Dazzle The Complete Unabridged Trilogy by Judith Gould Read Free Book Online Page B

collector. See? Over there, on the horse.'
    Senda carefully parted the bushes and peered out. Until Schmarya had pointed him out, she hadn't noticed Wolzak's tax collector. Her attention had been focused on the massacre, and the collector had been waiting quite some distance away on a horse far inferior to those of the Cossacks. His back was turned from the slaughter, as though by not watching it he would be absolved of any moral responsibility. Only when the massacre was over and every building was burning furiously did the leader of the Cossacks bellow for the collector. The collector wasted no time; the huge burly bear of a Cossack inspired fear even in him. With his perpetually scowling expression, fierce moustache, bushy black beard, and fiery eyes, the Cossack leader was enough to make anyone turn tail and run. During the massacre, his black lamb hat had been lost, and his glistening, frightfully smooth hairless skull threatened all who looked upon him, as did the massive raised white welt of a scar which coursed down the left side of his face from his brow to the corner of his mouth.
    Senda turned to Schmarya. 'But what's the collector doing here? There's nothing to collect.' Her voice was choked. 'Not anymore, there isn't.'
    'Yes, but he knows everyone in the village.'
    Senda watched the collector. His conversation with the leader of the Cossacks over, he swung down off his horse and started walking among the corpses.
    Senda frowned as she saw him consult a black ledger and make a note of the victims. 'He's checking the dead against some sort of list!'
    'Don't you see?' Schmarya hissed. 'The collector knows every man, woman, and child—even newborn babies—in this village. His ledger lists everyone. Now he's taking inventory of the dead.'
    Senda shook her head. 'But . . . why? I don't understand. If everyone has been butchered—'
    'To make certain everyone's accounted for,' Schmarya said grimly. 'Don't you see? Everyone is to have been killed. Every man, woman, and child in this village.' He shook his head in disbelief. 'Everyone! It was cold-bloodedly planned that way!'
    'Which means . . .' Senda gasped and her throat worked slackly. '. . . that when they find out we're missing . . .'
    'I'll kill that bastard first!' Schmarya growled. He jumped to his feet and clenched his fists at his sides.
    Senda clung to his legs and pulled him back down, out of sight. 'No, Schmarya,' she said softly. 'You won't. You'll only get yourself killed.'
    'So what?' he retorted bitterly. 'Everyone else is dead. Why shouldn't I die too?'
    'Why?' she whispered vehemently, shaking him with quiet fury. 'I'll tell you why. If we die too, then nobody will ever know what happened here. We have to live to keep the story alive. Besides, if we die too, then who's to mourn the dead?'
    His shoulders sagged. 'I suppose you're right,' he mur mured. Then he reached out and embraced her. They clung to each other for meagre comfort. Once again Senda felt as if each of her senses were heightened, only this time she did not smell the moist freshness of the earth or hear the singing of the birds. The birds and the whirring insects were still. The foul stench of blood and excrement assaulted her senses. She could almost taste the coppery, metallic aftertaste of blood in her mouth. Death hung in the air.
    Oily black plumes of smoke billowed skyward. Soon there would be nothing left of the village, only piles of ashes and scorch-scarred earth.
    The Cossack leader burst through a wall of smoke on his horse and looked about with grim satisfaction. 'Well?' he bellowed to the collector, who had finished his inventory. 'Did all the Jews get what they deserved? Are they all accounted for?'
    Senda held her breath, waiting to hear Schmarya's death notice—and her own—pronounced. This was the moment of reckoning, she knew. For she understood that if the Cossack learned that they'd escaped, the countryside would be searched until they were found and killed.
    The