The Abrupt Physics of Dying (37 page)

The Way It Was Supposed To Be

The vehicle was a mangled flaming wreck. Clay lurched through the smoke, eyes burning, stumbled over the AK, picked it up. The ground was littered with chunks of smoking metal and twisted, melted plastic. A pillar of black smoke towered into the sky, a beacon. Closer, he could see that the rear of the Land Cruiser had taken a direct hit. Only the front of the vehicle was recognisable. Just beyond the largest piece of wreckage, a body lay in the sand. He ran across the wasteland, stood looking down at the corpse. The head was gone, the limbs charred and black. Clay turned away, gagging. It was the soldier from Al Urush. He stumbled on through the smoke.

Clay found Abdulkader lying in a shallow depression. The Arab looked up as he approached, crisped his lips. There was a deep gash on the side of his face. His hands were knotted across his abdomen, low down, near his hip. Clay knelt beside him. Blood pumped from between Abdulkader’s fingers, dripped to the ground.

‘Jesus, Abdulkader.’ It was all he could say. Clay opened the satchel Suleiman had given him, tore open a compress bandage with his teeth. ‘Move your hands.’

Abdulkader pulled up his shirt to reveal a puncture about three inches long and half as wide, low down. Blood welled up, dark, artesian.

Clay pushed the compress down hard on the wound. ‘Push,’ he said, placing Abdulkader’s hands over the bandage. One-handed, he pulled out a length of tape, tried to lay it across the gauze. It twisted hopelessly, fell away. ‘Fuck.’ He tried again.

‘Do not,’ said Abdulkader, his voice faint.

Clay pulled out a length of gauze, wound it around Abdulkader’s torso.

Abdulkader looked up at him. His face was grey like the sand, his partially unwound headscarf hung across his mouth and beard. ‘The soldiers are coming,’ he said. ‘You must go.’

Clay looked over his shoulder. Two vehicles, shimmering mirages in the rising heat, danced across the plain. Clay slid his arm under Abdulkader’s chest, tried to pull him upright.

Abdulkader grunted and pushed him away. ‘No. There is no time. Go.’

‘I’m not leaving you, Abdulkader.’

‘Go.’

‘They’ll kill you.’

‘Allah decides who dies.’

‘No, Abdulkader.’

Abdulkader collapsed back to the ground. ‘You cannot carry me.’

‘We’ll get to the mountains. We can hide.’ Again he tried to pull him up, again Abdulkader pushed him away with a groan. The sound of engines approaching in the distance.

‘Give me the Kalashnikov,’ said Abdulkader. ‘Go. Now.’

Clay glanced up to where the mountains rose from the plain, a five-minute sprint away, no more. He shook his head. Tears welled up in his eyes. ‘I can’t, Abdulkader. I won’t.’

‘One man’s life is nothing. You must stop the poisoning.’

‘What did you say?’

Abdulkader groaned, pushed down on the compress. ‘One man’s life …’

‘I heard you.’ And then he knew. It all made sense. Abdulkader had been with Al Shams all along. He had led Clay to the place where they had first been hijacked, a lifetime ago. ‘It was always supposed to be this way, right from the beginning, wasn’t it, my friend?’

Abdulkader smiled. His teeth were strong and white, dazzling. It was the first time Clay had seen him smile. Slowly, Abdulkader reached up and took hold of Clay’s hand, gripped hard.

‘Why, Abdulkader?’

‘Would you have helped us?’

Clay looked down, overwhelmed. ‘No.’

‘You are a good man, Mister Clay.’

He bent over and kissed Abdulkader on the cheek, felt the coarse whiskers against his lips. He could smell the rank musk of the man, his goats, the dirt of his farm, the diesel in his skin, the earthy sweetness of his blood. Tears were pouring down Clay’s face. The vehicles were getting close now, two of them, speeding across the plain.

Abdulkader checked the AK’s magazine, laid the weapon across his chest. His eyes were half-closed, his breathing shallow. ‘Go with God,
hanif
,’ he breathed.

‘May Allah protect you, Abdulkader.’

Abdulkader touched his fingers to his lips and to his forehead and then to Clay’s chest, muttering something in Arabic.

Clay stood, looked down at his friend one last time and turned away. He ran to the soldier’s corpse, knelt beside it. The vehicles were closing fast. He searched the body, could see no identity tags or papers anywhere. He pulled out his UK passport, the cover battered and worn, riffled through the pages. He smeared it in the soldier’s coagulating blood, slid it into the mostly intact breast pocket of the man’s shredded uniform. ‘Goodbye, Clay Straker,’ he said to the man. Then he stood, and keeping the smoke from the burning vehicle between himself and the approaching vehicles, set off at a sprint towards the mountains.

The Kindness of Strangers

He kept running and did not stop until the sun was high. By now he was far above the plateau. Here the rock was dark, barren, frayed almost to gravel by the constant battering of wind and sun. Bands of purple rhyolite scarred the deep brown basalts. This was once a place of volcanoes, sheets of magma burying the land in fire.

He stopped and looked back in the direction he had come from. The Indian Ocean shimmered blue in the distance. Somewhere below, invisible to him now, was the place where Abdulkader lay, and further, across the world, was another place where she, too, lay. He blanked his thoughts, drove a sheet of white light through them. He looked east. Ahead, a long valley opened up. A thread of green wove through it, tiny terraced fields dotted amongst the rock, hanging to the side of the slope. He was in Oman.

Clay looked at his bandaged hand. The gauze was black, moist, covered in powdered rock. Running and fear had doped the pain, but now it came upon him like an eruption, relentless, hot to melt stone. He crumbled before it, fell to his knees gasping, shivering in the heat. Darkness collapsed in on him. He breathed deep, struggled to stay conscious. After a while he regained control, enough to search the satchel and find some painkillers, an oral dose of morphine. He swallowed two of the tablets and drank what was left of his water.

Soon he was able to stand. His breathing stabilised. He started down towards the valley, drawn by the green. Each step required a physical effort of will. There was no wind. Only convection moved the world here, the sun heating the rocks and the atmosphere. He
pushed himself on, down, picking his way through the rubble, the distant crack of Abdulkader’s final shots still pealing in his head.

By the time he reached the first fields, the valley was in deep shadow and the air had cooled. He was sweating; his clothes were soaked. Fever raged through him. Thirst was now simply part of his being, a constant thumping void, so strong that he used it to block the pain that seemed to creep further up his arm with each passing hour. He joined a narrow footpath that led past a barren field of stone and silt, its edges marked by loose piles of flint and shale. The ground looked as if it hadn’t seen water for months, years. Ahead in the fading light he could make out a clutch of trees, a stone wall. Wood smoke hung in the air, its tang stitched through with memories, and then, worse still, unbearable, the smell of roasting meat. His pace quickened, animal. Water, food, shelter: they were here, so close. He had a gun. He could take what he needed. He loped into a jog, sniffing the air like a painted dog.

At the end of the stone wall another clutch of trees, the sound of running water. Just beyond, flickering lights, a small stone house built into the slope. Voices. He reached behind his back for the Beretta. Almost there now. He skirted the trees, huge sprawling cacti heavy with fruit, tall Mediterranean cypresses. He could smell the water, fresh and clean, somewhere close. He rounded the last tree, shuffling now, exhausted, and came into a courtyard. The house was there, a warm yellow glow shining through the small windows, the crack under the door. Clay stumbled to the door, dressed himself straight, slid the Beretta back into his waistband, knocked, and collapsed to the ground.

A man sat by the bedside holding a cup of water to Clay’s lips. He looked down at Clay’s hand. ‘I am Omar,’ he said in Arabic.

Clay blinked twice.

‘You are from the war.’

Clay nodded yes. ‘It is not my war.’

Omar put the cup on the floor, teased his fingers through his beard, contemplated this. ‘You have been shot.’

Clay did not answer.

Omar reached into his pocket and placed Clay’s Beretta on the side table.

Clay glanced at the weapon, said nothing.

‘Why are you here?’

‘Where is this?’

‘This was my grandfather’s farm. One day it will be my son’s, if Allah wills it.’

Clay pushed himself up, felt the blood drain from his head, fell back to the bed. ‘I must leave,’ he whispered.

‘You need rest.’

‘Thank you,’ Clay said. ‘But I must get to Muscat. It is important.’ He lay on the bed and looked up at the intricate thatch of the roof and the frayed plane of light that streamed from the top of the stone wall. It was morning. He had slept through the night. Another day gone, ten thousand more barrels of produced water dumped, a thousand tons of salt, twenty lethal doses of radiation. His stomach lurched.

‘You have fever.’

‘I will see a doctor in Muscat.’

‘I must report you to the police.’

Clay pushed himself up, slowly this time, swung his legs to the floor. His jacket lay folded at the foot of the bed. He reached for it, pulled it to him, pulled out the envelope Al Shams had given him. Inside was a stack of US dollars. He pulled out a hundred-dollar note and gave it to Omar. ‘Please, no police.’

The man’s eyes widened as he contemplated the money. ‘They are searching for deserters, spies.’

‘I am neither.’

‘The police can take you to a doctor.’

Clay pushed the note into Omar’s hand. ‘Please, no. Many lives depend on it.’

Omar curled his hand over the bill, looked into Clay’s eyes.

Clay closed his eyes for a moment, looked at the man’s open face, the sorrow there, the toil, the pride. It took just a few minutes, Omar listening carefully to Clay’s rough Arabic, dropping his thick grey eyebrows when he did not understand, opening his eyes wide as Clay described the effect of the pollution on the children, the young women.

After Clay had finished, Omar sat silent a moment, then pushed the note back into Clay’s hand. ‘I have a car. I will take you.’

‘Please take the money, Omar. For the petrol. It is far.’

Omar stood. ‘For the petrol, yes,’ he said, folding the note and sliding it into his pocket. ‘We will leave soon.’

Clay reached into the satchel and withdrew a needle and an ampoule of morphine. ‘Before we go, I need your help.’ Clay was only vaguely aware of the passing of time as he slipped further into delirium from the fever, drugged into a series of overlapping dreams by the morphine. Eben lying in the military hospital in Pretoria, his head swaddled in gauze, those comatose eyes pleading with him to end this, Rania sitting on the edge of the bed, weeping into her hands, Eben’s mother pushing him towards the door, and he could not escape from any of it. Night fell. Omar stopped to refuel, brought him food and water, administered another injection. They carried on until morning, and through the day and into night again. Clay lapsed into periods of fever. Hallucinations came and he knew them as such, but could not force them away. He rode them through, emerged cold, shivering, his clothes soaked, only to fall back to the place from where had come.

Omar shook him awake. ‘My friend. We are in Muscat.’

Clay sat up, looked about. Whitewashed buildings, domes, archways, tree-lined streets, a swirling-blue Vincent sky. ‘Please, Omar. Take me to a hotel. One with a telephone and a bath.’

Omar nodded, stopped by the side of the road, waved to a passerby, engaged in quick conversation, drove on. ‘The Al-Bustan,’ he said.

Ten minutes later Omar pulled up to the hotel entrance, an
arched portico built in the traditional Omani style. A uniformed valet opened the car door. Clay stepped to the ground, held on to the edge of the door, his left hand buried deep in his jacket pocket. He looked at Omar. ‘I don’t know how to thank you.’

Omar smiled. ‘Allah protect you, my friend.’

Clay smiled, traced every detail of Omar’s kind face. He wanted to remember this face always. ‘And you, my brother,’ he said. Clay swallowed, caught his breath. The apparently random generosity of strangers; the power of this.

The valet closed the door. Clay stood and watched Omar disappear down the palm-lined hotel drive, thought about waving, but didn’t. Then he turned and walked through the doors and into the lobby. The air was air-conditioner cool. Water danced in a marble fountain. The sound it made was like music. Clay walked across the white marble floor towards reception, aware that he looked exactly like what he was. The uniformed hotel clerk was staring at him, a frown building on his face. Clay straightened his back, pushed back his shoulders and put his Australian passport on the granite counter top. The clerk’s countenance changed immediately. This was a foreigner, a tourist. He might look like hell, but hard currency spoke.

‘I would like a room,’ said Clay.

‘Is sir wanting a suite, or perhaps desiring something simpler?’ The clerk was Indian, Pakistani perhaps.

‘Just a room.’

The clerk glanced up at Clay, opened his passport. ‘I must make a photocopy,’ he said, leafing through the pages.

Clay looked around the lobby. An Arab in a dark blue suit, military haircut, was standing near the front door at the concierge’s desk. He looked straight at Clay, held his gaze for a moment, then looked away. ‘Fine.’ He could feel another bout of fever boiling to the surface. His arm was throbbing.

‘You entered Oman six days ago,’ the clerk said, looking at the passport. A recent stamp. Hussein and Al Shams had had this all planned out. ‘Are you enjoying?’

‘Unforgettable.’

The clerk stared back at him, the bandage on his hand, his torn clothes, the dry-blood echo of the desert that even Omar’s careful ministrations could not purge.

‘Cash or credit card?’

‘Cash.’

Clay locked and bolted the door to his room, threw open the windows, picked up the phone, dialled the house doctor. He was out of morphine, out of painkillers, out of everything. A doctor could visit him in an hour. Send him up.

He put down the phone, walked to the minibar and emptied two miniatures of Smirnoff and two of Red Label into a glass and downed the lot in one go. He felt better instantly. He pulled out Al Shams’ envelope, dumped the contents onto the bed. After what he’d given Omar, the advance payment on the room they had made him give, he had fourteen hundred left. Plus DG’s Visa card.

He picked up the phone, dialled long-distance. His Cypriot accountant answered.

‘It’s Clay Straker.’

Silence. Disbelief thick in the air.

‘Yianni, it’s me, Clay.’

Stumbling recognition, a break in tone, warmth in the voice now.

‘I don’t have long, Yianni. I need your help. Did a package come for me, from Yemen?’

‘It have it here.’

Good old Atef.

‘Mister Clay, I thought you were …’

‘Not yet.’

‘I am very glad. Very.’

‘So am I.’ Clay picked up the hotel notepad, read out the address, gave his room number. ‘Look, Yianni, I need you to make copies of everything I sent you and get them to me here, overnight express. Get it out on tonight’s flight. And hold on to the originals for me.’

‘Of course. Something else came for you. A letter.’

‘Send a copy of it, too. Anything else comes for me, hold on to it. I’ll be in touch.’

There was a knock at the door. Clay hung up the phone, put the cash into his jacket pocket. Through the door lens he could see a stout man, clean-shaven, balding. He was alone. ‘House doctor,’ came the voice from the corridor.

Clay turned the lock, drew aside the chain and opened the door. The man entered. Clay closed the door behind him, turned the dead bolt.

‘Good afternoon, young man,’ said the doctor. He had a gentle voice. His Arabic was accented, familiar.

‘
Ezayi’kah
,’ Clay attempted.

The doctor smiled, put his bag on the desk. ‘You know our Egyptian slang.’

‘I have spent time in Cairo. I have friends there.’ Clay pulled his hand out of his pocket.

The doctor looked down at Omar’s makeshift bandages, wet and ragged. ‘I am from Cairo,’ he said. ‘Please, sit. Let me examine your hand.’

Clay sat, the doctor pulled up a chair. He took Clay’s arm in his hands. ‘When did this happen?’

Clay thought back, a lifetime ago. ‘Three days.’

The doctor started to pull away the bandages. ‘And your friends, where do they live?’

Clay looked away, bit his tongue. ‘Zamalek. Football fanatics.’ A foul odour poisoned the room. He retched. The alcohol was wearing off and the fever was coming on again.