‘You saw that, Sergeant,’ he said to Stowers, ‘this nigger was attacking me. You saw that, didn’t you?’

‘Yessir, I sure did,’ Strut said dutifully, automatically, although he wasn’t at all happy about the situation. That had been one hell of a whack the captain had given the boy, and there were no witnesses to prove he’d acted in self-defence. No witnesses except me, Strut thought.

‘Check him out,’ Chuck ordered, ‘is he dead?’

Strut knelt and checked the young man’s pulse, but from the angle of the head they both knew already what the answer would be.

‘Yessir,’ he said, ‘this man is dead.’

Chuck’s mind instantly sprang into action. Even with Stowers’ support as a witness, making this a case of self-defence could prove tricky. Far better to avoid an investigation altogether.

He clicked off the overhead light, but from the bunk the torch’s beam still shone upon the canvas wall of the tent. He quickly picked up the torch and turned it off. ‘Check all’s clear outside, Sergeant,’ he hissed.

Stowers did so, peering through the tent flap. All remained as deserted as it had been when they’d first arrived.

‘Yessir,’ he reported, ‘all clear outside.’

‘Right. Get a jeep back here at the double. Take this nigger somewhere and dump him, you got that?’

‘Yessir.’

‘You make it look like an accident. We know nothing about this. There’ll be no official investigation. The boy just met with an accident, you hear me?’

‘Yessir, I hear you loud and clear. An accident.’

‘You get going now, Sergeant. I’ll check things are all in order here.’

Stowers dived out of the tent and set off as fast as he could without drawing attention to himself. He was relieved Captain Maxwell had decided upon this course of action. In obeying any order the captain might issue, as he always did, Strut Stowers would vastly prefer to stage an accident than to act as a witness in a military investigation.

Alone in the tent, Chuck switched on the torch, this time pointing it to the ground, shielding its beam. He checked the butt of his pistol. There was no sign of blood. He holstered the weapon and checked the tent’s ground cloth. Tossing the two halves of the book onto the bunk, he knelt and closely examined the area around the young man’s head. No blood. He examined the young man’s skull where he’d struck him. No blood there either.

Well, well, Chuck thought, switching off the torch and rising to his feet. How downright lucky. No mess at all. This nigger didn’t die from a smashed-in skull. This nigger died from a broken neck.