Look Into My Eyes by Warren Murphy

Author:Warren Murphy [Warren Murphy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Chiun (Fictitious character) --Fiction., Williams, Remo (Fictitious character) --Fiction.
ISBN: 9781035999101
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing

Chapter Ten

AT FIVE HUNDRED YARDS Gusev Balbek could put a bullet through a person’s eye during a windstorm. At a thousand yards he could bisect a chest. At fifteen hundred yards he could guarantee hitting a running man and stopping him.

That was with a sniper rifle. With a pistol he could shoot the beaks off low-flying birds. He would do these things for two hours every morning, partly to keep in practice, partly to keep the smiling commissars happy.

They would come, sometimes in the company of generals, and they would say most politely:

“Don’t let us disturb you. We just wish to watch.”

And then Gusev would put on the special performance. The honored guests would sit on a wooden stand made to look like a replica of an American inauguration platform. A dummy in a formal suit was made to move its arms by means of a small motor.

Gusev Balbek would walk fifteen hundred yards away, slowly, to impress upon them all how great a distance it was. Fifteen hundred yards was outside the cordon of protection of a head of state. All high officials knew that. Anything beyond a thousand yards just merited a cursory inspection to make sure no large band of men or a howitzer was lurking out there. A single person was not something security men would worry about at that distance. Everyone knew that.

And then just for drama, in the stands that represented an American inauguration, the American presidential song, “Hail to the Chief,” would play. And speakers would blare the noise of crowds applauding.

Then from the motorized dummy would come the recorded words of the inaugural speech. When this first was used, Gusev would fire on the lines “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.” The later speeches lacked that sort of dramatic high point. In fact, none of them were very good at all.

At the proper moment, Gusev, barely a speck in the distance, would fire. He always hit the dummy. Military men were always the most impressed.

Then Gusev would come in to a thousand yards, and while the spectators’ eyes could barely make him out, Gusev would put a bullet right into the heart of the dummy, or a second, replacement dummy if the first was badly damaged.

And then at five hundred yards, where security men were unafraid of simple handguns, Gusev provided the pièce de résistance.

A photograph of the current President of the United States was taped to the head of the statue, and faster than they could follow, Gusev would whip out a handgun and shoot out the photograph’s eyes, two quick shots. Then the exact scale photograph of the head would be passed around to the important visitors. They would look at the eyes and nod. Some smiled. Others said:

“If we have to. If we have to.”

There were other demonstrations. Shots gotten off in a crowded room, a press conference, and the ultimate display. Firing three bullets in succession at

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