cases where it wasn’t known if the dog had been vaccinated would a course of rabies injections be necessary. He felt confident that if he could find one dog bite case, or, better yet, two, he could figure out the name of the medication he was looking for.
Before he started reading the files he opened a large, leather ledger sitting next to the phone. It was the clinic’s appointment book. As each day wrapped up, someone had drawn a slash through the date. Based on what he could understand, the first appointment was tomorrow morning at 0800. That gave him literally all night to wade through the files if he wanted. It was more than enough time.
Taking off the anorak, he made himself comfortable. There had been a small task lamp in the break room, and he went and got it. Draping a dishtowel from the break room over it, he was able to dim the light enough that he felt comfortable using it to work by. He had no idea how much juice was left in his flashlight, nor how long his search was going to take.
Just like American doctors, Russian doctors had terrible handwriting, too. Using a blank piece of paper, he went through line by line. He was about a quarter of the way through the files when he found what he was looking for.
Two brothers had both had some sort of incident with a dog. Their charts were right next to each other. In both cases they had been prescribed антибиотики.
Harvath was pretty certain this was what he was looking for. After writing the word down on the blank sheet of paper, he headed for the medicine cabinet in the procedure room.
But when he stepped into the hallway, someone was waiting for him. And that someone had a very large-caliber weapon pointed right at him.
CHAPTER 32
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Who are you?” the woman demanded in Russian. “What are you doing here?”
She was dressed in a dark-green down parka, black snow pants, and winter boots. In her hands, she held a bolt-action hunting rifle with a large scope.
Harvath hadn’t even heard her come in the rear door, probably because the furnace was so loud. Stupidly, he had his shotgun over his shoulder. At this range, if he reached for it, she’d put a hole in him so big you could drive a tank through it.
Keeping his hands where she could see them, he held out the piece of paper with the word antibiotic written in Cyrillic.
“Who are you?” she repeated.
“I am not a threat,” he replied in his broken Russian.
“Last chance,” she stated, as she took a tighter grip on her rifle. “Who are you?”
“Menya zovut Scot.” My name is Scot.
“What are you doing here? Why did you break into my clinic?”
She was going too fast. He couldn’t understand what she was saying. “My Russian is terrible. Please. Do you speak English?” he asked.
Moments passed as she tried to decide whether she wanted to engage with him in his language rather than hers. Finally, in English she said, “What are you doing in my clinic?”
“I’m injured.”
“I can see that. You have blood all over you. Why did you break my door?”
“I’m sorry. I needed medicine.”
“So you just broke in?” she replied.
“You have every right to be angry.”
“Of course I do. This is my clinic.”
“Again, I’m sorry, but—”
He had begun to lower his hands and she stiffened, applying pressure to the trigger. “Keep them up,” she commanded.
Harvath put them back up. “I’m not a threat. I won’t hurt you.”
“Is that so? Then why don’t you tell me why my uncle’s snowmobile is parked outside, why you’re wearing his clothes, why you’re carrying his shotgun, and why you’re covered in blood?”
Harvath was stunned. “The fur trapper? He was your uncle?” He could see some resemblance in her face, a hint of Sámi around the eyes—but not much.
She was blonde, with high cheekbones, a thin, delicate nose, and full pink lips. She looked more Caucasian than anything else.
“What do you mean was?” she demanded. “What happened? What did you do to him?”
“Nothing,” Harvath insisted. “He saved my life. Unfortunately, I couldn’t do the same for him.”
The woman, though obviously distraught at hearing a family member had passed, kept the gun pointed right at him, waiting for him to continue.
“I was in a plane crash. The only survivor. I can’t even remember how long I was walking before I found your uncle’s cabin, but I was on the other side