CHAPTER 23

Barkov called a halt. Immediately, the half dozen soldiers flopped to the ground. The time for any semblance of military order was gone. They were tired of walking and running — mostly running — in the wake of dogs that never seemed able to catch the escaped Americans. Flasks of vodka appeared and the soldiers passed them around. In spite of the hardships, the soldiers still seemed eager for the chase. Barkov thought that it might be a different story once the vodka ran out.

"Do you hear them singing?" Bunin asked, a contented smile on his face.

Confused, Barkov looked at the men, who did not appear very musical. It took him a moment to understand that by singing, Bunin meant the baying of the dogs.

"It is about time," Barkov said. "I was beginning to think that those dogs were worthless. I was going to shoot them rather than have to feed them again."

Barkov, Bunin, and the Mink stood apart from the men. Rifles slung over their shoulders, they were turned in the direction of the dogs. Bunin was right about them singing — their barking had taken on a more musical note that made it clear they were on the trail of the escape prisoners and Inna.

"What will those dogs do once they catch them?" the Mink wanted to know.

Bunin answered with a question. "What does a dog do when it catches a sable?"

"I am thinking that they do not sit down and have tea, Comrade Bunin, but you tell me."

"The dog, he shakes that sable until he breaks its neck."

"A man is much bigger than a sable," Barkov pointed out.

"Then maybe the dog grabs a leg and does not let go until we arrive. What I want to know is—"

Bunin never finished his sentence.

• • •

Cole settled his crosshairs on the man to the right. At this distance, it was impossible to see their faces. Both men looked tall and heavy in their winter coats. The group of soldiers paused; some lit cigarettes or drank from flasks of vodka. Maybe the booze kept them going. It was possible that they were listening to the dogs; the two tall men and the shorter one seemed to be conferring about something.

He adjusted the crosshairs about a foot above the distant target to account for the drop that the bullet would make. Some officer had called it the bullet's trajectory, but Cole knew it was simple gravity. When you threw a rock, it fell to earth, and a bullet was no different. A bullet traveled a whole lot farther, but it was falling just like that rock the moment it left the barrel. The air, though heavy with the promise of snow, was barely stirred by the wind, so that much, at least, was in Cole's favor as he took aim.

He held the crosshairs steady, unwavering, and slowly squeezed the trigger, gently applying pressure with the pad of his right index finger.

Through the scope he could see all three men talking, oblivious.

Cole felt a familiar rush. This was the part of being a sniper that no one ever spoke about. Most people saw how a sniper would be satisfied in the ability to hit a distant target. Cole almost took that part for granted anymore — hitting targets was like pulling on his boots in the morning. He just did it. Without thinking much about it. However, that sense of holding a life in your hands — well, it was an almost god-like power. That part of being a sniper never faded or got old. It was what thrilled him about putting his finger on the trigger.

Focus, he warned himself.

By now, his body was operating on autopilot. He had done this so many times that it was like sleepwalking. Thinking too hard at this point only spoiled the shot Better to let training and instinct take over.

His finger applied the last fraction of the nine-point-eight pounds of pressure needed to release the trigger.

What happened next was a complex chain reaction that had changed little from the days when a twelfth century Chinese warrior fired a stone projectile from what was essentially a pipe. Thanks to modern technology, however, it was now a chain reaction that took place instantaneously.

Within the mechanism of the rifle, the firing pin shot forward and struck the center of the round in the chamber. That firing pin caused the primer in the base of the brass cartridge to explode, which in turn cased the gunpowder in the cartridge itself to ignite. The cyclone of hot gases drove the bullet down the barrel, in which the rifling gripped and spun the bullet until it emerged at a speed of more than two thousand feet per second. The spinning bullet honed in on its target like a supersonic hornet.

It all happened faster than Cole could think it.

Bullseye.

• • •

Bunin was still asking Barkov and the Mink his question when a neat round hole appeared in his chest. Barkov watched Bunin open his mouth in surprise once, then twice, before he sank to his knees.

Traveling at just a little under muzzle velocity now, the impact of the bullet released more than eighteen-hundred foot pounds of energy into Bunin's chest. His lungs exploded and his heart shattered, killing him instantly.

"Sniper!" Barkov bellowed, mostly for the benefit of the soldiers who lolled nearby. He was diving for cover behind a clump of bushes before Bunin's dead body hit the ground. Right about then, the noise of the rifle shot finally reached their ears.

The Mink had found a boulder to shelter behind and had gone to one knee, his rifle to his shoulder, scoping the vast open taiga for a target.

The soldiers were still busy putting away their vodka. Two or three, including young Dmitri, gawked at Bunin's body. They were too shocked and surprised to move.

"Get your heads down, you fools," Barkov shouted at them.

They finally stirred themselves to action and scrambled behind what shelter they could find. If the sniper had fired again, he could have killed at least one more.

But he did not fire.

Sniper. The word ran through Barkov's mind again. Only a sniper would fire once, and then keep his finger off the trigger.

"That shot was from a long way off," the Mink announced from his hiding place, several feet away. "Whoever it was knew his business."

"See anything?"

"Bushes, rocks, grass. That is not what you meant, is it?"

"The prisoners had no weapons."

"Maybe Inna took Dmitri's rifle," the Mink suggested.

"No, she did not. Besides, what could anyone hit with that piece of shit? You saw what happened. One shot, and Bunin is dead."

"Maybe not such a good shot," the Mink said. "Whoever it was, was trying to shoot you."

"What are you talking about?"

"Think about it. Who looked like you from a distance?"

Barkov nodded. As usual, the Mink made sense. But that still did not answer the question of who had shot at them. "Let's go see if we can find this sniper," Barkov said.

He didn’t care about Bunin, beyond the fact that someone else would now have to take care of those dogs. What he did care about was that somehow, his quarry had turned the tables on him.

• • •

Cole and Vaccaro watched the Russians in the distance. "How long do we wait?"

"Long as we need to."

“Do you think you got Barkov?” Vaccaro asked.

“I would say that’s a fifty-fifty chance,” Cole said. “I shot a big man. Was it Barkov? Flip a coin.”

“If he’s half the sniper he’s supposed to be, he’s already on his belly down there, trying to worm his way toward us.”

“Let him come on,” Cole said. “If someone shoots at us, then we know it ain’t Barkov that I shot down there.”

“The dogs are getting closer. You hear them?”

Cole nodded. “Them dogs are gonna be a problem.”

Down below, some of the soldiers had not hidden themselves well. Cole picked out a fellow who was lighting a cigarette.

Shot him.

• • •

Barkov gave orders for the men to stay put. There were no arguments after a second bullet killed one them. Nobody did anything as stupid as light a cigarette after that. Barkov kept forgetting that these men had not experienced war, until today.

He and the Mink began to work their way forward, using the terrain for cover. It was likely that the sniper had fired from the high ground just ahead. By working around to the left, they could follow a depression — not quite a gully — that brought them closer to the hill without exposing themselves to the sniper.

Barkov was beginning to have the nagging thought that perhaps, just perhaps, there was more to this escape than he had perceived. He thought about the fact that their quarry had somehow managed to cross miles and miles of taiga at a punishing pace. How was that possible? One of the trio had just picked off Bunin. With what weapon? None of it made sense.

He pushed aside his doubts and followed the Mink through the brush. True to his name, the Mink moved almost soundlessly. When people thought of a mink, they thought of fur coats. However, a mink was not cuddly. By nature, a mink was in fact a predator, and ruthless.

Being bigger, Barkov kept getting hung up on briars and had to bull his way through the brush. Barkov paused to listen for the dogs. They were somewhere on the hill ahead, baying in excitement. Poor Bunin. He would have liked to hear that. He really had been proud of those worthless mutts. The dogs sounded excited, as if they were very close now to the quarry.

"The dogs must have found them," the Mink said.

They moved in that direction, careful to stay low in the gully.

A rifle fired from the vicinity of the hilltop.

They heard a yelp.

“Now he is shooting the dogs," Barkov announced. "Good. He will be worried about those dogs, and not about us."

Still, he was a little surprised that the Americans would be so heartless — even Barkov wasn't sure that he could bring himself to shoot a dog. He had killed men without a second though, but never a dog.

They picked up the pace, moving toward the sound of the excited dogs. Close now. The dogs were near the base of the hill, which surprised Barkov, because he was sure the last rifle shot had come closer to the top if the hill. Then again, it could be that the trio they were pursuing had split up. Even now, Bunin's dogs might be snapping at that bitch Inna Mikhaylovna. She might even be glad to see him if he called off the dogs. The thought made him smile.

The Mink stopped, then jerked his chin at the noise ahead. They could just see the dogs through the brush, barking as if they had someone cornered. Barkov nodded and pushed his way through the undergrowth. Though the twigs and branches clutched at him, he managed to move almost silently.

Then the dogs were right there. Barkov stepped out into a clearing in the brush, the Mink right behind him. No one there. He did, however, see a bright red scarf tied high up in a bush. The dogs milled about under it, barking furiously, jumping to get at it, but the scarf was just out of reach of their jaws. One of the dogs was dead, shot by the Americans.

Barkov kicked the dogs out of the way and reached for the scarf.

From behind, the Mink gave him a shove.

An instant later, a bullet carved the air where Barkov's head had been.

From the corner of his eye, Barkov caught sight of a muzzle flash.

Instantly, Barkov put his rifle to his shoulder. Through the telescopic sight, he caught just a glimpse of a figure on the hilltop. As soon as his post sight touched the target, he pulled the trigger. It was a sloppy shot, more by instinct than aim. Then he rolled away into the brush, out of sight.

• • •

Vaccaro had been in the middle of saying, "I don’t think you got—"

He had not finished his sentence when the bullet struck a rock inches from both their heads, and a moment later came the crack of the Russian's rifle. Vaccaro took his time looking through the binoculars again.

"Goddamn, but that was close," Cole had to admit.

"That Russian can shoot."

"I guess that does answer the question."

"What question is that?"

"The one about which Russian I shot. If that was Barkov down there, then I reckon the one I shot was the wrong one."

"Now you know for next time."

When he had fired at Barkov just now, the man had managed to shoot back in a split second. The Russian had been shooting as a reflexive action. And yet, the bullet had pinged off a rock just inches from Cole's head. That was some shooting.

Pinged really wasn't the right word. A high velocity bullet ricocheting off a rock a foot from your head was a noise that turned your guts to water and made the back of your skull tingle. He puckered his asshole tighter. Wasn’t really a single word to describe all that.

"Let's get the hell out of here," Cole said.

They could have stayed in position and tried to pick off Barkov and the other Russian. However, if Barkov was half the sniper he seemed to be, it wasn't likely that he was going to let himself get picked off that easily. Cole had set out to buy the others some time, and that was just what he and Vaccaro had done. The dogs were confused now, milling about the clearing where Cole had tied the scarves. Barkov himself wouldn't be in any hurry to continue the pursuit if he thought Cole was still occupying the hilltop. What they needed to do now was let Barkov worry about that while they slipped out the back door.

They made their way back down the hilltop on the opposite side from where the Russians were hunkered down. The others would have a huge lead on them. If they were going to catch up, they would need to hurry.

"You ready?" Cole asked.

"Let's hoof it. I’ve got to admit, that Barkov makes me nervous.”

They set off at a trot across the taiga, hoping to catch the others before nightfall.

• • •

The Mink lay prone nearby, scoping the hill, hoping for any sign of movement.

After several minutes he said, "He is gone."

"Did I hit him?” Barkov asked.

"Maybe, maybe not, but you at least gave him something to think about."

He and the Mink settled deeper into the brush. A dead dog lay nearby. Barkov looked again at the scarf overhead. He realized that the Americans had made a false trail to lead the dogs here, tied the scarf in the brush, and waited. He and the Mink had walked right into the trap.

"Those three aren't that clever," the Mink said. "They should not have a rifle. They would not have set a trap. Someone is helping them."

Barkov agreed. Everything was not what it seemed. When they rejoined the others, he planned on seeing what else the boy Dmitri knew. Perhaps he had not told them everything.

He stood up, sure that the sniper was gone from the hilltop. Taking his whip from his belt, he snapped it at the remaining dogs, driving them away. Then he reached up and untied the scarf. Pressed his nose into it and inhaled deeply. Smelled wool and a hint of perfume like apple blossoms, and a little of the warm bread smell that women had. Inna.

While he admired the cleverness of the trap, he felt anger at allowing himself to be fooled by it. He coiled his whip and hung it on his belt. When he caught the Americans and Inna, he would use the whip to strip the skin from their bodies. Until then he looked forward to taking out some of his frustrations while questioning that young fool, Dmitri.

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