tray full of instruments. His stomach tightened inexplicably. He had seen far worse than a tray full of sterilized instruments in his thirtyeight years, but something about the way it was sitting there in the dark made him feel distinctly uncomfortable. It was like an omen of some kind, a sign of bad things to come.
There were two guards outside the door, both standing ramrod straight, both holding stubby black submachine guns. Qureshi eased between them and opened the door, then stepped into the room. Craig followed, sensing the stocky Pakistani was a few steps to his rear. He stopped just inside the threshold, more out of surprise than anything else.
The room was large and square. Unlike the rest of the house, which was warmly lit, the surgical suite was thrown into stark relief by harsh fluorescent lights that ran the length and width of the plaster ceiling. The floor was a light blue tile with cement-based grout, easy to clean and maintain. The instruments common to all surgical theaters were clearly visible: a portable Medtronic defibrillator; an aging Hewlett-Packard EKG, the monitor sitting nearby; a transport ventilator with a cracked plastic shell. There was also an array of tools that anyone on the street could identify: an IV pole with 2-inch swivel casters, blood pressure cuffs, a box of surgical gloves. There was a scrub sink directly opposite the door and, to the left, a piece of machinery that Craig recognized immediately. He guessed that it had been purchased specifically for this procedure; if Qureshi had frequent need of an anesthesiologist, he would also have access to one, and he wouldn’t have needed Craig.
His appraising eye took note of the quality—judging by the array of medical supply stickers that lined the base, it was a refurbished model—but he had used the Drager before, and as long as it worked, it would get the job done. The Drager Narkomed 4 had been one of the better anesthesia machines available when it first hit the market back in the late nineties. Now it was considered hopelessly outdated, at least in the States. In Pakistan, it still represented the best of modern medicine. Craig could have dealt with far worse. Over the past ten months, he had learned how to make do with substandard equipment, and the Drager was anything but. The surgical table was off to the right, a simple, stainless-steel contraption with a circular base and hydraulic hand cranks. Twin Burton lamps were mounted over the table, a total of eight bulbs lighting the patient below.
The patient . . .
Qureshi was standing at the head of the table, partially blocking Craig’s view. He walked forward, took a single step to the left, and looked down. He saw the woman’s face and experienced that brief moment of recognition. Then came the split second of complete inaction before his instincts took over. He took a fast step back, his hands coming up to ward off the sight.
“Oh, fuck,” Craig heard himself say. His eyes went wide, and he took another quick step back, his right arm pointing accusingly at the table, as if he were the first to figure it out. “Jesus Christ, do you know who that is?”
Qureshi was pulling him off to the side, pushing him into a chair. It was a considerable effort, given his small frame. The older Pakistani was standing next to the door, subtly blocking the only exit. Craig heard himself protesting, swearing, but he couldn’t seem to stop. His mind was moving in a million directions at once, and part of him was saying,
“That’s Fitzgerald,” he blurted out. He was still pointing the accusing finger. “That’s the goddamn secretary of state. The whole world is out looking for her, Said, right now, as we speak. What the hell have you done?” He whirled on Qureshi, shaking his head, his whole body trembling. “What the hell have you done? I can’t. . . .”
“You will,” someone said. The hard voice came from the door. Craig looked over, eyes wild. Qureshi said nothing, just looked at the floor. “You can and you will,” Mengal reminded them. “She is your patient. You are both responsible, and you will fix what is wrong with her.”
“No way,” Craig mumbled. “No fucking way. I’m not going to—”
Mengal was already crossing the floor, coming up from the rear. His left hand moved in a blur, snatching the hair at the base of Craig’s neck. His right hand came up, and he shoved the muzzle of a snubnosed .38 into the right side of the doctor’s temple. Craig froze at the touch of the gun, his mind sharpening, narrowing with the nearness of death.
“You listen to me,” Mengal hissed, his words cutting the cool, quiet air in the suite. Qureshi froze along with Craig; on the table, Brynn Fitzgerald remained motionless. She had barely stirred in thirty hours. “You will do what you were brought here to do. You will save this woman’s life. If you don’t, I promise you now, you
He shoved Craig’s head forward, releasing his grip at the same time. The pain was intense, so close to his earlier injury, but Craig was oblivious. He was too stunned to even react. The woman’s face was stuck in his mind, pale, calm, so unnaturally still . . . He just sat there, trying to see a way out of it.
The footsteps were fading behind him. He heard voices, a harsh, rapid exchange of Urdu. For the moment, he and Qureshi were alone in the room. Qureshi crouched before him, so their eyes were level. His expression was one of limitless sorrow.
“You gave them my name,” Craig said in a monotone. It was hard to know how he meant it. “You told them where to find me.”
Qureshi shook his head, but it wasn’t quite a denial.
“Who is he?”
“His name is Mengal,” the Pakistani murmured. “Benazir Mengal. He was a general in the Pakistani Army. He’s killed many people, and he’s behind everything that’s been in the news. The disappearance of those climbers on the Karakoram, the ambush of Fitzgerald’s vehicle . . . everything.”
“What about me, Said? Why am I here?”
Another hesitation. “You have to understand,” Qureshi began weakly, “I wasn’t given a choice. They were going to—”
“What’s wrong with her?” Craig cut in. His face was red, his tone suddenly harsh. He was embarrassed, Qureshi realized, ashamed that he’d allowed Mengal to get on top of him. Ashamed that he’d been bullied into submission.
“Blunt force trauma sustained in the attack on her car. She had a partial pneumothorax of the left lung, but I’ve already put in a chest tube. That was the lesser injury.”
“So . . . ?”
“So she needs a pericardial window,” Qureshi said quietly, “and she needs it soon. Preferably within the hour.”
Craig had only briefly surveyed the equipment in the room, but he didn’t have to look to know that Qureshi didn’t have access to a digital EMI. “You don’t have a—”
Qureshi waved it away, slightly annoyed. “It’s a physiologic diagnosis . . . I don’t need a CT scan to see the obvious.” He quickly went over his earlier observations: the abnormal blood pressure reading, the J-waves on the EKG, the specific complaints Fitzgerald had made when she was still lucid. “She’s sedated at the moment, but I need you to put her under all the way. I have everything you need. We can start as soon as you’re ready.”
“How do you—”
“I wrote the list out myself, and Mengal sent his people to pick up the items. It’s all here, ready and waiting. I’ve checked everything personally.”
Craig nodded slowly. He could see that Qureshi had sold him out, had provided them with his name, but he couldn’t summon the anger he should have felt. They would have put pressure on him, and while he wasn’t a coward, Qureshi wasn’t the kind of man to fight back. At least, not unless he was facing imminent death. Craig couldn’t blame him for what he’d done.
Craig looked up, directly into the other man’s deceptively placid eyes. “They want her for propaganda value, Said. In the end, they’ll probably kill her. And if they’re willing to kill her, we don’t stand a chance. You must know that.”
“Yes, I do.” Qureshi seemed to hesitate. “But I can help her, and for that reason alone, I have to do as they ask. I can’t walk away from that responsibility.”
Craig didn’t alter his steady gaze, just gave a short, understanding nod. “So you’re going to operate. Then what?”
Qureshi smiled in a resigned kind of way, but he never broke eye contact. “I’m not a fighter, but I won’t make it easy. I don’t want to die, but they are all over the house, the grounds, and one of them . . .”
