Gus said evenly, ‘The old stalkers in Scotland knew it. They’d have a guest fire at a stag and miss, and the stag always stays exactly still for two or three seconds. Then it runs. But, if it is winged, it runs immediately, until the wound kills it. I was lucky with that second shot.’
The machine-gun had opened up behind him and to his right, the tracer rounds arced across the dead ground, scattering little chasing patterns. The view through the ’scope was a blurred, fluid mess as he searched to find the position on the roof of the command post. And behind him he heard the whooping roar as the line of men began their charge.
A soldier yelled his name, waved frantically for him.
Major Karim Aziz was walking the dog alongside the edge of the high wire fence.
He heard his name and ran towards the soldier. The dog at his heel, he was led to the communications bunker.
The brigadier was already there, the general bursting in a minute after him.
He stood at the central map table and listened. The words that came blurted over the loudspeakers, high on the wall, were interspersed with break-up and howl.
‘… The captain is hit… Yes, Corporal Ahmad wore the captain’s coat, but was not shot at… Captain Kifaar is hit, is not dead, but they cannot bring a medical orderly to him. There is a general attack. We are waiting for Lieutenant Muhammad to take the place of Captain Kifaar in the command post.’
The Victory City at Quadir Beg broke across the transmission – their water tanker was late. When could they expect it?
The Victory City at Keshdan reported the failure of the single-stage air filtration system of a BMP. Could a qualified engineer accompany the next resupply column with a replacement?
‘Get those arseholes off the air,’ the general shouted.
‘… There is heavy shooting from the front… There are casualties… Lieutenant Muhammad has now reached the command post… They are led by a woman. She is with their forward force. The machine-gun fires at her, no hit yet, she is protected… The medical orderly has not come to the command post to treat Captain Kifaar. The captain is close to death. Are units advancing to help us? In God’s name, send us help.’
Aziz asked quietly, ‘Please, is it possible to know the circumstances of Captain Kifaar’s wounding? It would be useful for me.’
The question was relayed.
‘… A very long shot, twice. The second shot hit him. We must have help. They are near to us… No-one knows where the shot came from. Is help on its way?’
Over the loudspeaker came the sounds, staccato, of the firing. But Aziz had been given the answer he had expected and seemed not to hear the deep, distorted terror of the men under fire.
Gus had hit a man who ran to the nearest of the personnel carriers. He had missed another who made a snaky crawl to follow him but had put the next shot right through the gunport of the command post. A fuel drum, close to the earth walls for the personnel carriers, had caught fire and the deep red blaze of the incendiary threw a lowering pall of smoke across much of the village, which ebbed towards the fence. Between gusts of wind, gaps appeared in the grey-black wall of the smoke, and he caught fleeting glimpses of the machine-gun crew on the roof.
It was a scene of hell. Against him the boy was shivering with excitement.
She was at the front of the long, straggling line approaching the fence. She had no fear.
Suddenly, as if a man had punched him, came the realization of her vulnerability. He saw her turn and face the line of crouched men behind her, and give an imperious wave that they should follow.
Gus saw the machine-gun traverse towards her, then the smoke drifted and thickened.
The tracers poked through the cloud, firing at random, searching for her. Haquim was behind her, running awkwardly over the rough ground and hugging the metal box to his chest. The hellish cauldron was a small pocket of life and death, in which she stood and demanded that the peshmerga follow.
‘Watch for the fall,’ Gus snapped.
The wind was stronger: it tugged at the grass and wafted the smoke. He waited for the chance. She was a hundred yards from the fence. He had gone to eight clicks on the windage turret, but the wall of smoke was solid and he could not see through it. The tracers swarmed around her.
The smoke dissipated without warning.
He was gazing through the ’scope at the machine-gun crew. Three choices: the man who called the aim and was crouched at the back, puffing at a cigarette clamped between his lips; the one who fed the belt and whose helmet strap was undone and hung loosely against his cheek; or the one who pulled the trigger?
‘She’s hit,’ the boy gasped. ‘She has fallen.’
Gus fired, once, twice, a third shot. The smoke closed around his view of the target. He heaved back the bolt, squeezed the trigger again, and again, heard the empty scrape of the action and knew that his magazine was empty.
‘You have them, Mr Gus.’
He choked. ‘Does it matter?’
There was a stillness around him, as if the pace and clamour of the world had stopped.
It was the silence of remembrance.
‘The witch is down.’
Around Aziz there was a growl of pleasure, and the brigadier slapped his clenched fist into the other palm.
The operations officer lifted the microphone to his mouth and yelled at it, ‘Are the BMPs now engaged? Come on, man, what is happening there?’
The voice came back at them, echoed down on them. ‘They cannot reach them. There is a marksman. There is very great difficulty… Our machine-gun, the main defence, they are all dead, it is the marksman… Is help coming? Wait…’
Aziz felt a detached distaste for such confusion. It had no part in the warfare he practised. The chaotic noise was alien to him. He was at ease with himself, he had learned what he had wanted to know. He had no sympathy for the beleaguered soldiers: they were only a testing ground for his enemy. He yearned to be alone with his Dragunov and his dog, on a hillside, pitting himself against a worthwhile adversary.
‘She’s up… the witch is up. She’s-’
The voice was lost in a sea of static.
For several minutes the technicians tried to regain the link, to break the power of the jamming equipment, but the beating pulse of the garrison was gone.
He had seen the little clutch of men around her, had seen them drag her to her feet. She had stood for a moment, dazed, had then swayed, would have fallen again if they had not held her. She had pushed them away. He had lost her in the wall of smoke, and had reloaded five bullets in the magazine. When he had looked again through the sight, she was close to the perimeter wire, a dark stain on her thigh.
Gus watched. She was driving the men over the wire. They reached up and shredded their hands on the coiled barbs at the top. She was grabbing at those who followed, pitching them forward or helping to lift them. Sometimes her face was screwed tight in pain, and each time she ducked her head so that nobody could see. A man threw his heavy leather coat onto the coils, and others lifted her, pushing her feet so that she straddled the wire. More caught her as she fell on the far side.
His body slackened and he eased his hands from the rifle. The fighting was hand to hand, body to body. Like swarms of ants, the peshmerga fanned out to hunt down the last defenders. He saw a soldier emerge from a building holding high a white strip of torn sheet, before crumpling, his blood spattered across on the whiteness. Two more were running, only to be engulfed by the mob. He saw a soldier dragged from a bunker and the flash of knives. One of the BMPs coughed exhaust fumes and drove at speed towards the gate, crashed through it, then swerved into a ditch.
There was nothing more for Gus to fire at. He started to ease himself clear of the hiding place then turned and methodically started to pack away his rifle.