The Abrupt Physics of Dying (39 page)

Clay glanced over to the chair. It was too far. He dropped his pack to the floor. ‘My name is Claymore Straker.’

The Consul’s eyes widened. He fumbled through a pile of papers. ‘Did you say Straker?’

‘Yes.’

The Consul looked up at him. ‘It says here that a man of that name was killed in Yemen three days ago.’

Clay forced the words out, even as he felt himself go. ‘I have information concerning the murder of Thierry Champard, a French citizen.’ Then he collapsed to the floor.

A Problematic Resurrection

8th June. Muscat, Oman

Clay opened his eyes. Sunlight streamed through the shuttered windows, thick beams of it, dense bundles of photons, blinding. Palm shadows swayed across his eyes. A cool salt breeze caressed his face. And everywhere, resonating in the walls, tumbling through the open windows, the sounds of the sea. Muscat, Oman. He remembered standing in the French Embassy, then an ambulance, hospital corridors spinning above him, the blurred image of a masked surgeon, operating theatre lights, then the drugs taking him away.

Slowly his vision cleared. The tropical Arabian light was hard and white against the plaster walls, the polished ceramic floor. He narrowed his eyes. Clay looked down at his hand. It was bandaged, heavy with gauze, brilliantly white, wrapped up to his elbow. Umbilical tubes and wires connected him to a mechanical world of phials and pumps. A dull ache left his fingertips and swam to his forehead. He moved his fingers inside the bandages.

The evidence of Parnell’s crime, of Petro-Tex’s poisoning of the villagers, was with the French government now: Champard’s letter, the report, photos, lab reports, his field measurements and observations, the copies of Petro-Tex accounts, all of it. His testimony, too, if they wanted it. More than enough to shut Parnell away in a tomb of regret for a long time. Perhaps enough to convince the French to initiate international action against Petro-Tex. He would keep his
promise to Al Shams, to Abdulkader, to himself. To Rania. And then he would be free. Free to start digging in that big graveyard where one day, maybe, he would bury her.

He looked around the room. Life without her seemed impossible, disloyal. None of this should exist: the polished metal table hinged to his bed, the freshly painted walls, these windows looking out onto the gardens and the barren mountains beyond, that blue, aching sky, him still here, still breathing, his retina registering these images, all of it incomprehensible in its treachery, an affront.

Clay ripped the tube from the catheter in his arm, jammed down the bed’s side railing, swung his feet to the floor. He stood, head spinning, clinging to the bed frame. Fighting back the red edge of unconsciousness, he started towards the door, only one thought in his mind: get to the Embassy, push the French to action. Only then would any of it have been worth the price.

He was almost to the doorway when a big African woman dressed in a white uniform appeared in the doorway. ‘Good morning,’ she said, blocking his way. Her gaze searched down his bandaged arm to the disconnected catheter. She arched her brow. ‘Going for a little walk?’ Her skin was luminous, liked polished wood. Two parallel beauty scars, wide and straight, cut from her left cheekbone to the line of her jaw. ‘Feeling better then?’ she said. Her voice was soft, melodic like an Ashanti ballad.

‘Like a new man,’ said Clay.

She smiled, metres of big pale teeth. She stood beside him, took his arm. Half his height, probably double his weight.

‘I have to leave,’ he said. ‘There is something important I have to do.’ Clay took a step forward, unsteady, swaying on shaking legs.

She stood her ground, her bulk blocking the doorway.

‘Please,’ Clay whispered. ‘People’s lives are at stake.’ The pain in his arm was strong now, a continuous rage.

The woman crossed her arms over the vast bulk of her chest. ‘It is your life I am worried about right now, Mister Keating. You have had a very serious operation. Your condition is still fragile. The
doctor says you must rest.’ She stepped towards him and took his arm.

Clay’s vision blurred, the peripheries collapsing inwards. He slumped momentarily, recovered. She propped him up with her shoulder, guided him back to the bed, settled him, reattached his IV, and pumped in some morphine. The effect was almost instantaneous. Slowly, Clay’s vision cleared. The pain started to recede, skulked away until after a while it was almost completely hidden, lurking there beneath its opium camouflage.

The nurse plumped his pillows, wrote something on his chart. ‘If you are well enough, you can start therapy and exercise in a couple of days. Until then, you must rest.’

‘Keating?’ he said.

She looked at his chart. ‘Your name. Paul Keating.’

Clay smiled to himself. ‘My friends call me Clay,’ he said.

She glanced down at his chart, back up, looked into his eyes. ‘I am Afia.’

‘Born on Friday.’

She stood looking at him, a smile starting to bloom. ‘You know my country.’

‘I have worked in Ghana. In the Ashanti mostly, on the coast a bit.’

‘I am from Takoradi,’ she said, smiling wide.

‘I got very drunk once in Uncle Kwesi’s tavern on Port Road.’

She laughed behind a big raised hand. Her eyes sparkled like the African sun refracting off the Gulf of Guinea. She leaned over him, inspected his bandage. ‘The doctor says you have done well, Mister Clay.’

‘Just Clay, Afia.
Meh paa chow
.’ Please.

At the sound of her own language, Afia’s smile broadened further, if that was possible. ‘Clay,’ she said through a polished keyboard of teeth. ‘You speak Twi.’

Clay made a pincer with the thumb and index finger of his right hand, narrowed it down to an inch’s aperture. ‘
Kakra
.’ A little. He
tried a smile, failed, woozy from the anaesthetic. ‘How long have I been here, Afia?’

‘You were brought in yesterday evening. We operated soon after.’ She looked at her timepiece. ‘You slept eighteen hours.’ Afia tucked the blanket in around him.

Clay raised his bandaged arm. ‘And this?’

Afia frowned. ‘The doctor will be in soon to talk to you. He will explain everything.’ She cranked him upright in the bed, set a tray of breakfast in front of him.

‘I don’t know if I can eat.’

‘You must try, Mister Clay.’

He gave her a stern look.

She laughed, covered her hand with her mouth. ‘Clay, I mean.’

‘
Mepa wo kiew
,’ he said. Thank you.

Afia blazed white teeth again, fussed over his tray, checked his IV line, and bustled from the room, humming to herself.

Clay picked at his meal, set the tray aside, and lapsed into a drugged half-sleep. After a while Afia came back to remove the tray. A small Arab man in a white lab coat followed her into the room, stood at the foot of his bed examining his chart. He had a starved, narrow face. He looked solemn, downcast. Afia retreated with the tray, quiet, professional.

The man stood at Clay’s bedside. ‘I am Doctor Rashid,’ he said. ‘How do you feel, Mister Keating?’

Clay looked down at his bandaged arm. ‘I can feel my fingers tingling. I can move them.’

The doctor leaned forward, inspected Clay’s arm. ‘It will be like this for some time. Perhaps a long time.’

Clay looked down at the bandage. He’d seen so many like it before. ‘When can I leave?’

‘At least a week, yet. Perhaps longer. You need careful observation. The bandages need to be changed regularly. We will show you how, so you can start to do it yourself.’ The doctor glanced at the IV bottle hanging from the hood above Clay’s bed. ‘We are giving you
antibiotics and painkillers. There is still a high chance of secondary infection. You need time to heal.’

Clay ran his good hand through the thick beard that now covered his face. ‘I had a bag with me when I arrived.’

‘When you were admitted, you were in rags. A pair of trousers, a shirt, and a pair of boots. There was no bag. We took the liberty of disposing of your clothes.’

‘Identification?’

‘Nothing.’

Clay thought back to the hospital in Al Mukalla, Mohamed, his mother.

‘You were in critical condition when you arrived,’ said the Doctor. ‘The man who brought you provided all the necessary information, including payment details.’

‘From the Consulate.’

The doctor nodded. ‘I am Yemeni,’ said the doctor. ‘From the South.’

Clay looked him in the eyes, said nothing, wary now.

‘You came from my country,’ he said, jutting his chin towards Clay’s bandaged arm.

‘Was that on the admission form, too?’

The doctor shook his head. ‘No, it was not.’ He glanced from Clay’s cheek to his right forearm, the long scar there. ‘You have some experience, I think, with hospitals.’

‘A car accident,’ said Clay.

‘And the other?’ The Doctor pointed to Clay’s torso.

‘Same accident.’

‘I have seen many wounds. It is my business, after all.’

Clay said nothing.

The doctor leaned in close. ‘Be careful, Mister Keating. Saleh’s men are everywhere.’

Clay looked him in the eyes. The doctor did not look away.

‘I need to get to the French Embassy,’ he said.

After a while the doctor stood. ‘Let me see what can be done. In the meantime, rest.’ Then he smiled, turned and left the room.

The day turned. Clay lapsed in and out of consciousness, vaguely aware of the nurse coming and going, the swish of her skirts, the heat of day, the noise of the city beyond the open shuttered windows, the smell of the sea cutting through the morphine haze, the call to prayer echoing from the hills, a salty wet breeze flowing across his bare chest. And sometimes Rania would appear, slide through his consciousness, and he would wake overjoyed, laughing, heart racing, only to open his eyes and have day eviscerate the lie. Other times in his dreaming, the weaker part of him tried to stay with her, chase her through shifting dimensions, but then she was gone and there was only the swaying palms and the scorched black hills and the sounds of the cars on the street.

He opened his eyes. The room was dark. A nightlight glowed near the door. Afia was there, her bulk swaying as she closed shutters, secured latches. She turned and walked to the bed, wrote something on his chart, and checked his bandages. ‘You have a visitor,’ she said. ‘He is outside. He has been waiting for some time. Do you feel up to it?’

Clay nodded.

‘After, we will change your dressing.’

‘Looking forward to it,’ said Clay.

Afia walked to the door, disappeared, returned a moment later, ushered a man into the room. It was the Deputy Consul from the French Embassy. He walked to Clay’s bed, sat in the chair, folded his hands. He wore the same dark suit, clean starched shirt, dark tie. ‘Good morning, Monsieur, ah, Keating.’

Clay tried a smile. ‘Nice touch. Paul Keating. The Australian Prime Minister.’

‘I thought, under the circumstances, that you might want to keep your real name off the admission documents.’

‘Thanks.’ Not a bad bloke.

‘How are you feeling?’

‘Like nothing’s missing,’ said Clay.

The Consul glanced at Clay’s bandaged arm.

‘I have checked your documents, made enquiries.’ He flipped open a notebook. ‘Thierry Champard’s letter has been authenticated. Would you be willing to testify?’

‘Yes.’

‘And you say that this man Todorov can be made available for questioning?’

‘If you can get him out of Yemen.’

‘I have referred this matter to Paris. I have recommended that they take action to indict Vance Parnell for conspiracy in the murder of Thierry Champard.’

Clay took a deep breath. That was something. ‘And what about Petro-Tex, the pollution that Champard died trying to prevent?’

The Consul closed his notebook. ‘I am afraid that is beyond the jurisdiction of the French government. It is an internal Yemeni matter.’

‘I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but they’re a little preoccupied right now. There must be something you can do.’

‘I am afraid not, Monsieur.’

‘I have data, photographs, field and laboratory measurements, everything. I can prove categorically that Petro-Tex is knowingly poisoning at least a dozen villages. You’ve seen the letter. And it’s still going on. Surely you can bring diplomatic pressure to bear, go after Petro-Tex’s assets, something.’

‘I have seen and read everything you brought.’

‘Then you know what’s at stake. I need your help.’

‘That is impossible.’

Clay looked up at the Deputy Consul. He wasn’t much older than Clay, a man past apprenticeship, set on his career now, building a reputation, going places, a ring on his finger. He might have children, a mortgage back in France. ‘I’m not asking the government of France,’ said Clay. ‘I’m asking you. Help me help these people.’

The Consul stood, straightened his tie. ‘I’m sorry. Beyond seeking justice for Champard’s murder, I cannot help you. I have no authority in these matters. Please understand.’

Clay sank back in the bed, closed his eyes. A cold current welled up from somewhere deep inside him, spread through his extremities. Yes, he understood perfectly, comprehensively.

‘There is one more thing,’ said the Consul. ‘I recommend that you maintain your new identity, at least until your name can be cleared. I warn you that it may take some time. You are still officially a suspect in several murders.’

‘How long?’

‘Years. Perhaps never. It is difficult to know.’

The Consul put an envelope on the side table.

Clay picked it up, looked inside. DG’s passport, a sheaf of hundred dollar bills, all that was left of the cash Al Shams had given him. He looked back up at the Consul.