The cossacks reached the slope and rode up it, seeking the relative safety of the ground beyond but, not until they had reached their original camp-site did they finally rein back. Men and horses gasped for breath and some collapsed into the snow. Those who had not been hurt leapt from their saddles to attend either to wounded men or injured horses and now the moans of wounded men became quite loud in the stillness of the morning.
Boniak felt powerful hands pulling him from the saddle, the pain in his shoulder intensifying as they did so. He was laid carefully on the ground and, as he lay there, even the cold snow did not seem to chill him as it normally did. All he was aware of was the burning pain in his shoulder and the steadily-advancing wave of unconsciousness which seemed to be filling his mind. He heard words. They came floating at him through a haze of pain, almost unreaclass="underline"
“Nothing broken.”
“The bullet went clean through.”
Then he sank into the merciful oblivion of senselessness.
“So what the fuck happened?” roared Rostov, kicking at a heap of snow nearby.
“They were ready for us,” said Namarov, taking a long pull from the vodka bottle. He gazed around him at the remnants of his unit. Men were putting down dying horses, some wounded lay in long lines, covered with blankets to keep out the worst of the cold. Those cossacks who were unharmed sat on their mounts or stood around hastily-built fires in small groups talking quietly, still stunned by the horrendous slaughter.
“What the hell do you mean, they were ready for us?” Rostov demanded.
“They knew we were coming,” the major said, draining what was left in the bottle and tossing it aside.
Rostov looked puzzled.
“That’s impossible,” he said.
“Then why were they prepared?” Namarov said. “We rode into a trap.”
Rostov was unimpressed.
“Coincidence,” he insisted.
“If they knew we were coming, why did they hang around in the village? Why not just leave during the night? They knew they were outnumbered but they stayed there because they knew they had the advantage of surprise.”
“But how could they know?” Rostov demanded, more angrily this time.
Namarov was silent. His eyes scanned the faces of the men before him. Rostov. Petrovski. Kuragin. Amassova.
Kuragin swallowed hard and dropped his gaze.
Namarov remained silent.
“You’re trying to say that there’s a traitor amongst us?” said Petrovski.
“All I’m saying is, Kleiser knew we were coming. That ambush was too well organised to be coincidence,” said the one-eyed officer.
“Most of us have ridden together for two years or more and now you suddenly decide that one of us is a traitor.” Rostov gaped. “I think that bang on the head must have been harder than you first thought.”
Namarov rounded on him.
“Then how do you explain what happened in Ridanski?” he said, angrily.
“Well, I don’t think it was anything to do with a traitor for one thing,” Rostov told him.
“Who would want to betray us, Andrei?” said Petrovski.
Namarov did not speak.
“We attacked at the wrong time,” said Rostov. “We should have gone in before dawn, slaughtered the bastards in their beds.”
“It would have made no difference what time we attacked,” Namarov said.
The other men stared at him for long moments, all except Kuragin who was still gazing at the ground beneath his feet.
“How many men did we lose?” the major wanted to know.
Amassova spat a stream of tobacco juice into the snow.
“Twenty-seven dead, nearly forty wounded. We lost about thirty horses,” the cossack told him.
Namarov nodded slowly.
“So now what do we do?” demanded Rostov.
“We can’t move on yet,” the major told him. “I think we should spend the night here. Give the horses and the wounded time to rest, then we go after Kleiser tomorrow.”
“And the people in Ridanski?”
At last Kuragin spoke.
“What about them?”
“They’re probably dead already. They probably were when we attacked this morning,” said Namarov, eyeing his companion suspiciously. “There’s nothing we could have done for them.”
All heads turned as, from far away, the sound of gunshots split the air and, as the men watched, the first of many plumes of dark smoke began to rise into the sky. Their source was the village of Ridanski.
Through the relative stillness too, came the sound of powerful engines gradually receding until there was only silence again. The cossacks watched those plumes of smoke which rose like accusatory fingers, prodding the skies which were already heavy with cloud. The sun was swallowed up by them and the golden rays were wiped away.
It began to snow lightly. Small flakes, as if the heavens themselves were weeping for Ridanski and its people.
Kuragin walked away, his boots making deep indentations in the snow, and no-one saw the single tear that trickled down his cheek.
When Boniak awoke, it was dark. He sat up quickly, the pain in his shoulder biting at him like a snapping dog. He touched the wound tentatively and found that it had been heavily bandaged. Beside him another cossack, his head bandaged, slept peacefully. The boy rubbed his eyes and blinked hard, things gaining clarity as he looked around.
There were a number of camp-fires burning-men, as usual, huddled around them. He caught sight of Rostov, that familiar pipe in his mouth, chatting animatedly with some other men from his squadron.
Petrovski was sharpening his sabre. Mig was cleaning his with an oily rag, wiping the last blotches of dried blood from the razor-sharp steel.
“Feeling any better?”
The voice startled the youth who turned a little too quickly and hurt his shoulder again. He winced, squinting through the darkness to see Namarov at his side.
“How long have I been out?” asked Boniak, rubbing his injured shoulder gently.
“Ever since we came back from the attack,” Namarov told him. “Seven hours. Perhaps more.”
Boniak lay back once more, one hand across his forehead.
“What happened this morning?” he said, dreamily.
“We rode into a trap,” the officer told him.
Boniak looked up, puzzled.
“A trap?”
Namarov nodded.
“Kleiser and his men knew we were coming,” he said. “They were ready for us.”
“But that would mean…”
Namarov cut him short.
“A traitor.”
Boniak nodded.
“Who?”
“I’m not sure. I can’t be sure.”
“But you have an idea?”
“What I have is twenty-seven dead, forty wounded and thirty dead horses. The rest I can only guess at.”
The two of them did not speak for long moments then Namarov coughed, almost selfconsciously.
“You saved my life this morning,” he said. “Thankyou.”
Boniak smiled.
“Then that makes us even,” he said. “Because, if you hadn’t found me in that cave that day, I would probably be dead by now.”
Namarov smiled and ruffled the boy’s hair.
There was another long silence, finally broken by Boniak.
“What about Kleiser?” he said.
“He got away,” Namarov told him. “We go after him tomorrow. It shouldn’t be difficult to pick up his trail. I’ll send six men to watch his movement.” The major got to his feet. “I think you’d better get some rest now, there’s a lot to be done come daybreak.”
Namarov walked slowly away, murmuring words of encouragement to some of the other wounded as he passed.