The two journalists Lester and Malpacket drive a Fiat truck into enemy-held Benghazi, bluffing their way past sentries to wander throughout the place without being challenged. En route home, the truck breaks down and the novel ends with the two men walking east through the desert with the little water they have left. At Paul Schramm's funeral, Maria Grandinetti reflects on their relationship: "I helped him to stop feeling sorry for himself and to stop being angry with everyone else. And I showed him a lot of dying men, so he could see that war is not adventure and that pain is not payment, because it buys nothing. He didn't believe me."