Free In the Wolf's Mouth by Adam Foulds Page B

unfolded afresh in his imagination, full of light and life.

8
    Ray looked out through the back of the truck at the cold white rain, the road shining into mud and the snarling face of the truck behind. They were in foothills on an uncomfortable twisting drive. Either side there was forest, dark and inward, loud under the rain. Actually, through the gasoline and wet uniforms the world smelled good. The main thing was not to jump out of the truck, not to try and escape into the woods. Ray concentrated on not moving and allowing himself to be safely carried to his death. Thoughts kept coming to him, convulsions of his mind that showed bodies, explosions, Wosniak and Floyd ripped and dead, their eyes empty.
    They shouldn’t have had that time off. It made it so much harder to go back to running and killing, to a world of possible annihilation from three hundred and sixty degrees at any split second in time. Strangely, one of the hardest things was pulling the trigger, to open fire. Ray had only ever had to do it at a distance, his bullets flicking forwards into so much empty space it seemed they could only land harmlessly. Not like Randall and Carlson who had fired point blank through hair, skin, bone and blood, men swaying and falling, no longer men. ‘Point Blank Range’ was maybe a good name for a movie. Ray would hesitate at sucha moment and maybe that is what would kill him, soon, up there in the mountains. He smiled to himself. Going up into the mountains to die.
    That night, before the dawn attack, under a tarp drumming with the rain, George spoke seriously to Ray. They were standing together. Ray could tell from the way they were breathing and not saying anything that they were both thinking about the fighting to come and how things had been in the desert. He could tell because there wasn’t much else they could be thinking about. When he said slowly to himself, ‘Yep, yep,’ George answered, ‘Oh, yes, indeed.’
    Ray went on. ‘Hell of a …’
    ‘Sure was.’
    ‘I’m pleased that part’s over.’
    ‘Oh, it’s over. Came and went.’
    ‘Came and fucking went. Boom.’
    ‘I’ve been thinking, though.’
    ‘Not sure you ought to be doing that,’ Ray said.
    ‘Things got awful clear for a while out there. Couldn’t help it, I suppose. I’m going to tell you, Ray.’
    ‘What?’
    George pressed his palm against his forehead then looked at it. ‘It’s about the fighting.’
    ‘Yes?’
    ‘I’m thinking if it’s a straight out question of you against another man.’
    ‘Yes?’
    ‘Then you shouldn’t do it. You should let yourself be killed. I mean me. I don’t want to kill the other guy.’
    ‘Holy crap, George. Don’t fucking say that. In a fucking war?’
    ‘You can shoot, I’m not saying that, only above them or to the side. Take them prisoner. But I don’t want to shoot the man. It’s not right. Like I said, it came clear.’
    ‘George, you son of a bitch, don’t say this. What do you think that does to your chances?’
    ‘Really? Ray, statistically what do you think it does to your chances, killing or not killing? Do you think it makes a blind bit of difference? And anyway, chances, fuck ’em. You can’t steer by chances.’
    ‘George, come on,’ Ray pleaded. ‘I think you should change your mind. We’ll be out there in a couple hours.’
    ‘Change it. Just throw a switch and change it. I can’t.’
    ‘Goddammit George, I don’t want you …’
    ‘I know, I know. But what are we gonna do?’

9
    The gull lifted its wings, leaned into the wind and floated up from the harbour wall.
    Will watched it adjust its angles and move, sliding away, rising up and backwards on a gust. With its pale, shallow eyes, its long yellow bill switching from side to side, it scanned the scene. Its breast feathers flickered as it hung there, thinking, then it planed down, raced low over the water, circled around and settled back on the wall, folding its grey wings away. It tilted its head back