The doctor made room for her, then stood and changed the drip hag. 'I can't do anything about the leg until he has more strength. It's the leg that worries me. Maybe in an hour I can start on it.'
What did she want of him? Everything. How far would she go to help him? To the end of the road, to the square. What did she know of him? Nothing.
She sat and held his hand. The father and son stared at her, eyes never off her. A camel pushed its head against her arm, competed with her to touch him. The doctor now knelt at his bags and packages and checked an inventory. She did not look into his leg wound, but at his face. Never before had Beth held a man's hand with such caring softness. The drip worked. She thought of a dried-out flower that was watered and straightened. She felt his fingers stir in her grip. The breathing quickened. The doctor broke off, came closer.
Lips moved. The doctor crouched to listen. The eyes opened. She saw the eyes fastening on the doctor's as he strained to listen.
The voice came weak but clear: 'Don't look into my face, don't.'
The fingers tightened in her fists. 'Don't see my face, don't ever.' He seemed to sink back. 'Don't…'
She reeled, clung to his fingers but shook.
'That's all I bloody need,' the doctor wheezed beside her. 'He's English – as English as you or me. He spoke English like I do, like you. Well done, Miss Jenkins – this just keeps getting better and better.'
'You can stand there as long as you like but until I see identification you're not coming in,' Eric Perkins had said. He'd been behind his door, opened to the extent that the security chain would permit, and his wife had been behind him. 'You can stay on my step all the hours that God gives but you're not coming in till I see who you are.'
The retired maths teacher was wizened, small, and his cheek was cut from shaving, but he seemed to have the obstinacy that came with age and bloodymindedness, and he had been behind his front door, as if it was the portcullis of his castle. The door had been closed on them, and for ten minutes the rain had dripped on them. It went against Lovejoy's grain to show his card. He'd rung the bell again.
He'd shown the identification card that gained entry through the electronic barriers at Thames House, and the American had shown what was good enough for Camp Delta, far away on Cuba.
'Eh, wasn't so difficult, was it?' Eric Perkins had said, then had turned. 'Violet, love, we have visitors from the Security Service in London and what's called the Defense Intelligence Agency in America – and they're half drowned, not that it's my fault. They'd like a cup of tea, love, and I think some cake might see them right.'
The chain had come off the lock. Their coats had been hung in the ball and yesterday's newspaper was under them to protect the carpet.
They sat in the front room.
Maybe, Lovejoy thought, they should have taken off their shoes.
The room was pristine. Perkins held up the photograph in front of his face. He'd demanded to hold it, handle it, and Dietrich bad shown ill-concealed reluctance to pass it to him. Dietrich had covered the top of the head and the whole of the body with his hands, but the retired teacher had insisted.
Perkins chuckled. The photograph was close to his eyes. The prisoner's camp reference number was stamped at the bottom. He chuckled till he coughed. The light of his eyes danced. 'I used to do mathematics. The basis of mathematics is solving problems. I'm wondering if your problem, gentlemen, that needs solving, is that you don't know who he is.'
'I don't think you need explanations, sir,' Dietrich said sourly. 'We . are merely investigating background to-'
The wife, Violet, was in the doorway, holding the tray. Her husband's arm was up, like an old-time traffic policeman's. 'Sorry, love, waste of your time and effort. They won't be staying. They don't trust me, love.'
Lovejoy playing his winning smile, and said, 'Just so we have no misunderstandings, and I remind you, Mr Perkins, of the strictures of the Official Secrets Act, this man was a prisoner, designated as an unlawful combatant in Afghanistan, at Guantanamo Bay. He was released, because the authorities there thought him a taxi-driver from Herat in that country. While he was being transferred from the airbase to Kabul, he ran away. We don't know who he is, but believe him to be from this area. If he is from here he would most likely have gone to Adelaide Comprehensive. Mr Perkins, we are looking for your help.'
His face had lit as each morsel of trust was given him, and he'd laughed till his cheeks flushed.
'I was wrong again, Violet, they're staying. A late run for the post, getting by on the rails. Tell Violet whether you'd like sugar, gentlemen. Yes, I know him.'
Tea was poured and cakes were passed.
'Not that he was any good at mathematics. If I was judging him solely by the ability to multiply and divide, add and subtract, I'd have little to say. I digress. Most of the boys going through my final-year classes would have competency to add up profits from drug-pushing, or to subtract the days of a sentence remaining to be served in a young offenders' institution. That's about it. Adelaide Comprehensive isn't a school known for its shining successes but, over my time, I did have a couple of them. For this lad, well, I was able to provide something – call it motivation. Yes, there are little victories to be won, even at Adelaide Comprehensive.'
He broke off. He called to the kitchen to thank his wife for the tea.
Lovejoy saw the impatience building in the American: the shaking hands rattled the cup and saucer and the cake on the plate on his knees had gone untouched. He caught him with a glance: bide your time, man.
'There was a boy who was being bullied, an Asian child. There were two problems with the boy: a stutter and a wealthy father, cash in the child's hip pocket. You'll have learned a little of the area from which the school draws pupils. The money and the speech impediment made this pupil a predictable target – that's the real world. I induced your man here to become the pupil's friend. He did, and no doubt was paid for it, and the bullying was a thing of the past. The motivation was more complex. He sided naturally with the minority.
He went against the majority – not, I fancy, for any altruistic reason, not for any defence of the handicapped in a cruel world, but because it gave him pleasure to run against the tide. Are you with me? Are you beginning to see him?'
'Just getting a glimpse,' Lovejoy said drily.
'Second time around was more interesting. Our then esteemed headteacher, before he fled to the quieter world of local-education-authority inspections, wanted a competition launched for public recitation. Pupils standing on a stage and declaiming to their peers, such was the headteacher's plan. Most of the males could barely communicate, other than to demand their rights in a police station on a Friday night. The headteacher was very keen. I was given the job of organizing it. Was it a fiasco? It was not. Why not? Because this boy agreed to participate. What did I choose for him? I'd been to a funeral that week, in West Bromwich. There had been a reading from the First Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians, chapter fifteen, starting at verse fifty-four. Do you know it, gentlemen?'
Lovejoy did not, but he saw beside him the American's lips move.
They kept time with the recitation.
'He stood on the stage, in front of the school, and he silenced the chatter, stilled the movement. "So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in Victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" He did it, did it well. You see, by doing it he showed he could stand alone. It was nothing to do with the spirituality of the words, their uniqueness. Again, he just needed to run against the tide