Read Online I Hate Martin Amis et al. by Peter Barry - Free Book Online Page B

they’re out shopping in London or Paris. ‘It is up to you if you waste those idiots. I think if they are so keen to die, we should oblige, we should help them on their way. But others say we should not help them, that we should make them suffer. Why kill them if they want to die? They say, let those who want to die, live, and let us concentrate on killing the ones who want to stay alive.’ And he’d slapped me several times on the back, and laughed his machine-gun laugh, and taken another swig from his bottle of Slivovitz.
    I watched the man for a few minutes before raising my rifle. My hands were shaking. Seeing he was making no attempt to keep under cover, he’d be an easy target. The nerve of the fellow surprised me. I was adjusting the SSG’s sights – windage, five-to-seven east–west, distance four hundred yards – not, I have to admit, with much enthusiasm, when he reached into his jacket pocket and took out a pack of cigarettes. He lit one, as calm as anything, as if he were in a commercial extolling the virtues of this particular brand. There was a certain theatricality about his movements, as if he were acting this ever-so-cool part. It was too bizarre and, to tell the truth, I was fascinated. I could scarcely believe what I was seeing. It was so crazy, this man enjoying his last cigarette, he had me captivated. He made me smile. I decided to join in the fun.
    The dust kicked up just to his left, right at his feet, but he never moved, never turned round, didn’t even flinch. All he did was take another puff of his cigarette. I could see it clearly. I adjusted the rifle, took careful aim and put a shot to the other side of him, just to his right. Again I saw the dust kick up, but the man continued to puff away, leaning on the railings, staring down into the water as if these bullets cracking into the stone around him were of no concern or interest to him whatsoever. He treated the bullets like they were flies, some minor irritant, except that he was not even bothered to brush them aside. I’ll say that for him, he was cool, really cool. I liked him, he didn’t give a fuck about anything. I fired three or four more shots around him, the ricochets of which must have almost deafened him, but he never flinched. By this time it was as if we’d reached an agreement together; simultaneously agreeing, even though we were several hundred yards apart, that this was some kind of amusing game we were involved in, a game of bluff, a little joke between ourselves and, on my part at least, nothing fatal was about to occur. He finished his cigarette, dropped it on the pavement, ground it beneath his foot, raised his collar a little higher against the cold – as if he were the lead part in some B-grade detective movie – put his hands in his pockets and strolled off towards the city.
    And there was this argument raging in my head as I tracked the man with my rifle. I couldn’t afford to let him go … could I? But nor was I too happy about shooting someone who was simply offering himself as a target. Why didn’t he keep under cover? It was too cold-blooded to shoot him like this. By now my heart was beating so violently, I could scarcely hold the SSG steady. I had my finger on the trigger. I held my breath … I was struggling with indecision. And as I hesitated, the man suddenly jerked forwards, his body hit with such force that he spun sideways and landed face up on the road. I was shocked. For a fraction of a second I thought I’d squeezed the trigger, then realised it must have been another sniper, possibly someone in the adjoining apartment block.
    I had suspected there was one of our snipers nearby. It’s scarcely surprising. There’s no coordination of sniper positions as far as I can see: we don’t get together every morning to be allocated places to go. It’s totally haphazard, people heading off from camps around the city in any