Abraham Verghese - Cutting for Stone

In the end, it was peasants who betrayed the General with loud cries of lulululu when they stumbled on his group.

A police force soon surrounded General Mebratu. In that last fire-fight, running out of ammunition, the General disarmed a wounded policeman, then crawled to another wounded policeman to get his weapon. He called to Eskinder, his brother, to help, but instead Eskinder shot our beloved General in the face before putting the gun in his own mouth. I wondered if they had made a suicide pact. Or had Eskinder made a decision for the two of them? As for Zemui, father of Genet, friend of Darwin, he refused to surrender or to take his own life. He charged the forces that had him surrounded, and they gunned him down.

Eskinder's bullet had hit the General's cheek and ripped out his right eye, leaving it dangling, before lodging under the left eye. By some miracle the bullet did not enter the skull. The General was unconscious but alive. He was rushed to the military hospital in Addis Ababa, a distance of about one hundred kilometers.

WE SAT AROUND the dining table, the four of us, trying to block out the wailing from Rosina's. I could hear Genet's sobs from time to time. Though Hema had gone in and come out of Rosina's quarters, I couldn't bring myself to do so. Shiva had his hands over his ears, and his eyes were moist.

While we were still huddled at the table Mr. Loomis's office called. “Business as usual,” Ghosh said, putting down the phone. Loomis Town & Country was open, and if we were Tuesday House, we had to remember to bring our sports gear.

Despite our misgivings, Ghosh convinced us that school would be better than listening to Rosina's wailing all day. He drove us there, Shiva and I sharing the front seat.

Near the National Bank a crowd spilled off the sidewalk, into the street, charged with a strange energy, heading toward us. We inched forward. Suddenly I saw directly in front of us, as clearly as if they were on a stage, three bodies strung up on makeshift gallows. Ghosh told us to look away, but it was too late. In their immobility the corpses appeared to have been dangling there for centuries. Their heads were angled awkwardly, and their hands lashed behind their backs.

The crowd swarmed around our car. The festivities were apparently just over. One young man walking with two others slapped the hood of our car, the sound making me jump. He grinned, and whatever it was he said, it wasn't nice. Someone else slammed the roof above our heads, and then we felt our car rock back and forth.

I was sure the mob would string us up by our necks, too. I clutched the dashboard, a scream in my throat. Ghosh said, “Keep calm, boys! Smile, wave, show your teeth! Nod your head … make it look as if we came for the show.” I don't know if I smiled, but I do know that I stifled that scream. Shiva and I grinned like monkeys and pretended we weren't frightened. We waved. Perhaps it was the sight of identical twins, or the sense that we were just as crazy inside the car as they were on the outside, but we heard laughter, and the thumps on the car were now more good-natured, less violent.

Ghosh kept nodding his head, a big smile on his face, waving, keeping up an agitated chatter, “I know, I know, you unkempt rascal, good morning to you, too, yes indeed, I have come to delight in this heathen spectacle … Let's hang you, by Jove, it certainly is most civilized of you to do this, thank you, thank you,” and inching forward. I'd never seen him this way before, expressing such dangerous contempt and anger under a smiling and false exterior. At last we were through, the car moving freely. Looking back, I could see hands tugging at the leather shoes of the corpses.

Shiva and I had arms around each other in our ancient pose. We were badly shaken. In the school parking lot, Ghosh turned off the engine and held us to him. I wept for Zemui, for General Mebratu, shot in the eye, for Genet and Rosina, and at last for myself. To be in Ghosh's arms and against his chest was to find the safest haven in the world. He cleaned my face with one end of his kerchief and then used the other end on Shiva. “That was the bravest thing you might ever do in your lives. You kept your head. You screwed your courage to the sticking place. I'm proud of you. I tell you what—we'll go out of town this weekend. To the hot springs in Sodere, or Woliso. We'll swim and forget all about this.”

He gave us each a final hug. “If I find Mekonnen, then he'll be here with his taxi the usual time. If I don't find him, I'll be here myself at four.” When I was about to enter my classroom, I turned back to look. Ghosh was still standing there, waving.

Loomis Town & Country was abuzz. I heard boasts of what the other kids had seen and done. I felt no desire to contribute or listen.

THAT DAY, while we were in school, four men in a jeep came to visit Ghosh. They took him away as if he were a common criminal, his hands jacked up behind his back. They slapped him when he tried to protest. Hema learned this from W. W. Gonad, who told the men they were surely mistaken in taking away Missing's surgeon. For his impertinence W.W. got a boot in his stomach.

Hema refused to believe Ghosh was gone. She ran home, certain that she'd find him sunk into his armchair, his sockless feet up on the stool, reading a book. In anticipation of seeing him, in the certainty that he would be there, she was already furious with him.

She burst through the front door of our bungalow. “Do you see how dangerous it is for us to associate with the General? What have I been telling you? You could get us all killed!” Whenever she came at him like that, all her cylinders firing, it was Ghosh's habit to flourish an imaginary cape like a matador facing a charging bull. We found it funny, even if Hema never did.

But the house was quiet. No matador. She went from room to room, the jingle of her anklets echoing in the hallways. She imagined Ghosh with his arm twisted behind his back, being punched in the face, kicked in the genitals … She ran to the commode as her lunch came up. Later she lit incense, rang the bell, and vowed that she'd make pilgrimages to the shrines at Tirupati and Velankani if they released Ghosh alive.

Hema picked up the phone to tell Matron. But the line was dead. The phones had stopped working when the bombs fell, and ever since, they had only worked sporadically. She stood looking out of the kitchen window.

Ghosh's car was at the hospital. But even if she got in the car, where was she supposed to go? Where had they taken him? And if she went and they arrested her as well, then her sons would be left alone … It took a monumental effort of will for her to decide to wait for us.

Hema could hear a sobbing monologue from the servant's quarters— the voice was Rosina's, though it was hoarse and sounded nothing like her. It was addressed to Zemui, or to God, or to the men who killed her husband. It had begun that morning, and it had not reached its zenith.

Hema saw Genet emerge, red-eyed but composed, leading a wobbly Rosina. They were heading for the outhouse. They had no one to mourn with them other than Almaz and Gebrew, who at that moment were elsewhere. Hema felt that Genet had aged suddenly, that a hardness had crept into the little girl's face, and the sugar and spice and everything nice had died.

Hema splashed water on her cheeks. She took a deep breath. It was crucial that she stay calm for our sakes, she told herself.

She drank a glass of water that had passed through the purifier. She had just put the glass down when Almaz came running in. “Madam, don't drink the water. They are saying the rebels poisoned the water supply.”

But it was too late because Hema felt her face burning and then came the worst belly cramps of her life.