Game, set and match to the Digger

Brian Raymond Williams, "The Digger", a Reuters legend like they don't make them anymore, has signed off and closed down for the last time. He will be missed.

Brian gave me the handover to beat all handovers when I replaced him as chief correspondent in Islamabad in 1983, taking a whole week to introduce me to his contacts and friends in Islamabad, drive me up the Grand Trunk Road to meet the Afghan Mujahideen leaders in Peshawar, and initiate me into all the different ways to find booze in Islamic Pakistan. Who does that anymore? Brian went off to Delhi to become chief correspondent for the subcontinent, and thus my immediate boss, and never failed to support me whenever I needed it. Two incidents rank as the kind of stories we all like to tell about the Digger.

In January 1986, he sent me an urgent telex from Delhi saying that Soviet authorities in Moscow were organising a media trip from there to Kabul, the first such group visit since the Soviet invasion in December 1979. Could I get there before the others, he asked. After a frantic two days rushing around to get a visa, I was in Delhi and only had to get on the Afghan airlines flight to Kabul the next morning to beat the group arriving in the evening. Brian reserved two rooms at an airport hotel to make sure we were there first thing in the morning. Of course, we ended up drinking until about 3 am, leaving only three hours for sleep. When we got to the airport, the flight was all booked up. But Brian discreetly and repeatedly plied the Ariana Airlines manager with large rupee bills until he finally gave in and bumped someone else to get me on the flight. My scoop was assured.

About a year before that, Brian happened to come to Islamabad for some reason and was there for a weekend sports day and barbecue that a diplomat, who had a tennis court in his back yard, had arranged for six expat couples. Since he had not been scheduled for the events - rounds of tennis, badminton and ping-pong with ever-changing partners - Brian proceeded to drink all afternoon and loudly share his acid comments about everyone else's sporting skills. He had been the Islamabad expat tennis champion when he was there, and our very British host - who assumed that honour after Brian had moved to Delhi - finally got so annoyed with this loud-mouthed Aussie that he challenged him to a tennis match. The rest of us crowded around the court to watch the expected wipeout. Already quite drunk, Brian was visibly shaky and lost the first set, and the second was going so badly that our host started to taunt him openly as we looked on. But Brian slowly rallied, fought back more and more, and got our over-confident host increasingly worried. In the end, the Digger won the match and went on to celebrate his victory with - what else? - even more to drink.

We say "rest in peace" for the dead, but Brian never did that in life so I don't see why he should change his spots in death. Goodbye, old friend! ■