Kara’s Game. Gordon Stevens

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ have nothing further to say.’

      And then he had sat down. And no one, not even the Opposition front bench, had moved even a finger to ask him another question.

      

      Tesanj was spread below him.

      Most people were still keeping away from the areas known to be exposed to rifle fire, those that didn’t still darting furtively between doorways. A few hours of peace, then they’d come out, though.

      Valeschov shifted his position slightly and studied the town, fixed in his mind the streets and the places they would be entering and leaving and where, therefore, they would be exposed to him. The food centres, of course, the radio station, the hospital.

      

      All night, after they had returned from the graveyard on the hillside, Kara and Adin had slumped together in the corridor, occasionally talking, though not often, most of the time staring into the black and trying to struggle back from the abyss which engulfed them.

      A nurse brought them tea, a mug each, made sure their hands were firmly gripping the handles, sat with them without speaking before she was needed elsewhere.

      Perhaps they should have begun the journey back to Maglaj last night, after they had laid little Jovan to rest; perhaps it was right that they had delayed till this morning. There was, after all, a ceasefire, and the shells and mortars had stopped.

      They finished the tea, fastened the backpack Adin had brought with him, and began to leave. Thanked the doctors and nurses who were on duty, and asked for their thanks to be passed to those who were resting. Then they left the hospital and stepped into the cold, shuffled rather than walked down the street.

      An old couple leaving the hospital – Valeschov targeted them through the crosswires. At least a couple who looked old, but nowadays you couldn’t tell. Range four hundred metres, wind speed not enough to worry about. He followed them, played with them, as they walked down the street. But played with them without them knowing, and that was the problem.

      Interesting job, being a sniper, gave you such power. Plus the decision of life and death over them, almost like being God, really. Like being the emperor in the old Roman games, thumb up or thumb down. But for you to have that power people needed to at least know you were there. Only then were they afraid, and that was what gave you the power.

      And that was the problem today.

      The old couple, for example. Hadn’t been his enemies before the conflict and wouldn’t be after. But they weren’t afraid of him, because they didn’t know he was there. And that irked. He didn’t need to kill them, perhaps didn’t even want to kill them. This morning, anyway, because last night he’d eaten well and slept better than he’d done for days. But unless they knew he was there they weren’t playing the game. Nobody was. And there was only one way people could be persuaded to play the game.

      ‘You want to see Jovan before we leave?’ Adin suggested. ‘You want to say goodbye to him, tell him we’ll be back?’

      Because we will be back, because we’ll never leave him.

      They were tight together, holding and supporting each other.

      ‘Yes,’ Kara told him. ‘I’d like to see Jovan before we leave.’

      ‘Me, too.’ Adin tried to smile.

      The man or the woman, Valeschov wondered. It was like tossing a coin at the start of a football match, see who decided which way they’d play. Nothing personal, of course. Just part of the game. And the one thing he liked was the game. So after he’d killed them, or at least killed one of them, everybody would know he was there. And after that people would play the game again. He moved the rifle slightly, swung from the man to the woman then back to the man. The woman, he decided, and swung back again.

      Kara heard the shout and turned. The doctor was standing in the doorway, his white coat flapping slightly and his hand raised to them. ‘Good luck.’

      The man – Valeschov changed his mind. He swung the Dragunov and squeezed the trigger.

      ‘Thank you,’ Kara began to say and heard the crack, flinched and turned. Adin was falling backwards slightly, his fingers clutched at his chest and the pain and fear and bewilderment frozen on his face.

      No … she was screaming, no sound coming out. Please God, no.

      Adin was already crumpled on the ground. She crouched beside him, held his head in one arm and the hands clutching his chest with the other.

      The doctor ran – away from the safety of the door and down the street. Sniper, someone shouted at him and grabbed him into a doorway. ‘It’s all right,’ Kara was whispering to Adin, to herself. ‘The doctor’s coming, soon you’ll be okay.’ He was trying to push her away, trying to tell her to seek shelter. She was pulling him, dragging him across the ice towards a doorway. Someone grabbed her and pulled her inside, someone else hauling Adin behind her and slamming the door shut as the sniper aimed again. The room was dark and cold, the people inside staring at her. The doctor came in through a door at the back and knelt down, pulled Adin’s coat open and checked the entry area in the chest, then nodded to the others to move Kara from the room. She was screaming, protesting; they held her and dragged her out. Only then did the doctor turn Adin over and take off his pack. The back of the coat was shredded and oozing thick blood where the bullet had exited. Christ what a mess, someone whispered. Still a pulse – the doctor checked. ‘Help me get him to the hospital.’ Three of them lifted Adin, and squeezed through the door at the rear, ran through the side streets – two holding his arms and one his legs – and into a door at the side of the hospital.

      Kara ran with them, followed them through the door and down the corridor, heard them shouting for people to get out of the way. They turned left then left again, into an operating theatre. The doctor was already giving instructions and a nurse was cutting through Adin’s clothing, more doctors and nurses arriving. One of them took Kara by the shoulder and led her away, closed the door behind her and sat with her. Isn’t this the man who led the digging for the children? another asked. Didn’t he lose his son yesterday?

      Stay alive, Kara prayed. The panic swept over her in waves: the cold and the fear and the sudden abyss.

      Pulse, the first doctor pleaded; come on, where are you? Not much they could do about the wound anyway, they all knew, hardly anything they could do to counter the internal damage. Doesn’t matter, the doctor whispered to himself. I can do it, we can do it. Come on, my friend, he urged Adin. For Chrissake come on. No pulse – he was still checking for it. Perhaps there hadn’t been anyway, perhaps he’d felt it because he wanted to. Perhaps the pulse he’d felt was the last draining of Adin’s blood from his body.

      Don’t leave me, my dear precious husband. Don’t leave me ever, but don’t leave me at the moment I need you the most.

      Come on, the doctor was still saying, almost shouting. Don’t die. You haven’t died. You’re okay, you’re going to be okay. For Christ’s sake don’t give up, don’t stop your heart beating or your lungs breathing. For God’s sake help me to help you.

      Not you, my wonderful Adin. Not you who was such a good father, such a great man. Not you who gave so much to so many. Who loved the flowers in spring and the snow in winter.

      A nurse was still tying the lead surgeon’s face СКАЧАТЬ