“We are looking for Stephan Baronas and his daughter, or the man Borowsky.”
The old man shook his head. “They never say their names. They come and they go. They are strong young men and should be in the army or working on BAM. BAM? Is that the railroad? We had a railroad when I was a boy. It was down by the Amur.” He shook his head. “I never liked it. Too close to China! Those yellow bastards, one cannot trust them! I wouldn’t trust them!”
“Baronas,” Zamatev said patiently. “We were told he lived in that cabin.”
“We are alone. Alone! I do not want to be alone! I want to talk! And there are only those strangers. They are hooligans, all of them! Hooligans!”
“Did you know Stephan Baronas?” Zamatev was patient.
“They come and they go. Sometimes they speak, sometimes they do not.” He puckered his brow and squinted. “Baronas? Is that a Russian name? I think not.”
Zamatev turned angrily. “Peshkov? Do you know this man? Who is he?”
Peshkov was sweating. “I do not know him. He is here. He has always been here. There’s been no reason—”
“You brought me here to find the American. You spoke of this man Baronas. There is no such man here or the daughter. You have lied to us.”
“No! No, please! I have not lied! They were here. There were many of them, but they are gone!”
“That place,” Zamatev pointed, “has not been lived in, probably, for months!”
Alekhin sat on a fallen log and watched. Of course it had been lived in, but they had not asked him. It had been lived in not long since, and only a clumsy effort made to conceal the fact. He did not care about all this. It was a waste of time. Soon he would be on his way, and he would find this American. He knew where he was going now and knew the farther he went the easier he would be to catch. There was no hurry. He would get him in his own good time. Meanwhile this crazy old man was making a fool of them. And if they tortured him they would get no more from him.
Alekhin was contemptuous of Peshkov, and he was pleased to see him embarrassed.
Obviously the people here had scattered and might return again when things quieted down. What interested him was where the American had lived, certainly not here.
He got up and walked across the small clearing. If he had visited the Baronas family, then he would have left from there. He stood in front of that shelter and looked around. After a bit he walked past the corner of the place and looked up through the trees.
Gathering fuel, they had broken the dead branches from the lower part of the aspen trunks. They had picked up whatever had fallen to the ground, too.
There were old tracks under the trees. Some big square heels he recognized as tracks made by Peshkov. Smaller, older tracks evidently left by the woman. He moved up through the trees. Peshkov’s tracks were days old but had not been disturbed. Nothing had been up here since.
Alekhin stopped and studied the ground. Faint smears over Peshkov’s tracks here. He studied them thoughtfully, then went on. Peshkov had stopped, flatfooted, his two big feet side by side, the tracks blurred a little as though he had moved. Something had stopped him right about here, stopped him abruptly. There were smudges behind him. He walked about, came back to the tracks, and studied them some more. Somebody had slipped up behind Peshkov and stopped him. A knife in his back; or a gun. The American probably had no gun and did not even want one. He could have taken the AK-47 from the soldier he had killed at the helicopter, but he had left it.
No ammunition in it, of course, but that was not it. The American wanted to kill silently. A gun was noisy. It attracted too much attention.
Why had he not killed Peshkov? He was weak, this American. He should have killed him and just carried the body off and dumped it. With a man like Peshkov, who would care?
He worked his way up through the trees. The American was wearing something soft on his feet. What they called moccasins. His shoes had worn out, and he had used the skin of an animal to make shoes.
It was not an easy trail to follow and it was many days old, but nobody had been this way before. He lost the trail, found it again, and then found the cave.
A nice place. Oh, a very nice place! Spots of grease from cooking left on the rock, the ashes of his fires. Very small fires of dry wood. Very little smoke, not much light from the fire. Yet this place would have been warm.
Alekhin went outside and stood looking around. He could hear the mutter of voices from what they were calling the village. The American would have wanted a way out, a way to leave here quickly if necessary.
Alekhin took his time. He was learning something about this man he was following. Men and animals form habits. They have certain ways of doing things, and once you have visited a camp or two you always know how that man will camp again. You will know what he looks for, how he builds his fires. And this one was cautious.
Alekhin was pleased with the American. The man used his head. Now what would the next step be? He would have wanted an escape route. He would have wanted a second camp and perhaps a third. If the American had been here long, he would have prepared for escape.
When he came upon the opening in the trees, the hair prickled on the back of his neck. Ah? So! He found a faint smudge here, a piece of a track there, and he turned to look back.
Shrewd! The American had chosen a way of escape he knew. It was not straight away; it curved back on itself, but always gave a smooth way to go. He had used this way at night; that was why there were any tracks at all.
Slowly Alekhin was building a store of knowledge about the American. If he had planned such an escape route once, he would do so again. It would be something to remember.
Alekhin turned and walked back to the village. The soldiers were assembling.
Zamatev was irritable. He looked up angrily. “Where have you been?”
“I look about. He was here. I must know what he did here.”
“That old fool knows nothing! Peshkov has lied, I think, hoping for a reward.”
“He did not lie. He is a fool and a traitor, but he did not lie.”
“The American was here?”
“He was.” He jerked his head. “I found his place. It is a good place.” As Zamatev started, Alekhin said, “There is nothing there.”
Zamatev stopped. “You looked around?”
“He wears moccasins now. His boots wore out, so he wears moccasins.”
“Moccasins? Where could he get them? We must find—”
“He made them,” Alekhin interrupted. “He is an Indian. Indians can make soft shoes. He can make clothes to wear. He can live off the country.”
“Can you track him?”
“Of course. No need to track from here. I will go to where the helicopter fell. Track him from there.”
Together they walked back, passing the soldiers, who fell in behind them. One, a noncommissioned officer, saluted. “Shall we burn the places, sir?”
“Let them be,” Zamatev said. “They will come back. Then we will get them.”
When they parted, Alekhin took a helicopter and four men to the site of the crash. “Stay behind me,” he told them, “and stay awake. Keep your eyes open. Maybe we see him.”
“You don’t think he’s still around?”
Alekhin stared at the soldier from his heavy-lidded eyes until the soldier began to sweat and back up. “We do not know what he is doing. We do not guess. This man is dangerous.” He stared at them. “One man died here, and two died up there. He is but one man, but three are dead and a helicopter smashed and burned.”
He looked at them with contempt. “Keep your eyes open or you will be dead, too.”
He cast about for tracks. The Indian was a tall man with a fairly long stride. If you found one track, you looked the approximate length of that stride for another track. This American did not always choose the easy way. He often stepped on stones. He did not have to try to be careful. He was always careful in the woods. It was his nature.
By nightfall he
had learned more about the American’s methods of travel.
He did not stop to hunt, so he had a store of food. He had smoked and dried meat back there. Alekhin had not found the rack, but he had found holes where it had been set into the earth. He was carrying a pack. Alekhin could tell that from the increased depth of the tracks since leaving the cave. It was very slight, but it was there.
At the sight of the attack where Joe Mack had killed the soldier, Alekhin had correctly deduced the reason. There was no cover for a man on the ground. When the soldier turned around, he would have been seen.
That night around their fire, Alekhin went over every move in his mind. To follow a trail one had to decide what it was the pursued wanted to do.
To escape? Of course, but to what? To where? It was unlikely the American had friends, so his one object would be to get away, to get out of Siberia, to return to his home. Alekhin had never believed in the border of China. This man was an Indian. He would follow the old migration route, the way the ancient hunters had gone when they followed game into America.
Of course, they had not known they were going to America or even from one continent to another. They had simply gone hunting and followed the game to where they could kill them. And they had continued to follow the game.
The shortest way across the water was at the Bering Strait. He would choose that way. Zamatev had never believed that, but then Zamatev was a city man, a man of the streets and towns.
The American was an Indian. He would go where the game was because that was how he must live. He dared not go to the towns because he did not know the language.
Zamatev could do it his way. Alekhin had no interest in towns.
*
ZAMATEV DREW THE cork from the bottle and filled two glasses. “I came as quickly as possible,” he said.
“I am sorry. When I sent word, I thought they would be there. When we located the village, I did not believe it would be empty.”
“Somebody talked,” Zamatev surmised.
She lifted her glass. “Perhaps. More likely they just got in a panic and fled. I think the American had already gone.”
“Alekhin has his trail. He will get him now.”
“Maybe.”
“You do not believe it?”
“Who knows? This one is different.” She looked across the table at him. “You fly back tomorrow?”
“I must.”
“I shall fly to Magadan. Something might be done from there.”
He nodded. “Grigory is there. He’s a good one.”
“I was thinking of him.” She paused as if uncertain of what to say next. “Shepilov is there, also.”
Zamatev’s glass came down hard on the table. “Shepilov is in Magadan? Why?”
She shrugged. “That is why I am going. He knows something or believes he does. You know how it is with him. He does not move if he does not have to. Something important would be needed to take him to Magadan. He does not like the place.”
“How do you know that?”
“I worked for him. Don’t you remember? It was gossip in the bureau. He did not like Magadan, but he had been posted there once, long ago.”
“So he will have friends there?” Zamatev was thoughtful. “Perhaps he has some word from them? Is that what you believe?”
“Grigory will know.”
“Yes. Do you think he is loyal to me?”
“Oh, yes. He has told me so, and I know he hates Shepilov, as much as he can hate anyone. It isn’t in him, you know.”
“Hate clouds the mind. It is better to have no emotion when it is work. Do what needs to be done, and do it coolly.”
After she was gone he took out the map again. The net was drawing tighter now. They knew where he was. Not exactly—that would come later—but they knew where he had been, and Alekhin was following his trail. Kyra would be in Magadan, and Grigory would know what to do. Suvarov was in Nel’kan, even closer.
But what had taken Shepilov to Magadan? Shepilov would not move from his comforts unless he was sure of something. But Makatozi could not be that far along, not unless he had stolen a plane or caught a ride on one.
Of course, Shepilov would dearly love to capture the American. Zamatev could just see the smug satisfaction on his face.
Again Zamatev stared at the map. What a fool he had been not to keep the man in irons. Now all he had done, all he lived for, all he hoped to be, depended on capturing the American.
He stared at the map, stared at the area where he must be. Stared as if his very gaze would make Makatozi emerge from the map in a living presence.
He had to have him. There was no other way. He had to take the American.
There was no time.
Why had Shepilov gone to Magadan?
Why?
Chapter 23
*
ALEKHIN WAS IN no hurry. Siberia was a wide land, and the American was walking. To pursue a man effectively, it is best to begin with his thinking.
How did he travel? Where did he sleep? Was he skilled on a trail? What places did he choose when he wished to hide?
What did he eat? If he hunted, how did he hunt? How expert a woodsman was he? How did he cross streams? What did he do to avoid encounters with people? What did he know of the country across which he traveled? What was his eventual destination? Was he liable to alter that destination? What did he plan to do when he arrived there?
These were questions Alekhin asked himself, among many others. Bit by bit, picking up pieces of the trail here and there, he was learning to know Major Joseph Makatozi, and he was enjoying the acquaintance.
In the first place the man was good. Alekhin had never trailed an Indian before, although he had tracked down a few of his own people or other Siberians. The trouble was they were becoming too civilized. The Yakuts, Ostyaks, and others were losing their wilderness skills. They were working in factories, becoming soldiers, living in towns where they could see films and go to places where they could dance the new dances. Only a few of the old ones understood the forest anymore.
Alekhin was not given to introspection. He did not examine his own motives. He was given a job to do and he did it. What became of the man after he was caught he had no idea and did not care. He was a member of the Party, but he did not think about it. He knew little of the philosophy of communism and cared less. Marx and Engels were but names to him. Lenin was one with whom he could identify, Stalin even more so.
These men and their ideas and accomplishments were far from him. He cared about the forest, but only as a place to live. He did not object to the killing of game or the cutting down of trees. He had no knowledge or thought of the future. The possibility of there being a time when there was no more forest was something he could not imagine. It had always been here; it would always be here. The idea that man could not exist on a planet without forests was completely foreign to him. That trees remove carbon dioxide from air and return oxygen to it would have only made him blink or shrug. The idea was something he could not comprehend and with which he was unconcerned. He gathered wood for his fires, he killed animals to eat, and beyond that he gave them no thought.
For all city dwellers he had only contempt. He had no sense of inferiority concerning anybody or anything. There were spirits in the wilderness, in the trees and mountains, he knew that. Occasionally he appeased them in some minor way. He respected them without thinking of them.
He was as elemental as a beast. He had the strength of a gorilla and the movements of a cat. He thought no more of exercise or training than does a grizzly bear or a tiger. His strength had been born into him, and he used it constantly.
When Zamatev said he wanted the American alive, Alekhin was only half listening. Alive or dead did not matter, although it was often less trouble simply to kill them and save himself the trouble of getting them back to a highway or a railroad.
As for taking the American alive, Alekhin had his doubts. The American was revealing himself in his trail. He had also revealed
something of himself in the helicopter incident. The only puzzling question to Alekhin was why the American had not killed Peshkov. He’d had him cold.
Alekhin had read the tracks easily enough. The American had had him and let him go, and Peshkov had immediately informed on him. So the American was a bit of a fool.
Not entirely a fool. That would be dangerous thinking, but he had hesitated to kill.
Alekhin wasted no time thinking of motivations. One did what was necessary, and it had been necessary for the American to kill Peshkov.
The American would not be easily taken. Cornered, he would fight, and Alekhin would have to kill him.
He would have no choice.
Those soldiers were as much to protect the prisoner when captured as they were to assist him. So if necessary he might have to kill them, too.
On the third day after Joe Mack’s passing, Alekhin and his soldiers came to the shack of the big young woman with the blue eyes. She knew nothing, had seen nothing.
Her manner was brusque, and one of the soldiers did not like it. “I shall come back,” he said, “and question you further.”
“Bah!” she said contemptuously.
He started back, and Alekhin stopped him with a sharp order. “Do not be a fool! She would take your rifle from you and spank you with it. She cares nothing for you or your uniform.”
The soldier grumbled, and Alekhin said, “Look around you. This is where she lives. Could you live here? You would starve. You would die in the cold. Women like that you leave alone, or speak to politely, very politely.”
The soldier continued to mutter, and Alekhin said, “If we had the time I’d let you go back, just to see the fun. And if you continue to grumble, I’ll send you back.”
Alekhin found a camp on the slope of Mount Konus. A bed of spruce boughs, the remains of a small fire, a corner of a birchbark dish that had not quite burned, although left in the fire. On the side of the part of the dish that remained, he saw a tea leaf.
Novel 1986 - Last Of The Breed (v5.0) Page 18