Dream thief

10

… THE CAMP OF THE bandits looked less like a camp and more like a gypsy village than anything Spence had ever seen. Tents of scrap cloth and tarp sewn together, draped over branches or supported with poles scavenged in the jungle, gave the place a wild, fanciful appearance. Small children scampered half -naked to see the odd-looking visitors. Old men sat around the ashes of the previous night's fire nodding and pointing and clacking toothless gums as the raiding party returned with the booty. Women came running to see what their men had brought home for them. Over all an air of whimsical gaiety prevailed.

It was hard for Spence to imagine that these peaceful, happy people made their living killing the unlucky and robbing the unwary. He had expected the outlaw's hideaway to be a snake pit, dark and hateful, full of desperate men whose way of life made them vicious and unruly.

That these thieves had families that ran laughing to meet them amused him.

"Quite a picture," Spence whispered to Adjani as they moved down a wide avenue between tents and shelters made from empty cargo crates. Children ran along beside them giggling and pointing in the manner of excited children everywhere.

"Don't let it fool you, Spencer." Adjani spoke softly and peered with narrowed eyes at the leader of the bandits walking just ahead of them. "The cheerful highwayman is the more dangerous. Believe me, these men will not hesitate to disembowel us in front of their wives and children if it pleases them."

Spence thought Adjani was being melodramatic about their situation. But Gita, whose tongue had not stirred the whole of the trek into the jungle, rolled his eyes and quivered, saying, "Adjani knows of what he speaks, Spence Reston. Listen to him. These men are cutthroats for all their easy ways."

"But you can't think they'd harm us now. We have nothing of value."

"Don't you see? They have lived too long above the law; they have become secure, fearing nothing. Such men do not shrink from the worst deeds imaginable."

Gita nodded his agreement readily, so Spence said no more about it. Still, he found himself smiling at the children and gawking around the camp as if he were a tourist on holiday.

They had marched all night and rested only a few hours before striking off again. Now the sun stood high in the sky, filtering down through the leafy green canopy above. The prisoners were paraded through the camp and brought to the biggest tent and made to sit down under a large patchwork awning between two guards while the bandits proceeded to divide up the night's harvest of merchandise piled in the center of the settlement.

The shouting of the men and shrieking of the women was still in full chorus when the leader disengaged himself from the swarm around the goods and came to stand before them. The guards prodded the prisoners to their feet with their rifle muzzles.

The bandit leader, a huge hulk of a man with a spreading belly concealed beneath his flowing kaftan, eyed them with interest, and then spoke rapidly to Gita. Gita touched his forehead and bowed low. The leader pushed through them and went into his tent.

"His name is Watti and he wants us to follow him," explained Gita.

"After you," said Spence, and the three went into the leader's dwelling.

Though the interior was dark, the patchwork let in irregular splotches of light, decorating the inside with a speckled pattern that lifted and flowed as the tent breathed in the jungle breeze.

The goonda chief led them to a far corner and opened a flap in the side of the tent. Sunlight streamed in upon a bed of cushions on which a young boy rested so still that Spence thought at first he was dead.

Here was the reason they had been brought. The chief of the brigands wanted them to heal his son-that much at least needed no words. The look of the thief's face told as much as he gazed upon the boy's limp form. Likewise, his curt order to them left no doubt about their fate should their combined medical art fall short of curing the boy. A leisurely, painfully protracted death would commence immediately. That Spence also gathered without an interpreter.

Gita fell to his knees and began untying his linen sacks and rummaging through them. There were bags within bags, but he found one he wanted and opened it and drew out an old-fashioned stethoscope which he put on and immediately displayed his best doctorly manner, hovering over the boy and listening through the obsolete instrument.

Chief Watti seemed pleased and left them to their business.

"I hope we have enough medicine between us to do some good," remarked Spence when they were once again alone.

"It seems we have no choice," replied Adjani.

"His breathing is shallow and very light." Gita frowned. "He may be beyond help."

Adjani knelt over the patient and placed a hand on his forehead. "He's on fire! The boy is burning up with fever."

"What else do you have in your sack, Gita? Any drugs? Medicine?"

"Nothing much -novocaine, aspirin, a few antibiotics. I'm a dentist, remember."

"The antibiotics might be some help," said Adjani. "If we could only figure out what's wrong with him."

"We can try to get his temperature down in any case," said Spence. "Let's have the aspirin."

Gita reached his hand in and fished around and withdrew a small plastic bottle. "Here. Sixty tablets. Maybe enough, eh?"

"Let's give him some antibiotics, too, and a sponge bath and see if that will help." To Spence's amazed look Adjani replied, "Yes, antibiotics are still quite useful in this part of the world. Now then, Gita, go and tell Watti we need some water in a basin and clean cloths." Gita gave him a pleading look. "Yes, you. For all they know you're the only one that speaks Hindi. You'll be our spokesman."

Gita went out and came back in a few moments. They sat looking at the boy helplessly, desperately trying to recall the medical knowledge they possessed. Their lives depended upon such stray information now.

In a while a young woman in a yellow and orange sari entered the tent with a large bowl of water and several washcloths and towels. She spoke to Gita shyly and then withdrew a few paces to watch with folded hands.

"She is Watti's wife; the boy's mother, at least. I think Watti has more than one wife. She will get us anything we need."

Adjani moistened a cloth and proceeded to bathe the boys fevered limbs. Spence took four of the aspirin tablets and crushed them while Adjani opened several blue and white capsules." Get us some drinking water. And make sure it's clean," said Spence. Gita relayed the request to the woman who disappeared into the speckled shadows.

He took up a small cup and poured a swallow of the water into it and stirred in the powdered mixture. Adjani administered the medicine, lifting the boy's head and pouring it gently down his throat. Spence saw the boy's ribs poking out of his flesh and wondered how long it had been since he had eaten.

"We've got to get that fever down and get some food into him or we're sunk. He hasn't eaten anything in weeks, by the look of him."

"Very likely," said Adjani, and he went back to bathing the unconscious boy.

The day progressed with aching slowness. The three impromptu physicians took turns administering tepid baths and dosed their patient with aspirin at proper intervals. They dozed and checked the sick boy for signs of improvement and encouraged one another that they were doing the right things.

By evening the youngster seemed a little better, though it was hard to tell precisely. His temperature seemed to have fallen somewhat and he moaned slightly when Adjani started the baths again.

"Should we try to feed him?" wondered Spence.

"I don't know," said Adjani with a worried look. "I think tonight will tell."

"Meaning?"

"If he makes it through the night he'll get better. If not…"

"He's that bad, do you think?" Spence looked again at the prostrate form. The boy was pale and sunken-eyed; death did indeed seem to hover at his shoulder.

Gita rose from listening with his stethoscope. "I fear Adjani is right. His heartbeat is but a flutter. We may lose him."

"If we lose him we lose our ticket out of here." Spence turned and knelt over the boy as if to shake him awake and reason with him.

"Come on," said Adjani. "We'll take a walk if the guards will let us. I could use some fresh air."

They stepped from the tent and were met by the stern faces of the guards. Adjani motioned that they wanted to walk, and one of the guards nodded and pushed the other one to his feet to accompany the prisoners on their stroll.

The people of the bandit village eyed them curiously. Clearly, white men were a novelty to the younger ones, and a dark-skinned man dressed as a white man was perhaps equally unique. The pair drew long, unguarded stares wherever they went.

Neither spoke for a while. They just walked side by side among the crazy-quilt tents and listened to the raucous clatter of brilliant scarlet-and-yellow birds flitting among the treetops and swooping down from time to time in bold slashes of color.

"What are our chances, Adjani?" Spence broke the silence at last, saying what they both had on their minds.

"I don't know. It depends on the boy."

"What's he got-some kind of paratyphoid?"

"That's my guess. We'd need a lab set-up to know for sure. The point is we can't do much for him. The fever is in its third week, at least."

Spence was suddenly angry. "Why didn't they get help sooner? What's wrong with these people?"

"They are backward, ignorant. The same with poor people the world over. It is the way they have lived for centuries. They are not likely to change over the death of one small boy."

"On Gotham we would have had him cured and on his feet in less time than it takes his father to plunder a caravan. But here! What can we do? It isn't fair."

"Fair or not, this is the way it is-the way it always will be."

They had reached the extent of the village and the jungle stood before them a green wall. Their guard grunted and motioned them with the rifle to turn and start back.

The slanting rays of the afternoon light shone amber through the trees. The tops of the trees glinted gold among the green. Blue smoke from cooking fires began to thread into the air and the smells of strong spices scented their passage back through the bandit hideaway. The men, most of whom had slept all day, recovering from their night's work, stirred from their tents to gather in groups, talking loudly.

"Evil has many faces, does it not?" said Adjani, gazing around him. "This one is not particularly frightening. But it is evil nonetheless."

Just then a shout from the far end of the camp reached them. Spence saw Gita standing in front of the chief's tent waving to them and calling, "Come quickly! He speaks! Come!"

Spence and Adjani raced to the tent and found the boy, eyes hard and black in a face the color of old parchment, lolling his head from side to side moaning in weak delirium.

"Is he awake?" asked Spence. The boy's eyes, though open, had a dull-glazed shallow look.

"He is slipping into coma."

"We've got to do something," Spence said frantically. He fell to his knees beside the thin body, placing his hand on the frail chest. "The fever's worse." He looked at Gita and then Adjani with urgent expectation. "We've got to do something," he repeated.

"What would you have us do?" said Adjani.

"Anything is better than letting him die like this. Gita, get your pills."

"What are you going to do?"

"The only thing we can -megadose him with the antibiotics. He's dying before our eyes. At least this way he may have a chance."

Gita handed him an assortment of plastic bottles containing various drugs. Spence selected the antibiotics and emptied the contents of a handful of capsules into a small bowl.

"Gita, find the boy's mother," instructed Adjani. "Tell her to bring us honey or sugar water-anything sweet to drink. Lots of it. And hurry!"

"Don't die yet," whispered Spence as he worked. "Hang on, kid. Hang on."

Gita returned and handed Spence a vessel of liquid. Spence smelled it and said, "Smells like flowers; what is it?"

"Jasmine water. They drink it like tea. It is heavily sugared. Very sweet."

"Good, that's what we want." He poured some into a bowl with the crushed pills. "I'm no medic or I would have thought of this hours ago. The glucose will boost his metabolism. He's got to fight that fever."

The boy's mother entered and brought a jug of liquid which she handed to Spence. He smelled it and coughed, "Phew! What is that?"

Gita sniffed the jug and diffidently placed a tip of his little finger in the liquid and brought it to his tongue. "Mmm, it is puyati-nectar of the gods. Fermented palm sap. One develops a taste for it."

"Yeah? Well, we can't give him this."

"Why not? Undoubtedly he drinks it already, and the alcohol might do him some good."

"You're quite a country doctor, Gita. But I have a better idea." Spence grabbed the basin Adjani was using to bathe the boy and dashed the water out of it. He poured it full again with the palm liquor.

"Now we have an alcohol bath. That ought to cool him off quicker."

Adjani nodded and dipped the cloth into the reeking brew. When he had finished he turned to Spence and took the cup from his hands, swishing the liquid around the rim several times. He lifted the boy's head and administered the medicine. Then he turned to the others.

"Well, that's done. Now we wait. We'll take turns watching him and bathing him round the clock."

Spence looked at the weak, pathetic figure wasted painfully thin by fever. Their lives hung by the slenderest of threads, as fine as the breath which raised the little chest slowly and regularly and all but imperceptibly. Will any of us live to see another morning? Spence wondered. The next few hours would tell.