Stinger

by Stinger (retail) (epub)

  ‘But what can they do with one?’

  ‘The same as they did to BZ169.’

  Daru sat silent, watching us.

  I avoided his eye. ‘We have to get moving.’

  Amica gave the boy water and some of our rations, then stood up. ‘Wait for a moment,’ she said. ‘I must speak with my man.

  She led me back outside and studied my face for a moment. ‘He comes with us.’

  ‘Are you out of your mind? Our only hope of finding that Stinger is to move as fast as the Taliban we’re chasing. And you want to bring a kid with us?’

  ‘If we don’t, he’ll die.’

  ‘If we do, we will.’

  There was not a glimmer of doubt in her eyes. ‘His family are all dead because of what we did, Sean. Enough have died. No more.’

  I gave a guilty glance towards the house.

  ‘He won’t be a liability,’ Amica continued. ‘His family and his name are known. He can speak for us, vouch for us to the Taliban, and he’ll be good camouflage; we’ll look more like a man and wife with him.’

  Daru was now leaning out of the empty window frame. ‘Please take me with you,’ he said. ‘I can guide you through the mountains. I can track the Taliban. I can shoot. I can run. I can steal. I can find food. Take me with you. Take me to America.’

  Still I hesitated, lowering my voice so he could not overhear us. ‘What if he finds out what caused the flood? He could betray us.’

  ‘He won’t.’ She stared at me. ‘I mean it, Sean. He goes with us. If you’re not happy about that, then you must go alone.’

  ‘I guess that settles it, then.’ I gave a weary smile. ‘Let’s go.’

  ‘All three of us?’

  ‘All three of us.’

  ‘Wait a minute.’ She glanced at Daru. ‘Let’s see what we can find in the house – clothes, food, anything.’

  I began sifting through the debris in the first room as Amica clambered through a rubble-filled doorway. I found an old Soviet ammunition box in a corner. Inside was a rusty tin half full of raisins, a handful of rice grains, an onion and two discs of naan bread, green with mould. I put the onion in one pocket, emptied the rice and raisins into the other, and was about to throw the tin and the naan bread away when Amica stopped me.

  ‘Wait. We can use those.’

  She had found a pale blue and a mauve burka and a torn, threadbare blanket. She put them down on the floor and took one of the naan. ‘Let me see your wound,’ she said.

  I hesitated, then sat down and took off the soiled dressing.

  ‘It’s going to get infected if we don’t do something,’ she said.

  She tore a couple of pieces from the disc of bread, then rubbed them where the wall met the ceiling in the corner of the room.

  ‘What are you doing?’ I said.

  ‘Getting cobwebs.’ She walked back and knelt down in front of me.

  ‘Why?’

  She gave me a patient look. ‘We’ve lost our medical kit, Sean. We have to do it the Afghan way. They don’t have antibiotics or dressings.’

  She placed the fragments of bread over the two wounds, tore a strip from the blanket and bound it tightly around them.

  ‘It feels better already,’ I said.

  She gave a half-smile, the first I had seen from her in days. ‘Then let’s go.’

  She made a loose bundle of the clothing she had found, added the empty tin and the rest of the naan bread and tied it across her back, using another strip from the blanket.

  We moved off up the track. Daru led the way, his Kalashnikov slung across his shoulder. He hurried ahead, then waited for us to catch up.

  ‘How much do we tell him?’ I asked as he ranged ahead of us again.

  ‘Not everything,’ Amica said. ‘But if he’s going to help protect us, he needs to know that we’re on the run from the Taliban and that a wrong word could give us away.’

  ‘What were you saying?’ Daru had moved back down the track to chide us for our slowness.

  ‘That we should tell you the truth,’ Amica said. ‘If any Taliban – not just the two who killed your friends – find out who we are, they will kill us.’

  He studied me for a while as he digested the information. ‘I already knew that,’ he said. ‘We shall say you are my uncle. My father’s name is well known. My word will be enough.’

  Amica frowned. ‘But if they hear his accent, they will know he is not of your tribe. They’ll know he is faranji.’

  Daru considered that for a moment. ‘Then we shall say he is dumb,’ he said. ‘There was an old man in the village who could not speak.’ He imitated the grunting noises he made, then winked at me. ‘Leave the talking to me, Inglisi.’

  He turned and ran on again.

  I shook my head. ‘Two hours ago he was broken-hearted at the loss of his family. Now he’s running around like a kid without a trouble in the world.’

  ‘Don’t think his pain is any less.’

  We reached the ridge about half an hour before sunset. There was no sign of the Taliban soldiers on the slopes below us. A caravan of mules and camels moved slowly along the track in the bottom of the valley and I could hear the tinkle of bells as a shepherd led his sheep down from the hills. Compared to the valley of devastation behind us it was a different world.

  We passed a group of three windswept larches as we made our way down. Nearby were the ruins of a sheepfold, a rough, drystone semicircle, and a crumbling shepherd’s hut roofed with twigs. The last rays of the sun were still warming us, but I thought of the cold night ahead.

  My body cried out for rest and sleep, and my mind was so fuddled with fatigue I could no longer think clearly. I looked at Amica. ‘Do we stop or move on?’

  She thought about it in silence as she stared down into the valley. ‘We stop,’ she said. ‘We can’t track the Taliban in the dark, and if we’re caught breaking the curfew we have no real excuse. If we move openly by day, we can stick to Daru’s story.’ She gave another half-smile. ‘You see, he’s already paying his way.’ Then the smile faded. ‘There is no one from his village to contradict us.’

  We dropped below the skyline and moved round to the sheepfold. A soft rain of yellowing larch needles fell around us as we sat with our backs against the wall. I reached into my pocket and shared out some of the raisins. I began to eat them one at a time.

  Daru looked at me. ‘This is all we eat?’

  ‘This is all we have. It may have to last us several days.’

  He unslung his rifle. ‘I will find us food.’

  ‘No.’ I laid a hand on his arm. ‘No shooting, that will attract too much attention.’

  He shrugged and laid down the gun. ‘You found rice in the house, yes? Give me some.’

  ‘We have to save it, Daru.’

  He shook his head, exasperated. ‘Not to eat.’

  Puzzled, I dug my hand back in my pocket. He removed the thin cord tied round his jacket, searched among the litter of larch needles and twigs until he found a large stick, then ran off down the hillside clutching a handful of grains.

  I looked at Amica. ‘Do you think we’ll see him again?’

  ‘Of course we will.’

  I lay back against the wall, too weary to speak again.

  I woke with a start and scrambled to my feet when Amica laid her hand on my arm.

  ‘It’s all right,’ she said. ‘I’ve been keeping watch. Daru’s back.’ Through the gathering dusk his teeth showed white as he smiled at me, and something hit the ground with a soft thud.

  I looked down. Two partridges lay in the dirt. ‘How did you?’

  Daru grinned in triumph. ‘My father taught me this. You lay a trail of grains of rice across the ground to a flat rock propped with a stick, then you sit very quiet, holding the end of the cord tied to the stick. The partridges come and eat the rice grains until—’ He clapped his hands together.

  Amica smiled. ‘The first decent meal in days, even if it is raw.’

  ‘Let me
show you my trick,’ I said. I moved around in the last of the light, gathering larch needles, lichen, moss and small twigs.

  Daru climbed one of the larches and hung from a dead branch until it snapped, sending him crashing to the ground. He picked himself up unhurt and began breaking it up.

  ‘How are you going to light the fire?’ Amica said.

  ‘Special Forces kit. Every piece has a dual purpose. One of the buttons on the jacket is a compass, there’s a tungsten saw blade sewn into the seam and then there’s this.’ I undid my belt and worked the buckle loose. ‘The edge is sharpened steel, you can use it as a knife, but the prong of the buckle is a softer metal – aluminium. Strike them together and you make a spark.’

  I knelt down in the shelter of the wall, out of the wind and the line of sight from the valley, and plucked a handful of feathers from the chest of one of the partridges. I held the prong in the middle of them and struck it a few times. Sparks flew and the feathers began to smoulder. I blew on them and dropped fragments of lichen, dry moss and larch needles on to them until they glowed red and then burst into flame.

  As the flames strengthened I added dry sticks, then sat back on my haunches, embarrassed at my glow of achievement. ‘The Boy Scouts meet James Bond,’ I said. ‘Sorry, you wouldn’t know.’

  Amica interrupted me. ‘Even the Taliban have heard of James Bond, Sean.’

  While Daru fed the fire, I plucked and gutted the partridges, then impaled them on a couple of sharpened larch sticks. The smell of the birds cooking over the fire sent saliva flooding into my mouth. We devoured every scrap of the flesh and then chewed on the thin, brittle bones.

  We had no tea, but Amica took the empty tin from her bundle, filled it with water and boiled it in the embers of the fire. We passed it round, holding it in a scrap of blanket.

  I was still exhausted, but the black, debilitating depression that had hung over me had lifted. I knew that the odds against us were still astronomical, but I no longer had the slightest thought of giving up.

  The need for us to rest outweighed the risk of not mounting a guard. We let the fire burn itself out and huddled down together in the cold of the night, sharing the warmth of our bodies.

  * * *

  I was woken by Daru shaking my shoulder. ‘It is almost light,’ he said. ‘We must go.’ I smiled at the way he was assuming the leadership of the party.

  Before we left, I rekindled the fire and boiled some more water. We shared it, sitting against the wall, watching the dawn flow from mountain to mountain and across the ridge around us. The valley floor below was still in shadow, but I could see smoke rising from a few houses and figures already moving out towards the fields.

  I hobbled around, trying to force some movement back into my leg. Amica watched me for a moment. ‘Let me see it.’ She peeled away the bandage and stinking fluid oozed from the wound. ‘Sit down and wait,’ she said.

  ‘We must move.’

  ‘We can wait half an hour.’ She took the onion we’d scavenged from the ruined house, pushed it into the ashes of the fire and left it to bake. When she scraped it out of the fire, she cut it in half and left it to cool slightly, then pressed it against the wound on my leg.

  I let out a yelp of pain as I felt the heat burning into me. She ignored me, binding it tight with the bandage. ‘This will draw out the poison.’

  ‘And then we eat the onion, right?’

  She gave a weak smile, then stood up and pulled on one of the burkas we’d found in the house. She reached up inside it to remove her trousers. I turned my back as she did so and cuffed Daru, who was watching with great interest. ‘Perhaps this is the last time you will have to wear it,’ I said. ‘When we reach the border you can take it off and burn it.’

  ‘If we reach the border,’ she said, her voice already muffled and her eyes invisible behind the lattice screen.

  We collected our belongings and moved out. ‘Any people we meet,’ Daru said, ‘or any checkpoints, I’ll do the talking. Whatever happens, don’t say anything.’

  I smiled. ‘I’m being ordered around by a twelve-year-old boy.’

  ‘No,’ Daru said. ‘You’re being ordered around by a twelve-year-old man.’

  We made good time down the side of the valley, keeping pace with the line of the sunrise, as the villages below us came to life. People herded animals out into the fields and a steady stream of foot traffic moved along the road. Further down, we passed a villager working in his field. I held myself alert, my fingers twitching on the butt of my rifle, as Daru exchanged the ritual pleasantries. ‘Have you seen two Taliban soldiers?’ Daru said.

  The villager spat. ‘An hour ago. I offered to share my breakfast with them. They took it all. I have nothing left to offer you.’

  ‘Which way were they heading?’ Daru said.

  ‘Down the valley, towards Mazar.’

  We moved on. Our pace slowed more and more as each person we passed had to be greeted, his state of health enquired, his livestock admired, his offers of hospitality politely declined. From every dwelling, no matter how poor, even those devastated by the earthquake, the owners would hasten to offer us something – tea, bread, grapes, a handful of raisins – or would offer to share their meal. Refusal took longer than acceptance.

  Merchants driving a mule train down the valley pressed ropes of nuts threaded on string around our necks, as if they were garlands of flowers. It was a gesture of pure hospitality to fellow travellers; they had no hope or expectation of selling anything to us.

  The leader stopped to talk as his sons moved on down the road, driving the mules before them with thin, whippy branches. ‘What goods are you carrying?’ Daru said.

  ‘We are Blue Men.’

  Daru smiled and pointed to the bundles of rifles tied on either side of the mules swaying past us. ‘They don’t look like lapis lazuli to me.’

  ‘We must trade for what we want – guns for lapis.’

  ‘And is that all you’re carrying?’

  The merchant smiled. ‘There are other things one can buy in Pakistan, which are highly valued in Afghanistan.’ He turned to move on down the road.

  Amica leaned close to Daru’s ear. ‘Ask him where he’s bound.’

  ‘Where are you going?’ Daru said.

  ‘To Mazar to trade. Then back to Peshawar.’

  ‘May you travel safely,’ Daru said.

  ‘And may you not be tired,’ the man said. He touched his hand to his heart and then hurried after the mule train.

  Amica was watching me. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘We could travel with the merchant. Any checkpoint we pass on our own could mean the end for us. We have no papers, no right to be in this area.’

  ‘We’ve a good story.’

  She shrugged. ‘Maybe. But if we travel with the mule train, we’re just three more nomads. He will pay his usual bribe so that they let him pass and they’ll look the other way.’

  ‘But why should he take us?’ I said.

  ‘Because merchants love money above everything else and we will pay him well to do so.’

  I saw the sense in what Amica had said, and after a moment I nodded. ‘All right, let’s do it.’

  I unbuttoned my shirt and pulled out one of the Saudi gold riyals from the money belt next to my skin. I laid it on a stone and cut it in half with my knife, the blade biting through the soft metal. I pocketed one half and gave the other to Daru. ‘Run after the merchant and tell him he can have that now and the other half when we’re across the border, if we can travel with him.’

  Daru took the half coin and spun it into the air, watching the sunlight glitter from it, then caught it and ran off, shouting and waving. He rapidly overhauled the slow-moving mule train and spoke to the merchant for a few minutes, then whistled and signalled us to follow him.

  ‘I told him you were injured and my aunt is tired,’ Daru said as we came up to him. ‘He and his wife will walk, you can ride their mules, b
ut he wants to see the other half of the coin first.’

  I took it out of my pocket and handed it to the merchant. He tested it with his teeth, put the two halves of the coin together and then tossed it back to me, nodding and smiling. I clambered on to a mule; Amica sat side-saddle on the one behind, and Daru padded alongside us in the dust, chattering and laughing with the merchant.

  We moved at a bare walking pace, the bells around the mules’ necks clanking at each step. It was a relief not to be walking on my injured leg, but the heat, the slow pace, the dust thrown up by the hooves of the mules and the clouds of flies took their toll. Not only this, but the hard wooden saddle, covered with only a thin blanket, chafed my legs.

  As I shifted my weight, trying to ease the discomfort, my knee banged into one of the saddlebags and I heard the chink of glass. I undid the strap. A bolt of cloth lay across the top of the bag. Underneath it were rows of bottles of whisky.

  I glanced around. The merchant was ahead of me, deep in conversation with Daru, and the other members of his family trailed well behind. I slid down from the saddle, leaving the mule to plod along, and dropped back to walk alongside Amica. ‘This guy is smuggling alcohol. I think there’s more risk in travelling with him than there is in going it alone.’

  She turned to look at me and I peered through the mesh of the burka, trying to read the expression in her eyes. ‘You’re right,’ she said. She jumped down from the mule. ‘Get Daru.’

  ‘I can’t speak, remember,’ I said, but I ran to the front of the column and tugged at Daru’s arm and then beckoned him back away from the merchant.

  ‘What is it?’ he said.

  I beckoned again, then froze. Some distance ahead along the track, I could see a dust cloud moving fast towards us and the sun glinting off a windscreen. I took his wrist and pulled him away. The merchant muttered something to himself and then called to the eldest of his two sons, who hurried forward to stand alongside him.

  ‘What is it?’ Daru said.

  ‘He’s carrying alcohol. It’s not safe for us to travel with him. If the Taliban find it they might shoot the lot of us. We need to get away.’