Kara’s Game. Gordon Stevens

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СКАЧАТЬ river, a kilometre and a half from the town, was thin and rickety, and swinging slightly in the night, the snow ghostly in the PNGs. The river beneath was cold and grey and running fast, but the bridge itself might be wired. Finn knelt and felt carefully around and under the first sections, the others covering him from the shadows. There were no wires. He nodded and ran across, allowing for the swing of the bridge, then slipped into the dark and covered the next man. There was no cold now, just the adrenalin. The last man came over and they turned up the slope.

      The sites were a hundred metres apart, the support huts fifty metres back from them. Himself and Steve to take the first, Finn indicated, Ken and Jim to deal with the second. Knife job, no noise. Because if the guns simply stopped firing the soldiers in the back-up hut might think the gunners on duty had received a change of order, whereas if there was small-arms fire they might investigate. The guns were still pounding. One minute – they set their watches on count down.

      Twenty minutes, Finn had said, therefore five minutes to go. The bastards had his range now and were pounding the shells in. ‘You ready?’ Janner asked Max. He’d discarded almost everything, destroyed the radios. Four minutes to go. ‘It’s going to hurt like buggery,’ he told Max, ‘but it’s the only way.’ It’s going to hurt me as well, because I don’t know where my head is going and the pain is in my legs again and my chest feels like it doesn’t exist.

      He ducked as the next round came in.

      ‘Ready, Max?’

      Christ, Max was a mess, his legs hanging disjointed and his face and body mangled as hell.

      ‘Ready, Janner.’

      He half-lifted Max so that his body was across his shoulders and Max could still carry his Heckler, still use it if he needed, and began counting since the last round. A minute between rounds now, never more than a minute and twenty seconds. In the distance the other guns and mortars pounded the town. Thirty seconds since the last round. Forty-five. Minute gone. He waited for the next incoming round. Finn would have done it. Finn and the boys wouldn’t let him down. One minute twenty, one thirty.

      Go – he heard himself shout, heard himself scream.

      He was out of the bunker and trying to run. Max bouncing on his shoulders and telling him he was okay. Up the slope of the hill fifty metres, then turn along the contour line – he had worked it out on the map, knew exactly what he had to do, drummed it into his head so he would do it automatically. Christ, Max was heavy. Christ, his legs and his chest and his head were suddenly hurting. He was running slower now, little more than a stagger. Control it, he told himself, keep it calm and measured, just get up the first fifty metres and you’re okay. Still no incoming rounds, still the wonderful blissful silence. Except for the pounding in his head and the heavy metallic rasping in his lungs. Thanks, Finn, thanks, lads. He turned right, along the hillside, the woods green in the night sights and his feet slipping on the ice.

      ‘You okay?’ he asked the man on his back. ‘Okay,’ Max told him. The rounds going into the town were like echoes in his head, the trees around him and the slope of the hillside making it difficult to move. He was walking now, holding on to the instructions Finn had given him and the directions he had instilled into his brain. Can’t be far now, halfway there already, probably more. He was no longer walking, was on his knees, forcing himself forward. Bit like selection: when you think you’ve had it, that’s the point you start really going. Bit like counter-interrogation: get your story fixed in your head and stick to it. So he was going well, going great guns, was getting there.

      He was bent forward now, was on his hands and knees, the pain tearing at his chest and the ice and trees cutting into him. Don’t think about it, don’t think about anything. Just keep going. Finn and the lads will be waiting at the RV, and the chopper will already be airborne. Nice pint of beer at the end, nice fag to go with it. He was crying now, on his face and his front, reaching forward with one hand and grabbing anything, pulling himself and Max on, Heckler still in the other hand. Doing well, doing great, you old bugger. Christ he must have passed the RV point a hundred years ago. He reached forward again and grabbed the tree stump, pulled himself and Max up to it, lifted his face from the ice and reached forward again, felt for the next thing he could, pulled himself forward again. Tell Max to mind his legs on the stump, part of his mind warned him, tell Max to keep his legs clear.

      

      The shelling on the town was continuing but the shelling on the hillside had stopped. Jovan’s fever was burning now, his breathing shallow and his lips moving, as if he was praying. Kara knelt by him and wiped his face and hands. Don’t worry, she told him, everything will be all right soon; you’ll be okay soon. She wet the flannel and held it against his lips. Heard the scream.

      Like an animal caught in a trap. Like a fox when its leg is torn off. Except that it wasn’t an animal. It was a man.

      Someone’s hurt – her mind was numb with the cold and the shelling and the shock. Someone’s been hit by a shell. Except there hadn’t been a shell before the scream. Her mind was still numb. It’s all right, she told Jovan, everything is fine. She dipped the flannel into the water again and cooled his face again.

      Adin – it came out of the darkness, out of the black. Adin was outside. Adin had left the front line and was coming home. Adin was hurt, was trying to reach her and Jovan even though he was wounded.

      Not Adin, it couldn’t be Adin, because Adin wouldn’t come that way. But could she take the risk …

      She smiled at the boy and kissed him. ‘I’m going to get something.’ She wiped his forehead again. ‘I’ll be back in two minutes to tell you a story.’

      She pulled on her coat and laced her boots. Made sure Jovan was comfortable and opened the door, slipped through it and closed it quickly so as not to let the cold in. Crouched in the dark and listened for the sound, listened for her husband.

      ‘Sorry, Janner.’ Max’s voice shuddered as his body was shuddering.

      ‘All right, Max. No probs. Almost there.’ The shells were coming in again, falling on the old town, falling near them. He was hardly moving now. One hand, the hand with the gun, trying to reach out and the other holding Max’s wrist and trying to pull him. The night sights were getting in the way, but he and Max needed them to see where they were going. Fuck me, part of his mind was saying, the places you take me. Ten green bottles, part of his brain was singing as he had sung with his wife during the last stages of labour when their first child had been born. Ten green bottles hanging on the wall, and if one green bottle should accidentally fall. You’re losing it, Janner; stop thinking about Jude, stop thinking about the kids. Because if you do you’re finished, you’re on the way out. The shrapnel was cutting through his chest now and the shells were bursting round him, his head was down and his face was scraping on the ice. You’re making it, he told himself. Just keep it up, just keep going.

      The shell was coming in. He heard it explode. Heard the other explosion which it detonated. Oh Christ, he thought. Oh Jesus bloody Christ. I’m in a minefield.

      Kara heard Adin, saw Adin. Dark and black against the snow and the ice. The shells and the noise and the hell pounding down on him, pounding down on them both. She was lying on the ground, wriggling forward trying to protect herself from the bombs and the guns. Adin, she whispered, no noise coming out. It’s me, Adin; please move, Adin. Don’t be dead, Adin. The shell was coming in, close to them. She ignored it, ignored everything.

      Saw him.

      Christ the pain in his head and his legs and his chest. Forget the pain, pain only exists when you acknowledge it. Got to get to the lads, can’t let the lads down after СКАЧАТЬ