High Citadel

I

Forester felt warm and at ease, and to him the two were synonymous. Strange that the snow is so warm and soft, he thought; and opened his eyes to see a glare of white before him. He sighed and closed his eyes again, feeling a sense of disappointment. It was snow, after all. He supposed he should make an effort to move and get out of this deliciously warm snow or he would die, but he decided it was not worth the effort. He just let the warmth lap him in comfort and for a second before he relapsed into unconsciousness he wondered vaguely where Rohde had got to.

The next time he opened his eyes the glare of white was still there but now he had recovered enough to see it for what it was — the brilliance of sunlight falling on the crisply laundered white counterpane that covered him. He blinked and looked again, but the glare hurt his eyes, so he closed them. He knew he should do something but what it was he could not remember, and he passed out again while struggling to keep awake long enough to remember what it was.

Vaguely, in his sleep, he was aware of the passage of time and he knew he must fight against this, that he must stop the clock, hold the moving fingers, because he had something to do that was of prime urgency. He stirred and moaned, and a nurse in a trim white uniform gently sponged the sweat from his brow.

But she did not wake him.

At last he woke fully and stared at the ceiling. That was also white, plainly whitewashed with thick wooden beams. He turned his head and found himself looking into kindly eyes. He licked dry lips and whispered, ‘What happened?’

‘No comprendo,’ said the nurse. ‘No talk — I bring doctor.’

She got up and his eyes moved as she went out of the room. He desperately wanted her to come back, to tell him where he was and what had happened and where to find Rohde. As he thought of Rohde it all came back to him — the night on the mountain and the frustrating attempts to find a way over the pass. Most of it he remembered, although the end bits were hazy — and he also remembered why that impossible thing had been attempted.

He tried to sit up but his muscles had no strength in them and he just lay there, breathing hard. He felt as though his body weighed a thousand pounds and as though he had been beaten all over with a rubber hose. Every muscle was loose and flabby, even the muscles of his neck, as he found when he tried to raise his head. And he felt very, very tired.

It was a long time before anyone came into the room, and then it was the nurse bearing a bowl of hot soup. She would not let him talk and he was too weak to insist, and every time he opened his mouth she ladled a spoonful of soup into it. The broth gave him new strength and he felt better, and when he had finished the bowl he said, ‘Where is the other man — el otro hombre?’

‘Your friend will be all right,’ she said in Spanish, and whisked out of the room before he could ask anything else.

Again it was a long time before anyone came to see him. He had no watch, but by the position of the sun he judged it was about midday. But which day? How long had he been there? He put up his hand to scratch an intolerable itching in his chest and discovered why he felt so heavy and uncomfortable; he seemed to be wrapped in a couple of miles of adhesive tape.

A man entered the room and closed the door. He said in an American accent, ‘Well, Mr Forester, I hear you’re better.’ He was dressed in hospital white and could have been a doctor. He was elderly but still powerfully built, with a shock of white hair and the crow’s-feet of frequent laughter around his eyes.

Forester relaxed. ‘Thank God — an American,’ he said. His voice was much stronger.

‘I’m McGruder — Doctor McGruder.’

‘How did you know my name?’ asked Forester.

‘The papers in your pocket,’ said McGruder. ‘You carry an American passport.’

‘Look,’ said Forester urgently. ‘You’ve got to let me out of here. I’ve got things to do. I’ve got to—’

‘You’re not leaving here for a long time,’ said McGruder abruptly. ‘And you couldn’t stand if you tried.’

Forester sagged back in bed. ‘Where is this place?’

‘San Antonio Mission,’ said McGruder,’ ‘I’m the Big White Chief here. Presbyterian, you know.’

‘Anywhere near Altemiros?’

‘Sure. Altemiros village is just down the road — almost two miles away.’

‘I want a message sent,’ said Forester rapidly. ‘Two messages — one to Ramón Sueguerra in Altemiros and one to Santillana to the—’

McGruder held up his hand. ‘Whoa up, there; you’ll have a relapse if you’re not careful. Take it easy.’

‘For God’s sake,’ said Forester bitterly. ‘This is urgent.’

‘For God’s sake nothing is urgent,’ said McGruder equably. ‘He has all the time there is. What I’m interested in right now is why one man should come over an impossible pass in a blizzard carrying another man.’

‘Did Rohde carry me? How is he?’

‘As well as can be expected,’ said McGruder. ‘I’d be interested to know why he carried you.’

‘Because I was dying,’ said Forester. He looked at McGruder speculatively, sizing him up. He did not want to make a blunder — the communists had some very unexpected friends in the strangest places — but he did not think he could go wrong with a Presbyterian doctor, and McGruder looked all right. ‘All right,’ he said at last. ‘I suppose I’ll have to tell you. You look okay to me.’

McGruder raised his eyebrows but said nothing, and Forester told him what was happening on the other side of the mountains, beginning with the air crash but leaving out such irrelevancies as the killing of Peabody, which, he thought, might harm his case. As he spoke McGruder’s eyebrows crawled up his scalp until they were almost lost in his hair.

When Forester finished he said, ‘Now that’s as improbable a story as I’ve ever heard. You see, Mr Forester, I don’t entirely trust you. I had a phone call from the Air Force base — there’s one quite close — and they were looking for you. Moreover, you were carrying this.’ He put his hand in his pocket and pulled out a pistol. ‘I don’t like people who carry guns — it’s against my religion.’

Forester watched as McGruder skilfully worked the action and the cartridges flipped out. He said, ‘For a man who doesn’t like guns you know a bit too much about their workings.’

‘I was a Marine at Iwo Jima,’ said McGruder. ‘Now why would the Cordilleran military be interested in you?’

‘Because they’ve gone communist.’

‘Tchah!’ said McGruder disgustedly. ‘You talk like an old maid who sees burglars under every bed. Colonel Rodriguez is as communist as I am.’

Forester felt a sudden hope. Rodriguez was the commandant of Fourteenth Squadron and the friend of Aguillar. ‘Did you speak to Rodriguez?’ he asked.

‘No,’ said McGruder. ‘It was some junior officer.’ He paused. ‘Look, Forester, the military want you and I’d like you to tell me why.’

‘Is Fourteenth Squadron still at the airfield?’ countered Forester.

‘I don’t know. Rodriguez did say something about moving — but I haven’t seen him for nearly a month.’

So it was a toss-up, thought Forester disgustedly. The military were friend or foe and he had no immediate means of finding out — and it looked as though McGruder was quite prepared to hand him over. He said speculatively, ‘I suppose you try to keep your nose clean. I suppose you work in with the local authorities and you don’t interfere in local politics.’

‘Indeed I don’t,’ said McGruder. ‘I don’t want this mission closed. We have enough trouble as it is.’

‘You think you have trouble with Lopez, but that’s nothing to the trouble you’ll have when the commies move in,’ snapped Forester. ‘Tell me, is it against your religion to stand by and wait while your fellow human beings — some of them fellow countrymen, not that that matters — are slaughtered not fifteen miles from where you are standing?’

McGruder whitened about the nostrils and the lines deepened about his mouth. ‘I almost think you are telling the truth,’ he said slowly.

‘You’re damn right I am.’

Ignoring the profanity McGruder said, ‘You mentioned a name — Sueguerra. I know Señor Sueguerra very well. I play chess with him whenever I get into the village. He is a good man, so that is a point for you. What was the other message — to Santillana?’

‘The same message to a different man,’ said Forester patiently. ‘Bob Addison of the United States Embassy. Tell them both what I’ve told you — and tell Addison to get the lead out of his breeches fast.’

McGruder wrinkled his brow. ‘Addison? I believe I know all the Embassy staff, but I don’t recall an Addison.’

‘You wouldn’t,’ said Forester. ‘He’s an officer of the Central Intelligence Agency of the United States. We don’t advertise.’

McGruder’s eyebrows crawled up again. ‘We?’

Forester grinned weakly. ‘I’m a C.I.A. officer, too. But you’ll have to take it on trust — I don’t carry the information tattooed on my chest.’

II

Forester was shocked to hear that Rohde was likely to lose his leg. ‘Frostbite in a very bad open wound is not conducive to the best of health,’ said McGruder dryly. ‘I’m very sorry about this; I’ll try to save the leg, of course — it’s a pity that this should happen to so brave a man.’

McGruder now appeared to have accepted Forester’s story, although he had taken a lot of convincing and had doubts about the wisdom of the State Department. ‘They’re stupid,’ he said. ‘We don’t want open American interference down here — that’s certain to stir up anti-Americanism. It’s giving the communists a perfect opening.’

‘For God’s sake, I’m not interfering actively,’ protested Forester. ‘We knew that Aguillar was going to make his move and my job was to keep a friendly eye on him, to see that he got through safely.’ He looked at the ceiling and said bitterly, ‘I seem to have balled it up, don’t I?’

‘I don’t see that you could have done anything different,’ observed McGruder. He got up from the bedside. ‘I’ll check up on which squadron is at the airfield, and I’ll go to see Sueguerra myself.’

‘Don’t forget the Embassy.’

‘I’ll put a phone call through right away.’

But that proved to be difficult because the line was not open. McGruder sat at his desk and fumed at the unresponsive telephone. This was something that happened about once a week and always at a critical moment. At last he put down the hand-set and turned to take off his white coat, but hesitated as he heard the squeal of brakes from the courtyard. He looked through his office window and saw a military staff car pull up followed by a truck and a military ambulance. A squad of uniformed and armed men debussed from the truck under the barked orders of an N.C.O., and an officer climbed casually out of the staff car.

McGruder hastily put on the white coat again and when the officer strode into the room he was busy writing at his desk. He looked up and said, ‘Good day — er — Major. To what do I owe this honour?’

The officer clicked his heels punctiliously. ‘Major Garcia, at your service.’

The doctor leaned back in his chair and put both his hands flat on the desk. ‘I’m McGruder. What can I do for you, Major?’

Garcia flicked his glove against the side of his well-cut breeches. ‘We — the Cordilleran Air Force, that is — thought we might be of service,’ he said easily. ‘We understand that you have two badly injured men here — the men who came down from the mountain. We offer the use of our medical staff and the base hospital at the airfield.’ He waved. ‘The ambulance is waiting outside.’

McGruder swivelled his eyes to the window and saw the soldiers taking up position outside. They looked stripped for action. He flicked his gaze back to Garcia. ‘And the escort!’

Garcia smiled. ‘No es nada,’ he said casually. ‘I was conducting a small exercise when I got my orders, and it was as easy to bring the men along as to dismiss them and let them idle.’

McGruder did not believe a word of it. He said pleasantly, ‘Well, Major, I don’t think we need trouble the military. I haven’t been in your hospital at the airfield, but this place of mine is well enough equipped to take care of these men. I don’t think they need to be moved.’

Garcia lost his smile. ‘But we insist,’ he said icily.

McGruder’s mobile eyebrows shot up. ‘Insist, Major Garcia? I don’t think you’re in a position to insist.’

Garcia looked meaningly at the squad of soldiers in the courtyard. ‘No?’ he asked silkily.

‘No,’ said McGruder flatly. ‘As a doctor, I say that these men are too sick to be moved. If you don’t believe me, then trot out your own doctor from that ambulance and let him have a look at them. I am sure he will tell you the same.’

For the first time Garcia seemed to lose his self-possession. ‘Doctor?’ he said uncertainly. ‘Er... we have brought no doctor.’

‘No doctor?’ said McGruder in surprise. He wiggled his eyebrows at Garcia. ‘I am sure you have misinterpreted your orders, Major Garcia. I don’t think your commanding officer would approve of these men leaving here unless under qualified supervision; and I certainly don’t have the time to go with you to the airfield — I am a busy man.’

Garcia hesitated and then said sullenly, ‘Your telephone — may I use it?’

‘Help yourself,’ said McGruder. ‘But it isn’t working — as usual.’

Garcia smiled thinly and spoke into the mouthpiece. He got an answer, too, which really surprised McGruder and told him of the seriousness of the position. This was not an ordinary breakdown of the telephone system — it was planned; and he guessed that the exchange was under military control.

When next Garcia spoke he came to attention and McGruder smiled humourlessly; that would be his commanding officer and it certainly wouldn’t be Rodriguez — he didn’t go in for that kind of spit-and-polish. Garcia explained McGruder’s attitude concisely and then listened to the spate of words which followed. There was a grim smile on his face as he put down the telephone. ‘I regret to tell you, Doctor McGruder, that I must take those men.’

He stepped to the window and called his sergeant as McGruder came to his feet in anger. ‘And I say the men are too ill to be moved. One of those men is an American, Major Garcia. Are you trying to cause an international incident?’

‘I am obeying orders,’ said Garcia stiffly. His sergeant came to the window and he gave a rapid stream of instructions, then turned to McGruder. ‘I have to inform you that these men stand accused of plotting against the safety of the State. I am under instructions to arrest them.’

‘You’re nuts,’ said McGruder. ‘You take these men and you’ll be up to your neck in diplomats.’ He moved over to the door.

Garcia stood in front of him. ‘I must ask you to move away from the door, Doctor McGruder, or I will be forced to arrest you, too.’ He spoke over McGruder’s shoulder to a corporal standing outside. ‘Escort the doctor into the courtyard.’

‘Well, if you’re going to feel like that about it, there’s nothing I can do,’ said McGruder. ‘But that commanding officer of yours — what’s his name...?’

‘Colonel Coello.’

‘Colonel Coello is going to find himself in a sticky position.’ He stood aside and let Garcia precede him into the corridor.

Garcia waited for him, slapping the side of his leg impatiently. ‘Where are the men?’

McGruder led the way down the corridor at a rapid pace. Outside Forester’s room he paused and deliberately raised his voice. ‘You realize I am letting these men go under protest. The military have no jurisdiction here and I intend to protest to the Cordilleran government through the United States Embassy. And I further protest upon medical grounds — neither of these men is fit to be moved.’

‘Where are the men?’ repeated Garcia.

‘I have just operated on one of them — he is recovering from an anaesthetic. The other is also very ill and I insist on giving him a sedative before he is moved.’

Garcia hesitated and McGruder pressed him. ‘Come, Major; military ambulances have never been noted for smooth running — you would not begrudge a man a painkiller.’ He tapped Garcia on the chest. ‘This is going to make headlines in every paper across the United States. Do you want to make matters worse by appearing anti-humanitarian?’

‘Very well,’ said Garcia unwillingly.

‘I’ll get the morphine from the surgery,’ said McGruder and went back, leaving Garcia standing in the corridor.

Forester heard the raised voices as he was polishing the plate of the best meal he had ever enjoyed in his life. He realized that something was amiss and that McGruder was making him appear sicker than he was. He was willing to play along with that, so he hastily pushed the tray under the bed and when the door opened he was lying flat on his back with his eyes closed. As McGruder touched him he groaned.

McGruder said, ‘Mr Forester, Major Garcia thinks you will be better looked after in another hospital, so you are being moved.’ As Forester opened his eyes McGruder frowned at him heavily. ‘I do not agree with this move, which is being done under force majeure, and I am going to consult the appropriate authorities. I am going to give you a sedative so that the journey will not harm you, although it is not far — merely to the airfield.’

He rolled up the sleeve of Forester’s pyjamas and dabbed at his arm with cotton-wool, then produced a hypodermic syringe which he filled from an ampoule. He spoke casually. ‘The tape round your chest will support your ribs but I wouldn’t move around much — not unless you have to.’ There was a subtle emphasis on the last few words and he winked at Forester.

As he pushed home the needle in Forester’s arm he leaned over and whispered, ‘It’s a stimulant.’

‘What was that?’ said Garcia sharply.

‘What was what?’ asked McGruder, turning and skewering Garcia with an icy glare. ‘I’ll trouble you not to interfere with a doctor in his duties. Mr Forester is a very sick man, and on behalf of the United States government I am holding you and Colonel Coello responsible for what happens to him. Now, where are your stretcher-bearers?’

Garcia snapped to the sergeant at the door, ‘Una camilla.’ The sergeant bawled down the corridor and presently a stretcher was brought in. McGruder fussed about while Forester was transferred from the bed, and when he was settled said, ‘There, you can take him.’

He stepped back and knocked a kidney basin on the floor with a clatter. The noise was startling in that quiet room, and while everyone’s attention was diverted McGruder hastily thrust something hard under Forester’s pillow.

Then Forester was borne down the corridor and into the open courtyard and he winced as the sun struck his eyes. Once in the ambulance he had to wait a long time before anything else happened and he closed his eyes, feigning sleep, because the soldier on guard kept peering at him. Slowly he brought his hand up under the coverlet towards the pillow and eventually touched the butt of a gun.

Good old McGruder, he thought; the Marines to the rescue. He hooked his finger in the trigger guard and gradually brought the gun down to his side, where he thrust it into the waistband of his pyjamas at the small of his back where it could not be seen when he was transferred to another bed. He smiled to himself; at other times lying on a hard piece of metal might be thought extremely uncomfortable, but he found the touch of the gun very comforting.

And what McGruder had said was comforting, too. The tape would hold him together and the stimulant would give him strength to move. Not that he thought he needed it; his strength had returned rapidly once he had eaten, but no doubt the doctor knew best.

Rohde was pushed into the ambulance and Forester looked across at the stretcher. He was unconscious and there was a hump under the coverlet where his legs were. His face was pale and covered with small beads of sweat and he breathed stertorously.

Two soldiers climbed into the ambulance and the doors were slammed, and after a few minutes it moved off. Forester kept his eyes closed at first — he wanted the soldiers to believe that the hypothetical sedative was taking effect. But after a while he decided that these rank and file would probably not know anything about a sedative being given to him, so he risked opening his eyes and turned his head to look out of the window.

He could not see much because of the restricted angle of view, but presently the ambulance stopped and he saw a wrought-iron gate and through the bars a large board. It depicted an eagle flying over a snow-capped mountain, and round this emblem in a scroll and written in ornate letters were the words: ESQUADRON OCTAVO.

He closed his eyes in pain. They had drawn the wrong straw; this was the communist squadron.

III

McGruder watched the ambulance leave the courtyard followed by the staff car. Then he went into his office, stripped off his white coat and put on his jacket. He took his car keys from a drawer and went round to the hospital garage, where he got a shock. Lounging outside the big doors was a soldier in a sloppy uniform — but there was nothing sloppy about the rifle he was holding, nor about the gleaming bayonet.

He walked over and barked authoritatively, ‘Let me pass.’

The soldier looked at him through half-closed eyes and shook his head, then spat on the ground. McGruder got mad and tried to push his way past but found the tip of the bayonet pricking his throat. The soldier said, ‘You see the sergeant — if he says you can take a car, then you take a car.’

McGruder backed away, rubbing his throat. He turned on his heel and went to look for the sergeant, but got nowhere with him. The sergeant was a sympathetic man when away from his officers and his broad Indian face was sorrowful. ‘I’m sorry, Doctor,’ he said. ‘I just obey orders — and my orders are that no one leaves the mission until I get contrary orders.’

‘And when will that be?’ demanded McGruder.

The sergeant shrugged. ‘Who knows?’ he said with the fatalism of one to whom officers were a race apart and their doings incomprehensible.

McGruder snorted and withdrew to his office, where he picked up the telephone. Apparently it was still dead, but when he snapped, ‘Get me Colonel Coello at the military airfield,’ it suddenly came to life and he was put through — not to Coello, but to some underling.

It took him over fifteen minutes before he got through to Coello and by then he was breathing hard with ill-suppressed rage. He said aggressively, ‘McGruder here. What’s all this about closing down San Antonio Mission?’

Coello was suave. ‘But the mission is not closed, Doctor; anyone can enter.’

‘But I can’t leave,’ said McGruder. ‘I have work to do.’

‘Then do it,’ said Coello. ‘Your work is in the mission, Doctor; stick to your job — like the cobbler. Do not interfere in things which do not concern you.’

‘I don’t know what the hell you mean,’ snarled McGruder with a profanity he had not used since his Marine days. ‘I have to pick up a consignment of drugs at the railroad depot in Altemiros. I need them and the Cordilleran Air Force is stopping me getting them — that’s how I see it. You’re not going to look very good when this comes out, Colonel.’

‘But you should have said this earlier,’ said Coello soothingly. ‘I will send one of the airfield vehicles to pick them up for you. As you know, the Cordilleran Air Force is always ready to help your mission. I hear you run a very good hospital, Doctor McGruder. We are short of good hospitals in this country.’

McGruder heard the cynical amusement in the voice. He said irascibly, ‘All right,’ and banged the phone down. Mopping his brow he thought that it was indeed fortunate there was a consignment of drugs waiting in Altemiros. He paused, wondering what to do next, then he drew a sheet of blank paper from a drawer and began writing.

Half an hour later he had the gist of Forester’s story on paper. He folded the sheets, sealed them in an envelope and put the envelope into his pocket. All the while he was conscious of the soldier posted just outside the window who was keeping direct surveillance of him. He went out into the corridor to find another soldier lounging outside the office door whom he ignored, carrying on down towards the wards and the operating theatre. The soldier stared after him with incurious eyes and drifted down the corridor after him.

McGruder looked for Sánchez, his second-in-command, and found him in one of the wards. Sánchez looked at his face and raised his eyebrows. ‘What is happening, Doctor?’

‘The local military have gone berserk,’ said McGruder unhappily. ‘And I seem to be mixed up in it — they won’t let me leave the mission.’

‘They won’t let anyone leave the mission,’ said Sánchez. ‘I tried.’

‘I must get to Altemiros,’ said McGruder. ‘Will you help me? I know I’m usually non-political, but this is different. There’s murder going on across the mountains.’

‘Eight Squadron came to the airfield two days ago — I have heard strange stories about Eight Squadron,’ said Sánchez reflectively. ‘You may be non-political, Doctor McGruder, but I am not. Of course I will help you.’

McGruder turned and saw the soldier gazing blankly at him from the entrance of the ward. ‘Let’s go into your office,’ he said.

They went to the office and McGruder switched on an X-ray viewer and pointed out the salient features of an X-ray plate to Sánchez. He left the door open and the soldier leaned on the opposite wall of the corridor, solemnly picking his teeth. ‘This is what I want you to do,’ said McGruder in a low voice.

Fifteen minutes later he went to find the sergeant and spoke to him forthrightly. ‘What are your orders concerning the mission?’ he demanded.

The sergeant said, ‘Not to let anyone leave — and to watch you, Doctor McGruder.’ He paused. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘I seem to have noticed that I’ve been watched,’ said McGruder with heavy irony. ‘Now, I’m going to do an operation. Old Pedro must have his kidneys seen to or he will die. I can’t have any of your men in the operating theatre, spitting all over the floor; we have enough trouble attaining asepsis as it is.’

‘We all know you norteamericanos are very clean,’ acknowledged the sergeant. He frowned. ‘This room — how many doors?’

‘One door — no windows,’ said McGruder. ‘You can come and look at it if you like; but don’t spit on the floor.’

He took the sergeant into the operating theatre and satisfied him that there was only one entrance. ‘Very well,’ said the sergeant. ‘I will put two men outside the door — that will be all right.’

McGruder went into the sluice room and prepared for the operation, putting on his gown and cap and fastening the mask loosely about his neck. Old Pedro was brought up on a stretcher and McGruder stood outside the door while he was pushed into the theatre. The sergeant said, ‘How long will this take?’

McGruder considered. ‘About two hours — maybe longer. It is a serious operation, Sergeant.’

He went into the theatre and closed the door. Five minutes later the empty stretcher was pushed out and the sergeant looked through the open door and saw the doctor masked and bending over the operating table, a scalpel in his hand. The door closed, the sergeant nodded to the sentries and wandered towards the courtyard to find a sunny spot. He quite ignored the empty stretcher being pushed by two chattering nurses down the corridor.

In the safety of the bottom ward McGruder dropped from under the stretcher where he had been clinging and flexed the muscles of his arms. Getting too old for these acrobatics, he thought, and nodded to the nurses who had pushed in the stretcher. They giggled and went out, and he changed his clothes quickly.

He knew of a place where the tide of prickly pear which covered the hillside overflowed into the mission grounds. For weeks he had intended to cut down the growth and tidy it up, but now he was glad that he had let it be. No sentry in his right mind would deliberately patrol in the middle of a grove of sharp-spined cactus, no matter what his orders, and McGruder thought he had a chance of getting through.

He was right. Twenty minutes later he was on the other side of a low rise, the mission out of sight behind him and the houses of Altemiros spread in front. His clothes were torn and so was his flesh — the cactus had not been kind.

He began to run.

IV

Forester was still on his stretcher. He had expected to be taken into a hospital ward and transferred to a bed, but instead the stretcher was taken into an office and laid across two chairs. Then he was left alone, but he could hear the shuffling feet of a sentry outside the door and knew he was well guarded.

It was a large office overlooking the airfield, and he guessed it belonged to the commanding officer. There were many maps on the walls and some aerial photographs, mainly of mountain country. He looked at the décor without interest; he had been in many offices like this when he was in the American Air Force and it was all very familiar, from the group photographs of the squadron to the clock let into the boss of an old wooden propeller.

What interested him was the scene outside. One complete wall of the office was a window and through it he could see the apron outside the control tower and, farther away, a group of hangars. He clicked his tongue as he recognized the aircraft standing on the apron — they were Sabres.

Good old Uncle Sam, he thought in disgust; always willing to give handouts, even military handouts, to potential enemies. He looked at the fighter planes with intense curiosity. They were early model Sabres, now obsolete in the major air forces, but quite adequate for the defence of a country like Cordillera which had no conceivable military enemies of any strength. As far as he could see, they were the identical model he had flown in Korea. I could fly one of those, he thought, if I could just get into the cockpit.

There were four of them standing in a neat line and he saw they were being serviced. Suddenly he sat up — no, not serviced — those were rockets going under the wings. And those men standing on the wings were not mechanics, they were armourers loading cannon shells. He did not have to be close enough to see the shells; he had seen this operation performed many times in Korea and he knew automatically that these planes were being readied for instant action.

Christ! he thought bitterly; it’s like using a steam hammer to crack a nut. O’Hara and the others won’t have a chance against this lot. But then he became aware of something else — this must mean that O’Hara was still holding out; that the communists across the bridge were still baffled. He felt exhilarated and depressed at the same time as he watched the planes being readied.

He lay back again and felt the gun pressing into the small of his back. This was the time to prepare for action, he realized, so he pulled out the gun, keeping a wary eye on the door, and examined it. It was the pistol he had brought over the mountain — Grivas’s pistol. Cold and exposure to the elements had not done it any good — the oil had dried out and the action was stiff — but he thought it would work. He snapped the action several times, catching the rounds as they flipped from the breech, then he reloaded the magazine and worked the action again, putting a round in the breech ready for instant shooting.

He stowed the pistol by his side under the coverlet and laid his hand on the butt. Now he was ready — as ready as he could be.

He waited a long time and began to get edgy. He felt little tics all over his body as small muscles jumped and twitched, and he had never been so wide-awake in his life. That’s McGruder’s stimulant he thought: I wonder what it was and if it’ll mix with all the coca I’ve taken.

He kept an eye on the Sabres outside. The ground crews had completed their work long before someone opened the door of the office, and Forester looked up to see a man with a long, saturnine face looking down at him. The man smiled. ‘Colonel Coello, a sus ordenes.’ He clicked his heels.

Forester blinked his eyes, endeavouring to simulate sleepiness. ‘Colonel who?’ he mumbled.

The colonel sat behind the desk. ‘Coello,’ he said pleasantly. ‘I am the commandant of this fighter squadron.’

‘It’s the damnedest thing,’ said Forester with a baffled look. ‘One minute I was in hospital, and the next minute I’m in this office. Familiar surroundings, too; I woke up and became interested in those Sabres.’

‘You have flown?’ asked Coello politely.

‘I sure have,’ said Forester. ‘I was in Korea — I flew Sabres there.’

‘Then we can talk together as comrades,’ said Coello heartily. ‘You remember Doctor McGruder?’

‘Not much,’ said Forester. ‘I woke up and he pumped me full of stuff to put me to sleep again — then I found myself here. Say, shouldn’t I be in hospital or something?’

‘Then you did not talk to McGruder about anything — anything at all?’

‘I didn’t have the chance,’ said Forester. He did not want to implicate McGruder in this. ‘Say, Colonel, am I glad to see you. All hell is breaking loose on the other side of the mountains. There’s a bunch of bandits trying to murder some stranded airline passengers. We were on our way here to tell you.’

‘On your way here?’

That’s right; there was a South American guy told us to come here — now, what was his name?’ Forester wrinkled his brow.

‘Aguillar — perhaps?’

‘Never heard that name before,’ said Forester. ‘No, this guy was called Montes.’

‘And Montes told you to come here?’ said Coello incredulously. ‘He must have thought that fool Rodriguez was here. You were two days too late, Mr Forester.’ He began to laugh.

Forester felt a cold chill run through him but pressed on with his act of innocence. ‘What’s so funny?’ he asked plaintively. ‘Why the hell are you sitting there laughing instead of doing something about it?’

Coello wiped the tears of laughter from his eyes. ‘Do not worry, Señor Forester; we know all about it already. We are making preparations for... er... a rescue attempt.’

I’ll bet you are, thought Forester bitterly, looking at the Sabres drawn up on the apron. He said, ‘What the hell! Then I nearly killed myself on the mountain for nothing. What a damned fool I am.’

Coello opened a folder on his desk. ‘Your name is Raymond Forester; you are South American Sales Manager for the Fairfield Machine Tool Corporation, and you were on your way to Santillana.’ He smiled as he looked down at the folder. ‘We have checked, of course; there is a Raymond Forester who works for this company, and he is sales manager in South America. The C.I.A. can be efficient in small matters, Mr Forester.’

‘Huh!’ said Forester. ‘C.I.A.? What the devil are you talking about?’

Coello waved his hand airily. ‘Espionage! Sabotage! Corruption of public officials! Undermining the will of the people! Name anything bad and you name the C.I.A. — and also yourself, Mr Forester.’

‘You’re nuts,’ said Forester disgustedly.

‘You are a meddling American,’ said Coello sharply. ‘You are a plutocratic, capitalistic lackey. One could forgive you if you were but a tool; but you do your filthy work in full awareness of its evil. You came to Cordillera to foment an imperialistic revolution, putting up that scoundrel Aguillar as a figurehead for your machinations.’

‘Who?’ said Forester. ‘You’re still nuts.’

‘Give up, Forester; stop this pretence. We know all about the Fairfield Machine Tool Corporation. It is a cover that capitalistic Wall Street has erected to hide your imperialistic American secret service. We know all about you and we know all about Addison in Santillana. He has been removed from the game — and so have you, Forester.’

Forester smiled crookedly. ‘The voice is Spanish-American, but the words come from Moscow — or is it Peking this time?’ He nodded towards the armed aircraft. ‘Who is really doing the meddling round here?’

Coello smiled. ‘I am a servant of the present government of General Lopez. I am sure he would be happy to know that Aguillar will soon be dead.’

‘But I bet you won’t tell him,’ said Forester. ‘Not if I know how you boys operate. You’ll use the threat of Aguillar to drive Lopez out as soon as it suits you.’ He tried to scratch his itching chest but was unsuccessful. ‘You jumped me and Rohde pretty fast — how did you know we were at McGruder’s hospital?’

‘I am sure you are trying to sound more stupid than you really are,’ said Coello. ‘My dear Forester, we are in radio communication with our forces on the other side of the mountains.’ He sounded suddenly bitter. ‘Inefficient though they are, they have at least kept their radio working. You were seen by the bridge. And when men come over that pass, do you think the news can be kept quiet? The whole of Altemiros knows of the mad American who has done the impossible.’

But they don’t know why I did it, thought Forester savagely; and they’ll never find out if this bastard has his way.

Coello held up a photograph. ‘We suspected that the C.I.A. might have someone with Aguillar. It was only a suspicion then, but now we know it to be a fact. This photograph was taken in Washington six months ago.’

He skimmed it over and Forester looked at it. It was a glossy picture of himself and his immediate superior talking together on the steps of a building. He flicked the photograph with his fingernail. ‘Processed in Moscow?’

Coello smiled and asked silkily, ‘Can you give me any sound reasons why you should not be shot?’

‘Not many,’ said Forester off-handedly. ‘But enough.’ He propped himself up on one elbow and tried to make it sound good. ‘You’re killing Americans on the other side of those mountains, Coello. The American government is going to demand an explanation — an investigation.’

‘So? There is an air crash — there have been many such crashes even in North America. Especially can they occur on such ill-run air lines as Andes Airlift, which, incidentally, is owned by one of your own countrymen. An obsolete aircraft with a drunken pilot — what more natural? There will be no bodies to send back to the United States, I assure you. Regrettable, isn’t it?’

‘You don’t know the facts of life,’ said Forester. ‘My government is going to be very interested. Now, don’t get me wrong; they’re not interested in air crashes as such. But I was in that airplane and they’re going to be goddam suspicious. There’ll be an official investigation — Uncle Sam will goose the I.A.T.A. into making one — and there’ll be a concurrent undercover investigation. This country will be full of operatives within a week — you can’t stop them all and you can’t hide all the evidence. The truth is going to come out and the U.S. government will be delighted to blow the lid off. Nothing would please them more.’

He coughed, sweating a little — now it had to sound really good. ‘Now, there’s a way round all that.’ He sat up on the stretcher. ‘Have you a cigarette?’

Coello’s eyes narrowed as he picked up a cigarette-box from the desk and walked round to the stretcher. He offered the open box and said, ‘Am I to understand that you’re trying to bargain for your life?’

‘You’re dead right,’ said Forester. He put a whine in his voice. ‘I’ve no hankering to wear a wooden overcoat, and I know how you boys operate on captured prisoners.’

Thoughtfully Coello flicked his lighter and lit Forester’s cigarette. ‘Well?’

Forester said, ‘Look, Colonel; supposing I was the only survivor of that crash — thrown clear by some miraculous chance. Then I could say that the crash was okay; that it was on the up-and-up. Why wouldn’t they believe me? I’m one of their bright boys.’

Coello nodded. ‘You are bright.’ He smiled. ‘What guarantee have we that you will do this for us?’

‘Guarantee? You know damn well I can’t give you one. But I tell you this, buddy-boy; you’re not the boss round here — not by a long shot. And I’m stuffed full of information about the C.I.A. — operation areas, names, faces, addresses, covers — you ask for it, I’ve got it. And if your boss ever finds out that you’ve turned down a chance like this you’re going to be in trouble. What have you got to lose? All you have to do is to put it to your boss and let him say “yes” or “no”. If anything goes wrong he’ll have to take the rap from higher up, but you’ll be in the clear.’

Coello tapped his teeth with a fingernail. ‘I think you’re playing for time, Forester.’ He thought deeply. ‘If you can give me a sensible answer to the next question I might believe you. You say you are afraid of dying. If you are so afraid, why did you risk your life in coming over the pass?’

Forester thought of Peabody and laughed outright. ‘Use your brains. I was being shot at over there by that goddam bridge. Have you ever tried to talk reasonably with someone who shoots at you if you bat an eyelid? But you’re not shooting at me, Colonel; I can talk to you. Anyway, I reckoned it was a sight safer on the mountain than down by the bridge — and I’ve proved it, haven’t I? I’m here and I’m still alive.’

‘Yes,’ said Coello pensively. ‘You are still alive.’ He went to his desk. ‘You might as well begin by proving your goodwill immediately. We sent a reconnaissance plane over to see what was happening and the pilot took these photographs. What do you make of them?’

He tossed a sheaf of glossy photographs on to the foot of the stretcher. Forester leaned over and gasped. ‘Have a heart, Colonel; I’m all bust up inside — I can’t reach.’

Coello leaned over with a ruler and flicked them within his reach, and Forester fanned them out. They were good; a little blurred because of the speed of the aircraft, but still sharp enough to make out details. He saw the bridge and a scattering of upturned faces, white blobs against a grey background. And he saw the trebuchet. So they’d got it down from the camp all right. ‘Interesting,’ he said.

Coello leaned over. ‘What is that?’ he asked. ‘Our experts have been able to make nothing of it.’ His finger was pointing at the trebuchet.

Forester smiled. ‘I’m not surprised,’ he said. ‘There’s a nutcase over there; a guy called Armstrong. He conned the others into building that gadget; it’s called a trebuchet and it’s for throwing stones. He said the last time it was used was when Cortes besieged Mexico City and then it didn’t work properly. It’s nothing to worry about.’

‘No?’ said Coello. ‘They nearly broke down the bridge with it.’

Forester gave a silent cheer, but said nothing. He was itching to pull out his gun and let Coello have it right where it hurt most, but he would gain nothing by that — just a bullet in the brain from the guard and no chance of doing anything more damaging.

Coello gathered the photographs together and tapped them on his hand. ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘We will not shoot you — yet. You have possibly gained yourself another hour of life — perhaps much longer. I will consult my superior and let him decide what to do with you.’

He went to the door, then turned. ‘I would not do anything foolish; you realize you are well guarded.’

‘What the hell can I do?’ growled Forester. ‘I’m bust up inside and all strapped up; I’m as weak as a kitten and full of dope. I’m safe enough.’

When Coello closed the door behind him Forester broke out into a sweat. During the last half-hour Coello had nearly been relieved of the responsibility of him, for he had almost had a heart attack on three separate occasions. He hoped he had established the points he had tried to make; that he could be bought — something which might gain precious time; that he was too ill to move — Coello might get a shock on that one; and that Coello himself had nothing to lose by waiting a little — nothing but his life, Forester hoped.

He touched the butt of the gun and gazed out of the window. There was action about the Sabres on the apron; a truck had pulled up and a group of men in flying kit were getting out — three of them. They stood about talking for some time and then went to their aircraft and got settled in the cockpits with the assistance of the ground crew. Forester heard the whine of the engines as the starter truck rolled from one plane to another and, one by one, the planes slowly taxied forward until they went out of his sight.

He looked at the remaining Sabre. He knew nothing about the Cordilleran Air Force insignia, but the three stripes on the tail looked important. Perhaps the good colonel was going to lead this strike himself; it would be just his mark, thought Forester with animosity.

V

Ramón Sueguerra was the last person he would have expected to be involved in a desperate enterprise involving the overthrow of governments, thought McGruder, as he made his devious way through the back streets of Altemiros towards Sueguerra’s office. What had a plump and comfortable merchant to do with revolution? Yet perhaps the Lopez régime was hurting him more than most — his profits were eaten up by bribes; his markets were increasingly more restricted; and the fibre of his business slackened as the general economic level of the country sagged under the misrule of Lopez. Not all revolutions were made by the starving proletariat.

He came upon the building which housed the multitudinous activities of Sueguerra from the rear and entered by the back door. The front door was, of course, impossible; directly across the street was the post and telegraph office, and McGruder suspected that the building would be occupied by men of Eighth Squadron. He went into Sueguerra’s office as he had always done — with a cheery wave to his secretary — and found Sueguerra looking out of the window which faced the street.

He was surprised to see McGruder. ‘What brings you here?’ he asked. ‘It’s too early for chess, my friend.’ A truck roared in the street outside and his eyes flickered back to the window and McGruder saw that he was uneasy and worried.

‘I won’t waste your time,’ said McGruder, pulling the envelope from his pocket. ‘Read this — it will be quicker than my explanations.’

As Sueguerra read he sank into his chair and his face whitened. ‘But this is incredible,’ he said. ‘Are you sure of this?’

‘They took Forester and Rohde from the mission,’ said McGruder. ‘It was done by force.’

‘The man Forester I do not know — but Miguel Rohde should have been here two days ago,’ said Sueguerra. ‘He is supposed to take charge in the mountains when...’

‘When the revolution begins?’

Sueguerra looked up. ‘All right — call it revolution if you will. How else can we get rid of Lopez?’ He cocked his head to the street. ‘This explains what is happening over there; I was wondering about that.’

He picked up a white telephone. ‘Send in Juan.’

‘What are you going to do?’ asked McGruder.

Sueguerra stabbed his finger at the black telephone. ‘That is useless, my friend, as long as the post office is occupied. And this local telephone exchange controls all the communications in our mountain area. I will send Juan, my son, over the mountains, but he has a long way to go and it will take time — you know what our roads are like.’

‘It will take him four hours or more,’ agreed McGruder.

‘Still, I will send him. But we will take more direct action.’ Sueguerra walked over to the window and looked across the street to the post office. ‘We must take the post office.’

McGruder’s head jerked up. ‘You will fight Eighth Squadron?’

Sueguerra swung round. ‘We must — there is more than telephones involved here.’ He walked over to his desk and sat down. ‘Doctor McGruder, we always knew that when the revolution came and if Eighth Squadron was stationed here, then Eighth Squadron would have to be removed from the game. But how to do it — that was the problem.’

He smiled slightly. ‘The solution proved to be ridiculously easy. Colonel Rodriguez has mined all important installations on the airfield. The mines can be exploded electrically — and the wires lead from the airfield to Altemiros; they were installed under the guise of telephone cables. It just needs one touch on a plunger and Eighth Squadron is out of action.’

Then he thumped the desk and said savagely, ‘An extra lead was supposed to be installed in my office this morning — as it is, the only way we can do it is to take the post office by force, because that is where the electrical connection is.’

McGruder shook his head. ‘I’m no electrical engineer, but surely you can tap the wire outside the post office.’

‘It was done by Fourteenth Squadron engineers in a hurry,’ said Sueguerra. ‘And they were pulled out when Eighth Squadron so unexpectedly moved in. There are hundreds of wires in the civil and military networks and no one knows which is the right one. But I know the right connection inside the post office — Rodriguez showed it to me.’

They heard the high scream of a jet as it flew over Altemiros from the airfield, and Sueguerra said, ‘We must act quickly — Eighth Squadron must not be allowed to fly.’

He burst into activity and McGruder paled when he saw the extent of his preparations. Men assembled in his warehouses as though by magic and innocent tea-chests and bales of hides disgorged an incredible number of arms — both rifles and automatic weapons. The lines deepened in McGruder’s face and he said to Sueguerra, ‘I will not fight, you know.’

Sueguerra clapped him on the back. ‘We do not need you — what is one extra man? And in any case we do not want a norteamericano involved. This is a home-grown revolution. But there may be some patching-up for you to do when this is over.’

But there was little fighting at the post office. The attack was so unexpected and in such overwhelming strength that the Eighth Squadron detachment put up almost no resistance at all, and the only casualty was a corporal who got a bullet in his leg because an inexperienced and enthusiastic amateur rifleman had left off his safety-catch.

Sueguerra strode into the post office. ‘Jaime! Jaime! Where is that fool of an electrician? Jaime!’

‘I’m here,’ said Jaime, and came forward carrying a large box under his arm. Sueguerra took him into the main switch-room and McGruder followed.

‘It’s the third bank of switches — fifteenth from the right and nineteenth from the bottom,’ said Sueguerra, consulting a scrap of paper.

Jaime counted carefully. ‘That’s it,’ he said. ‘Those two screw connections there.’ He produced a screwdriver. ‘I’ll be about two minutes.’

As he worked a plane screamed over the town and then another and another. ‘I hope we’re not too late,’ whispered Sueguerra.

McGruder put his hand on his arm. ‘What about Forester and Rohde?’ he said in alarm. ‘They are at the airfield.’

‘We do not destroy hospitals,’ said Sueguerra. ‘Only the important installations are mined — the fuel and ammunition dumps, the hangars, the runways, the control tower. We only want to immobilize them — they are Cordillerans, you know.’

Jaime said, ‘Ready,’ and Sueguerra lifted the plunger.

‘It must be done,’ he said, and abruptly pushed down hard.

VI

It seemed that Coello was leading the strike because the next time he entered the office he was in full flying kit, parachute pack and all. He looked sour. ‘You have gained yourself more time, Forester. The decision on you will have to wait. I have other, more urgent, matters to attend to. However, I have something to show you — an educative demonstration.’ He snapped his fingers and two soldiers entered and picked up the stretcher.

‘What sort of a demonstration?’ asked Forester as he was carried out.

‘A demonstration of the dangers of lacking patriotism,’ answered Coello, smiling. ‘Something you may be accused of by your government one day, Mr Forester.’

Forester lay limply on the stretcher as it was carried out of the building and wondered what the hell was going on. The bearers veered across the apron in front of the control tower, past the single Sabre fighter, and Coello called to a mechanic, ‘Diez momentos’. The man saluted, and Forester thought, Ten minutes? Whatever it is, it won’t take long.

He turned his head as he heard the whine of an aircraft taking off and saw a Sabre clearing the ground, its wheels retracting. Then there was another, and then the third. They disappeared over the horizon and he wondered where they were going — certainly in the wrong direction if they intended to strafe O’Hara.

The small party approached one of the hangars. The big sliding doors were closed and Coello opened the wicket door and went inside, the stretcher-bearers following. There were no aircraft in the hangar and their footfalls echoed hollowly in dull clangour from the metal walls. Coello went into a side room, waddling awkwardly in his flying gear, and motioned for the stretcher to be brought in. He saw the stretcher placed across two chairs, then told the soldiers to wait outside.

Forester looked up at him. ‘What the hell is this?’ he demanded.

‘You will see,’ said Coello calmly, and switched on the light. He went to the window and drew a cord and the curtains came across. ‘Now then,’ he said, and crossed the room to draw another cord and curtains parted on an internal window looking into the hangar. ‘The demonstration will begin almost immediately,’ he said, and cocked his head on one side as though listening for something.

Forester heard it too, and looked up. It was the banshee howl of a diving jet plane, growing louder and louder until it threatened to shatter the eardrums. With a shriek the plane passed over the hangar and Forester reckoned with professional interest that it could not have cleared the hangar roof by many feet.

‘We begin,’ said Coello, and indicated the hangar.

Almost as though the diving plane had been a signal, a file of soldiers marched into the hangar and stood in a line, an officer barking at them until they trimmed the rank. Each man carried a rifle at the slope and Forester began to have a prickly foreknowledge of what was to come.

He looked at Coello coldly and began to speak but the howling racket of another diving plane drowned his words. When the plane had gone he turned and saw with rage in his heart that Rohde was being dragged in.

He could not walk and two soldiers were half dragging, half carrying him, his feet trailing on the concrete floor. Coello tapped on the window with a pencil and the soldiers brought Rohde forward. His face was dreadfully battered, both eyes were turning black and he had bruised cheeks. But his eyes were open and he regarded Forester with a lacklustre expression and opened his mouth and said a few words which Forester could not hear. He had some teeth missing.

‘You’ve beaten him up, you bastard,’ exploded Forester.

Coello laughed. ‘The man is a Cordilleran national, a traitor to his country, a conspirator against his lawful government. What do you do with traitors in the United States, Forester?’

‘You hypocritical son-of-a-bitch,’ said Forester with heat. ‘What else are you doing but subverting the government?’

Coello grinned. ‘That is different; I have not been caught. Besides, I regard myself as being on the right side — the stronger side is always right, is it not? We will crush all these puling, whining liberals like Miguel Rohde and Aguillar.’ He bared his teeth. ‘In fact, we will crush Rohde now — and Aguillar in not more than forty-five minutes.’

He waved to the officer in the hangar and the soldiers began to drag Rohde away. Forester began to curse Coello, but his words were destroyed in the quivering air as another plane dived on the hangar. He looked after the pitiful figure of Rohde and waited until it was quiet, then he said, ‘Why are you doing this?’

‘Perhaps to teach you a lesson,’ said Coello lightly. ‘Let this be a warning — if you cross us, this can happen to you.’

‘But you’re not too certain of your squadron, are you?’ said Forester. ‘You’re going to shoot Rohde and your military vanity makes you relish a firing-squad, but you can’t afford a public execution — the men of the squadron might not stand for it. I’m right, aren’t I?’

Coello gestured irritably. ‘Leave these mental probings to your bourgeois psychoanalysts.’

‘And you’ve laid on a lot of noise to drown the shots,’ persisted Forester as he heard another plane begin its dive.

Coello said something which was lost in the roar and Forester looked at him in horror. He did not know what to do. He could shoot Coello, but that would not help Rohde; there were more than a dozen armed men outside, and some were watching through the window. Coello laughed silently and pointed. When Forester could hear what he was saying, he shuddered. ‘The poor fool cannot stand, he will be shot sitting down.’

‘God damn you,’ groaned out Forester. ‘God damn your lousy soul to hell.’

A soldier had brought up an ordinary kitchen chair which he placed against the wall, and Rohde was dragged to it and seated, his stiff leg sticking out grotesquely in front of him. A noose of rope was tossed over his head and he was bound to the chair. The soldiers left him and the officer barked out a command. The firing-squad lifted their rifles as one man and aimed, and the officer lifted his arm in the air.

Forester looked on helplessly but with horrified fascination, unable to drag his eyes away. He talked loudly, directing a stream of vicious obscenities at Coello in English and Spanish, each one viler than the last.

Another Sabre started its dive, the hand of the officer twitched and, as the noise grew to its height, he dropped his arm sharply and there was a rippling flash along the line of men. Rohde jerked convulsively in the chair as the bullets slammed into him and his body toppled on one side, taking the chair with it. The officer drew his pistol and walked over to examine the body.

Coello pulled the drawstring and the curtains closed, shutting off the hideous sight. Forester snarled, ‘Hijo de puta!’

‘It will do you no good calling me names,’ said Coello. ‘Although as a man of honour I resent them and will take the appropriate steps.’ He smiled. ‘Now I will tell you the reason for this demonstration. From your rather crude observations I gather you are in sympathy with the unfortunate Rohde — the late Rohde, I should say. I was instructed to give you this test by my superior and I regret to inform you that you have failed. I think you have proved that you were not entirely sincere in the offer you made earlier, so I am afraid that you must go the same way as Rohde.’ His hand went to the pistol at his belt. ‘And after you — Aguillar. He will come to his reckoning not long from now.’ He began to draw the pistol. ‘Really, Forester, you should have known better than to—’

His words were lost in the uproar of another diving Sabre and it was then that Forester shot him, very coldly and precisely, twice in the stomach. He did not pull out the gun, but fired through the coverlet.

Coello shouted in pain and surprise and put his hands to his belly, but nothing could be heard over the tremendous racket above. Forester shot him again, this time to kill, right through the heart, and Coello rocked back as the bullet hit him and fell against the desk, dragging the blotter and the inkwell to the floor with him. He stared up with blank eyes at the ceiling, seeming to listen to the departing aircraft.

Forester slid from the stretcher and went to the door, gun in hand. Softly he turned the key, locking himself in, then he cautiously parted the curtain and looked into the hangar. The file of men — the firing-squad — were marching out, followed by the officer, and two soldiers were throwing a piece of canvas over the body of Rohde.

Forester waited until they had gone, then went to the door again and heard a shuffling of feet outside. His personal guard was still there, waiting to take him to Coello’s office or wherever Coello should direct. Something would have to be done about that.

He began to strip Coello’s body, bending awkwardly in the mummy-like wrappings of tape which constricted him. His ribs hurt, but not very much, and his body seemed to glory in the prospect of action. The twitchiness had gone now that he was moving about and he blessed McGruder for that enlivening injection.

He and Coello were much of a size and the flying overalls and boots fitted well enough. He strapped on the parachute and then lifted Coello on to the stretcher, covering him with the sheet carefully so that the face could not be seen. Then he put on the heavy plastic flying helmet with the dangling oxygen mask, and picked up the pistol.

When he opened the door he appeared to be having some trouble with the fastenings of the mask, for he was fumbling with the straps, his hand and the mask obscuring his face. He gestured casually with the pistol he held in his other hand and said to the sentries, ‘Vaya usted por allí,’ pointing to the other end of the hangar. His voice was very indistinct.

He was prepared to shoot it out if either of the soldiers showed any sign of suspicion and his finger was nervous on the trigger. The eyes of one of the men flicked momentarily to the room behind Forester, and he must have seen the shrouded body on the stretcher. Forester was counting on military obedience and the natural fear these men had for their officers. They had already witnessed one execution and if that mad dog, Coello, had held another, more private, killing, what was it to them?

The soldier clicked to attention. ‘Si, mio Colonel,’ he said, and they both marched stiffly down to the end of the hangar. Forester watched them go out by the bottom door, then locked the office, thrust the pistol into the thigh pocket of the overalls and strode out of the hangar, fastening the oxygen mask as he went.

He heard the whistle of jet planes overhead and looked up to see three Sabres circling in tight formation. As he watched they broke off into a straight course, climbing eastward over the mountains. They’re not waiting for Coello, he thought; and broke into a clumsy run.

The ground crew waiting by the Sabre saw him coming and were galvanized into action. As he approached he pointed to the departing aircraft and shouted, ‘Rapidemente! Dése prisa!’ He ran up to the Sabre with averted face and scrambled up to the cockpit, being surprised when one of the ground crew gave him a boost from behind.

He settled himself before the controls and looked at them; they were familiar but at the same time strange through long absence. The starter truck was already plugged in, its crew looking up at him with expectant faces. Damn, he thought; I don’t know the command routine in Spanish. He closed his eyes and his hands went to the proper switches and then he waved.

Apparently that was good enough; the engine burst into noisy song and the ground crew ran to uncouple the starter cable. Another man tapped him on the helmet and closed the canopy and Forester waved again, indicating that the wheels should be unchocked. Then he was rolling, and he turned to taxi up the runway, coupling up the oxygen as he went.

At the end of the runway he switched on the radio, hoping that it was already netted in to the control tower; not that he wanted to obey any damned instructions they gave, but he wanted to know what was going on. A voice crackled in the headphones. ‘Colonel Coello?’

‘Si,’ he mumbled.

‘You are cleared for take-off.’

Forester grinned, and rammed the Sabre straight down the runway. His wheels were just off the ground when all hell broke loose. The runway seemed to erupt before him for its entire length and the Sabre staggered in the air. He went into a steep, climbing turn and looked down at the airfield in astonishment. The ground was alive with the deep red flashes of violent explosions and even as he watched, he saw the control tower shiver and disintegrate into a pile of rubble and a pillar of smoke coiled up to reach him.

He fought with the controls as a particularly violent eruption shivered the air, making the plane swerve drunkenly. ‘Who’s started the goddam war?’ he demanded of no one in particular. There was just a nervous crackle in the earphones to answer him — the control tower had cut out.

He gave up the futile questioning. Whatever it was certainly did him no harm and Eighth Squadron looked as though it was hamstrung for a long time. With one last look at the amazing spectacle on the ground, he set the Sabre in a long climb to the westward and clicked switches on the radio, searching for the other three Sabres. Two channels were apparently not in use, but he got them on the third, carrying on an idle conversation and in total ignorance of the destruction of their base, having already travelled too far to have seen the debacle.

A sloppy, undisciplined lot, he thought; but useful. He looked down as he eavesdropped and saw the pass drifting below him, the place where he had nearly died, and decided that flying beat walking. Then he scanned the sky ahead, looking for the rest of the flight. From their talk he gathered that they were orbiting a pre-selected point while waiting for Coello and he wondered if they were already briefed on the operation or whether Coello had intended to brief them in flight. That might make a difference to his tactics.

At last he saw them orbiting the mountain by the side of the pass, but very high. He pulled gently on the control column and went to meet them. These were going to be three very surprised communists.