BG blinked slowly. He did not lose his temper. He had no temper left to lose. That was his tragedy, and his mark of dignity too.
‘I faced all the reality I got to face, Grainger,’ he said, without raising his voice. ‘You don’t know what I’ve done and what I have not done; you don’t know where I came from and why I left; you don’t know who I’ve hurt and who’s hurt me; you ain’t seen my scorecard and I ain’t gonna show it to you. You want a juicy fact about my daddy? He died when he was the exact age I am now. A blood vessel in his heart got blocked up: bye-bye Billy Graham Senior. And all you need to know about me is, if I inherited that same blood vessel, and I die next week, well… I’m OK with it.’ BG changed gear, slowed the vehicle down. They were approaching the base. ‘In the meantime, Grainger, whenever you need a ride out of the desert, I’m your man.’
She was quiet after that. The vehicle’s wheels made the transition from earth to tarmac, giving the illusion of airborne cruising. BG parked in the shadow of the compound, right in front of the entrance nearest Grainger’s quarters, then scooted round and opened the car door for her: a perfect gentleman.
‘Thank you,’ she said. She had not acknowledged Peter’s presence for the duration of the drive. Peter twisted round in his seat to catch a glimpse of her as she was manoeuvring her stiff, weary body out of the car. BG’s arm was offered like a metal rung; she took hold of it and pulled herself up. The door slammed shut, and Peter continued to watch through the fogged window: two white-clad USIC personnel shimmering in and out of recognisability like degraded video images. He wondered if they would walk into the building side by side, arm in arm, but as soon as Grainger was on her feet, she broke free and was gone.
‘I figure it’s the lightning,’ said BG when he returned to the car. ‘Can’t be good for a person, being whammoed like that. Give her time, she’ll get over it.’
Peter nodded. He was unsure if he would get over it himself.
It was Dr Adkins who found Peter outside the intensive care unit, on his knees. ‘Found’ was the wrong word, perhaps: he almost tripped over him. Unfazed, the surgeon looked down at Peter’s body, assessing in a couple of seconds whether any part of it was in urgent need of medical intervention.
‘You OK?’ he said.
‘I’m trying to pray,’ said Peter.
‘Oh… OK,’ said Adkins, glancing over Peter’s shoulder to a place further down the corridor, as if to say, Could you try it somewhere where people won’t break their neck over you?
‘I’ve come to see Jesus Lover Five,’ said Peter, hauling himself off the floor. ‘You know about her?’
‘Of course. She’s my patient.’ The doctor smiled. ‘It’s nice to have a real patient for a change. Instead of a five-minute whambam-thank-you-ma’am with someone who’s got conjunctivitis or hit their thumb with a hammer.’
Peter stared into the doctor’s face, searching for evidence of empathy. ‘I got the impression Dr Austin didn’t really understand what’s happening to Lover Five. I got the impression he’s assuming you can make her better.’
‘We’ll do what we can,’ said Adkins inscrutably.
‘She’s going to die,’ said Peter.
‘Let’s not go there yet.’
Peter clenched one hand inside the other, and found that his strenuous attempts to pray had bruised the tender flesh between his knuckles. ‘These people don’t heal, you understand that?’ he said. ‘They can’t heal. Our bodies… your body, my body… we’re living inside a miracle. Forget religion, we’re a miracle of nature. We can hit our thumb with a hammer, we can tear a hole in our skin, we can get burnt, broken, swollen up with pus, and a little while later, it’s all fixed! Good as new! Unbelievable! Impossible! But true. That’s the gift we’re given. But the สีฐฉั — the Oasans — they never received this amazing gift. They get one chance… just one chance… the body they’re born with. They do their best to take care of it, but when it gets damaged, that’s… that’s it.’
Dr Adkins nodded. He was a kindly man, and not unintelligent. He laid a palm on Peter’s shoulder.
‘Let’s take it day by day with this… lady. She’ll lose her hand. That’s obvious. Beyond that… We’ll try our best to figure something out.’
Peter’s eyes stung with tears. He wanted so much to believe.
‘Listen,’ said Adkins, ‘remember when I was patching you up, I told you that medicine is just carpentry, plumbing and sewing. Which doesn’t apply in this lady’s case, I appreciate that. But I forgot to mention: there’s chemistry too. These people take pain-killers, they take cortisone, they take lots of other medicines from us. They wouldn’t take them, year after year, if nothing had any effect.’
Peter nodded, or tried to; it was more of a facial tremor, a shiver of the chin. The cynicism he’d thought he’d banished for ever was coursing through his system. Placebo, all is placebo. Swallow the pills and feel invigorated while the cells die inside you. Hallelujah, I can walk on these septic feet, the pain is gone, barely there, quite bearable, praise the Lord.
Adkins looked down at the palm that he’d laid on Peter’s shoulder a minute ago, briefly appraised that palm as if there was a vial of magic serum nestling in it. ‘This… Lover Five of yours: she’s our way in. We never had one of these people to study before. We’ll learn a lot and we’ll learn fast. Who knows, we may be able to save her. Or if we can’t save her, we may be able to save her children.’ He paused. ‘They do have children, don’t they?’
Peter’s mind re-played the vision of the calf-like newborn, the cheering crowd, the dressing ceremony, the eerie beauty of little สคฉ้รี่, clumsily dancing on his inaugural day of life, waving his tiny gloved hands.
‘Yes, they do,’ he said.
‘Well, there you go,’ said Adkins.
Lover Five, confined to bed in her brightly lit chamber of care, looked just as small and alone as before. If only there could have been a USIC worker laid up with a broken leg in one of the other beds, or a few healthy สีฐฉั sitting nearby, conversing with her in their native tongue, it would have been less awful. Awful for who, though? Peter knew it was for his own sake as well as for hers that he yearned for the pathos to be less sharp. In his career as a minister, he’d visited many hospital wards, but never, until now, to confront a person whose impending death he felt responsible for.
‘God bleสี our reunion, Father Peรี่er,’ she said as he walked in. Since he’d last seen her, she’d gotten hold of a USIC bathtowel and deftly folded it around her head as an improvised hood. It lent her a more feminine appearance, like a hijab or a wig. She’d tucked the loose ends under the neckline of her hospital gown, and pulled the blankets up to her armpits. Her left hand was still naked; her right was snugly bound in its cotton sheath.
‘Lover Five, I’m so, so sorry,’ he said, his voice already cracking.
‘สีorry noรี่ neสีeสีary,’ she reassured him. The absolution cost her an absurd amount of effort to pronounce. Insult to injury.
‘The painting that fell on your hand… ’ he said, lowering himself onto the edge of the bed near the meagre hump of her knees. ‘If I hadn’t asked for… ’
With her free hand she did a surprising thing, a thing he’d never have imagined anyone of her kind doing: she silenced him by laying her fingers against his lips. It was the first time he had been touched by the naked flesh of an สีฐฉั, unmediated by the soft fabric of gloves. Her fingertips were smooth and warm and smelled like fruit.