Chapter One
Outer Mongolia, August 1995:
Doctor Victor Cranston could not remember when he had been so busy, so content, so needed and so respected. Here, at the Mongolian Medical University Hospital in the capital city of Ulaanbaatar, he had reunited with Richard McDowell, the American doctor who had saved his life when Victor and his party had escaped from China after rescuing an American by the name of Sean O’Rourke held captive by the master Chinese criminal, Kang Sheng.[1] In a goodwill gesture Victor had returned to Mongolia to help the good doctor as the latter strove to educate and train local people in modern medical practices.
Cranston had not come empty-handed. He had cajoled, bullied, shamed, and strong-armed American companies to donate medical supplies and equipment badly needed in the former Soviet Republic. That was not the only cargo he had brought. There was also Antonia, his precocious seven-year-old daughter along with her maternal grandparents.
She was a handful. By the end of the first week, she had dragged her grandparents into and out of every bazaar, every market, every public building, every square, every historical site of the capital city. When her guardians begged for some time off, the girl enlisted her father. This time the University became the focus of her explorations, especially the hospital. She missed nothing. When her father was busy, she roamed the halls and rooms staring pop-eyed at the patients who were invariably of her own age. They, in turn, turned their typical Mongolian round faces in wonder at the dark hair, dark eyed curious westerner who smiled and talked to them in a totally incomprehensible foreign language. When her father made the rounds in the company of Doctor McDowell and Mongolian medical people, Antonia insisted that she tag along. Soon, the staff had adopted her and, in her quiet moments, read stories in English to the puzzled patients.
Her father was also very busy. No one could miss his tall handsome athletic figure, his full head of dark hair showing traces of gray at the sides and temples, his blue penetrating eyes giving out traces of humor, his pencil-thin dark mustache, his strong jaw, his stethoscope wrapped around his neck as he strode through the halls at all hours of the day or night. Even though his specialty was neurosurgery and he had been away from the operating room for some time, Victor Cranston drew on his vast knowledge of surgery to correct cleft palates, remove hernias, set broken limbs all the while educating and training the local medical people. He felt extremely humble and grateful.
Two groups of volunteer pediatricians and oncologists belonging to an organization called Medicine for Humanity, based in Newport Beach, California, had arrived in Mongolia to observe and assist local doctors in the city and outlying villages. Cranston and McDowell received them at the airport and escorted them to the University hospital.
“We have come to Mongolia,” one of the doctors explains, “To see if we can make a difference. This must be the beginning, the start of a sustained relationship between this newly independent nation and the West.”
All western doctors were at the hospital early the next morning when they began their daily routines of accompanying the local physicians on their rounds. The Mongolians, shy and overly respectful at first, soon became inquisitive and friendly. Victor found himself in distress when he saw victims seeking attention long after an accident had occurred. By the time family members brought them in, infections had set in, and the wounds did not heal. One particular case disturbed him.
A sixteen-year-old boy came in three months after the blunt end of an ax had hit him in the face and shattered the bones. By that time, it was too late for immediate surgery.
He asked a local doctor, “Did you take a blood sample for a bacterial check?”
The woman physician shook her head negatively.
“You should always do that first, you understand?”
The doctor said yes in Russian.
Then one afternoon Doctor McDowell received a call from an outlying village. It seemed that some kind of plague had broken out. The two American doctors made arrangements to move out the following morning, but not before taking precautions.
Cranston placed a call to the American Embassy in Beijing. He smiled when he was put through to Sandra Davidson.[2]
“Hello, Sandra? I’m glad to have found you when you weren’t busy. You are busy? That’s too bad because at the present time I am not too busy…I thought bureaucrats were never busy. Why am I calling when you are very busy? So I can get busy also. …All joking aside…You’re not joking? My dear lady, you are getting positively paranoid.” The doctor became serious, “We might be looking at a dangerous problem. We just received a call from an outlying village that a plague of some kind has broken out. We don’t know what yet. I notified the Center in Atlanta. … What do I want you to do? Remember our old friend, Colonel Wu[3]? …He’s now a General…Oh, you see him occasionally…I hope it’s always about official business. Oh, it’s none of my affair? Tut, tut dear lady. Such language. Ask him to send us what he can spare in the way of flamethrowers, protective gear for twelve or fifteen men, vaccines, shovels, explosives etc. etc. He’ll know what to do… Have the Ambassador contact the nearest Russian air base and ask for helicopters. Whatever they can spare. I wouldn’t advise you to come along. It could get rough. What do I think about it? You’re right. It’s possibly bubonic plague again. I’ll look for the plane late today. We leave first thing in the morning. Antonia? She stays behind, that’s for sure. Take care.”
[1]See; The Chinese Connection.
[2]See: Walking a Thin line, The Chinese Connection
[3]See: The Chinese Connection
