The difference in a drop between 500 metres and 600 metres was the height of a grown man. But he knew the distance to his target, his experience had made the calculation, and he had adjusted his 'scope sight for that distance. Beyond the target, away to the target's right, was a small fire that had been lit by a shepherd. He had watched the shepherd all day, hoping that the shepherd would keep his flock close to the stream and far from the rock slope on which he had made his hide. He was grateful to the shepherd for lighting the fire. The fire smoked right to left. The movement of the smoke enabled him to gauge the wind speed that would deflect his bullet. Another graph. His estimate of the wind speed was five miles per hour. His estimate of the deflection was eleven inches, for a target that was six hundred metres away.
It amused him, the way that sometimes the figures in his head were metric, and sometimes they were yards and feet and inches, and sometimes the thoughts in his mind were Hebrew, and sometimes they were English.
He reckoned that he was close now to the optimum moment, and so the throb of the pain behind his right eye was relegated in importance. He was old for work as a sniper. He was 48 years old, and the balance was delicately poised between his expertise at gauging the distance to the target and the wind speed, against the ache of a tired eye. On a range he could shoot well inside a melon-sized group at 600 metres. A man's head was wider than a melon. That he was not on a range made little difference to him. If he had been young, perhaps he would have been knotted in tension and he would have cramp in his leg muscles. He was not young, he was quite relaxed, and he had learned long ago to rotate his toes in his boots to beat the cramp. He was not looking for a head shot. His 'scope showed him, where the hair lines crossed, the upper arm of the target who was in profile to him. He waited for the target to turn, to face him, he waited for the hair lines to cross on the upper torso of the target.
Steady hands on the rifle. No shake in the elbow that supported the rifle. The target faced him, was gesturing.
There was no caution from the target. The target had no need for caution. The target was standing on open ground that was four clear miles from the edge of the security zone, four clear miles beyond the stop point of Israeli patrols. He knew that the target, the man with the flowing beard and the old camouflage battledress, was a commander of a unit of the Hezbollah. He knew no more about him. He did not know why the man had been targeted. That concerned him not at all. He received his orders, he carried them out. He was only thankful that he still belonged, was still wanted, as a regular.
His finger slid slowly from against the trigger guard to curl around the curve of the trigger. The hair lines were full on the chest of the target, they wavered around the flash of a small gold pendant. He knew the men of the Hezbollah talked at length of the glory of martyrdom.
There was a wry, cold smile on his dirt-smeared face.
Crane fired.
The crack of a bullet. The collapse of a man. The scream of the crows taking flight. The bleat of stam peding sheep. The yelling of the men who had been with the target And the great silence.
The sun slipped. The dusk gathered. A grey blanket sliding over the valleys and water courses and rock outcrops and jebels of south Lebanon. Shadows merging, features losing substance.
There would be no search, that was the advantage of firing in the late afternoon. There could be no search in darkness, and where to search? None of the men who had stood with the commander of a unit of the Hezbollah could have pointed out the source of the single shot.
In the black night, canopied by stars, Crane walked with his rifle and his backpack homewards towards the security zone. Each time he fired, each time he scored, he believed that he prolonged his life as a regular, he put off the day when life would mean little more than a seat at a pavement cafe on Dizengoff. In the darkness his strained right eye no longer throbbed, the stabbing pain was gone.
At the edge of the security zone an armoured personnel carrier waited for him. From a distance he shouted a password, and when the response was yelled back at him, he came forward.
The crew of the carrier were all youngsters, all conscripts. They stared in awe as Crane slept in the back of the lurching, pitching vehicle. Each one of the conscripts knew his name, his reputation. They saw the worn filthy boots, and the torn trousers, and the muddied camouflage tunic, and the smeared face, and the woollen cap into which had been inserted sprigs of thorn bush. He was a legend to them.
At the camp, on high ground outside the town of Kiryat Shmona, two miles inside the border of the state of Israel, Crane jumped easily from the tail board of the carrier. No backward glance, no thanks, no small talk.
He was told that a helicopter was standing by to take him to Tel Aviv.
"You've done well."
"I'll confess, sir, I had doubts at first. I'm losing them."
"That's what I like to hear, Percy. I am tired of the rubbishing of the Service by every newspaper in London. I'm looking for a result we can be proud of."
The Director General shrugged into his overcoat. His briefcase was on the desk, filled with the evening's reading. His detective waited by the door.
"I'd like to be in charge, sir." Martins stuck his jaw forward.
"You'd what?"
"I'd like to run this show, sir-here and in Tel Aviv."
He saw the Director General pause, take stock, then jerk the coat into place.
"I was thinking of Fenner."
"Hasn't my experience, sir. I'd give it my best shot, sir. You could depend on me."
"Bit old, aren't you, for running in the field?"
"It's my show, sir, and I want it, I want it badly."
The Director General wrapped his scarf across his throat. He pulled on his gloves.
"What would I tell Fenner?"
"That life doesn't end at fifty, sir."
The Director General laughed. "Bloody good… It's yours, Percy. Get it in place."
Young Holt had been all day on the moor.
He came down the long straight road towards the village. All the time he was coming down the hill he could see the front garden and the front door of the house that doubled as his parents' home and his father's surgery. There was a car parked outside by the front gate. It had been there for as long as he could see the house.
He had caught every shower of the day, and the winds from the west had spurred him along. He had seen deer and he had seen a dog fox, and he fancied that he might have found the holt of an otter. And he had decided that he would return to London, end his indefinite compassionate leave. The decision made the wet and the cold worthwhile. Impossible to have made the decision at home, under his mother's watching eye.
He was coming fast down the hill, looking for a bath, looking for a mug of hot sugared tea. He could see her face, he could feel her arms round his neck, he could hear her voice. In the rain on the moor he had cried to her, in the wind he had shouted to her.
He saw the front door open. He saw his father come out, and look up the road and discover him and wave to him.
The front garden was a picture. Daffodils and crocuses, and the leaves sprouting on the shrub bushes, and the path cleanly swept. He reached the gate. He saw his father's wheelbarrow piled with winter debris and the fork and the secateurs and the broom leaning against the wheelbarrow, as if the work had been disturbed.
"Been waiting ages for you, Holt. There's a chap here who's driven down from London to collect you. A Mr Martins. Percy Martins, I think he said."