Kruger’s eyes flared. The Israeli scientist seemed like a man possessed. He had the German’s arm in a bear hug, his angry, crimson face only a few inches from Kruger’s as he tried to pry the pistol from Kruger’s grip. The sheer impudence of the smaller man’s suicidal attack stunned him for a moment, driving him backward and into a rage. Kruger did not have time for this. He jammed the automatic into Chorev’s gut and pulled the trigger again. The expression on the German’s face soon turned from surprise to anger as he realized Chorev was still there, hanging on as tightly as ever. Kruger pulled backward and tried to free the Beretta and his gun hand once more, but Chorev still refused to let go. It seemed such a pathetic mismatch, but that damned fool was still there, gripping Kruger’s arm even tighter.
The German went into a rage, growling like an angry animal, whipping Chorev from side to side, trying to break this lunatic’s hold on his arm; but Chorev still refused to let go. Kruger lifted the Israeli completely off the deck and slammed him against the wall of the wheelhouse with all his might, pounding him into the solid oak, still to no avail. Chorev’s eyes were closed, his teeth clenched, and his face wracked with pain; but he refused to release his grip on the German’s arm.
Kruger was furious, as if he were the one who was caught in the trap, and began pulling the trigger, again and again.
Later, all Leslie remembered was that something snapped deep inside her and she knew she had to do something. She reached back to push herself off the deck and found her right hand pressing on something hard. She looked down and saw it was Schiff’s spear pistol, still strapped in its holster to the warrant officer’s thigh.
In that instant, Leslie’s mind cleared. It all seemed so logical, so cold and unemotional. Revenge? No, it was much more primitive than that, far more elemental. She remembered the expression on Balck’s face in the corridor the night before, when he skewered that deck hand Lindstromm with his filleting knife, and he had Balck had the same expression on his face now. The cold-eyed bastard was evil personified. Suddenly, Leslie felt an overpowering burst of strength fill her, as if all of Balck’s legion of victims had risen up and were now rallying to her side. They formed a long line that stretched back over the years, and lent her all the courage and strength she needed. Yes, it was all so clear now. She had become their instrument of revenge. Nothing seemed more natural now. This was why she followed Michael here to Sweden. This must be her destiny too, as it was his. She felt the spirit of his victims wrap her fingers around the grip of that spear gun and rip it out of the holster as she looked up into Balck’s cruel blue eyes.
CHAPTER FORTY
Rung by rung, Sergei Varentsov climbed to the top of the Soviet trawler’s radar mast. With his ample gut pressed against the mast, he braced himself against the roll and pitch of the boat and focused his field glasses on the faint smudge on the horizon. The damned thing should have blown up by now! There should be smoke and wreckage on the water, but through the morning mist, Varentsov could still see the Brunnhilde riding unharmed on the rising seas, mocking him. The Speznaz diving team he sent had more than enough time to blow that damned whaler out of the water, destroy the U-boat, and swim back here; so where were they? Where were the explosions? Where were the smoke and flames that would finally bring an end to his misery, and where were the divers? Where were they!
He cursed his rotten luck. The flames of hell were rising up around him again, licking at his pants legs even up here at the top of the mast. He had browbeaten that insolent Ruchenko, ordering him to take the trawler in closer to shore, well inside Swedish waters, so he could get a better look; but that was a half-hour ago, and he could see the Russian spy trawler had barely moved. Varentsov suddenly felt dizzy and light-headed. He grabbed the mast with both arms, too weak to stand. The fiery chasm was opening up beneath him again. “Give it up, Varentsov,” the flames whispered to him, speaking in Serov’s voice this time. “You are a miserable failure and a traitor. Put a gun to your head or swallow a handful of your red pills; but end it now, before I end it for you, because you are finished.” He felt the blistering heat, and saw his trousers smoking; knowing all the while that the flames weren’t real. It was insane. He was insane, but it felt so real.
Varentsov knew he had to end this. Soon, his choice would be suicide or that personal hell Serov crafted for him, knee-deep in the snow outside the rear door of the Lubyanka. He willed his shaking legs back down the rungs of the mast until he collapsed on deck. Half crawling, he stumbled down the stairs and went below, desperate to reach the radio room. Wind blown and wild-eyed, he burst through the door and found that traitor Ruchenko and his radioman with their heads pressed together, whispering and grinning, no doubt conspiring against him, again. As the sweat poured off his face, Varentsov screamed at them from the doorway, “How far? How far away are we?”
“How far? You mean from that old whaler?” came the Captain’s astonished reply as he looked at Varentsov and saw the man was shaking, completely out of control. “Three miles, I would say. Why do you ask?”
“Why? Because it is up to us now. Don’t you understand? It is up to us. You have small arms on board. Pistols, Kalashnikovs and machine guns? Well, break them out,” Varentsov ordered, his eyes dancing. “Yes, break them out. They only have a skeleton crew on that old tub. They will never know what hit them.”
The Captain’s jaw dropped as he heard Varentsov’s words.
“There is no choice, Ruchenko,” Varentsov said with a sharp, nervous laugh. “Surely, you see that now. We must act swiftly and decisively or all will be lost.”
Unfortunately, all the trawler captain saw was a maniac, and one with an MVD Colonel’s commission at that. “We?” Ruchenko asked. “You mean you want us to attack the whaler?" he asked incredulously. “I took my ship well inside Swedish waters to drop off your diving team, Comrade Colonel; but I dare not go any closer."
“If you disobey me again, I’ll have you shot, you insolent…”
“Perhaps you will, but if I lose this ship with all its top secret electronic equipment, you will need to stand at the end of a very long line. My orders were to bring you here and be your ‘Moscow taxi’ as you called it; but if you need more than that, you should have them send you a damned Navy frigate!”
Before the argument could get any more heated, a panicky voice interrupted them over the loud speaker. “Captain! This is the bridge. We have high speed aircraft on the radar, coming in fast from the northwest."
Ruchenko bolted from the radio room and took the stairs two at a time with Varentsov hot on his heels, screaming more threats at him. As they reached the bridge, the MVD Colonel’s loud ranting was drowned out by the roar of three swept-wing jet fighters passing overhead, only a few feet above the trawler’s radar mast.
“Are those ours, Ruchenko?” Varentsov screamed. “Yes! Look! I think they are Mig-15s,” hoping against all hope that Moscow had sent him help.
“Mig15s?” Ruchenko scoffed. “No, no. Those are Swedish, Saab 29s. Look at the colors, man! And look at the bombs hanging under their wings, Comrade Colonel. I have no doubt that Stockholm vectored them over us for your benefit,” the trawler Captain said as the heavy ship rocked from side to side in the down draft. “As I told you, we are still well inside their territorial waters; and that was the only warning they are likely to give us. We must move farther out to sea.”
“No! No!” Varentsov raged. “We must attack… we must…”
“It is over, Varentsov. This game of yours is over.”
“No!" Varentsov screamed. "They cannot do this to me.”
“They can’t?” the Captain asked incredulously. “They? You need help, Comrade Colonel. You are out of control.”
Varentsov stared wide-eyed at the contrails of the Swedish jets as they turned and came back for a second pass. His lips were moving, but the words no longer came out.
Ruchenko looked at him and knew precisely why this big Moscow Colonel was in such a panic. First, there was the sm
all matter of the Speznaz Diving Team he sent to blow up the old U-boat. They left with forty-five minutes of air, perhaps a bit more; but that was well over an hour ago. It was the simplest of Stalinist arithmetic. Failure equals the basement of the Lubyanka. If those divers had been MVD men, no one in Moscow Center would give a fig. Unfortunately for Varentsov, they were an elite and very expensive special operations unit the MVD had borrowed from the Navy. Given the intense intra-service hatreds involved, the MVD would be forced to grovel and apologize to the Navy; and the good Colonel would pay a heavy price for it.
Unfortunately, when shit like that hit the fan, it splattered everyone in the room. That could create a problem of fatal proportions for one Captain Junior Grade Vasily Ruchenko as well. The MVD would try to blame the Navy, and the Navy would want its own scapegoat. Yes, when it all hit the fan, everyone associated with this fiasco would be packed off to the gulag. What rotten-ass luck, and just when everything was going his way, Ruchenko glowered.
Kruger’s face was only inches from Chorev as he fired the pistol into the man’s stomach one more time. He was still draped across Kruger’s gun-arm, and the German felt the impact of each bullet and smelled the fear radiating from the man. In that instant, Kruger felt the old rush welled up inside until he thought he would burst. He closed his eyes and savored every second of it, even though he knew he shouldn’t. He must end this business, so he forced himself to open his eyes and focus on this maniac Israeli. He must free himself and be rid of him. Kruger raised his left arm and brought his fist down on Chorev’s back like a sledgehammer, determined to break free of this madman’s grip. The blow would have killed most men. It finally broke Chorev’s grip on Kruger’s arm, and the Israeli collapsed in a heap on the deck.
The German looked down on the body of his latest victim and exulted. Free! He had finally broken free and now he could conclude his business with the other three. As he turned his eyes back toward them, he found the American woman sitting on the deck directly in front of him. Their eyes locked on each other’s, and both were filled with hate. The bitch, he thought! She was behind this, whether he shot her up here or below deck no longer mattered to him, she would be the next to die. After all, he had serious work left to do. He must radio Wilhelmshaven. He must set his explosive charges below deck and scuttle this old whaler, and he must make good his escape. With the Swedish Air Force nosing around, their Navy would soon follow, so he must move quickly.
Odd though, he saw that the woman had something in her hand. Her arm was turning, extending upward toward him. What was it, he wondered as his brain raced to catch up. It was short and black with a shiny-silver tip. He knew he should have killed them all the moment he came back aboard. In fact, he should have killed her first. The bitch had a smart tongue and an arrogant mouth, but one bullet would put an end to that problem. Yet as he raised the Beretta automatic and began to swing it around toward her, he felt a thin, icy shiver run down his spine. Something was wrong; something was very wrong with the picture that lay before him. Perhaps it was that shiny, pointed thing in her hand. His arm felt numb from struggling with that fool Chorev, from all that beating and pounding. It felt slow. Could that be it? Was he simply tired? Maybe it was only a heartbeat or two, but his arm felt sluggish. His eyes finally focused on her hands and on that shiny, silver tip, and he realized what it was. The bitch was holding a spear pistol. It was already pointed directly at him, while he was still swinging the automatic around toward her; and that made the scene all wrong as that icy shiver raced down his spine again, even stronger this time.
Sturmbannführer Heinz Kruger, recipient of the Knight’s Cross with Swords and Diamonds from the hand of Adolf Hitler himself, had never found himself this close to the wrong end of anyone else’s weapon. It had always been the other way around. Yet in that split second when he realized what she was holding in her hands, Kruger felt a sudden and unwanted bond with his many, many victims. This was what they must have seen and felt as they looked down the barrel of his weapon and realized they were about to die.
Leslie did not have time to aim or even think. If she had, she probably would have frozen. Balck loomed above her in his wet suit, a black-garbed shape silhouetted against the bright blue morning sky. He was turning toward her, his right arm and the automatic in his hand covered with Yuri Chorev’s blood. While his eyes were already locked on her, his pistol was still tracking around. If she had any doubts, one look into those cold, blue eyes told her everything she needed to know. Balck was an animal. He would kill her and then kill the others, just as he killed Lindstromm and God only knew how many more. While Eddie and her Daddy liked hunting duck back home, no one was better than Leslie at shooting quail. They would flush from the stubbly cornrows right at your feet, and you did not have time to think or aim. A good quail hunter turned from the waist and shoulder and squeezed the trigger when it felt right, trusting to instinct to do the rest. That was what she did.
For an instant she felt — nothing.
Time stopped. She never heard the soft click of the trigger. She never felt the burst of compressed air that propelled the silver rod from the barrel of the spear gun. And she never heard the sharp crack of Balck’s automatic as he shot at her. Her eyes remained fused on his. The recoil of the spear gun knocked her backwards just as a finger of blue flame exploded from the muzzle of the Beretta.
She never knew which of them saved her life — the recoil of her spear pistol or Balck’s own haste. If he had taken the time to finish his turn and aim the Beretta at her before he fired, she would surely be dead. But he didn’t. He continued to tower over her as if nothing had happened, but something was very different. Those hateful blue eyes dropped to his chest and he frowned. The Walther was now pointed at her head, but it was as if he had forgotten about it. Its barrel was no longer rock-solid steady. It began to waver.
“Go ahead. Shoot, you bastard," she screamed at him. “Shoot!”
Still, the German did nothing. Why? As she looked up at him, she saw the answer in his eyes. They looked surprised, strangely distant, and suddenly full of fear. Slowly, his arm sagged. The pistol slipped from his fingers and clattered on the deck as if it no longer meant anything to him. He brought both hands to his chest, his fingers moving, scratching and digging at something. His eyes slowly glazed over and Balck swayed back and forth like a tall, leafy tree in a strong wind.
That was when Leslie saw it: between his fingertips the nub of a stainless-steel spear protruded from the center of Balck’s chest.
Kruger’s brain could not comprehend what had happened. He had experienced pain before, but nothing like this. It began with a numbing punch in the center of his chest that spread to the pit of his stomach and up to the top of his head, sucking the energy out of him. He wanted to shoot that American bitch again, but his arm grew heavy and listless and it hardly seemed to matter anymore. Slowly, his eyes dropped to his chest. That was when he saw the nub of the spear sticking out. This couldn’t be happening. It must be a joke; something must be stuck to the front of his wet suit. No other explanation was possible.
After all, he was Heinz Kruger. He was invincible.
An icy chill swept through him, and he never heard the Walther clatter on the deck at his feet. His fingers seemed to have taken on a will of their own as they felt for the shaft of the spear and closed around that shiny silver nub. He tried to brush it off and make it go away, until he saw dark blood oozing out around it.
If someone held a mirror up to his eyes and he could see the expression on his own face, he might have understood. The arrogant smile had vanished along with the sadistic glow in his cold blue eyes. They were replaced by the same uncomprehending expression he had placed on so many other faces. He saw the victim, the look of the soon-to-be-dead. In that instant of terrible understanding, Heinz Kruger’s eyes rolled back in his head, his body went limp, and he toppled backward on the Brunnhilde’s deck… dead.
Captain Vasily Ruchenko didn’t think things could get
any worse, until his Radar Officer called to him in a panicky voice. “Captain!” he said, pointing at one of the screens. “High-speed boats, coming straight at us — range five miles and closing. Swedish Patrol boats, I think — two of them.”
“No!” Varentsov screamed. "We must go after that whaler. Do you hear me!"
Now it was Ruchenko’s turn to sweat. With Swedish jet fighters and two patrol boats closing on him, he was a sitting duck. He looked over at Varentsov, knowing he was about to lose his ship and his career because of this lunatic.
“Shut up, you fool! You were out-played, and this fiasco is over.”
“Captain," his radio officer interrupted him again. “It’s the Swedish Navy. They say we’re inside their territorial waters, and they insist we heave-to.”
The Captain turned and looked at Varentsov with disgust. “See what you have done, Mister big-shot Moscow Colonel? Do I start a war, or do I let the Swedes capture my trawler, eh? The American CIA would love to get their hands on her, but don’t worry. We have explosive charges along the keel, and I’ll blow this boat into next Tuesday before I let anyone set foot on my deck. It will all be on your head; but you need not worry, we shall all be dead.”
Varentsov turned white. His eyes darted back and forth between Ruchenko and the radar screen. Finally, Varentsov’s shoulders sank. In desperation, he asked, “What… what else can I do?”
“Do? What else can you do? You? Nothing!” Turning to his electronics officer, Ruchenko said, “Radio the Swedes. Tell them our navigational gear shows we are a mile outside of their territorial water. But in the interest of international cooperation between our two great peoples, we shall move a bit farther out to a place where the cod are more plentiful; and we thank them for their assistance… and get us back in deep water. Now!”
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