The three of them fell back into silence, and they stayed like that until darkness fell. As ever, nightfall brought a subtle shift in the seething soundscape of the jungle and an immediate increase in the number of mosquitoes harassing them.

A light came on in the bunkhouse and then the door was closed, but in the darkness the sounds from within, raucous and drunken, still came clearly across the jungle to them. The guard went into the barn and came back out almost immediately, carrying a lantern that he lit and placed on the ground next to him—within seconds, moths spun out of the dark and crashed frantically into it.

The noise within the bunkhouse rose in peaks, falling away again, and then the door opened and two men stepped out. Even in silhouette, Tom could see that one was the man in charge. He wasn’t sure if he recognized the other, but he didn’t like the slightly drunken swagger of either of them.

The boss was eating a huge piece of meat, what looked like half a chicken, but he saw the dog now and teased it, holding the meat just beyond the reach of its chain. He dropped it on the ground then and laughed as the dog struggled in vain to reach it.

The two men headed across to the barn, talking to the young guard, and Tom felt his stomach tightening into a ball of vicious energy, because he didn’t like how this was looking at all. Whatever they had in mind, they looked fired up with alcohol and cruelty.

The guard stood in response to them and the boss laughed and patted him on the cheek. The guard knocked his hand away halfheartedly and walked back to the bunkhouse, closing the door behind him, briefly dulling the chorus from within before it started up again.

The other man picked up the lantern and both of them walked into the barn and closed the door. Tom wasn’t sure if he could hear them laughing about something, or if that was just the sound carrying from the bunkhouse.

Then he heard Alice, almost mumbling to herself before the words formed together and she said, “I don’t like this, Tom. I don’t like it at all.”

Tom hardly heard her. He was staring at the sliver of light around the doors to the bunkhouse and the barn, at the dog trying to get to the food that was in the dirt beyond its reach, and he could hear the noise coming from the camp, and the dog straining at its chain, and indistinct words from both Nick and Alice, and the constant chatter of the jungle and the troubling silence of the barn.