The Blue Ice

by Innes, Hammond;

  He suddenly turned towards me. ‘So you did not catch up with your friend Farnell, eh? And where is he now, I wonder?’

  ‘Half-way to Finse, I should think,’ I answered.

  He nodded. ‘Perhaps.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘It is just after eleven. The train from Oslo comes through Finse at twelve-thirty. Allow that it is half an hour late – our State Railways are always late. He has two hours. I think perhaps he will make it.’ He glanced up at Lovaas, who had started to move towards his rucksack. ‘And the police will be on that train, Kaptein Lovaas.’

  Lovaas halted. Then he came slowly back towards Dahler. I could see by his face that he wanted to strangle the cripple. And yet something stopped him. There was something about Dahler’s eyes that was cold and dead, yet strangely excited. ‘The net is drawing round him, you see,’ he said with a little laugh. ‘All around you, eh?’

  There was the sound of skis being placed against the side of the hut. Then the outer door closed, there was a stamp of nailed boots and the inner door opened and Jorgensen came in. His tall figure looked lithe and active in a white ski suit. His leathery features seemed darker than usual against the white of the snow that clung to him. He stopped and looked round the room – first at Jill and myself, then at Lovaas and his mate, finally at Dahler. ‘Where is he?’ he asked. Then he turned to me. ‘You followed him, Mr Gansert. Did you catch up with him?’

  ‘You mean Farnell?’ I asked.

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘How did you know I followed him?’

  ‘Norway is a small country for its size, Mr Gansert. I can keep track of anybody if I wish to. I see from your expression you were not successful.’ He turned to Lovaas. ‘So you did not obey my instructions, eh? I told you to await orders at Bovaagen Hval. But you decided to play your own hand. Well, Kaptein Lovaas, play it. But be careful.’ His voice was suddenly harsh. ‘I am not a person to disregard – unless you are successful. And I don’t think you have been successful.’ He turned to me again, ignoring Dahler entirely. ‘Where is Farnell now?’

  ‘Somewhere out there,’ I said, indicating the snow-lined windows.

  He nodded. ‘Aurland, Osterbo, Gjeiteryggen, Sankt Paal.’ He spoke the names softly as though to himself. ‘Then he will make for the railway. Good.’ He nodded as though satisfied with his arrangements. Then he turned to Dahler. ‘I should advise you to leave the country. Leave with Mr Gansert.’

  ‘Are you having me thrown out?’ I asked.

  He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Good heavens, no,’ he answered with pained surprise. ‘But now that your mission has failed you will naturally wish to go back to England – to start on your Mediterranean trip. I do not imagine Sir Clinton Mann will finance you indefinitely in Norway. Had you been successful in your mission—’ He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Then it would have been different. Then we might have been business associates. As it is—’ He left the rest of the sentence unfinished.

  ‘But you will still need finance,’ I said.

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘Sir Clinton Mann would be willing to discuss business on my recommendation,’ I added. ‘The only thing that held us up before was the feeling that you were insufficiently informed about the nature and location of these thorite deposits.’

  And then suddenly Jill spoke. ‘But Mr Jorgensen, you still do not know where the deposits are.’

  He frowned. ‘The police will pick Farnell up on the train, Miss Somers.’

  ‘Possibly,’ she replied. ‘But how will you make him talk?’

  ‘Oh, he will talk.’ He took a step towards her. ‘Listen, Miss Somers. George Farnell is wanted for murder. He may be tried as Schreuder for the murder of George Farnell. Or perhaps he will be tried as George Farnell for the murder of Schreuder. It is immaterial. He will be offered a free pardon if he is willing to assist Norway.’

  ‘Does your conscience never worry you, Knut?’ Dahler asked with that crooked smile of his.

  ‘What I do, I do for Norway,’ Jorgensen barked. ‘In everything I have done – both during the war and since – it has been of Norway that I have been thinking. Norway needs these mineral resources. Instead of a poor country, dependent on fish and timber, she might then become rich. What is one man’s life against the livelihood of three million people, eh? And who killed Schreuder, if Farnell did not?’

  ‘You will still not get the information you want,’ Jill said.

  Jorgensen gave an abrupt laugh. ‘My dear Miss Somers. No man faces a life sentence if he can help it. Farnell will talk.’

  But Jill walked towards him. ‘I tell you, he will not talk. George has no interest in anything but these metals. He has sacrificed everything to that end – everything, I tell you. I know,’ she added softly. ‘The threat of imprisonment will not make him talk unless he wants to. He has never thought—’

  The door burst open behind me and she stopped speaking. Her mouth fell open and then in a whisper she breathed, ‘George!’

  ‘Get back against the table, all of you.’ The voice was hard, desperate.

  I turned. Standing in the doorway, a Luger in his hand, was George Farnell. If Jill had not spoken his name, I don’t think I should have known him. His face was white and covered with several days’ growth of beard. Snow was plastered over him. His voice was cold and metallic. ‘Go on. Get back. All of you. You too, Jill.’ That was all to her. He’d recognised her. But that was all his greeting.

  ‘Farnell!’ I said. ‘Thank God you’re here. Don’t go down to the Oslo train. The police will be on it.’

  ‘I know. I heard. I’ve been listening outside the door ever since Jorgensen arrived. Go on, get back – you too, Gansert. I’m trusting nobody.’

  I backed away until I felt the hard edge of the table against my body.

  ‘Jill. Go behind that table and get their pistols from them. Throw them over here to me.’

  But she didn’t move. ‘George. You’ve got to listen to me. Mr Gansert has his yacht in Aurland. We can get you away to England. You can’t stay here. They’re going to arrest you for the murder of a man called Schreuder.’ Her voice choked. ‘I saw his body at Fjaerland. You didn’t kill him – did you?’

  ‘Do as I say,’ he answered without a trace of emotion. ‘Get their guns off them.’

  Jill hesitated. ‘You didn’t kill him, did you?’ she asked again.

  ‘Of course I killed him,’ Farnell replied harshly. ‘What else was I to do – have a swine of a Nazi collaborator steal all that I’d worked for? For two years I worked up at Finse on forced labour, crawling to the Germans, ingratiating myself, earning freedom to find out what I wanted to find out. And then after the war, always hiding. Never able to return to England. What did you expect me to do with the bastard when I found he’d followed me and seen me at work? Go on, Jill – now get those guns.’

  I glanced at her face. It was set and hard. She turned away and went along behind the table. In all, she collected three guns and threw them on to the floor at Farnell’s feet. ‘That’s better,’ he said. He kicked them into a corner and went over to the stove. ‘So you’ve got the police on the Oslo train, Jorgensen?’ His eyes peered at us through his glasses. ‘I wonder how the devil so many of you managed to converge here? Somebody’s been talking.’ He searched our faces. Then his eyes fell on the flask of brandy. He picked it up and took a long swig. ‘A-ah. That’s better. So you came all the way from England in your own boat, Gansert – just to find me?’

  I nodded.

  He smiled. ‘When you finally achieve what you’ve been fighting for all your life, then people will help you.’ He swung viciously towards me. ‘And that’s just when you don’t need their help. When you need them, they’re not there. When you don’t they come rushing half across the world in their fine yachts searching for you. God! If only I’d been interested in archaeology instead of mineralogy – how much pleasanter my life would have been! There’s no money in archaeology. But minerals! Remember how they wanted to get rid of
us without even paying us the salary they owed us out in Southern Rhodesia? Then I located the copper. They couldn’t have done more for us after that – the bastards.’ His face seemed drawn and bitter. He hadn’t had an easy road. He seemed lost in thought for a moment. Nobody spoke. Slowly he looked up and stared straight at Jorgensen. ‘Jill was quite right, you know,’ he said quietly. ‘Your threat of prison wouldn’t have made me tell you anything.’

  Jill took a step towards him. Then she stopped. ‘Why don’t you tell Bill where the thorite is?’ she said. ‘He’ll play fair with you – and he’s got B.M. & I. behind him.’

  ‘So it’s Bill, is it? Big Bill Gansert.’ He laughed unpleasantly. ‘And you’ll vouch for him, will you, Jill? My girl calls him Bill and she says she’ll vouch for him, and I’m supposed to make him a present of my life’s work. I’ll see you in hell first,’ he shouted at me. He turned on Jill. ‘As for you—’ And then he stopped and rubbed his hand over his face. ‘No,’ he said. ‘No. I guess it’s not your fault. It’s my fault. If only I could make you understand.’

  ‘But I do understand,’ she said softly.

  He looked at her long and searchingly. ‘Maybe you do,’ he said with a sigh. ‘But it’s too late now.’ He straightened up and looked us over, the muzzle of his Luger following the direction of his gaze. ‘I’ll get away from you all – do you hear?’

  ‘There are police down at Finse,’ Jill said.

  He nodded. ‘Yes. I expected that. I expected that as soon as I saw Jorgensen here.’ He crashed the butt of his pistol against the wooden wall. ‘I’m hounded out of my own country. Now I’m being hounded out of Norway. Why? Why?’ His voice was high-pitched, hysterical. ‘I did what I had to do. These metals were my life work. I needed money for research. Would any institute in Britain give it to me? Would any of the big industrial concerns?’

  ‘No.’ He looked angrily at me. ‘Certainly not B.M. & I. So I stole the money. I stole it from my partner. He was a dull, unimaginative little man anyway. But now – now I’ve done the spadework and got something they want – now they’d be prepared to condone murder – if you can call killing a rat like Schreuder – a traitor – murder. Well, you won’t get it – any of you. I’ll get away. Right away. Somewhere where I’m not known. Then I’ll make my own terms.’

  ‘You can make your terms right here and now,’ I said.

  He looked at me. ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘I have full authority to act for B.M. & I.,’ I pointed out.

  He laughed. ‘What will you offer?’

  I hesitated. What offer could I honestly make him? ‘Do you want an outright figure or a percentage of the ore lifted?’ I asked.

  ‘What’s your outright figure?’ He was watching me with a sneer.

  ‘A hundred thousand pounds,’ I said. ‘Payable over five years provided the deposits hold out that long.’

  He threw back his head and laughed. ‘A hundred thousand! If you offered me a million, it wouldn’t repay me for what I’ve been through – or Jill – or that poor little wretch, Clegg. It wouldn’t bring Schreuder back to life or stop my father from committing suicide. You didn’t know about that, did you? He committed suicide. A million! Those deposits are worth tens of millions to the company that gets hold of them.’

  ‘What about a directorship in Det Norske Staalselskab and a part share in the business?’ Jorgensen said.

  He sighed. ‘You don’t seem to realise what I’ve got here. It’s bigger than D.N.S. Bigger than B.M. & I. It could be the world’s biggest industrial plant. And anyway I don’t trust you,’ he shouted. ‘I don’t trust any of you.’

  ‘Well, who will you trust?’ I asked. ‘What about the person you sent those samples to – in the whale meat. Will you trust them? Who was it?’

  He stared. ‘You mean to say you don’t know who it was? But I thought’ – he looked across at Jill – ‘I thought that’s why you were here. Didn’t you tip Gansert off?’

  Jill stared. ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘Those samples – didn’t you give them to Gansert?’

  ‘I never received any samples. Mr Gansert got some, but that was from Sir Clinton Mann.’

  ‘They were delivered to us as the result of an advertisement,’ I explained. ‘The address on the package had been obliterated by blood.’

  ‘Oh. So that’s what happened.’ He looked across at Jill again. ‘I’m sorry. I thought—’

  He rubbed his hands across his face. He was dead with tiredness.

  ‘Why don’t you trust Mr Gansert?’ Jill said again. ‘Please, George.’

  She moved towards him. But he waved her back. ‘Keep there against the table, Jill. And throw me a sandwich from that packet.’

  She tossed him the packet. He took another swig at the flask of brandy and then began to eat. ‘He could get you out of Norway,’ Jill went on, pleadingly. ‘He’s got his yacht here. Everything could be arranged. We could start again. Please, George – trust him.’

  ‘I’ll trust nobody,’ he snarled, his mouth full.

  I was watching Jill and I saw her lower lip tremble. Her eyes were dull and lifeless. Dahler began to agitate his withered arm. His right hand plucked at his ski suit. ‘Mr Farnell,’ he said. ‘I wish to speak to you. I want to ask something of you. Once you saved my life, you know. Now I wish for your help again. I want you to tell them how I escaped. Tell them that I didn’t sell any secrets to the Germans. Tell them—’

  ‘Shut up!’ Farnell shouted violently. ‘I’m trying to think.’

  ‘But – please – they must be told. They will not let me into Norway. They say I am a traitor. I am not. I gave no secrets away. Tell them that, please. Tell them how you helped me escape from Finse.’

  ‘Shut up – damn you!’ Farnell almost screamed.

  I looked across at Dahler. His face was no longer cunning and there was no sardonic smile on his lips. He looked just like a child that has been refused a sweet. And that moment I saw Lovaas’s heavy body tense. Jill must have seen it too, for she cried, ‘George! Look out!’ And then Lovaas plucked Dahler up in his hands and, using him as a shield, flung himself at Farnell.

  Farnell didn’t hesitate. His Luger came up and he fired from the hip. The noise was shattering in that confined space. Lovaas dropped Dahler with a cry and spun round clutching at his left shoulder. Farnell crammed the rest of the sandwich into his mouth. ‘Next time I shoot to kill,’ he said. Blood was oozing between Lovaas’s fingers. His face looked white and his teeth were bared with pain. ‘Gansert,’ Farnell said. ‘Come over here. I want a word with you.’

  I crossed the room towards him. He watched me. The gun, still smoking, followed me. ‘Where did you say your boat was?’

  ‘Aurland,’ I answered.

  He came closer to me. Then he leaned forward and whispered in my ear. ‘Take it round to Bjorne Fjord, south of Bergen. Contact Olaf Steer. Wait for me there. I may come or I may not.’

  ‘Why not accept my offer?’ I suggested. ‘Or at least give B.M. & I. a chance to negotiate.’

  ‘Do as I say,’ he answered. ‘We’ll talk about that later. Now get back over there.’ He turned to Dahler, who was getting up off the floor where Lovaas had dropped him. ‘Go outside and slide all the skis except mine down the slope. Go on, move.’

  Dahler hesitated. But the violence in Farnell’s eyes sent him out. ‘My skis are by themselves to the left of the door.’ Farnell picked up his rucksack and thrust his arms through the straps.

  ‘You’re being a fool,’ Jorgensen said angrily. ‘I can save you from all this trouble. We could have a development company, half English, half Norwegian if you like.’

  ‘And you dictating your own terms – blackmailing me for Schreuder and this.’ He nodded at Lovaas. ‘By God, you must take me for a fool, Jorgensen,’ he suddenly cried. ‘Do you think I don’t know who Schreuder was working for? No, I’ll handle this my own way. And nothing you can do now will stop me.’

  ‘George!’
Jill took a step forward. ‘You haven’t a chance. The police—’

  ‘To hell with the police.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Have you got rid of those skis, Dahler?’ he called.

  ‘Yes,’ came the faint answer, brought in by the cold wind that entered from the open door. Drifts of light snow were whitening the boards near the entrance.

  Farnell backed away, easing the weight of the pack on to his shoulders. He stood for a moment in the doorway, his teeth bared in a smile in his stubble beard. ‘I’ll be on the Oslo train, Jorgensen, if you want me but your policemen won’t find me.’

  Then suddenly he was gone and we were staring at the closed door. And I became conscious again of the weight of the wind against the hut and the snow piling against the windows.

  CHAPTER TEN

  THE BLAAISEN

  It was a moment, after Farnell had left, before anyone in the hut moved. It wasn’t so much that we were stunned by the suddenness of his exit as the fact that none of us had any plan. Lovaas was half bent over the table, holding his shoulder. Halvorsen was cutting his jacket away with a large jack knife. Jorgensen, usually so quick, stood motionless, staring at the closed door. I met Jill’s eyes. She looked away as though it hurt her to look at me. Her face looked pinched and cold. Her jaw was set firmly like a man’s. ‘Come on, Bill,’ she said suddenly. ‘We must do something. If the police get him—’ She didn’t finish the sentence, but started for the door.

  I followed her, sliding up the zip of my windbreaker. As she opened the outer door, a swirl of fine, powdery snow swept up into my face. Outside, the force of the wind was driving the snow almost parallel with the top of the ridge on which the hut stood. The whole world seemed moving, the myriad snowflakes showing as dark specks against the dismal grey light. Dahler looked up as we came out of the hut. He was fixing his last ski. I called to him. ‘Where are our skis?’ But he made no reply. He was working feverishly at the binding of his ski. Then he straightened up, pulling his sticks out of the snow and, with one last glance at us, turned and thrust himself forward into the driving snow.