“They — they probably do not understand Ingleezi,” Burgaz warned.
“They are Kurds.” He made the circling motion at the side of his head again.
Langley took a deep breath and continued his slow pace up the hill, aware that each time he took a step he was taking a calculated risk. With each step he continued to scan what was left of the village.
He had been unable to detect any kind of movement until a dog emerged from one of the burned-out huts to stand sentinel on what was left of a lean-to porch.
Only then did he see the silhouette standing half hidden in the doorway of the building. The figure was barely noticeable, a shadow within the shadows, but twice Langley caught the fleeting glint of the sun on the barrel of the shadow’s weapon.
Langley took another deep breath, held it, and continued to move forward. He had already calculated that if he had been a praying man, by this time he would have been well into his third rosary.
If the silhouette decided to open fire now, Langley was the proverbial sitting duck. He raised both hands.
“I mean no harm,” he repeated.
“I’m not armed. I’m looking for someone.” At the same time he was hoping that whoever it was that had fired the shots could understand English.
The silhouette moved cautiously from the shadows into the sun, and he could see that it was a woman. She was wrapped in a blanket and she had a rifle aimed at him.
Langley tried again, “Look, I’m not armed. I need information.” The woman stepped down from the porch and finally spoke as she moved closer.
“Who are you?” she shouted. To Langley’s astonishment, she spoke excellent English.
By Langley’s estimate, it had taken the woman the better part of an hour to trust him enough to begin to explain what had happened. As she talked, a small crowd of Kurds gathered. They were the ones, Andera explained, who had escaped into the hills and somehow managed to survive the NIMF surprise attack on the village. They were mostly children along with a handful of women. Langley counted only three men. Yes, she confirmed, there had been a helicopter crash, and yes, there had been survivors; survivors the village elders had decided to hold until they could be judged for their crimes against the Kurdish people. There were other things she did not have to explain; she had paraded him past freshly dug graves while she recited the names of Aman, Mahmud, and the village’s elder, Sairan Buk — explaining that those who had not died during the NIMF helicopter t attack had been rounded up and shot after she revealed the whereabouts of the Iraqi officer, Khaldun, and the helicopter survivor, Ozal.
Langley was painstaking in his probing, asking each question slowly and carefully articulating each word to be certain the Kurd woman understood him.
“You said there was a third man, that he was injured, that he was neither Iraqi or Turk.
Tell me about him.”
Andera nodded.
“He was a Canadian. His name was Bogner. He was condemned to die because it was his intention to sell weapons to the Iraqis.
He was not kept with the others because he was injured in the crash.” Before Langley could ask, she went on to explain that he had received second and third-degree burns to the face, neck, and shoulders.
“It was difficult for him to talk and see,” she concluded.
For a moment Langley was tempted to reveal Bogner’s true identity and the real nature of his mission, but he was aware the NIMF patrols could return and under intense interrogation the woman might disclose the information. Instead he tried to summarize what she had told him.
“Then as far as you know, both the one you call Ozal and the one you call Bogner, along with the Iraqi officer, were put aboard the helicopter before it left.”
The woman nodded. She was crying. The tortured words came out in fragments.
“The Iraqi captain gave his word that in exchange for revealing where the prisoners were being kept, my son would be allowed to live. As soon as the helicopter took off, the lieutenant who remained ordered his men to destroy what remained of the village. They rounded up my people, formed a firing squad, shot the remaining men first, then the women, and finally the children, before they killed the livestock…” She was reliving the nightmare and despite her strength, her voice trailed off into sobs.
“Someday I will return to Ammash and I will make them pay for their…”
“You are familiar with the complex at Ammash?” The woman nodded.
“I worked at the hospital there for a brief time before I met my husband.”
Langley looked around for the boy.
“You were able to save your son?”
The woman pointed to a mound of fresh earth near where the others were buried.
“That is his grave,” she said.
“I buried him… and then I cried.”
For the past several days the return to consciousness for Bogner was tantamount to having to claw his way up out of a black pit. But this time there was a difference. Bogner realized that someone had removed the gauze strips from his eyes and he could see better than he had in days. Images were still somewhat vague, blurry, and indistinct, but now they were identifiable at least by shape and color. He raised his right hand and looked at it. It was nothing more than a clump: a white, bandaged club shape with no real definition.
His movements triggered a series of sounds from the other side of the darkened room, the sounds of someone suddenly alert, of someone aware that he had slipped back into the world of the sentient, of wakefulness and awareness. He heard small footsteps, and the approaching gossamer image gradually materialized into that of a woman walking toward him; she was carrying a tray.
Her voice was small but she spoke in English.
“We have removed the compresses that were covering the eyes,” she informed him.
“The doctors have advised me to keep the room dark and increase the light level gradually. The bandages on your hand will come off tomorrow.”
Bogner rolled his head toward the woman and looked at her. For the first time in days he accomplished the move with a minimum of pain. The woman was wearing a white starched smock with a bib, her hair was tucked under a cap, and she was smiling. Despite his confusion, he sensed her concern.
“Do you know where you are?” she asked. She was aware that Doctor Khan had already asked her patient the same questions, but she had been told about the ongoing disorganization and confusion that accompanied the journeys in and out of her patient’s awareness. When Bogner failed to respond, she went on.
“You are in the hospital at the NIMF compound in Ammash.”
“How long have I been here?” Bogner finally asked. He was surprised at the increased strength in his voice and the lessened pain in his throat when he spoke.
“Only a matter of hours,” the woman said.
“You were brought in yesterday evening.”
Bogner tried to think back. This time the pieces were coming together: mental snapshots of the Kurd village, of a woman who called herself Andera, of being led sightless into a room full of men and the indistinct murmur of their muted voices.
Those images were overlaid by the sounds of gunfire and the pungent smell of smoke. He tried to sit up, made it as far as propping himself on his elbows, and heard the woman caution him.
“Be careful,” she warned.
“You are still weak.”
Bogner ignored the warning, pushed himself into a sitting position, and inched his legs over the side of the bed. Finally, he found the courage to push, and in the process forced himself to stand up. The woman was right. His legs were rubbery and unsteady when he took his first step. He held on to the bed and walked slowly around it, gaining confidence — now convinced he felt strong enough to try walking over to the only window in the room. When he got there, he pushed back the heavy curtains and looked out on a darkened scene: a broad expanse of featureless, colorless landscape surrounding a clutter of modestly lighted, single-story, and equally featureless buildings. In the distance he could see the broad expanse of a tarmac dotted with a handful of aircraft.