Wednesday, August 12, 2009
"His name shall be alterd," quoth William Stutely,
maps it showed topographical detail for no more than the first twenty miles inland, but it was sufficient for my purpose. It showed the twisting Kangalak glacier debouching into the Kangalak Fjord, the wide deep bay beyond the southern headland of the fjord, the northern headland continuing in a wide shallow smooth curve for many miles to the north. "Where did you say the destroyer was?" I asked. "The Wykenhaml I'm not sure." "Blocking the Kangalak Fjord here, perhaps?" I indicated the spot on the map. "No, that I'm certain of." He shook his head regretfully. "Captain said the pack-ice was too heavy, he couldn't risk his destroyer in any of the leads in case they closed." Hillcrest snorted in disgust. "I gather its hull is made of paper." "It's not much thickerI've served in destroyers. I don't blame him. But I'll bet his trawler, probably a specially strengthened job, is well inside the fjordand a submarine no great distance away. Look, this is all we can do." I traced my finger on the map. "We must parallel the glacier, maybe a mile away. With the slope of the valley sides Smallwood won't see us, and with his own engine running he can't hear us. Down here" "What's to stop him from cutting his engine now and again to listen?" Hillcrest demanded. "Because what Smallwood and Corazzini don't know about engines would fill an encyclopedia. They'd be dead scared to stop it in case they couldn't start it again.. . . Down here, at the base of the headland separating the fjord from the bay to the south -about a mile from the end of the glacier, I would saythe sides of the glacier valley fall away and level off into the plateau on either side. But there's bound to be some kind of moraine or shelter there. That's where we'll ambush them." "Ambush?" He frowned at me. "What's the difference between that and pursuing them? It'll still come to a fightand they can still hold pistols to the heads of Levin and the stewardess, and bargain from there." "There'll be no fight," I said quietly. "They've been following the left-hand side of the glacier all the way down, I see no reason why they should change. They should come into sight maybe fifty yards from where we're hidingfarther out on the glacier the going is impossible for tractors." I nodded at the telescopic sighted .303 in the corner. "With that Jackstraw can hit a three-inch target at a hundred yards. A man's head at fifty cannon 20d digital camera yards is six times that size. First he gets Corazzini, who's probably driving, and when Smallwood sticks his head out the back as he certainly willwell that's it." "But, good God, man, you can't do that!" Hillcrest was horrified. "Without a chance, without warning? It's murder, simple murder!" "Want me to go over the number of people they've murdered?" I shook my head. "You just don't begin to know those two, Hillcrest." "But" He broke off, turned to Jackstraw. "It's you he's asking to do it. What do you say?" "It will be a pleasure," Jackstraw said very softly. Hillcrest stared at us both, baffled incomprehension in his eyes. I suppose he thought he knew both of us well. And he did. But he didn't know what we had been through, words couldn't even begin to make him understand. The atmosphere was uncomfortable, tense even, and I was grateful for Joss's sudden calm words. "0943, Captain Hillcrest. Three minutes to go." "Good." He was, I could see, as glad of the interruption as I was. "Barclay"this to the cook, the only other of Hillcrest's men there, the other three were in the big driving cabin to make room for us'three Wessex rockets. Line them up on the and stand wait for the word. I'll go myself with the flare, two for safety. Give a beep on the horn, Joss, when it's time to set 'em off." I went with him to watch and the whole thing went off without a hitch. Dead on time, just seconds after the third rocket had been fired to curve upwards and explode into incandescent light in the star-dusted darkness above, we heard the high-pitched whine approaching out of the south-west, and in an incredibly short space of time a vague dark blur, carrying no navigation lights, screamed by five hundred feet overhead, banked in the distance, came at us again at much reduced speed, banked a second time and then, with a crescendoing banshee shriek of the jet engine, had vanished again into the vaguely lightening darkness to the south-east before we had realised that the pilot had made his drop. It was a measure of his complete self-confidence that he didn't even trouble to check the accuracy of his drop: but for a man skilled in landing on the handkerchief-sized flight deck of a carrier in the middle of the night this must have been a childishly simple exercise. There were two packages, not one, attached not to parachutes but to
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