Midnight Never Comes

11

The sound of the Land Rover slowing to a halt outside pulled Asta back to reality just as she was dropping off to sleep. She threw back the bedclothes, ran across to the window in time to see her step-father and a stranger, hurry up the steps into the porch. They were followed by Paul Chavasse, Stavrou and Murdoch a pace or two behind.

Asta dropped the curtain, went across to the door and opened it. The landing was in darkness and she tip-toed along to the end and peered over the banisters.

They were standing in a group in the hall below and Chavasse in whipcord slacks and a white polo-necked sweater, seemed completely relaxed, that slight inimitable smile on his face. For a moment she thought everything was all right and then she noticed the revolver Stavrou was holding.

When Donner spoke, she could hear him perfectly. 'Put him in the cellar for half an hour,' he told Stavrou. 'We'll have words later.'

The library door closed and Stavrou and Chavasse moved away. Asta stayed there, gripping the banister rail with both hands.

'So they've picked up your boyfriend, have they?'

The voice was unnaturally loud in the stillness and when she turned, Ruth Murray was standing no more than a yard away, swaying drunkenly, a glass in one hand, a decanter in the other.

Asta brushed past her and went back to her room. She closed the door behind her, but it was opened again almost immediately and Ruth entered.

'Why don't you go to bed?' Asta said patiently. 'I'm not in the mood.'

'But maybe I am,' Ruth said. 'Maybe I'm in the mood for a lot of things. Truth or consequences for instance.' She put the decanter down carefully and went into the bathroom. When she came out, she was holding the rain-soaked sweater that Asta had worn earlier. 'You've really been having yourself a ball, haven't you, and don't bother to deny it. I saw you come in. I wonder what Max would say?'

'You can always try him.'

Ruth's foolish smile disappeared and in a moment her face was contorted with fury. 'You think you're so damned good, don't you? That all you have to do is whistle and he'll come running. Well I could tell you a thing or two about Mr. Max Donner.'

'You'd be wasting your time.'

'Is that so? Just like your mother. She thought she knew how to handle him and look where it got her.'

When she carried on, it was as if she was talking to herself. 'Everything had to be just right, so they told him to get a wife. A nice normal wife. That's why he married your mother.' She tossed back the contents of her glass and refilled it, brandy slopping to the floor. 'The bloody fool. She found out about him. She found out about the great Max Donner. He couldn't have that, now could he?'

'What are you trying to say?' Asta demanded, and something moved coldly inside her.

'Remember how your mother died? Skin-diving off Lesbos?'

'That's right. She went too deep. Ran out of air.'

Ruth Murray laughed harshly. 'What would you say if I told you her emergency cylinder was empty to start with?'

Asta clutched at the end of the bed to steady herself. 'What are you trying to say?' she said in a whisper.

'What do you think I'm trying to say?' Ruth Murray emptied the last of the brandy into her glass and took it down in one quick swallow. 'Yes, he's quite a man, our Max, or Ivan or Boris or Anton or whatever his damned name is.'

Asta managed to make it to the bathroom before she was sick, leaning over the basin, her whole body retching. And when she finished, a stranger stared out at her from the mirror, eyes burning in a face that was the same colour as the hair.

When she returned to the bedroom, Ruth Murray lay on her back sleeping peacefully. Asta looked down at her for a moment, then she got another pair of slacks and a sweater from the wardrobe and dressed quickly. The revolver Chavasse had given her was beneath her pillow. She slipped it into her pocket and went out.

There was only one thing she was certain of-that she was going to kill Max Donner. She moved along the landing and as she reached the stairhead, Chavasse crossed the hall to the library, Stavrou at his back with a gun. They went inside, Asta drew back into the shadows and waited.

Donner was standing at the fireplace smoking a cigar when Chavasse and Stavrou went into the library. There was no sign of Souvorin or Murdoch.

He looked Chavasse over carefully for a moment and then nodded. 'All right, sport. I'm a busy man and my time's limited, so let's get down to business.'

'A long way from Rum Jungle,' Chavasse said in Russian.

Stavrou grunted, moving in quickly, but Donner held up a hand, his face calm. 'You seem to know more than I thought you did.'

'Clay Crossing in 1933 till you joined up at Kalgoorlie in 1939,' Chavasse said. 'Six years of nothing in between and don't tell me you were going walkabout in the bush.' He helped himself to a cigarette from a silver box on the table. 'Whatever happened to Donner by the way? He must have been really perfect. Austrian immigrant, orphaned, no relatives.'

'He stowed away on a Russian freighter in Sydney Harbour in 1933.'

'Bound for the land of milk and honey?'

'He did all right,' Donner said. 'He had everything he needed.'

'And in return you took everything he had-everything that was Max Donner.'

'What put you on to me?'

Chavasse shrugged. 'The same sort of thing that pulled Gordon Lonsdale down. In the end you have to depend on others. Little people who aren't quite as clever as you are, like that stupid little Admiralty clerk, Simmons, and Ranesvsky.'

'What about Ranevsky?'

'He paid Simmons in new notes. They not only led us to Ranevsky-they also provided us with the interesting fact that he'd cashed a cheque signed by you.'

'That wouldn't get you very far.'

'No-it wasn't even worth mentioning at the trial, but it did start us checking and that was all that was needed, especially when the trail went all the way back to six blank years.'

'Not to worry,' Donner grinned. 'I've had a good run and I'll be out of it soon. One last big coup, that's all.'

'Don't kid yourself,' Chavasse said. 'You're not going anywhere.'

'A good try,' Donner said, 'but it won't work. Craig's man, George Gunn, told me everything I needed to know back there at the lodge.'

'I don't believe you,' Chavasse said.

'All right, try this for size. You're only up here on the snoop to see what I'm up to and Craig was supposed to provide a cover.' He grinned. 'I'm forgetting the most important bit. Nobody makes a move till you report back so I've got all the time in the world.'

For a moment, all that Chavasse felt showed clearly on his face. 'Don't take it to heart, sport. You haven't seen Stavrou in action. George Gunn was a tough bird. He only spilled his guts because he thought it would save the old man's skin.' Donner laughed harshly. 'He was wrong.'

He stood there, a strange, expectant look on his face as if he was waiting for something and Chavasse, fighting with every fibre of his being the overwhelming desire to fling himself forward to destroy this man, helped himself to another cigarette and lit it, hands shaking slightly.

When he spoke, his voice was quite calm. 'That's the way it goes sometimes.'

Donner laughed delightedly. 'You know, I like you, sport. You've got class. I think I'll take you back with me. I bet they could squeeze a lot of good stuff out of you.'

'I'll say this,' Chavasse told him. 'You certainly had everyone fooled with this Souvorin business. When he defected, he was accepted without question. He's spent the best part of a year working in the classified section of the Rocket Research Establishment, Boscombe Down.'

'That was the general idea. What he's taking back home in his head alone should set your people back five years at least. If it comes to that, what I'm taking home should put you out of the race altogether.'

For a moment, the monumental ego of the man broke through to the surface and Chavasse seized on it quickly. 'I was wondering about that. I realised it had to be something pretty special when I caught a glimpse of your private army back there on the island.'

'You'd never guess, sport. You'd never guess in a thousand years.' With a sudden gesture, Donner tossed the cigar into the fire. 'What the hell-why not?'

He crossed to a door in the far corner, opened it and disappeared. He was back in a moment, pulling on a German Army officer's tunic which had obviously been made to measure. 'Perfect fit, isn't it?' he said as he buttoned it up.

Chavasse took in the badges of rank, the insignia, the triple row of medal ribbons. 'You must have had a hard war. I see you've got everything that counts including the Knight's Cross.'

'And they didn't give that away with the rations.' Donner clicked his heels. 'Allow me to introduce myself. Colonel Gunther von Bayern, German Military Intelligence on temporary detachment to the Royal Artillery on the island of Fhada in the Outer Hebrides.'

'Fhada?' Chavasse said, frowning. 'That's a Missile Training Base.'

'It sure is, sport. Did you think I was joking?' Donner shook his head. 'Von Bayern and a detachment of nine men from the German 101st Missile Regiment are flying in to Glasgow airport in the morning. They then proceed by road to Mallaig where a tank landing craft will be waiting to run them across to Fhada.'

And then Chavasse saw everything. 'Let me guess. They won't even get as far as Mallaig. You're going to work a switch.'

'Let's say we divert them to here and then take over. There are thirty-eight men stationed on Fhada. I shouldn't think we'll have too much trouble. They'll be under wraps before they know what's hit them.'

'There must be something pretty special there to make a stunt like this worthwhile.'

'You could say that. You British never change, do you? The Empire crumbles, the pound totters, you cut back on defence and while everyone gloats, you get together with the Germans on a nice little mutual research programme that no one else knows a damn thing about.'

'Such as?'

'A new kind of rocket propulsion unit that produces limitless power from a negative energy field, whatever that's supposed to mean. It's being tried out in a new anti-tank missile called Firebird. That's what von Bayern and his boys are here for-to train on the operational side.'

'I suppose Souvorin put you on to this?'

Donner nodded. 'And he's going in with us, too, just to make sure we collect the right item.'

Chavasse shook his head. 'You'll never get away with it.'

'Why not? Once we take over, all we need is five hours. On the right signal, a fast diesel trawler comes in and takes off the missile and the men. She sails under the Panamanian flag, by the way. Once she's out to sea again, she's just one more trawler amongst the hundreds that fish those waters from every country in Europe.'

Chavasse, searching desperately for a flaw, clutched at the only straw in sight. 'There's standard checking procedure between Guided Weapon H.Q. and all outstations. If they get radio silence from Fhada, they'll want to know why.'

'But they won't. We'll maintain essential radio contact until we leave and emergency checking procedures don't come into operation until radio silence has lasted for six hours. That gives us plenty of time to move on. Anything else?'

Chavasse shook his head slowly. 'You seem to have thought of just about everything.'

Donner laughed. 'Don't worry, sport, Stavrou will take good care of you while I'm gone and when I come back, we'll fly out of here together. Back to the dear old homeland.'

'Does Asta come too.'

'Where I go, Asta goes from now on.'

'I wonder what she'll have to say about that.'

Donner's face hardened. 'She'll do as she's told because, like you, she isn't going to have much choice in the matter.' He nodded to Stavrou. 'Go on, take him below. I've wasted enough time.'

He turned abruptly and went into the other room, unbuttoning his tunic and Stavrou touched Chavasse gently on the back of the neck with the barrel of his revolver.

It was cold on the way through the hall, colder still in the dimly lit passages beneath the old house. The cellar outside which they stopped had a gnarled oak door, secured by an iron bar fitted into sockets on either side.

Stavrou stood well away and nodded and Chavasse raised the bar. He weighed it in both hands for a moment longer than was necessary and Stavrou took careful aim and thumbed back the hammer of his revolver.

Chavasse grinned. 'All right, you bastard, I get the point.'

He dropped the bar on the ground and went inside. The door closed behind him and the bar clanged into place.

He listened to the man's steps recede along the corridor, then turned to examine the cellar. It was almost totally dark, a patch of light showing from a tiny barred window on the other side. Rain drifted in through a hole in the glass and when he pulled himself up, he looked out at ground level across the courtyard to the stables and the garage.

He dropped to the ground and went right round the room, feeling at the walls, but there was no way out-not even a possibility of one-and he squatted in the corner by the door, and waited.

He dozed fitfully and was finally awakened by the sound of footsteps in the courtyard. He got to his feet and hurried across to the window. The first grey light of dawn seeped through and he looked outside in time to see one of the Land Rovers turn out of the garage, Jack Murdoch at the wheel. He was followed by Donner and Souvorin in the other, Donner driving.

He wondered where they were going? To the loch probably, to pick up the rest of the party. Then to the appointed place on the Mallaig road to wait in ambush for von Bayern and his men.

He dropped to the floor and slammed the heel of his hand in impotent rage against the wall. The wheels were turning, the whole damned thing was in motion and there was nothing he could do about it.

He slumped down against the wall, his hands tucked into his armpits, trying to keep warm in the intense cold. It was perhaps half an hour later that he heard slow, cautious footsteps approaching along the passage outside. A door was opened and then another. Chavasse got to his feet, drew back against the wall and waited.

The steps paused outside, the bar was lifted and then the door opened. He raised his fist to strike and Asta stepped into the room.