“A bad thing happened, Bambo,” the man driving him said, as Brad told him to stop. “Men got hurt bad. Four of them.” Brad nodded. The term the driver had used for him was “Father,” a gesture of respect.
“I know. One of them is my son.” The man only nodded in answer, as Brad went to look for someone to tell him where the wounded men were. And finally he found one, a tribesman wearing shorts and sandals, with scars on his face. He pointed to a building where the men had been taken. And as soon as he walked in, he saw women crying, and children squatting, and others shooing flies off the faces of the injured men. He found Dylan kneeling beside Jason, among them. Jason was unconscious and there was a tremendous blood-soaked bandage on his head. Dylan stood up instantly and collapsed sobbing in his father's arms. Dylan was so exhausted he couldn't stop crying. The only good news from what Brad could see was that Jason was still alive. But he appeared to be close to death, and Dylan told him that one of the others had died several hours before.
“Has he seen a doctor?” Brad asked, trying to fight panic. He knew he needed to be strong for both his sons, particularly Dylan now, who had been brave and sensible on his own for two days.
“He came yesterday, but he had to leave again.”
“What did he say?” Brad looked tense.
“Not much. I tried to get the plane, Dad. But I couldn't.”
“Do you know where it is?”
“They said it's probably in Victoria Falls, but no one seems to know for sure.”
“Okay. Let me see what I can do.” Brad walked into the bright sunshine, not sure where to start, and as though he could hear Faith's voice in his head, he started to pray. He walked to the post office, and asked the only man working there who to talk to about the plane. He gave Brad a number, and told him how to call. It took half an hour to get a local line, and then it occurred to him to radio the game preserve. There was no answer at the phone number he'd been given, and the man in the post office told him where to go to find a radio. And from there, Brad radioed the game preserve, and asked them to radio for the plane. And then he went back to Dylan, standing guard over Jason. He kept swatting the flies off his twin and staring miserably at him. Even with his deep tan, Brad could see that his son was gray. Dylan said he hadn't regained consciousness in two days.
It took another six hours for the game preserve to get the plane. And then they sent a boy in a Jeep into town to tell Brad that it would be at the airport at eleven o'clock that night. If he could get the wounded men to the airport, they would fly them to the hospital in Lukulu. He helped load two men into the Jeep, with their relatives following on foot. And they got a truck for Jason, laid him carefully on a blanket, and put him in the back of the truck, with Dylan kneeling next to him, and Brad in the front seat. They were a motley crew when the plane finally arrived two hours later than they said.
It took nearly an hour to get everyone settled in the plane. And shortly after that, they took off. For Brad, it was like an out-of-body experience, in a totally primitive place, with people who responded at their own pace. The plane was going to land in an open stretch of terrain the pilot was familiar with, and they had an ambulance standing by. Someone had radioed ahead. The ambulance made three trips back and forth with the injured men, as Brad paid the pilot of the plane, and took off with Jason and Dylan. And finally, once they got to the hospital, he knew that Jason would be in halfway decent hands. Most of the hospital staff was British, and there was a New Zealander and an Australian doctor as well. It was easy to see why Jason had wanted to study in the health care field and come back to a country like this. They needed help desperately, and he could make a difference here. If he survived.
After examining him, the doctor in charge told Brad and Dylan that Jason had a head injury of some magnitude, and had both swelling and fluid on the brain. And the only way to relieve it was to drain it. In normal circumstances, it was not a complicated surgery, but setting a broken arm was complicated in a place like this. Brad gave them his permission, and within seconds, Jason was wheeled away, as Brad and Dylan sat together, talking quietly, and watching other people come and go. It was an endless day.
The sun came up while they were sitting, waiting for news of Jason. They were told hours later that the procedure had been done, and he was still alive, but there had been no visible change in his condition so far. And they knew nothing more when the sun set again.
Brad and Dylan took turns sitting by his bedside, and he never stirred. They sat there, never leaving him for three days. Brad felt tired and filthy. He hadn't changed his clothes, showered, or shaved, but he never left his son for a minute. They ate whatever the nurses brought them, and on the third day, he realized that Pam had never arrived. He wondered if she was waiting for them at the game preserve, but there was no way to find out. He finally asked someone to radio there, and the message came back that she wasn't coming. But they had no other details. It was impossible to call her from where they were.
And on the fourth day, finally, Jason moaned softly, opened his eyes, smiled at them, sighed, and drifted back to sleep. For a horrifying instant, Brad thought he had died, and he clutched Dylan's arm, with wide eyes. But the nurse said he was out of the coma, and sleeping normally. He had made it. He was going to live.
He and Dylan went outside, and they cried and laughed and shouted. It was the best day of both their lives. And the longest week Brad had ever lived.
“You smell like a dead rat,” Dylan teased his father, as they sat outside for a long time, celebrating and talking quietly. Someone had brought them some hard cheese and a piece of bread. The hospital was primitive in the extreme, and poorly stocked, but the medical personnel had been terrific, and saved Jason's life.
“You don't smell so great yourself.” Brad grinned at him.
After checking on Jason again, Brad asked a nurse and she directed them to an outdoor shower. He had brought his only bag with him, and shared the clothes he'd brought with his son. They were clean at least by the time they went back to Jason, he was awake again and trying to talk, and the doctor was pleased.
“You got quite a blow, young man,” the New Zealander said, smiling at Jason. “You must have a mighty hard head.” And when Brad took him aside later, the doctor told him it had been a miracle that the young man had lived. Of those who had survived the accident, he had been the most dangerously hurt.
Brad asked later if there was a telephone somewhere, and everyone laughed at him when he said he wanted to call the States. The best they could offer him was a phone he could use to call the post office in Ngulwana, where someone told him they would radio the game preserve, and in turn ask them to contact Jason's mother in the States, if she was still there. It took another day to get an answer from them. They had used the same complicated, circuitous route to call Pam in San Francisco, and she was relieved to know that her son was “okay.” It was obvious to Brad from all that that she had never left. And he wondered what she imagined “okay” meant. She had no idea what they had been through. There was no excuse for her not coming, in Brad's eyes. No matter how much she hated third world countries, or Africa when she'd been there two months before, she should have been there. He didn't say anything to either of his sons, but Brad knew he would never forgive her for it. There was nothing she could have done, but she owed it to her boys to be there, and to Brad as well.
And a day later, he used the same circuitous routing of radios and local phones to ask someone to call Faith in New York to tell her Jason would live, and to thank her for her prayers. Brad had no doubt that they had made a difference, and he was desperately sorry that he couldn't call her and talk to her himself, but there was no way he could while he was there.