnamon and figs.
The two stayed down and quiet while a thief robbed the merchant of the shop. Then, the thief walked around the shop looking for fruit or else to take with him. Suddenly, Sarah hiding behind her mother screamed. The little monkey above them grabbed her hair and scared her. Alerted by her scream, the man looked and listened. Then, he walked suspecting a mother hiding a child from him. He walked back to where Sarah had screamed and found her and her mother hiding from the thief.
“Hahaha,” the man laughed and said something in his own language.
Both mother and daughter froze in fear, but they stood unmoving and brave. The man walked closer to them. He looked at Sarah's red hair and smiled reaching for it and touching it. He held Sarah’s hair in his hand and a grin came to his face.
Then, he said something in his foreign language just for himself again. Sarah’s mom protested and slapped the thief’s hand.
He laughed and then pushed Sarah’s mother to the ground. The thief then grabbed Sarah from her waist. Peter came out from hiding.
Peter ran bravely ramming his head into the man’s waist and wrestled with the man. The thief grabbed Peter by an arm and laughed aloud. He gazed at him and dragged Peter with him too. With both children at his hands, he left seeking his horse. It took the band of thieves only a few minutes to rob the merchants of the market. Then, they jumped onto their horses and left with anything they wanted to have.
Peter squirmed kicking the man’s legs while Sarah screamed for help. Her mother stood up from the ground to get her children back and ran outside after them! But all seemed too late. The thief was on his horse trotting away. Peter was pushed down on his stomach as he tried to dismount from the horse.
The thief tied him down quickly to the horse’s saddle as the thief’s horse went out of the market with the English children on his mount. Sarah kicked and bit the man. She was unafraid of him, but he tied her down too. Peter and Sarah were taken on the horse’s mount to the desert.
Hours later in the desert, when the heat of the sun fell on the caravan, a man came to Peter and Sarah to look at them and wrapped them in desert linens to protect them from the sun. Then, the group of camels went on West under the heat of the sun above that scorched them as they traveled. Peter’s eyes gazed around seeking a route to escape, but the desert looked the same in every direction. Sarah’s face had turned from pinkish and freckled to a tomato red. That afternoon the caravan drove the camel and horses to an Oasis and the desert thieves set up an encampment there. A bonfire in the middle of it kept them warm through the cold night.
Once on the sands, Peter told his sister that soon they would be going home and not to worry. He thought about a Genie’s lamp. It could be anywhere in the desert. If they could find it, they would be saved in the blink of an eye. Just one wish from its Genie and they would be home, he said. It would grant them three wishes and they would go home, he imagined himself with the magic lamp under his arm. A Genie popping at once perhaps will get us to see the treasure-filled mountains of Ali-Baba too! He said trying to cheer up his sister sobbing and sad.
“Who knows if we get to see the gold! And see treasures that filled their trunks, “he told his sister Sarah to stop her crying and make her happy again. He imagined the enormous stone and the gate opening to his command. Inside the cave all the treasures of Ali-Baba and his forty thieves,“ he told Sarah and she stopped crying.
When Sara went to sleep and she could not hear him anymore, Peter laid next to her. He felt like crying too for a second or two but wanted to be brave indeed. The story of the White Talking Camel entered his head. Mr. Bernard’s story returned to his mind. He closed his eyes wanting to sleep too.
The thieves sat around the fire keeping an eye on their camels and the children around. He heard their guffaws celebrating; their voices sounded loud in the silence of the night. Peter put his face down on the coarse pellet, but after a while, he fixed his eyes on the small twisters of sands. Every now and then, tiny grains of sand danced pushed by the wind.
They flew in the air and up they went away like tiny stars as they gleamed in the breeze going up and up flying away. His eyes traced them wishing to fly like them. They flew like sparks of glittering gold. Up and up they went as Peter glared at them imagining flying with them away and away. He gazed at the sky and he closed his eyes.
Somehow he knew they would be saved.
“Be brave Peter like a knight! He reminded himself. Then, he thought again about the White Talking Camel and asked him to help them! Yes, help us escape, he said to himself and closed his eyes too.
Unbeknown to Peter and Sarah, the White Talking Camel had come already; he was looking after them.
The next day, the caravan got ready again and went South through Tunisia and Peter could understand the children’s language and anything the thieves said to each other. By midday, they stopped outside a tiny village and the men watered their camels. The pouch with camel’s milk went from child to child. Peter and Sarah took some of it, for now, they knew it would be a long, long trip. Sarah asked Peter where the men were taking them. They're headed to Libya, a country South and far from Tunisia, Peter thought.
Tal-Mishem, the Talking Camel, had answered their questions right in Peter’s heads without him noticing yet. Tunisia, Peter said to himself and then to Sarah, ”it is the country of Barbarossa the red beard pirate Sarah! That’s what dad read to us one day remember?
Peter said. We’ve traveled from the port of Tunis and we’re now going South, but don’t worry for mom and dad are coming for us,” Peter said.
“Tunisia is the smallest of the countries in Africa. We’re going to travel for a few days only. We’re going to travel through the Atlas mountain of Hercules, and we may even see the city of Carthage. The city of Hannibal and warring elephants, remember? Sarah reminded her brother as if she had all that in her head too.
“Do you see that tower? Peter asked.
“Yes, it looks like a tall castle in England, “Sarah said.
“That’s their place for praying. They call it the Great Mosque of
Kairouan and it’s the oldest in the world! Wow, it’s the oldest, about a thousand years old, Sarah,” Peter said.
“I see no trees of fruits here, Peter. Do they eat fruits like in Morocco?
“Well, at one time these gardens and orchards were here too and there were water canals and everything was green, Dad told me that,” Peter remembered. “Pirates robbed ships going by from Greece to Italy or Spain and those coming here. They also cut their trees and sold their woods,” Peter said.
“Are the pirates still at sea? Sarah asked fearfully.
“No, of course, no, Sarah. It was a long time ago when they lived,
“Peter said proudly remembering his father’s stories.
“Why do the people say “Bon Jour in the morning and Adieu for goodbye? Sarah asked.
“After the Turkish people lived here also the French people live here for many years and people learned French too ” Peter explained.
“Do they know English too?
“I think so Sarah, but some also talk in Italian,“ Peter said.
Sometime after the great lake of Tunis came to sight and the caravan and its camels and children prepared to stop at the lake and spend the night there. They traveled many days and many nights from the port of Tunis. The caravan with the children had left behind the old city of Sfax.