The Walking Dead

He stepped forward briskly. 'Can I help you, madam?' He smiled at her.

'Oh, didn't see you…I just popped over to see that all was well with you all. You understand?'

'Madam, I think you embarrass my niece.'

'So sorry; didn't mean to. I just thought…'

He charmed. 'And will embarrass my nephews. Madam, we are late up this morning, and have not yet tidied the cottage. Some are still using the bathroom. Another time, another day would be more suitable. You know, madam, what young people are. Please, madam.'

He took her arm and turned her gently. It was the courtesy that his grandfather would have shown, an old and near-forgotten skill. As a commander in war, he rarely used courtesy, charm, the richness of his smile and the soft persuasion of words, but now he scratched in his memory for them.

'Are you sure — nothing I can do?'

'Nothing, madam. Everything is perfect. And you have our gratitude for the use of a home, at this time that is so special to us, where the comfort and facilities you have provided will be long remembered. We thank you, madam.'

Would she live or die? He could smell soft scent on her. She hesitated, as if she were not often balked, and he saw disappointment slide on to her face. But she turned and, in doing so, safeguarded her life.

She said, 'Well, we all know what young people are, and the mess they leave around…Anyway, if the shower is working…'

'Thank you, madam, for your concern.'

'Right. I'll be on my way. I do Meals on Wheels for the elderly as a volunteer on Wednesdays…So nice to meet you.'

'The pleasure, madam, is for me.'

He opened the Land Rover's door for her, then closed it quietly. She reversed, did a three-pointer, and he waved as she drove off up the track. He did not tremble, or pant, but the fingers that waved her off were those that would have strangled the breath from her lungs.

The girl understood.

Ajaq said, watching the Land Rover labouring on the track, 'Stupid fucking interfering bitch — one step more and she was dead, but she did not take the step.'

* * *

He left the waistcoat on the table, surrounded by the carcasses of dead flies, and checked the room a last time. Satisfied, he closed the door after him, locked it, and carried his bag down the corridor. He did not pause, or glance at the room where the boy was but went past it.

The Engineer walked through the living room and into the hail. Two of the kids, and the girl, were in the living room but he ignored them. They were no longer of importance to him.

His friend was at the front door. The Engineer had a choke in his voice — he told his friend that the button switch was taped over, that the device was live. From his pocket, he took one of the two ferry tickets in the envelope and passed it. They hugged, and he heard the car start up. He said, 'I am an old fool, the worst of them. I have done what I came to do, with ill grace but done it. You should be with me…' His cheeks were kissed.'…trust none of them.'

They broke apart. He looked into the face of his friend.. 'Trust no one. Move. Set it in place, and run. There's no shame in running. Come back to me. Hurt them some more in our place, not here.' He felt his eyes watering. 'Is it that important?'

His shoulder was cuffed. He strode to the car and did not look back.

He was driven away. He did not think of the boy who would wear the waistcoat. He had lost count of the number of young men for whom he had made waistcoats and belts, for whom he had rigged the firing switches in cars and lorries. The building of the waistcoat, with the sticks, the debris and the wiring, was so basic to an artist such as himself that he could have fashioned it in his sleep. The car turned on to the main road and they drove by low hedges that had been cut savagely. Once there was a flash of the cottage. Already he thought of the battlefield that was his home.

He settled back in the seat.

He yearned to be beside his friend, lying in a ditch, hunkered down in a grove of palms, or in the upper window of a house, with a wide straight road in view, and the distant rumble of a lorry convoy or a Humvee patrol approaching. With his friend beside him, he would have in his hand a mobile.phone.whose signal could detonate a device built round a 120mm artillery shell with ten kilos of rocket propellant to give it the kick to break through the strongest armour plate reinforcing the sides of any enemy transport vehicle. He thought of the great flash, the crimson and orange flames rising, then the soaring columns of blackened smoke and falling debris. He did not see other traffic, or the homes beside the dual-carriageway, or the kids who kicked footballs, women who pushed buggies and men with small, straining dogs. His thoughts played on sacks of refuse dumped at the side of another dual-carriageway — and in one, under a mass of garbage, and holed by scavenging rats, ten or fifteen kilos of explosive were buried.