The Girl in Green Read Online Free PDF Page B

between where he was and the covering fire of Arwood’s M60, but the girl was in the spot he needed to get to, and few other choices remained. The truck was the first destination in a route from here to there.
    Benton looked east. He could hear the Mi-24, but couldn’t see it. Shots were being fired in the city. He knew there were ground forces going from door to door, killing every male over the age of twelve and many others, just for the experience of it, or the pay. But they seemed to be behind him or off in the distance. If he dropped the camera bag and kept only the few rolls of 35mm that he’d taken until now, he could easily jog the rest of the way.
    Benton stripped the remaining film from the Pentax and tucked it into his front pocket. He paused before his sprint to check for new movement and — momentarily confident — started running.
    There were concrete buildings to the east about three hundred metres away. It was not until the gunship rose above the walls that he had any idea of how well they masked the sounds of the rotors.
    He ran faster.
    When he reached the truck and the girl, he paused by the front wheel to pant. He hadn’t covered much ground, but he was winded and scared. As the truck was already smouldering, he figured it wouldn’t be a target, but the helicopter pilot was blowing families to pieces with an anti-tank Gatling gun, so perhaps there was a different logic at play.
    The girl looked at him, and he at her. They regarded one another like strangers at the souk .
    She was slender and very young. Her head was not covered, though it was possible that in the commotion her scarf had come loose. Her gently tanned skin was flawless and healthy, and her sandy hair was full and lush, the way that women’s magazines promised it would be if you used their products. Her eyes were a very light brown.
    Her accent was thick, and he didn’t know whether it was English or Arabic she was speaking when she said, ‘America?’
    â€˜Britain,’ said Benton. ‘Going to visit the Americans, though. Perhaps you should come.’
    The helicopter was now starting to move in their direction. Whatever water Benton had consumed at the pharmacy had become sweat again. The need to decide whether to stay or run vanished when the helicopter sped toward them faster than the speed of choice. The pilot did not shoot. It may have been because he already had a destination that was fifty metres farther away. Also, his line of sight was blocked by the truck, and it was unlikely he saw Benton and the girl.
    He stopped to hover ten metres off the deck — close enough for Benton to see the side of his helmet-covered head and his exposed chin.
    The wind pressed down on them as from the wings of a dragon.
    The pilot was taking aim at a tent village made of families driven from other homes by Saddam, or the rebellion, or Desert Storm itself.
    History enveloped them like a sandstorm. It didn’t matter which event was going to kill them, because now they were going to die. The reasons were immaterial.
    The helicopter gunship opened up without remorse, or humanity, or mercy, or any heavenly virtue. Benton, from his angle, could see it all. He no longer had a camera. There was no documenting this. There was only submission. It was every war painting he had seen in the British Museum and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. It was the suffering of the saints. It was the inferno. It was the hell that is war, only this was not war. This — it was declared from marble steps — was peace: a world restored, the state system reaffirmed, and the hard faith in law again proclaimed for the benefit of all, except the dying and the dead.
    â€˜Come on,’ he said, still not knowing how much English the girl spoke.
    She refused to give him her hand; she resisted any movement at all. Which was why he grabbed it, and pulled her up and started running with her.
    It was not a sprint. Neither of