杀戮许可证

What the two men wanted to know—the gunpoint question they kept shouting at him over and over again—was whether Adi was govern- ment. No, Adi kept saying, no, trying but plainly failing to explain the distinction between a government and a multinational nonprofit foun- dation. Only when he said I’m just here to shoot the goats did the shouting finally ebb. The men stood frowning at each other and then back at Adi until the one without the gun broke into croaks of laughter. Then the gun- man laughed too. The goats? he said, casting the spotlight briefly down to where Adi’s rifle was lying beside him in the sand. Adi said, The foundation—they sent me here for five weeks. …