reading that he was running northeast. If he kept going, he d
reach the coastal road north of Rio Grande. He was taking a risk,
since this direction meant he would have to skirt the northern
perimeter of the airfield. Well, they wouldn t be expecting him
anywhere near there, would they? More crucial, he had two ob-
stacles to cross: a main road and the Rio Grande itself.
He didn t know why he d set his sights on the coast, and if Jay
was headed for Chile so be it. Jay would wait for him an hour or
so at the ERV, then move off. Bloody good luck to him, too.
The bastard.
Reeve went over the rise on all fours, keeping low in case
there were any nasty surprises waiting for him. But the Argentine
bombing had done him a distinct favor by clearing out all the
patrols. He scurried down the other side of the escarpment, slid-
ing over loose rocks and pebbles. It didn t seem to be man-made.
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Blood Hunt
It wasn t a quarry or a dump for unwanted stone and shale, it was
more like the scree Reeve had come across on the glacial slopes
of the Scottish mountains. He ended up going down the slope on
his arse. Just when he thought there was no end to the drop he
found himself on a road and crossed it hurriedly, remembering to
turn around first, in case they came hunting him with flashlights.
His footprints led back the way he d just come. The other side of
the track, he turned on his heels again, hit another uphill slope at
a run, and powered his way to the summit. There was gunfire
behind him, gunfire and rockets and grenades. The sky was full
of pink smoke, like a fireworks display. Gunpowder was in his
nostrils.
That stupid bastard.
There was someone over to his right, about seventy or eighty
yards away. It looked like Jay s silhouette.
Jay! Reeve called.
Jay caught his breath. Keep going! he said.
So Reeve kept going. And the sky above him turned brilliant
white. He couldn t believe it. Jay had let off a WP grenade.
White phos made a good smoke screen, but you didn t use the
stuff when you were already on your way out of a situation. Then
Reeve realized what Jay had done, and his stomach did a flip. Jay
had tossed the phos in Reeve s direction, and had headed off
the other way. He was using Reeve as his decoy, bringing the Ar-
gentine troops over in Reeve s direction while he made his own
escape.
Bastard!
And now Reeve could hear whistling, a human whistle. A
tune he recognized.
Row, row, row your boat,
Gently down the stream . . .
And then silence. Jay was gone. Reeve could have followed
him, but that would mean running straight through the smoke
into God knew what. Instead, he picked up his pace and kept
running the direction he d been going. He wondered how Jay
could have set off one way yet come back around to meet up with
Reeve. It was crazy, Jay s sense of direction wasn t that bad . . .
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Ian Rankin
Unless . . . unless he d come back on purpose. The enemy
had heard only one yelled voice, come under fire from just one
rifle, one grenade launcher.
They didn t know there were two men out here!
Reeve saw it all. The safest way out of this was to lie low and
let the enemy catch your partner. But that only worked if your
partner was caught. Jay was just making sure. Back at Hereford, it
would be one man s word against the other s . . . always suppos-
ing they both made it home.
Over the rise the ground seemed to level out, which meant he
could move faster, but also that he could be spotted more easily.
He thought he could hear rotors behind him: a chopper, maybe
more than one, probably with searchlights attached. He had
to reach cover. No, he had to keep moving, had to put some dis-
tance between himself and his pursuers. Relieved of his rucksack
and most of his kit, he felt as though weights had been taken off
his ankles. That thought made him think of shackles, and the
image of shackles gave him fresh impetus. His ears still seemed
blocked; there was still a hissing sound there. He couldn t hear
any vehicles, any commands or gunfire. Just rotors . . . coming
closer.
Much closer.
Reeve flung himself to the ground as the helicopter passed
overhead. It was over to his right and moving too quickly to pick
him out. This was a general sweep. They d carry on until they
were sure they were at a distance he couldn t have reached, then
they d come back, moving more slowly, hovering so the search-
light could play over the ground.
He needed cover right now.
But there was no cover. He loaded a grenade into the
launcher, got up, and started running again. The rifle was no
longer in both hands and held low in front of him: now it was in
his right hand, the safety off. It would take him a second to swing
the barrel into his other hand, aim, and fire.
He could see the beam of light ahead of him, waving in an arc
which would pick him out when the chopper was closer. Reeve
dropped to one knee and wiped sweat from his eyes. His knees
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Blood Hunt
hurt, they were stiff. The chopper was moving steadily now,
marking out a grid pattern. They weren t rushing things. They
were being methodical, the way Reeve would have done in their
situation.
When the helicopter was seventy-five yards in front of him
Reeve took aim, resting one elbow on his knee to steady himself.
As soon as the helicopter went into a hover, Reeve let go with the
grenade. He watched the bomb, like an engorged bullet, leave
the launcher and head into the sky, but he didn t wait to see the
result. He was running again, dipping to a protective crouch as
the sky overhead exploded in a ball of flame, rotor blades crum-
pling and falling to the ground. Something hot fell onto Reeve s
arm. He checked it wasn t phos. It wasn t just hot metal. It
stuck to his arm, and he had to scrape it off against the ground,
taking burning flesh with it.
Jesus Christ! he gasped. The helicopter had hit the ground
behind him. There was another explosion, which almost toppled
him. More flying metal and glass hit him. Maybe bits of bodies
were hitting him, too. He didn t bother looking.
His arm wasn t sore; the adrenaline and fear were taking care
of that for the moment, the best anesthetics on the planet.
He d been scared for a second, though, and what had scared
him most was the fear that the heat on his arm had been white
phos. The stuff was lethal it would have burned straight
through him, eating as it went.
Well, he thought, if Jay s smoke screen had hinted I was here,
the helicopter was an open fucking invitation.
He heard a motor, revving hard: a Jeep, probably on the track
he d crossed a few minutes back. If it unloaded men, then those
men would be that few minutes behind no more. No time to
stop, no time to slow. He didn t have time to pace himself, the
way he knew he should so he d have some idea how far he d trav-
eled when he got a chance to stop and recce. You did it by count-
ing the number of strides you took and multiplying by length of
stride. It was fine in training, fine when they told you about it in
a classroom . . .
But out here, it was just another piece of kit to be discarded.
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Ian Rankin
He had no idea where Jay was. The last he d seen of him was
vanishing behind all that thick white smoke, like a magician
doing a disappearing trick. Magicians always had trapdoors, and
that s what Reeve was looking for now a door he could disap-
pear through. There was a small explosion at his back. Maybe it
was the helicopter, maybe Jay launching another grenade, or the
enemy redoubling its bombardment.
Whatever it was, it was far enough behind him to be of little
concern. He couldn t hear the Jeep anymore. He wondered if [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]