by Craig Thomas
Buckholz looked around the clearing. Stores, the commpack, equipment, had all been removed. It was as if they were about to abandon the Firefox, having spent so much time and effort - and two lives - bringing her out of the lake. 'What have you done so far?' he asked.
'There's no magnetic card to activate any auto-destruct,' Moresby snapped. 'No armed micro-switches-nothing that could be set off other than by the removal of the canopy or the ejection of the bang-seat.'
'But - there has to be something else?'
'I'd bet on it. Of course there has to be something - '
'Hell.'
'Excuse me - I'm needed,' Moresby said, and turned away from Buckholz and Waterford. Buckholz let the man go. He had no expertise and could not dissuade Moresby. Instead, he worried about the thickness of the snow that had fallen on the ice. Gant had had snow cleared from the ice-floe when he had refuelled. It would have to be done here, with hot-air blowers. He would talk directly to Bardufoss, as soon -
As soon as they knew whether or not there was a clock ticking somewhere, a clock they could neither see nor hear. Was there anything?
Gunnar had covered almost the whole of the fuselage. He had worked around the airframe, reaching the fuselage below the cockpit once more. He had found nothing other than routine fuelling and inspection points, catches, switches, points, bolts, panels.
'Below this small window, it reads.- "In the event of red placard, cordon off airframe and advise Senior Armaments Officer".' Gunnar recited, then began humming and murmuring to himself over the R/T. Then he added: 'Yes, that's what it says. There is a red placard showing in the window.'
'Let me see,' they heard Moresby say.
Involuntarily. Buckholz started forward. Waterford snorted in derision, but followed him.
'What is it?' Buckholz asked as he reached Moresby, who was craning to look through a tiny perspex window set at eye-level below the cockpit.
'Approximately five millimetres of red-painted tin,' Moresby answered without turning his head. 'It doesn't mean a lot, does it?' He tapped the fuselage alongside the window. 'Access panel - be careful, my lad, as you take it off, won't you?'
He stepped back and allowed the technician to reach the panel and gently begin to move the first four screws.
'Is it anything?' Buckholz insisted.
'Who knows? The instruction is pretty clear. You don't cordon off aircraft for no reason, or tell the armaments people it's all theirs. I wonder… Come on lad, get a move on!' The technician had removed three of the flush screws, and he pivoted the access panel. Moresby immediately moved forward brandishing a torch like a weapon. He craned towards the panel, moving the torch's thin beam as carefully as if he were attempting to skewer something with it. Buckholz listened to his commentary over the R/T, having retreated to his former position. 'Mm. Twqsolenoids, a relay - what's that…? Wiring, a box with a tag… Gunnar, what does it say on the tag -here…" Moresby stepped away.
Gunnar wriggled the beam of the torch into the open panel. 'It says "Battery change due on…" And it gives the date. Next month.'
'Useless!' Moresby snapped. 'Let me have another look. What else have we got here? Mm? Small canister, looks a bit like - what? Old flasher unit I had on my Morris, years ago. Top surface had a thin coating of some kind, wires from the base which couple into solenoids and the relay… and that's it. Might be to run the pilot's model railway, I suppose… Anyone else want a look?'
Moresby passed the torch to one of the technicians, and turned to face Buckholz and Waterford. 'Who knows?' he announced with a shrug. 'It ought to be important, but I can't see why.'
'The red placard?' Buckholz asked.
'If this is the auto-destruct, then it's armed, yes,'
'Thanks.'
'Pleasure.' He turned to his technician. 'Well?'
'It doesn't remind me of a flasher unit sir,' the technician offered.
'Brilliant. And what does it remind you of?'
'Looks like the automatic sprinkler device my old Dad fitted in his greenhouses - down Evesham way… very pleased with them, he was.'
'Fascinating.' Moresby flashed the torch back into the open panel, wriggled its light, sighed over the R/T, glanced at the red placard in the window, then back into the hole. 'How does your father's sprinkler system work, then?' he asked with studied casualness. They heard his muffled voice continue: 'Speak up, laddie, I'm very interested in gardening myself.'
Moresby's massive calm and expertise and exaggerated manner had all conspired to lessen the tension which Buckholz felt was beginning to grow in him again.
'You've warned your men to stay at a safe distance?' he muttered to Waterford.
'I have.' Waterford had called in nine of the eighteen SBS marines who formed his reconnaissance perimeter, to form a guard around the clearing now that the Firefox had been winched out of the lake.
Buckholz knew they should be starting to arrive within the next fifteen minutes. His concern for their safety deflected his fears for himself. The red placard must mean something.
The technician was explaining his father's greenhouse sprinkler system. Buckholz could not accommodate the seeming irrelevance of the information. '… when it dries out turns the sprinkler on… when it's wet by the right amount, it turns it off again.'
'Mm. Must get one for the lawn,' Moresby murmured, his face still pressed to the access panel. Then he stood up, and stretched. 'In the absence of anything more technical than the greenhouse sprinkler system donated by Carter and his father, I think we'll wedge the solenoids, just in case. Carry on, Carter. Let's play safe.' Immediately he walked across to Buckholz, rubbing his hands as if washing them inside his gloves. 'Hurry up, Carter,' he called over his shoulder, 'it's getting pretty dry behind that panel.'
'Do you think that's it?' Buckholz asked, his nerves and tension making him feel ridiculous.
'I should think so - bang,' he added with a tight little smile. He flicked at his moustache, which creaked with his frozen breath. 'I don't know why they wanted a water-activated system. Morbidly security-conscious, though, the Russians.'
'So how did it work?' Buckholz was more and more angry. It was an anti-climax, he had been frightened for nothing.
'With the airframe's immersion, the system became operational,' Moresby replied, almost with relish. 'It was fully armed once it came out of the water. When it dried out completely - bang! At least, I assume that's what would have happened.'
He turned. The technician gave him a thumbs-up sign, and Moresby sighed with satisfaction.
'Safe?' Buckholz asked.
'Hang about for a bit and see, if you wish. I think so - we'll get down to the real work now. I should get your chaps to cut down a few more trees. Major. It's almost three now.' He nodded, and walked away towards the aircraft.
'Christ,' Buckholzbreathed. 'Jesus H. Christ.'
'No, but he's not bad for RAF.' Waterford murmured, placing the R/T against his lips and turning away from the American.
Hoses, Buckholz reminded himseif, masking the fears that he no longer wished to admit to. He felt himself trembling. He had been frightened, really frightened. Now, he had to find an activity, some occupation.
He wondered whether they had sufficient lengths of hose at Bardufoss to steam a runway across the ice for the Firefox, now that it was no longer in danger of being destroyed.
Then he thought of Gant.
And realised that the pilot might hang by more of a thread than the airframe had done.
The guards were bored, then impressed, then efficient. It had been simple. The barbed wire strung on crossed logs and poles was thickened, whitened and made innocent by clinging snow. It stretched away on either side into the hidden landscape. Snow covered the ploughed swathe of earth that marked the border. Lights shone down on the guard post and customs office, and a look-out tower threw a shadow across the road just beyond the red and white pole.
Priabin had not told them, Gant thought to himself once more. He warmed hims
elf with the knowledge. He stood with his back to the long table where Anna was now showing her papers and answering the few deferential questions offered by the Border Guard captain in command of the crossing-point. Gant could see beyond the shadow of the tower, the distant red and white pole on the Finnish side. Lights glowed from the windows of the huts like signals. The Finns who were to meet them would be watching the door of this customs office, waiting for their re-emergence. They would get into the car, the Russian pole would swing up, they would be through. Sixty or seventy yards, and they would be in Finland.
Don't think about it, he told himself, feeling his hands quiver in the pockets of his overcoat The snow that had gathered on his fur hat had melted, and began to trickle down his neck and beneath the collar of his shirt. Don't think about crossing…
If he did dwell on it, his mask would crack in the closing seconds of his performance. It was easy, acting this officious senior diplomat or civil servant. An older man, testy with authority, dry and sharp like a fallen brown holly leaf. These people were half-afraid of him, half-afraid of his power to make telephone calls, speak to superiors, complain, condemn. They had hurried their questions, their examination of his papers. They had not wished to search his luggage. They had accepted his explanation that their Finnish companion, expected to drive them, had fallen ill - too much drink, he had snapped with an acid dislike - but they had important, vital meetings later that same day… planes were grounded in Leningrad, as they knew, thus the car. He was angry at losing sleep, at delay of any kind.
He paced a little now, while Anna answered the brief questions. He clicked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. Nerve, he thought. Hold on -
Act.
He glared at the captain over his half-glasses. The captain caught his look, and immediately surrendered Anna's papers, making the most of a polite bow to her.
'Thank you,' Gant said with little grace. 'Now, we may go?'
'Of course, sir-please…' He opened the door for them. Gant preceded Anna out into the snow and the lights. Stepping into the glare, he almost froze, as if he had been exposed and recognised. Then he walked on to the car. Impatiently, he held the passenger door open for Anna, and she climbed in. Then, merely nodding dismissively in the captain's direction, he rounded the bonnet to the driver's door. The captain himself held it open for him.
'A successful conclusion to your business, sir,' he offered.
He bent to climb into the driver's seat. Then he heard the approaching car. Its engine made it clear that it was moving with speed. Stifling a groan, keeping the tremor from his frame, Gant looked up. He saw headlights rounding a bend, dancing towards them. He knew it was Priabin. He hadn't found -hadn't even looked for - the man's car. He should have killed him…
He glanced at Anna's face. She knew, too. The captain was alarmed, then alert and decisive. He waved two guards armed with Kalashnikov rifles forward. They positioned themselves in the headlight beams. The car swayed, then slewed halfway across the road as it stopped in a skid. The door opened.
Gant realised the barrier had been raised. He slammed the door. Already, the pole was beginning to descend. He switched on the engine, revved, put the car into gear. The captain bent to warn him, an arm raised to point at the barrier. His head flicked away as they both heard Priabin shouting. In the mirror, Gant saw Priabin running towards them, waving his ID wallet above his head, calling his rank and name and their identities -
He let out the clutch and accelerated. The barrier was coming down. He skidded, but the car slid forward before it started to swing round - the barrier bounced on the roof, shattering the rear window with its impact. He swung the wheel, grinning at Anna, and let the car accelerate as soon as he came out of the skid.
'Stop them!' Priabin yelled. 'Stop him, stop him!' His ID was thrust under the captain's nose. The man stepped back half a pace, made to salute. The two guards had turned to follow the flight of the car. Priabin bellowed, 'The tyres-the tyres!' The guards opened fire. 'The woman is a hostage!' Priabin yelled, his words drowned by the first rounds fired from the two rifles. Horribly, one of them was on automatic. 'The tyres, only the tyres!' he continued to bellow, his voice little more than a screech, hoarse and unheard. The car slid across the road, spun almost to face them, stalled. The two rifles continued firing, both now on single shot. 'Stop, stop- !'
The Finnish barrier was up, a car was revving. Priabin could see its exhaust rising in the glare of the lights. He was running alongside the captain, who had drawn his gun.
Gant was running. He had got out of the car, hesitated for only a moment, and then had begun running towards the other barrier and the car that was moving forward to protect him.
'Shoot him, shoot him - he's the American pilot! Kill him.'
Gant was alone. Running alone.
PART THREE
THE AIRCRAFT
'.. -the one path of my flight is direct
Through the bones of the living.
No arguments assert my right:
The sun is behind me.'
-Ted Hughes: Hawk Roosting
TWELVE:
Through The Window
She had swivelled in the passenger seat to stare back through the car's rear window at some excitement on the road behind, just like a child. And it was as if he were gently remonstrating with that child when he turned her in her seat. Except that by turning her he could not prevent harm from coming to her. She was already dead. Gant knew that even as he gently moved her. He knew before he saw the neat blue hole in her forehead, just at the hairline.
He had told her to keep down, had tried to push her back into her seat; but her arm had become limp and unresponding. Anna had turned to look back at Priabin, standing in the middle of the road, waving his arms. Gant had heard one of the two Kalashnikovs on automatic. The bellow of sound had unnerved him more than the concussions of the first bullets; the thuds against the boot and into the rear seat.
He stared at her face for only a moment. Very pale. Her eyes were open. They hardly registered shock, were without pain.
He let her body fall back against the seat and wished he had not done so. She looked very dead the moment he released her. Her head too rapidly flopped onto her shoulder, the hair spilled over her cheek, and there was a snail-track of saliva at the corner of her mouth. He withdrew his hands, holding them against his chest, afraid to touch her again. They were shaking as he bunched them into fists. He groaned.
The Vietnamese girl, burning…
He grabbed the door handle. His hand froze for a moment, then flung open the door. Two bullets immediately thudded into it, making the plastic of the panel bulge near his knuckles. He knelt behind the door. The two rifles ceased firing. He straightened, smelling on the freezing air the exhaust from the Finnish car moving towards him. He ran. He heard Priabin shout something; the voice sounded almost demented above the noise of Gant's breathing and heartbeat and squeaking footfalls. He hunched his body against the expected impact of rifle bullets.
Then the Finnish car, a long Mercedes saloon, swung across the road behind him, skidding to a halt. He heard the doors open. He tried to stop and turn, but slipped and fell onto the snow-bound road. His buttocks and hands ached. The Vietnamese girl was incinerated in an instant beside the car he had abandoned. Two men were kneeling behind the open doors of the Mercedes, yet not expecting trouble. The two border guards had stopped firing, stopped running.
Another man was still moving, charging towards the abandoned car, arms flailing as if he were combating the freezing night and the falling snow. Headlights from the Mercedes glared towards the lights of the abandoned car. The brightness hid Anna; hid Priabin the moment he stopped and ducked his whole body almost frenziedly into the car's interior. Gant closed his eyes. The image of the Vietnamese girl had vanished, but he could clearly discern the blue hole in Anna's forehead. He shook his head, but her surprised, hardly shocked face would not leave him. He breathed in deeply and opened his eyes. A man was exten
ding his hand, offering to help him to his feet.
'Major Gant?' he said.
Immediately, as if the action would help to establish his identity, or remove Anna's image from his retinae, Gant tugged the hairpiece from his own closely-cropped hair.
'Yes,' he said.
'Quickly,' the Finn instructed, clutching Gant's elbow, forcing him to his feet. Gant's legs were foal-like, awkward. 'We must get you away from here - I do not think there will be trouble, but - '
'Yes,' Gant repeated dully, brushing down his overcoat and trousers. The other two Finns had also stood up. One of them, the driver, had climbed into the Mercedes. The engine was still running. The incident was over. The two guards had retreated to the customs hut, where their officer stood on the wooden steps, watching through night-glasses. 'Yes.'
He was ushered to the rear door of the Mercedes. He paused and stared into the other car's headlights. It was as if he had been trapped in a searchlight's eager beam. Beyond the lights, he saw Priabin. He was out of the car, his arms wrapped around Anna's body. Gant could see the splash of fair hair against Priabin's dark clothing. Priabin's face was white, aghast, lost.
Quickly, Gant got into the car, which reversed across the road, turned, and headed back towards the red and white pole on the Finnish side. Gant turned his head, wincing as he realised he was imitating Anna's last living movement, and watched the figure of Priabin diminish, the splash of blonde hair against his chest no more than a trick of the light. Priabin did not move, seemed incapable of volition. He simply stared in his lost way after the receding Mercedes.
Then the Finnish border post was behind them, the glow from the overhead lights retreating behind the falling snow. Gant shivered, realising that the car was warm, realising that it was over.
He did not dare to close his eyes. Open, and Anna remained only a tumbled trick of the light against Priabin's chest; closed, and the white face with its blue hole would return. He stared at the back of the Finn in the front passenger seat like a nauseous drunk attempting to defeat the spinning of his head.