An Enemy Within (8 page)

‘What do he do, sir?’ P.J. the grenadier had asked.

‘He takes pictures, dumb-ass,’ Sergeant Rath replied shaking his head in disbelief while some of the others sniggered.

‘No, I mean who do he take pictures FOR?’

‘Yeah, are we gonna be famous, Lieutenant?’ The Bradley’s driver, Bobby-Jo, turned to look at McDermott expectantly.

The lieutenant plucked up courage and allowed himself a rare smile. ‘Be on your best and I’ll personally see that colour pictures of your asses are shown in Starbucks window, Times Square.’

Their laughs rang in his ears as he walked away. It was unlike the lieutenant to crack a joke. They all thought he was something of a strange one, a bit of a homey character. And there was talk that, if not the army, he might have gone into the ministry which is why they tried very hard not to cuss when he was around. But, on the whole, he was an okay sort of guy. They knew he would do his best for them.

In his barracks, McDermott wrote a letter home:

‘Dear Mom and Dad, Having a good time out here. Safe inside the Green Zone. Nothing much happening. Not seen any black bears yet… God be with you.’

He didn’t want to mention anything of the event that was causing him increasing anxiety. They would learn something of it in due course, he was sure. He had never lied to them in his life. And he didn’t know if he could refrain from telling them the whole truth if they sought it.

Slumping on his bed, he put his hands behind his head and closed his eyes. He felt weary. Since the incident, he sensed the energy being drained from his body, little by little. He had hoped everything would quieten down. But now, a photographer was on the prowl and the unit was under orders to fully co-operate.

His life seemed to be twisting out of control, shooting along in an inescapable vicious circle, a dilemma that was torturing him every waking hour.

6

The sound of nearby gunfire woke Alex with a start. She checked the time. It was almost 6.15. She groaned.

Her plan was to have had a lie-in, seeing she was not meeting McDermott’s CO until mid-morning. She tried to re-enter that warm, floating, solace of drowsiness, but flashes of her Kandahar nightmare surfaced causing her to start.

The shooting had stirred her brain anyway. It was now wide awake and urged her body to catch up. As she flung on her clothes, half of her wanted to ignore whatever had happened. The other half needed to know – a journalist’s instinct.

Checking the batteries in the Canon, she ran to the lift, sliding a spare pack into the knee pocket of her combat trousers and hiding the camera beneath her blouson.

She approached the reception desk, about to hand over her room key when she changed her mind, putting it in her pocket. She saw Kowolski’s room key still in its box. He was either up earlier than her – or had not been back to the hotel yet.

‘I heard shooting,’ she said to the clerk.

‘Yes, Miss – at the end of the street,’ he gestured.

Turning right out of the hotel and jogging along the sidewalk, she reached the road junction where a large crowd had gathered. A gut-wrenching sensation suddenly stopped her. Did she really want to witness this? Only half awake, she’d been operating on auto pilot so far, old instincts. But indecision always missed the picture, she reasoned. Steeling herself, she took a deep breath and joined the throng.

A group of soldiers stood nonchalantly around a bullet-ridden car. The bloodied body of the young driver lay motionless in his seat, the engine still running. An army paramedic truck screeched
to a halt. A soldier wearing sunglasses, chewing gum and keeping the onlookers at bay, diverted his attention to the medics. The crowd shuffled forward. Alex took out her camera and, over the shoulder of the man in front of her, began shooting.

Music blared from the car stereo; a Beatles number: ‘All You Need Is Love’.

The medics pulled the driver from the car, laid him out on the pavement and began attempting resuscitation. After a few minutes they gave up. Suddenly, a woman in a black abayah pushed her way through, shouting, hysterical. A soldier stepped in her way but she pushed him aside. Letting out an uncontrollable wail, she knelt by the young man’s body, cradling his head in her lap, screaming at the soldiers who backed away. Alex rattled off several more shots.

She looked about her. ‘Anybody tell me what she’s saying?’

A man in a striped dishdashah stepped forward. ‘She is saying that they have killed her only son.’

An Iraqi translator with the soldiers began shouting at the woman. She screamed back at him, spitting venom in her words, tears flooding her face.

‘The Americans say they saw him acting suspiciously, that he was driving around the block many times like he was watching them. She says he was giving a lift to a friend to the university where both are students – but the friend was late. She says she told her son never to stop and wait near an army patrol and that is why he was driving round – waiting for his friend to appear.’

‘Shit,’ Alex said, shocked, backing away. She’d seen enough. She headed towards the hotel, her stomach churning. Glancing round just once, she caught sight of the body being loaded into the ambulance. The tormented mother sank to her knees, crying woefully to the sky.

Alex trembled, sending a shiver through to her knees, her eyes filling up. She hadn’t signed up for this. Walking slower, now, her breathing heavy, nausea finally forced her to stop. She put a hand out against a wall – and threw up all over it.

A film crew scurried past towards the scene, closely followed by an army press liaison man. No one gave her a second glance. They would be too late to capture the scene – she possessed the only picture that mattered.

She called Greg’s mobile – he was at breakfast. She asked him to meet in her room and to bring her a strong sweet coffee.

An envelope had been pushed under her door; a list of ground rules for embedded journalists to be signed and handed to the major. She noted it was fifty paragraphs long. Tossing it aside, she went to the bathroom and splashed water on her face.

Greg tapped on her door just as she was downloading the pictures to her laptop. He waltzed into the room imitating a room-service waiter. ‘Good morning, Madam. Coffee, as requested, khubz – flatbread to you – and jam. Sorry, there is no butter in the whole of Baghdad.’

She could only manage a thin smile.

‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.

Taking a sip of the drink, she pointed to the screen.

‘Wow, what the…’

‘The shooting.’

‘I slept through it, I’m afraid – you sort of get used to it. I did hear the guys on the barrier outside say they’d bagged themselves another baddie.’

‘Bullshit,’ she said, shaking with anger, going into detail.

Greg let out a low whistle. ‘We’ve got to get a piece out to go with the pics – the bastards are shooting anything that moves out there.’ He thought for a moment. ‘Send them to me and I’ll bang a piece over to the agency in Oz – they have worldwide syndication. Keep your name out of the frame, no byline – don’t want to compromise your work here.’

‘And what about you?’

‘I’ll take my chance – no byline, either.’

‘But what if someone blabs and word gets back here? That’d be the end of your embeds.’

‘Fuck them. We’ve got to tell it how it is for Christ’s sake, laugh or cry.’

Alex considered the options for a few seconds. ‘I’m with you, let’s do it!’ she said emphatically.

He unscrewed a bottle of water, offered it. She took a long gulp.

Resting an arm round her shoulder, he pulled her closer, sighing. ‘Call me naïve, but I just can’t believe someone didn’t plan for all this. It’s total bedlam out there, good people like this kid…’ His voice broke away.

‘That poor mother,’ she whispered.

For a few moments, there was silence between them.

‘Hardly anything’s working,’ Greg continued. ‘People are queuing four or five hours for a gallon of petrol, risking death stuck in a traffic jam. Aban was saying he thinks it’s going to get an awful lot worse, too, once the various tribal factions start pulling for power.’

‘I was sick just now,’ Alex said. ‘I wonder if I’m not cut out for all this any more.’ She slumped on the edge of the bed, defeat in her shoulders.

Greg eyed her for a while. ‘How long have we known each other – five years?’

‘Guess so.’

‘I’ll tell you what I think you need – a loving man and a couple of kids.’

Her response surprised both of them. She broke down and began crying uncontrollably.

‘Hey, don’t start or you’ll get me going, too,’ he said, handing her a tissue and sitting beside her.

Dabbing her nose, she let out a shuddering sigh. ‘Are you offering or something?’

He hugged her. ‘I would, kid. But it’s against the law to marry a sister.’

Drying her eyes, she gave him a resigned smile. ‘Sorry about that – things are a bit rocky right now.’

Greg kissed her on the forehead and sprang to his feet. ‘I’ve got to go. You back here later?’

‘Need an early night. I was thinking of catching the President’s speech. I could always give you a call at five tomorrow morning if you want to join me.’

‘No thanks – you can tell me about it. And take your laptop with you. The military have been searching the rooms of late, some guys have had stuff confiscated.’

After he left, Alex started putting together things she’d need for the rest of the day. In a few hours, she was due to hit the Baghdad streets with Lieutenant McDermott and his men. In previous times, the prospect would have charged her very being, a frisson at the unexpected, all thoughts of personal danger suspended.

Now, her nerves taking over, the thought of it sent her rushing to the bathroom. Over the handbowl, she retched again until her throat and stomach hurt.

*  *  *

The journey from the hotel to the entrance to the Green Zone at Checkpoint 12 on Yafa Street, just across the river, was only a few kilometers. But it was taking Alex and her security driver longer than they envisaged. A slow-moving convoy of Humvees, tanks and army personnel carriers also happened to be heading west.

At first, her driver, emotionless behind dark glasses, had tagged on to the end of the convoy, seemingly oblivious to the large painted sign stuck on the rear of the last vehicle, a Bradley, which warned: ‘Stay back 100 yards – or we fire’. It was only when the rear door of the armoured car opened and a soldier pointed a rifle at them that the driver hurriedly braked and backed off.

Alex gave the soldier the finger. He appeared shocked. Almost immediately, she reflected on the absurdity of a finger versus an M16.

A long line of assorted vehicles greeted them at the checkpoint. Dozens of people on foot joined the melee in the torrid heat, grudgingly acquiescent to the daily ritual of sniffer dogs, body searches and hand-swabbing just to go about their daily business.

It was then Alex discovered she had left her phone in her room. She cursed herself, imagining a dishonest maid racking up a series of calls across the Middle East.

Finally getting to show her privileged yellow pass, they were allowed through. The car meandered down the wide boulevard. They passed dozens of shirt-sleeved office people, carrying briefcases and walking to their workplaces as if they had just come out of Grand Central Station. Except, in Manhattan, no one had to be mindful of a careless trip into a mortar hole in the sidewalk. Here, it could send them sprawling headfirst into a deadly jumble of stainless steel razor wire. Alex could see its glistening barbs, concertinaed into the distance like smoke rings, separating the pavement from the road and its monotonous verges of high, pre-cast concrete T-walls.

They found Major Walter Douglas’ office behind the massive blancmange-shaped Council of Ministers building, which had been heavily bombed and set alight in the initial bombardment. Alex remembered seeing it on television, glowing against the night sky as it was hit repeatedly. Surreal, then, in 36-inch wide-screen colour, the ugly reality proved a sickening testimony to the deadly brute force of that opening bombardment.

The major’s command post had been set up in a villa at the edge of a stretch of lush parkland, now dotted with the shipping-container homes of his troops.

A sentry scanned her pass and ID, pointing the way to the door at the far end of a corridor. She knocked and, without waiting for a reply, marched in carrying her gear, which she put down at the foot of the major’s desk.

He looked surprised. ‘Yes, Ma’am. What can I do for…’

She offered her hand. ‘Alex Stead reporting for duty – the photographer?’

‘Well, goddam. We all thought you were…’

‘A he?’ She sighed.

‘Let me get you a coffee,’ he blustered.

Presently there was a rap on the door. ‘Enter,’ the major barked.

Lieutenant Matt McDermott hesitated at the doorway. ‘Sorry, sir. I didn’t know you had company.’

‘Come in, Lieutenant. This is your embed, Alex Stead.’

McDermott’s jaw dropped. ‘But I thought…’

‘Okay, soldier, we’ve been through all that. Why don’t you take Miss… Alex… and show her the set-up.’ He turned to Alex. ‘The boys are going on patrol. I guess you’d want to join them?’

She felt like telling him it was the last thing she wanted. Instead, she swallowed hard. ‘Sure,’ she murmured, gathering her gear. ‘Oh, and this is for you, I believe, Major.’ She handed him the ground rules document, duly signed. ‘I’m afraid I only got as far as point thirty-seven.’ With that, she turned on her heel, and left the room.

*  *  *

‘Excuse me, Ma’am, but didn’t you give me the finger just a little while ago?’ P.J. gave Alex a suspicious look as she climbed aboard from the rear-loading ramp.

‘I don’t take too kindly to having a gun aimed at my face,’ Alex snapped.

‘That was you, was it, Ma’am,’ McDermott said. ‘Gave young P.J. here quite a surprise – him being a country boy an’ all. That right, P.J.?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Seriously, though. It’s bordering on plain foolish to follow a convoy too close. An Iraqi got himself killed doing that only last
week, got two warnings to pull back, the third time they shot him. Could have been a suicide bomber.’