David Robbins - War of the Rats - A Novel of Stalingrad

And look there, in the notch. Presto. Just when my patience was wearing thin. There’s a helmet. Is there a head beneath it, or is it just a helmet on a stick? It moves the way a man moves, smoothly. I think there is a head beneath that helmet, a head that’s alive. For the moment, anyway, it’s alive. I’m going to put a bullet through it. I’ll turn that head into a skeleton key to unlock this casket I’ve been lying in. It’s my wish granted.

And what of the cunning little tunnel low and to the right? Is there another head waiting for me there? Move the reticle down, to the right, let the crosshairs crawl over the stones. There it is. The tunnel. Shiny, brass. Still glowing. Look close. No, no one home. But I know someone is there, waiting just out of sight. Now, Heinz, go back to the helmet in the notch. How long has this one been there? Does it matter? He’s there now and I am here. I am also there, with him, my eyes touching his helmet like his own skin. Stay there another few seconds, clever little Russian. I am stiffening in my coils, girding to strike. I’ll shoot the one in the notch first, the high target. Pull! Then I’ll haul back the bolt and swing low for the mortar shell. Mark! I’ll send off two shots, just so. Whether the Rabbit is in front of one or the other won’t matter. Any head in either place is going to pop like a dropped melon. Look to the head in the notch first. He’s bold, this one, with the sun at his back, moving his helmet in and out of my sight, sliding in and out of my crosshairs. He can’t see me. No reflection comes from my hole; I’m wearing darkness like the new black uniform I’ll wear in Berlin. What’s he looking at? He seems to be… there, that’s the barrel of a rifle resting at the bottom of the notch. He’s looking to my left. He thinks I’m over there. A shot! He just fired at that bunker. Idiot. He thinks I’m a fool to be in there. Do they think there’s no Thorvald? Like there’s no Rabbit? Listen to the sound of his rifle shot, aimed at an empty bunker, a waste. All of this is a waste. Well, die Russian, in the bottom of the notch. Move in one more time and stay there, let me put the brand of these thin lines across your helmet like a cross over your grave. But first, Heinz, quick! Take one practice swing from the notch down to the tunnel. Just like the trap range. Start high. Pull! Now the bolt! Back, forward, speed and balance. Now swing low, to the right, there! Perfect. Mark!

Wait. What is this? Yes, yes, yes. There is someone home in that tunnel now. A circle of glass sitting on top of a black dot. That’s a scope and a rifle looking this way, into my darkness. So. They’ve finally figured out my hiding place. And they’re getting ready. That shot at the bunker was clearly another fake to confuse me. Well, my friend in the tunnel, hold yourself there. Don’t move from behind your scope. I will clear up all confusion in another few moments.

That scope in the tunnel is watching, waiting for me to fire first. That is the Rabbit looking through the mortar shell, I’m sure of it. Pleased to meet you at last, Russian supersniper. Just in time to say goodbye. Poetic, really, and heroic in a way; it depends on how the story is told later.

Perhaps you’re hoping to spot my muzzle flash when I shoot out the head in the notch, Rabbit. Perhaps. That’s likely to be your plan. But will you see me here in my darkness? No. You’ll have to make a blind shot, a perfect shot, guided only by a pop of blue light, lit and gone in a fraction of an instant. I don’t believe you have that brand of skill. You are more the stalking hunter, the visceral, faithful, stupid man of nature than you are a trained and practiced marksman.

This, then, is the finale of our duet, Rabbit. I’ll tell you what: I’ll make it into a race. I’ll even take a handicap. Here are the rules: If by miraculous luck you’re looking in the exact place when I kill your companion with my first shot, I’ll show myself to you with my muzzle flash. You’ll then have about three seconds to find my head in the darkness before I swing low to find yours in the light. The fastest hands, the clearest eye, and the best shot wins. Wins all.

Ready, Zaitsev? I, Heinz von Krupp Thorvald, the German super-sniper, will now display for you what is truly meant by “one man, one bullet” twice over. Pull! The high notch. Mark! The low tunnel.

It’s a contest you cannot win, Rabbit.

Now, little helmets in my sights. It’s time for Nikki and me to board our flight home. Wings and coffee.

First, the high target. The helmet in the notch.

Let the pulse ease.

The crosshairs. Still. Black. Sharp.

There’s a beauty to this.

The target waits. It beckons the bullet, dead center.

Die now, first helmet. The high target.

Pull!

Loud. I pulled the trigger.

The bullet was true.

He’s up. There he is.

A man. His arms are spread. He’s fallen.

Why did he jump up like that? Strange. He should have gone straight down, crumpled. I know it was a hit.

Heinz! Forget him! The second target. The tunnel.

Find it. Move!

Yank back the bolt. Smooth. Fast. Ram it home.

Swing, swing down, right and low.

Now find the Hare. Find his gleaming tunnel.

Where is he? Find him! Fast!

Too much movement. Damn it!

Where is he?

How much time has elapsed? Too much!

Seconds. Only seconds, Heinz.

Stay calm. He can’t see you. Find him.

Stop! There’s the mortar shell.

There’s his scope, with his soft eye behind it.

The low target. Ease the pulse.

The crosshairs. The beauty.

Mark.

I am finished.

ZAITSEV LAY ON THE GROUND, STOMACH DOWN, HIS feet spread behind him for balance.

He slid only the first centimeter of the Moisin-Nagant’s barrel into the brass casing he’d worked into the bottom of the wall the night before. This was today’s trick, a German ploy from the slopes of Mamayev Kurgan. Zaitsev hoped that after dueling for four days, Thorvald would not be vigilant enough to spot this small opening. It had taken him hours of chipping away at the stones to make the shaft for the mortar shell. Kulikov had lent him inspiration, working silently beside him through the cold night. Kulikov’s task was to cut a V-shaped notch into the wall with his trenching tool, twenty meters to Zaitsev’s left. Neither man exchanged a word until both jobs were completed.

It was a simple idea. Draw the Headmaster’s fire with a feint. The gash in the wall was calculated to be so obvious it would be spotted by the Headmaster as soon as the morning light was full enough over the park. This would lock in Thorvald’s attention to keep him from blundering onto the mortar shell at the base of the wall to his right. In that small tunnel, pointed directly into his lair, lay the true sting of this day’s tactic, the Hare’s rifle.

Zaitsev’s hope was that if he was staring straight into the darkness beneath the metal when the Headmaster fired at Kulikov, he might spot the muzzle flash. If so, he would risk a blind shot at the flash point. If he missed, he would scare Thorvald out of his position and the duel would surely start over in a different location in the city. As unpleasant a result as that would be, it couldn’t be helped. One man, one bullet? It sounded good. But Thorvald was not just a man. He was a killer ghost. It was best to seize on the first, and probably only, opportunity when it presented itself, even if the shot was less than certain. The hunt for the Headmaster had taken several days and lives; it might also take several bullets.

The sun was high now and favored Zaitsev’s position, perhaps only for another hour. It’s time to move, he thought. The Headmaster will expect something from us while the light is out of the east. Zaitsev laid his cheek on the cool wooden stock. He crept his eye up to the scope, creating as little motion as possible. He swung the crosshairs to the metal sheet, which lay on a pile of bricks. He raised his cheek a millimeter, lowering the center of the cross to the black depth between the bricks, into the dark den of the Headmaster.