With his left hand, Collinson reached out to grab hold of her arm, pulling her towards him. He looked back to Porter, a twisted smile on his lips and a smirk in his eye. Then he raised his Beretta.
‘To quote Sir Winston, “The armies must cast away the idea of resisting behind concrete lines or natural obstacles, and must realise that mastery can only be regained by furious and unrelenting assault,”’ he said. ‘“And this spirit must not only animate the High Command, but must inspire every fighting man.”’
He looked straight into Porter’s eyes, and chuckled. ‘And indeed, that spirit animates me today.’
I don’t mind dying if I have to, thought Porter. But I don’t think I can listen to this tosser much more.
He could see Collinson’s finger hovering on the trigger. And he could see into the man’s eyes, and tell that he meant to kill him.
There was a movement. Somewhere behind the window.
Suddenly, the rattle of a machine gun filled the air. The window had shattered, and a lethal storm of bullets had ripped through the hut, slicing into the backs of the two men standing guard. They had both tried to respond, their fingers reaching for the triggers of their guns, but the ordnance had already smashed up their spinal cords so badly they were no longer able to control their muscles. They had collapsed on their faces, their weapons sprawling out on the floor in front of them.
Porter threw himself to the ground, narrowly missing the bullets that were starting to slam into the wall behind him: he could feel the used rounds falling onto his body as they pinged off the wall. As he dropped to the ground, he caught sight of the man standing behind the window.
Hassad.
His AK-47 gripped to his fists, he was spraying round after round of bullets through the window and into the bodies of the men who had taken them captive.
Porter reached forward, grabbing hold of one of the guns that had spilt out onto the floor. He rolled away, so that his back was against the wall, then flashed the gun up and lashed his finger onto the trigger. It was pointing straight at Collinson.
Outside the firing had stopped. Hassad must have realised he’d already killed the two men, Porter guessed. To get any more he’d have to come inside.
He doesn’t need to bother, Porter told himself grimly. That’s my job.
As he looked up, he could see that Collinson had shaken Katie free. She was standing next to him, tears of terror and exhaustion streaming down her face. In his right hand, Collinson was still holding the Beretta. Porter gripped the AK-47 tighter in his hands, and although he hadn’t had time to line up a shot, that probably didn’t matter. Press the trigger, and he should be able to pump out enough bullets to bring the man down.
‘Drop it,’ Collinson spat, ‘and I’ll let you go back to the ragheads.’
Porter stood up. ‘I’m not going anywhere,’ he said.
Katie’s eyes were darting from one man to the other. She was standing six inches to Collinson’s left: close enough to be a threat, Porter judged, but not close enough to stop the bastard from shooting me.
‘Go back to ragheads, man,’ Collinson sneered. ‘They can fix you up with a bottle of vodka and a nice archway to kip down in.’
Outside, Porter could hear Hassad moving towards the door, but it was still too dangerous for him to come inside. There was no sign the guards back on the Lebanese side of the border were going to intervene. Maybe they hadn’t heard the gunfire, or else they didn’t want to move into the demilitarised zone.
There were only two men who were going to sort out this fight, Porter told himself. And they are both in this hut.
‘I’ll give you one more warning,’ said Collinson.
Porter held the gun steady. He was pointing it straight at Collinson’s stomach and groin. When he fired, he didn’t much care any more if Collinson shot him back. He just wanted to rip out the man’s guts and his balls before he went down.
‘Take your shot,’ Porter snapped.
He could see beads of sweat starting to pour from the man’s brow. His hand was trembling, the same way he’d started trembling back in Beirut seventeen years ago.
‘We’ll see who the coward is now,’ said Porter. ‘Take the fucking shot.’
Collinson remained motionless.
‘You’re fucking afraid, aren’t you, just like you were all those years ago,’ Porter snarled. ‘Except this time, you’re not going to have me to blame.’
The hand was shaking perceptibly now.
Porter held steady, the sights of the AK-47 lined up straight.
A shot.
Porter could see the recoil on the Beretta as the gun kicked back.
He could feel a bullet winging his shoulder, taking out a chunk of flesh, and biting off a piece of bone.
His feet remained rooted to the ground. He swallowed hard, ignoring the pain raging through him.
He could see Katie jumping out of the way.
He squeezed the trigger on the AK-47.
The bullets flew out of the barrel of the assault rifle. One smashed into Collinson’s guts, spilling blood and intestines onto the ground. Another clipped his groin, taking at least one ball with it as it chewed its way through his body.
Collinson fell back onto the floor. He was clutching his stomach, trying to hold his intestines in place, but his hands were drenched with his own blood. He was screaming for his mother.
Porter kept the AK-47 tight in his hand, and walked the few paces of empty ground that separated him from the dying man.
He looked down. Collinson was writhing in agony. Porter put his boot down on his chest to hold him still. Then he looked into his eyes. They were pale and watery as the life slowly drained out of him, but the man was still conscious. Porter smiled. ‘I’ve got a quote from Winston bloody Churchill you might enjoy,’ he said. ‘“When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.”’
He pressed the barrel of the rifle into the soft flesh at the side of Collinson’s neck. ‘So, goodnight, sir, and sweet fucking dreams.’
Porter squeezed the trigger once, then twice, then three times.
He tossed the gun aside. The mag was empty, and it was no more use to him now. The bullets had smashed through the man’s neck, effectively decapitating him. His head was lying to one side, the last of his blood draining away into the cracks in the wooden floorboards of the hut.
It’s over, he thought to himself. At last.
Porter grasped hold of Katie. She was shaking with fear, but she was still standing. There was nasty flesh wound to his shoulder where Collinson’s bullet had hit him, but he strapped that up with a strip of his sweatshirt to staunch the bleeding, and he knew that a decent bandage was all he needed to sort himself out.
‘Let’s get the hell out of here,’ he said.
Hassad had already pushed his way through the door. He looked at the three corpses, then across at Porter. ‘You OK?’
Porter nodded, permitting himself a brief, tense smile. ‘How’d you know we were in trouble?’
‘I could see the van had been stopped,’ said Hassad. ‘That shouldn’t have happened. This is just an observation post, strictly neutral. The guards here shouldn’t stop anyone … so when I saw you’d been pulled up I knew something was wrong.’
They were outside now, helping a weak and frightened Katie to walk towards the van. Porter opened the door, and helped her into the passenger seat. Looking around, he clasped Hassad on the shoulder. ‘We’re quits,’ he said.
Hassad nodded. ‘Good luck …’ he said.
‘I’ll need it.’
‘And don’t come back to the Lebanon,’ he said crisply. ‘The amount of trouble you cause …’
Porter laughed. He’d climbed into the driver’s seat, and fired up the engine, not even looking back as Hassad turned and started walking back to the border.
He kicked on the accelerator, and pulled the Fiat back onto the road. It was less than a mile now to the Israeli border, and they could cover that in minutes. He increased his speed, anxious not to waste any time. The sooner we’re out of here the better.