Known Dead_ A Novel - Donald Harstad [4]
‘‘They’re still here,’’ came the whispered voice. ‘‘Be careful . . .’’
No shit. Thanks for filling in the gaps.
‘‘Where are you now?’’ he asked, in a barely discernible whisper.
‘‘Right at a sharp bend to the right . . .’’ I whispered back. The best I could do.
There was a long pause. ‘‘Come on ahead, I’ll cover you, we’re just past the bend.’’
Fine. Why didn’t you cover me before? ‘‘Ten-four,’’ I whispered. Yeah, come on ahead. Sure. All I had to do was force myself to get up, at least into a crouch. That was difficult, because all my instincts told me to keep down and still. But I had to get to Johansen. He needed assistance.
When I got to my feet, I found I was only about one step off the trail. Very carefully, I stepped out. I stopped, crouched down, and looked around, my rifle pointing ahead of me. Nothing. But . . . I didn’t have my first-aid kit. Where in the hell had I lost it? I backed back into the tall brush, and glanced down. It was to my right. Holding my rifle in my left hand, I picked the metal kit up and stuffed it partway down the front of my jeans. Both hands on the rifle again, I got back on the trail.
‘‘Carl,’’ I heard from the walkie-talkie. ‘‘You comin’, Carl?’’
I didn’t bother to answer, because I would have had to take one hand off my rifle again to do so, and I was feeling eyes on me all the time. Instead, I crept around the corner to the right. About four steps into it, and I saw them.
Johansen was about a foot off the trail, kneeling by a body that had to be Kellerman, although I could only see his lower half. They were both in camouflage clothes, and Johansen was as white as a sheet. They were shielded a little by a grassy mound about two feet high and a dead tree that stretched into the brush just past them. There were several pale blue paper wrappers strewn on the ground . . . first-aid kit compresses. They reminded me of flowers. I was to them in two steps, and knelt back down just off the trail.
‘‘You all right?’’
‘‘Yeah,’’ said Johansen. His eyes were wild-looking, and his head was moving constantly, scanning the area. ‘‘They fuckin’ killed us, man. They killed us.’’
Shock does strange things. I moved slightly, and reached out to try to find a carotid pulse on Kellerman. Johansen blocked my hand.
‘‘He’s dead.’’
‘‘Just let me check, Ken. Just for the record.’’
He thought for a second. ‘‘Yeah, yeah. Okay.’’
I reached out and pressed two fingers into Kellerman’s neck. Nothing. Cool to the touch, but damp. His color and texture reminded me of pale cheese. I noticed he hadn’t shaved that morning.
‘‘Okay,’’ I said softly. I wiped my hand on my jeans, and pulled the first-aid kit out before it cut me in half. ‘‘What happened?’’ I asked, keeping my eyes focused opposite Johansen’s, peering uphill. It occurred to me that, crouched down as we were, we couldn’t see much more than a few feet, except uphill, and up the trail. ‘‘You sure you’re all right?’’
‘‘We got set up,’’ he said. ‘‘They were waitin’ for us. Just waitin’ . . . No, no, I didn’t get hit. I’m just fine.’’
Off in the distance, a fragment of a siren’s wail came drifting up the little valley.
‘‘I’m sorry, man,’’ said Johansen, to me.
‘‘Nothing for you to be sorry about,’’ I said, scanning the area around us. I was thinking the siren might stir up the ambushers. ‘‘This shit can happen.’’
‘‘Yeah, I do. I am, I mean,’’ he said softly.
I kept looking up slope. There could be a tank up there, and I wouldn’t be able to see it unless it moved. ‘‘Why?’’ I asked, almost absently, trying to humor him.
‘‘It was me that shot at you, just now. I thought you might be them.’’
I looked at him. ‘‘Oh.’’ I looked back uphill. ‘‘Apology accepted.’’ Sort of.
‘‘I didn’t mean to,’’ he said.
‘‘No problem.’’ I just wasn’t going to think about that. ‘‘How many you mean by they?’’ I asked.
‘‘Lots.’’
‘‘Right.’’
The siren was Lamar Ridgeway, Nation County sheriff, and my boss for more than fifteen years.