The Education of Sebastian & the Education of Caroline (45 page)

I’d become used to living with the minimum of necessities, and dressy clothes were very low on the list. When on assignment, I lived in jeans and lightweight walking boots, and had a no-frills haircut that required low to zero maintenance—I just pulled it all into a rough ponytail. Makeup? Not really. I had an old lipstick and tube of mascara somewhere in the bottom of my bag, but a fully charged smart phone and laptop were more important; and I never went anywhere, not even to the bathroom, without a small notebook and pencil. I had some of my best ideas in the bathroom. Probably too much information. I’d even perfected the art of making notes to myself in the dark to save the hassle of turning on a light on when I woke in the night with an idea—of course, reading my scrawl in daylight was another story.

I did, however, have a set of my own body armor that weighed a ton, and cost me a fortune in excess baggage charges.

My cab driver, who was just finishing his shift, was unusually quiet: for which I was grateful. He dropped me off at the international departures terminal, and I began the first leg of my long journey.

I rolled over in bed and groaned. The six-hour time difference between New York and Switzerland meant that I was wide awake at four in the morning, and the prospect of sleep seemed slim.

I tried to force my eyes shut, but they soon drifted open of their own accord and I lay staring at the ceiling.

My hotel was one of those nondescript blocks of concrete that you could find in any city, in any country, the world over. But it had a central location, functional rooms, free Wi-Fi, and boasted a tiny swimming pool and gym. I’d stayed in far worse places and probably would again—in fact, as I was headed to Afghanistan sooner rather than later, that was a given.

Feeling gritty-eyed and grumpy, I climbed out of bed and gazed out of the window. My room was just high enough up for me to see Lake Geneva glittering darkly in the distance. I was tempted to go for a walk, to stretch my legs and try to wear myself out enough for sleep to take me again. Wandering the streets of a strange city in the early hours was asking for trouble, even somewhere as safe and well-ordered as Switzerland. I wouldn’t have lasted long in my present job taking those sorts of unnecessary risks.

Turning from the window with a sigh, I wondered if the swimming pool or fitness center would be open: it seemed unlikely. Frustrated and sleepless, I pulled out my laptop and spent a couple of hours reading news stories online.

I finally managed to get an hour’s sleep before my alarm dragged me awake at 7
am
.

The face that stared back at me in the bathroom mirror made me want to shatter the glass with my hairbrush. Today, I looked every one of my forty years. I felt like draping a black cloth over the mirror to blot out the view. Instead, I turned to the shower and contemplated the creamy-white tiles, as my tired brain stuttered into action.

The shower was marvelous: so powerful, it almost pinned me to the back wall. It was like having hundreds of little fingers massaging me, and definitely provided the shot of vigor I needed to face the day ahead. I was very grateful for the deep pockets of my employer in providing for my current comfort.

I pulled on a pair of jeans, not caring that I was woefully underdressed compared to the rest of the hotel’s clientele. Hungry, I enjoyed a leisurely breakfast comprising of
Zopf
, a rich, white bread baked into the shape of a braid, and served with butter, different jellies, honey, Emmenthal cheese and a selection of cold meats. There was muesli, too, of course, but that didn’t interest me. Too much like the granola I usually had at home.

I was just contemplating whether or not to order a third coffee when I heard someone calling my name.

“Hey, Lee! Yo, Venzi! What the bloody blue hell are you doing here?”

I looked up and grinned.

Bearing down on me was Liz Ashton, an indomitable British bulldog of a woman in her late fifties. She was rather famous in our field, an English Marie Colvin you might say, having been to every war front since Chad in 1979, every civil unrest since Uganda in the 1980s, and every guerrilla action since El Salvador in 1981. She’d reported on every atrocity from Croatia to the Congo, and was as tough as nails: probably tougher. She didn’t take shit from anyone.

Liz was a senior reporter with
The Times
of London. We’d become friends over the course of the last five years when we’d run across each other in a variety of low-rent hotels, pitched together among the testosterone-rich world of the foreign correspondent.

“Hi, Liz! Good to see you!”

She swept me into a hug that almost cracked a rib.

“You, too. So, what’s cooking, Venzi?”

“I’m in town for a hostile environment training course,” I replied. “I’m supposed to be flying out to Camp Leatherneck in four or five days. You?”

“Hmm, well good luck with that. A little bird told me that your top brass are being tricky customers over nonmilitary personnel visiting their precious Base since that last blue-on-green incident...”

Incidents where our so-called allies attacked US personnel were increasing.

“Who are you with on this one?

“New York Times.”

“Well, tell them to kick some arses or you could be stuck here for weeks. My insurers are demanding that I attend some sodding training course for journos, too: how to wipe my bleeding nose in a ‘conflict area’, that sort of thing. I’m shipping out to Bastion next week, so we’ll be neighbors. Just got to jump through the usual hoops first.”

Camp Leatherneck was the US Marines’ base in Afghanistan, and Bastion was the equivalent for British forces. I wasn’t delighted to hear that my travel plans were likely to be disrupted, but Liz’s information was invariably accurate: forewarned was forearmed in this job. Liz had spent years, decades even, developing her contacts, and she had fingers on the pulse of the beast that was international news. I made a mental note to contact my editor and see what strings he could pull to get me on my way.

“Is your training at the InterContinental by any chance, Liz? Because if it is, then I’m booked in the same one.”

“Excellent news, Venzi! We can go and get pissed afterwards.”

I really didn’t think that was a good idea: Liz’s drinking sessions were legendary. I definitely wasn’t in that league.

“No way! I can’t keep up with you. You’d be carrying me home.”

“You’re such a lightweight, Lee.”

“That is true—and I intend to keep it that way, so stop trying to lead me astray.”

“Ha! All work and no play makes Jill a dull girl. Come on, let’s go and see who they’ve sent to whip us into shape this time.”

Outside, the air was clean and crisp, the faintest whisper of Spring penetrating the crystal clear morning. The city felt very European, the architecture reflecting the mix of French, German and Italian influences, and, in the distance, I could see the dominating summit of Mont Blanc, snow lying thick on the top like frosting.

Liz linked her arm through mine and we strolled through the city, behaving like a couple of tourists. I had to drag her away from an upscale chocolate shop where they sold crystallized lemons dipped in dark, milk, and white chocolate. We could have easily spent a week’s salary in there, and gorged ourselves stupid under the supercilious eye of the sales assistant.

There was a time when the piercing eye of someone like that would have reduced me to a nervous wreck, but not anymore. I wasn’t twenty and married to a bullying man; I was forty, myself at last, and doing a job I was passionate about.

Less than a half-mile from the Palais des Nations and its long avenue of national flags, the InterContinental was an ugly, 18-story tower in the center of the diplomatic district. In the distance, the Alps outlined the horizon, reminding me, if I needed it, that I wasn’t in Kansas anymore.

The receptionist directed us to a nondescript, beige-colored conference room, where coffee and croissants awaited us.

Liz dug in with gusto and I decided one more cup of black coffee wouldn’t go amiss.

I thought about what she’d told me, and the probable delays I’d experience. I suspected this was the old Washington two-step. It had happened five years ago when I’d been trying to get into military bases in Iraq. I was shuffled around between departments, each one denying the delay was anything to do with them. I would try to be stoic, but it wasn’t always easy.

For now both Liz and I had to play the game to get where we wanted to be. As we waited, six other journalists from various European nations joined us, a couple that I knew by sight, as well as my friend Marc Lebuin, a freelance writer who sold his stories to French language newspapers.

“Chère Lee, and ma bonne Liz! This is a most pleasant surprise. How are you, my dear ladies!”

He hugged us warmly and kissed us on both cheeks.

“Keen as mustard, Marc, and as excited as a wet weekend in Wigan. Where are you off to?” said Liz.

He shrugged. “I do not yet know. I am here waiting for assignment. I think it is to pass the time. Perhaps I will learn some Farsi. I understand there is a language specialist here to train us. It might be useful, who knows? Ça fait bien.”

A young-looking British lieutenant entered the room, and looked around him rather nervously.

“New kid on the block,” said Liz, grinning. “I think we can have some fun with him.”

I groaned inwardly: Liz’s idea of ‘fun’ didn’t match mine. But there was no stopping her: not even a Sherman tank could change her mind once it was made up. Her mantra, ‘compromise is the sign of a third-rate mind’, summed up her general attitude to life.

The young lieutenant disappeared. I wondered idly if he’d noticed Liz’s gorgon gaze and gone for backup.

As the scheduled starting time came and went, an irritated muttering rippled through the assembled journalists.

“Damn all this waiting around!” snapped Liz.

I cast an amused glance at my friend: she really didn’t do waiting very well—which was ironic, because a good chunk of our work involved sitting around: waiting for the people we needed to talk to, hoping they would acknowledge our presence; waiting for flights; waiting for rides; waiting for visas; and waiting for permission to cross borders into war zones. It was rather similar to the military adage, ‘soldiering is 99% boredom and 1% sheer terror’. I didn’t mind the boredom.

The room was chilly, overly-air conditioned and similarly soulless. I hunkered down in my chair at the back of the room, and wrapped my long, cashmere scarf twice around my neck so it covered my chin and part of my nose.

Liz, as I said, was made of sterner stuff: she marched to the front of the room and fiddled with the thermostat, while the British lieutenant watched her anxiously. I could tell he was dying to tell her not to touch it, but had quailed beneath her withering gaze. She had that effect on most people—especially men. I wondered if I’d ever acquire that chilling, thousand-yard stare. Probably not.

The lieutenant kept stealing glances at his watch, and it became apparent that he was waiting for someone who was late. I imagined it was probably a journalist who was a no-show. That happened a lot: missed planes, changed schedules, visas refused, or even assignments cancelled at the last minute. As it turned out, I was wrong about that.

Very wrong.

Eventually we were joined by a much older man with the crown insignia of a British Major embroidered onto the epaulettes of his khaki uniform.

His cap badge was the tiny figure of Mercury—winged messenger of the gods—which meant he was from the Royal Signals Corps. I enjoyed the British whimsy embodied by that image.

The Major was a strong-looking man of about 50, with kind, hazel eyes that crinkled when he smiled. He wasn’t smiling now. In fact he looked more than a little irritated and as he entered the room, shutting the door behind him, I heard him mutter something that sounded uncannily like “bloody Yanks”.

I shifted uneasily in my seat while Liz winked at me.

“Well, good morning, ladies and gentlemen,” he began. “My name is Major Mike Parsons and my colleague here is Lieutenant Tom Farley.”

He indicated toward the young lieutenant, who was trying to appear relaxed and doing a very poor job of it.

“I apologize for the slight delay in starting; our American colleague has clearly been held up. However, we’ll press on and begin with the basics. I’ll be talking about prep and planning and what you need to have in your exit plan—primarily how you’ll be repatriated in the event of injury or illness. Then I’ll hand over to Lieutenant Farley, who will discuss making use of local knowledge and getting around in a dangerous place. In the afternoon sessions we’ll cover coping with gunfire, keeping safe in a crowd and emergency first aid. Tomorrow we’ll be covering landmines, IEDs, chemical dangers and what to do in the event that you are taken hostage. We’ll be joined by our colleague from the US Marines for some of the sessions and for an introduction to Dari and Pashto—the two official languages of Afghanistan.” And then he muttered under his breath, “If he bothers to turn up.”

Liz nudged me and I felt irritated that my compatriot, whoever the hell he was, was making the US look bad. I had to remind myself that such tardiness was not restricted to press training: after all, it was Washington officials who were deliberately delaying my paperwork.