‘Hasn’t got anyone else?’
‘That’s right. Oh, he was famous for a little while, for all the good it did him.’
‘What do you mean he was famous?’ Daniel sounded as surprised to hear this as I was.
Now Russell sounded surprised. ‘You didn’t know? I guess you don’t spend a lot of time looking at social media.’ He pulled his phone out of his pocket, played with it for a bit then handed it over.
Daniel peered at the screen. ‘How long ago was this?’ he asked.
‘Two years. The army’s generally not over keen on letting out any information about what goes on in theatres of war, but this was such a good propaganda piece that they let it through.’ I was dying to know what they were talking about, but it looked as though I would have to wait. Russell seemed like a good bloke, but he’d fallen into the All Blokes Together habit of leaving the womenfolk to catch up as best we could.
‘Perhaps,’ Daniel suggested, ‘the government was in a spot of bother back then and welcomed the distraction.’ He frowned. ‘Though this is an English journal, isn’t it?’
‘Yep. He was still serving with the British Army then. But we got to know each other in Helmand and he decided he’d rather be an Aussie. After he was demobbed he applied for citizenship and it was granted overnight. Ministerial prerogative. I guess the minister is more into social media than you.’ Russell brought his beer to his lips and tipped his head back to drink. ‘So maybe Alasdair has some information that the kidnappers – dognappers – want? There’s a lot of drugs in Afghanistan. Maybe this is connected to the drug trade.’
‘That’s a promising idea, Russell. I’ll keep it in mind. Tell me more about him.’
‘Poor old Scottie. Not interested in girls. Or boys. Just him and his dog. He used to spy for the English. He had a serious talent for passing himself off as a local, and he found out lots of intel they’d never have found otherwise. I knew he was going to drive down from Townsville to spare Geordie the journey in the plane’s hold. Well, I did that, too. Bill and I went on the train. It was fun. Picked up my family in Sydney and came down together. The kid loves Bill and Bill thinks Tommy’s his puppy. But what Scottie will do without Geordie …’ He shook his head. ‘He was caught in a bad ambush; jeep ran over an IED. Everyone else was killed, but Scottie was captured. They had him for three days. Three days before anyone noticed that he wasn’t among the dead. ’Course, it can be hard to put together all the pieces. That’s why a lot of us put one of our dog tags on the laces of our boots.’
‘They tortured him?’
‘Bastards,’ Russell spat again. ‘Only one who knew he was gone was Geordie. Whined, dragged, tried to pull people by the sleeve, did everything short of actually running off the base, because he knew he needed help. Finally some fuckwitted squaddie worked out what Geordie was about and got a patrol on to it. The bastards had had a lot of fun with Scottie. The medics didn’t think he’d live, but he did. Still, I reckon he’s got no reason to trust anyone in the world except his dog. His mates didn’t come looking for him. It took one of our patrols to find him.’
‘What do you think will happen to Alasdair if we don’t find Geordie alive?’ asked Daniel.
‘I dunno, mate,’ said Russell heavily.
A head was reposing on my knee. I patted. It was Bill. He grabbed my sleeve in his teeth and pulled me to my feet. I valued my caftan so I rose and came into view.
‘Who you got there, Bill?’ asked Russell. His hand dropped to where the stock of his gun would have been; on a sling, I suspected. In the same manner as Daniel, he looked suddenly extremely dangerous. I held up both hands.
‘Friend,’ I told him.
He relaxed back into the chair.
‘All right, Bill, loose,’ he told the dog. Bill, wagging his tail, un-fanged my dress and went to sit by his master’s side.
‘You see, these dogs are like brothers,’ said Russell, making room for me on the bench. ‘Sorry about that, he’s a bit protective.’
‘A very good thing to be,’ I agreed.
‘This is Corinna,’ said Daniel. ‘She’s helping me to find Geordie.’
‘Your partner, eh? Okay.’
‘How do you find the dogs in the first place?’ I asked.
Russell scratched Bill’s ears absently. ‘In refuges, lost dogs’ homes. We look for a smallish dog with a real good nose.’
‘Why small?’ I asked.
He grinned at me. ‘Because sometimes we have to carry the dog, along with the pack and the gear and the rifle – and you do not want a St Bernard strapped to your chest when you’re leaping out of a copter.’
This struck me as eminently sensible.
‘We go through all the training together. We devise our own orders, so no one can mislead the dog. Dogs have got amazing noses. Haven’t you, Bill, eh? Amazing. They can sniff out a microgram of explosive in air. And Geordie was a drug dog, too. Whereas if you want a bloodhound, you can’t go past my Bill here.’
Bill wagged his tail again. I could practically see the halo around his ragged ears. He was a shabby, ill-favoured dog, but clearly very happy. His master was rubbing those ears and Bill was slavering happily onto his thigh.
‘Anyway, will you let me know if I can help in any way?’ Russell asked. ‘I feel bad about Scottie. Someone should have come for him. And they didn’t.’
‘I’ll call you,’ promised Daniel, and he rose to escort Russell and Bill out.
I stayed on the bench, looking out on the flowery, fragrant garden. Alasdair had probably known that he would not be rescued, that no one would notice him missing from that heap of body parts and destroyed machinery. He was captive, in the hands of his enemies, to be killed in the cruellest way possible, at their sadistic leisure. He must have despaired.
And who delivered him from his enemies and the pains of hell? Not his mates. His dog. His only friend in the world.
We absolutely had to get Geordie back.
But how?
CHAPTER FIVE
Flout ’em and scout ’em; and scout ’em and flout ’em
Thought is free
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, THE TEMPEST, ACT 3, SCENE 2
‘So tell me about this article,’ I prompted. Daniel took out his phone, rummaged in the depths of cyberland for a moment then handed the phone to me.
On the screen was a photo of Alasdair holding a smallish black-and-white dog in his arms and grinning. My heart turned over to see the change in him. Back then, he looked absurdly young and filled with ebullience. Now, the face was the same, but haunted and filled with terror. The banner headline read HERO GEORDIE SAVES PATROL.
The accompanying text was somewhat overwritten, but the gist was clear enough as I flicked downwards. A patrol had been driving along the highway in an armoured car, when Geordie had begun barking furiously. Rather than telling the dog to shut up, the driver had braked hard and stopped. The patrol had disembarked and fanned out on both sides of the road. They found an IED almost immediately, not ten metres from where they had stopped, right in the middle of the road. The bomb squad disarmed the IED and great had been the rejoicing of everyone, and presumably there’d been extra rations for Geordie. I handed the phone back and we exchanged one of those Significant Looks.