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you can expect to be held in Turkey for the duration?’
    â€˜Can’t be helped, sir. As a doctor I took an oath.’
    â€˜You won’t be able to do much without medical supplies.’
    â€˜I’m confident that when the Red Cross or Red Crescent hear of our predicament, they’ll send us at least some of what we need. But even if they don’t, after almost two years of improvised doctoring in the desert I may be able to alleviate some of the men’s suffering.’
    â€˜Even if it’s only to help them on their way? No – don’t comment on that remark, Mason. It was fatuous of me to make it. Some things are best left unsaid. As for marching over the desert, you’re as skeletal, sick, and exhausted as the rest of us.’
    â€˜I’m fine, sir,’ John lied.
    â€˜David Knight wanted you to go downstream with the worst of the casualties we exchanged for Turkish POWs, didn’t he?’
    â€˜We tossed, sir. He won.’
    â€˜That’s not the version I heard. You have a two-headed sovereign and a wife in Basra?’
    â€˜My wife and I are estranged, sir.’ John avoided mentioning the sovereign that had been a birthday gift from Harry Downe.
    â€˜You volunteered to stay with the main force to avoid your wife?’
    John smiled. ‘I doubt any man would choose to be here simply to avoid his wife even if she was a demon, sir. Maud and I agreed to divorce before I left Basra last July. I’m certain she no more wants to see me than I do her.’
    â€˜She does know you weren’t shot at dawn after that ridiculous court martial when Perry and Cleck-Heaton levied trumped-up charges against you?’
    â€˜If she didn’t know it before we surrendered at Kut, I don’t doubt Smythe told her when he and Mitkhal smuggled dispatches to the Relief Force last January, sir.’
    The brigadier lowered his voice. ‘Can you honestly tell me that your decision to remain with the Force has nothing to do with your personal circumstances?’
    â€˜I volunteered to stay with the Force because I’ve been in Mesopotamia longer than Knight and have more experience of treating tropical diseases, sir.’
    Realising John had said as much as he was going to about his private affairs, the brigadier changed the subject. ‘When you say “travel behind with orderlies”, presumably you mean your Indian orderly?’
    â€˜Dira, yes, sir, but only if he volunteers.’
    â€˜Sergeant Greening?’
    â€˜He’s my guard, sir.’
    â€˜Since you’ve proved yourself a model prisoner, I’ve heard that under your tutelage Greening’s become proficient in administering various medical procedures?’
    â€˜He has, sir.’
    â€˜Do you think Greening would happy to stay behind with you and your Indian orderly and assist you?’
    â€˜As with Dira, the choice would have to be his, sir.’
    â€˜You’ll probably need more help.’
    â€˜I’ll take any that is offered from experienced orderlies, sir, but the choice has to be theirs.’
    â€˜Ask for volunteers. I’ll talk to the Turks and do what I can to help you implement your plan. Can I leave it to you to delegate responsibilities to the other medics?’
    â€˜I’ll call a medics’ conference for first thing tomorrow, sir.’
    â€˜I’ll send someone to notify you if that supply ship is spotted. This is not a corner I’d have chosen to be pushed into, Mason, but it’s good to have men like you and Crabbe with me.’
    â€˜Thank you, sir.’
    When John walked away he saw Patel returning to the brigadier’s cook fire. He made a detour to the shelters that had been erected next to the river. Leigh had been packed into a two-man tent with half a dozen other officers. Dira was using a sponge attached to a stick to moisten his lips.
    â€˜Good work, Dira, but there’s little we can without