“I have no serious worries about the native population, despite the complications caused by settling part of the Tuareg tribe in the southern territories. It is possible that this development may even prove to be a very positive one: after all, the desert Bedouins were very cooperative during the digging of the Suez Canal. For the moment, these nomadic tribes appear to be quiet but watchful; it would nevertheless be a mistake to rely too heavily on their seeming inactivity. With a brave and experienced soldier like Captain Hardigan, who has confidence in the men under his command and is thoroughly familiar with the ways and customs of the strange inhabitants of these regions, you may be sure that we will have nothing to fear. Upon our return we will give you a precise account of its status and an exact estimate as to the cost of completing this project. As a result, you will be able to share in the glory (and, I venture to say, the profits) of a ‘great work’ that is both progressive and patriotic. Although earlier doomed to failure, it will now, thanks to you, be successfully completed. We shall accomplish this for the honor and prosperity of our homeland, which will come to our assistance as needed and, as in the south Oran region, will find a way to transform the hostile tribes into the most loyal and trustworthy guardians of our incomparable conquest over nature.
“Gentlemen, you know who I am, and you also know what strengths, both financial and intellectual, I bring to this great work. These combined strengths overcome all obstacles. Once our new company is organized, I guarantee that we will succeed where our predecessors, less well equipped than we, have failed. That is what I wanted to tell you before I leave for the south. As you well know, confidence and steadfast energy always lead to success. A hundred years after the French flag was raised over the kasbah in Algiers, we will finally see our French fleet sailing over the Sahara Sea, bringing supplies to our desert outposts.”5
v
As Mr. de Schaller had announced at the meeting in the casino, the work would be resumed in an orderly and energetic fashion after the planned expedition returned, and the Gabès ridge would finally be breached, permitting the waters from the gulf to flow through the new canal. But the first essential step would be to make an on-site investigation of whatever was left of the previous work. The best method to accomplish that seemed to be to follow the route of the first canal through the Djerid to the point where it emptied into Chott Rharsa, and the route of the second from Chott Rharsa to Chott Melrir, through the smaller chotts lying between them, then to travel around Chott Melrir (after making contact with a work party that had been hired at Biskra), and finally to decide on the location of the various ports on the Sahara Sea.
For the exploitation of the two million five hundred thousand hectares granted by the state to the France-Overseas Company,1 as well as the purchase, as needed, of the latter’s existing constructions and available raw materials, a powerful new company had been formed, with a board of directors based in Paris. The stocks and bonds issued by the new company seemed to elicit a favorable response from the public. Their quoted value in the stock exchange was high, mostly because of the financial success the company’s directors had previously shown in large business dealings and beneficial public works projects.
The bright future of this undertaking, one of the largest of the mid-twentieth century, seemed to be guaranteed from every standpoint.
The new company’s chief engineer was the very speaker who had just outlined the history of the work already completed, and he would be in charge of the expedition that would assess the present state of this work.
Mr. de Schaller was forty years old, of medium height, strong-willed (or, to use the popular expression, bull-headed), with short hair, a reddish-blond moustache, a small mouth, thin lips, sharp eyes, and a piercing gaze. His broad shoulders, his strong limbs, the barrel chest where lungs pumped as smoothly as a high-pressure machine in a large, well-ventilated room, were all signs of a very robust constitution. And he was as perfectly well equipped mentally as he was physically. After graduating near the top of his class from Central,2 he immediately made a name for himself with his first construction projects and progressed rapidly along the road to fame and fortune. No one ever had a more positive attitude than he. With his reflective and methodical mind—mathematical, if one may use that term—he never let himself be deceived by illusions. It was said of him that he calculated the chances of success or failure of a situation or a business affair with a precision “carried to the tenth decimal place.” He reduced everything to figures and summed it up in equations. If ever there was a human being immune to flights of fancy, it was certainly this number-and-algebra man, who had been assigned to complete the vast work of creating the Sahara Sea.
Since Mr. de Schaller, after an objective and meticulous study of Captain Roudaire’s plan, had declared it to be feasible, then that clearly meant it was. Under his direction, there would certainly be no miscalculation in either materials or finances. Those who knew the engineer said over and over again, “If de Schaller is involved in the project, it must be a good one!” and there was every reason to assume that they were right.
Mr. de Schaller’s plan had been to travel around the perimeter of the future sea, to make sure nothing would prevent the water from flowing through the first canal as far as the Rharsa and through the second as far as the Melrir, and to check on the condition of the banks and shoreline that would contain the twenty-eight billion tons of water.
Since his team of future coworkers would include some members of the France-Overseas Company as well as new engineers and entrepreneurs, some of whom, including senior officials, could not come to Gabès at that time, the chief engineer had decided not to take with him any members of the new company’s still incomplete personnel, in order to avoid any subsequent conflict of authority.
He did take with him, however, a servant, or valet—if he had not been a civilian, he could have been called an “orderly.” Punctual, methodical, one might say “military,” even though he had not seen military service, Mr. François was the ideal man for this task. His robust health enabled him to endure without complaint the many exhausting ordeals he had experienced during his ten years in the engineer’s employ. He said little, but though he was short on words, he was long on ideas. He was a thinking man, a perfect precision instrument, for whom Mr. de Schaller had a high regard. He was sober, discreet, and clean, and would never let twenty-four hours go by without shaving. He wore neither sideburns nor moustache, and had never, even under the most difficult conditions, neglected his daily toilette.3
It goes without saying that the expedition organized by the chief engineer of the French Sahara Sea Company would not accomplish its objectives unless certain precautions were taken. It would have been foolhardy for Mr. de Schaller to set out across the Djerid accompanied only by his servant. Work sites established by the former company were widely separated and lightly guarded, if at all; accordingly, communications were notoriously unreliable, even for caravans, in this land where nomads were constantly on the move. The few military command posts set up previously had been taken out of service many years ago. Further, the attacks of Hadjar and his band must not be forgotten. That fearsome leader, following his capture and imprisonment, had escaped before the just sentence in store for him could rid the country of his presence. It was only too obvious that he would want to resume his thieving activities.
Moreover, the situation was in Hadjar’s favor at the moment. It was highly unlikely that the Arabs of southern Algeria and Tunisia, to say nothing of the sedentary and nomadic tribes of the Djerid, would stand by without protest while Captain Roudaire’s project was carried out, for it would involve the destruction of several oases in the Rharsa and Melrir regions. The owners would be compensated, of course, but by and large, the compensation would not be to their advantage. Undoubtedly, some interests had been infringed upon, and those owners felt a deep hatred whenever they thought of their fertile touals disappearing beneath the waters coming in from the Gulf of Gabès. Those peoples whose way of life would be disrupted by the new “Sahara Sea” now also included the Tuareg, who were