Chapter 31
A woman’s voice answered from behind the door of the second house. She knew nothing of an aircraft or a man from China.
“Can I come in and talk to you?” asked Nuri.
“You can talk to my husband when he comes home,” said the woman.
“When will that be?”
“I don’t know.”
Nuri asked a few more questions, then told the woman he would try back later. He backed away, reaching Danny in a few steps.
“What do you think?” asked Danny.
“Could go either way. I stuck a bug near the door stop. MY-PID will activate it once the satellite comes overhead.”
“I think it was the first house.”
“Maybe,” agreed Nuri. “But we still have two more to check. One thing that’s very unusual — ordinarily, people are extremely friendly to strangers. The shooting has everybody on edge. Very on edge.”
“So I see.” Danny nodded in the direction of two men with AK-47s standing in the shadows at the side of the house across the way.
The muscles in Nuri’s shoulders immediately tensed, and his throat tightened. But he’d been in situations like this dozens, even hundreds of times in Africa. He continued to walk toward the car, keeping an easy, almost lackadaisical pace.
“They’re just watchin’ us,” said Danny.
“Yeah. Just move nice and easy.”
Danny opened the driver’s side door but didn’t get in. Nuri went around and got in the car. He kept his eyes straight ahead, but took his pistol out from his waistband.
Danny eased into the seat, pulled the door closed and started the car.
“You have to make a U-turn,” said Nuri.
The Mercedes stuttered as it started out of the turn, then stalled.
“Shit,” muttered Danny.
He turned the car over — once, twice. It wasn’t starting.
“Don’t flood it,” whispered Nuri.
“No shit.”
“Maybe our friends will push us,” said Nuri.
The car caught. Danny put it into gear gently and they edged forward.
“Maybe our friends will push us?” mocked Danny after they turned the corner.
“I was making a joke.”
“It wasn’t very funny.”
“It was funny. A little.”
“Not even a little. Which way to the next house?”
Nuri consulted the map on MY-PID.
“About a quarter mile down here. Take a left. There should be a bunch of huts.”
There were. There were also three men with guns blocking the way.
“What do you think?” Danny asked, slowing to a stop in the middle of the intersection.
The men were standing about ten yards away. Each held a Belgian FN Minimi machine gun. They were relatively large guns, but the men were so big the weapons looked like scale models. The man in the middle had a bandolier of bullets around his neck and was dressed in generic fatigues similar to Danny’s. The other two wore the dusty, cream-colored clothes more common there.
“I’ll ask what’s going on,” said Nuri. “Stay in the car.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” said Danny.
“Just wait.”
Nuri pushed open the door and got out. His heart was pounding.
“Hello,” he said, starting in English. “I am looking for a Chinese man named Li Han.”
There was no reaction from any of the trio as he gave his spiel. He switched to Arabic but did no better.
“Are you with the Brothers?” Nuri asked finally.
“The Brothers are dirt,” said one of the men, using English. He fired off a few rounds to emphasize his point.
“Right,” said Nuri. “Can I get through?”
“You better leave, mister,” said the man who’d fired. “Now.”
Nuri thought it best to comply.
Chapter 32
Melissa finished taping the bandages on the old man’s arm and straightened. He turned his head toward her as she rose. The pupils in his eyes were large black disks, edged by the faintest gray. They met hers for a moment, drilling in with a wordless question.
“You’re going to be OK,” she said in Arabic.
The old man’s eyes held hers as she put her hand on his back and eased him to his feet. Melissa helped him from her corner of the examining room, gently pushing him past the table where Marie Bloom was working on another patient.
Bloom’s patient was a young boy who had caught shrapnel in his leg. He was much better off than the old man or any of the other patients they’d seen, but the pain on his face touched Melissa in a way none of the others had. She suddenly felt overwhelmed by sympathy for the people here, like a tree that had bent under the weight of heavy snow until finally it snapped.
“Who’s next?” she asked in English.
The aide who’d been helping triage and organize the patients shook her head. They were done.
For now.
Melissa went back to help Bloom get the boy down from the table. He winced, unable to put much weight on the leg.
“We’ll have to get one of the men to carry him home,” said Bloom.
“I’ll take him,” said Melissa. She dropped down to one knee, propping him up as he continued to test his leg. She guessed he was four or five. “Where’s his mother?”
“She was one of the dead,” said Bloom.
The boy’s shirt was splattered with blood, and Bloom had cut off the bottom of his pants leg to work on him. He wore sandals rather than shoes.
“One of the women I treated earlier is his aunt,” said Bloom. “I sent her home already. That’s where he should go.”
“It’s terrible,” said Melissa.
“Yes.” Bloom frowned at her.
“What’s wrong?” Melissa asked.
“Go ahead and take him home.”
