Red Sniper

Toward nightfall, Barkov came to his senses again. As he regained consciousness, he was surprised by the simple fact that he was still breathing. In Stalingrad, he had seen men miraculously survive terrible wounds. Maybe he would be one of those lucky ones. He ate some snow and felt better.

The day stretched on toward dusk. In the gathering gloom on the taiga, he caught a glimpse of something moving. Maybe it was that ingrate Dmitri returning to help him, after all. Barkov felt a glimmer of hope. Another shape flicked past in the gloom. Maybe it was another group of soldiers, coming to find him.

Barkov heard something in the snow to his right, and turned painfully toward the sound.

A large gray wolf stood there, head down, studying Barkov with its deep brown eyes. Measuring him.

Barkov cursed at the wolf, and tried to crawl away. His arms worked all right, but he felt like he was dragging a sack of broken crockery that had been dredged in warm lard—the sack being the rest of his body.

The wolf followed in the wake of Barkov’s progress. Coming closer.

Panting from the effort, Barkov stopped trying to crawl. He reached for this whip, then remembered that it was no longer there. When the wolf was close enough, he shook a fist at it, driving the animal back.

“Son of a whore!”

The wolf retreated. But then another wolf appeared on its flank, and the first wolf advanced. Barkov couldn’t keep an eye on both of them.

Barkov swung his fist again, but his strength was depleted. Propped up on one elbow, he flailed weakly at the wolf.

The two wolves moved closer, growling, jowls curled back from sharp white teeth. He raised his arm to protect himself.

The wolf darted forward and grabbed his arm. The second wolf went for the bloody wound near his hip.

This time, Barkov screamed.

CHAPTER 33

Whitlock and the others spent the rest of the day on the move. Having lost so much weight in the Gulag camp, he couldn’t seem to get warm and his teeth chattered constantly, giving him a headache. For Inna, each step was a small agony, but like a good Russian, she did not complain. Honaker and Vaska plodded along silently. Vaccaro bitched enough for everyone else.

From time to time, they looked over their shoulders for Cole, but there was no sign of him. They had heard the rifle shots in the distance, and then nothing but the Russian wind and the squeak of snow under their boots. The silence revealed nothing about Cole’s fate.

The sun was low and shadows stretched toward the horizon when they spotted the rescue party waiting for them at the Finnish border. Two Jeeps and what looked like six men. Through his rifle scope, Vaccaro saw that they were clearly Americans. They were all armed, weapons ready, as if they knew the Russians were just out of sight.

“I’ll be damned,” Vaccaro said, lowering his rifle. “There’s a sight for sore eyes.”

“I can’t believe it,” Whitlock said. “We made it!”

Inna made a happy sound.

They picked up the pace, all of them trotting now. Inna was limping as she ran, but she didn’t let that stop her. After days spent crossing the taiga, having run out of food—having fought off wolves, for God’s sake—it was hard not to be thrilled at the sight of the rescue party. Only Honaker lagged behind, bringing up the rear.

Nobody noticed when he stopped and leveled his rifle at their backs.

“Hold it right there,” he said.

Something in the tone of voice stopped them in their tracks. They whirled around to see Honaker with his weapon aiming at them.

“Honaker, what the hell?” Vaccaro demanded.

“We can do this the easy way, or we can do this the hard way,” Honaker said, keeping the rifle pointed at them.

“Jesus, Honaker, we’re almost there. What the hell are you doing? We made it!”

“Is that what you think? That you made it? Drop your rifle, Vaccaro. Put your hands on your head. All of you.”

They had no choice. They did as they were told.

“What the hell is this about?” Vaccaro demanded. “What are you, some kind of Russian agent?”

The rifle didn’t waver. The four of them weren’t spread very far apart, so that Honaker covered them all easily with the weapon. “You don’t get it, do you? Bring our boys home! It sounds good, but it’s not that simple. Far from it. Nobody can let Whitlock here go back and tell the American public that the Russians are holding some of our men prisoner. The Russians are supposed to be our allies. How do you think that will make President Truman look?”

“Honaker, this is insane. Why did we go on this mission in the first place if we weren’t supposed to bring anyone home?”

“You can thank Senator Whitlock for that. The old man has clout. There was no stopping him. It was strictly a back channel operation. He was going to send somebody to spring his precious grandson from the Gulag camp no matter what, so I went along as insurance, just in case we actually made it.”

“Why did we cross all this territory? Why did you let us get this far?”