Dust to dust

TWENTY-SEVEN

‘You’ve been busy,’ said Macmillan when Steven called him.

‘What makes you say that?’

‘The phone’s been red hot with calls from people who’d rather you stopped what you’ve been doing.’

‘Anyone interesting?’

‘People in high places. But…’

‘But what?’

‘I don’t know — I should be used to this sort of thing by now, but there’s something different about it this time: I can’t quite put my finger on it. Usually I can work out the primary source of any flak that’s flying, but not this time.’

‘Maybe I’ve upset everyone equally,’ suggested Steven, tongue in cheek.

Macmillan permitted himself a laugh before he said, ‘Seriously, watch your back.’

‘Will do.’

‘How’s Dr Simmons, by the way?’

‘I’m sure she’s fine.’

‘Oh… I didn’t realise.’

‘Some other time, John.’

‘Right… Are you still intent on heading off to sunny climes?’

‘I’ve been in touch with my old pals in Hereford. They’ve been given a job to do in the Sangin Valley in the north of Helmand Province — that’s where 45 Commando have been operating. I’ve arranged to fly out with them; they’ll kit me out and provide me with a vehicle. After that, they’ll go their way and I’ll go mine. I plan to start at the field hospital where Michael Kelly was reportedly treated before he was transferred to Camp Bastion.’

‘You do realise we could do all this through official channels,’ suggested Macmillan.

‘I prefer my way,’ said Steven. ‘Official channels can leak, and from what you’ve said about some folks in officialdom not being too happy, I’d rather not be a sitting target. The Regiment doesn’t advertise its travel arrangements.

‘And after you’ve checked out the field hospital?’

‘I’ll play it by ear. My Sci-Med ID should get me most of the answers I’m looking for unless there’s some really big cover-up going on. If that should turn out to be the case, I’ll let you know.’

‘Don’t forget your satellite phone.’

‘Packed and ready.’

‘Take care, Steven.’

Being back at the Hereford base of the SAS was like a trip down memory lane for Steven. It wasn’t the first time he’d had to call on old friends since he’d joined Sci-Med, but the last time had been over three years ago. No longer being an active member of the Regiment meant, of course, that he was excluded from team briefings, and he knew better than to enquire about their mission. Likewise, he did not divulge the nature of his own assignment, but there was still a bond that members past and present shared and valued. As one ex-comrade had put it, you really don’t know what being alive feels like until you’re bloody nearly not. Sharing that experience was the basis of a special relationship. Steven took particular pleasure in learning from one young soldier, recruited from 2 Para — the same route that he himself had followed — that his reputation had preceded him and he was still well thought of in Hereford.

The flight out to Afghanistan followed a familiar pattern for Steven. For the first hour or so everyone on board was running on the adrenalin of anticipation, and good-humoured banter made sure there was lots of laughter around, but after that things started to quieten down, eventually to such an extent that John Donne’s assertion was proved wrong — at least in the short term — and every man on board the aircraft became an island.

Steven was no exception: he became lost in his thoughts. He glanced at his watch and knew that Jenny would be at school, perhaps painting one of the animal pictures she liked to present him with when he went up to see her, possibly arguing with one of the other children over the colouring. Red elephants and green tigers were no strangers to Jenny’s world. ‘Just because you haven’t seen them doesn’t mean they’re not there,’ she would assert. Bossy little madam.

Tally would be on duty at the hospital, doing her best to restore sick children to good health, perhaps doing her morning ward rounds, reading charts, getting lab reports, discussing cases with colleagues and the nursing staff. He wondered if she was still angry with him or whether the passage of a few days had caused her to mellow and perhaps reconsider. Was there any way back for him? The idea of making up with Tally was, for him at that particular moment, a vision of paradise. Paradise lost? Please God, no.

When he closed his eyes, he could see them holidaying together in the Highlands of Scotland, in a cottage with no one else around, entirely lost in each other’s company with no desire to be anywhere else on earth. Time would stand still and… Steven suddenly realised that Tally didn’t know where he was right now. If she did… what was that word journalists used but no one else did?… incandescent, that was it. That’s what she’d be. He closed his eyes again and tried to catch up on some sleep.

As he waved farewell to his travel companions and watched their Land Rovers move off into the desert, Steven felt a momentary pang of regret that he wasn’t going with them. Not that he missed that awful feeling in the stomach when heading off into a dangerous unknown, but he did miss the camaraderie. They were off to take on the Taleban, and when their vehicles faded from sight he would be off to visit 179 Field Hospital where Michael Kelly had reportedly been taken after his wounds had become infected.

Steven checked the map and set a start point on his satnav. The hospital was only forty kilometres away but the ground was rough. He checked fuel and oil levels for a second time and took comfort from patting the plentiful supplies of drinking water he had with him in the Land Rover. He hoped he wouldn’t need the automatic rifle and ammunition he’d also been given.

He paused for a final few moments to take in the scene around him before setting off. It wasn’t the first time he’d been in Afghanistan: he’d been here with a Special Forces team on a ‘fact-finding’ mission a few years after the Russians had given up the struggle against the mujahideen and withdrawn from what would generally come to be thought of as their Vietnam. The talc-like sand and jagged-toothed mountains held memories, not all of them good.

Steven was a civilian now, but one well versed in the ways of the military. He had no trouble at all convincing the sentries at 179 Field Hospital that he had a right to be there. His request to be taken to see the commanding officer, Major Tom Lewis (TA), was acted upon without question.

Lewis, a stocky man in his mid-to-late forties with a complexion that was obviously ill at ease with the sun in his current surroundings, looked at Steven’s ID at some length before confessing with a smile, ‘Doesn’t mean a lot, I’m afraid, doctor. Where’s your base exactly?’

‘The Home Office.’

‘Bit out of your way, aren’t you?’ said Lewis, looking surprised.

‘I could say the same about you,’ said Steven.

‘Fair point,’ Lewis conceded with a smile. ‘I’m an orthopaedic surgeon at Cardiff General in the real world.’

‘Life’s rich pattern.’

‘What can I do for you?’

‘Does the name Michael Kelly mean anything to you?’

‘Certainly does. We all read the papers.’

‘I understand he was brought here to your hospital?’

Lewis nodded. ‘Marine Michael Kelly was brought here in a field ambulance. He was suffering from a wound infection. It was actually quite advanced by the time we saw him.’

‘Advanced?’ Steven repeated. ‘Where had he been before?’

‘That wasn’t clear,’ said Lewis. ‘I was informed that Marine Kelly had been slightly wounded by shrapnel but had brushed off his injuries as being insignificant at the time. Unfortunately they turned septic and he was forced to stop ignoring the condition and seek medical help. That’s when he was brought in here, but he must have been in considerable pain for some time before.’

‘Didn’t that strike you as odd?’

Lewis gave a slight shrug. ‘I suppose I was more concerned with his condition at the time.’

‘Didn’t you ask him about it?’

‘He was heavily sedated.’

‘Then what happened?’

‘After a brief examination, I decided that he needed a more sophisticated medical environment than our tent village here if he was to have any chance of recovery, so I ordered him taken on to Camp Bastion.’

‘I see,’ said Steven thoughtfully. ‘Did you examine Kelly personally?’

Lewis nodded. ‘I did.’

‘About these shrapnel wounds… where had he been hit?’

Lewis took a deep breath. ‘Difficult to say really, the infection had made such a mess of his flesh, but it looked to me as if the epicentre was round about his mid region, upper thighs spreading across lower stomach.’

Steven thanked Lewis for his help and asked for an estimate of how long it would take him to drive to Camp Bastion.

‘You’ll be there before nightfall.’

Steven was awestruck by the sheer size of Camp Bastion. It seemed to stretch for miles, a huge artificial home for a very large military community, with proper buildings for a medical facility. He was given a tour of the hospital by its commanding officer, Lientement Colonel James McCready, a Scotsman who was obviously proud of what he and his colleagues had achieved in the desert. ‘We can do most things here,’ he said, ‘outside plastic surgery. What’s your specialty, doctor?’

‘Field medicine,’ replied Steven, something that caused McCready to raise his eyebrows.

‘So you were military?’ he said.

Steven nodded. ‘For a good few years.’

‘So this must all be familiar to you?’

‘Not really,’ said Steven, feeling slightly awkward. He was getting into a conversation he’d rather not have been in. ‘I didn’t actually serve with any medical unit…’

‘Then what, might I ask?’

‘2 Para and SAS.’

‘Ah. Then you will have seen the odd cut thumb.’ To Steven’s relief, McCready seemed happy to leave things at that. ‘What exactly about Marine Kelly did you want to know?’

‘I understand he was admitted here?’

‘He was,’ said McCready. ‘He was suffering from infected shrapnel wounds. 179 Field Hospital referred him to us. We admitted him and did our best to stabilise him. We put him on antibiotics but, despite our best efforts, he died two days later.’

‘Why?’

The bluntness of the question caused McCready to exaggerate surprise. ‘Because it happens, doctor. His infection didn’t respond to treatment. It proved resistant to every antibiotic we tried.’

‘Do you know what the infection was?’

‘We have an excellent lab here,’ replied McCready with some pride. ‘It was a Staphylococcus aureus infection. Marine Kelly died from MRSA.’

‘It may seem irrelevant, colonel, but can you tell me anything about the wounds that led to the infection?’

‘Not really,’ replied McCready. ‘I was told they were very slight and he neglected — for whatever reason — to have them seen to right away. Unfortunately, he paid the price.’

Steven nodded. Outwardly, he remained calm and thoughtful but inside his head all hell had been let loose. Michael Kelly had died in Afghanistan, but not as the result of any shrapnel wounds. He’d died of an MRSA infection after being the donor in a bone marrow transplant in London. The bone marrow would have been extracted through wide-bore needles from his hip bones; the ‘shrapnel wounds’ were needle puncture marks which had turned septic. Instead of being treated in London, he had been flown all the way back to Afghanistan to die, complete with a phoney story about having been wounded in action.