Chapter 20 #3
I watched the stranger wash the berries down with water from a scuffed metal bottle, and then they belched so loud I could hear it from the fifty or so metres away, even over the wind.
Maybe because I used to like making Cat roll her eyes at my burps, I decided then and there that they must be a man like me.
I watched them put the bottle and the cloth bundle back in the pack, and then they stood and stretched and left their stuff and walked behind one of the rusted-out vans in front of the restaurant and I couldn’t see them for a bit, but I thought I knew what they were doing and wasn’t too worried, because they’d left the bow and quiver full of arrows propped against the bench next to their pack.
Sure enough they walked back into view, hunched over as they re-buttoned their trousers, and then picked their stuff up, shouldering it quickly and efficiently, and I was instantly tense again, in case they walked off towards the Bunker.
But I needn’t have worried. Or rather, I needn’t have worried about that.
The fact they were walking straight towards the tank was enough to fill my mind and bunch my muscles ready for fight or flight without realising I had sealed myself in and wasn’t going to be able to get out in time to flee anywhere.
Once again I pulled the bowstring tight and kept it aimed at them as they approached, each step making me more and more aware of how unwieldy it was doing so within the tight confines of the tank, especially as they walked past the side and stood looking up at the gun barrel: I had to make no noise as I switched my aim from the side slit to the front port, but I made contact with the seat, making the corroded springs twang.
I thought they must have heard but the wind was my friend and covered it.
I watched them reach up into the muzzle of the gun, unaware that, hidden from view only a couple of metres away, I had an arrow aimed squarely at the bear’s head on their chest. They pulled the baby doll’s head from the gun barrel and looked down at it, turning it this way and that, as if they’d picked an apple from a tree and were assessing it with a critical eye for wormholes or some kind of blight.
Evidently, whatever they was seeing pleased them because they nodded at it and then reached up and put the head back into the mouth of the gun.
Better keep on watching, Bear Shirt said.
I was shocked to hear them talk so unexpectedly and so naturally that for a moment I thought they were talking to me, but then I saw they were looking up at the doll’s head.
The voice was low and kind of hoarse but it was a nice voice but also sort of heartbreaking.
I don’t know why that was. It wasn’t defeated or broken or anything like that.
It was just full of a lot of sadness that it was trying to hide behind a grin.
And as they looked up at the doll’s head I was able to see the face close up for the first time, and I don’t know why, but my heart sort of bumped in something like recognition which was unsettling because it was definitely the first time I’d seen it.
It was much darker skinned than mine, more weather-beaten maybe, almost the same colour as the rusty sun-lightened ends of their hair.
The face was close to my age, I thought, maybe younger because I saw no sign of stubble coming in yet, and I liked it.
It was sad now, but it looked like it was better designed to laugh, an impression that was confirmed as it grinned up at the doll again and said, as if it was an afterthought:
And if you see that Jip? You tell him where I went, OK?
None of which made any sense to me, other than immediately starting me worrying about this other stranger called Jip.
Because Jip was either a third potential Russian, or the name of the one I had already killed.
Then, as I was getting used to this new information, they suddenly swung up on the front of the tank by the gun barrel and I could see only feet and knees walking towards me.
I’d relaxed too soon. I’d judged a book by its cover. Just because they looked nice, I’d decided they actually were nice, and had let down my guard.