Edith Airey’s eye fixed on the open doorway to the byre, the image overlaid by the mil lines in the reticle of the Unertl scope.
She’d managed to carry the Barrett only six hundred metres from the farmyard, up the sloping field that rose behind it, before she’d heard the raucous approach of an engine, driven hard, and she’d sought the shelter of a small stand of trees.
The copse stood about halfway up the hill, which she realised would give her ideal cover to set up the gun, the way she’d watched Patrick do it. Now, lying behind it, copying his position, she felt empowered and all-conquering.
From here she had an unobstructed view of the front of the byre in the narrow gap between the farmhouse on one side, and the wall of the barn on the other. She’d hoped to get further away, to use something of the Barrett’s awesome power and range, but for her first time out this would do.
I’ll get better with practice, she thought, her belly warmed by the thought.
The gun was much heavier than she’d expected. Patrick always made it look so easy. She’d taken his ghillie suit, too, like a trophy, lugged that up the hill with her, staggering under her awkward burden. By the time she’d reached the safety of the trees, she was light-headed with both exertion and elation.
She’d chosen a roundabout route to her present location, following the hedge line that ran down to her left, so her view of the yard had been blocked when the four men had arrived in the dark red Discovery. By the time she’d scrambled into position, they were just climbing back into the vehicle, scribing a rapid circle and driving away.
Patrick!
Edith felt the bitter pang of a missed opportunity, angry that they’d come before she was ready. But it wasn’t long, only a matter of minutes, before she heard the other car accelerating up the farm track, caught a glimpse of it pulling into the yard. Moments later, the two people she’d most wanted to see through the scope of a sniper’s rifle, walked into shot.
She spread the ghillie suit out beneath her, wriggled into position behind the gun. As she concentrated on regulating her breathing, she was suddenly overwhelmed with doubt. Not for what she was about to do, but her own readiness.
Flustered, she realised she hadn’t adjusted the sight for this distance. She hadn’t worked out the direction or speed of the wind, the difference in elevation. Her own little .22 was incapable of this kind of range and she was unsure of the amount of bullet drop to take into account with something as powerful as the Barrett. So close to her target, would it make a difference?
And while she dithered, she watched the couple linger tauntingly by the doorway, bending to examine something near the old water trough, then disappear inside.
Damn!
For a moment she slumped, defeated, letting tears of self-pity start to form, but she dashed them away and set her jaw, mulish.
Lyudmila Pavlichenko hadn’t given up so easily. From what Edith remembered reading of the Ukrainian-born sniper, she was already a sharpshooter when she volunteered to fight after the Nazi invasion back in 1941. Ancient history.
Had she been as frightened as this when she made her first two kills near Belyayevka? If so, she overcame her fear quickly. Less than a year after Pavlichenko had marched into the Red Army recruiting office, she received a commendation for killing two hundred and fifty-seven enemy soldiers in the battles for Odessa and Sevastopol.
After the war, she’d toured America, been greeted by cheering crowds, met the President at the White House, been heaped with praise and medals for valour. As Edith lay behind the Barrett, she felt certain triumph awaiting her.
She fidgeted again, trying to adopt the same effortless sprawl Patrick used. But the gun was so much bigger than her Gaucher, not just in calibre but in every way. With the butt nestled against her shoulder, she could barely reach the pistol grip. Her hand was stretched by the distance to the trigger. But she curved her index finger inside the guard and felt the tunnel-vision of panic begin to recede. She took a breath, let it out shakily.
Calmer now, Edith reached to wind down the elevation on the sight, but her hand stilled, reluctant to alter Patrick’s perfect settings. Just as she hadn’t wanted the detective to mess with the scope on her own gun. I can work out the hold-off. The last time she and Patrick had used the gun was at a thousand metres, wasn’t it? From the back of the Land Rover near Raisbeck. She was a little more than half that distance now.
I can do this.
She closed her eyes, finally feeling her pulse begin to steady. But she needed to be prepared to take the shot, mentally as well as physically.
Him first, she decided, already able to visualise the pink mist and the falling, recalling the way bits of Angela Inglis had actually cartwheeled through the air. One moment human, and the next…
Besides, if last time was anything to go by, the woman—that bitch McColl—would go to him once he was down. She would present herself, brazen, foolish, and Edith would be able to take aim at her leisure.
With only waiting to occupy her mind, Edith’s memories surfaced. The way Ian Hogg had simply ceased to exist in human terms, the moment she’d pulled the trigger. The shock on her father’s face as the bullet from the AK had taken his leg out from underneath him, spun him back. He’d ended on his rump, clutching stupidly at his leaching thigh and looking like he might cry.
He can’t be my real father, she thought with fierce contempt. My mother must have had some fling with a mysterious stranger. But the image that conjured was too ridiculous for words. The thought of her fat little anxious mother indulging in a passionate affair. Adopted, then. That was better! Delivered to their doorstep as a new-born, in the dead of night, never to be told her true heritage.
Blood will out.
Suddenly, there was movement in the doorway below and they came out. He moved quickly across the yard and was out of sight before she could collect her scattered thoughts. But the McColl woman was a different story. She retrieved her bag, lifted out a camera and began snapping away at the side of the water trough.
Edith wiped her sweating palm down the side of her leg, slipped her finger back inside the guard, but hesitated, not liking to abandon her original plan. She swept across the yard, but the blond detective had disappeared completely. In combat, snipers have to adapt to circumstances, she told herself. How else can I hope to equal Pavlichenko’s record?
Through the scope, she followed as the redhead cast slowly across the concrete, eyes down, following some kind of trail invisible from this distance. Finally, she stopped, more or less where the Discovery had stood, bent low to inspect something on the ground more closely. How does she know? Edith wondered. Could she really see their tracks?
Edith settled her aim. She centred her finger on the trigger, took in a deep lungful of air.
Here’s to fame and glory…