The Noble Path: A relentless standalone thriller from the #1 bestseller by Peter May (learn to read books .TXT) 📕

his rib cage. He fell forward, and McCue held him for a moment in an embrace of death, slowly withdrawing the knife before lowering him gently to the ground.

McCue took a moment to steady himself. That had been too close for comfort. He wiped the blade clean and resheathed the knife. Through the trees he saw that the guard in the tower was still smoking. There was no way he could approach the tower unseen or, even if he could, climb to the platform unheard. He took a deep breath, and the tension seeped back into his muscles. He adjusted the scarf at his neck to hide the jungle camouflage beneath the black pyjama top, and walked out from the shade of the trees into the naked moonlight of the open compound.

From their position among the trees above the commune, Elliot and Slattery saw a guard approach the tower. Elliot tensed. ‘Where’s McCue? Something must have gone wrong.’

Slattery grinned. ‘Nothing wrong, chief. You’re looking at him.’

Elliot looked hard at the figure crossing the compound. ‘Jesus,’ he whispered, ‘that guy’s got balls.’

‘Time I moved,’ Slattery said. He hesitated. ‘Anything goes wrong, chief, it’s been nice knowing you.’

‘Just make sure nothing goes wrong, you ugly bastard.’

Slattery grinned and slipped off through the trees. Elliot felt the seed of fear growing in his gut. But he knew that fear was not such a bad thing. It was when you stopped being afraid that you would die.

From his platform high above the compound, the remaining guard saw McCue approach. ‘What’s up?’ he called. The figure below merely waved in response. The guard frowned. What was going on? He didn’t recognize the approaching guard. The face always seemed to be in shadow. The figure disappeared below the tower and he heard the creak of the ladder. He went to the open trap and watched the figure climb up towards him.

‘What is it? What’s wrong?’ He still couldn’t see the man’s face. Who was it?

Almost at the top, McCue held up a hand for the guard to help him up. The guard obliged and found himself looking into a strange face that smiled in the dark. The questions that filled his head went unanswered, and death rattled briefly in his throat. McCue rolled him to one side and picked up the cigarette that had fallen from his mouth. It was still wet with the dead man’s saliva as he took a single draw and threw it over the side. He unslung his automatic and crossed to the rail that gave him a commanding view of the compound. A stalky, oddly familiar figure was strolling across the open ground towards the guard hut. It was Slattery, McCue realized, humming to himself as he walked, as if he was taking a casual stroll along Bondi Beach. McCue’s jaw slackened with disbelief as he recognized the soft strains of Waltzing Matilda. ‘Mad sonofabitch!’ he whispered.

In the hut, four guards sat around a table playing cards by the light of an oil lamp. The others lay sleeping on bunks around the walls. One of the players lifted his head and frowned as he heard a tuneless voice softly humming a strange melody. They all looked up as the door opened and Slattery stood framed in the doorway, grinning.

‘Good day,’ he said and rolled two hand grenades into the centre of the hut. He slammed the door shut and took several steps back, hearing the clatter of panic inside before the grenades went off, blowing the door outwards. He felt the force of the blast, but stood his ground before swinging his M16 round and stepping back into the doorway. He emptied the magazine into the confusion of smoke and destruction in two sweeps of the room, quickly banged in another and waited for the smoke to clear. His eyes flickered over broken, bleeding bodies, making a quick professional assessment. All dead.

He turned and ran back out into the compound as the door of the cadres’ hut flew open and a man, half naked and still half blind with sleep, staggered out. A burst of automatic fire from the tower cut him down, and Slattery heard the soft whistle of a mortar shell. He threw himself flat and heard the shell explode just behind the hut. The bugger’s missed, he thought. But he didn’t get up, still pressing himself flat in the dust and listening for the second shell. He heard shouts of fear and confusion from inside the hut, and there was another burst of fire from the tower. Come on, Elliot! He gritted his teeth and covered his head with his arms as the second shell whispered through the warm night and ploughed into the roof of the hut. The explosion sent large splinters of wood singing out across the compound.

The dust hung in the air like silver mist in the moonlight. Slattery got slowly to his feet and looked around him, but could see very little. McCue shinned quickly down from the tower, collected his M16 and joined him.

‘Jeez,’ Slattery said. ‘It’s so quiet it’s eerie.’ He looked towards the civilian huts, but there was no sound, no sign of movement. ‘Where is everybody?’

A tall figure walked towards them, through the settling dust, from the other side of the compound. Elliot looked grim. He dropped their backpacks at their feet and glanced round.

‘Sure we got the right place, chief?’

*

Serey had awoken from a shallow sleep with the first explosions of the hand grenades, and wondered if she had been dreaming. Then bursts of automatic fire had sent chills of fear through her. All the women in the hut were awake now, sitting up and staring with frightened eyes in the dark. She had felt Ny move at her side.

‘What is it?’

‘I don’t know.’

Then two huge explosions had rocked the whole commune. Their hut had shaken on its stilts. Ny held tight to her mother’s arm. Still no one in the hut moved, and a deep silence followed. Then