Minotaur

42

“We both know you’re dying,” Chapel said.

The Russian only sneered.

“I cut your femoral artery,” Chapel went on. It hurt to talk through a partially crushed windpipe, but he had to. “You’re bleeding out. If you don’t get that leg bandaged you have maybe a minute left before you pass out. And then you’ll die.”

“Plenty of time to shoot you. And I don’t trust you to just watch while I wrap up my leg.”

Chapel shook his head. “I have a better plan. You tell me what I need to know. Then I’ll bandage your leg, and radio for the Coast Guard to pick us up. We can airlift you right to a hospital. You’ll live.”

“I’ll live in prison for the rest of my life, you mean.”

Chapel shrugged. “You’ll live,” he said again.

Favorov slumped backward, pressing his shoulders against the sailboat’s high gunwale. At least he wasn’t grabbing for the pistol. “After all this, you would save my life,” he said. “You Americans. You never understood total war.”

“We understand that when you get what you’re fighting for, you stop fighting,” Chapel said. “Come on, Favorov. This is your only chance and you know it.”

Still the Russian waited. He turned his head and looked away. “I can bandage myself after you are dead. But I will lack the strength to sail. I won’t make it to Cuba, now,” he admitted. He sighed deeply. “I think, though, you do understand one thing. Secrecy… it gets in a man’s marrow. It becomes so ingrained. Even with my life at stake, it is so hard to tell the truth.”

“Fight that instinct,” Chapel said.

Favorov shook his head. Then he grabbed for the pistol. Chapel had time to throw his hand over his face, to try to shield himself from the bullet, but Favorov had something else in mind. He shoved the barrel of the pistol between his teeth and started to squeeze the trigger.

“No!” Chapel shouted.

Favorov stared down at the gun in his hand. He hadn’t fired it. He hadn’t pulled the trigger, not all the way. He’d made the classic mistake of attempted suicides everywhere—he’d stopped to think, even for a moment, about what he was doing.

Slowly he removed the gun from his mouth. He lifted it again and pointed it roughly in Chapel’s direction. But Chapel was already on top of him, and he yanked the pistol out of Favorov’s hands. The Russian was too weak with blood loss to put up much resistance.

“I couldn’t do it,” Favorov said. His pale face looked haunted. “I… I lacked the will.”

There was something in his eye, something Chapel recognized. It chilled him to the core, but he knew exactly what Favorov was feeling. He’d felt exactly the same thing, when he’d thought he’d failed in his mission, that he hadn’t been good enough. Tough enough.

It was a terrible feeling. Despite everything that had happened—everything Favorov had done—Chapel couldn’t help feeling sorry for the man.

Favorov had lost, and he knew it.