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deeper into the wound. Webb saw the blood on the boy’s ears. It was pointless, the concussion of the explosion had blown out his eardrums.
    ‘Captain,’ Webb said.
    The officer hesitated. He looked grey. He saw Ryan pick up his cameras and that made up his mind. ‘That’s enough,’ he said.
    ‘But he’s VC!’ the Ranger protested.
    ‘We’ll call in a dust-off.’
    The Ranger spat in the boy’s face and wiped the knife blade on his pajamas. But instead of backing off he took out his revolver and held it against the boy’s head. ‘We just kill him now.’
    The captain looked back at Ryan, who had moved to within ten feet. ‘Let it be. That’s an order.’ The boy was still writhing, clutching at his stomach. ‘Get the corpsman here,’ he said, and walked away.
     
    * * *
     
    The night was so black Webb had to touch his eyelids with his own fingertips to satisfy himself that they were open. Just on sunset Ryan had laid down next to him, his helmet down, his lucky green towel carefully arranged over his face to leave just enough room to breathe. He had tucked his hands under his arms to protect them from the hordes of mosquitoes.
    ‘What do you think happened to that kid?’ Webb whispered.
    ‘I don’t know,’ Ryan said. His voice was muffled by the helmet and towel.
    ‘You think he’s dead?’
    ‘Probably.’
    Webb listened to the maddening whine of mosquitoes inches from his face.
    ‘I know what you’re thinking,’ Ryan said. ‘But the war’s not going to stop because a couple of blokes with cameras don’t like what they see.’
    ‘I didn’t do anything. Ryan. I just watched.’
    ‘Didn’t you take any snaps?’
    Snaps? ‘I couldn’t.’
    ‘Good-oh. That means I’ve got an exclusive.’
    A long silence.
    ‘That was barbaric,’ Webb murmured.
    ‘It’s a bloody war. What did you think it was going to be like?’
    After a while, Webb said: ‘I should have done something.’
    ‘We did do something. We stopped that prick shooting him this afternoon. It won’t do any good. They’ll take him to Long Binh, and if he lives the Vietnamese will get hold of him and they’ll torture him again. And then they’ll shoot him.’
    ‘That was wrong.’
    ‘Look, I’ve got news for you, sport. This war is not about your conscience. What happened out there was no concern of mine or yours. We’re just doing a job. There is absolutely no situation where we should stop working because it’s what we show the rest of the world that’s going to stop this bloody madness.’ Webb heard him shuffle around, settling himself under the towel and helmet once more. ‘Now go to sleep. We’ve got another long hike through the boonies tomorrow.’
     
    * * *
     
    He heard gongs banging somewhere in the jungle, smelled shit and incense. A fecund jungle inhabited only by women, children and old men. They walked all through the morning, the heat crushing them. Already Webb had almost emptied one canteen of water. They stopped to rest in a rice paddy, squatting down with their backs against the embankment of an irrigation channel.
    One of the Marines, a raw nineteen-year-old from Kentucky, grinned at Webb as he fumbled with his cameras. ‘Except for them dead gooks I guess you ain’t had much to snap at,’ he said. The tag on his fatigues read McCague .
    Webb shook his head.
    ‘Can’t say I’d mind a contact right now, just for a chance to lie down for a while.’
    ‘We’re sitting ducks out here.’
    ‘Shoot, we sitting ducks wherever we are. That’s the whole point, mister. Only way we ever get to find gooks is when they ambush us.’ McCague sucked some water from his canteen. ‘Want to get yourself a picture?’
    ‘Sure,’ Webb said, without thinking.
    ‘You send me a copy?’
    ‘What have you got in mind?’
    ‘I was figuring to put a few rounds into that tree line over there. Be just like the real thing. Who’s gonna know, right?’
    Webb thought about it. He had missed two golden