The Last Kestrel

by Jill McGivering

  She lifted her right foot and took a bold step backwards off the track, aiming for the small triangle of stones just inside the minefield. The muscles in her leg shook as she put her foot to the ground. Her heel found its place. She put her weight on it. Silence. Nothing. She brought her other foot smartly to join it and stood, swaying lightly from the knees with tension.

  She turned her head and glanced back at the scrub. Wherever they lay, the mines were invisible, crouching below the surface, patiently waiting, camouflaged by dust and scrub. The dirt and stone marks that had led her through to safety were already being compromised by the shifting desert.

  When she turned back, Karam was staring at her. His eyes had widened. He was flexing his fingers as if he were about to lunge.

  ‘You Britishers,’ he said, ‘you are ignorant people. Some day you will realize the trouble you are making here with your money and guns.’

  She shifted her weight. Sweat was trickling down her temples and dripping onto her shirt. She could feel panic rising. A bubbling urge to turn and run and, if she were blown to pieces, so be it, let it happen. The fear and imagining were far worse.

  She breathed slowly and steadily and lifted her foot. She moved it back another step to rest on a tiny mound of dirt, half scattered by the wind. She put her weight on it. A soldier had told her once that mine victims didn’t live long enough to hear the bang. The last thing they knew was a blinding light before shock closed down the senses.

  ‘Forget the boy,’ she said.

  Karam was walking slowly towards her as he spoke. He was halfway across the track. He paused, looking at her with amusement.

  ‘This is not good land,’ he said, nodding to the scrub. ‘Don’t you understand that?’

  She held his gaze and took another deliberate step backwards onto an X of crossed twigs. Her foot pressed it deeper into the dust. The ground held. She breathed.

  ‘I’ll take my chances,’ she said. ‘Won’t you?’

  He threw back his head and laughed. She saw the rigid waves of his beard ripple down his throat. She stepped again, glancing quickly backwards to find the next mark before forcing herself to place her foot squarely on top of it.

  ‘They cleared it then,’ he said. ‘The soldiers.’

  She didn’t answer. He was still hesitating. He had reached the scrub now and was standing with his toes at the edge, as if he were on the shore of a dangerous sea. She was walking backwards now, one careful pace at a time, her knees weak with tension, gradually opening up the distance between them.

  ‘Surely you’re not afraid?’ Her tone was taunting. ‘And you call yourself a man?’

  She took another step backwards, then froze. There was no sign of the next mark. She looked across at Karam. His eyes on hers were cold and appraising. She felt panic rise. She was afraid to move but she must. He was watching, waiting. She swallowed. It must be there. An unusual stone, a mound of earth, something. She flicked her eyes again over the ground behind her. Two full paces away, she could make out a cluster of stones, bunched together. But whatever sign she’d made next had simply disappeared.

  ‘Wherever you go, the Taliban will find you.’ She was stalling for time, trying to goad him. What did she do now? Risk stepping out into the unknown? Her steps hadn’t always been evenly spaced.

  ‘They killed your brother, didn’t they?’ she went on. ‘For much less than you’ve done. He never took money from soldiers. You did.’

  He glared at her. She had to keep moving. She had to distract him. Her eyes flicked from his eyes to his hands, clenched into fists at his sides.

  ‘The fighters trust me,’ he said. ‘They know me.’

  He took a step off the track onto the scrubland. His eyes were narrowed, his face dark with anger.

  ‘Are you sure?’ She held her breath, her heart painful in her chest. ‘They’ll still trust you when the word is out? Once they know everything? Karam, tell me, where will you and your money hide then?’

  He was treading recklessly, taking broad strides towards her. He must have believed what he’d said, that the ground had been cleared.

  She closed her eyes and stepped boldly backwards into the dirt, her nerves screaming. Silence. She opened her eyes. The next step took her to the cluster of stones, then the next, beyond, to a jagged stone, placed upright.

  ‘I warned you.’ He was calling to her, venomous. ‘I told you to leave this place.’

  A bird rose, squawking, from a bank of scrub to her left and flapped up into the sky. It startled her. She stood motionless for a second, shaking. Karam was gaining on her. She turned her back to him and stepped forward to the next mark, jumping to the next and the next. The rocks, scrub, dirt swam dizzily at her feet. The land was stretching on endlessly, an undulating sweep that curled down towards the village. Too far. Behind her, his feet were thudding. He was running, heavy—

  A bang. Shattering. Splitting the air. Blast, striking her body, making her stagger. Panting. Her head a jumble of confusion. Her ears dull with the throb of the vibrations. Her body rigid. She was trembling where she stood, straining to listen. Silence. Then a great cry rose, a shrill animal cry of pain.

  She sank to her haunches and pressed her hands on her ears, trying to shut out the screaming. Make it stop. Please God, make it stop. She tucked her head into her chest and closed her eyes. The screams pierced everything. She clasped her head. Her legs were juddering beneath her and she shook helplessly, unable to quieten them.

  Finally she forced herself to twist, open her eyes and look. He was lying on his back, writhing in the dirt, his hands clawing the air round his lower body. His legs were tattered. One was severed at the thigh, the flesh hanging loose in ragged strips. Blood was spurting from the wound, pooling around him in the dust. His other leg was drumming the earth, his cotton trousers a mess of gore and sinew.

  His eyes were wide, fixed on her, his face white and wet with shock. I can’t move, she thought. I can’t save him. It’s too late. She closed her eyes and hunched again into a ball, her hands holding her head. She rocked herself. Gradually the screaming grew less shrill and less frantic until it faded at last to a low pulsing moan. In the end, that too gave way, and finally there was silence.

  28

  Ellen sat cross-legged on the worn carpet, her back supported by velveteen cushions. The fabric was so thin, the filling was bulging between its threads. Heavy drapes hung across the doorway, muffling sounds from the rest of the house. The television, on its stand, bled coloured light across the carpet as the picture changed. The volume was down.

  She turned to the solid wooden dresser and looked again at the old-fashioned picture of Jalil framed there, his eyes veiled with self-consciousness. It was time to make her peace with him, she thought. To say goodbye and let him go.

  Outside a car horn sounded, followed by an angry shout. A construction drill screamed. After Helmand, Kabul, with its rutted mud streets and traffic jams and rows of stalls and staring male crowds, seemed a step back into the chaos of the modern world.

  The drapes were pushed aside. Jalil’s little brother stood in the doorway, looking in at her shyly, using all his strength to hold back the curtain for his sister. She was carrying in a tray of chai sabz in a scratched enamel teapot, with two glasses for the tea. She folded herself beside Ellen on the floor and poured. Stray leaves swirled and sank in the light green liquid and pungent steam rose. She set out a glass dish divided into thirds, filled with raisins and almonds and hard white clusters of boiled sugar. Ellen took an almond. It was stale.

  ‘How is she?’

  Jalil’s sister leaned forward and lowered her voice. Her hair was escaping in tendrils along her cheek but she didn’t move to adjust her headscarf and cover them. Jalil’s little brother had already disappeared.

  ‘I’ve been very worried,’ she said. She pushed a glass of tea an inch closer to Ellen. ‘She’s been like a dead woman. No life. No hope.’

  Ellen nodded, lifted the hot glass by the rim a
nd inhaled its richness.

  ‘She never left the house. At night, she was awake, crying, walking from room to room. She thought I was asleep but I heard her.’ Her voice had fallen to a whisper. She had poured tea for herself but it sat before her untouched.

  ‘In the afternoon, she closed the curtains and slept. She wouldn’t see even my auntie.’

  Ellen listened. Jalil’s mother was looking gaunt and pale. The deterioration, even since her last visit, worried her.

  ‘How do you think she feels about this boy?’

  Jalil’s sister put her head to one side, like a bird. Her gold earring flashed.

  ‘No one can replace Jalil,’ she said.

  ‘Of course not.’

  ‘But she is distracted by him, by caring for him. It is giving her – ’ she paused, reaching for the word – ‘some meaning.’

  Ellen looked at her fingers, idle in her lap. ‘I don’t know much about him, about what kind of boy he is,’ she said. ‘Your mother is very kind. But you must also be careful.’

  ‘Of course.’ Jalil’s sister looked up, a half-smile on her lips. ‘My mother is a clever woman. She knows that. He is a village boy, not educated.’

  ‘He won’t be able to work for some time,’ she said. ‘The army doctor said the wound on his stomach would take at least a month to heal. That’s a long time for him to stay with you.’

  Jalil’s sister shrugged. ‘Maybe it’s a blessing,’ she said, ‘for us and for him.’

  Ellen paused, watching the images flicker across the television screen. She let the silence settle for a moment.

  ‘I’ll pay for him,’ she said. ‘For his medicine. His food. Any other expenses.’

  Jalil’s sister hesitated. Ellen saw her eyes drop to her fingers, twisting in her lap. She reached out and covered them with her own hands, bunching the girl’s fingers in hers.

  ‘Once,’ she said, ‘Jalil asked me for money.’

  His sister didn’t raise her eyes. Ellen sensed her awkwardness.

  ‘I was wrong,’ she went on. ‘I’m so sorry.’ She paused. ‘I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.’

  Jalil’s sister shifted her weight and withdrew her hands. ‘You must ask my mother.’

  ‘Do you think…?’

  ‘I know what she will say: Allah will provide.’ Jalil’s sister shrugged. When she looked up, her expression was calm. ‘But I think Allah also provided you. So we should accept and be thankful.’

  Ellen looked again at Jalil’s face, staring out at her from the dresser. At what point had he realized that Mack, the man he respected like a father, had blood on his hands? Ellen closed her eyes. When had he realized how far Mack would go to keep him quiet?

  ‘He has no relatives at all?’ Jalil’s sister’s voice cut into her thoughts. Ellen opened her eyes, turned to face her.

  ‘An aunt,’ she said. ‘That’s all.’

  Jalil’s sister leaned forward to refill Ellen’s glass and nudged the dish of snacks another inch nearer. She lifted her own glass of tea and drank, holding it delicately at the rim between her thumb and forefinger. Outside, horns blared as the traffic congealed.

  Ellen was conscious of the time. She must leave for the airport soon and her flight home. This was her last chance to make peace.

  ‘This Major.’ Jalil’s sister kept her head low. ‘What kind of man was he? How could he do that to Jalil, when he worked for him, he was responsible for him?’

  Ellen sighed. She thought of Mack, of his quick mind and strong character.

  ‘In a way, he and Jalil wanted the same thing,’ she said. She spoke slowly, choosing her words with care. ‘Security. An end to this bloodshed as quickly as possible. And, like Jalil, he was a loyal person. But only to his own men.’

  Jalil’s sister lifted her head. Her eyes were clear, fringed with long dark lashes; her look was perplexed. I must be careful, Ellen thought. What I say now will set in her mind like amber.

  ‘He did a terrible thing. A deal that led to the deaths of many innocent people. Somehow he justified it to himself. Convinced himself it was for the greater good.’

  ‘And that’s what Jalil found out?’

  Ellen nodded. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘He found out. And after that, the Major couldn’t risk letting him leave.’

  The bedroom door was ajar, giving her a covert view of the scene inside. Aref was lying on a cot, his head and shoulders propped up by cushions, wool blankets tucked round his body. Jalil’s little brother was sitting with him, a basin of water balanced on a towel across his lap and a damp cloth in his hand. He was dabbing at the soft skin behind Aref’s ears and at the straggly beard on his chin and neck. The boy was concentrating hard, the tip of his tongue protruding from the corner of his mouth, his jaw set. Aref’s eyes on the boy were gentle.

  The staircase creaked. Slippered feet were rising from the ground floor. Ellen turned. Jalil’s mother was coming along the landing, carrying a tray with a bowl and spoon and a platter of fresh bread. Heavy earrings swung in her ears, their weight stretching the lobes. Her headscarf was neatly tucked into folds at her temples and pinned so that every hair was covered. She smiled. Ellen held open the door and cleared a place on the low bedside table for her to set down the tray. The boy dried off Aref’s face with his towel and, the job half done, got to his feet.

  Ellen stood against the wall at the back and watched as Jalil’s mother smoothed her long skirt and settled herself on the low stool at Aref’s bedside. She shifted the tray across her knee and tucked a cloth round his neck as a napkin, then lifted the soup, spoonful by spoonful, blowing across it first herself, then taking it to his lips. His eyes never left hers.

  The contours of his face were still stark, his cheeks hollowed, but already his eyes were starting to lose their dull, bruised look. His skin was pale but no longer grey. The sweat of fever had cleared.

  Jalil’s mother leaned forward to touch the edge of his mouth with her cloth where the soup had spilled. Ellen thought of Hasina, fierce with love, gathering her son into her lap as he lay, half dead, his eyes closed and his feet fluttering weakly against the sandy floor of the tunnel. She thought of the desert dust that now covered her and was already claiming her flesh as its own. She thought of the small hand with pink fingernails, emerging ghostlike with its tin bangle from the rubble of the bombed house.

  Her task here was done. Phil had been delighted with the story she’d filed. The eyewitness account of the attack was both dramatic and an exclusive. She’d given a sense of Hasina as more than just some pro-Taliban fighter. She was a freshly bereaved wife. A mother. A woman who would defend her family to her last breath. Of Mack’s betrayal, Jalil’s murder and Karam’s complicity she wrote nothing.

  She looked now at Jalil’s mother, patiently lifting each spoonful of soup to Aref’s mouth. Her eyes were unsentimental. This was not her son and never would be. But he was an Afghan boy without a mother who needed soup. And she had soup to share.

  Ellen stood upright from the wall and walked quietly to the door. No one seemed to notice her leave. The staircase creaked as she made her way slowly downstairs to the front door. Outside a car and driver were waiting to take her to the airport, her rucksack in the boot. She pulled her scarf up round her face and hid away her hair.

  She had her story. Phil was happy. So why, now she was leaving, did she feel so weighed down by sadness? Everything she’d written was true. And yet, to the rest of the world, Mack had died a hero. Jalil’s death was still a mystery.

  She settled on the hot plastic of the car’s back seat. The family’s guard, his gun slung across his shoulder, dragged open the heavy metal gates and the driver nosed out into the street. The bleached brightness of the midday heat had passed and the first notes of gold were creeping into the sunlight.

  At the junction, they pushed into the main road and its stream of honking traffic. She gazed out of the window at the passing scene. A young man, a jihadi scarf across his shoulders, was shovelling dates into thi
n plastic bags, his features blurred by the drifting smoke of a nearby brazier. Next to him, a cluster of stout middle-aged women, their faces veiled, were picking through a mound of second-hand clothes.

  The driver sounded his horn, forcing his way between a lumbering cart and a truck parked crookedly in the gutter. A plump woman with a hooked nose and heavily powdered face was leaning in the open doorway of a beauty parlour, arms folded, surveying the street. A burst of children ran past her, barefoot, shouting. Two men were standing, gossiping, their pot-bellies lifting long cotton salwar kameez, their beards straggly and streaked with grey.

  The driver crunched into a higher gear and urged the car forward. As they started to gather speed, Ellen’s final sight was of a woman in a patched blue burqa, the cotton grid of her face bent low to a child. She raked his hair roughly with her fingers, then took him by the hand, guiding him as she picked her way patiently through a shattered pavement of broken stone and endlessly drifting dust.

  Acknowledgements

  Thank you to all at HarperCollins, especially to Patrick Janson-Smith, editor par excellence, and to Susan Opie. The Blue Door would never have opened for me without the wisdom and guidance of my wonderful agent, Judith Murdoch.

  As a foreign correspondent, I’ve made many reporting trips to Afghanistan in recent years. I’m grateful to the BBC for those opportunities and to Afghan and British colleagues there, particularly producer Caroline Finnigan. Like Ellen, I’ve been embedded at times with the British forces in Helmand. I thank my military hosts of all ranks for their courtesy and kindness. Any negative portrayals are entirely fictional.

  Special thanks to the members of my excellent writing group – Dorothy, Gabriela, Hilary, James, Maria and Ros – who nurtured this novel through early drafts and gave invaluable criticism. My thanks to the tutors on the MA in Creative Writing at Birkbeck College, University of London, in particular Julia Bell and Professor Russell Celyn Jones, for their ideas and support. Nageen Kargar gave informed comment on the book from the perspective of an Afghan woman.