Dead Centre

1

The muslim without Borders convoy of six white Mercedes Sprinter vans passed through yet another Free Benghazi checkpoint on the outskirts of the war-scarred city. With all the 12.7-mounted technicals and AKs and RPGs, it could almost have been Mogadishu — except that these Africans were Arabs.

After he’d laughed himself out, Frank had ordered the G6 to fly to Sallun, the Egyptian border-crossing. Near the Mediterranean, it was about ninety miles from Tobruk. The small airport that greeted me there looked exactly like Camp Hope in Aceh Province six years ago. The only difference was that transport planes could land a lot closer.

Aircraft disgorged humanitarian supplies 24/7. Lots of people ran around looking very busy in khaki waistcoats and cargoes with a huge number of pockets full of very important stuff. The white Toyota 4×4s had already turned up with their big antennas and NGO and MONGO stickers.

The G6 looked totally out of place as it taxied to a standstill. Even the happy-clappy crowd who’d just arrived to convert the Libyans and Egyptians to Christianity stopped and stared, as if Obama had turned up to take a personal look. The locals just watched suspiciously. They needed to make sure it hadn’t come to help Gaddafi’s family do a runner.

When I emerged in a pair of Frank’s centre-creased jeans and a green and yellow checked shirt they all looked very let down. Frank knew how to make a billion or ten. He also knew how to dress like a knob.

Getting into Libya was a piece of piss, mainly because nobody wanted to. There were no officials on the Libyan side of the crossing. It was getting out that would be the problem: the Egyptian side was heavily policed. Sub-Saharan migrant workers waited for days in makeshift camps to do so, drinking bottled water and eating bread doled out by the agencies. Every one of them carried at least one large market bag with that tight tartan weave, tied up with string. Some even had TVs wrapped in cardboard. These lads had worked hard to buy that shit, so it was coming with them.

And even when they finally got across, it was only to step into yet another camp. Where would you go? There was fuck-all for miles in any direction apart from some Roman wells and a Second World War Commonwealth cemetery.

At least those who’d made it this far were getting fed until somebody, somewhere, somehow, got them home. It wasn’t like the Egyptians didn’t have problems of their own. They’d just had their own Arab Spring and were still trying to sort their shit out.

The Bangladeshis faced the worst hardships. There were thousands of them, and they were thousands of miles from home.

Militias controlled the main drag along the coast, and the eastern part of the country — or so rumour had it. Whatever, they looked ecstatic to see our convoy coming through. They knew we were on our way to help their brothers.

Wahid Kandawalla, the young Pakistani guy in command of the line of vehicles, was negotiating the war zone for the fifth time in ten days, bringing supplies to the hospital. His fresh face full of goodwill, he sat in the right-hand seat, still trying to grow his beard like a good Muslim.

He glanced into the rear of the van from time to time to check I was OK. I was. I’d made myself reasonably comfortable, lying on the boxes of dressings and surgical sterilization kits. I was also completely fucked. The rocking of the vehicle, the darkness and the heat had me asleep in no time at all.

And now I was just lying there relaxing. I had no control over what was happening. I couldn’t do anything about it. So: whenever there’s a lull in the battle, get your head down. You never know the next time you’re going to get the chance to sleep.

I’d thrown Awaale’s mobile away at Sallun. I wasn’t fucking him off: it was just that these ‘meet up again’ things never really work. Events had brought us together for a moment, but that was all it had been. Besides, Awaale wasn’t going back to Minneapolis for a while. He’d be too busy taking over the clan, brassing up Lucky Justice, and standing his ground against AS fighters coming from the south. That was if he stayed alive long enough. Piracy was a dangerous business on both sides of the deal.

Everything Kandy had in the way of information about what was happening on the ground was a product of the rumour mill. Rumour had it that defecting Gaddafi troops had ransacked Benghazi’s main police barracks, looting tons of weapons and ammunition. That meant the local militia had been rearmed and resupplied and could take on anything Gaddafi threw at them from the west.

There were rumours, too, that Turkey would soon be sending its navy to defend the route between Benghazi port and Crete, and their troops to take over the airport to secure humanitarian sea and air corridors.

Kandy did have one fact. Turkey already had five warships and one submarine off the coast. They were stopping Gaddafi’s navy laying mines to deny the port.

Kandy received a fresh batch of rumours at every checkpoint. The militias had just been told that the French and British fast jets had mounted raids on the oil town on Ajdabiya. Gaddafi’s forces had been hammered. The town had been retaken. Further west, however, the fighting went on.

Another low-flying rumour was that Gaddafi had offered $100,000 to anyone willing to fight for him, payable on victory. That rumour was met with the militia head-shed telling all the rebels that if they defected they would be classed as traitors and shot as soon as hostilities were over. That was the problem with this type of war. It was fast-moving, and communications were poor. There was still no signal on my iPhone, and no one really knew what the fuck was going on.

2

The dark streets of Free Benghazi were littered with the hulks of tanks that had been totalled by French and British fast jets. They were already covered with graffiti. A lot of it was in English, for external consumption. One message read: Thank You Obama, Thank You Cameron. If Sarkozy saw that on breakfast TV, there was going to be one very pissed-off Frenchman.

A poster on a shell-blasted wall showed Gaddafi looking defiant but without a hat, and blood all over his head. Words like ‘Murderer’, ‘Terrorist’ and ‘Dictator’ were scrawled all over it. Another wall mural had the president’s face repainted with a big yellow smiley. I’d seen hundreds of those giving Saddam the same treatment just hours after the US tanks rolled into Baghdad.

As we moved through the blacked-out city, there were plenty of signs that Gaddafi had lost control. If it wasn’t covered in graffiti, every physical sign of the dictator had been taken down and shot or torched. The solid green flag was no longer flying above ramshackle and ransacked government buildings that Gaddafi’s troops had wrecked when they withdrew; the old royal standard — red, black and green with the crescent and star at its centre — hung in its place.

A storm was raging out there in the Mediterranean. I spotted several passenger ferries offshore, all lit up as they rode it out. They’d been waiting for days to come in and evacuate foreign nationals.

Another rumour was that because the Turks, NATO’s second biggest army, had provided a large naval contingent, the Brits had been forced at last to up their game. They were sending a frigate. It would park up in the port in the next couple of days and take off Brits and anyone else it had room for. Kandy laughed at that one. The Turks, Italians and Russians had already been and gone. Even the French were back home drinking coffee and watching the war on the news. But the Cumberland’s late arrival was good news for Anna. Jules had booked her a place on board.

The vehicle slowed. Kandy turned in his seat. ‘Nick, here we are.’ A big friendly smile wreathed his face. ‘Nick?’

I was dozing.

‘The hospital — we’re here.’

I stretched in my Timberland-effect fleece that I’d bought at the border crossing. Even in war and desperation, there will always be a Del Trotter setting up his stall.

‘That’s brilliant, Kandy.’ I passed him the bundle of a thousand US dollars. ‘Thanks, mate.’ Two dollars a kilometre, as promised. He waved the cash before putting it into his pocket, uncounted. ‘This will buy us fuel to go back and make another run here the day after tomorrow. Thank you.’

I had no doubt that it would.

We got out of the wagon as the lads hooked up with the waiting militia. We all shook. ‘Good luck, Nick. I hope that you find her.’

I nodded. ‘And good luck to you, mate. Hope you get back in one piece, eh?’

From the outside, the main hospital, Al-Jalaa, looked like most of the rest of the city: concrete, rectangular, plain. The courtyard and car park were a blur of news crews, ambulances, 12.7-mounted technicals, and casualties from the fighting in the west.

A pair of fast jets screamed through the darkness somewhere overhead. Nobody looked up. They could only be French or British. Although someone had said that the Italians were about to join in too.

For the news agencies, war was business. They set up shop outside hospitals to be close to the action, but also for protection. Gaddafi wouldn’t hit a hospital, would he? Hmm. We’d see.

I hobbled up to the nearest crew. ‘You know where the foreigners are being looked after? I’m looking for a Russian reporter, Anna Ludmilova.’ I nodded at the three lads sitting on blue nylon folding chairs. ‘You know her at all, lads?’

Even in the middle of a war zone, the Germans were always immaculate. Even the military contractors protecting them were perfectly turned out, right down to their national flag on the front flap of their body armour. Me, I still hadn’t washed or shaved since landing in Mog. Frank’s clothes and trainers would probably start to dissolve quite soon.

One of the coffee drinkers pointed me towards the main doors. ‘They’ll know inside. There’s a couple of media who can’t be moved yet.’ He threw a bottle of water at me. ‘Good luck.’

3

The interior of the hospital was cleaner and brighter than a lot of the NHS ones I’d been in. It was also a whole bunch busier.

Medical teams in green aprons and masks rushed past with trolleys laden with militia, kids, old people blasted by Gaddafi’s artillery and mortar fire. I walked across the freshly polished floor. I almost felt embarrassed to wait in line for the receptionist behind a group of militia who’d run in with a badly injured comrade. She pointed in the direction of what I guessed was the emergency room, and then asked them something in Arabic. I guessed it was to unload their weapons, because they did.

The girl manning the desk was still in her teens. The phone rang. She answered it efficiently before nodding at me. This was the future of the Arab Spring. A head covered by a purple scarf, but face powdered, eyes made up, lips glossed. I didn’t think the jihadists were going to get much of a hold in this country.

‘Do you speak English?’

She smiled. ‘Of course. What do you need?’ She was surprisingly calm and pleasant. It made me feel even worse. ‘I’m looking for a Russian reporter, Anna Ludmilova. She was shot in Misrata a couple of days ago.’

‘OK. All the foreigners are on the second floor, Ward Seventeen. If you’re armed, please unload your weapon.’

‘I’m not armed.’

‘Can I see?’

I unzipped my fleece, lifted it up, and turned round so she could admire the crease in my jeans.

‘Thank you. I hope you find her.’

Two more militia came in. They’d linked arms to improvise a seat for a guy who couldn’t have been any older than the receptionist. His right leg had been blown away below the knee. His blood trailed all the way back to the main entrance.

4

The first-floor corridor was grey lino, clean and polished. I came to the main hub. Phones rang. Staff shouted for help. The wounded moaned. But at least they were in beds and the dressings were clean. The place functioned. There was an air of total efficiency.

I wasn’t sure what I was going to say or do when I saw her. When people I knew got shot, they were normally mates and I just took the piss. But this was different. She was more than a mate. She was the most important person in my life.

Yes, I was punching above my weight. Yes, she might well tire of me one day. But I knew I’d have the best time of my life while it lasted. I was even looking forward to taking care of her until she was fit enough to go back and play reporter and leave me watching her on TV at Gunslingers.

Ward 17 went on for ever, a classic Nightingale ward with fifteen or twenty beds each side. Some had screens. Some had solid partitions. I walked down the centre of it, checking the beds I could see. Most were occupied by militia. A couple of white guys lay with wound dressings. Maybe they were oil or military contractors, or media. I didn’t give a fuck. I just wanted to find Anna.

I kept walking. The last two beds at the end were partitioned off like little cubicles. Maybe that was where the women were.

The one to the right was open. An old woman lay with her family gathered round. She’d been hit in the stomach. Blood seeped through her dressing, and onto her sheets. Her face was pockmarked with red scabs. A mortar round had probably zapped her.

I went to the left-hand door and knocked gently. I didn’t wait for an answer.

She was sitting up, half asleep, supported by pillows. She was wearing a green surgical gown.

‘Nicholas?’

5

Her blonde hair was a mess. Her face was washed out and knackered. But she still looked great to me.

‘I called. I tried but …’ I leant over and kissed her on the cheek. ‘You OK?’

She looked me up and down. ‘Are you, more to the point?’

‘Fine. I’ll tell you later.’

I sat down on the steel chair beside her and took her hand in mine.

Things were strained. Or maybe it was just me.

‘Where did you get hit?’

‘Left-hand side. Lower gut. It came from nowhere. There were bursts in the distance. There was an air raid, but nothing too close. Then down I went. The crew were fantastic. They got me here and I had surgery. No organs hit. But it hurts and I can’t be moved just yet.’

The family opposite started to wail and cry. Medical staff came rushing down the ward.

‘What’s wrong, Anna? Why can’t you be moved? It hit nerves on your spine or something? Your legs? Can you move them?’

She was welling up. She bit her lower lip to try and control it.

‘They said it’s the wound track, Nicholas. The round passed through but … very close to my womb.’

I looked at her, waiting for more.

Her hands were now gripping mine.

‘They need to make sure the baby isn’t damaged.’ Tears ran down her cheeks. ‘I’m three months pregnant, Nicholas …’

It was like I’d pulled ten Gs in a fast jet. My arse pushed down into the seat. My whole body felt like I was getting rammed through the floor.

‘Everything’s OK, Nicholas. I just have to rest, and get checked out again in a few days. It’s just that until I get the all-clear I can’t move.’

The family the other side of the partition were led away down the hall. I heard a trolley rattle into the room.

‘That’s good. That’s good …’

She kissed my cheek. Her breath was rancid. I was sure she’d thought the same when I kissed her. Her hands brought my head onto her chest. ‘I was so worried about you.’ She stroked my hair.

Eventually I summoned up the courage to put a hand on her stomach, so gently it was hardly touching. I moved it carefully, like I was expecting something to be there apart from the wound dressing. What the fuck did I know?

‘Nicholas, I’ve been really worried about how you’d take the news. I wasn’t sure how you’d react. We haven’t been together for long and—’

‘Why did you stay out here in this condition?’

‘My grandmother gave birth to all her children while working in the wheat fields.’ She tried to laugh. ‘Stupid, I know. But I guess it was because I knew this had to be my last foreign job.’ She managed a lopsided smile. ‘I’ve got responsibilities now …’

I grinned back. ‘Sounds like I have too.’

I thought of Mong, of Tracy and of Stefan. Maybe it was the end of an era after all. A new one had just begun.

She held my face in her hands and I kept on staring at her and smiling.

Then she looked at me more seriously. ‘Have you finished Crime and Punishment?’

I pulled a guilty face. ‘I’ve got to tell you — these classics are doing my head in. I keep telling everybody who asks me that I’m reading it, but you know what? I’m even having trouble with the cheat notes.’

She kissed my head and then gave it a big slap.

I stood and held her close, until long after the old woman was wheeled away and another casualty was brought in to replace her.