“Really? That would be great.”
A small hesitation, then: “Of course.”
“Thank you, Rashida, thank you so much.’
“I’ll see you there.”
Thirty-Eight
ELIZABETH WILLOUGHBY’S DIARY
6th May 1915
A new battle is raging, this time in Ypres. The Germans have a new weapon, poison gas, which is carried on the wind and fills the trenches, forcing the men to climb out into enemy fire or killing them by suffocation. The newspapers are filled with stories of men blinded, wracked by coughing, spitting up blood before a long and painful death.
This morning I came across Hari cleaning his instruments and looking morose. My heart swelled. Since that afternoon with Robert things have been awkward. In part there is a sense of complicity, a secret shared, but it embarrasses us both so much that when we do meet we find it difficult to talk. I miss our conversations. I miss him. And so, when I saw him standing there, frowning as he disinfected a pile of scalpels, I swallowed hard and went to him.
“Are you all right?” I said.
He turned, looking sombre. “I’m thinking of what we’ve done with these scalpels. We’ve cut out the bad bits, made the patients well enough to go back to the Front, but it’s even worse for them than before, because now they know what to expect.”
“But don’t they want to go?” I asked, cautiously. “I thought they wanted to die in battle, that it was an honour.”
He sighed and said that it was more complicated than that.
“When the men first go into the army, izzat obliges them to fight and to die if required, but once they have fought, their duty is done. If they’ve been wounded honourably, they don’t need to fight again.”
There wasn’t much I could think of to say to that.
“They don’t want to get well, especially since they heard about the gas. I hate to see the men sitting in their beds or on the garden benches, impressing the visitors by how much they’ve improved, when what they are really thinking about is what happens next. They’re sick with worry: it consumes them day and night. I don’t know if I can carry on making them better just so they can be torn apart again.” He shook his head. “That’s not my idea of medicine.”
I was struck by a terrible thought. “You’re not going to leave?”
“Why should I not?”
“The men would miss you dreadfully. It must be so reassuring for them to be looked after by someone who can talk to them, properly, in their own language. If I were ill abroad, I’d much rather be treated by a doctor who was British.”
He smiled. “They’d much rather be seen by a British doctor, because the British are in charge.”
“But… what else would you do? Where could you go? A field hospital?”
“Too dangerous. It’s not very gallant of me, perhaps, but this isn’t my war. I’ve no sense of izzat any more, not since working here.”
I couldn’t help it. “Don’t go,” I said, in a rush. “I would miss you very much.”
An odd look came into his eyes.
“Elizabeth,” he said. “I must speak to you. I care very deeply —”
“Go on,” I said, feeling a little prickle travel up my spine.
“It’s about what happened the other day. I haven’t been able to put it out of my mind.”
“I wanted to talk about it too. I’m so sorry, I’ve felt so—”
“Please, Elizabeth. This isn’t an easy thing for me to say.”
“Yes?”
Speaking slowly and deliberately, he said that, in his medical opinion, what had happened at the Front had had a terrible effect on Robert. He was suffering, he thought, from something that he had read about in a medical journal called shell shock. If that were the case, I should be careful.
“Careful?”
He nodded and said that marrying a man in that condition would be – he thought for a moment, trying to find the right word – “unwise”.
I shivered, as if I had caught a sudden chill.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I said. “You don’t know Robert like I do. Besides, you’re not fully qualified. You… you just don’t know.”
Hari looked shocked, as if I had struck him. Quickly, he excused himself and left.
I stood, shaking, unsure as to what had just happened. Why had I reacted that way? After all, I have thought about consulting a doctor on Robert’s behalf. He is not Lal Bahadur, with his jolting legs and staring eyes, but something has taken hold of him, that much is certain.
And now I have treated Hari badly, which I bitterly regret. He is the only person I talk to about things that really matter. My work takes up so much time, and my childhood friends have married or moved away. I must confess as well that I have neglected some of those friendships, because it has been clear to me that I was going to leave them anyway, when I married Robert and went to India.
For years I have been waiting for that marriage for my life to truly begin.
But now? What am I waiting for now?
Thirty-Nine
I was lost in thought as Bazir made his way through Kabul’s perpetual gridlock – cars pushing through the bumpy streets, claiming every last inch of space, navigating around hawkers, bullock carts, small boys riding bicycles piled high with stacks of bread. I knew that without Rashida I had no hope of ever understanding the place. There wasn’t much point in staying without her.
Looking out at the jumble of little stalls and roadside shacks, I realized I’d miss it. I liked the anarchy, the little gestures of refusal, of resistance that kept popping up through the cracks, like the Banksy-style graffiti on the government building that we were passing – a sea of sharp-shouldered women in burqas surrounded by helicopters, dollar signs and poppies.
Getting closer to the refuge, I began to worry that Rashida wouldn’t turn up, that her brothers had stopped her from coming. As we crawled through the traffic, I checked my phone constantly, expecting a text to tell me she wouldn’t be there. But as we turned the corner onto the road where the refuge was, I saw her, a slight figure in a green shalwar kameez, looking around for me.
Just then, a battered car drove up fast behind her, swerving wildly. As it reached the gates of the refuge, it exploded – a sudden, awful blast of noise and light. The gates blew in: a fireball hurtled towards the building.
I flung open the door and ran to where she had been standing.
“Rashida!” I shouted, but there was nothing left apart from the blackened shell of the car, the driver burnt to death inside.
I skittered about, looking for any trace of her. Then I found it: a hand, with a little gold ring on its index finger.
Everyone in this game has a tipping point, a moment when something changes inside, when you just can’t face it any more. That was mine, Suze: I hit it then. For once I didn’t pick up my cameras. This was a story I couldn’t bear to record.
Soon there were police and officials and onlookers everywhere, shouting, waving their hands, taking pictures on their mobile phones. I was in shock, clutching myself, unable to move, until I noticed a man filming me.
“Fuck off,” I shouted. “Go away.”
Women from the refuge were led out, their faces blackened with soot, wisps of hair escaping from their headscarves. Some of them held children who were wailing in confusion.
The police began to gather body parts and scraps of clothing, putting them into transparent plastic bags labelled “Evidence”. Tears began to slide down my face.
By the time I got back to the guest house, news of the attack had spread around the world. I watched the BBC report on my computer, showing the remains of the car, the blackened porch of the refuge, soldiers with guns keeping guard, groups of men standing about, giving their opinions, or just staring at the camera. The headline kept to the facts:
Kabul, Afghanistan: Suicide attack on women’s refuge claimed by Taliban. Five dead, sixteen injured.
I sat on the bed with my head in my
hands. Five dead: Rashida, the refuge guards, the bomber himself. I imagined him driving towards the refuge, negotiating the traffic, inching forward, knowing he wouldn’t be driving back. Had he really believed it was a brothel? Did he have a wife he liked to beat who’d left him? Or was he simply following orders? I remembered what Orla had said about feeling safe until something happened. I’d been lulled into a false sense of security. Now it was well and truly gone.
Bazir drove me to the Gandamack Lodge in Wazir Akbar Khan. It was a Thursday night, and that meant a barbecue in the garden and an expat piss-up. The checkpoints and guards and heavy steel doors didn’t feel like the usual hassle. I wanted to be safely behind them, away from the rules, to behave as badly as I liked, to forget where I was.
The Gandamack was its usual refined self: a low, white villa with wicker chairs on the veranda and lanterns lighting up the garden. Milling about the barbecue were the people with the money to stay there – mercenaries, spooks, the odd journalist with an expense account – mingling with aid workers, UN staff and diplomats, all young, free and single.
I got myself a beer and lit a cigarette, then wandered around the garden. Pretty soon, I’d finished the beer – a weak import from Dubai – and went to get another.
I’d hoped that Orla would be there, but I couldn’t see her. Instead, I bumped into François, a journalist working for Le Monde.
“Are you all right, Joséphine?” he asked.
“Not really.”
“That doesn’t sound good.” He led me over to the cluster of wicker chairs and muttered something to the men sitting in them. They were happily drunk and got to their feet, making their way back over to the barbecue.
We sat down close enough to put people off joining us.
“What happened?” he said.
I told him about Rashida, trying to fight back tears.
François put his hand on my knee. “Joséphine – this will sound heartless, but it isn’t meant that way, OK?”
I nodded.
“We’ve all lost people. Our job brings trouble. Remember when we were all here together, back in 2001 at the Intercon?”
I nodded again.
“And that noticeboard, covered with tributes to our colleagues who’d been killed?”
“I remember,” I said.
“What I mean is – it happens. Journalists understand the risks. We all know it’s part of the job.”
I took a deep drag of my cigarette, then blew the smoke out into the garden, watching it drift away.
“The thing is,” I said, “those journalists chose to come to Kabul. They were chasing the story. They decided the risks were worth it. Rashida wasn’t following a story, not her own one. She was doing it for me.”
“She still chose to do it.”
“She wasn’t going to. Her brothers had made her promise to stop, but I got her to come with me, one last time. If it weren’t for me, she wouldn’t be dead.”
He signalled to a waiter. “Two brandies.”
Turning back to me, he shook his head. “Joséphine, you’re in shock. But you cannot blame yourself. There’s no point. War is like everything else in life: it’s about being in the right place at the right time, or the wrong one at the wrong time. It’s about chance, and one thing leading to another. That’s just the way it is. An Austrian prince takes a wrong turn up a side street, gets shot, World War One begins, bam! See what I mean?”
The waiter brought two glasses of brandy.
“Let’s make a toast to your friend,” said François.
Wearily, I raised my glass. “To Rashida.”
François kept up with me as I drank my way down the bottle of brandy. The garden was buzzing now, full of people clustered into little groups, the conversations louder, interrupted now and then by bursts of laughter.
I looked at François. He was a good-looking man – typically French, I guess you’d say, like in those films you used to drag me to – dark, a little shaggy at the edges, lines around the eyes from laughing a lot and working in sunny places. And for the first time in all my years of leading this crazy way of life, I felt a sudden shiver of something like lust. I imagined myself kissing him, pressing myself against his body, feeling his hands on my back. I felt my cheeks flush, my heart begin to race.
“François…” I said.
He drained the rest of his brandy and stood up. “You must excuse me. I have a reservation for dinner at L’Atmosphère. Just a few people, you’d like them. Do you want to join us?”
I felt a stab of disappointment. There was no way I could sit in a restaurant, pretending to carry on as normal.
“No thanks,” I said. “I think I’m going to take myself off to bed.”
He kissed me on both cheeks. I fought not to cup his chin and kiss him harder, the way I wanted.
“Goodnight Joséphine,” he said. “I hope you feel better soon.” I ordered another brandy and took it out into the garden, away from the lights of the veranda. What am I doing? I thought. Why am I here?
I was restless, pacing around the lawn – prowling, I realized suddenly, looking for trouble. My head was pounding, blood coursing through my body.
I spotted a group of men near the barbecue: broad-shouldered, with close-cropped hair. Private security. Mercenaries. Contractors, as they like to call themselves. Unconcerned by ethics, alert to opportunity. Perfect.
Pretty soon I was chatting to one of them. And no, Suze, I don’t remember his name. Tall. Strong. Not bad-looking. Not the kind of man I’d ever have given a second glance to.
Not the kind of man I’d ever have given a second glance to?
What the hell am I saying? I haven’t slept with a man for twenty years.
Hadn’t.
More brandy made me bolder. I was properly drunk now, enough not to care about consequences, enough to make me feel invincible. The pounding was getting stronger, a pulse beat in my hand as I gripped the glass.
He was interested too. I could see it in the way he leant in close as we talked. I wasn’t especially flattered – he was drunk too. At least we had that much in common.
“Did you know this isn’t the original Gandamack?” he said. “It’s the second.”
“Er, no.”
“The first one was opened just after the fall of the Taliban. By a British cameraman.”
“Oh.”
“Before that it was owned by one of Osama’s wives. He used to stay in what’s now Room No. 1. Can you imagine?”
“Blimey.”
“I’ve got a room,” he said, looking at our empty glasses. “Not Osama’s, but it’s pretty nice.”
“I’m a lesbian,” I said.
He smirked. “I don’t mind if you don’t.”
There’s not much point in giving you the details. For the first time that day, the first time since I’d arrived in Kabul, my mind switched off, and I was just a body – and that was all I wanted. Afterwards we had a cigarette but didn’t talk much, and then I took a shower, pulled on my clothes and left.
On the way back to the guest house I didn’t feel anything much, apart from sober. Sleeping with him hadn’t seemed like a choice, but like something I had to do, right there and then, with no time to think or question or worry about anything else. I’d never felt like that before. I knew it was dangerous.
Forty
ELIZABETH WILLOUGHBY’S DIARY
17th May 1915
I have something very strange and very difficult to admit: I am in love with Hari Mitra.
Just writing it gives me at once a thrill and a pang of regret. Perhaps regret is not the right word. Perhaps it is fear. Perhaps it is anticipation.
Whatever the word, it is something that I know is true and will not go away. It is something that is not new, but which I did not want to see before. This morning, however, it became clear to me.
There has been another battle at Neuve-Chapelle, another slaughter. The Germans were much better prepared than last time, and thousands of our sol
diers perished. So many were wounded that it took days to get them to the field ambulances waiting on the second line.
We have been tremendously busy with new patients – so busy that the surgeons have begun to allow their assistants to carry out operations. This morning I entered the theatre and saw Hari treating a patient with horrific wounds, cleaning them out with his fine fingers. The look on his face was one of utter absorption and tenderness. His brows were knitted in concentration, his movements were deliberate, precise, but also fluid, as he worked with absolute confidence. I watched his hands, marvelling at their light precision. I saw that this was a doctor who truly loved his patients, and suddenly I knew that I loved him.
But I am not free to be in love with anyone except Robert. Robert, my whole reason for wanting to work in the Pavilion, the person who first made me excited about India and living somewhere different.
Robert, who is now so very changed.
He is still as handsome, blue-eyed, square-jawed, the very model of a military man. His uniform is impeccable, his boots always shined. He is the perfect product of Wellington College and Sandhurst: a man of honour, valour, grit. He was a fearless leader of his men in the trenches, and remains devoted to them now.
But I have realized the true meaning of the feeling that came over me when Hari told me that marriage to Robert would be unwise. It was the chill of recognition that he was right. There has been a cracking, like a glass that chips, then, at the slightest pressure, one day shatters. Robert has come back damaged from the Front. It is a damage that was imperceptible at first, but then became more evident in his small twitches and odd reactions, and then those horrible stories of what the men had put in their letters home, followed by the final affront, the woman on the street outside his boarding house.
There is a sickness in him, if not in his body, in his mind. This war has broken him: it has got to his very core, and is still there, bubbling away like the gangrene that the surgeons cut from their patients. Robert has become like a patient too, of the worst kind, the sort that will not admit to being ill and refuses the treatment that would save them. As a patient is how I now see him: a patient for whom I feel much tenderness, wanting him to get well. But I no longer see him as a man, as a future husband with whom to spend the rest of my life.
The Repercussions Page 17
