Eagle in the Sky - Smith Wilbur - Страница 32

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the unconscious body of a woman who lay, face down, in a floral dress,

with her arms thrown wide.  He did not recognize her as Debra's mother.

Debra!  He tried to hurry, but his legs would not respond.  He saw her

then, at the corner of the wall where he had left her.

Debra!  He felt his heart soar.  She seemed unhurt, kneeling below one

of the marble Grecian statues, with the flowers in her hair and the

yellow silk of her dress gay and festive.

She knelt, facing the wall, and her head was bowed as though in prayer.

The dark wing of her hair hung forward screening her and she held her

cupped hands to her face.

Debra.  He dropped to his knees beside her, and timidly he touched her

shoulder.

Are you all right, my darling?  And she lowered her hands slowly, but

still holding them cupped together.  A great coldness closed around

David's chest as he saw that her cupped hands were filled with blood.

Rich'red blood, bright as wine in a crystal glass.

David, she whispered, turning her face towards him.  Is that you,

darling?  David gave a small breathless moan of agony as he saw the

blood-glutted eye sockets, the dark gelatinous mess that congealed in

the thick dark eyelashes and turned the lovely face into a gory mask.

Is that you, David?  she asked again, her head cocked at a blind

listening angle.

Oh God, Debra.  He stared into her face.

I can't see, David.  She groped for him.  Oh David I can't see.

And he took her sticky wet hands in his, and he thought that his heart

would break.

The stark modern silhouette of Hadassah Hospital stood upon the skyline

above the village of Em Karem.  The speed with which the ambulances

arrived saved many of the victims whose lives were critically balanced,

and the hospital was geared to sudden influxes of war casualties.

The three men, the Brig, Joe and David, kept their vigil together all

that night upon the hard wooden benches of the hospital waiting-room.

When more was learned of the planning behind the attack, a security

agent would come to whisper a report to the Brig.

One of the assassins was a long-term and trusted employee of the

catering firm, and the other two were his cousins who had.  been

employed as temporary staff on his recommendation.  It was certain that

their papers were forged.

The Prime Minister and her cabinet had been delayed by an emergency

session, but had been on their way to the wedding when the attack was

made.  A fortunate chance had saved them, and she sent her personal

condolences; to the relatives of the victims.

At ten o'clock, Damascus radio gave a report in which El Fatah claimed

responsibility for the attack by members of a suicide squad.

A little before midnight, the chief surgeon came from the main theatre,

still in his theatre greens and boots, with his mask pulled down to his

throat.  Ruth Mordecai was out of danger, he told the Brig.  They had

removed a bullet that had passed through her lung and lodged under her

shoulder blade.  They had saved the lung.

Thank God, murmured the Brig and closed his eyes for a moment, imagining

life without his woman of twenty-five years.  Then he looked up.  My

daughter?

The surgeon shook his head.  They are still working on her in the small

casualty theatre.  He hesitated.

Colonel Halmin died in theatre a few minutes ago The toll of the dead

was eleven so far, with four others on the critical list.

In the early morning the undertakers arrived for the bodies with their

long wicker baskets and black limousines.  David gave Joe the keys of

the Mercedes, that he might follow by the hearse bearing Hannah's body

and arrange the details of the funeral.

David and the Brig sat side by side, haggard and with sleepless bruised

eyes, drinking coffee from paper cups.

In the late morning the eye surgeon came out to them.

He was a smooth-faced, young-looking man in his forties, the greying of

his hair seeming incongruous against the unlined skin and clear blue

eyes.

General Mordecai?

The Brig rose stiffly.  He seemed to have aged ten years during the

night.

I am Doctor Edelman.  Will you come with me please?

David rose to follow them, but the doctor paused and looked to the Brig.

I am her fiance, said David.

It might be best if we spoke alone first, General.  Edelman was clearly

trying to pass a warning with his eyes, and the Brig nodded.  Please,

David.  But- David began, and the Brig squeezed his shoulder briefly,

the first gesture of affection that had ever passed between them.

Please, my boy, and David turned back to the hard bench.

In the tiny cubicle of his office Edelman hitched himself on to the

corner of the desk and lit a cigarette.  His hands were long and slim as

a girl's, and he used the lighter with a surgeon's neat economical

movements.

You don't want it with a sugar coating, I imagine?  He had appraised the

Brig carefully, and went on without waiting for a reply.  Neither of

your daughter's eyes are damaged, but be held up a hand to forestall the

rising expression of relief on the Brig's lips, and turned to the

scanner on which hung a set of X-ray plates.  He switched on the back

light.

The eyes were untouched, there is almost no damage to her facial

features, however, the damage is here he touched a hard frosty outline

in the smoky grey swirls and patterns of the X-ray plate, - that is a

steel fragment, a tiny steel fragment, almost certainly from a grenade.

It is no larger than the tip of a lead pencil.  It entered the skull

through the outer edge of the right temple, severing the large vein

which accounted for the profuse haernorrhage, and it travelled obliquely

behind the eye-balls without touching them or any other vital tissue.

Then, however, it pierced the bony surrounds of the optic chiasma, he

traced the path of the fragment through Debra's head, and it seems to

have cut through the canal and severed the chiasma, before lodging in

the bone sponge beyond.  Edelman drew heavily on the cigarette while he

looked for a reaction from the Brig.

There was none.

Do you understand the implications of this, General?  he asked, and the

Brig shook his head wearily.  The surgeon switched off the light of the

X-ray scanner, and returned to the desk.  He pulled a scrap pad towards

the Brig and took a propelling pencil from his top pocket.

Boldly he sketched an optical chart, eyeballs, brain, and optical

nerves, as seen from above.

The optical nerves, one from each eye, run back into this narrow tunnel

of bone where they fuse, and then branch again to opposite lobes of the

brain The Brig nodded, and Edelman slashed the point of his pencil

through the point where the nerves fused.

Understanding began to show on the Brig's strained and tired features.

Blind?  he asked, and Edelman nodded.  Both eyes? 'I'm afraid so.  The

Brig bowed his head and gently massaged his own eyes with thumb and

forefinger.  He spoke again without looking at Edelman.

Permanently?  he asked.

She has no recognition of shape, or colour, of light or darkness.  The

track of the fragment is through the optic chiasma.  All indications are

that the nerve is severed.

There is no technique known to medical science which will restore that.

Edelman paused to draw breath, before going on.  In a word then, your

daughter is permanently and totally blinded in both eyes.  The Brig

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