There was no point in running after him – he had too much of a head start and he was moving too fast. But a bullet could catch him. Ben snatched up the AK, brought it to his shoulder and trained his sights on the rapidly diminishing figure. Weighing up in his mind and in his heart the brutal decision that, on the face of it, would have been the right tactical choice to make.

But he couldn’t bring himself to squeeze the trigger. He lowered the weapon and watched with a sigh as the boy scampered away into the distance and disappeared over the brow of a low ridge.

‘What the heck was that?’ Madison asked.

‘That was a scout,’ Ben replied. ‘They’ve found us.’

Chapter 45

‘He must have already been hiding in the ruins when we turned up,’ Ben said. ‘We didn’t see him until it was too late to catch him.’

A small crowd of people had gathered in a dimly lantern-lit circle within the secondary grotto to discuss the news that Ben and Madison had reported back on their hurried return. She was sitting by him, staying very close at his side and backing up every word he said. Ramin and Aziz were seated opposite, and it was hard to tell which of the pair looked more fraught with worry at this troubling new development. Mère Blanchet had joined them as well, but because of the seriousness of their discussion, none of the children had been allowed to attend. The other absentees were Schulz, who was on watch duty along with three of the Pathfinders (and had in any case been sulkily keeping himself to himself since the incident with the goats), and Liebowitz, who was still hard at work trying to fix the sat phone. He was so concentrated on repairing all those minute solder connections in the light of a fading torch that it had been decided to leave him to it.

Baldacci was frowning as he sat cradling his M4 across his knees, one foot twitching up and down with nervous agitation. ‘If this kid was hiding there as you guys appeared, he must’ve seen you coming down the hill, right? Maybe even watched you come out of the cave.’

Ben couldn’t disagree. ‘Correct. And if that’s the case, then he knows where we are.’

‘And he’ll have run straight back to report that information to his people,’ Baldacci said.

Wolf, sitting to Baldacci’s left, turned and gave him a defensive stare. ‘Yeah, and what were Ben and Maddie supposed to have done to prevent that?’

‘I know what I’d have done,’ Baldacci replied darkly, and patted the M4.

‘I’ll bet you would,’ Wolf said with a tinge of disgust. ‘Then what does that make you?’ Even during his long stint as a professional assassin, Wolf had worked by an unbreakable golden rule. No women, no kids.

‘Just saying,’ Baldacci said.