As a result of the impromptu clinic, Mohammed got a chicken, which he boiled in their saucepan. Jane would have preferred to go to sleep, but she made herself wait for the food and ate ravenously when it came. It was stringy and tasteless, but she was hungrier than she had ever been in her life.
Ellis and Jane were given a room in one of the village houses. There was a mattress for them and a crude wooden crib for Chantal. They joined their sleeping bags together and made love with weary tenderness. Jane enjoyed the warmth and the lying down almost as much as the sex. Afterwards, Ellis fell asleep instantly. Jane lay awake for a few minutes. Her muscles seemed to hurt more now that she was relaxing. She thought about lying on a real bed in an ordinary bedroom, with street lights shining through the curtains and car doors slamming outside, and a bathroom with a flush toilet and a hot-water tap, and a shop on the corner where you could buy cotton balls and Pampers and Johnson's No More Tears baby shampoo. We escaped from the Russians, she thought, as she drifted off to sleep; maybe we really will make it home. Maybe we really will.
Jane woke when Ellis did, sensing his sudden tension. He lay rigid beside her for a moment, not breathing, listening to the sound of two dogs barking. Then he slipped out of bed fast.
The room was pitch-dark. She heard a match scrape; then a candle flickered in the corner. She looked at Chantaclass="underline"
the baby was sleeping peacefully. "What is it?" she said to Ellis.
"I don't know," he whispered. He pulled on his jeans, stepped into his boots, and put on his coat, then he went out.
Jane threw on some clothes and followed him. In the next room, moonlight coming through the open door revealed four children in a row in a bed, all staring wide-eyed over the edge of their shared blanket. Their parents were asleep in another room. Ellis was in the doorway, looking out.
Jane stood beside him. Up on the hill she could see, by the moonlight, a lone figure, running toward them.
"The dogs heard him," Ellis whispered.
"But who is he?" said Jane.
Suddenly there was another figure beside them. Jane gave a start, then recognized Mohammed. The blade of a knife glinted in his hand.
The figure came closer. His gait seemed familiar to Jane. Suddenly Mohammed gave a grunt and lowered the knife. "Ali Ghanim," he said.
Jane now recognized the distinctive stride of Ali, who ran that way because his back was slightly twisted. "But why?" she whispered.
Mohammed stepped forward and waved. Ali saw him, waved back and ran to the hut where the three of them stood. He and Mohammed embraced.
Jane waited impatiently for Ali to catch his breath. At last he said: "The Russians are on your trail."
Jane's heart sank. She had thought they had escaped. What had gone wrong?
Ali breathed hard for a few seconds longer, then went on: "Masud has sent me to warn you. The day you left, they searched the whole Five Lions Valley for you, with hundreds of helicopters and thousands of men. Today, having failed to find you, they sent search parties to follow each valley leading to Nuristan."
"What's he saying?" Ellis interrupted.
Jane held up a hand to stop Ali while she translated for Ellis, who could not follow All's rapid, breathless speech.
Ellis said: "How did they know we had gone to Nuristan? We might have decided to hide out anywhere in the damn country."
Jane asked Ali. He did not know.
"Is there a search party in this valley?" Jane asked Ali.
"Yes. I overtook them just before the Aryu Pass. They may have reached the last village by nightfall."
"Oh, no," said Jane despairingly. She translated for Ellis. "How can they move so much faster than us?" she said. Ellis shrugged, and she answered the question herself: "Because they're not slowed down by a woman with a baby. Oh, shit."
Ellis said: "If they start early in the morning they'll catch us tomorrow."
"What can we do?"
"Leave now."
Jane felt the weariness in her bones, and she was filled with an irrational resentment against Ellis. "Can't we hide somewhere?" she said irritably.
"Where?" said Ellis. "There's only one road here. The Russians have enough men to search all the houses—there aren't many. Besides, the local people aren't necessarily on our side. They might easily tell the Russians where we're hiding. No, our only hope is to stay ahead of the searchers.''
Jane looked at her watch. It was two A.M. She felt ready to give up.
"I'll load the horse," Ellis said. "You feed Chantal." He switched to Dan and said to Mohammed: "Will you make some tea? And give Ali something to eat."
Jane went back into the house, finished dressing, then fed Chantal. While she was doing that, Ellis brought her sweet green tea in a pottery bowl. She drank it gratefully.
As Chantal sucked, Jane wondered how much Jean-Pierre had to do with this relentless pursuit of her and Ellis. She knew he had helped with the raid on Banda, for she had seen him. When they searched the Five Lions Valley, his local knowledge would be invaluable. He must know they were hunting down his wife and baby like dogs chasing rats. How could he bring himself to help them? His love must have been changed to hatred by his seething resentment and jealousy.
Chantal had had enough. How pleasant it must be, Jane thought, to know nothing of passion or jealousy or betrayal, to have no feelings but warm or cold and full or empty. "Enjoy it while you may, little girl," she said.
Hurriedly, she buttoned her shirt and pulled her heavy oiled sweater down over her head. She put the sling around her neck, made Chantal comfortable inside it, then shrugged into her coat and went outside.
Ellis and Mohammed were studying the map by the light of a lantern. Ellis showed Jane their route. "We follow the Linar down to where it empties into the Nuristan River, then we turn uphill again, following the Nuristan north. Then we take one of these side valleys—Mohammed won't be sure which one until he gets there—and head for the Kantiwar Pass. I'd like to get out of the Nuristan Valley today—that will make it more difficult for the Russians to follow us, for they won't be sure which side valley we've taken."
"How far is it?" said Jane.
"It's only fifteen miles—but whether that's easy or tough depends on the terrain, of course."
Jane nodded. "Let's get going," she said. She was proud of herself for sounding more cheerful than she felt.
They set off in the moonlight. Mohammed set a fast pace, and whipped the horse mercilessly with a leather strap when she hung back. Jane had a slight headache and an empty, nauseous feeling in her stomach. However, she was not sleepy, but rather nervously tense and bone-weary.
She found the track scary by night. Sometimes they walked in the sparse grass beside the river, which was all right; but then the trail would hairpin up the mountainside to continue on the cliff edge hundreds of feet above, where the ground was covered with snow, and Jane was terrified of slipping and falling to her death with her baby in her arms.
Sometimes there was a choice: the path forked, one way going up and the other down. Since none of them knew which route to take, they let Mohammed guess. The first time, he stayed low and turned out to be right: the track led them across a little beach where they had to wade through a foot of water, but it saved them a long diversion. However, the second time they had to choose they again took the river bank, but this time they regretted it: after a mile or so the path led straight into a sheer rock face, and the only way around it would have been to swim. Wearily they retraced their steps to the fork and then climbed the cliff path.
At the next opportunity they descended to the riverbank again. This time the path led them to a ledge which ran along the face of the cliff about a hundred feet above the river. The horse became nervous, probably because the path was so narrow. Jane was frightened, too. The starlight was not enough to illuminate the river below, so the gorge seemed like a bottomless black pit beside her. Maggie kept stopping, and Mohammed would have to pull on the reins to make her go again.