The last to sleep was Taras. The wolfhound yawned and lay down beside the girl; strangely, all of his previous worries about the place were now gone. His companions were out of the cold bora wind, and that was all that seemed important.
He dreamed a vivid dream of ancient tribesmen and their young warrior priestess, of her horses and of the wicked Germans.
CORPORAL HAGEN CLIMBED OFF his motorcycle, walked stiffly across the snow to the end of the trail and shook his head.
“The tracks stop dead right here, sir,” he said. “It looks as though they doubled back on their own trail, which means we must have driven straight past them somewhere. Probably in those woods.” Hagen took off his steel helmet and rubbed his squarish head for a moment. His leather coat creaked as his arm moved, and it sounded just like the snow shifting under his boots as he walked. “You did say this was a child we were after, sir, didn’t you?”
“You know I did,” said Captain Grenzmann. “Why do you ask?”
“Only it’s not many children who could lay a false trail like this and would have the nerve to hide from us as we passed straight by them.”
“S’right, sir,” said the SS man called Donkels. “This can’t be any ordinary child.”
“Unless it was the horses that did it,” said the third SS man. “Them being as cunning as you said they were.”
“That would be very cunning for a horse,” said Donkels. “A horse would have to be as cunning as a fox to do something like that.”
“And I keep telling you that’s exactly what these horses are like,” insisted Grenzmann.
“Well,” said Hagen, “it seems we have to go back the same way we came.” He yawned, wiped the inside of his helmet with a handkerchief and then placed it back on his head. “Look, sir. Why don’t we call it a day? Or more accurately, a night, since that’s what this is. We’ve been on their trail now for what—eighteen hours? We tried our best to catch them and we’ve failed. Not that anyone ever needs to know that, sir.”
“I will know it, Corporal,” Grenzmann said coldly.
“All I’m saying, sir, is that since we are now returning the way we came, why don’t we keep going until we run into the sergeant and the rest of our men? Perhaps they’ve made camp back there. We can rest up a bit, get some hot food inside us and then try again tomorrow.” He shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe we’ll see some sign of the horses when it’s light. But if we don’t then, where’s the harm in just going back to the big house at Askaniya-Nova? A couple of wild horses and a child. I mean, really, sir, is it worth all this effort?”
“That’s right, sir,” said Donkels. “No one could have done more than you did. Anyone else but you would have given up ages ago.”
“You think so, huh?”
“Yes, sir. You’ve been quite relentless, sir.”
“But now the time has come to give up, is that what you’re saying?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Let me tell you what I think about that idea.”
Grenzmann drew his pistol, laid it on his lap and stared at it meaningfully. The other three men shifted awkwardly.
“We’re going on with the search,” Grenzmann said firmly. “Until we find them. Do you understand? Nobody is going to quit now. Need I remind you that this is a breeding pair of Przewalski’s horses we’re pursuing and we have a duty to cleanse the earth of their wandering kind forever? That’s a duty I’m not about to shirk just because you are all feeling tired. And anyone who wants to argue about this can take it up with Mr. Luger here.” Grenzmann paused. “Anyone? How about you, Corporal?”
Hagen shook his head.
“No, I thought not. So let’s have a little less argument and a little more enthusiasm. Now mount that motorcycle, Corporal, and let’s move, shall we? There’s no time to waste. As you say, it’s clear they’ve doubled back. That can only mean that they know we’re close to catching them. In spite of what you say, we haven’t failed yet. Not by a long way.”
Hagen saluted smartly and climbed onto his motorcycle; he had no love for Grenzmann, but he feared the captain and he knew the others feared him, too. It was fear that kept them all in line and often made them obey orders they sometimes found distasteful; at least that was what they had told themselves.
Minutes later, they were speeding back along the frozen trail.
An hour’s hard ride brought them back to the circle of standing stones, and they might have carried straight on because the previous tracks of their own wheels were much more noticeable in the moonlight than anything else. The ancient monument was almost behind them when Grenzmann glanced back over his shoulder and noticed two lines of hoofprints leading off at a tangent and over the brow of the hill. He slapped the arm of the man beside him and pointed.