Then the Americans stopped. They were perhaps sixty metres away, and, because of a little bend in the road, they were directly in front of the small hummock behind which he was lying. They were talking very loudly. One of the Americans, in fact, was shouting, and Christian could even hear what he was saying.
"Human beings!" the American kept shouting, over and over again, inexplicably.
Christian watched them coldly. So much at home in Germany. Strolling unaccompanied through the woods. Making speeches in English in the middle of Bavaria. Looking forward to summering in the Alps, staying at the tourist hotels with the local girls, and there no doubt would be plenty of them. Well-fed Americans; young, too, no Volkssturm for them; all young all in good condition, with well-repaired boots and clothing, with scientific diets, with an Air Force, and ambulances that ran on petrol, with no problems about whom it would be better to surrender to… And after it was all over, going back to that fat country, loaded with souvenirs of the war, the helmets of dead Germans, the Iron Crosses plucked off dead breasts, the pictures off the walls of bombed houses, the photographs of the sweethearts of dead soldiers… Going back to that country which had never heard a shot fired, in which no single wall had trembled, no single pane of glass had been shattered… That fat country, untouched, untouchable…
Christian could feel his mouth twisting in a harsh grimace of distaste. He brought his gun up slowly. Two more, he thought, why not? He began to hum to himself softly, as he brought the nearest one, the one who was yelling, into his sights. You will not yell so loud in a moment, Friend, he thought, putting his hand gently on the trigger, humming, remembering suddenly that Hardenburg had hummed at another time which had been very much like this one, on the ridge in Africa, over the British convoy at breakfast… He was amused that he remembered it. Just before he pulled the trigger he thought once more of the possibility that there were other Americans around who might hear the shots and find him and kill him. He hesitated for a moment. Then he shook his head and blinked. The hell with it, he thought, it will be worth it…
He fired. He got off two shots. Then the gun jammed. He knew he'd hit one of the swine. But by the time he looked up again after working fiercely to clear the jammed cartridge, the two men had vanished. He'd seen one start to go down, but now there was nothing on the road except a rifle which had been knocked out of the hands of one of the Americans. The rifle lay in the middle of the road, with a pin-point of sparkling sunlight reflecting off a spot near the muzzle.
Well, Christian thought disgustedly, that was a nicely botched job! He listened carefully, but there were no sounds along the road or in the forest. The two Americans had been alone, he decided… And now, he was sure, there was only one. Or if the other one, who had been hit, was alive, he was in no shape to move…
He himself had to move, though. It wouldn't take long for the unwounded man to figure out the general direction from which the shots had come. He might come after him, and he might not… Christian felt that he probably wouldn't. Americans weren't particularly eager at moments like this. Their style was to wait for the Air Force, wait for the tanks, wait for the artillery. And, for once, in this silent forest, with only half an hour more light remaining, there would be no tanks, no artillery to call up. Just one man with a rifle… Christian was convinced that a man wouldn't try it, especially now, with the war so nearly over, when it was bound to seem to him such a waste. If the man who had been hit was dead by now, Christian reasoned, the survivor was probably racing back to whatever unit he had come from, to get reinforcements. But if the man who had been hit was only wounded, his comrade must be standing by him, and, anchored to him, not being able to move quickly or quietly, would make a beautiful target…
Christian grinned. Just one more, he thought, and I shall retire from the war. He peered cautiously down the road at the rifle lying there, scanned the slightly rising, bush-and-trunk-obscured ground ahead of him, shimmering dully in the dying light. There was no sign there, no indication.
Crouching over, moving very carefully, Christian moved deeper into the forest, circling…
Michael's right hand was numb. He didn't realize it until he bent over to put Noah down. One of the bullets had struck the butt of the rifle Michael had been carrying and, whirling it out of his hand, had sent a hammer-blow of pain up to his shoulder. In the confusion of grabbing Noah and dragging him off into the woods, he hadn't noticed it, but now, bending over the wounded boy, the numbness became another ominous element of the situation.
Noah had been hit in the throat, low and to one side. He was bleeding badly, but he was still breathing, shallow, erratic gasps. He was not conscious. Michael crouched beside him, putting a bandage on, but it didn't seem to stop the blood much. Noah was lying on his back, his helmet in a bed of pale pink flowers growing close to the ground. His face had resumed its remote expression. His eyes were closed and the blond-tipped lashes, curled over his pale-fuzzed cheek, gave the upper part of his face the old, vulnerable expression of girlishness and youth.
Michael did not stare at him for long. His brain seemed to be working with difficulty. I can't leave him here, he thought, and I can't carry him away, because we'd both buy it then, and fast, moving clumsily through the woods, a perfect target for the sniper.
There was a flicker in the branches above his head. Michael snapped his head back, remembering sharply where he was and that the man who had shot Noah was probably stalking him at this moment. It was only a bird this time, swinging on a branch-tip, scolding down into the cooling air under the trees, but the next time it would be an armed man who was anxious to kill him.
Michael bent over. He lifted Noah gently and slid the rifle from Noah's shoulder. He looked down once more, then walked slowly into the forest. For a step or two, he could still hear the shallow, mechanical breathing of the wounded man. It was a pity, but Noah had to breathe or not breathe, unattended for a while.
This is where I probably catch it, Michael thought. But it was the only way out. Find the man who had fired the two shots before the man found him. The only way out. For Noah. For himself.
He could feel his heart going very fast, and he kept yawning, dryly and nervously. He had a bad feeling that he was going to be killed.
He walked thoughtfully and carefully, bent over, stopping often behind the thick trunks of trees to listen. He heard his own breathing, the occasional song of a bird, the drone of insects, a frog's croak from some near-by water, the minute clashing of the boughs in the light wind. But there was no sound of steps, no sound of equipment jangling, a rifle bolt being drawn.
He moved away from the road, deeper into the forest, away from where Noah was lying with the hole in his throat, his helmet tilted back away from his forehead on the bed of pink flowers. Michael hadn't thought out his manoeuvre reasonably. He had just felt, almost instinctively, that sticking close to the road would have been bad, would have meant being pinned against an open space, would have made him more visible, since the forest was less dense there.
His heavy boots made a crunching noise on the thick, crisp, dead leaves underfoot and on the hidden, dead twigs. He was annoyed with himself for his clumsiness. But no matter how slowly he went, through the thickening brush, it seemed impossible not to make a noise.
He stopped often, to listen, but there were only the normal late-afternoon woodland sounds.
He tried to concentrate on the Kraut. What would the Kraut be like?
Perhaps, after he'd fired, the Kraut had packed up and headed straight back towards the Austrian border. Two shots, one American, good enough for a day's work at the tail end of a lost war. Hitler could ask no more. Or maybe it wasn't a soldier at all, perhaps it was one of those insane ten-year-old boys, with a rifle from the last war dragged down out of the attic, and all hopped up with the Werewolf nonsense. Michael might come upon a boy with a mop of blond hair, bare feet, a frightened nursery-expression, a rifle three sizes too large… What would he do then? Shoot him? Spank him?