He came out from behind the tree holding his hands up, the universal sign of surrender.
“I mean you no harm,” he said in Russian.
No one responded. There were six of them, and three held rifles pointed directly at him.
“I mean you no harm,” he said in English, then tried German, his only other language. There was no response. He scrambled for what few words in Chinese he knew, but he couldn’t remember them, and the men with weapons drew closer.
He kept his hands up while stepping backward. “Please,” he said. “I am a wealthy man. My family will pay well for my safety.”
The man in front unleashed a stream of foreign words directed at him, but Dimitri shook his head, still retreating.
“I don’t understand.”
The diamonds in his boot were hard lumps beneath his foot. If he could offer them a diamond, it might help. How could he get it out? Reaching toward his boot would alarm them, but if he could figure out how to offer them a diamond, he might have a chance.
He kept talking as he retreated. “Please. I want to join you.”
A man with his hair pulled into a topknot smiled. Perhaps he understood Russian after all, because he let the rifle drop from his hand and carried it by the barrel as he approached Dimitri, a taunting hint of a smile on his face.
Like lightning, the stranger swung the rifle, slamming it behind Dimitri’s knees and knocking him to the ground. A punch to the side of his head almost knocked him out. His vision whirled, but before he could rise, someone hauled him up from behind, and another fist slammed into his jaw.
Down again. Voices shouting, men surrounding him. Kicks, shoves, fists. He braced a knee beneath him and tried to stand, but a boot between his shoulders forced him back down.
“Please,” he choked out. “I am a—”
A fist shut him up. He couldn’t die out here in this godforsaken wilderness. His mother would never learn what happened to him. But maybe that was for the best.
Someone jerked one of his boots off. They tried to get his coat off, but he clenched his arms tight. If he lost this coat, he would freeze to death.
“Back away,” he roared, but it was hopeless.
The stitching on his lapel ripped open, and the gold coins rolled out. Now the men descended like jackals as they tore at his clothing and pulled the other boot from him.
More blows to his head, then nothing but black.
The cold woke him. Everything hurt. He tried to move, but the pain in his head was brutal. The groan in his ears sounded like an animal, but it came from his own throat. Blood was crusted on his face and down his neck. He tried to open his eyes, but they were swollen shut.
A crackle and a pop sounded. Fire.
Panic raced through him, and he managed to get an eye open. A small campfire was only a few yards away.
He was alone in the forest except for a lone figure on the other side of the fire. It was the man with the topknot, and he wore Dimitri’s coat. With its epaulets and gold braid, it looked strange on the man with long hair and dark eyes that glinted in the firelight.
“Are you awake?” the topknotted man asked in Russian. Good Russian too.
“Awake,” Dimitri croaked.
The topknotted man held a lump of meat over the fire with a skewer, and the tantalizing aroma of hot, seared meat made Dimitri dizzy. The tiny carcass looked like a squirrel, but he’d never craved anything so desperately as that chunk of meat.
“We found eight gold coins in this coat,” the man said casually. “Do you have anything else on you?”
Dimitri rolled onto his elbow and took stock of his situation.The only items of clothing he had left were his trousers, socks, and broadcloth shirt. A blanket was draped over his shoulders. There was no sign of his boots. The diamonds hidden in them were gone.
“Nothing,” he said. “Where are my boots?”
The other man shrugged. “Everything you had got split up. My share was the coat and a gold coin. Someone else got your boots.” He casually tossed a pair of filthy moccasins toward Dimitri. “You can wear those.”
Dimitri sagged. “Those shoes are completely inadequate.”
