The Last Kestrel

by Jill McGivering

  The Danes cut the engine. The air was instantly softer as animal sounds were restored: footsteps, voices, the cry of a bird. The Danes started to pile the earth by hand in a metallic scrape of spades and gentle male grunting. Ellen listened intently. There was another sound rising beyond them. The throaty chug of a diesel engine and, tangled in it, the subdued voices of women.

  Frank swung to look as she strode off towards the sound. His face was tight with disapproval. She crossed the street before anyone could stop her and rounded a corner. The noise peaked at once.

  A tractor was labouring up the slope towards her, driven by a thin Afghan man. He was pulling a simple wooden cart, laden with women and children. The colour had been washed out of their cotton clothes. They had a subdued air, as if they were wary or afraid. They clung together as a sticky mass, extended legs dangling over the side of the cart. Toddlers stood upright in the cage of their mother’s arms, clinging to the top struts to keep their balance. The low murmur of voices fell silent as the women saw her.

  Two young soldiers were walking alongside the tractor, weapons readied. She nodded to them as they all approached.

  ‘What’s this?’

  The soldier nearest to her, a young Brit, shrugged. ‘Women, ma’am.’

  At the top of the slope, the tractor juddered to a halt. The women clambered off. They pulled their headscarves further forward, hiding their faces. Children were handed down to the ground, their noses encrusted, faces streaked with dirt. Dresses and shirts gaped with the memory of buttons.

  Ellen saw their eyes shift to a place behind her and turned to look. Najib had come round the corner, followed by Hasina, hobbling on her crutches. A low murmur of voices ran through the group of women when they saw Hasina. Finally Frank appeared, his face sullen, his gun against his chest.

  ‘We shouldn’t be here.’ Frank’s tone was petulant. ‘Let’s move.’

  Some of the young women, babies in their arms, looked to be teenagers. Their faces were thin with malnourishment, their cheekbones sharp. They drifted to nearby compounds and stood in clusters at the closed metal gates without knocking, visitors without hope. Some of the women sank to their haunches in the dust, eyes to the ground.

  Ellen spoke again to the British soldiers. ‘What’s going on?’

  One of them spat sideways into the dirt. His dark goggles hid the expression in his eyes.

  ‘Dunno, ma’am,’ he said. ‘We was just told to let them come.’

  The sun was starting to burn. The women crouched in the thin lines of shade along compound walls and waited. Hasina had reached them now and was leaning, her face pale, against a compound wall. Several women gathered round her and they spoke quietly amongst themselves, heads close together.

  Ellen turned to Najib. ‘Are the women from this village?’

  He looked round. ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘Must be from these houses.’

  ‘Where are they living now?’

  He waved his hand towards the vastness of the desert. ‘Out there, maybe.’

  Her eyes fell on a young woman whose eyes didn’t flicker away. She was holding herself erect, her expression challenging. Her clothes stood out in the crowd, the colours brighter and made of finer cotton.

  ‘Ask this woman,’ she said to Najib. ‘Ask her where she’s living.’

  Najib sighed as if to protest about the pointlessness of asking village women anything, then spoke to her. ‘In the desert,’ he said. ‘I told you.’

  The young woman ignored Najib when he lifted his hand to quieten her and jabbed the air with her finger, her voice angry.

  ‘What’s she saying now?’

  ‘They have no shelter, she is saying.’ Najib pulled a face. ‘They are getting sick. They are not having clean water.’

  ‘Which house is hers?’

  ‘This one,’ he said. He pointed to a grand compound behind them on the corner, its metal gates closed. ‘That’s what she says.’

  Frank signalled to Ellen. ‘That’s enough.’ He sounded rattled. ‘Time we moved.’

  Ellen kept her eyes on the young woman. ‘Ask her what she’s come for.’

  Najib stared at Ellen as if she were stupid. ‘We must go,’ he said. ‘Didn’t you—?’

  ‘Najib. Ask her.’

  He sighed theatrically and threw out the question. The woman rattled off another angry speech.

  ‘So many things.’ Najib counted them off on his fingers. ‘Blankets, pots, buckets, knives, stools, cots. And she has good clothes, she says. And carpets.’ He was looking increasingly incredulous. ‘Expensive carpets, this is what she says.’

  The woman was still talking.

  ‘They have goats, chickens, she says. If no one gives the animals food and water, they will surely die. This is all what she says.’ He pulled a face. ‘She is very bossy woman,’ he added in a low voice. ‘God’s mercy on her husband.’

  Frank put his hand on Ellen’s arm, his gun pointed defensively at the women. ‘Now,’ he said. ‘Time to go.’

  Ellen considered for a moment, then walked over to the grand compound and banged her fist on the metal gate. Frank swore.

  ‘Hey!’ The grille made a satisfying metallic crash.

  A bolt scratched and the inner gate opened a fraction. A gun butt poked towards her, inches from her head. Behind it, a Danish soldier with startling blue eyes and a sullen face.

  ‘These women need their things,’ she said.

  The Dane’s face was furious. ‘Not possible.’

  The feisty young woman pressed into her back, trying to peer past into the compound. Ellen felt the hard warmth of her body. The Dane scowled.

  ‘They need cooking pots. Blankets.’

  ‘This is a secure area.’ The Dane’s blue eyes were cold.

  Ellen nodded to the angry Dane, preserving her smile. ‘We’ll wait. I’m a journalist, by the way. Ellen Thomas. NewsWorld magazine.’

  The gate slammed shut in her face. The meeker women settled back in the shade and pulled children into their laps.

  Frank had stormed to the corner and disappeared. Ellen turned back to Najib.

  ‘Ask this woman about the fighters,’ she said. ‘Were they here?’

  Najib shook his head in despair.

  ‘If they come with guns, she is saying, what can we do? Now you have come with guns, what can we do?’ He lowered his voice. ‘They are lying, these village women. They all support Taliban.’

  Najib spelled out the woman’s name in Ellen’s notebook: PALWASHA.

  The metal gate opened. The cold-eyed Dane peered out, his weapon raised. A bucket flew out and splashed into the dust, followed by a bundle of cotton clothing and the crash of a metal cooking pot.

  ‘Anything else?’ Ellen asked the Dane.

  The Dane glared back. ‘You are welcome,’ he said, then slammed the metal gate shut.

  Ellen looked round at the women who were silently watching her. Hasina’s gaze was the most intense. Her strong green eyes were locked on Ellen’s, boring into her as if she were penetrating Ellen for the first time.

  The Sergeant Major was waiting for them just inside the gate of their own compound. He poked a finger at Najib. ‘Get a move on,’ he said. ‘Major Mack’s waiting.’ Ellen followed, uninvited, as they strode off.

  Mack was sitting at his table under an awning, a mess mug of tea in front of him. He twisted round as they approached and smiled. Opposite him, flowing over the edges of a spindly camp chair, was a stout Afghan man. His rounded stomach, pushing out a long white tunic, was forcing him to sit back from the table. His face looked familiar. It was dominated by a white beard, which fell from his chin in ridged waves. His full moustache, in contrast, was a confusion of black, grey and white streaks as its colour turned. The hair on his head, visible in clumps beneath a round hat, was still a glossy black. So were his eyebrows, which hung over sharp eyes. They fixed on Ellen, stony, as she held his gaze, trying to remember where she’d seen him before. He had the hard stare of a man w
ho has seen bloodshed and chaos and survived.

  ‘Ellen Thomas. Quite a celebrity in England,’ said Mack. He gestured her to a seat. ‘Join us. We’re nearly finished.’

  Mack turned to Najib, who was standing with his head lowered.

  ‘I was eager to find you a little earlier,’ he said, ‘but in fact Mr Karam speaks very good English, I discover.’

  The Afghan man turned back to Mack. ‘Just a little,’ he said. His accent was thick but his voice strong. He reached forward to take a biscuit from the tin plate on the table and a chunky foreign watch flashed at his wrist.

  ‘Mr Karam is one of the headmen here,’ said Mack. ‘We’re talking about arranging a shoura, a village meeting. See what we can do to help.’

  Karam inclined his head. ‘Certainly that can be arranged. Perhaps in two or three days?’

  Mack looked pleased. ‘Any help you need, let me know.’

  Karam rested his large hands on the table. The skin was smooth with long dark hairs bunched around the knuckles. A businessman’s hands, not a farmer’s.

  ‘There is one thing.’ He broadened his mouth into a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. ‘My wife is ill. As you know, the last days have been very difficult. And now, living without shelter in the desert – well, it is too much for her. I would be most grateful…’

  Mack pursed his lips. He pressed his hands together, making an arch with his fingers, and tapped his chin. ‘Difficult,’ he said. ‘Yes, I can see.’

  ‘It would be a sign of good intention,’ Karam went on, ‘if we could have access to a small house. My compound is under occupation. I am host of the Danish troops, I believe.’

  Mack cleared his throat. ‘Well, I’m afraid I really couldn’t—’

  Karam raised his hand to stop him. ‘But I have another house. A small place on the edge of the village. For servants and for storage and for the children to play.’ He stopped, steadied his breath. ‘Perhaps if we could go there, it would not be too inconvenient? A sort of village base, if you will.’

  He paused. The air was heavy and silent.

  ‘Where is it, exactly?’

  Karam pointed in the direction of the river. ‘Close to the house that was bombed,’ he said. ‘My brother’s house.’

  There was a moment’s silence. Karam’s eyes were empty, his smile controlled. As she made the connection, Ellen realized where she’d seen him before. In Hasina’s photographs.

  Mack nodded. He seemed embarrassed. ‘I’m sure we can work something out,’ he said. ‘Access will be restricted. We can’t allow other villagers here without permission. You understand. Security.’ He paused, his eyes on Karam’s face. ‘But perhaps, in the circumstances, for you and your wife…’ He pushed back his chair and stood up.

  Karam too got to his feet, easing himself out of the small chair. At full height, he looked all the more imposing. The two men shook hands as the officers looked on.

  As Karam turned and headed back towards the gate, Ellen pursued him, pushing alongside him to make him acknowledge her.

  ‘Your brother,’ she said. ‘His name is Abdul?’

  He stopped and turned to look at her. He was clearly not a man who was used to someone holding his gaze, especially not a woman.

  ‘He was here,’ she said. ‘Yesterday. To see his wife.’ She pointed to the curtained enclosure of the medics’ corner.

  ‘I know this.’

  Ellen felt the challenge in his eyes as he tried to stare her down. His face was hard with power. Just by looking, they were circling each other like fighting cocks, each getting the measure of the other’s strength. The silence grew round them.

  ‘The bombing,’ she said at last. ‘They were your children?’

  He did the last thing she expected. He smiled. ‘They were,’ he said. ‘Is that what you are so anxious to know?’

  ‘They know that?’ She nodded back towards the officers, bent in conversation round Mack.

  ‘They know.’ The false smile was still on his lips. ‘They offered me money. They pay per child, as I understand.’ He gave a brusque nod. ‘I declined their offer.’

  Ellen tried to read his eyes, his tone of voice. He was giving nothing away. He turned and she walked slowly by his side across the sand.

  ‘Unusual,’ she said. ‘To come from such a small village and speak such good English.’

  ‘Not so good.’

  ‘Where did you study?’

  He paused before answering. ‘In the mosque at first,’ he said. ‘Later in Kandahar. I was very fortunate about my teachers.’

  They were approaching the compound gate. ‘The poppy must have brought a lot of money to the village,’ she said. ‘This is good land.’

  He turned to her, his face composed. ‘Does it look like a rich village?’ he said.

  ‘No,’ she said, returning his half-smile. ‘That’s what makes me wonder where the money’s been going.’

  He looked past her for a moment, gazing over the heaps of kicked straw and rows of army sleeping bags, the damp shirts draped along mosquito nets to dry, and at the soldiers themselves, stripped to the waist and sweating in the sun.

  ‘Always in Afghanistan’, he said, ‘the rich get richer. And the money from poppy goes to guns, to fighting. This is the tragedy of our country.’

  ‘And where are the fighters?’ she said. ‘Where have they gone?’

  The square hat bobbed on its wiry pillow of black hair. ‘You ask too many questions,’ he said. His eyes were cold. ‘You are in my country now, in Afghanistan.’ He continued to stare at her and she felt the menace in his look. ‘Life here is easily lost. You would be wise not to make enemies.’

  She stood, watching him walk away, his back broad under his cotton clothes. He was a powerful man and a dangerous one. She felt her heart rate quicken. You should be careful, she thought, making threats like that. I make quite an enemy too. She watched Karam gain the gate. He stood proudly as the young soldier there slipped back the bolt and let him leave.

  The compound was fast turning into a barracks. The lads all had mosquito nets erected, draped with newly washed socks and damp cotton boxers. Young Hancock was lying on a mat, his head against a mud brick, his eyes closed. The wires of his iPod trailed from his ears. Frank, walking back to their corner, lit up a cigarette for himself. He tossed a spare one into Hancock’s lap as he passed. Hancock half opened a lazy eye and a hand came out like a lizard’s tongue to take it. The eye closed again.

  Dillon and Moss were both stripped to the waist, winding up buckets of water from the well. Its old-fashioned crank moaned as they turned it. Their flesh shone white in the sunshine, Moss revealed in all his flabbiness and Dillon, narrow-chested, his arms and back branded with tattoos. Their desert sunburn stopped abruptly at shirt necks and cuffs.

  Frank settled to smoke and shouted across to them. ‘Burning some fat, Moss?’

  Moss gave him the finger. They heaved out another load of water and sloshed it into army buckets. Frank lay back on his sleeping bag, smoking his cigarette and staring at the sky.

  Ellen felt restless, eager to be alone, to sit and stare into the vast bleakness of the desert and mull over the puzzle of everything she’d heard so far. She paced along the inside of the wall for a few turns, then struck out across the compound and walked round the outside of the house. Household goods had been cleared from the rooms and piled up against the walls.

  The first room she peered into had become a communications base, oozing wired kit. The second had been turned into a command centre. Satellite maps were stuck up round the walls and a large table dominated the centre of the room, scattered with more. She took a quiet step inside. The first satellite map was of the area west of Nayullah. The second showed the land they’d just taken. The valley, with the river threaded through it. The rise to the village, each compound marked with—

  ‘Looking for something?’

  The voice came from the shadows behind her. She turned. Mack, his eyes lively, was crouched
low in the corner, a pile of papers on the ground in front of him. His boots creaked as he swung himself to his feet.

  ‘Maps,’ she said. ‘Can’t resist them.’

  ‘They’re old.’ He left the papers and beckoned her across to the table. His skin smelt freshly of army soap, his breath of coffee. He picked up a map and unrolled it on the surface, weighting the ends. ‘This is the course we took yesterday.’ He traced a route with his finger across the river and into the green zone.

  She ran her eyes across the contours, measured the distances. He pointed to the dense cluster of compounds that showed the village.

  ‘This is where we are now.’

  He unrolled a second map on top of the first. This showed an area outside the green zone, where whole tracts of desert seemed no more than uninhabited wilderness. The only signs of life were scattered dots of compounds in the middle of nothingness. Hard to imagine how the families who lived there could survive at all.

  ‘Pretty bleak.’

  Mack nodded. ‘Primitive,’ he said. ‘Unchanged for centuries.’ He ran his hand slowly over the paper, reading its features. ‘I think sometimes of the British soldiers who fought the last campaign here. Walking on the same sand. Facing the same heat.’

  His expression was wistful. She thought of Najib’s comment. That Jalil thought Major Mack had the heart of an Afghan.

  ‘The ones playing the Great Game?’

  ‘Not playing.’ He tutted. ‘Giving their lives for their country.’

  She looked at the seriousness in his face. ‘Maybe history’s repeating itself. Except this time, it’s a proxy war against global jihad, not against the Russians.’

  He lifted his hand from the map and it sprang back into its roll. He turned to face her. ‘You’re clever,’ he said. ‘But it’s too easy to be cynical. Men’s lives are at risk. My men. That’s not for nothing.’ His eyes were intense on hers. ‘You have a great responsibility. You should be careful what you write.’

  ‘Oh, I am.’

  He turned abruptly back to the table, moved the map aside and unrolled a third. His cheek was flushed. She had annoyed him, punctured his sense of mission. She felt both amused and contrite. She had a tendency to be flippant without thinking, to deflate people. It wasn’t always welcome.