by Jack Higgins
“Now then, Marcel,” Jean-Paul said. “What’s the score?”
“Not good, boss,” the old man said. “A bad blow forecast, winds seven to eight. Not enough to blow anyone’s roof off, but for men out there in the waters of the Race…” He shrugged.
Jean-Paul turned to Devlin, his face pale in the dim light. “Don’t worry, this old sea rat is the finest skipper on the coast. If anyone can bring this off it’s him—with the help of this gadget, of course.” He tapped the gleaming blue box on the chart table. “The very latest thing. I had it installed yesterday. Microchip and digital read-out, so it really thinks for itself. Once locked onto the wave-length of that homing device, it will give us a course straight to it, whatever the weather.”
“Fine,” Devlin said, “but if you’ve got any candles handy, I’d like to light a couple, just in case.”
Jean-Paul returned to the charts, and Devlin went out on to the bridge where Anne-Marie stood at the rail, muffled in her sheepskin jacket. Whitecaps stretched into the darkness, and spray scattered across the deck as the trawler dipped its prow into the waves.
“It’s not good, is it?” she said.
“Not from the sound of it.” He grabbed the rail tightly. “You might as well know it all. The captain thinks it will get worse before it gets better.”
“Enough to put them off?” she said. “Martin and Savary, I mean?”
“I can only speak for Martin, but in my opinion nothing could stop him entering the water if he makes it outside those walls, no matter how bad the storm. He’s prepared to die if necessary, you see. That’s the important thing.”
“My God,” she whispered and then suddenly clutched his arm as the wind carried a strange roaring sound from the far distance.
“Did you hear that, Liam? What is it?”
“Why, from the sound of it, I’d say that must be the Mill Race.”
She didn’t say a word. He slipped an arm about her shoulders, and together they stood there at the rail listening.
Pierre Lebel pulled back the flap on the spyhole of the cell on the upper tier. Brosnan and Savary sat opposite each other with a wooden box between them. Savary had a pack of tarot cards in one hand and was laying out the wheel of fortune.
“This gives an answer to a specific question,” he said, “and the outcome of events in the immediate future.”
“Really?” Brosnan said. “You amaze me. Do I cross your palm with silver?”
“I’ve told you before, I’ve got gypsy blood.”
Lebel called. “You should be in bed you two. Lights out.”
The cell was plunged into darkness. Savary called, “God bless you, too, Pierre, and thanks for everything. You’ve been swell.”
“Idiot!” Brosnan whispered.
Lebel checked the next cell; they listened as his footsteps worked their way along the landing. The barred gate at the end clanged, he descended the iron stairs, and the footsteps faded.
“Switch on the flashlight,” Savary said. “I just want to see what I’ve laid out.” Brosnan produced the small pocket flashlight Devlin had given him. It had a surprisingly powerful beam. Savary turned over the first card. It showed death, a skeleton on horseback riding across a field of corpses. Savary gathered up the cards and put them on the shelf. “Now that I can very definitely do without. I’m not looking anymore. Let’s get moving.”
Brosnan turned over his mattress, slid his hand through the seam at one side, and pulled out a coil of nylon rope and a sling with snap links at the end, items he had frequently used at the quarry when placing dynamite charges in the cliff face. He also produced a narrow-handled screwdriver and a pair of twelve-inch heavy-gauge wire cutters, which Savary had obtained from a convict who worked in the machine shop. They each arranged their beds with extra clothes, a few books, a pillow to give the appearance of a human form.
“Do you think it will pass?” Savary asked.
“With Lebel? Most nights, he doesn’t even look in, and I reckon that will be good enough if he does. Now let’s get moving. We’ve got a tight schedule.”
They pulled on their heavy reefer coats, prison issue for those working outside in bad weather, and leather and canvas gloves. Brosnan picked up the rope, and Savary knelt at the door with a spoon. There was a slight click, and he stood up. “That’s it, Martin, let’s go.”
They moved outside, and he closed the door carefully behind them. They stood in the shadows of the wall for a moment, then moved quietly to the end of the landing.
The central hall was illuminated by a single light, and music drifted up from the radio in the duty officer’s room. The roof and the dome were shrouded in darkness. Brosnan climbed on the rail and scrambled up the steel mesh curtain to the roof of the cell block. He hooked the snap links of his sling into the wire to hold himself secure and took out the wire cutters.
It took him no more than five minutes to make a hole about three feet across, through which he pulled himself. Once on the other side, he stepped onto one of the steel support girders. He looked down at Savary, his face pale in the darkness, and beckoned. The Frenchman followed him.
They balanced together on one girder and held onto another. Brosnan hooked a line to the sling around Savary’s waist and touched him briefly on the shoulder. There was no need to say anything, for they had discussed in detail the route and what to expect.
The difficult part came now, for the grill he needed to reach was thirty feet up in the darkness and the girder curved out, following the line of the wall. Brosnan slipped his sling around it, fastened the links at his waist, and started to climb, bracing himself against the girder, using a well-proven climbing technique.
It was now that his strength and excellent physical condition stood him in good stead. He heaved himself up inch by inch, until he reached his objective, a large ventilation grill.
It was held in place by four screws, and he took out his screwdriver, braced himself against the girder, and set to work. The screws were brass and came out easily enough, but he left the one on the bottom left-hand corner partly in position so the grill swung down, no longer obscuring the entrance, but still held securely.
So far so good. He looked down at Savary, waved and tugged on the line, and the Frenchman secured himself to the girder with his sling and started to climb.
Brosnan kept the tension on the line, giving Savary all the help that he could. It went well enough for a while, and then a door clanged far below. Savary, shocked by the unexpected noise, lost his hold and slipped.
Brosnan clenched his teeth and leaned back against the girder, a foot on the wall, and held on, the line cutting into his back and shoulder. Savary hung there, while below, a prison officer crossed the hall and went into the office. There was a rumble of voices, laughter.
Savary swung back against the girder and started to climb again and finally reached Brosnan.
They poised there for a few moments, and Brosnan whispered, “Okay, Jacques, you first.”
Savary unhooked himself from the beam, leaned forward and went head first into the shaft. Brosnan coiled the line neatly about his waist and went after him.
Clouds of dry dust filled his nostrils, and he took out the flashlight and switched it on, the spot traveling ahead of Savary, picking out the dirt-encrusted metal sides of the shaft. The Frenchman started to pull himself along, no room to crawl, and Brosnan followed. Then there was a distinct current of air, a low, humming sound far below, and the shaft emerged into a sort of central chamber, the dark mouths of other shafts at intervals around it.
The noise came from a hole about three feet in diameter in the center of the chamber, and Brosnan crouched beside Savary and shone his torch down.
“This is it,” he said. “I saw the plans for the ventilation system of this place two years ago when I was working with the heating engineer’s detail at the hospital. From what I remember, this shaft goes down sixty or seventy feet to the boiler room. How are you doing?”
“Fin
e,” Savary said. “Don’t worry about me. I haven’t felt so good in years.”
Brosnan examined the interior of the shaft with his torch. The circular metal sheets were held in place by steel stays.
“Good footholds,” he said. “If you get tired, just wedge yourself against the sides for a few moments. I’ll go first, then if you fall you can drop on me.”
Savary’s teeth gleamed in the darkness. “Good luck, Martin.”
Brosnan started down, holding the flashlight in one hand. It was easy enough, far easier than the earlier climb up the girder in the central hall. The hum of the generators increased as he got closer to the bottom of the shaft. There was light down there, shining up through a grill. He braced himself against the sides of the shaft and tried to peer through. All he could see was the boiler room floor. Usually, there was no one on duty at this time of night and if there was, it was likely to be a trusty anyway. Not that he had much choice.
He shined the flashlight up and found Savary poised just above him. “Hang on,” Brosnan whispered. “I’m going through.”
He slipped the flashlight into his pocket, braced himself against the sides, then stamped on the grill with both feet. It buckled, started to give, and at the third attempt gave way completely and crashed to the floor eight feet below, followed by Brosnan himself.
He got up, shaken but unhurt, and looked about him. The boiler room was in semi-darkness, the only light a small bulb that hung over the dials on the instrument panel on the far wall. Most important of all, there was no one there.
He called up the shaft, “Okay, Jacques, let’s be having you. Just let yourself go,” and a moment later caught the Frenchman as he dropped through.
They moved to the door at once. Brosnan opened it and peered outside. Rain fell heavily, bouncing from the cobbled courtyard.
“The manhole cover is over there,” he said. “To the right of the hospital entrance. Keep your head down, and let’s go.”
He kept to the shadows of the wall, working his way around the courtyard, Savary at his heels, until he reached the manhole cover and crouched down. He got the screwdriver out and cleaned the dirt from the iron handles that were set into the cover, but when he heaved it refused to budge.
“What is it, for God’s sake?” For the first time there was panic in Savary’s voice.
“Nothing,” Brosnan said. “Probably hasn’t been up in years. I’ll fix it, don’t worry.”
He worked the screwdriver around the edge of the manhole cover methodically, stifling an insane desire to laugh. There had been a notice on the command board at Khe Sahn. For those who fight for it, life has a flavor the sheltered never know. Whoever wrote that had certainly known what he was talking about.
He tried again, exerting all his strength, Savary wrapping his hands around him to assist. The manhole gave suddenly and easily, so that Brosnan lost his balance and they fell together.
The stench was immediate and appalling, accentuated by the freshness of the rain. Savary said, “Oh, my God, I didn’t realize.”
“The only way, Jacques,” Brosnan said. “Down you go.”
Savary disappeared into darkness and Brosnan followed, descending a short iron ladder, pausing only to slide the manhole cover back into place. When he switched on the flashlight, he found Savary standing in three feet of stinking water and excrement. The Frenchman leaned against the wall and vomited.
He turned, his face pale. “I can’t take much of this, Martin.”
“You don’t have to,” Brosnan lied. “A couple of hundred yards, that’s all, I promise you.”
The tunnel was six feet high and very old, the brickwork crumbling, and as they advanced the flashlight picked out rats by the dozen, scampering along the ledges on either side. Fifty or sixty yards further on, the tunnel emptied itself into a pool over a concrete apron. It was obviously the main catchment chamber for the entire system, several other tunnels emptying into it.
Brosnan slid down the apron, holding the flashlight high, and found himself almost chest deep. Savary came after him, lost his balance and went under. Brosnan pulled him up by the collar, and the Frenchman surfaced in a dreadful state, his face smeared with filth. He was badly shocked.
Brosnan said, “Come on, Jacques, keep going. Just keep going.”
He worked his way across the pool and pulled himself up on a concrete ledge, heaving Savary up behind him. He followed the ledge and came to an iron ladder, the water with the sewer cascading down beside it for some thirty feet.
They descended the ladder and moved on, negotiating two more before the walkway ended.
“We must be close to the shoreline now,” Brosnan said. “It can’t be much further.”
He eased himself down into the water, and Savary followed him. The water rose higher and higher as Brosnan advanced. There was a ground swell now, and the stench was not so apparent. Then suddenly, a yard or two ahead, the tunnel simply disappeared.
Savary said, “Now what?”
“The outfall must be under the surface,” Brosnan said. “I hadn’t counted on that.”
“So what do we do?”
“Swim for it.”
“Under water?” The Frenchman shook his head. “I don’t think I can.”
Brosnan gave him the flashlight. “Hang onto this and I’ll take a look.”
He took a couple of deep breaths, went under, and swam forward, sliding against the roof of the tunnel. Ten feet, fifteen, twenty and he was through and immediately surfaced in a channel among rocks at the foot of the cliffs.
It was dark, rain falling, a heavy swell running. He floated there for a moment, took a breath, and went down into the mouth of the tunnel again. The return journey was more difficult, but he surfaced beside Savary a few moments later and braced himself against the tunnel wall, gasping for breath.
“Bad?” Savary asked.
“Twenty feet, Jacques, that’s all, and you’re out.”
“I can’t,” Savary said.
Brosnan was untying the line from about his waist and he snapped it to the link on Savary’s sling. “You want to go back?”
“No, I’d rather die.”
“Good. I’m going to swim out again now. When you’re ready, pull twice on the line and hold your breath. I’ll haul you through.”
He didn’t give Savary time to think about it, simply dived under the water again and swam back along the tunnel. He surfaced and floated for a moment in the pool and then found that his feet could touch bottom and that it was no more than five feet deep. He pulled in the slack on the line until it was tight and waited. The tugs, when they came, were quite distinct. He started to haul in with all his strength, pulling steadily, never stopping until Savary surfaced beside him, gasping for air.
Brosnan held him for a moment, then said, “Okay, let’s get out of here,” and together they waded out of the water and scrambled up the hillside, the walls of Belle Isle towering into the night above them.
Lightning flickered on the far horizon as they crouched at the door of the hut while Savary worked the lock. Finally, it clicked open. They moved inside, Brosnan closed the door and switched on the light.
“All right?” he said to Savary.
The Frenchman nodded, nervous, excited. The sea had washed the filth from his body and he seemed to have recovered his spirits. “We beat the bastards, eh, Martin?”
“Not yet,” Brosnan told him. “Get ready, quick as you like. Two life jackets, remember, not one. We’ll need all the flotation we can get out there.”
Five minutes later, they were ready. Brosnan took the homing device Devlin had given him, activated it, then strapped it to one of his life jackets.
He said to Savary, “Let’s go,” and he switched off the light, opened the door, and they left.
The rain hammered down, and when the sheet lightning crackled they saw waves lashing into foam stretching as far as the eye could see. They descended the cliffs, following the course of a ravine that finally emptie
d itself into the water.
The funeral rock towered into the night above their heads, and Savary looked up at it. “Maybe we’re just saving Lebel a job.”
Brosnan uncoiled the line and secured it, first to Savary’s sling and then his own, leaving an umblical cord perhaps six feet long between them.
“Together, or not at all?” Savary said.
“Exactly.”
They shook hands, then made their way to a ledge on the outer reaches of the rocks where the sea roared by. Brosnan turned inquiringly, Savary nodded, and they jumped, committing themselves to the waters of the Mill Race.
They were carried along at a terrific rate, for the current was running at nine or ten knots and the distance they were covering was quite phenomenal. Strangely enough, it didn’t seem particularly cold at first, but that would come later. The clothing helped there, of course, and the heavy reefers.
There was no real sense of passing time. Just the sea and the roaring and the tug of the line at Brosnan’s waist as Savary pulled at it. Occasionally lightning flickered again, but all it illuminated was the sea, a waste of broken water in which they were quite alone.
After fifteen or twenty minutes Brosnan did begin to feel the cold. He wondered how Savary was doing, tugged on the line and a moment later got a response. Belle Isle was so far back there in the darkness that there seemed no longer any need to fear detection and he switched on the light on his life jacket. A moment later, Savary did the same, and they continued on, dipping over the waves like two will-o‘-the-wisps in the darkness.
On the bridge of the trawler, Anne-Marie and Devlin stood at the rail as the ship plunged into the waves. They both wore oilskin coats and sou’westers, and water streamed from them. As lightning flickered, illuminating the size of the seas breaking, the white carpet of foam, Devlin said desperately, “This is no good—no good at all.”