Durrani looked at him quizzically. He’d never had a medical examination before in his life and removing his clothing in front of a stranger like this was alien to him.
‘We don’t have time to waste,’ the mullah said testily. ‘Do as he says. That is a command.’
Durrani had been obeying orders of one kind or another all his life and during the last fifteen years they had been those of mullahs.To act without question was ingrained in him. He pulled off his robe to reveal a grubby sweat-stained wool shirt.
‘And your shirt,’ the doctor said.
Durrani unbuttoned his shirt, pulled it off his shoulders and held it in his hand as the doctor studied him from where he stood. Durrani was sinewy, without an ounce of fat on him, his taut muscles and large veins well defined beneath his tight yellowy-brown skin. He was also covered in a collection of interesting scars.
The doctor slowly walked around him, pausing to study the marks of some of the old injuries. He had no doubt that each of them had some kind of horrifying story attached to it. He was not wrong.
A series of deep gouges on Durrani’s chest was the result of shrapnel from a missile fired from a Russian helicopter in the Jegay Valley in 1983. A round indentation on his right lat with a corresponding one on his back marked the entry and exit holes of a bullet that had struck him during his first assault on Kabul. A scar across the side of his stomach was from a cut given to him by a Pakistani fighter two days after the Yakaolang massacre when the man accused Durrani of cowardice. Durrani cared little for the man’s opinions and was content to ignore him but the man took the lack of reaction as proof of his accusation and drew his knife to kill him. Durrani was not easily riled but a threat of death was sufficient to get his blood up. The Pakistani’s thrust to Durrani’s side was his last attack. Durrani side-stepped, knocked the man’s arm away, closed the gap between them in the next instant, wrapped an arm around his assailant’s throat and, while others looked on, crushed his windpipe, letting go only when the man had been dead a good half-minute. His back bore the chequered scars of dozens of lashes that he had once received from a Saudi troop commander who had accused Durrani of stealing loot he was not entitled to. During the next battle a week later Durrani bided his time and in the thick of the fighting he pulled the pin from a grenade and stuffed it down the back of the man’s chest harness. No one suspected that the explosion and subsequent disintegration of the Saudi was Durrani’s way of taking revenge.
‘You have survived much,’ the doctor muttered.
‘He is my best,’ the mullah said with some pride.
‘Lie on the desk,’ the doctor said. ‘On your back.’
The mullah cleared the items off the desk and Durrani sat on the edge of it and lay back.
The doctor moved alongside Durrani, concentrating his examination on the fighter’s stomach area. He took hold of the top of Durrani’s trousers and pulled them down as far as his pubic hairs, prodding around his lower abdomen.‘It should not be a problem,’ the doctor finally acknowledged.
‘You must do it now,’ the mullah said. ‘Tonight.’
The doctor nodded and turned to get his bag from the floor in the corner of the room.
The mullah leaned over Durrani to look into his eyes. ‘He is going to perform a small operation on you.’
Durrani stared up at him, unsure how to respond. But whatever was going to happen would happen and, as the mullah had said, Durrani would find out the reason behind it soon enough.
The doctor placed his bag on the desk beside Durrani and removed a bottle of lidocaine, a hypodermic needle, a scalpel, some gauze and a pair of rubber gloves which he pulled on over his hands. Durrani stared at the cracked smoke-stained ceiling and concentrated on detaching his consciousness from whatever was happening to him.
The doctor filled the hypodermic needle with the lidocaine and wiped a small area of Durrani’s lower abdomen with an antiseptic swab. ‘I’m going to anaesthetise a small area of skin,’ he said reassuringly.
Durrani gave no response and did not flinch when the doctor pushed the needle deep into his flesh and squeezed out the contents of the syringe as he slowly withdrew it. The doctor then took a small plastic bag from his medical kit, placed the tiny device inside it, sealed it by winding thread tightly around the opening and dropped it into a bottle of Betadine antiseptic solution.
There was a sudden flash of flame and Durrani’s eyes darted to the mullah who was lighting up a cigarette.
The doctor picked up the scalpel and paused, the blade hovering over Durrani’s stomach. ‘How do you feel?’ he asked. ‘Are you OK?’
‘You will not bother Durrani with a small cut, doctor,’ the mullah said confidently.
The doctor looked at the deep scars on Durrani’s torso and shrugged in agreement. ‘You should not feel much anyway,’ the doctor said. ‘Perhaps a small burning as I cut into your muscle.’
Durrani exhaled slowly, wishing the man would stop talking and get on with it.
The doctor placed the scalpel against Durrani’s flesh. Durrani felt a sting as the blade cut him and the doctor began a slight sawing motion. He could feel his blood trickling down his side and the doctor swabbing him with a piece of gauze. He raised his head to take a look. The doctor pressed a gloved index finger on the cut and pushed it in until it disappeared inside Durrani’s body up to the second joint. Durrani decided it was too bizarre and went back to staring at the ceiling.
The doctor withdrew his finger, wiped the blood off it and produced a pair of tweezers from his kit. He removed the small plastic bag with the device inside it from the betadine and, opening the incision, placed the bag in the hole, pushing it all the way in with his finger. He took a fresh piece of gauze, wiped the wound clean, pushed the sides together and nodded to himself.
As he reached for a suture pack the mullah stopped him. ‘No,’ the mullah said. ‘No stitches. It must look like an untended wound.’
‘He must lie still for a while, then,’ the doctor said.
‘Tape it,’ the mullah said.
The doctor suspected that the fighter would not have the luxury of resting at all. But it was none of his business anyway so he took a roll of tape from the bag, tore off several strips and placed them across the cut to hold it closed. He covered the wound with a large dressing which he taped firmly into place, returned his instruments to his bag and closed it. ‘It’s done.’
The mullah nodded. ‘You can go.’
The doctor was about to pick up his bag when he had a second thought. He reopened it and removed a packet of tablets in a strip of foil-covered plastic. ‘He should take these. Just in case there’s an infection.’
The mullah took the pills and fixed his gaze on the doctor who read the clear message in his eyes. He left the room.
‘Sit up,’ the mullah said to Durrani when they were alone.
Durrani started to sit up, pausing as he felt a sudden pain where the doctor had cut him. He took his weight on his hands and pushed himself up the rest of the way. He examined the dressing - a bloodstain was forming at the centre - and eased himself to his feet.
‘Get dressed,’ the mullah said. ‘It will stop bleeding soon. You’ve had far worse than that.’
Durrani pulled on his shirt.
‘You are to go to Kandahar and then on to Chaman,’ the mullah told him.
‘Pakistan?’ Durrani asked, buttoning up his shirt. Chaman was a well-known pass out of southern Afghanistan.
‘You will be met at Spin Buldak and escorted across the border.’
‘And then what?’ Durrani asked.
‘There is no need to trouble yourself with more information.You will be in good hands.What you carry in your belly is of great importance.’
All Durrani understood was that at the end of his journey someone else would cut him open once again, this time to remove what the doctor had placed inside him. The mullah was going to a lot of trouble to hide the device but he had to concede it was a smart way to ensure that it was not lost. If Durrani had a serious accident or was attacked and robbed, unless his body was completely destroyed the device could still be retrieved. ‘I leave right away?’
‘Sena will give you all you need. Money and food. You will travel with four of my men.’
‘Would it not be better if I travelled alone?’ Durrani asked, even though he knew the mullah would not agree.
