The name of the game was beating the clock. On the regiment’s memorial clock back in Hereford were written the names of all SAS men killed in action. As a result of the war in the Falklands, there were already a lot of new names to be added to the clock. Reeve didn’t want his to be one of them.

When he looked at Jay again, Jay was still looking at him. Reeve gestured with his head for Jay to return to watch. They were lying side by side, but facing opposite directions, so that Jay’s boots rested an inch or so from Reeve’s left ear. Earlier, Jay had tapped a Morse message with his fingers on Reeve’s boot-“Kill them all”-repeating the message three times. Kill them all.

The ground was cold and damp, and Reeve knew his body temperature was dropping, same as it had done the previous night. A couple more nights like this and they would be in serious trouble, not so much from the enemy as from their own treacherous bodies. They had eaten only chocolate and drunk only water for the past thirty-six hours, and what sleep they’d taken had been fitful and short-lived.

Even when planning their escape route and emergency rendezvous they had not spoken, but had lain head to head with the map on the ground in front of them. Reeve had pointed to a couple of possible routes-if they were forced to withdraw from the OP in the midst of a firefight, chances were they’d be split up-then had tapped the map at the ERV. Jay had then traced a line with his unwashed finger from the ERV to the Chilean border, leaving no doubt what his route would be after the ERV.

Reeve wasn’t so sure. Would the Argentine command expect them to make for the border or for the coast? They were still a lot closer to the coast than the border, so maybe the border was the best plan. Besides, there was no point reaching the coast if no ship had been alerted of your plight. They wouldn’t be able to radio that message in the middle of brassing up, and if forced to retreat they would lighten their load, which meant leaving the rucksack and very probably the transmitter. Reeve had already mentally checked off the contents of his rucksack and had decided he needed nothing out of it but a few more rations. It was because he was thinking along these lines that he knew the mission was at an end. There’d be time later to wonder where and why it had gone wrong, always supposing he was still alive at the end of it all. The coast was closer; Reeve couldn’t get that idea out of his head. He had an emergency beacon with him. If they could find a boat and head out to sea, they could switch on the beacon and then pray someone would pick up the signal. The problem with that was, it was as likely to be an Argentine plane returning to base as anyone else.

The sky turned pink again and started to fizz and crackle as the flare started its gentle parachute-borne descent. Reeve could see a four-man patrol five hundred yards off to his right. Reeve and Jay were lying beneath netting and local foliage, and the patrol would have to get a lot closer to see them, even with the help of the flare. There was a sudden shrill whistle, like one of the old tin-and-pea jobs football referees use.

“Half time,” Jay whispered. He’d broken the code of silence, but he’d also broken the tension. Reeve found himself grinning, stifling laughter which wrenched itself up from his gut. The way Jay’s feet were quivering, he was laughing, too. It became almost uncontrollable. Reeve took a deep breath and expelled it slowly. The patrol was moving away at speed-and there was nothing funny about that.

Then the first rocket thudded into the ground several hundred yards to Reeve’s left. The earth beneath tried to buck his body into the air, and his face slammed down hard into the dirt.

“Shit,” Jay said, not caring who heard him. Not caring because he knew, like Reeve knew, that there was no one around to hear: the patrols had been signaled to evacuate the area.

Another rocket landed, farther away this time. Then another, and another. Finally, a flare went up. Two blows on the whistle. Reeve guessed patrols were being sent into the freshly bombed area to look for bodies or fleeing survivors.

“What do you reckon?” Jay whispered.

“Lie doggo,” Reeve said. His mouth felt strange when it worked. “A rocket’s as likely to hit us up-and-running as lying still.”

“You think so?” Jay sounded unsure. Reeve nodded and resumed watch. There was sweat in the hollow of his spine, trickling down towards the trouser line. His heart was beating ever more loudly in his ears. Then he heard a distant megaphone, a voice speaking heavily accented English.

“Surrender or we will kill you. You have two minutes to decide.”

The two minutes passed all too quickly. Reeve flipped open the cover on his watch face and followed the sweep of the luminous dial.

“Very well,” the megaphone said. Then another single blow on the whistle. Reeve could feel Jay trying to burrow deeper into the scrape, pressing himself hard against the ground.

Rockets whistled past to their left and right, causing deafening explosions on impact. Great clumps of earth fell on both men. More missiles, more gut-wrenching explosions. Between impacts, Reeve could hear nothing but a loud buzzing in his ears. He’d been too late putting his hands over them, and was now suffering the consequence. He felt fingers tapping his leg, and half turned to see Jay starting to rise onto his knees.

“Get down!” Reeve hissed.

“Fuck this, let’s go!”

“No.”

More explosions caused them both to fall flat, but Jay scrambled up again straight after, dirt and grass and bits of bark falling like heavy dollops of rain.

“They send a patrol out to check this grid, they’re bound to spot us,” he spat.

“No.”

“I say we go.”

“No. We can’t lose our bottle now.”

The flare went up, the double whistle sounded, and Reeve pulled Jay to the ground. Jay started to struggle, giving Reeve two options: let him go, or slug him. Jay came to his own decision first, catching Reeve on the side of the head with his rifle butt. Reeve snatched at the rifle, letting go of Jay in the process, and Jay got to his feet, pulling the rifle out of Reeve’s hands.

Reeve risked a glance around. The patrols would be on their way. Smoke was being blown all around them, but when it cleared they’d be as visible as targets at the fairground.

Jay was pointing his M16 at Reeve, finger just shy of the trigger. He was grinning like a monkey, his face blackened, eyes wide and white. Reeve noticed that there was a 40mm missile in the 203 grenade launcher. Jay raised the rifle above Reeve’s head and fired the grenade into the sky. With the 203 there was no explosion or recoil, but a loud pop as the grenade was launched.

Reeve didn’t use up precious seconds on watching the gre-nade’s trajectory. He was up and moving. Jay had done it now; he’d let the enemy know they were there. They were fair game now for anything the Argentines threw at them. Reeve left his rucksack. He didn’t care whether Jay left his or not, or even if he left the transmitter. It was time to move-and quickly. Behind them, the grenade made impact and exploded.

With his rifle carried low in front of him, Reeve ran.

“Where are you going?” Jay yelled at him, pouring bullets from his M16 towards where the enemy would be hunkered down, waiting for him to expend the lot. Reeve knew his partner had cracked. He’d never been sure of Jay in the first place, and now his worst fears were being realized. Everything Jay was doing was against the standard operating procedure… or any other procedure. Reeve wondered if he’d be justified putting a bullet into Jay himself. He dismissed the thought in less than a second.

“See you in Chile!” Jay yelled. Reeve didn’t look back, but he knew from Jay’s voice that he was moving too, taking a different line from Reeve.