only silence. Again and again, Asha turned and walked and listened, but everywhere that she went over the hard Afghan hills she found no green growing things in the earth.
After an hour’s wandering she came back down into the camp, passing a scowling young man with a whip who had apparently followed her to ensure she was not attempting to leave. Evening was falling as she sat down beside Priya among the injured men and began the tedious duty of checking each one’s wounds for signs of infection. When she was done, she joined Priya beside a small fire pit where an old dented kettle sat in the coals and a pinch of tea leaves waited in two chipped cups.
“Did you find anything?” the nun asked.
“No. Nothing.” Asha glanced across the remaining patients. “Judging from the tents, it looks as though there are only two hundred men here. And with no nearby towns to recruit new workers, I understand why Sebek wants them all back to work as soon as possible. But it can’t be done. Over twenty injured men here, and more than that lying in the sick camp over there.” She nodded toward the tents of the men who could not stop coughing. “And more will be falling ill soon. There must be something else I can do.”
“Why?”
“Because Sebek isn’t going to keep feeding men who can’t work.”
“If the sick men cannot be healed, then they cannot be healed,” Priya said. “If the workers cannot stop breathing in the dust, then they will fall sick. And these men cannot mend their bones faster than nature allows. These are facts. No amount of worry or fear or anger will change them.”
Asha stared at the kettle as it began to whistle. “Don’t be so sure about that.”
“What do you mean? Is there some way to make these men heal faster? Or perhaps we can make better splints so they can work before their bones are mended?” There was genuine curiosity and eagerness in the young nun’s voice.
“No.” Asha peered off into the darkness toward the western edge of the camp. “But maybe we can cure the men with the coughing sickness.”
“But you said that was impossible, didn’t you?”
“Did I?” Asha shrugged. “Well, maybe it was impossible yesterday. But if the wind can wear down a mountain, then I should be able to clean out a man’s lungs.” She stood up and brushed the dust from her sari. “I have to go see about some supplies.”
She crossed the camp to the wooden houses and knocked on the first door she came to. The same scowling young man from earlier opened the door but behind him Asha could see Sebek sitting at a desk by the light of a small oil lamp. The man in green glanced up. “Ah, yes. How are your patients, doctor?”
Asha grimaced. “Just Asha will be fine. Fifteen of your men will be back to work tomorrow. Another four or five may be fit enough by the end of the week. But that leaves about seventeen severe fractures that may take more than a month to heal.”
Sebek nodded. “I suspected as much. I’ll have them moved to the west end of the camp with the other cripples where they’ll be out of the way. It probably won’t do any good to tell them to leave since there’s no place to go. We’ll simply have to wait for nature to take its course.”
Asha curled her fingers into a fist. “None of your men are dying. The injured will heal in just a few weeks. You don’t need to do anything except feed them.”
“No, that food will be needed for the new men we’ll have to hire in Herat. Food is my primary operating expense right now. Everything is at a premium since it has to be imported from so far away.” Sebek sighed. “Even if I did feed the injured, the sick would probably get jealous of that lavish treatment.”
“The men with dust-lung coughs aren’t dying.”
“And they aren’t working, either,” Sebek said loudly. “And you have done nothing but confirm my own suspicions. The injured and sick men cannot work. And since you cannot heal them, you and your blind friend are free to leave. Have a pleasant walk to Herat. If you follow the railroad, it should only take you six days to arrive, assuming you don’t die of thirst and hunger first. Good night.”
The young man by the door reached for her arm, but Asha stepped farther into the room, out of his reach. “I can heal the sick men.”
Sebek sighed again as he looked up from his papers. “And now you’ve resorted to lying to save yourself.”
“No, I can do it. At least, I think I can.” Asha frowned. “But I’ll need to use that big black steam machine of yours.”
“The train engine?”
“Whatever you call it. If I’m right, I can have all of the coughing men cured by noon tomorrow.”
“Really?” Sebek smiled. “If you do that, you and your friend can ride first class all the way to Herat.”
“Just promise you’ll keep feeding the injured men until they can work again.”
Sebek narrowed his gaze. “You’re confident you can cure them?”
“Yes. Mostly.”
“Very well. You have the engine, and you have until noon tomorrow.”
5
The sun rose small and yellow in a pink and blue haze as it crept above the eastern ridge. A steady breeze blew through the valley, drawing the smoke trails of the cook fires off to the south. A lone vulture circled high overhead. It looked very much like the same vulture from the day before.
Asha left Priya sleeping under the watchful eye of the scowling youth and went to speak to the yawning man shoveling coal at the back of the train engine. As she approached, she could just barely see the raging inferno through the little firebox door, and as she drew closer, the sheer number of gleaming iron pistons and rams and wheels and whistles and rails and plates left her staring and wondering what all of them were for. The man with the shovel paused to lean over the railing to peer at her. “So, are you her?”
“I’m Asha, the healer,” she said. “Master Sebek said you would help me to cure the men with the dust-lung cough.”
“Mm.” He nodded. “The master didn’t say how, though. What do you want me to do?”
“Just make steam. Lots of steam. It comes out there, right?” She pointed to the fat black funnel on the front of the boiler.
He squinted and nodded.
“Good. Then I’ll just need a ladder, a bellows, and a bucket.”
“I’ve all three of those, actually.” The engineer ducked down, and there was a brief clatter of metal on metal, and then he stood up again with a large steel bucket. The handles of the small bellows poked out above the rim. “Ladder’s on the back. Where do you need it?”
“Here, on the side, so the men can climb up to the steam.” Asha pointed.
The engineer nodded sagely. “You want them to breathe in the steam? So what do you need these for?” He swung the bucket and bellows on his finger.
Asha set her lips in a stern line. “For the hard part.”
Half an hour later, all of the sick men were lined up beside the engine and the ladder leading up to the funnel on top of the boiler. Asha balanced on top of the boiler with the bellows in her hand and the bucket sitting to one side.
The first man climbed the ladder and, following Asha’s instructions, placed his face over the funnel, deep into the bright white steam. Down below, the engineer kept the fires burning, though not too hot, and Asha stood counting the seconds. When she tapped her first patient on the shoulder, he turned to her, his face bright red and dripping with water. Asha placed the tip of the closed bellows in his mouth and said, “Exhale!” as she yanked the bellows open.
The man stumbled forward as the bellows popped out of his mouth and he fell to his knees, barely keeping his balance on the curved roof of the boiler. He fell straight down over the bucket and a small stream of black filth poured through his lips and into the bucket between his knees. For a moment he sat gasping and spitting and making quiet retching sounds, and then he exhaled and wiped his mouth on his sleeve. And then he looked up at
