Cohen looked at it. “A-4511, seven miles northeast of Iria, two miles off what passes as a main highway in southern Syria.”

“Why that, Sergeant Swagger?”

“I’m looking for shooting ranges. This guy has to shoot, a lot, each day. He’s very disciplined, very detail-driven. He has to have access to at least three hundred yards of open space, never less, maybe a lot more. The sun will be important too. He will, if possible, orient north-south or south-north. The other two wasted hours lost to the brightness of sunset and sunrise. And wind. It’s so helpful if there’s shelter. A stormy day, a windy ruckus—that can take a day from him, a day he can’t afford. I see all that here.”

“Please proceed.”

“Another thing. The standard equipment of a range. He’ll want a bench, or at least some kind of concrete pad, to go prone off the bipod. And at the far end, he’ll want a berm—a roll of land, maybe just bulldozed dirt—against which to place his target. He’ll want to see and analyze his misses, make adjustments. He has to see where the bullet hits relative to the target; that’s why the target has to be surrounded by stuff that’ll go puff. And then the target itself. I’m betting he’s shooting at steel, which goes clang on each hit. He doesn’t want to break concentration after a string and go to his spotting scope and track his hits with pad and pencil. Maybe they’d have a TV hookup or something computer-driven, but I’m guessing that’s unlikely way out here. So I’m thinking steel. Looking at the south border of this whatever-it-is, I see a structure. Can’t bring it up high enough for clear resolution, but it could be a jerry-built frame, exactly the sort you’d need to hang a chunk of steel plate . . . Can you get more resolution?”

“Perhaps later. Please proceed.”

“At the other end, it’s smooth, as if flattened out. Not paved, but someone had gone over it with a grader, scoured the grass away, rolled the dirt smooth. Just a little patch, but it orients nicely on the presumed target.”

“Not much space there,” said Gold.