Last of the Breed

Chapter 40

For a moment Botev stood still. Then he reached out and touched his companion. The other man turned, and it was Borowsky.

Were they to be considered friends or enemies? They were, after all, Russians. Yet they had differences with their government. He walked closer.

“You are still free,” Botev said. “It is an achievement.”

“Yakov is a prisoner.”

“That is why we are here.”

“He is at the airfield?”

Botev’s eyes swept the area around to see if they were attracting attention. Nobody was in sight.

“He is there. There are four KGB men with him. They are in a small waiting room near the control center, waiting for the plane to come and take them away. It will be a helicopter, I believe.”

“You have a plan?”

Botev shrugged. “How can we plan? We know so little. He is there and we wish to free him. If we free him, we can escape into the taiga. We have friends there, scattered friends. We also have friends in Magadan.”

“I did not know there were so many of you.”

Borowsky shrugged. “We are few, comrade, very few. We are not seeking to overthrow the government, even if that were possible. We only want some freedom for ourselves and to protect our own. Yakov is one of the best. We need him. He has helped all of us from time to time.”

“Our choice is limited,” Botev said. “The taiga or a prison camp, and for Borowsky and me, they would put us to work that would soon kill us. If they did not torture us to death. We can expect nothing less. Neither can Yakov.”

“We had better move on,” Borowsky said. “To stand talking in the cold is unreasonable. We will attract attention.”

“Four men, you say? There will be others about?”

Borowsky shrugged. “Perhaps, Most of them will not like the KGB, but we cannot tell what they might do.”

They walked on in silence along the snow-covered road. They passed a long building like a warehouse and then some smaller buildings. They could see the field now. It had several hangars, a building that was probably an administration building with a tower, and a smaller building nearby with a Volga standing before it.

Joe Mack said, “There’s a chopper coming in now. Will that be it?”

“It will. When they start for the chopper, we had better take them.”

“No,” Joe Mack said. “Let’s take the chopper. I can fly it.”

“Well—”

“It will get us out of town. There will be planes after us, but we can ditch it and take to the woods.”

They paused beside a hangar. “When it lands,” Botev said, “they will drive out in the Volga. They will not expect trouble.”

They waited, stamping their feet against the cold, shivering and watching. “If we are seen,” Borowsky said, “they will wonder why we are standing here in the cold.”

“It is a risk we take,” Botev said, “Yakov would do it for us.”

“He got me out of Kirensk,” Borowsky said. “He risked his neck to do it.”

“And me from one of the Sol’vychegodsk camps,” Botev said.

The chopper was coming in low. It would land on the airfield not far from the hangars.

Joe Mack’s hand was on the AK-47. He heard the Volga start, and from the corner of the hangar they saw two men emerge from the building with a prisoner between them. His hands were shackled behind him.

“There will be two men in the building. Maybe they will be watching.”

“No matter.” Joe Mack saw the helicopter landing gently on the field and heard the car’s motor start. The hatch of the copter opened and a man got down and stood aside. It was a bigger ship than those he had seen before and would carry at least a squad. Inwardly he was praying there was no such force aboard. If there were, nobody would get out of this alive.

“Let’s go,” he said, and they started to walk, not in a group but scattered out, drifting onto the field with the casual manner of curious country folk.

The Volga swung alongside the chopper, and the driver remained at the wheel. From the Volga, three men got down, and they saw Yakov turn his head slightly, eyes downcast, and glance toward them. Suddenly he fell to his knees. “No! No!” he cried out. “I am afraid to fly! I—!”

Angrily, the KGB men tried to jerk him erect, their attention completely on their prisoner. Even the driver had turned his head to see what was happening. Borowsky stepped alongside the Volga and opened the door on the driver’s side. The driver, surprised, turned to look into a pistol. “Get out, very carefully,” Borowsky said quietly. “I do not want to kill you.”

Botev had rounded the Volga, coming up behind the two men who struggled with Yakov. Yakov was a powerful man, and he had managed, with a lunge, to knock one man off his feet. The other struggled, swearing, to pull Yakov to a standing position. Botev moved in behind him as Joe Mack went to the chopper. He spoke to the pilot.

“Will you step out, please? I am very nervous, and a burst of fire at this distance would empty your guts.”

Carefully, the copter pilot began to get out. He was a brave man, but he wished to live, and the AK-47 was very close, and the man who held it was like no one he had ever seen, with the striking gray eyes in a dark hawklike face, his hair in two braids. The pilot moved very carefully. “Be careful with that,” he said. “I have two children.”

“You are fortunate. Children need a father, so stay alive, comrade, and make no mistakes. I want your chopper.”

“You can fly it?”

“I can fly anything.” He nudged the pilot with the gun barrel to move him further. “And this seems very like one of our own.”

Botev had the two KGB men on their feet against the side of the Volga. From the buildings they were screened. Nevertheless, one of the KGB men had come outside and was looking toward them. “Have you got the key for the handcuffs?” he asked Botev. “If so, disarm them and put them in the copter.”

Borowsky was astonished. “You will take them with us?”

“Why not? There is room, and if left behind there’s no telling what tales they might tell.”

Working swiftly, the four men, the pilot, the driver of the Volga, and the two KGB men were bundled into the helicopter. Yakov, his hands freed, took the guns taken from two of them and climbed in with them. The helicopter was soon airborne.

Joe Mack glanced at his watch. The whole operation had taken just six minutes.

A half hour later he landed on a rugged plateau of the Chersky Mountains. “Yakov? Let them out here. Loosen their bonds so they can free themselves after we are gone. No reason to let them freeze to death.”

“To the devil with them,” Yakov said. “Let the bastards freeze!”

“The pilot did you no harm,” Joe Mack said. “Besides, he’s a family man. Let them free themselves and find their way back. However,” he added, “I’ve had some experience with these mountains. I would suggest the first things you do is build a fire and a windbreak. Then get settled for the night. It is too late to get anywhere today.”

He circled once as they took off. The men were on their feet, struggling to free themselves. He turned the helicopter and headed off to the west; then, when some distance away, he circled back to the east.

“Where?” he asked Yakov.

“To the mountains east of Semychan,” Yakov suggested. “I’ve a place there.” He took up a map board. “Here, I can show you.” He glanced up. “How are we on fuel?”

“No more than an hour’s flying time. Perhaps less. I will take you as far as possible.”

He kept the helicopter low, barely clearing the treetops, following canyons and low ground wherever possible. By now there would be pursuit, and when sighted they would be shot down without hesitation. But until they picked up the four men left behind, the pursuers would not know who was involved. And the KGB men would not know him, unless the description fitted one they already had. The braids might be a giveaway. Certainly it was unlikely that anybody else would be wearing such a hairstyle. Yet what could he do? There were no barbers in the taiga, and it had been nearly a year since he had had a haircut.

The air was clear, visibility excellent. He had left the Indigirka behind and was flying toward the Kolyma. When he landed the plane, it was in a small clearing among the trees. “We should chance it no further,” he said. “They will be searching for us now. Let’s camouflage the chopper. It will take them that much longer to find us.”

There were, as in all such craft flying in the area, emergency rations. “We will give you half,” Yakov said. “We have friends not far off where we can get more. Luck to you, comrade.”

“And to you.”

Yakov smiled widely. “You know, of course, that if we met in a war I should shoot you. I do not like our government very much, but I am a Russian.”

“Of course,” Joe Mack replied. “And I am an American. Let us hope it does not come to that. After all,” he added, “we want nothing you have. Nothing but free travel and communication. There are millions of Americans who would like to see Lake Baikal and the Kamchatka Peninsula. If Russia would put the KGB to working on farms and doing something productive, tear down the Berlin Wall, and build more good hotels, we Americans would be all over your country spending money, making friends, seeing the beauties of Russia, and making ridiculous all that both countries are spending on munitions.

“If America had had any aggressive intentions against Russia, we could have moved when only America had the atomic bomb. We did not and would not, so don’t worry about it, Yakov.”

Yakov chuckled. “I like that bit about putting the KGB to work on farms. I doubt if they could raise enough to feed themselves.” He lifted a hand. “Good-bye, then!”

He walked away, followed by Botev and Borowsky. Joe Mack waited a while, watching them go, glancing again at the now-camouflaged helicopter. It would be found, but not soon.

He added the additional rations to his pack, arranged his goatskin coat, and started off to the north.

Nothing moved but the wind. The coarse snow stirred along the frozen ground. Spring was coming, but the earth did not yet know it, holding itself back, waiting for some of the frost to go out of the sleeping earth.

Spring was coming and after it, the brief summer. It would be good to be warm again. He had almost forgotten how it would feel.

Where was Natalya now? Would he ever see her again? Ever hold her hands in his and look again into her eyes? Or had she forgotten already? He could not blame her. After all, who was he? A strange young man who came from the forest and disappeared again into that strange forest. A man whose path had crossed hers briefly and who must now seem like a dream. He grinned into the late afternoon. “Or a nightmare,” he said aloud.

There was still forest, although the trees were not as tall, the undergrowth less, and there was more moss, lichens, and tundra. Soon he would run out of cover and would have to seek out other ways in which to hide himself.

In the thickest patch he could find, he built a crude shelter, started a fire with his two pieces of iron pyrite, and made a thick broth as well as tea. The helicopter flight had probably given him a little respite. Even Alekhin would have trouble picking up his trail now.

Twice during the day he had seen the tracks of moose and decided it would be good to kill one and save as much meat as possible. In this cold, it was no problem to keep meat. It froze solid almost as soon as it was killed. Tomorrow he would kill a moose. Tomorrow—

Arkady Zamatev looked across his desk at the Yakut. “Why have you not found him?” he demanded. “Has he outwitted you again?”

“I do not have to follow him. I know where he is going. I shall be there.”

“Where now?”

“I go to Gizhiga. There I go inland. He will come that way, and I shall take him.”

“So you said before.”

“And I shall.” Alekhin shrugged impatiently. “Those others, they get in the way.” He smirked, his sullen eyes showing his contempt. “He made a fool of Colonel Rukovsky. He destroyed him. Ruined him. How does he explain losing so many men, and nothing to show for it? Rukovsky was a fool to get involved. It was not necessary, and I was there. I would have had him then but that they muddied the waters. I knew where he was.”

“And you did not tell?”

“To let Rukovsky or Shepilov get credit for capturing him? He cost Rukovsky twenty-nine men, and Rukovsky must explain.”

“The American had nothing to do with the slide.”

“You say. I say he knew where he hid. He knew how they must search, and he prepared some traps and led them to others. Of course he knew. He planned it that way.

“What of the fire that destroyed so much equipment? The American started that fire. What of the traps along the trail that killed or injured men? He prepared those, too. He is no fool, this American, but I shall have him now.”

He looked up slyly from under his brows. “You still want him alive? It would be easier to kill him.”

“I must have him alive. I need three to five days alone with him. He will tell me all I wish to know,”

“He will tell you nothing. Nothing at all. By now you should know this. You may kill him, but he will tell you nothing. He is not afraid of pain, this one. He knows what he can do.”

Zamatev shook his head. “Bring him here. That is all I ask.”

“He was one of those who delivered Yakov.”

Zamatev sat up sharply. “You know this? Why was I not told?”

“I tell you now.”

Zamatev swore. “Then he has Russians helping him! I want them rounded up, brought in, every one of them!”

Alekhin looked at his thick fingers with their broken nails, and then he looked up from under his brows. “Be careful, comrade. He has destroyed Rukovsky, this one. Be sure he does not destroy you.”

Zamatev snorted angrily. “Destroy me? That is ridiculous!”

Alekhin looked out of the window. “He will destroy you,” he said contemptuously, “and then he will return and kill you.”

“Bah!” Zamatev said impatiently. “How could he reach me? If he is anxious to kill me, why has he not tried?”

“First,” Alekhin said, “he wishes to escape. But to escape is not enough. He escapes to make light of you. Then he wishes to beat you at your own game.”

“That’s childish! That’s nonsense! Why should he care? Anyway, how could you know this?”

“He is Indian. I am Yakut. He is not like you. He is like me. He knows how to hate, this one. He knows how to win. He will make a fool of you, destroy you, and then he will come back.”

“Come back to Siberia? You are insane! He cannot escape, but if he should, why would he come back?”

“To kill you,” Alekhin repeated. “He has pride, this one. He does not ask reward. He does not care if his government knows. He does not care if Russia knows. It is only important that he knows.” Alekhin smiled, and it was not a good smile. “And that you know. When he kills you, you will know he is doing it.”