David Healey - Red Sniper

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.

In northern Russia, on the cusp of winter, the daylight hours lasted slightly longer than the flavor in a stick of chewing gum.

Cole and Vaccaro reunited with the others in the final waning hour of daylight. Cole was pleased to see that they had put some distance between themselves and the Russian soldiers. He and Vaccaro had only managed to catch up by maintaining a steady trot. His legs sure as hell could feel that.

As if the day hadn’t had drama enough, the weather took a turn.

Just before dark, ice pellets began peppering their faces. Stinging and cold. The ice turned to snow. Along with the snow came the wind. They wrapped up their faces and covered their ears so that just their eyes looked out from between layers of damp wool flecked with ice. Still, the cold and the snow managed to sift in.

Vaska’s dog stopped, perked up his pointy ears, and growled. They thought at first that Buka sensed the Russian dogs were back on their trail. Then they heard the distant howl carried on the wind.

There came another howl. And another. The sound cut through the snow and wind. It was hard to say where the howls were coming from, but it was clear that the wolves were on the move.

Honaker looked around at the growing darkness. “What the hell is that?”

“Wolves,” Cole said. He paused to listen. Something deep in him thrilled at the sound, even though it represented danger. Cole had never seen a wolf. The had long since been hunted to extinction in the Appalachians.