Either they are not here, or else they are bloody good.

He started walking towards the bar. It was just a single room, built into a ragged concrete structure on the street directly opposite the bus station. There were a couple of cars parked alongside, and a few plastic tables and chairs. About a dozen guys were sitting around outside, drinking coffee and tea, and there were heaps of dog ends at their feet. Sandwiched close to the Lebanese, Syrian and Israeli borders, it was hardly surprising Anjar didn’t exist as anything more than a brutally fought-over dot on a map. Why the hell would anyone want to live here? Porter wondered. There was nothing to tie you to the place except for war, poverty and anger.

Crossing the road, he paused before the entrance to the bar. It had no name, just a dirty brown awning that would provide some shade when the sun was shining. Still, there was no mistaking the place. Anjar only had about four proper streets and two of those appeared to have been abandoned. It had a couple of shops, but this was the only café or bar. Porter started to step inside, yet for a brief moment he could feel himself hesitating. This is the line, he thought to himself. On one side, there’s this world. On the other a different one, probably the next world, if that happens to exist.

Cross it and there’s no going back.

Sod it, he told himself with a grim smile. There’s nothing to go back to. And the next world probably isn’t so bad. There’s bound to be a place where a bloke can doss down for the night. Who knows, you might even be able to get a drink.

The only trouble is I wouldn’t ever see Sandy again.

The guy at the counter looked around thirty, with a black T-shirt, and blue jeans hanging loose over his white trainers. There were a few men inside the bar: where they stashed the women in this place, Porter had no idea, but he hadn’t seen any apart from at the shop and on the bus. The men were all drinking tea and pouring over a single copy of a newspaper. There was some kind of discussion going on, but whether it was about sport, or politics, or business, Porter couldn’t tell. He nodded towards the barman. There were some beer bottles in the cooler, and Porter felt tempted. A beer was just exactly what he needed right now. Lebanon was a Muslim country, but it wasn’t dry like some of them. Still, the locals hardly ever drank, and ordering a beer would only attract attention to himself. And that was the very last thing he wanted.

‘A coffee,’ he said in English.

He’d learnt a few words of Arabic back in the Regiment, but he didn’t want to try them out now. The barman looked at him, his expression puzzled. Not many English guys up here, thought Porter. The only foreigners you ever got around this place were probably Israelis and they didn’t usually get out of their fighter jets to say hello.