An Honourable Man

In Khartoum the trumpeters, layers of red sand glittering on their faces, are posted at each corner of the palace roof. Trapped between the desert and the Jihad, oblivious to the heat and the impending dust storm, General Gordon is waiting, hopelessly, for Wolseley''s camel corps to cross the shimmering land and rescue him. He begins to hallucinate betrayals and beheadings; unwittingly he is about...