by Holly Watt
‘We practise just over there.’ Josh pointed at some red dots in the distance. ‘Leo’s just setting up the targets on that rise. They’re the same distance as between the viewpoint and Salama.’
They watched Leo in the distance.
‘Have you had interesting people out here?’ Oliver asked the question Casey hadn’t dared ask.
‘All sorts.’ Rory looked up with a grin. ‘But we don’t talk about them.’
‘Oh, go on,’ Oliver nudged. ‘We’ll never tell anyone.’
‘Sorry.’ Rory was unapologetic.
A few yards from the house, the gun case lay in the dirt. Josh clicked it open.
The gun lay there, ugly as death.
It was the M24 system. The military version of the Remington 700 rifle, with the telescopic sight spoiling the lines. It looked in good condition.
Kevlar, graphite and fibreglass. Used by armies right round the world. Fifteen thousand-odd built over the decades, so no one would ever notice if one went missing.
The Remington is bolt-action, Casey remembered from somewhere, which slows it down a bit, but not much. Not enough. Highly accurate, effortlessly so, for the distance from the rocks to the camp. Death delivered by a speck in the distance.
‘It’s loaded.’ Josh nodded at the gun. ‘Take it easy.’
‘Do people ever miss?’ Casey asked.
‘Not really,’ said Josh. ‘Some people have to take two shots, which isn’t ideal. London makes sure they can really shoot, before they come out here. This isn’t a fucking practice effort. And they never back out.’
‘We had one guy.’ Rory laughed at the memory. ‘The first time he missed so completely no one in the camp even noticed. There’s a silencer on the gun and the bullet never went anywhere near them. Fuck knows where it went. Probably took out someone a couple of miles away. Then he took another shot, and got it perfectly.’
‘You need to be pretty good.’ Josh clapped Oliver on the shoulder. ‘But it isn’t a hard shot from up there.’
‘Out in Afghanistan, the snipers have been putting people away from well over two clicks,’ said Rory. ‘For that sort of thing, you need to think about the curve of the earth. Control your heart rate and everything. A heartbeat is enough to shift the bullet over those distances. My favourite story was when one of the British snipers knocked out one of the Taliban, from a long way out. The Talib was wearing a suicide belt. He blew up and took ten of his fucking mates with him.’
As they spoke, Oliver was measuring the wind, reading the distance to the target. He took the gun out of the case, easily confident. Now Casey could see the ruthless alpha male, closing deals and crushing opposition. Eyes narrowed, every gesture purposeful.
Josh eyed him with satisfaction. ‘You know what you’re doing.’
Oliver lay down on the ground, the gun balanced on the bipod. He stared down the barrel, sighting the gun. There was a pause, just for a few seconds, then Casey saw his finger squeeze the trigger. Such a small movement.
The gun jumped. The air shuddered.
‘Well done, mate.’ Josh had binoculars out. ‘You got it bang on.’
Casey applauded loudly. ‘You’re so good, Oliver. Brilliant.’
‘Your go,’ Josh said to Ed, and Casey heard the challenge in his voice.
Ed held the gun as if it were an extension of himself, every move instinctive. He dropped to the ground, tiger in the grass. The gun had fired almost before Casey was ready, and Ed was back on his feet before Josh had time to call it.
‘Straight through the middle, buddy. I guess those Scottish stags never knew what hit them. Nice one.’
And, just for a second, Casey could see that Ed was thrilled with himself. He dropped the gun back into its case, took two steps towards her and kissed her, deep and hard.
34
‘Fancy another go?’ Josh asked Oliver.
They practised firing, Ed and Oliver barely missing, enjoying their skill.
‘Why do you think,’ Rory said to Casey, ‘that Americans spend all their time on a shooting range? Do you think none of them ever think about the next step? Not ever?’
Casey laughed and clapped and coquetted.
‘Dying for a drink,’ Rory said to her, in the end. ‘Shall we grab one?’
Casey followed him towards the blue and white umbrellas on the terrace.
He moved a book, Shakespeare, away from a chair with a flourish.
‘Only book in the whole bloody place,’ he said. ‘Someone left it out here on a trip. Josh claims to have read Macbeth. It’s his favourite, apparently. Took him about a month to read it.’
‘“All is but toys”,’ she recited. ‘“Renown and grace is dead”.’
‘Indeed.’
In the distance, she could hear the crack of the rifle and the tangled bursts of laughter. She was thinking about ice and lemon, and blue and white umbrellas.
‘Abayghur,’ Rory shouted. ‘Gin and tonic suit you, Carrie?’
‘Please.’ A big smile.
‘So,’ he said. ‘Carrie . . .’
He let his words fall away to a silence, and there was a sudden thud of fear. She looked up with a jolt and found his wolf-grey eyes upon her. The trapdoor yawned open. Rory was hunting.
Grey wolves hunt their prey for miles. They stalk and they chase and endure. They wait for that moment – just one moment – when their prey is alone. Isolated and panicked, just for a second.
Because it takes only a second.
There on the terrace, Casey felt the terror flood through her body, and saw the end. The unmarked grave, and that forgotten girl. She stood, a lazy, steady movement, and strolled over to the hedge of rosemary. But the others were too far away. Even if she ran, she could never outrun Rory. And she could never leave Ed to this fate.
She waved at Ed, just the same. He hesitated for a second, and then waved back. She forced herself to stretch, quite carelessly.
Hide the fear. Bury it deep. So deep that no one will know.
‘I gather you knew Milo.’ The voice was low. ‘And Ethan.’
Casey stretched her face into a smile, and spun round to Rory.
‘Did you know Ethan? I love hearing about him.’
Casey sounded thrilled, because fear can look like excitement, and he wouldn’t be expecting delight.
‘He was one of my oldest friends. Where did you—’
‘He was such an incredible man. Where did you meet him?’
Her voice sounded forced. She clasped her hands to stop them shaking, and it was almost a prayer. Accelerate through the curve, it’s the only way. Keep asking the questions, keep smiling and smiling and smiling.
‘We met in Angola,’ said Rory. ‘Did he ever tell you about Angola?’
And because she’d read the few cuttings Hessa had found, and because Miranda had sent the notes of that brief conversation with his mother, and because there was no other choice, Casey was able to laugh.
‘He was out there five years ago, wasn’t he? It sounded pretty wild. God, I miss him so much. Did you meet him when he was doing maritime security?’
Because Josh, back in Djanet, had talked about the supertankers. When they were on the same team as the Marines. Or at least fighting the same enemy, which is almost the same thing. She could use those stories.
‘We did a couple of trips together,’ Rory said. ‘What did he tell you about it?’
‘He said that you were on a ship going from Mumbai to Piraeus.’ Casey let her eyes go soft. ‘The crew picked up security in India because they’d been attacked on the way through the Red Sea, down towards Mumbai. The pirates had got right on to the deck, Ethan said. The crew had no guns at all, then. But they threw jam jars down, and there was shattered glass all over the deck, and the Somali were barefoot, so they had to give up.’
‘That was a close one,’ Rory nodded.
‘So then they hired you guys for the next leg of the journey. But on the trip after yours, down to Dar es Salaam, the shi
p owners couldn’t be bothered to pay for security,’ Casey recited. ‘So that time the ship did get snatched. The pirates called the owners, but they wouldn’t pay the ransom. Those pirates held the ship for months, and then radioed the owners again. And the owners listened as the pirates cut off the captain’s arm.’
Keep talking, she thought. He isn’t sure, but he can’t quite make this an interrogation.
‘Those owners were cheap,’ Rory shrugged. ‘They never got their ship back. She sank somewhere off Eyl, in the end. He was a good guy though, that captain.’
Under her sad smile, Casey was scrambling through memories, and Hessa’s careful research.
‘It’s Ethan’s birthday next week,’ she whispered. ‘It’s always so hard, thinking of him, locked up in that jail for his birthday. I don’t know if he would even know the date any more.’
Rory was nodding. She wondered if she should cry. It would be so easy. And it might embarrass him too.
She heard the steps, running up towards the terrace, taking the stairs two at a time.
‘Those look delicious.’ It was Ed. ‘I’m stealing one. Got bored of shooting. Didn’t miss a thing.’
He grabbed her drink, and pulled her close with his other hand.
Thank you, she said with her eyes. Thank you. I’m sorry about all this.
I know, he smiled at her.
‘Are you OK?’ he asked loudly.
‘Ethan,’ she buried her head in his neck. ‘Sorry.’
‘It upsets her talking about him,’ Ed said over her shoulder. ‘We never speak about him.’
‘Sure,’ said Rory, looking away. ‘Sure.’
35
The next morning, Casey woke up with dread in her bones. Ed had slept through the night.
‘Morning, you.’ He smiled at her, heavy with sleep.
It felt so right, waking up next to him, that Casey had to roll away, clear her throat, break the mood.
They dressed in silence. He was fiddling with his boots, head down, when she heard him take a breath.
‘Casey, I can’t.’
The word dropped, stone into water.
Automatically, she switched on the music.
‘I’m sorry . . . I can’t go up there . . . And watch that madman shoot into a school. It’s wrong. You can’t watch a man do that to another human being just because he wants to know how it feels. You can’t be a part of it.’
‘But we have to, Ed . . .’
‘You can’t be a spectator.’ He shuddered at the word. ‘It’s barbaric, and you know it.’
‘I’ve watched people kill each other before,’ she spat. ‘I’ve gone out, with the Army, off in Helmand. And watched them shoot to kill, when we were pinned down in some awful canal.’
‘That’s different,’ he said. ‘They’re retaliating when they’ve come under fire.’
‘But it’s not different for me,’ she said. ‘I’m going out there to watch someone kill another person, regardless. Deaths that would happen if I were there or not. And some days I choose to be there and watch. And some days I don’t.’
‘You don’t know . . .’ and his voice stumbled. ‘You don’t know . . .’
‘What?’ Casey was almost impatient.
‘When I was in that field,’ he said. ‘When there wasn’t any way out. There was another man. And he was so near . . . I shot him. Before he could shoot me. I could see his eyes, and he knew. He knew it was me or him, and I moved first. And it can’t be undone, not ever. Everyone who’s ever loved him, their lives will never be the same . . . Not ever. And I just turned and ran, and left him alone, out among the maize. And I can’t go out today . . . With people who want to do that, just for fun. You don’t know.’
He was sitting on the side of the bed, with his hands in his lap.
‘Ed . . .’
‘No,’ he said. ‘I thought the end justified the means out there, too. That’s what we told ourselves every single day. And we were wrong. We were so very wrong.’
‘This is different.’
‘They’re going to a school, Casey. They’re going to kill a fucking child.’
‘I know,’ she said. ‘Do you think I don’t care?’
‘But how can anyone do it?’
‘He’s a man,’ Casey said slowly, ‘who’s always thought of people as numbers. Because that’s how they learn to think, those men. Of people as employment figures and mortgage defaults, life expectancy and spending power. And, sure, a child is younger and prettier, and a little bit more innocent. But it all stopped being real, so long ago, when he started putting a price on it all. People are numbers now. So how is a child any worse? And what does it even matter?’
‘And how,’ asked Ed, ‘are we any different? You’re thinking of this child as the last in a line. This child is a number to you, too. But that child is out there right now, with a whole life ahead. And to you, it’s just a better story.’
Casey’s head jerked.
‘That’s not true, Ed. It’s not.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘In the founding books of Christianity and Islam,’ she said slowly, ‘the word for martyr is almost identical to the word for witness. Someone who testifies about their beliefs. We bear witness, Ed. And no one makes it easy.’
‘No one,’ he said, ‘would call you a fucking martyr, Casey. You’re doing exactly what you bloody want.’
For a moment, Casey stepped away from him, staring out at the desert. Then she turned, heel to floor.
‘I’ve got to go.’
‘Please, Casey.’
‘I am going, Ed. Even if I have to go up there on my own.’ He went still.
‘You can’t go up there alone. It’s insanity.’
‘I can. I’ll say you’re ill or something. I don’t care.’ And now Casey’s face was diamond-hard. ‘I haven’t come this far to turn away at the last.’
‘I can’t let you go up there on your own.’
‘Well, make up your mind, Ed.’ It was almost a taunt. ‘You’re in or you’re out. And once we leave this room, you’ll have to see it through. And you’ll have to just watch up there. No heroics. Or we’ll be killed too, you know. Left up on that cliff to die, with no one ever to know.’
‘Casey . . .’ There was a long pause. The linen curtains fluttered in the breeze.
‘Make up your mind, Ed.’
‘We’ve got enough now, anyway,’ said Ed.
‘We don’t have enough,’ said Casey. ‘The lawyers will never let us run this, unless we can absolutely prove that Selby shot someone up on that cliff.’
‘And so the end justifies the means? Always?’
There was another long pause.
She would have to go on her own, she thought despairingly. Walk up there and be on her own for the worst. She turned, and made for the door, listening to the silence be-hind her.
‘Wait . . .’
She turned back. He was standing there. Shoulders slumped, but standing.
‘Ed . . .’ She walked back to him, wrapped her arms around him. ‘I am sorry . . . I am so very sorry.’
And the useless words floated away in the silence.
Oliver gave them a thumbs-up as they walked into the dining room.
‘Today’s the day!’
He was juddering with excitement, knocking over a bottle of orange juice with a sudden movement.
‘Steady on, dude,’ Josh laughed at him.
They walked out to the car, and Rory appeared from nowhere.
They climbed in, Oliver almost giggling. The road away from Euzma was familiar now. Casey recognised a distorted cypress here, ticked off a pile of rocks there. It was molten hot, even the sky shaded to yellow.
Another truck blazed past, with its desperate cargo.
‘I was talking to one of the Tuareg last night.’ Rory jerked his thumb. ‘The traffickers have started forcing the women to take birth control. Injections, before they set off. Because some of them get raped at every truck stop.’
>
Casey shuddered.
‘Out in the desert,’ muttered Josh. ‘Out in the desert.’
‘They shoot horses,’ said Rory. ‘Don’t they?’
Josh pointed out a black vulture in a twisted tree, hunched like death.
Next to Casey, Ed was staring at the horizon, eyes narrowed. And Casey realised abruptly that she didn’t know this man. Not really. He could do anything, up here. It might be this that broke him.
She felt a flare of rage at Miranda for suggesting it. Miranda, who never cared.
The arrogance of it all. The stupid, wilful arrogance.
They stormed along the main road, and then the pickup swung left, and up. Up the track, and into the hills.
It was impossible, all of this. Casey felt like a child left alone in a car. Pressing buttons, and all at once it’s moving. Faster and faster, and people are starting to scream. Or the acrobat, in her glittering pink leotard, sparkling in the spotlight and flying from her trapeze. And, just for a second, she looks down, and sees that today is the day they forgot to put out the safety net.
The pickup’s engine began to howl as they reached the steepest climb.
Maybe there never was a net after all.
36
It was as if she were watching from a distance. The car skidded to a halt. Five figures stepped out. One pointed, admiring the view. They had parked further down the hill, today, careful not to slam the doors.
Nothing grows, in these Sahara hills. The men picked their way through broken brown rocks.
Oliver Selby, the forty-four-year-old chief executive of Cormium was excited. He had looked forward to this day for a long time . . .
One of the men picked up the gun in its small coffin from the back of the car. He smiled back at the others, over his shoulder.
Oliver Selby, forty-four, chief executive of commodity traders Cormium, chatted as he walked up the path towards the viewpoint over the refugee camp. Salama, in the south of Libya, is . . .
Then they turned, towards the narrow path that picked up the hill. It was a long walk to the top of the bluff.
*
At the age of forty-four, the Cormium boss had achieved almost everything on his bucket list. There was just one thing left . . .
