Read Journeys on the Silk Road for Free Online Page B

Macartney’s roof. Even as Macartney was enjoying the lively companionship of some new European faces in town—and a gregarious pair at that—he was gleaning information about their plans and quietly passing the news to Stein, along with the confidential reports prepared for his own political masters in India. The Germans represented rival ambitions. Nothing personal, of course.
    Albert von Le Coq, two years older than Stein, was an assistant at Berlin’s Ethnological Museum. It was the first time von Le Coq, who studied medicine and languages before joining the museum, had led an expedition or journeyed to Turkestan. He was the wealthy heir to a wine and brewing fortune, and judging by the contents of his baggage he had a very different temperament to the reserved and stoic Stein. Von Le Coq ventured into the desert with twelve bottles of Veuve Clicquot champagne, a farewell gift from his sisters. He chilled the bubbly by wrapping the bottles in wet felt and leaving them in a breeze. After a hard day’s digging, he found it a most refreshing drink.
    He had set out from Germany with Theodor Bartus, the museum’s knockabout handyman. Bartus had no formal education but knew his way around Turkestan, having accompanied the first German expedition to Turfan three years earlier. In Kashgar, the two men were waiting impatiently for the arrival of their museum boss and Indian scholar Professor Albert Grünwedel. Traveling overland from Europe, the professor had been stuck for more than a month in Russian Turkestan waiting for baggage that had gone astray. Until Grünwedel turned up, von Le Coq’s movements were stymied.
    “The absence of the Professor seems to have disconcerted Mr. Lecoq considerably,” Macartney wrote in mid-October. Exactly why would not be known until much later. But Macartney did learn that von Le Coq appeared to have his eye on the very places Stein was aiming for: Lop Nor and Dunhuang. Moreover, Macartney also learned von Le Coq was not looking forward to the arrival of Grünwedel, who would take over as expedition leader. Von Le Coq and Bartus worked well together; they moved quickly and traveled light. Grünwedel, by contrast, was slow and meticulous. Their different methods were not the only reason for disharmony. “There is a good deal of jealousy between Grünwedel & Lecoq, and Lecoq tells me that he is not anxious to work with Grünwedel with whom he is rather afraid of having misunderstandings. Bartus is a splendid man,” Macartney reported three weeks later.
    Indeed Bartus was a garrulous sidekick. The former sailor had washed up in Australia at one stage, where he had learned to ride a horse, lost his money in a Melbourne bank collapse and returned to Europe. He was a man with a mischievous sense of humor. When Turkestan officials once asked him to teach them a polite German greeting, he kept a straight face as he instructed them to say: “Good morning, old fat-head.” Bartus taught them well. When Grünwedel returned six years later, that was how he was greeted.
    Macartney kept silent about Stein’s plans to his lively German guests. But he suggested that perhaps Stein should write to von Le Coq, whom he found a “pucca” well-read man, and make clear his intentions. After all, Stein’s movements could not remain a secret for much longer. What prompted Macartney’s suggestion isn’t known. Perhaps it was made out of the respect Macartney developed for von Le Coq in the two months the German spent under Chini Bagh’s roof. Or maybe he saw it as a way for Stein to explicitly stake out his territory. But declaring his hand was against Stein’s instincts. He had gone to great lengths to keep his plans secret and did not want his rivals tipped off. “I have never believed in the advantage of grand announcements beforehand,” Stein wrote back.
    Meanwhile, Grünwedel and his young offsider, Referendar Pohrt, eventually overcame their problems with the Russian railways and reached