Red Sniper

Barkov and his men were on the receiving end of a military issue trench warfare shotgun. The Winchester Model 12 pump action shotgun could be slam fired—that is, as long as the trigger was depressed, the gun fired each time the action was pumped.

The fire slackened. Then a pause. Time to reload? Barkov sprang to his feet, remarkably agile for a big man, and bulled ahead, rifle at the ready.

He found a big man behind a rock, hurrying to feed shotgun shells into the gun. He got it loaded and leveled it at Barkov, who threw himself flat as the man fired twice. Just two shots—either the man hadn’t had time to fully reload, or he must be out of shells.

Barkov got to his feet, taking his time.

The man shouted something at Barkov in English—American, Barkov thought—then threw the shotgun at him in frustration, and pulled a knife.

Barkov almost sneered as he leveled his rifle at the big American’s chest. A knife? He was about to pull the trigger when he caught movement just beyond the big man. Another man crouched there with a pistol at his side. Why didn’t he shoot? Because the gun was empty, Barkov thought.

His eyes locked on the man, whom he recognized immediately as one of the escaped prisoners. The one called Ramsey. Barkov took his finger off the trigger and shouted at the others not to shoot. It would be so much more satisfying to take them both alive.

Alive for now, anyhow.

Barkov knew about six words of English, one of which he spoke now: “American?”

The big man said something that started with Yeah, which was another one of the words Barkov knew. The others were no, booze, gun, and sonofabitch. He couldn’t understand the rest. He was trying to get his head around the fact that there was an American out here who was not an escapee from the Gulag compound. What was going on?

Then the prisoner named Ramsey shouted something at the big man. What Barkov heard was Samson. That sounded like a name to him.

He handed his rifle to the Mink and took out his whip. His eyes met those of the big American. Barkov didn’t see any fear there, just a challenge. Smiling, he advanced toward the American in a wary crouch.

The two men were almost equally matched, both of them well over six feet tall and heavy through the shoulders. Hands out, heads down, they resembled two bears about to rumble. Samson was maybe a little bigger, but he was limping, favoring a leg that was wrapped in bloody rags. Barkov took note of that.

They circled each other, looking for an advantage, knife against whip. It wasn’t just any knife. The American had one of those wickedly sharp combat knives that resembled a medieval dagger. When the Americans and Russians had met outside Berlin, those knives had been freely traded for vodka and even Russian pistols. If the American managed to stick that thing into him, the fight would be over.

Barkov did not plan on letting him get in that close. The whip was an ideal defense against a knife attack. When Samson lunged, Barkov stung his hand with the whip and pulled back. The whip was made of braided leather, thick as a broomstick near the base and taping slightly down its two-foot length. It had some weight behind it.

Samson feinted left, then lunged from the right. Barkov slapped him away again.

Cautious now of the whip, the American circled just out of reach. Barkov held the whip cocked back by his ear, and gestured with his left hand for the American to come on. The American really had no choice but to attack. His shotgun blast had killed one of the Russians, but there were still four of them with their guns trained on him. It was attack, or die.

He steamed forward like a bull.

Barkov was ready with the whip, but as it hissed down, the American instantly tossed the knife from his right hand to his left and caught the whip in his open right hand. It must have been painful, but he did not let go. Instead, he dragged the whip down and pulled Barkov off balance, then stabbed down with his left hand.

Barkov felt the blade slice his shoulder. Fortunately for him, the American was not accurate with his left hand. Most of the damage was done to his winter coat.

The American wasn’t finished. He drew back his left hand for another go at Barkov.

The Russian saw it coming. He turned sideways and kicked the American’s injured leg out from under him.

Samson went down to his hands and knees like a bull felled by a matador, but one hand still grasped the whip. He was using it to pull himself back up.

Barkov let go, and the American went toppling backwards. Barkov did not give him a chance to recover. As the American got to his knees, Barkov punched him in the back of the head so hard that his knuckles screamed in pain. The American went down again. Then Barkov kicked him. The American rolled onto his back.