"L'Amour, Louis - Last_of_the_Breed36" - читать интересную книгу автора (L'Amour Louis)

Last of the Breed
Chapter 36

When morning came, Joe Mack stood alone upon the mountain. His hair had grown long, and rather than try to cut it with his knife he had begun wearing it in two braids that hung down over his chest. All you need now, he told himself, is a necklace of bear claws.
His smile was grim as he studied the country below and about him. Yet his thoughts wandered, and he remembered the story of the Apache, the Indian Massai, who had been deported to Florida after Geronimo's surrender in 1886. He had escaped from the train after they had left St. Louis, and he had worked his way across country, returning to Arizona without being seen except by a friendly Indian to whom he revealed himself. Two thousand miles or more he had traveled, much of it through populated country. Nobody had ever known the whole story, but it had been a tale worth the telling.
In the old days the Apaches would have sung songs of his courage and his skills. Nowadays they did not sing anymore, and too many of the Indians were forgetting the old songs and the old stories. He knew many of them. His grandmother and his mother had told him the stories, and his white grandfather, too, who had known more of them than many of the Indians. He had lived close to the old men, and he knew the value of their songs and their stories. Many he had noted down; others he had simply repeated to Joe Mack when he was a small boy.
Below him was the vast gorge with its roaring river, rimmed with jagged rocks as if born from some surrealistic nightmare, rocks gnawed upon by wind and broken by expanding ice, sheets of rock and slabs of rock and crumbled rock underneath. Below the rim, the wild, wind-torn trees leaned with the prevailing winds and cast their dead branches like skeleton bones along the narrow ledges below.
He knew this land, knew it from his memories of Hell's Canyon, from the Snake and the Salmon rivers of Idaho. This was like them, but wilder, somehow different. More and more he felt himself turning back the leaves of time. Fading into dimness were his days of training as an officer, his years of flying, his neat uniforms, and before them the lessons learned in school. Now he was back to the mountains of his boyhood and his memories of the wild, free mountain life.
He had never been but superficially a civilized man. He knew that, and he knew he could, or thought he could, return to it. Now he did not know. He was a man of the wilderness, living as he had dreamed of living. His life was wild, hard, cold, and dangerous, yet he was ready for it.
"I may be the last Indian," he told himself aloud, "who will live in the old way, think the old thoughts."
He had not chosen his enemies. They had chosen him. They had ripped him away from the life he had been living, to be used, drained, and cast aside. They would have left the pitiful rags of a man, what remained after torture, after repeated, demeaning questionings. This was better. He was not afraid to die. All his life had been a preparation for dying, but dying as a warrior would die. Yet now he would not die, for dying would give them victory. He would live, he would escape, he would flaunt it in their faces. He would show them what a man could do.
They were out there now, seeking him. Very well, let them find him, and find death.
A few had died, he knew that. The pursuit of him had not gone easily for them. How many his traps had killed he did not know, but he knew of three who had died with the helicopter, and there had been others. All right, if they wished to pay the price, he would give them what they wished.
No longer would he simply flee to escape them. Now he would fight back.

Rukovsky was waiting beside the fire when Suvarov drove up. "He's up there somewhere," Rukovsky said. "It is rough, but we will find him." He gestured. "I've a dozen patrols scattered along this valley. When we have eaten, we will start up the mountains. You can tell your Colonel Zamatev that we will have him."
Suvarov nodded, but kept his doubts to himself. "We have pursued him for months. I would like to see him taken."
"Have no fears. My men will take him." He turned his back to the wind that was blowing down from the mountain. It was not a strong wind, but cold, very cold.
"It will be an exercise for them. Get them in shape for the real thing. This could not have come at a better time."
Suvarov looked up at the mountains. Here there was some snow on the ridges and a huge bank of it under one ridge.
"You are from the Ukraine?" Suvarov looked at the mountain again. "Have you traveled mountains in the winter?"
"A little. No matter; my men can handle mountains. They can handle anything."
He looked around. "Personally, I'll be glad to get into the hills. Get away from some of this wind."
Rukovsky glanced at Suvarov. "I've a bottle in the car. How about a nip of vodka?"
"Why not?" Suvarov stood up, nervously. "I thought I smelled smoke?"
"You probably did. My men have fires; they're making tea and having a bite." He glanced at his wristwatch. "They've not much longer."
Suvarov took a swallow from the bottle and passed it to Rukovsky. "I hear Comrade Shepilov has recruited trappers to find the American."
Rukovsky smiled. "No matter. We will get him first."
"That's rough country up there," Suvarov gestured. "I have not seen it myself, but I have heard stories."
He took another swallow from the vodka and reached for his teacup. He filled it and stood up. "I say, that's an awful lot of smoke!"
Rukovsky got to his feet. It was quite a lot. Suddenly he was angry. "They've let their fire get away from them!" He swore and reached for the radio. He asked a question and then began barking orders.
"Get in. We will see what's going on." They scrambled into the car, and the driver stepped on the starter. It whirred, but nothing happened. The driver stepped on the starter again, and at that moment the smoke billowed up, a cloud of it swept over them, and they saw a wall of flame racing toward them ahead of the wind. The grass in the small valley was dry, and the fire was coming fast. "To hell with the car!" Rukovsky dropped to the ground and started for the rocks. Suvarov and the driver were only a step behind him.
They scrambled up in the rocks where there was very little growth just as the flames swept down the valley. They hit the car and rolled around it, and then the flames got to the gas spilled around the tank. Flames roared, flames leaped up, and then the car exploded. For a moment the flames shot skyward and then roared madly as the remaining gas burned.
Rukovsky swore again. "I will find who is responsible for this, and I'll--!"
The line of flames raced down the little valley, leaving the grass charred and black behind it. Only a few of the soldiers had suffered minor burns, most of them in attempting to save equipment or food.
"Sir?"
Rukovsky glanced around impatiently. Suvarov said, "Before you assign the blame, it would be well to think of the American."
"What do you mean?"
"He could have set the grass afire."
"Nonsense!" Rukovsky spoke and then paused to consider. "Is it likely? Would he attempt such a thing?"
Suvarov repeated the story of the helicopter. Of numerous traps, "It is guerrilla warfare. He's very good at it."
"Come! Let's go see where the fire started."
Soldiers were beginning to climb down from the rocks where they had taken refuge. Most had escaped with their arms; some had escaped with rations. Three vehicles had been destroyed, the last one a truck just beyond the line of the fire.
"This one was set afire after the fire had passed, Colonel. See? It was over this rise, out of sight of most of the command."
"Is anything missing?"
Several cases of rations had been ripped open and both food and ammunition taken. An AK-47 was missing.
Reports came in slowly. Most of the food supplies had been burned and much equipment damaged. The fire had been sudden and unexpected and had moved swiftly ahead of the wind. Most men had saved their weapons; some had rations upon them; some had been hastily gathered among the rocks and out of reach of the flames. Not enough remained to keep the command in the field.
"Did anyone see him?"
Nobody had seen anything, but it was apparent that the flames had come from several points. "Fire arrows," somebody said.
"What?" Rukovsky turned on him.