The Hunt (14 page)

Treading water, he let the initial hyperventilation subside, acclimatising as best he could. His clothing weighed him down and the rucksack felt five times heavier. In a race he’d be wearing a wetsuit; it buoyed him up and helped his weak swimming, and over the last couple of years he’d learned to ease his fears of what lay beneath.

He’d found that looking helped. Some lakes were so cloudy that he could not even see his own feet, while others – old quarries, or manmade lakes – often had visibility reaching down twenty feet or more. Either way, knowing what was beneath him seemed to calm his fears.

He couldn’t do that now. He had no goggles, and no time. He had to start swimming.

Aiming for the other side of the lake, he kicked hard and pulled a few powerful strokes to get himself moving. He breathed bilaterally – breathe left, stroke, stroke, breathe right – spitting out any remaining breath and water before gasping in another lungful of air. His swimming had advanced hugely in the past couple of years. Two years before he could not swim four lengths of a pool without having to stop, exhausted, muscles burning and chest heaving. Now he could comfortably swim four thousand metres, and while he was not particularly fast, he was consistent. But he still sometimes had brief, inexplicable moments of blind panic. When he spoke to Terri about them she told him he was being silly, but he insisted that they were a healthy reaction to being in the water. Humans weren’t meant to swim, and occasionally his animal self reminded him of that.

But not now. Swimming fully clothed and carrying a heavy backpack was already way beyond his comfort zone, and he could not afford a moment’s doubt. His life, and his family’s, relied upon him crossing this lake.

He quickly found his usual comfortable rhythm. It was strange swimming without goggles, but he opened his eyes whenever he turned his head to breathe, and the blurred sunlight kept him in touch with the world. He didn’t usually kick hard when swimming – saving his legs for the bike and run phases of a triathlon – and he did the same now, using a light kick merely to keep his legs and feet up close to the surface. He relied on his arm stroke to propel him across the lake. It was a pleasant feeling, and one that he had only recently grown used to. On long swims, feeling himself glide, hanging on to the water and pulling himself forward, he often went into a contemplative state almost akin to hypnosis. Biking and running were his other loves, and with both of them it was necessary to pay attention to what was going on around him. Look at the trail or road before him, watch out for traffic or other bikes or runners, check his bike, concentrate on his running form. Swimming, he seemed to retreat into himself.

Perhaps it was an unconscious attempt to keep the fear at bay.

His hands cut through the water, smooth and controlled. He reached for the opposite shore, grabbed the water and pulled, drawing himself forward, rolling as his opposite hand cut in, reached, grabbed. The roll was more jarring than usual, and he had to control it to make sure he didn’t tip over too far. The rucksack was waterlogged and heavy, slipping from left to right on his back as he swam. The straps cut into his shoulders.

What if it pulled him down? What if he couldn’t unlock the straps and the weight grabbed him, drawing him deep into colder, darker waters?

He gasped and sucked in water on his next breath. Coughed it back out beneath the surface, breathed to the other side, then tried to find his rhythm again, exhaling smoothly through his mouth.

Something touched his leg. He kicked hard to draw away and it happened again, a gentle, slick stroke from his knee down towards his foot.

He should have taken his shoes off and put them in his rucksack. What if he lost one?

He kicked again, tensing his toes to clasp on to his shoes.

Whatever had touched him was gone; a spread of long weeds left behind, an eel or fish swimming away.

What if there was a pike in here? They’d been known to bite off fingers. It could be circling him, trying to assess this stranger in its environment and wondering whether any part of him would make a tasty morsel.

Calm the hell down!
Chris thought, and he made a conscious effort to slow his flailing stroke, concentrating on his style and rhythm once again. He sighted after a breath and judged that he was at least halfway across, closing on the opposite shore just where he’d intended. At least he was swimming straight.

The rucksack slipped further to the left, dragging him beneath the water as he tried breathing to the right. He took in a mouthful of water, gagged, coughed it out, splashed as he tried to surface. The fear was instant and yet illogical – he was so close to the surface that his next breath would come in mere seconds. But he kicked and splashed, and opened his mouth underwater to shout out in instinctive fear. Took in more water. There was something slick in there this time, a shred of weed or perhaps a small fish, and he opened his mouth wider as he vomited it back out.

He surfaced at last, treading water as he caught his breath and tried to calm himself. Nothing touched him. There was no fish in his mouth, and the depths below him were innocent.

‘Fuck’s sake!’ he shouted. His voice echoed back to him, but there was something strange about the echo. He couldn’t place it. Odd. ‘Hey!’ he shouted, and once again the echoes came
…
but longer.

Saying more words.

He spun around in the water and looked back the way he’d come. At first he didn’t see the movement because he was still in a part of the lake touched by sunlight, and it dazzled where it reflected from the frantic waves he was making. Then he saw the figure silhouetted up on the ridge line he’d descended from so recently, and he couldn’t believe the man had made it there so fast.

Blondie. It had to be. And he was pointing, and shouting.

Why share the kill?
Chris thought, and the idea suddenly struck him hard, chilling, disbelieving.

Chris kicked himself around and started swimming again. He thrashed with his legs, kicking from the hip to provide maximum power, and heaved hard with his hands and forearms, grasping the water as far ahead as he could, shoving back at his hip.
It all comes down to how well I can swim
, he thought, and the fear was replaced with a strange, detached calm.

You’ve suddenly become a can-do guy
, his wife had said to him a year or so ago. She’d been referring to his mid-life transformation from a fat, relatively unhealthy man to someone fit, lean, and capable. He’d learned to swim when he never thought he could, done other things that he’d never have believed possible for most people, let alone himself. His negativity had given way to a can-do attitude.

And he could do this.

He was Terri’s can-do guy, and he would never let her down.

He swam hard. Pausing to look back would waste time, slow him down, and give Blondie a motionless target. He thought of zig-zagging, but at swimming pace it would have little effect. His best bet was to put as much distance between him and his pursuer before—

The sound was strange, like a rapid, bubbling hiss. Water in his ears.

It came again, just when he was turning to the left to breathe, and this time he saw the water splashing up a few metres away.

He was within range.

What will it feel like? Will I even feel it in such cold water? Will I know I’m about to die …?

The opposite shore was getting much closer. What he’d do when he got there was something to worry about when it happened. It looked rocky, ragged, and hopefully there’d be places to hide as he dashed from rock to rock, climbing the slope towards whatever might lie beyond.

That bubbling hiss came again, much closer this time.

Chris took action without even thinking about it, taking a deep breath, pointing his head down and kicking his legs up, pulling with his arms and descending below the surface. It was frighteningly easy, as his clothes and rucksack pulled him down. He levelled out and kicked hard, breast-stroking towards what he hoped was the shore. He tried not to exhale too much – a trail of bubbles would show Blondie just where to aim his next shot.

After close on a minute he rose quickly to the surface, exhaled, drew in a huge shuddering breath, checked his direction, and submerged again.

Something struck him in the back.

It was like a hard punch or kick, similar to many he’d felt at the tumultuous start of many open water triathlons.

Shot!
he thought,
I’ve been shot!
But he could still kick and pull, so he stayed underwater and surged on. Those cold-water impacts often felt like nothing, the cold absorbing some of the pain or damage for a while. He didn’t want to dwell on that. If the bullet had injured him, he’d know it soon enough.

He jigged to the right a little, kicked hard, held his breath for as long as he could, then surfaced again. This time there was no shot, and he risked a moment to look back the way he’d come.

All four hunters were descending the rocky slope. Even the fat one was there, lumbering downhill as if nothing and no one could stop him.
Fall and break your ankle
, Chris thought, but it seemed that his willing power wasn’t strong enough. Blondie was still in the lead, thinking that getting closer was better than commanding the high ground. Was he really that stupid? The closer he came to the water’s edge, the more difficult the angle.

Chris turned and started swimming hard for shore. This time he heard the gunshots, and they came from more than one rifle.

Maybe he’d made the wrong choice. He could have climbed and scrambled around the lake, at least then he’d have had some cover when they started shooting. Now he was exposed. And when he reached the lake’s edge and tried to climb out, they’d have a clearer shot at him.

But three hundred metres was a long way.

He drew close to the shore, and his dragging feet knocked against the lake bed.

Water splashed close to his right shoulder. Another bullet crashed from the rocky slope above the lake and ahead of him, scattering rock splinters across his head and into the water.

The lake edge was shallower here, and he stood, swaying a little unsteadily—

—
From the swim? Hope so. Hope it’s not blood loss from a wound I can’t even feel yet
—

—then starting up towards a spread of boulders. The rocks beneath his feet were slick and he slipped sideways, trying to regain his balance but falling. He landed hard and started crawling, grabbing the slippery rocks and pulling, pushing with his feet.

More gunfire. Bullets whistled and ricocheted. He stood, gasping and shouting incoherently, and ran half a dozen endless steps to a pile of rocks. He fell behind them and scurried deeper, peering through a narrow gap and back across the lake.

Safe at last
, he thought, almost laughing at the futility of it all.

He was in the shadow of the mountain here, the hunters on the other side in bright sunshine, and it illuminated their frustration. Blondie paced back and forth at the lake’s edge, and for a minute Chris thought he was actually going to leap in and start swimming. The Rambo character was hunkered down catching his breath, and the other fat man was lying on his back on a flat rock. The fourth man, short, thin and bald, seemed to be taking photographs with his mobile phone.

A warm, glowing pain spread across his back. Chris shrugged off the rucksack, reached back and grasped at his shirt, squeezing it, then checking his hand. No blood. It didn’t
feel
that bad – more like he’d been punched hard rather than shot.

But he’d never
been
shot. Had no idea what it felt like.

There was a bullet hole in the rucksack, high up and to the right. He flipped it over and checked the mesh section that pressed against his back. There was no corresponding exit hole, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

Then he hurriedly opened the rucksack and peered inside.

The plastic bag was holed and torn in several places, and still awash.

‘Shit!’ He tipped the bag and emptied its contents on the ground between his knees. The penknife was bent, several tools projecting at fractured angles where the bullet had struck and fragmented. The map was holed but probably salvageable, printed as it was on showerproof paper. The water bottles looked okay. A couple of gels had bitten the dust, and the GPS display screen was blank. Water swilled inside.

The phone screen was black.

Bloody perfect.

But it could have been so much worse.

He shoved everything back into the rucksack and shouldered it again. It was time to leave. Once he got up the slope and disappeared over the top, he’d have an hour or so until they managed to edge their way around the lake. By then the light would be fading, and he’d have to come up with a plan to see him through the night.

No more gunshots cracked out as he started to climb. He risked a look over his shoulder, and back across the lake the four men were watching him. Blondie stood by the water, rifle held in both hands across his stomach. The other three were sitting close together, passing something back and forth. They drank from it. A bottle of whiskey, perhaps, otherwise there’d have been no need to share.

Good. Alcohol would dehydrate them, slow them down.

Chris gave them the finger. He couldn’t help it, did it instinctively, knew that if he’d thought about it for even a second he’d have held back
…
but it felt good, and it meant that he could smile. The smile gave him a moment of optimism in a darkening world.

Blondie shouted in rage, his voice lost in the vast wilderness, and started shooting at Chris again.

Bullets whistled and whipped. Chris hid behind rocks. It was only for thirty seconds, but every wasted bullet was one less that could hit him.

His trail shoes squelched as he started moving again. He was cold, and as he moved his soaked outfit brought on the shivers. He needed a change of clothing – the spare running trousers in the rucksack were soaked – something warm to wear on top, and some decent food.

Failing that, somewhere to dry his kit might be a distant second best.