The 92nd Tiger by Michael Gilbert Page B

clear. A vehicle of some sort had been driven up the re-entrant.
    The Sergeant had got out and was sniffing at the tracks like a gun dog on a fresh spoor. He said, ‘Army truck. Four-wheel drive.’
    ‘It can’t have gone far.’
    ‘Gone and come back again.’ The Sergeant was on his knees, unravelling the marks. Ten, twelve hours ago.’
    ‘We’ll go on foot. Avoid messing up the signs.’ He looked out of the corner of his eye at Hugo and said, ‘You can come if you like.’
    ‘I’d rather come with you than sit here,’ said Hugo. The heat in the little amphitheatre was ferocious. He plodded after them up the re-entrant. They kept well to one side, to avoid messing up the wheel tracks which were clearly visible, coming and going. At the second bend Cowcroft raised his hand to stop Hugo and the Sergeant went forward alone. He shouted something, and they followed him.
    The body was tumbled among the bushes in a cleft in the rocks. No particular attempt had been made to conceal it. The Sergeant was on his knees beside it. He touched the head gently and it rolled round. The throat had been cut so savagely that the head had almost been severed from the body.
    ‘It is Mahmoud,’ said the Sergeant.
    The man was dressed in peasant clothes. His feet were bare. The swarm of flies which had been at work buzzed resentfully at the interruption.
    Cowcroft was staring down abstractedly at the body. He said to Hugo, ‘Mahmoud was one of our men. He was working as a kitchen hand in Sheik Hammuz’s Palace,’ and to the Sergeant, ‘They tortured him before they killed him.’
    The Sergeant said, ‘They broke up his feet.’
    Hugo could see, now, the splintered ends of bone sticking out through the skin.
    ‘He would not talk,’ said Cowcroft. ‘Whatever they did to him, he would say nothing.’
    Hugo tried to visualise what it would feel like to have your feet smashed up with a hammer, and quite suddenly the whole thing became too much for him. The blackened blood, the greedy flies, the heat, the smell and his own imaginings came on him together, the earth and the sky changed places, and he was on his back, propped up against a rock in the shade, with Cowcroft forcing some brandy down his throat from a hip flask.
    He put it aside, and climbed shakily to his feet. He was angry, and his anger cleared his head quicker than brandy.
    He said, ‘A bloody fine show, I’m meant to be your military adviser, and I pass out at the sight of blood.’
    ‘I expect it was the heat,’ said Cowcroft. ‘Let’s get back to the car. I’ll leave the Sergeant here to see that no one disturbs things until we can get a party out.’
    Back at the Land Rover he switched on the wireless and spoke into it at length. Then he got behind the wheel and they drove back towards the Palace.
    Hugo said, ‘I think you’d better put me in the picture about one or two things. You mentioned Sheik Hammuz. He’s the Ruler’s brother, isn’t he?’
    ‘His younger brother, by eleven months.’
    ‘And you had a man planted to spy on him. Why?’
    The Land Rover had travelled some distance before Cowcroft answered. Then he said, ‘It sounds a bit odd when you put it that way. But there are two factions in this country, and always have been. The eastern seaboard is the progressive side. It’s got Mohara, which is the only town worth dignifying with the name. And the main dhow harbour and the boat jetty, and the best roads, and now it’s got the air-strip too. The other side’s primitive. Jungly, we should have called it in India. There’s a bit of farming along the coast. Most of the farmers dabble in smuggling as well. The rest of them live in the desert or up in the djebel. The hill men are a pretty wild lot. When a light plane belonging to one of the local oil companies made a forced landing there last year they rescued the four men in it all right. Then they sold them back to the company, for eight thousand pounds. A thousand pounds a leg was the