Carroll chose a different route back to the camp, one that took them back through a burnt forest. In contrast to the first trail, the land was hot and flat, and the vegetation dry, but the Doctor stopped several times to show Edgar more plants, tiny orchids that were hidden in the shade, innocuous-looking pitcher plants whose carnivory Carroll explained in macabre detail, trees that held water, rubber, medicine.

On the lonely road, they passed through an old temple complex where dozens of pagodas were aligned in rows. The structures were of various sizes and ages and shapes, some freshly painted and capped with ornaments, others pale and crumbling. On one, the body of the pagoda had been crafted into the shape of a coiled serpent. It was eerily silent. Birds flitted over the ground. The only person they saw was a monk who looked as old as the temples themselves, his skin dark and wrinkled, his body tinted with dust. He was sweeping the path as they approached, and Edgar saw Carroll press his hands together and bow slightly to the man. The old monk said nothing, but kept sweeping, the grass broomstick swaying with the hypnotic rhythm of his chant.

The trail was long, and at last Edgar grew weary. He thought how much the Doctor must have traveled through the Plateau to know each stream, each hill, and how, if they were separated, he would not know how to find his way back. For a brief moment, the thought frightened him. But I have trusted him by deciding to come here, he thought, there is no reason I shouldn’t now. The path narrowed and the Doctor rode ahead. Edgar watched him as he rode, his back straight, one hand on his waist, alert, watching.

They passed from the forest onto a wide ridge and back into the valley from which they had come. The sun was setting when, from the rise of one of the hills, Edgar saw the Salween. It was dark when they reached Mae Lwin.

13

The following morning, Edgar awoke before the children came, and wandered down to the river. He expected to find the Doctor eating breakfast or perhaps even see Khin Myo, but the bank was empty. The Salween lapped against the sand. He looked briefly across the river for birds. There was a fluttering. Another crested kingfisher, he thought, and smiled to himself, I am already beginning to learn. He walked back up to the clearing. Nok Lek was walking down from the path that led up to the houses.

“Good morning, Mr. Drake,” said the boy.

“Good morning, I was looking for the Doctor. Can you kindly tell me where he is?”

“Once a week the Doctor is in his…how do you say?”

“The Doctor is in his surgery?”

“Yes, his surgery. He told me to get you.”

Nok Lek led Edgar up the small path to the camp headquarters. As they were entering, an older woman passed inside carrying a crying baby in her arms, swaddled tightly in a checkered cloth. Nok Lek and Edgar followed.

The room was full of people, dozens of men and women in colorful coats and turbans, crouching or standing, holding children, peering over shoulders to watch the Doctor, who sat at the far end of the room. Nok Lek led the piano tuner through the crowd, speaking softly to part it.

They found the Doctor at a broad desk, listening to a baby’s chest with a stethoscope. He raised his eyebrows in welcome and continued to listen. The baby lay limp and passive on the lap of a young woman Edgar guessed was its mother. She was very young, a girl of perhaps fifteen or sixteen, but her eyes looked swollen and tired. Like most of the other women, her hair was tied up in a wide turban that seemed to rest precariously on her head. She wore a dress tied over her bosom, a hand-woven cloth patterned with interlaced geometric designs. Though there was an elegance in the way she wore it, when Edgar looked closer, he saw that it was tattered at the edges. He thought of the Doctor’s stories of the drought.

At long last, Carroll removed the stethoscope. He spoke to the woman for a moment in Shan, and then turned to rummage through a cabinet behind him. Edgar peered over his shoulder at the rows of apothecary vials.

The Doctor saw him stare. “Much the same as any English chemist,” he said as he handed the woman a small bottle of a dark elixir. “Warburg’s tincture and arsenic for fever, Cockle’s pills and Chlorodyne, Goa powder for ringworm, Vaseline, Holloway’s ointment, Dover’s powder, laudanum for dysentery. And then these.” He pointed to a row of unlabeled bottles filled with leaves and dirty liquids, crushed bugs, and lizards floating in solution. “Local medicine.”

Carroll reached back into the cabinet and took out a larger flask filled with herbs and a smoky liquid. He pulled the stopper, and the room filled with a deep, sweet scent. He dipped his fingers into the bottle and pulled out a wet mass of leaves and placed them on the baby’s chest. Water pooled around the leaves and ran over the baby’s sides. He began to run his fingers over its body, spreading the fluid over its throat and chest. His eyes were closed and he began to whisper something, softly. At last he opened them. He wrapped the baby’s swaddling back around the leaves and spoke to the girl. She rose and bowed in thanks, and walked away through the crowd.

“What was that?” Edgar asked.

“I think the child has consumption. That little bottle is Steven’s Consumption Cure,” said Carroll. “Direct from England. I somewhat doubt its efficacy, but we don’t have much better. Do you know of Koch’s discoveries?”

“Only what I have read in the broadsheets. But I couldn’t tell you anything. I know Steven’s Cure only because we bought it for our housemaid—her mother has consumption.”

“Well, the German thinks that he found the cause of consumption in a bacteria, he calls it a ‘tubercle bacillus.’ But that was five years ago. As closely as I try to follow the advances, I am too isolated, and it is difficult to know how science has changed.”

“And the plant?”

“The medicine men call it mahaw tsi It is a famous Kachin cure, and their medicine men guard it from foreigners. It took a long time to convince them to show it to me. I am pretty certain it is a species of Euonymus, although I can’t be sure. They use it for many ailments, some believe that even saying the words mahaw tsi can cure disease. They say it is especially potent for diseases of air, and this baby has a cough. Anyway, I mix it with Holloway’s ointment. For a long time I was doubtful about the herbs, but I think that I see some improvement in my patients who use them. That and prayer.”

Edgar stared at the Doctor. “To whom?” he asked, finally. But another patient had arrived, and the Doctor didn’t answer.

It was a young boy, holding his left hand close to his body. Carroll motioned for Edgar to sit in a chair behind him. He reached for the boy’s hand, but the boy guarded it. The boy’s mother, who stood behind him, spoke to him sharply. Finally Carroll gently pried his arms open.

Three fingers on the boy’s left hand were almost completely severed, held by ragged tendons and covered with clotted blood. Carroll handled the wound carefully, and the boy winced in pain. “This is bad,” the Doctor muttered, and spoke to the woman in Shan. The boy began to cry. Carroll turned and said something to Nok Lek, who removed a package from the cabinet and rolled it out on the desk. There was a cloth, and bandages, and several cutting tools. The boy started to yell.

Edgar looked uncomfortably over the waiting room. The other patients were still, unexpressive, watching.

Carroll removed another bottle from the cabinet. He took the boy’s hand and stretched it over the cloth on the table. He poured the contents of the bottle out over the wound. The boy jumped and screamed. Carroll poured more, wiping the hand vigorously with the cloth. He took a smaller vial from the cabinet and poured a thick liquid onto a bandage, which he rubbed over the wound. Almost immediately the boy began to calm down.