The fires might well have attracted interest, but the desert was empty, as far as he could see through his night vision. Visibility was down to one or two kilometres, thanks to a moderate summer ghibli – the local variant of the sirocco – which had started up behind them not long after they’d left the location of the firefight, and was still blowing dust up from the south.

Kev McMullen appeared at his side, and passed him a US Army MRE.

‘Think we’ll get followed up?’ he said, scratching his thick, black hair to get the grit out of it.

‘Not unless they’ve got fucking Tonto with them,’ said Carr. ‘Stop flapping.’

‘I’m not flapping,’ said McMullen, defensively. ‘Doesn’t hurt to think about it.’

Carr decided to go easy on him. ‘Aye, fair enough,’ he said, swallowing a mouthful of beef stew and suddenly realising how hungry he was. ‘But it’s not a drama. Anyone who comes across that shit is going to think twice about coming after us. And if they do, which way do they go? This wind will have blown our tracks away.’

McMullen nodded. ‘So what’s the plan?’ he said. ‘When we stopping for some proper rest?’

Carr looked at his watch.

He’d identified a final LUP in a small cluster of mountains on the far side of another small town, Ash Shwayrif.

That was some two hundred kilometres from Sirte, and still a good eight hours away.

By the time they got there they’d have been on the go for something like forty-five hours, bar the two or three hours’ kip they’d grabbed in the minibus on the way down from Tunis.

Adrenalin would keep them going for a while yet, but tiredness was the enemy, and it led to mistakes, and mistakes got you killed.

Against that, he was sure of one thing: he didn’t want to get bounced again. He’d been planning to move by day as much as by night, but the contact had made him think. They’d won it easily enough, but if the technical with the .50 cal had stood off while the other two vehicles had come in to recce, the outcome might have been very different.

He felt like he’d used up the trip’s ration of luck; next time they might bump into men who knew what they were doing.

‘We’ll keep going for now, and lie-up during daylight,’ he said. ‘Safer that way.’

‘Good,’ said McMullen, turning away.

Carr watched him walk back to pick up a mug of tea from Fred.

He finished his MRE, turned back to the wagons, took a now-lukewarm brew of his own from Fred, and gulped it down.

‘Right, lads,’ he said. ‘Ten minutes, then we move out.’

Chapter 84.

84.

TARIQ’S UNCLE FINALLY came back three days after Zeff Mahsoud had arrived in Sirte.

It was gone 2 a.m., but Mahsoud was sent for.