The One That Got Away by Chris Ryan

Author:Chris Ryan
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2011-02-17T00:00:00+00:00

FIVE

BOXING CLEVER

In the days and nights that followed, there were several moments when morale plunged to rock-bottom – and this was one of them. A wave of loneliness swept over me, as I realised that I was utterly alone. I thought, 'This can't get any worse.' I was hungry, wet, tired, cut off from all communication with friends, and still far inside a hostile country.

'If things get on top of you,' my mum always used to say, 'have a good cry.' So I lay there in the rocks and tried to cry – but I couldn't. Instead my face crumpled up and I started laughing. 'Dickhead!' I thought. 'Here you are, deep in the shite, and all you can do is laugh!' But somehow it did the trick; it let go the tension and sorted me out. I daydreamed wistfully about the glorious puddings my mum used to make – particularly her rice pudding, with its thick, sweet, creamy inside, and its crust baked to a crisp golden brown. I could have done with a helping of that, there and then. But from that point I wasn't bothered about being alone. I seemed to have made a transition into feeling that I'd been on my own for the whole trip. I was used to it now – all I had to do was get on with heading for the border.

It was the morning of Sunday 27 January, my third day on the run. I would have liked to let my feet breathe, but that would have involved too great a risk. I had to be ready to leg it at any minute: so it was one boot off, one sock off, check that foot, and get sock and boot back on. Then the other foot. The blisters looked bad; they had long since burst, and the underlying skin was raw and bleeding. My toenails had started lifting, and there were blisters under my toes. I had no means of treating them, and could only hope that my feet would hold out until I reached the border.

With my boots back on, I devoted the best part of an hour to cleaning my weapon. Again, I took care not to make any noise that would carry. If you release the working parts of a 203 normally, they snap forward with a sharp crack, but if you handle them gently, you need make scarcely a sound. Once I had everything squared away, I lay back with my belt undone but my webbing still in place, straps over my shoulders, so that I could make a rapid getaway if need be. Even down there, almost on the level of the Euphrates, the air was still icy cold, and I shivered continuously. I lay on one side, with my hands between my legs, tucked in under one big rock, with smaller rocks pulled into position shielding my head and feet, and bare rock beneath me.

From time to time I dozed off, but always I woke with a start a few minutes later, shaking all over.

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