The Last Kestrel. Jill McGivering

whispering in each other’s ears in the midst of the hubbub, as if they were sheltering together under a tree in a violent storm.

      ‘The foreign soldiers have built a camp in the desert,’ he said. ‘Just a few miles outside Nayullah. They’re trying to shake out all the…’ He paused, hesitating as he chose his word. ‘…the fighters.’

      She nodded. ‘I heard.’

      ‘Every day they drive through the streets, big guns pointing everywhere, shouting at us all.’ He shook his head. ‘The children throw stones. Everyone’s afraid.’ He coughed, spat to the side.

      ‘First the Russians, now the Americans,’ Hasina said. ‘When will they leave us in peace?’

      The old man tutted agreement. ‘Today, even people from town have walked out here.’ He paused, gestured about him with an outstretched arm. ‘People are frightened to go to market in town in case the foreigners come. How many are being killed?’ He lowered his voice to a murmur. ‘Killed or just disappeared.’

      Hasina closed her eyes. She felt the ground beneath her sway and put her hand to her face. Her fingers, close to her nose, stank of orange. When she opened her eyes again, the old man was looking at her with concern.

      She swallowed hard. ‘Will we ever see peace?’

      ‘We chased off the Russians. But it cost a lot of blood.’ He paused, looked away into the blur of the crowd. ‘All the bombing. My old body doesn’t matter. But the young people, the children…’ He sighed.

      A passer-by stopped to examine the oranges. The old man got to his feet and invited him to taste one. The man walked on without speaking. The old man settled back. ‘These people,’ he said. ‘No manners.’

      His expression suddenly lightened as he remembered something. He reached in his pocket to pull out a grimy photograph. A cheap studio portrait, creased with wear. It showed a couple, uncomfortable in new clothes, posing stiffly with an infant. ‘See,’ he said. His face shone with pride. ‘I have a grandson now. Finally! After so many years of just girls. Praise be to Allah!’

      ‘What a blessing,’ she said. ‘I’ll pray he grows up safe and healthy.’

      She got to her feet.

      ‘Pray he grows up safe,’ he whispered. ‘And not speaking American.’

      She bought spices and, at a hardware stall, bargained for a stout cooking pot. She started back along the road. The cries from the market stalls were garish in her ears. Her hand steadied the pot on her head. The young boy, hawking his local juice, ran up again as soon as he saw her, pushing the bottles in her face. She fended him off with her free hand.

      ‘Have you no manners?’ she said. The boy paused, backed off a little. ‘Weren’t you taught to show respect?’ He took a step towards her again. ‘Well, weren’t you?’

      She was punched in the back of the head. Struck hard. Pitched forward. Knocked down. A deep, resonant boom. Powerful as thunder. Her bones vibrated with it. Her face smacked into the ground. Deafened. Dust filled her eyes. Her mouth. A wave of sickness. Her limbs were shaking, drumming the ground in spasms. She blinked frantically, trying to see. She managed to lift her head. The broken shards of the pot were rocking from side to side in the road.

      She lay still. She must breathe. The world must settle into place again. Alive. Praise Allah. She was alive. She closed her eyes. She was sinking. Her limbs were like stones. Still and heavy, held by the ground. She tried again to lift her head, to open her eyes. She was breathing now. The air stank. Petrol. Burning cloth. A stench of singed meat. Her stomach was convulsing. Around her, a blur of fast-moving shapes. People were running. Arms were waving in and out of clouds of dust. She could hear nothing. Was she dying? No. A pop. She was bursting up from the bottom of a well. Raw sound broke into her ears. Screaming. Men shouting. Feet beating on the road.

      The soft tang of fruit pulp broke near her face. Rivulets of juice running in the dust. Bubbling as it sank into the ground, turning it to mud. The small boy. His bottles. Burst. She sensed him scrambling to his feet beside her. He peered into her face. His brown eyes wide with terror. A sweet boy. Like Aref. She shouldn’t have scolded. He was staring past her, back down the road, towards the market. Something there. What? She eased her head from the ground. Twisted her neck. Black smoke hung, thick and oily. A tall orange flame. A flame dirty with smoke, bent like a person staggering. She let her face fall back to the dust. Exhausted. Someone was tugging at her. A frightened voice in her ear. ‘Get up, Auntie. Get up.’ The boy.

      Finally she managed to sit. She was in the road. In the way. People were crying. Hugging children. A man, running, stepped on her hand. His arms were brimming with shoes, snatched up from somewhere. A plastic sandal fell in the dirt beside her. Green. Shiny. How stupid, she thought. To steal an odd shoe.

      The boy had run towards the smoke. Now he came running back. His face was contorted. He knelt in the dirt, took hold of her shoulders and shook them.

      ‘Get up.’ He seemed ready to cry. Why didn’t he leave her be? He was pulling on her arms. She got onto her knees, then to her feet. She stood uncertainly. Swaying. Her scarf was in folds at her neck, her head exposed. She lifted it back into place. She felt sick. Her head was dizzy with fumes, with noise. Maybe she should sink down and sit again. The boy, pulling at her, was agitated.

      ‘What?’ she said. ‘What now?’

      He lifted his hand and pointed down the road to the wreckage. ‘The policemen,’ he said. ‘Look!’

      She tried out her legs. They were shaking. She took a step. The boy buzzed about in front of her. She was intact. She was alive. He seized her hand and pulled her forward, down the road.

      A ring of people had formed. A tight crowd. Men stood, silent with shock. Others draped their arms round shoulders and craned forward to see. Their arms and heads were blocking her view. The boy had crouched to look through the legs. She sank down beside him. The flame was burning quietly in a sheath of smoke. It was thin and dying, rising from a greasy heap of twisted metal. The fumes filled her mouth. The air was shuddering with its heat.

      She twisted to see through the gaps. She could make out the mangled remains of vehicles. She couldn’t tell how many. Too many blackened parts. Many were blown some distance. They smouldered where they lay. Scattered fragments of metal, of glass, covered the surface of the road. Dark pools of oil, others of blood, stained the dust. Splashes of black and deep red against brown.

      She sat heavily. The boy was pulling at her sleeve, pointing. She couldn’t look. The heat of the fire, the press of the men, was making her giddy. She tasted bile and tried to swallow it back. She put her hand to her mouth. ‘I’m sick,’ she said. No one was listening.

      The boy was still tugging. She lifted her head. Through the legs and the shifting smoke, she made out figures slumped along the road. A policeman, his torso drenched in blood. On his side. A woman, her hair blackened with soot. Sitting. Bent over the shape of a child stretched across her lap. A man, staggering, his hands grasping the air. A boy, staring about him in confusion. A police radio, abandoned on the ground, suddenly sparked into life, pumping out voices from far away. She covered her eyes with her hands. Too much. How could this happen? The fading smell of orange was still on her fingers. Dizziness enfolded her in waves. She lowered her head to her lap.

      The sounds swelled and faded and swelled again in her ears. She sat. She had to get home. How would she get home? She shifted her feet. The soles of her sandals stuck to the filth in the road. Two men beside her were talking in low voices. She opened her eyes, looked up at them. Their faces swam.

      ‘What happened?’ She didn’t bother with the customary greetings.

      ‘Bombs,’ said one of the men. ‘Maybe two.’ He gestured towards the debris. ‘Suicide bombers.’

      ‘Who?’ She had clasped his leg, digging her nails into his cotton trousers. ‘Who did it?’

      He leaned back from her, his face closing. ‘Who knows?’

      Aref.