Air Force One is Down

by John Denis

  Dunkels had been airborne before Sabrina arrived at the caves. His radio link with the castle had revealed not only that Cooligan had not been recaptured, but also that Fayeed had been strangled, and that Sabrina Carver was missing. The German had analysed the confused message about the mysterious reappearance of Jagger at a time when the ringer ought to have been at the caves with Smith and the hostages.

  He reported to Smith, who quickly grasped that the genuine McCafferty was back on the scene to ring the changes on his alter ego by posing as himself.

  ‘How can you be sure?’ Dunkels asked.

  Smith rounded on him, his control slipping, fury twisting his features. ‘Jagger was here!’ he screamed, ‘so he couldn’t have been up there, idiot. He’s still here. Take the helicopter – now! Find Carver and bring her to me – alive. I must know Philpott’s movements. Look for a motorcycle … they’ll have abandoned the jeep.

  ‘McCafferty will have gone by now to join Philpott’s force, but Carver will be around here somewhere, on the motorcycle Cooligan used. Get her, Dunkels.’

  ‘How d’you know she’ll be around here?’ Dunkels asked unwisely as he turned to leave.

  ‘Because she’ll have followed the supply-jeep here,’ Smith sneered, almost frantic with rage now. ‘The timing fits, you fool. Get out! Now! And do not return without her.’

  Sabrina ducked off the road and skidded to a halt under a sturdy beech tree. She could hear the Kamov circling overhead, and peered up into the branches. The sun was leaving the sky now, but the twilight air was crisp and clear, and she saw Dunkels at the controls ease the helicopter lower and lower until its blades threatened to decapitate her tree.

  She unclipped the machine-pistol, took careful aim, and fired a burst through the foliage at the grey, swooping shape. Dunkels jerked back on the stick as a stray bullet ricocheted off the fuselage of the Kamov. He rose above the little copse and flew out of range, then buzzed her hiding-place like an angry wasp. He sighted a clear space to his left, and gained height again, banking sharply at the end of his spiral to signal his obvious intention of landing.

  Sabrina took the bait. While the Kamov hovered a few feet from the ground she remounted the Honda, throttled up and roared away from the concealment of the trees. It was only when she heard the rising engine whine of the helicopter that she realised she had been tricked: Dunkels had merely made a landing feint to flush her out of cover.

  She swore fluently and skirted a tufted hillock to crash through a hedge which she hoped might lead to another coppice, only to find herself in an even bigger field. There was a wood at the other side, though, and she was streaking towards it when Dunkels caught up with her again. The first bullets from his own machine-gun tore red divots out of the bumpy ground.

  The German played cat-and-mouse with her, and she could see him through the perspex awning of the cockpit, laughing as he brought the helicopter down to block her path and force her to swerve dangerously away. Then he backed off and she resumed her course, but wrenched at the handlebars again as the rushing blades of the Kamov fanned the air only a few yards from her face. Dunkels chased her this time, forcing her back the way she had come until she spun the Honda round and, ducking low in the saddle, drove it straight under his wheels.

  But she had neither the speed nor the manoeuvrability to elude him, and the end was inevitable, for Dunkels had noticed something she could not have seen: between the field and the copse that was her target lay a small pond, sunk into a dip in the ground, and not visible from her vantage-point.

  As a sheepdog would, he herded her across the pasture, and like a rabbit fleeing the teeth of a snapping hound, Sabrina scuttled in the direction he wanted her to go, lurching and weaving to avoid the helicopter and the constant stream of bullets. She had hated being chased as a child, and when she was cornered, her resolve to fight always gave way to hysteria. She was sobbing now, and close to total panic when the Honda left the ground and back-flipped her off to dump both of them in the middle of the pond.

  Sabrina lay stunned and half-drowning in the murky water. She came to as Dunkels gripped her by the collar and hauled her to the muddy bank. He stood astride her, letting her lay there in her misery. Then he leaned down, grasped her hair, pulled up her head and smashed his fist into her face.

  For the second time she lost consciousness, and when her brain again struggled through the mists of returning awareness, the noise of the Kamov’s engine completed her disorientation. She collected her thoughts and flexed her arms and legs. Dunkels had not even considered it necessary to tie her.

  Above the roar of the helicopter, Bert Cooligan caught the few words she managed to get out before Dunkels shot Sabrina’s communicator to pieces.

  ‘Bert!’ she screamed, ‘they’ve got me! They’re taking me to the caves!’

  Sonya Kolchinsky felt oddly comforted by the presence of Brigadier Tomlin standing beside her in the prow of the motor launch, cutting through the Adriatic off the coast of Dalmatia. Since Philpott had been told he was in complete charge of the operation, Sonya had used UNACO’s authority to browbeat the Yugoslavians into yielding every ounce of assistance she could squeeze from them. With a fair-sized naval task-force at her disposal, she had bludgeoned the Deputy Minister of the Interior into conceding a NATO commanding officer. Tomlin had needed no second bidding, and jetted over from Naples almost before the words were out of the politician’s mouth.

  Now he looked gloomily over his shoulder at the waning light, and snapped on his torch to study a sea-chart of the myriad of islands sprinkled around like seaweed between their embarkation port of Split and the Italian peninsula of Venezia Giulia.

  Sonya sighed and looked for reassurance from the lights of Sibenik winking at them from the shoreline. The lights of the next coastal town of any size, Zadar, were more distant. She had been confident, based on the geographical relationship of the landing strip to the castle to the presumed location of the hostage caves, that Smith’s ransom island would lie somewhere between Sibenik and Zadar, which tied in with his necessarily generalised map reference. But they had covered the territory once, and it was coming up to seven o’clock, only an hour away from Smith’s deadline for placing the diamonds on the gibbet.

  ‘We obviously missed it first time,’ Tomlin declared. ‘We’ll have another look.’

  ‘But it’s almost dark now,’ she protested.

  ‘Nonetheless, we go on searching,’ Tomlin pronounced firmly. There were three other boats in his flotilla, and he was in touch with English speakers aboard each of them. ‘Quarter the area again,’ the brigadier ordered, ‘and bear in mind that the island could be a hell of a lot smaller than it looks in the photograph. What we’re seeking may not be an island at all – just a rock.’

  Tomlin returned to his chart. They rounded the island of Kakan with Kaprije to starboard and the larger bulk of Kornati to port. Murter passed to starboard and Zut to port, and ahead of them, lying off the seaward coast of Pasman Island, was another islet which Tomlin immediately identified. He stabbed his finger on the chart and said ‘Lighthouse,’ with immense satisfaction. Just then the beam of the light flashed on and swept the sea before them. Sonya stammered ‘It’s th–there! Over there!’

  On its return trip the light confirmed the fleeting impression she had gained. It picked out the flat bulge of Saucer Island, lying like an upturned dinner plate in the sea and washed by breakers. On the starboard rim of the island stood the gibbet.

  The helmsman of their launch followed her pointing finger and steered the vessel through the chunky waves towards the little island. Tomlin held up the Polaroid and glanced from the snapshot to the islet, now transfixed in their lights and those of two other vessels in their fleet. ‘Spot on,’

  he said, ‘well done, Mrs Kolchinsky. First-class piece of observation.’

  The launch made a complete circuit of the island before drawing up and backing in to take position next to the curious pole with the horizontal arm.

>   ‘Don’t get too close,’ Tomlin warned the cutter’s crew, ‘and no one, but no none, must make any attempt to land on the island. I don’t want anybody slinging hooks near that pole or prodding it with guns or anything else. We don’t want to berth there; we just want to get far enough in to let me drop this bag over that projecting arm, and we can do that while we’re still on the move. If we miss, we’ll try until we succeed.’

  As it turned out, they needed three passes before Tomlin found his range and encircled the arm with the metal ring. He rubbed his hands together briskly and his teeth gleamed under the pencil moustache as he favoured her with a glowing smile. ‘Excellent,’ he pronounced. ‘Now we lay off and take posts.’

  ‘Where do you suggest we go?’ Sonya inquired, and Tomlin jerked his head at the neighbouring island. ‘No sense in staying out here in the cold when we can be sitting down over a steaming mug of cocoa,’ he chortled.

  ‘Cocoa?’ she echoed blankly.

  ‘Quite so,’ Tomlin replied. ‘Never knew a lighthouse-keeper yet who didn’t make jolly good cocoa. That’ll be our headquarters, ma’am, if you agree.’

  Sonya grinned at him appreciatively and said, ‘Spot on, Brigadier. With you all the way. Cocoa it is.’

  Tomlin barked into his communicator, ‘All units. Calling all units. Proceed to designated stations forthwith. Flagship will moor at the island 30 degrees to starboard, and the command post, offering a full view of the rock at all times, will be the lighthouse. If you read me, please acknowledge.’

  Three Aldis lamps blinked in acquiescence, and Tomlin ordered his crew to proceed to the lighthouse while the flotilla, manned by armed marines, ringed Saucer Island and sat a quarter of a mile off like sharks waiting for dinner-time.

  Smith received Sabrina with icy politeness, trusting she was none the worse for her encounters with Achmed at the castle and Dunkels in the helicopter.

  ‘Not at all,’ she said sweetly, ‘they behaved like the perfect gentlemen they obviously are.’

  ‘Or were, in Achmed’s case,’ Smith pointed out. Sabrina tried to conceal her alarm at the news that he had learned of Fayeed’s death.

  Smith, however, forestalled any lies she might have invented. ‘Of course I know Achmed is dead,’ he said, ‘and what is more I am aware that he was killed by Colonel McCafferty – the real Colonel McCafferty, if you follow me, not our ersatz and somewhat shop-soiled model.’

  Again she wished she had a poker face, but what nature had not given her she found it impossible to assume. So she replied, evenly, ‘All of which indicates that you’re on the point of losing, doesn’t it, Mister Smith?’

  ‘To the contrary,’ Smith beamed, ‘Philpott will be able to do nothing to prevent me from picking up the ransom, and I have prepared a little surprise to guard my back. I am beginning to find these Arabs decidedly tiresome. No, Sabrina, I have not lost; neither shall I. All Philpott is doing sitting off my island with a—’

  ‘If you think that—’ she began, and bit her lip in anger.

  ‘I didn’t really,’ Smith purred. ‘Indeed, I imagine him to be much closer to my castle than to the seashore, since of course you were kind enough to supply him with the location of these caves through your communicator, and he would hardly have had time to get here yet, would he? No doubt he and Colonel McCafferty are at this very moment linking up with the agent Cooligan to plan how they can best launch their assault force on this stronghold.’

  Once more she tried to keep her expression neutral, and for the third time failed. Smith laughed in genuine amusement.

  ‘My dear Sabrina,’ he chuckled, ‘there really is no point in submitting you to persuasion, when all one has to do is study your lovely face and get all the answers one needs. I have now learned that Philpott, possibly with McCafferty and Cooligan, are at or near my castle, and that far from possessing an army capable of defeating me, they may well be acting entirely alone. Probably they have some assistance at sea, where I would guess that the estimable Mrs Kolchinsky is holding the fort—’

  Sabrina flushed and her lower lip quivered. ‘Bull’s eye again,’ Smith chuckled. ‘There we are, then, the complete picture.’ He beckoned to the grinning Dunkels. ‘Siegfried, give our beauteous “Brünhilde” some hot food, then take her to join the others, that they may all meet their Götterdämmerung together.’

  He laughed full-bellied, and strode into the main cavern …

  Philpott groaned and swore when Cooligan brought him and McCafferty up to date with the news of Sabrina’s capture.

  ‘How long ago did you get her message?’ he rapped.

  ‘Not ten minutes,’ Cooligan replied.

  ‘Damn, damn, damn,’ Philpott said, with feeling.

  ‘Why so gloomy, Chief?’ McCafferty asked. ‘Sabrina’s a tough cookie, isn’t she? Surely she’ll be able to take care of herself?’

  Philpott’s response was a resigned sigh. ‘It isn’t that, Mac,’ he admitted, ‘it’s just that we’ll now have to assume that Smith knows everything, and act accordingly.’

  ‘How so?’ Cooligan frowned, as mystified as McCafferty.

  Philpott grinned ruefully. ‘Sabrina never could lie with a straight face,’ he explained. ‘She’s like an open book: plenty of guts, plenty of brains, but not a shred of guile.

  ‘No – Smith will have found out as much as he needs by now. I was going to hold off trying for the caves until Smith had picked up the ransom, so as not to endanger the hostages unnecessarily; but all that’s changed. We must strike at the caves first, and quickly. I have a suspicion that the hostages’ lives may not be worth a row of beans after Smith’s got his hands on the diamonds.’

  McCafferty objected, ‘But I thought you said he wasn’t a murderer by design.’

  Philpott shook his head wearily. ‘I know, Mac,’ he replied, ‘but this operation seems to be different. He’s already allowed Hawley Hemmingsway to die, and since he knows we’re hot on his tail he may be starting to feel threatened. And we all know what rats do when they’re cornered. I fancy I’ve always assumed that Mister Smith is some sort of gentleman bastard … but I’ve never seen his evil side, Mac. For everyone’s sake, Sabrina’s included, we must tread very prudently from now on.’

  As the ‘assault force’ boarded the jeep to take them to the caves, Smith stood, arms folded, alongside Jagger at the side of the suspension-bridge nearer to the captives on their cold, cramped ledge.

  Smith looked approvingly, and Jagger grinned, the light from his torch picking out the guerilla who was placing a plastic explosives charge into a hole in the wall of the cave above the ledge.

  Unseen by the hostages below, the man wired a detonator to the plastique, and rolled the coil of bright yellow cable across to Jagger. The ringer scooped it up and spliced the loose end into a reel. He backed across the bridge unwinding the cable, and Smith followed him, meticulously avoiding the wire snake.

  FIFTEEN

  Sabrina sat on a rock eating a peppery goulash and pondered the meaning of Smith’s last remark. The connection she did make – the Wagnerian one between ‘Siegfried’, ‘Brünhilde’ and Götterdämmerung – was not reassuring, since the ‘Twilight of the Gods’ implied the destruction of practically everyone in sight.

  At the end of Dunkels’ gun she was conducted to the bridge over the river chasm, where they had to give way to Smith and Jagger returning from the hostage cave and sharing some secret diversion. Her eyes met the ringer’s, and for an instant she knew the sensation of cold steel in her heart.

  The fleeting insight of Jagger’s gaze boring into her own made her now unswervingly sure of something she had merely suspected: that whatever fate Smith had planned for the captives, Jagger intended killing every last one of them.

  She read the message unmistakably in the ringer’s eyes as clearly as if he had spoken the words. And he did not hide the pitiless loathing he felt for her, for he knew that he would never see her again.

  The realisation brought her to a halt on
the swaying bridge, and she felt the barrel of Dunkels’ machine-pistol drill into the small of her back. She looked wildly round at him, and down at the slatted wood under her feet, then back at the entrance cavern, and stumbled as she tried to move. Dunkels’ arm shot out and supported her as she half fell – but before he pushed her roughly ahead she caught the barest glimpse (and again – and there, again!) of the yellow cable tacked to the side-runner of the bridge.

  Anger swiftly replaced the fear in her, and she strode off the bridge barely acknowledging the bomb which she could see clearly in its nest of rock. Dunkels propelled her down the steps, where Feisal ran to her, and she caught the boy in her arms.

  ‘Don’t let her out of your sight,’ Dunkels said in Serbo-Croat to the single remaining guard, ‘and keep away from her yourself. She’s dangerous. She may not look it, but she is.’ The guard nodded curtly, and Dunkels backed up the flight of steps and disappeared.

  Sabrina eased the boy from her embrace, but allowed him to lead her to his grandfather. She guessed that neither Sheikh Zeidan nor any of the other hostages knew that Smith had given Jagger the means to kill them all, and she preferred to tell Zeidan first and seek his counsel.

  The old Arab heard her out in silence, and allowed his eyes to stray only once to the point high on the wall of the cave where Sabrina indicated the explosives were placed. Feisal followed his gaze, then turned his head back and looked steadily at Sabrina.

  ‘If you recall,’ the boy said softly, ‘I am rather good at climbing. Should you or someone else be successful in persuading the guard not to look, I believe I could get up there and defuse that bomb.’

  Sabrina gasped and shook her head violently. ‘No!’ she whispered. ‘Never! I couldn’t forgive myself if anything happened to you.’

  Sheikh Zeidan’s hand fell on her wrist and he tugged it gently. ‘The decision would not be yours to make, Miss Carver,’ he said. ‘Nor indeed would it be mine. Feisal is of royal blood, my blood, going back untraceable numbers of centuries. He is brave like the desert lion and as fearless as a hunting falcon. If he wishes to do this thing, then he shall. Besides,’ Zeidan added with a twinkling smile, ‘he does know about chemistry.’