Last of the Breed (Louis L'Amour's Lost Treasures)

by Louis L'Amour

  Under the trees he found a viewpoint that permitted him to see both possible entries into the hanging valley below him.

  Suddenly, on the trail opposite, a soldier appeared. He was only two or three steps above the flat white stone Joe Mack had undermined.

  The soldier halted, his weapon ready. He was surveying what he could see of the surprising little valley. He turned and spoke over his shoulder to someone; then another man appeared. Joe Mack could not see his insignia, but supposed him a noncommissioned officer.

  There was no way they could see more of the valley without descending into it. As if on command, the soldier started forward; he hit the step above, moving fast, and then he stepped down hard on the flat white stone, as it was somewhat lower than a normal step. Instantly the stone tipped and slid, and the soldier came down hard. The fall was no more than fifteen or sixteen feet, but it was immediately apparent that the fallen soldier had broken his leg.

  Others gathered around him while two or three descended into the valley and began a search. An injured man was better than a dead man, for it would take at least two men to carry him back to where he could get attention.

  An improvised stretcher was made while two other soldiers attempted to restore the broken step in the path. Joe Mack, resting in his brush hideout, waited and watched.

  Only minutes passed before a helicopter appeared. It swung around and surveyed the hanging valley, but appeared to ignore his hideout, which from the air must have seemed no more than a small ledge on the side of the mountain above the valley, a place of no consequence. Unless Alekhin was in that helicopter.

  Always, he must remember Alekhin.

  The soldiers were laboring back up the path, and he lay quiet, watching them. At last they were gone, and he added spruce boughs to his bed. Taking a chance, he kindled a small fire of dry wood and broiled some meat from the mountain goat. He ate well, drank tea, and extinguished his fire. Again he took a look all about and then returned to his bed.

  Lying on his back on the boughs, he stared up into the branches overhead. He had done the right things, made the right moves. Even so he had been lucky, indeed, and such luck could not be expected to last.

  He sat up and in the dimming light, studied his maps. Ahead of him lay lower and fewer mountains and many small lakes and tundra. Places to hide would be infrequent, and much of the time he would be traveling in the open.

  For three days he remained on the small bench, cold most of the time, having a fire but rarely with which to make tea and boil meat. He saw no more soldiers, although twice planes flew over and once a helicopter. Once, on the far side of the hanging valley, he saw movement in the brush, but nothing appeared. If it was a wild animal, it did not emerge.

  He lighted his fire only when the wind was taking the smell of it out over the gorge. He always used dry wood, avoiding smoke.

  On the fourth day, he decided to move. Carefully, from a hidden place among the trees, he studied possible routes by which he could keep under cover. He selected a possible destination, although that would vary according to what he found when he arrived. While in camp he doubled his supply of arrows and found two new and better chunks of iron pyrite, which he partly covered with rawhide for a better grip when striking a fire.

  He started before dawn on the fifth day, impatient to be off. He went out to the north and stayed under cover of the trees. Now he took special effort to leave no trail. Although he did not like the added weight, he kept the AK-47.

  Topping a ridge, he looked over the vast panorama of mountain, forest, and valley toward the east and south. Timbered ridges marched away in endless procession, with hollow basins, ridges of slide rock, patches of snow, and here and there what seemed to be glaciers. Beyond that were great crags and the cone shapes of ancient volcanoes. Avoiding an easy path into the woods, he took a mere goat trail up into the crags and crouched there to study the country. The more he saw of it, the more he was inclined to cut back to the southeast and try to stay clear of regions of small lakes and tundra. It would be much the longer route, but offered better chances of finding cover, as well as wild game.

  That night he decided he would turn southeast and try to reach the Kolyma Mountains above Magadan and then follow them to the northeast.

  Every few minutes now, he checked his back trail. That somebody was following him he was quite sure, and he began to think of a trap, a very subtle one that might fool even Alekhin.

  Dipping down into a narrow opening between two appallingly sheer gray cliffs, he walked along a sandy floor, crawled over boulders, and wended a precarious way through a forest of tumbled rock. Here and there were patches of snow and narrow crevasses into which a man’s foot might slip, breaking an ankle. Growth was scarce except for lichens.

  Except for his carefully husbanded tea, his food was almost gone, so he watched for any kind of wild animal that he might kill.

  Several times he glimpsed grouse, or ptarmigan, but it was midday before he was able to kill one with his sling. He had just climbed down over a steep wall of black rocks and at their base came on a pile of driftwood stacked up against boulders by the rushing waters of spring runoff in past years. He made a small fire, broiled and ate the grouse, and then carefully covered the feathers and bones.

  Looking back up the narrow gorge down which he had come, he was amazed. He must have descended more than a thousand feet, and watching, he could see no signs of movement behind him or on the cliffs above. Finding a break in the canyon wall, he turned into it and climbed steeply up, crossing a wide belt of slide rock that sounded, as he crossed it, like walking on piles of empty bottles. At the top of the slide, he found a few inches next to the cliff where he could walk. The towering boulders at the place he had started his climb now looked like mere pebbles.

  Trees choked the great crack up which he was traveling. Mostly spruce and fir, there was a scattering of larch and an occasional dwarfed and gnarled cedar. There was much debris, broken branches and fallen trees, many of them mere bare poles now. He found some long-dead bark and gathered tinder for a fire whenever he might decide to stop.

  Looking back down, he judged any follower would have gone on down the canyon, not thinking that a man would choose such a precipitous climb. He turned and kept on, climbing now as if up a steep stairway. Soon the crack became so tight he could touch either side with ease. At the top a raven flew up, flapping its black wings slowly away. He had to use his hands to lift himself out of the crack at the place where it began. First, just enough to look around.

  Not fifty feet away was a mountain goat, a big one weighing he would guess not less than three hundred pounds. It was looking right at him, no doubt astonished by the sudden appearance of this weird looking creature in a domain where he no doubt ruled the roost. The animal seemed in no wise frightened or even disturbed.

  Carefully, aware that his hands were busy and unable to use a weapon, Joe Mack hoisted himself from the crack and sat on its edge. He needed the meat, but estimating the distance, he did not like the odds.

  Cautiously, Joe Mack got to his feet. The goat was amazingly white, his horns jet black and sharp as needles. His build was like others of his kind, stocky and powerful, better for climbing and leaping than running, something he would rarely have a chance to do, living on the heights as he did.

  Joe Mack brought his bow around, and then seeing some larch trees not far off, he backed toward them. The goat watched him with interest, once bobbing his head low and giving it a kind of twisting shake.

  Having seen goats in action, Joe Mack was perfectly aware of how dangerous they could be. Usually they hooked low and hard, trying to rip the belly of whatever they were attacking. When he reached the trees, Joe Mack retreated into the small grove and began working his way through them. When he emerged, he was upon an almost sheer mountainside, with an enormous panorama of ridges, peaks, and mountains lying before h
im. He was facing east and a little south and looking at one of the most rugged bits of terrain he had ever seen. It reminded him of the Sawtooth Range in his own Idaho country.

  Climbing a promontory, he studied the country behind him. He could see no movement, nothing to indicate pursuit, although he knew it was there. He doubted whether the soldiers would persist, however, but somewhere soon he should be meeting the trappers and hunters Shepilov had sent to find him.

  He descended from the rocks and made his way carefully over the bare rock of the mountain’s crest. Here and there were loose slabs and patches of snow, some of them extensive.

  He was working his way down a steeply sloping dome of granite when he saw them.

  Three men, trappers or hunters by their look, far down the slope below him. If they looked up they would see him, unless his goatskin coat and pants appeared to them like snow. These men would be good shots, and all carried rifles.

  For a moment he held himself still; then, just a little further down the slope, he saw a big, rounded boulder balanced on the slick rock face.

  Carefully, he began edging closer. If that boulder fell—!

  They were right beneath it and at least three hundred yards away, but at the base of a steep hillside.

  He climbed down, using his hands to ease himself down in a sitting position. The rock was very slick, and at places there was ice. The three men were coming closer.

  He reached the boulder, lifted his feet until he could put them high on its side, and then bracing himself against the mountainside, he pushed.

  There was a moment when it only crunched slightly, and he pushed again, with all the power in his legs. The boulder teetered, crunched, and slowly began to turn over.

  Ponderously, almost majestically, it began to roll over, and then suddenly, seized by the forces of gravity, it turned over and began to tumble down the slope.

  It reached a drop, fell, and bounded high, and then as it began to fall, the hunters froze in place, staring up, eyes wide with horror.

  THIRTY-NINE

  THE HUNTERS TOOK that one startled look and then scrambled to escape. All three made it.

  The boulder landed within inches of where they had been standing, hitting with terrific impact. Then it rolled back a few feet and lodged against a smaller rock.

  Two of the men had fallen. They got to their feet, badly shaken, and looked up at the mountain. They could see nothing.

  Hurriedly, they moved back into the nearest trees. There were not many at that point, but they were some shelter.

  “That was no accident,” one of them said.

  For several minutes nobody spoke, and then Hymoff said, “Did you ever think of all you could do to somebody following you into the mountains?”

  “Who hasn’t?”

  “I never liked Shepilov, anyway,” Hymoff suggested.

  It was a dangerous remark, and they all knew it. If such a comment were repeated, it could mean trouble for the speaker.

  “Well, a man could always trap some fur. Doubt if this country has been trapped lately. A man could keep busy,” he added.

  “How did he come to be a prisoner here, anyway? My grandfather sold furs to an American trader at Emma’s Landing, years ago. Said he was an honest man, as traders go.”

  “No way he’s going to escape, anyway. No way he could cross the Strait.”

  “The Chukchis crossed it for years, hundreds of years, I guess.”

  “That was before radar and patrol planes. I crossed it most of the way on the ice, one time. I was with my father, and I was just twelve that year.”

  From high on the slope, Joe Mack watched them. What reward had been offered for him he did not know, or what other inducement, if any. He had not planned to kill any of them, but that was their problem. If they chose to follow, he would stop them, one way or another.

  He arose and went back off the ridge and followed it toward the southeast. It was easy walking here, with few trees, scattered rock, and nothing but sky above. It was clear and blue, like most skies in this part of the country. He did not hurry, but he made good time. Yet at intervals he stopped to study his back trail. Alekhin would be back there somewhere, or perhaps outguessing him and waiting up ahead. That had been one of the reasons he had changed direction so drastically.

  Later that day he killed a musk deer and broiled a steak over the fire. He ate hugely, eating as his forebears had eaten when meat could not be saved and another kill might be days away.

  When he had eaten he put out his fire, obliterated as much as possible of the sign it left, and hiked on another two miles before finding a place to sleep.

  Somewhere far ahead was the Kolyma River and beyond it mountains of the same name. When he reached those mountains he would follow them toward the northeast.

  He was tempted to go into Magadan, just for a change of diet, if no more. He had his suit and he had the white shirt Natalya had made for him. At this time of the year, he might even get away with wearing moccasins. He shook his head. Not with a suit. A new suit, at that. It would draw attention he did not want. Nonetheless, it was a temptation.

  There was no trail or path where he now walked, and he kept his eyes open to pick up an animal trail. It was easy to get oneself into a cul-de-sac, not knowing the mountains. If you followed a trail, it was always a way somebody or something had gone before.

  It was bitterly cold and getting more so. Before nightfall he would have to get down off the top of the mountain where he now walked. Warm air rises, and if he could find a hiding place on a good slope he would settle in, even if it was early.

  He heard the helicopter only a moment before it appeared, and there was nowhere to hide. Hoping they had not seen him he dropped to the ground among some flat rocks, hoping they would take him for snow or even a dead animal. He lay perfectly still, but inside his coat his hand gripped the AK-47.

  The copter swung by, not directly overhead, and started on; then it turned around and came back, flying lower.

  They had seen something. They were coming back for him. All right, Joe Mack, he whispered to himself. Get them the first time.

  He lay still, and they swung by directly over him, not fifty feet off the ground.

  He rolled over as they swung by and let go with a burst just as they began their turn. They were making a tight turn not more than fifty yards away, and they believed he had only a bow and arrows. What they got was totally unexpected.

  The copter dipped sharply and then smashed into the ground, tipping slightly and then righting itself. The rotor made a few despairing turns and then slowed to a stop.

  Lying behind the rocks—a poor cover at best, for they were very low—Joe Mack watched, ready to fire again.

  Nothing happened. Nobody stirred.

  He waited a slow count of twenty and still nothing moved. His gun covering the side of the helicopter, he got to his feet. Working his way toward the tail, he kept the gun in position and slowly drew abreast. He heard a low gasping moan, as if someone had tried to move and had been stopped by sheer agony. With his left hand he opened the door.

  The pilot lay slumped forward, obviously dead. The man nearest him made a feeble effort to reach for a weapon. “No!” Joe Mack spoke sharply, the muzzle of his gun against the Russian’s side.

  He was a young man with a boyish face, but a tough, competent-looking man. In Russian he asked him, “How are you hurt?”

  “My legs are broken, I think.”

  Quickly, efficiently, he searched the man, taking a pistol from him. Then, with infinite care, he lifted him out of the seat to the ground. From the helicopter he recovered the man’s heavy coat and several blankets. There was a folded emergency tent, and he took that out and laid it on the ground.

  “Not much I can do for you,” he said. “I’m no surgeon. Did you get off a call for help?”


  “No.”

  Joe Mack believed him. There had been no time, no chance. “How soon will they start looking for you?”

  “When we do not answer.”

  “All right. I’m going to fix you up as warm as I can, and then I’ll leave. Sorry about this, but you shouldn’t have been hunting me.”

  “We were not. That is, until we saw something lying there. We were going to pick up a prisoner. A dissident.”

  Joe Mack gathered all the coats and blankets from the copter to make the wounded man as warm as possible. As he talked, he built a windbreak of the flat rocks.

  “A dissident? I didn’t know you had such things.” He spoke with a touch of sarcasm in his tone.

  “We have our share. This is a bad one. He tried to free another prisoner. Did free him, in fact, but was captured himself.”

  “Tough.”

  “Yes, he is a tough one, as you say. Very strong man and not afraid. Too bad he has become a dissident. We need such men in Russia.”

  “So does every country.” A thought came to him suddenly, a wild random thought. Yet why not? “What was his name?”

  “Yakov. We do not have a patronymic. He was known to the KGB.”

  “You are not KGB?”

  “I am a soldier,” the man said. Then, “How will they find me?”

  “I shall build a fire and leave some fuel for you. There is much lying about. And I found a flashlight in the plane.” He had found two of them, as a matter of fact. One he intended to keep. He had also found emergency rations, such as every such ship carried in this country, and matches.

  He built a small fire and made tea, hot, black, and strong. “Best thing for shock, they tell me.”

  He drank some tea himself and moved a packet of the emergency rations close to the wounded man.