The River of Bones v5

by Tom Hron

  Ka--boom! The shot scared him half out of his wits. Don’t move a muscle, his mind screamed. The blast had sounded close. Then, strangely, he sensed his best friend was still alive and one less enemy was stalking the woods. He peered back and forth again, listening. Christ, he wished the trees weren’t so thick. If only he could see a little farther. Slowly, he slung his rifle and lifted his Uzi.

  Then came a faint sound. “Mne itsi suda?”

  He stared, not blinking even once. The whisper had come from the other side of a birch tree, red with young branches only twenty feet away. What should he do? He hardly knew any Russian words, but he had to get the man to step out. Pressing his tongue to the roof of his mouth, he whispered, “Da.”

  “Mne ne nravitsa eta.”

  Praying, he whispered again, “Da.”

  A silhouette inched ahead . . . and he squeezed the trigger, gripping his machine pistol until it emptied.

  “Did you get him?” Simon’s voice came from the opposite side, also near, and every nerve in his body jumped.

  “Yes.”

  “Come here and don’t look at him. Let him lay. We need to get out of here. The wild animals will take care of the rest.”

  He felt sick, just like Simon had prophesied when he’d wanted to go back and kill the Yakut. Turning, he ran for the road. They would be dead meat, themselves, unless they hurried.

  Simon quickly caught him and kept an even pace, and he wondered about the single rifle shot. Why hadn’t the other Russian screamed?

  “What happened to the other guy?” he asked. “I didn’t hear a thing after you fired.”

  “You never do when you shoot a man dead center,” answered Simon. “The moment I saw those guys I knew we’d ambushed the bigger thieves. Those two were Russian mafioso who’d stolen that fuel for themselves and weren’t about ready to give it up, not without a fight. I’m sure half the truck is full of gasoline, precious as gold in this country.”

  “How come you know all these things?”

  “Don’t ask.”

  “Do you know how to drive a Russian truck?”

  “I’m an expert.”

  “Drive it onto the bridge, hook up the hose, drop it over the side, then wait for me to find the funnel I brought along. I’ll yell when I want you to turn the tank valve on. We should be completely full in a few minutes.”

  Simon stepped onto the road. “Start both airplanes when you finish. I’ll set a fuse with gas soaked rags and blow the whole thing to kingdom come. The snow will thaw in a circle and melt our tracks. I doubt anyone will bother looking for the bad guys.”

  He glanced at Simon, ran past the fuel trailers, and skidded downhill to the airplanes, shaking his head. They always seemed to think alike, especially when they were in trouble. He opened his Super Cub’s door and searched for the funnel, throwing things out of the way. They had to hurry because their lives depended on it. He prayed both airplanes would start without preheating the engines.

  He heard the truck stop above, then silence. The filler hose snaked over the bridge’s railing to the river’s frozen surface. He grabbed it, stepped up on the landing gear, and held the end over the funnel he’d mounted in the wing tank. He yelled for Simon to open the master valve, just a little or else they’d flood the funnel. Three more wing tanks and two more belly tanks to go, he thought. Damn, he wished there was a way to speed up the process. Time passed so slowly when you were scared.

  Finally, all the tanks were full. He hollered at Simon to wait while he started both airplanes. Better not blow the tanker yet, just in case. He spun each propeller by hand, loosening the oil, pumped the engine primers full of fuel, and hit the start buttons. Each fired and ran smoothly at idle. God bless the Cubs. He yelled that both were ready, climbed into his airplane, and waited. Seconds later, he saw Simon coming down the river bank on the dead run.

  “Get out of here. My rag fuse didn’t work and I caught the whole thing on fire. It’s burning like crazy and it’s going to explode any second.”

  Jake leaned out and looked up. Black smoke was rolling off the bridge. “Not until I know you’re ready,” he said.

  “Damnit, don’t worry about me. Leastwise, I can see where I’m going this time. Get the hell out of here.”

  He had to trust their luck would hold and Simon would be, in fact, right behind him. He pushed on full throttle and blasted ahead, stomping one rudder and then the other, dodging the rocks and rough ice in front of him.

  He heard an explosion, despite the propeller’s snarl, and felt his airplane pulse in the shock waves. Pulling half flaps, he lifted off, banked, and looked back. A ball of fire almost blinded him, but he’d seen Simon coming right behind him. They had made it . . . and now Lake Baikal lay ahead, only a few hours further.

  Blinking to clear his eyes, he keyed the map coordinates of their destination in his GPS, hit enter, and read the bearing and distance. Fly straight and avoid the Lena River, he told himself, though it ran in line with their intended course, because way too many people were scattered along its shorelines. The Lena was Siberia’s principal waterway, serving countless villages on its way to the Laptev Sea, lying below the Arctic Ocean.

  He noticed the land was lower around Yakutsk, so he left it and flew along the slopes south of the city, hugging the foothills all the way. After an hour he saw the Buotama River joining the wide Lena a few miles ahead, and descended into its long canyon, which ran right toward Lake Baikal.

  His map showed that once they hit Buotama’s headwaters, they could continue hiding in all the high country stretching to Baikal, crossing two main tributaries of the Lena on the way, the Oljokma, and later the Witim. They would cross the Baikal-Amur Mainline as well, the great Russian railway nicknamed the BAM, which had opened Siberia to exploitation in the Soviet’s glory days . . . though now the land looked cold and hungry, without much human activity at all. They would also see several peaks 3,000 meters high beside the BAM on their left, summits that would protect them from the ubiquitous radar. Sit back and relax, he told himself, there were still eight hours to go.

  Mountains, frozen rivers, endless evergreen forests—the boundless wilderness slipped by. The high peaks and railroad crept past as well, after the day had become dark and he had pulled on his night goggles once more. Would they ever get there? Finally, the GPS read two hours and his heartbeat quickened. What would Lake Baikal look like?

  An hour east of their destination he flew over the trip’s strangest sight . . . a town without any sign of life. For three days they had steered clear of every settlement by avoiding the inevitable wintertime smoke and steam in the daylight and the aurora of outdoor lighting at night. He had come across this small place unexpectedly, standing by itself in the middle of the woods. Three apartment buildings, two warehouses, an airport with a hangar, a power plant, and other structures all sat in a town square, but without a single trail of any kind on the snowbound roads that ran between the unlit buildings. It was a ghost town. But why? He hit the memory key on his GPS and stored the site for later use. Maybe Sasha or Simon would know why the whole town had been deserted. Something odd was going on.

  Finally, he broke over a mountainside and looked down, then felt the view overwhelm him. Lake Baikal lay below, milky-white in the gray morning, reminding him of Lake Superior in the wintertime. They had made it safely. He smiled, looked back, and saw Simon close behind, smiling as well. Clenching his fist in triumph, he pumped his right forearm in the window so his friend could see the emotion he felt.

  He throttled back and dove toward the lake. Let’s find the dacha that Sasha had rented, he thought, and hide. Weeks would pass before Molly and she would join them. Meanwhile, he would learn a little Russian . . . just in case.

  PART TWO—THE SPIES

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  MOSCOW

  Molly gazed at St. Basil’s Cathedral, surprised by the grandeur of its eight fairy tale towers of green and gold, honoring the holy saints on the day Ivan the Terrible
had triumphed over the Tartars in 1552. Her travel agent, during the six weeks of waiting for her visa, had said Moscow’s most famous sight would make all the frustrations worthwhile, and now she saw the agency had been right. The giant, onion-shaped domes had been built as a memorial to the destruction of Russia’s greatest enemy. When it was done, the eyes of the architect had been gouged out so no more beautiful cathedral could ever be built.

  She had reserved a room at the Savoy, the city’s finest hotel, then happily found herself only one block from the magnificent pink and white Bolshoi Theater, world famous for Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake, and only a few minutes walk from Moscow’s other sights, the Kremlin being the most famous, along with Red Square, the site of all the military marches of times gone by.

  The megalopolis of almost nine million people ran in concentric circles around her, with the Kremlin at its center, built by Yuri Dolgoruky, called Long Arm because of his fondness for his neighbor’s lands. He had ordered a fortress built between the Neglinnaya and Moskva rivers in 1147, founding the greatest city in Russia.

  Moscow had quickly become an important trading center, despite being burnt to the ground repeatedly by the Tartars, called the Golden Horde. A succession of Muscovite princes, with Ivan I, nicknamed Moneybags for collecting taxes on behalf of the Golden Horde, starting the consolidation of religious, political, and economic forces by asking the Orthodox Church to reside in the city, giving a later Tsar, Ivan the Great, the opportunity to defeat the Tartars, leaving Russia’s new principality stronger than them. Molly remembered Ivan the Great had ordered the construction of the Kremlin’s redbrick walls and towers, still standing as testament to Russia’s greatness. She felt the country’s awesome power all around her, and its omnipresence frightened her. The deliberate stares of the Russian people added to her fear. Moscow was not a bit like Dallas and Forth Worth, and she would be glad to leave.

  Her plan had been to play an ordinary American tourist, busy sightseeing her way to Novosibirsk. Red Square was full of wondrous sights—a mix of modern and ancient architecture, European and Eastern customs, poverty, prosperity, all homogeneous. She would visit Lenin’s Tomb first, then the Armory, the oldest museum in Russia, exhibiting all the treasures of the past, such as the crown jewels of the tsars and the Faberge’ eggs. Trembling, she set off across Red Square, shoving aside the gypsy children whom she’d been told harassed and robbed careless foreigners, especially lone women. The front desk at the Savoy had also warned her to keep away from the money changers and prostitutes who roamed the streets. She missed her handgun. She had learned to be a dead shot just like Jake had asked.

  The flying lessons had been the most fun, despite her long history of stuffy things. Sometimes she cursed her mother’s generation, and her late husband as well, for causing her to miss the interesting things in life, such as preflighting the million moving parts on a Robinson R22 helicopter. It had been great fun hanging out at the airport with the guys, shooting touch-and-go landings by herself, and listening to the wisdom of the high-time pilots who had been so generous with their time. She had learned so much in a short span that she often felt like a different person altogether. Never, never would she go back to her old way of life. Now she was a soldier of fortune and a pilot, an amateur of course, but she would never give up her newly found freedom. She had learned to be like Jake and Simon and was determined to take on the world, even if it killed her. No more cocktail parties and croissants for her. If anyone greeted her with Hollywood’s “kiss-kiss” routine again, she’d smack them in the mouth. She had become a real person.

  Though, the idea of courage was troubling her. On one hand, she was able to jack up her nerve, take flying lessons, handle deadly weapons, and wander all alone in the middle of Moscow, but on the other hand, she never seemed able to overcome the anxiety in her heart.

  What was bravery all about? Was feeling fearful always part of the big picture? Did Jake and Simon sense fear like she did when they faced danger? Were you less courageous than others when your stomach knotted up, yet you still charged ahead? She must learn to control her anxiety, and maybe Jake and Simon would share their thoughts with her someday soon.

  Her grandson had looked thunderstruck the day she’d taken him to Love Field in Dallas and told him to watch her solo a Cessna 172 and the Robinson R22. But . . . his maternal grandparents had hit the roof when they’d found out about her flying lessons. What’s wrong with you? Have you lost your senses, especially at your age? they’d yelled.

  Their comments had really angered her. At her age. What did they think, that she was a hundred? She had screwed Simon’s lights out in Las Vegas and loved every minute of it. What made them think they had any business telling her to dry up and blow away? She smiled, remembering how her grandson had come to her defense, even with one of his hugs. He had told them to leave her alone, and that he thought she was Captain Terrific. She still felt tears in her eyes when she recalled how loudly he’d spoken out for her. He was growing up and getting over his parents’ death. God bless him . . .

  Joining the long queue in front of Lenin’s Tomb, she began the solemn march past his well preserved remains. Why did the Russian people keep him? The man had deliberately sentenced millions to death when he’d founded the world’s first communist state. She especially despised him for his complicity in the macabre slaying of Tsar Nicholas Romanov’s family. How could any sane man order the shooting, stabbing, and dismemberment of the lone, sickly son and four beautiful daughters of the tsar and tsarina? She felt like spitting when she walked past his glass coffin, but thought better of it, because the guards looked very unfriendly.

  She toured the city for five days, even learning to board the Metro, the world’s busiest underground rail system, moving seven million people daily in their need to get around. She always woke early, memorized her destination in the Cyrillic alphabet, then had someone at the front desk who spoke English write down the same place in translation before she set off.

  Curiously, she found some Metro rail cars used trick mirrors for decoration, warping everyone’s reflection into comical shapes, like when one visited a fairground. But she noticed very few Muscovites ever laughed at their images. Why were they always so grim?

  She began learning certain Russian expressions as well, using them during her trips around the city. Her favorite was “Pamagite mne pazhalusta?” She’d found most people were willing to help her, and many spoke English. Each day she had grown bolder.

  Finally, the day came for her to catch her Aeroflot flight to Novosibirsk and the covert part of her trip. She packed, checked out, and caught the Savoy’s chauffeured car to Sheremetyevo I, the domestic airport serving Russia’s outlying cities, St. Petersburg being the principal one. Once again she trembled, praying for her safety as the driver glanced at her handwritten note and tore down the street. She was on her way, come hell or high water.

  She found the airport very primitive with only an untidy tea counter and a few kiosks. After buying an English language newspaper at one, she sat, drank tea, and waited, then waited some more. Her travel agent had warned her about Aeroflot’s hours of delays, also their wretched, smelly airplanes with cattle-car seating. Would they ever call the flight to Novosibirsk? What would the city look like? At last she heard the odd syllables of her destination called on the terminal’s speakers and boarded the plane.

  For hours she sat cramped between the side of the airplane and a fat man with a cleft palate who spoke no English. Just my luck, she thought to herself. Why couldn’t the person have been an educated Russian woman, fluent in English and familiar with Akademgorodok? Then she could have learned about visiting the famed academic city that was being so criticized in recent times. She had recently read its scientists were studying the feasibility of reversing the flow of several Siberian rivers and sending them to the deserts of Central Asia, diverting them away from the Arctic Ocean. Environmentalists from around the world hadn’t stopped screaming bloody murder since the ment
ion of the idea, which made sense to her. She had always felt more open-minded about dams and reservoirs than most people, but this colossal scheme seemed crazy.

  She watched the ground go by her window—first the open steppes around Moscow, then several large reservoirs along a river coming through the countryside. Was that the Kama River in Tatarstan she’d once seen marked on a map? Afterward, she saw the Ural Mountains, reaching north and south like a fortress wall. A chill ran down her back. She had reached Siberia, the land of lost places, untouched by man.

  When she stepped onto the icy tarmac of Novosibirsk’s airport, she stopped, thoroughly surprised. Winter had seemed very distant in Moscow, although it had been cold, but here winter lay everywhere. The ice under her feet looked like grayish rock. At least it was sunny and the snowbanks were starting to thaw. She waited for her bags, hailed a cab, said two words, Hotel Sibir, and dug out her rubles, seeing the driver thought she was Russian. What should she do when he demanded payment? Quickly, she counted the round numbers in her mind . . . adin, pyat’, desiat’, and tihseecha. Would he ask for, pyat’ tihseecha?

  A half hour later she reached the fifth floor of her hotel, then wondered if she’d walked into a mental ward by mistake. The long passageway looked like a hospital dressed up in filthy carpet runners. She had been getting two distinct impressions of Russia—everything had been built in the 1950s and hadn’t been cleaned since. Some public bathrooms in Moscow hadn’t even had toilet paper. How could an atrocity like that take place in such a great nation? Then she remembered the all-knowing and all-powerful government Sasha had complained about so often. They were ruining the country with way too much bureaucracy.

  She suddenly heard a female voice welcome her from down the dark hallway, next saw a round woman waddle toward her at a fast pace, sweating and gasping in her great hurry. What was this all about?. . . Then it struck her—the travel brochures had written about the old Russian custom, but the guard had been an elderly man back in Moscow. The woman was the floor matron, and, incredibly, had called out in English, sounding as friendly as a lonely grandmother.