Last of the Breed

Chapter 39

The hunters took that one startled look and then scrambled to escape. All three made it.

The boulder landed within inches of where they had been standing, hitting with terrific impact. Then it rolled back a few feet and lodged against a smaller rock.

Two of the men had fallen. They got to their feet, badly shaken, and looked up at the mountain. They could see nothing.

Hurriedly, they moved back into the nearest trees. There were not many at that point, but they were some shelter.

“That was no accident,” one of them said.

For several minutes nobody spoke, and then Hymoff said, “Did you ever think of all you could do to somebody following you into the mountains?”

“Who hasn’t?”

“I never liked Shepilov, anyway,” Hymoff suggested.

It was a dangerous remark, and they all knew it. If such a comment were repeated, it could mean trouble for the speaker.

“Well, a man could always trap some fur. Doubt if this country has been trapped lately. A man could keep busy,” he added.

“How did he come to be a prisoner here, anyway? My grandfather sold furs to an American trader at Emma’s Landing, years ago. Said he was an honest man, as traders go.”

“No way he’s going to escape, anyway. No way he could cross the Strait.”

“The Chukchis crossed it for years, hundreds of years, I guess.”

“That was before radar and patrol planes. I crossed it most of the way on the ice, one time. I was with my father, and I was just twelve that year.”

From high on the slope, Joe Mack watched them. What reward had been offered for him he did not know, or what other inducement, if any. He had not planned to kill any of them, but that was their problem. If they chose to follow, he would stop them, one way or another.

He arose and went back off the ridge and followed it toward the southeast. It was easy walking here, with few trees, scattered rock, and nothing but sky above. It was clear and blue, like most skies in this part of the country. He did not hurry, but he made good time. Yet at intervals he stopped to study his back trail. Alekhin would be back there somewhere, or perhaps outguessing him and waiting up ahead. That had been one of the reasons he had changed direction so drastically.

Later that day he killed a musk deer and broiled a steak over the fire. He ate hugely, eating as his forebears had eaten when meat could not be saved and another kill might be days away.

When he had eaten he put out his fire, obliterated as much as possible of the sign it left, and hiked on another two miles before finding a place to sleep.

Somewhere far ahead was the Kolyma River and beyond it mountains of the same name. When he reached those mountains he would follow them toward the northeast.

He was tempted to go into Magadan, just for a change of diet, if no more. He had his suit and he had the white shirt Natalya had made for him. At this time of the year, he might even get away with wearing moccasins. He shook his head. Not with a suit. A new suit, at that. It would draw attention he did not want. Nonetheless, it was a temptation.

There was no trail or path where he now walked, and he kept his eyes open to pick up an animal trail. It was easy to get oneself into a cul-de-sac, not knowing the mountains. If you followed a trail, it was always a way somebody or something had gone before.

It was bitterly cold and getting more so. Before nightfall he would have to get down off the top of the mountain where he now walked. Warm air rises, and if he could find a hiding place on a good slope he would settle in, even if it was early.

He heard the helicopter only a moment before it appeared, and there was nowhere to hide. Hoping they had not seen him he dropped to the ground among some flat rocks, hoping they would take him for snow or even a dead animal. He lay perfectly still, but inside his coat his hand gripped the AK-47.

The copter swung by, not directly overhead, and started on; then it around and came back, flying lower.

They had seen something. They were coming back for him. All right, Joe Mack, he whispered to himself. Get them the first time.

He lay still, and they swung by directly over him, not fifty feet off the ground.

He rolled over as they swung by and let go with a burst just as they began their turn. They were making a tight turn not more than fifty yards away, and they believed he had only a bow and arrows. What they got was totally unexpected.

The copter dipped sharply and then smashed into the ground, tipping slightly and then righting itself. The rotor made a few despairing turns and then slowed to a stop.

Lying behind the rocks — a poor cover at best, for they were very low — Joe Mack watched, ready to fire again.

Nothing happened. Nobody stirred.

He waited a slow count of twenty and still nothing moved. His gun covering the side of the helicopter, he got to his feet. Working his way toward the tail, he kept the gun in position and slowly drew abreast. He heard a low gasping moan, as if someone had tried to move and had been stopped by sheer agony. With his left hand he opened the door.

The pilot lay slumped forward, obviously dead. The man nearest him made a feeble effort to reach for a weapon. “No!” Joe Mack spoke sharply, the muzzle of his gun against the Russian’s side.

He was a young man with a boyish face, but a tough, competent-looking man. In Russian he asked him, “How are you hurt?”

“My legs are broken, I think.”

Quickly, efficiently, he searched the man, taking a pistol from him. Then, with infinite care, he lifted him out of the seat to the ground. From the helicopter he recovered the man’s heavy coat and several blankets. There was a folded emergency tent, and he took that out and laid it on the ground.

“Not much I can do for you,” he said. “I’m no surgeon. Did you get off a call for help?”

“No.”

Joe Mack believed him. There had been no time, no chance. “How soon will they start looking for you?”

“When we do not answer.”

“All right. I’m going to fix you up as warm as I can, and then I’ll leave. Sorry about this, but you shouldn’t have been hunting me.”

“We were not. That is, until we saw something lying there. We were going to pick up a prisoner. A dissident.”

Joe Mack gathered all the coats and blankets from the copter to make the wounded man as warm as possible. As he talked, he built a windbreak of the flat rocks.

“A dissident? I didn’t know you had such things.” He spoke with a touch of sarcasm in his tone.

“We have our share. This is a bad one. He tried to free another prisoner. Did free him, in fact, but was captured himself.”

“Tough.”

“Yes, he is a tough one, as you say. Very strong man and not afraid. Too bad he has become a dissident. We need such men in Russia.”

“So does every country.” A thought came to him suddenly, a wild random thought. Yet why not? “What was his name?”

“Yakov. We do not have a patronymic. He was known to the KGB.”

“You are not KGB?”

“I am a soldier,” the man said. Then, “How will they find me?”

“I shall build a fire and leave some fuel for you. There is much lying about. And I found a flashlight in the plane.” He had found two of them, as a matter of fact. One he intended to keep. He had also found emergency rations, such as every such ship carried in this country, and matches.

He built a small fire and made tea, hot, black, and strong. “Best thing for shock, they tell me.”

He drank some tea himself and moved a packet of the emergency rations close to the wounded man.

“I won’t be able to stay, you know. In fact, I’d best be off and away.”

“I am obliged. You could have killed me.”

“You are a soldier. I am a soldier. In combat I might have killed you or been killed, but you are wounded. It is a different thing.”

“It is said you are a Red Indian?”

Joe Mack smiled. “I am.”

Obviously in pain, the man bit his lip and held himself hard against it. Then he said, “Do not Indians take scalps?”

Joe Mack shrugged. “That was long ago, in another world almost. Yes, it was a way of keeping score. I have never taken one, although in a couple of cases I might be tempted.”

He gathered his things, rummaged in the plane for more ammunition, found it, and took what other rations were available. Then he brought more wood for the fire. There was not a shortage of that, except that it needed gathering.

“It will keep a small fire going, and from up there they will see it easily. I must be off now.” Yet he lingered. “Yakov, you say? Where were you to pick him up?”

“Near Khonuu. It is not far,” he caught himself and was silent for a moment, “if you are flying.”

He paused again. “The KGB are holding him at the airfield.” He glanced up. “I have feeling for him. They will be rough, I think.”

“When were they not? I do not know your country. I did not think there were rebels here.”

The flyer shrugged. “There are none, or at least few who speak out. There is corruption, of course, and the black market. Many are discontented but have faith that everything will be put right.”

Joe Mack went into the darkness and gathered fuel. There were few trees here and scattered, but there was much debris fallen from them and dead trees, blown down or struck by lightning. He dragged some heavy stuff closer.

“You will not escape, you know,” the flyer said. “Alekhin knows where you are. He will find you.”

“I shall be expecting him.”

“You are not afraid?”

“He is a man. I am a man. We will see.”

He added a few sticks to the fire. “Good luck, Russian. Next time, tell your pilot to stay out of matters that do not concern him.”

He walked away into the darkness.

Of course, he had delayed too long. When there was no word from the helicopter, a search would begin. Once the helicopter was found, they would know where he was, approximately.

Khonuu? It was a town on the Indigirka, and Yakov was a prisoner there.

Yakov, who had helped him, gone out of his way to guide him. Yakov, who was a free spirit and partly of Tungus blood. Yakov, who refused to be harnessed. Yakov was a prisoner. Yet what could he, Joe Mack, do? He did not know the town or the airfield. The chances were great, however, that Yakov would be held at the airfield awaiting transportation to wherever the KGB wanted him. After interrogation, Yakov would be killed. Of that there could be no question.

Khonuu was not that far out of his way, yet he had avoided populated districts, knowing he would be recognized for who he was almost at once.

When it was light enough to see, he began to run. He ran easily, smoothly, careful of each step. Black, bare trees stretched bare black arms against the lightening sky. He ran into the dawn, an Indian, feeling himself an Indian, and when he found a dim game trail he went along it, finding it led him down the mountain.

The long hard months had left him lean and strong. As a cold sun arose from the far-distant gray clouds, he ran toward it, and then the trail took him north. He was going the way he must. Was it fate? He did not believe in fate, but something seemed to be guiding him as he ran.

He was a warrior, and another warrior, brother to him in spirit, was in trouble. He knew the risk, knew the slight chance he had of even finding where Yakov was held, but he took the chance freely.

Once, long ago, he had seen a young Chinese on the gallows waiting for the noose. He had said, “Some mans spend nice new money. I spend nice new life.”

“If I must, I will,” he told himself. “I am alone, and nobody awaits me.”

Nobody? What of her? What of Natalya? Did she await him somewhere? Or was he forgotten, something that had drifted across her life like a passing cloud?

What had she promised? Nothing. What had he offered? To come for her, when both knew it was a vain, desperate promise to which no sane person would hold him. Yet in that respect he might not be sane, for he truly expected to return, to take her from the shore at Plastun Bay.

Foolish? Of course, but so many things worth doing may seem foolish to others, may seem impossible.

He ran down the mountain in the morning’s gray light and found his way into the shadowed firs, the black guardian firs that clustered along his way. He crossed frozen streams and ran through patches of thin snow where his moccasins barely left a track behind.

When the sun was warm he found a place among the willows and slept, and when the sun was higher still he awakened. For a long time he stood, listening to the wind, hearing what was moving, watching the flight of birds, and they seemed unafraid and undisturbed. He began to run once more, for he had far to go and did not know how much time he had.

He saw no one and heard nothing but, once, far off, the ring of an ax chopping wood.

The morning opened wide before him, and the forest thinned again. In the distance he saw the smoke of cooking fires in the homes of those he did not know, and far off a city against the sky and a river between.

He slowed to a walk. A running man would be seen and would invite questions to which he had no answers. Now he must find the airfield. He was guessing, judging Yakov would be held waiting for the transportation to take him away. Now to scout the field and see where such a man might be held. And after that?

He was a warrior, and for a warrior any day was a good day to die.

Only he expected to live. He needed to live to free Yakov, to count coup on his enemies, and to meet a golden lady on a distant shore.

He was no longer an officer and a gentleman, no longer a flyer for the American Air Force; he was, for now, an Indian. And he had enemies.

There were scattered houses. One man, carrying an armful of wood, glanced at him, then went inside.

He walked steadily on. He saw a small plane take off and knew where the airfield was. He changed direction, walked among some houses, and crossed a bridge. His heart was pounding, his mouth dry. His AK-47 was hidden under his coat, his bow appeared to be a staff, no more than that.

It was very early and very cold. Nobody went willingly into the cold on such a day.

Two men walked before him, two thick men in thick coats and dark fur hats. They walked steadily and did not look back, but the walk of one was familiar. He unfastened the string that tied his coat and let his hand touch the butt of the AK-47. He was ready, but he took longer strides to move faster without seeming to hurry.

The man turned around, and it was Botev.