The Reluctant Hero

by Michael Dobbs

  He’d made it, but only just. He’d started running the moment he rolled away from the governor’s lifeless body, but it made him a target of suspicion, and he’d soon had to stop, slow to nothing more than a brisk walk, even as sirens sprang up on all sides and vehicles crammed with policemen had hurtled past. He’d relied on nothing more than prayer to ensure they didn’t stop to question why he was headed in the opposite direction. He’d tried to keep to side streets and the slushy back alleys, breaking into a trot when he could, finding it harder to walk than run, his heart thumping within his broken chest and his breath coming in snatches. By the time he clattered down the steps of the Fat Chance he was sweating profusely, both from the effort and the pain.

  ‘You waited,’ he gasped. The solitary open eye overflowed with a fusion of exhaustion and awe.

  ‘Of course I did, stupid. And a good thing, too, by the look of you.’ She was putting on a brave front, trying not to burst into tears.

  ‘Thank you,’ he whispered.

  She put a finger softly to his lips, swollen where he had bitten them in pain. ‘Be quiet. Do as you’re told, for once.’ She turned to Bektour. ‘Please, help us.’

  Before he could answer, there was another presence in the cellar, and a cry of anguish. They turned. It was Benazir. She was holding a gun, a Makarov, an old Sovietera pistol. And it was pointing directly at Harry.

  Less than two miles away from the Fat Chance, and much in the manner of Martha, the young prison guard was also emerging from the darkness. A violent noise was shaking the peace that had descended upon his tranquil world of unconsciousness. It was the sound of Amir Beg screaming.

  As soon as he heard the guard stirring, Beg’s cries began to take concrete form. They were no longer incoherent outpourings of his physical and emotional pain, but became specific demands. For a doctor. For the immediate presence of Sydykov. For the entire fucking army to be put on alert. And for the guard to be shot. There was a long list of reasons for the guard’s condemnation – spilling the tea, falling unconscious on duty, most of all simply for witnessing the humiliation of his master; Beg didn’t specify, it wasn’t necessary. It was enough to be within reach when a man like him worked up an appetite for vengeance.

  But Beg still had his back to him, hadn’t seen him.

  ‘I’ll fetch help, sir,’ the guard groaned, and stumbled from the room, hoping desperately that he would be able to spread the responsibility for this chaos, and find a new pair of trousers.

  ‘Mother!’ Bektour cried in concern.

  ‘Get that man out of here. He brings us nothing but trouble!’ Her words were fired with passion, and the pistol was shaking in her hand, but never away from Harry.

  Deliberately, very slowly, Bektour moved in front of Harry, placing his own body between Harry and the gun. ‘No, Mother,’ he said defiantly, ‘we owe him support, as Ta’argis. Or has Karabayev taken even that from us?’

  ‘We owe him nothing! They are not here for us, these foreigners, only for themselves!’

  ‘I’ll go,’ Harry said, still panting heavily and holding his ribs.

  Bektour would not be moved. ‘Please call the doctor, Mother.’

  ‘Someone might have seen him come in here!’ she snapped.

  ‘So the longer we wait for the doctor, the more risk we run.’ His tone was remarkably self-possessed for such a young man. He stared at his mother through his tinted glasses. ‘Please. Call him.’

  It was a moment when the balance in their lives shifted. This was more than mere youthful defiance, it was a claim to his own independence, and authority. His life, no longer hers. She seemed to grow older before she moved to a distant table and began pushing buttons on a phone. The gun remained pointed at Harry.

  The doctor was the same one who had attended Zac the night before. He must have been local, for he arrived within ten minutes. He made a rapid inspection of Harry’s injuries. ‘Like your friend, you require a hospital,’ he concluded.

  ‘I know a fine one,’ Harry replied through gritted teeth as the doctor felt across his ribs. ‘St Thomas’s. Just across the river from Westminster. I’ll visit as soon as I can.’

  The doctor shook his head in resignation, wondering what he might find in his bag that would be of any use in the treatment of multiple contusions, lacerations, abrasions, a missing ear and broken ribs.

  ‘Nothing too strong, Doctor. I need my wits about me,’ Harry said.

  ‘You are sure?’

  Harry nodded. Even doing that hurt.

  The doctor picked up a packet of Ibuprofen. ‘Only two at a time. I also prescribe plenty of rest.’

  ‘I think Amir Beg might have other ideas.’

  Harry’s supposition was correct. While a prison surgeon bobbed nervously from foot to foot, cleaning and bandaging the injured ear with a huge wad of cotton, Beg began to hurl a welter of instructions at Sydykov. The major had returned less than an hour earlier from the trip to the Celestial Mountains; he listened impassively, his face carved from granite, as Beg began closing down the city.

  His first order was that the airport should be closed and all flights cancelled. There would be complaints from airlines and demands for compensation, but Beg’s anger was beyond price. The railway station could remain open but guards with weapons prominently on display would man every crack and crevice in both platforms, and an armed patrol would be placed on all departing trains. Roadblocks would be thrown across highways out of Ashkek – not a major challenge in a mountain city which had only a handful of routes leading out along the valleys, but it meant the capital would grind quickly to a halt. That was the point, Beg insisted. Anyone running would become an obvious target. Then he instructed that the guard outside Western embassies was to be increased, all visitors scrutinized and searched and to hell with the inevitable protests. It was a blessing in such circumstances that there were only three – American, German and Japanese. The British had long promised to open some diplomatic facility, but it had been yet another promise swept away in the recession, and another slight taken by the Ta’argis. The foreigners could go fuck themselves, Beg declared, his voice rising almost to incoherence while he waited for the painkillers to kick in. Then he turned on Ashkek. Every location that had ever been suspected of harbouring critical voices was to be raided and, if necessary, wrecked. No, Beg added, banging his fist on the table, better wrecked! Teach all such maggots a lesson. And as Beg roared at those around him in order to cover his shame, Sydykov took notes, pages of them, making sure he missed nothing, his impassive face never faltering, even when Beg instructed that every hotel room was to be searched. Every hospital, too, come to that, every sick bed examined, every blanket pulled back, every bandage lifted, every patient identified, every doctor’s office inspected, every nurse interrogated. Then the entire process was to be repeated.

  Beg demanded immediate results. No stone unturned, no arm untwisted, no corner left uninspected. He warned that Sydykov’s own neck would be on the line if the man wasn’t recaptured by daybreak. The major recognized the bluster, but knew he would need to be careful. This situation put many at risk, and none more than Beg himself. That’s what made him so dangerous. Yet if he fell, the resulting tidal wave might swamp smaller boats like Sydykov’s.

  It was only when the name of the President came up that Sydykov raised an eyebrow. The troops stationed around the Presidential Palace were to be doubled, Beg instructed, which confused the major. It implied that Beg had an extraordinarily high opinion of this man Jones to think him capable of such grand folly as breaking into the palace. Unless, of course, Amir Beg had finally succumbed to the temptation of ambition and the troops were being sent to prevent Karabayev getting out . . .

  Beg roared, his hands flying out as he tried to orchestrate events, his head held rock still, his lips twisting in pain as the doctor dabbed nervously about his ear. Meanwhile Sydykov scribbled away in his notebook, and minute by minute an entire capital city was laid waste as they stepped up the hunt
for one man.

  The sirens were a constant presence on the streets, but none had stopped outside the Fat Chance, yet. The doctor had finished strapping up Harry’s ribs.

  ‘What next?’ Martha asked quietly.

  ‘The border with Afghanistan is only thirty miles away,’ Harry said, testing his breathing now his ribs were constricted. ‘My plan was to make for that.’

  ‘Was?’

  ‘It’s through the mountains. On foot.’

  ‘So what’s the alternative?’

  All she got was a silence.

  ‘I’m working on it,’ Harry said eventually.

  ‘If the plan was good enough this morning, what’s changed?’ she persisted.

  ‘He needs a hospital, not a trek through the mountains,’ the doctor insisted.

  ‘You have me now, Harry,’ Martha said.

  ‘I know.’

  It was the tone that betrayed his meaning, as though she had presented him with a flat soufflé. She was the problem, not his ribs. He knew she would react badly.

  ‘Martha, it’s the middle of winter,’ he protested, getting his argument in first. ‘There are no roads, no motels, no sushi bars, no Starbucks. Everything’s buried under God knows how many feet of snow, and the lowest pass out is at something like twelve thousand feet. That’s getting on for halfway up ruddy Everest.’

  ‘But you can’t get out any other way.’ He chewed a knuckle.

  ‘I’m coming with you.’

  ‘You can’t.’

  ‘And why not?’ she snapped, hotly, facing up to him.

  ‘I’m trained for that sort of thing. You are not.’

  ‘Your training was twenty years ago, Harry. And by the look of you, you’ve forgotten most of it.’

  ‘I won’t let you.’

  ‘Since when did you start telling me what to do?’

  ‘You should have been on the plane, like I told you. Why on earth weren’t you?’

  ‘Because she’s in love with you.’

  It was a new voice in the argument. They both turned. It was the mother.

  ‘She’s in love with you, Mr Jones. That’s why she stayed. And that’s why you can’t stop her coming with you.’

  ‘But . . .’ Harry was lost for words. His eyes settled on Martha. The flush that had spread into her cheeks told him it was true.

  ‘You mentioned dinner when we got home,’ she said, awkwardly. ‘I thought maybe I’d take you up on it, that’s all.’

  ‘Martha—’

  ‘Don’t say a word!’

  ‘It will be dangerous.’

  ‘I always suspected falling for you would be.’

  ‘No, the mountains.’

  ‘I know that, you fool!’ she bit back. Then the fire subsided. ‘What a girl will do for dinner with Harry Jones, eh?’

  ‘I don’t know what to say.’

  ‘I’d prefer it if you said absolutely nothing. Not until we get to the other side of the mountains. Anyway, I’ve been shopping for you. A whole load of winter gear. Pipe, slippers, the lot. Everything an Englishman could need in the mountains.’

  ‘You’ve got a lot to learn about me,’ he said, smiling. ‘I’m Welsh.’

  ‘Now, where did I leave them?’ she said, turning, searching the cellar for the bags.

  ‘I burned them,’ Benazir said defiantly.

  ‘You what?’

  ‘I burned them!’ she shouted, defiant.

  ‘But . . . in God’s name, why?’

  ‘We want nothing to do with you, nothing of yours here that could betray us. And I will shoot if you don’t leave. Both of you.’ The gun began waving once more. ‘Enough. The doctor is done with you. Now go!’

  Another siren passed by outside. The woman’s eyes grew wide with alarm, the gun shook all the more. Harry knew that even if she didn’t shoot, she would have no hesitation in handing them over to the authorities. She would do anything if she thought it might save her son.

  A new siren started screaming, very near at hand. It took them a second to realize that this one wasn’t passing. It had stopped right outside. Already they could hear the thumping of car doors, the clump of impatient boots on pavement, shouts. The doctor’s face turned grey with fear. They were being raided. Then came the sound of battering at the upstairs door.

  ‘Quickly, come with me. There’s a back way out,’ Bektour instructed them.

  ‘No, Bektour!’ his mother cried, flinging her arms wide, imploring him to stop. ‘They don’t stand a chance . . .’

  But the son was hustling them towards the rear of the cellar, and the doctor was hurriedly repacking his case, hiding the blood-stained swabs of gauze inside. As Bektour led them on, Harry glanced over his shoulder to see if they had left any sign of their presence. He could find nothing but a dirty coffee cup.

  And, at her table, a mother wailing in grief.

  *

  Beg’s world was filled with many twists and torments. His ear was now heavily anaesthetized, yet still gave forth frequent shrill cries of distress, but that alone wasn’t sufficient to account for his pain. It was more than the ear; mostly it was the agony of humiliation. As much as he screamed at others and demanded that they leap back in time in order to carry out his instructions more quickly, he knew there could be no hiding place from the responsibility for this fiasco. The humiliation would follow him for all eternity, or at least as long as men were meant to have two ears. There was only one way to prevent others from sniggering behind his back, and that was to terrify them, to leave no one in any doubt as to the terrible consequences that lay in wait for any man unwise enough to be caught sneering at Amir Beg. They might remember, but they would never dare mock.

  So he threw everything into the hunt for Harry. The Briton would become the first victim of a new purge, an example for others to fear, and of how no one could flout Amir Beg for long. The rules of this new game were simple; no hold barred, no arm untwisted, no room unransacked, no life left alone. The search for Harry allowed neither respite nor reservation.

  They didn’t catch him at the Fat Chance, didn’t even sniff his presence or catch the faint, lingering hint of a Western woman’s perfume. That didn’t prevent Beg’s men from turning the place over, breaking chairs, ripping down curtains, smashing bottles – at least, those they didn’t steal. They kicked and cudgelled into pieces every single computer monitor they found, then they beat up the doctor, and slapped around Bektour’s mother. But they didn’t hang around too long. They had many more lives to ruin before Amir Beg would be satisfied.

  Bektour led them through back streets, constantly glancing over his shoulder, pausing at every corner, until they came to a car park behind a block of crumbling dwellings. He stopped beside an ancient and dust-smeared Lada – Harry reckoned it must have been at least fifteen years old – and bent down beside the front wing, reaching beneath it. When he stood up, he had keys in his hand. ‘Belongs to a friend of mine,’ he explained, ‘part of our group. He won’t mind, not if I return it with a tank full of petrol.’

  ‘And windscreen wipers,’ Harry added. There were none.

  ‘He takes them off, to protect them from the frost. And to stop them being stolen, of course.’ Bektour unlocked the vehicle. Martha and Harry climbed in the back, and Bektour reversed it out.

  ‘Could do with new shocks, too,’ Harry muttered, but only to himself. He was scarcely in a position to be fastidious. The back seat was filled with clutter, the marginal paraphernalia of a young man’s world – CDs, a woollen hat, road maps, a cheap plastic anorak, an ice scraper, a rucksack filled with overused gym gear. Without asking, Harry grabbed the hat and placed it tenderly on his head so that the dressing couldn’t be seen. He also clambered into the anorak, stret2ching it across his uniform. So long as no one looked too closely, it provided a reasonable disguise. Then he opened the map, stared at it, trying to make sense of the ribbons of road that led from the city.

  ‘So what’s the plan?’ Martha asked as they passed a police ca
r screaming its way in the opposite direction.

  Harry looked up. There was a hard glint in his eye. It was the only answer she would get. Harry went back to poring over the map.

  Bektour drove through the streets, not quickly, cursing at each clumsy gear change, trying not to attract attention. Every street seemed to have some security presence, men with weapons at the ready, peering suspiciously through car windows. Harry raised a prayer of thanks for the filthy windows, but as they joined a line of vehicles waiting to cross an intersection a militiaman, an AK-47 in the crook of his arm, began prowling between the lines of traffic, bending low, peering inside the cars. Every step was bringing him closer, and not even the dirt would prevent him seeing them. Bektour moaned, froze, Harry felt sick, as though his stomach had been hollowed out. Martha smiled. The militiaman smiled back, moved on.

  ‘Seems I have my uses, after all,’ she whispered as the line of vehicles began to move again.

  After only a few hundred yards, the traffic once more began to slow. Ahead it had stopped completely, gleaming brake lights suddenly spreading along the road. ‘It’s the underpass by the university,’ Bektour muttered, ‘they must be checking every car.’ Quickly, before they were held tight in the jam, he swung the wheel and turned aside.

  ‘We’ve got to get out of the city,’ Harry said.

  Bektour nodded.

  ‘And then?’ Martha asked.

  ‘The mountains,’ Harry whispered, his voice almost lost beneath the grumble of the old exhaust. ‘There’s no other way.’

  Soon they were driving through an industrial estate full of workshops and warehouses. It had seen better times. Many of the facilities were closed, even those that bore foreign names. Gates were padlocked, windows broken, metalwork rusting, pallets overturned, yards covered in old snow. The only facility they passed that appeared to be thriving was a Germanowned cigarette factory. But the roads through the estate were mercifully empty, not a police car in sight.