The Heights of Zervos

The Heights of Zervos
CHAPTER ONE

Thursday, April 3, 1941

Less than ten minutes to zero, to detonation point, Macomber, lying on his stomach along the top of the oil tanker wagon, listened to the German patrol closing in round the Bucharest railyard. His escape route was blocked, his body chilled to the bone by the snow which drifted down through the night, and the frightening barks of the Alsatian dogs assaulted his ears, a sound punctuated by orders rapped out in German. 'Watch the wire… At the first sign of movement open fire… Gunther, take the signal-box – you can see what's happening from up there…'

It was the third night of April and Rumania was still gripped by winter, still showed no inkling of spring on the way, still lay numbed under the icy wind which flowed from the east, from the Russian steppes and Siberia beyond. The insidious cold of 2 AM was penetrating Macomber's leather coat as he remained sprawled over the curve of the tanker, not daring to flex even a gloved finger as a German soldier walked beside the track below, and the crunch of boots breaking the crusted snow came up to the trapped Scot like the sound of twigs snapping.

The sub-zero temperature, the realization that arms, legs, feet were gradually losing all feeling, the trudge of marching troops below the wagon – these were the least of his worries when he remembered what was supporting his precariously poised body. He was lying on top of several thousand gallons of refined aviation spirit, petrol already bound for the Luftwaffe even though the Wehrmacht had occupied Rumania only recently, and a ten-kilogram composite demolition charge was attached under the belly of this huge tanker. The time fuse he had set was ticking down to zero, synchronized with other charges spaced out along the petrol train. And now the patrol had arrived and was checking for an intruder, searching for a saboteur – although perhaps sabotage had not yet entered their minds as they systematically surrounded the petrol train.

The snow, damp and paralysingly cold, was building up over his exposed neck, forming an icy collar where his woollen scarf parted company with his bare skin, but he remained perfectly motionless, thankful that his head at least was protected by the soft hat squashed over his brow. There's too damned much of me for this concealment game, he was thinking. Over six feet tall, over fourteen stone in weight, there was far too much of him, but he dismissed the thought as he stared at the illuminated hands of his watch, a watch strapped to the inside of his wrist as a precaution against the phosphorescent face betraying his position. Eight minutes to zero. Eight minutes before the charges detonated – and the tankers detonated seconds later – turning the railyard into a flaming furnace, a furnace which would cremate Ian Macomber. And there was yet a further hazard which made it impossible for him to protect himself against the elements which were slowly embalming him with a covering of freezing snow – as though to prepare his body for the imminent cremation. Ice had formed over the metal surface of the cylindrical tanker, ice which would send him slithering down into the path of the searching patrol if he altered his position by so much as a centimetre. So he lay still as a dead man while he watched a field-grey figure pass under a lamp close to the wire, mount the steps to the signal-box and enter the stilt-legged structure which overlooked the petrol train.

The lamp was hooded against direct observation from aircraft flying overhead, as were all the lamps inside the yard -hooded to avoid giving guidance to Allied planes which might appear on their way to bomb the vital oil-fields at Ploesti. Not that Macomber was expecting an RAF raid – the chronic shortage of bombers, the lack even of a machine which could fly the distance, guaranteed the Germans the safety of their newly acquired oil reserves – which made the sabotaging of oil for Germany vital. More footsteps crunched in the snow and then stopped immediately below where Macomber lay. His muscles tensed involuntarily and then relaxed. The metal ladder attached to the tanker's side ended a few inches beyond his head where the final rung rested close to the huge cap concealing him. Was someone coming up the ladder to investigate? His brain was still wrestling with this contingency when it received a further shock: something metallic clanged against a wheel. The demolition charge was hidden behind the front wheel. Christ, they'd found it!

'Get under the wagon – cross to the other side and wait there!' The voice spoke in German, a language Macomber understood and spoke fluently. An NCO issuing an order to a soldier – so there were two of them standing not fifteen feet below him. The voice continued, harsh and keyed up by the sub-zero temperature. 'If he runs for it, he'll run for the wire. I'm posting men the whole length of the train…' So they knew someone was inside the railyard. Macomber blinked as a snow flurry percolated under his hat and clouded his eyes; fearful lest the snow should begin to freeze his eyelids, he blinked several times while he waited for the soldier to crawl under the tanker. He would, of course, find the demolition charge. At least there was little sign of activity from the signal-box where he could see two shadowed figures under a blue light behind the windows – Gunther was checking with the signalman presumably. Feet crunched through the snow again, were swallowed up quickly as the NCO continued his march to post more men along the train – men who would inevitably close the door to escape. Not that he had a chance in hell of covering the hundred yards which would take him to the hole in the wire where he had cut his way through, and the wire-cutters in his pocket were now so much dead weight; with the place so well covered he could never hope to cut a fresh hole before they spotted him. He heard a fresh sound from below, the rasp of metal against the tanker as the soldier began clambering under the wagon. A clumsy Jerry, this one. Perhaps a stupid one, too, but not stupid enough to miss seeing the charge…

More scrabbling noises, hurrying noises from under the tanker. The German didn't like passing over the track in case the train started moving. An illogical fear since the wagons would never be moved during the search, but Macomber understood the reaction and had experienced it himself. Wondering whether he would ever be able to stir again, Macomber lay motionless and waited for the noises to stop suddenly, which would warn him that the charge had been found. And then he would wait again, but only briefly before the soldier's shout announced his lethal discovery. The scrabbling sounds ceased and Macomber held his breath, waiting for the shout, but he heard only a wheezing cough and a shuffle of frozen feet. The damned fool had missed seeing it, thank God. He was now standing on the other side of the tanker, the side nearest the signal-box – which put him between Macomber and the wire. The Scot checked his watch. Five minutes to zero.

The uncanny silence of winter's darkness descended on the railyard once more. The dogs had been taken farther up the line, the sound of feet crunching through the snow had ceased, and the wind was dropping. The stage was set, the Wehrmacht were in position, and now it only remained for Macomber's nerve to break, for him to be apprehended when he climbed down the small ladder and ended his career by the tracks of a desolate junction few people had ever heard of. As the snow fell more slowly the silence was so complete he heard in the distance coals going down the iron hopper in the eastern rail-yard. The silence was broken by the sound of a window opening in the signal-box, opening with a fracturing crack as ice on the ledge shattered. Gunther leaned out of the window and stared directly at the snow-shrouded hump on top of the last petrol wagon.

Macomber stared back at Gunther's silhouette, moving only his eyes to take in this new source of danger. He was boxed in: observed from a distance and trapped by the soldier below. His eyes swivelled back to his watch. Four minutes to zero and still no way out, not even the ghost of a diversion he could take advantage of. It was his swansong as a British saboteur, the end of his dangerous passage down through the Balkans, a trail not only blazed by the series of devastating explosions which had destroyed vast quantities of strategic war materials – but also a trail which the German Abwehr Intelligence service had followed, often only one step behind him. He weighed up his chances.

With a great deal of luck the Luger in his coat pocket would eliminate the soldier below the wagon, but then there was the German in the signal-box who had apparently noticed nothing amiss, who had left the window while he talked to the signalman again; there was the wire fence he could never hope to climb; and there was the line of Wehrmacht troops posted along the train with instructions to watch that wire, to shoot on sight. His mind raced, estimating possibilities, and his watch raced faster. Three minutes and thirty seconds to go. He had calculated the odds and decided they were loaded impossibly against him. The sound of the car starting up so startled him he almost lost his balance; he hadn't even realized it was there, but now the driver switched on a light inside the vehicle and he saw it parked close to the signal-box on the far side of the wire. A Mercedes. The driver was having trouble firing the motor. A chance in a thousand – but the repeating rattle of the car's engine struggling to fire revived his hopes enormously, stirring the blood inside his half-congealed body as he worked out how to exploit this heaven-sent diversion.

Between the misfires of the numbed engine he heard feet dumping below the wagon as the unseen soldier stamped the ground to bring back the circulation into his frozen system, then the wheezing cough again. The feet began tramping through the snow, moving away from the wagon and over the empty neighbouring track, and Macomber guessed that he was improvising his own sentry-go to neutralize the appalling cold. The open window in the signal-box was still unoccupied as the marching German moved farther away; if only that bloody engine would start, would begin shifting the Mercedes -because stationary the car was useless. His nerves prickled with desperate impatience as the driver tried again and again to wake up the dead motor, and Macomber's prayers were with the driver as he went on struggling to spark life from the sullen engine. The motor caught, ticked over unenthusiastically, died again. God, he'd really thought it was going. He gritted his teeth to prevent them chattering with the cold, stared at the empty window in the signal-box, watched the marching German cross a second track close to the lamp. Another laboured spasm when the car seemed to be going, another false start which faded away – and Macomber suddenly realized that the wheezing German was growing curious about the car because he was marching towards the wire now. Then the engine caught, ticked over, continued ticking as the Scot moved for the first time in ten minutes, breaking the stiffened rigidity of his posture to reach inside his coat pocket and haul out the Luger.

He aimed the Luger, fired once. The car was moving slowly, and he had aimed at the rear window – away from the driver who must remain in control of his vehicle, who must be panicked if the plan was to have any chance of working. The bullet shattered the rear window and its report echoed in the darkness as a voice roared out across the railyard in German. 'He's in that car… on the other side of the wire… Don't let him get away!' The darkness, the falling snow, distorted the direction from which the voice came, but Macomber's bellowed command carried a long distance. Someone opened fire, a burst from a machine-pistol which sprayed the rear of the accelerating Mercedes. A fusillade of shots crackled in the darkness and men ran forward, leaving the train. A German, finding the wire barring his way, shouted a warning, retreated behind the signal-box, threw a grenade, then another. The explosions were bright flashes, muffled assaults on the eardrums, the men were pouring through the hole in the shattered wire, a muddle of field-grey figures rushing past the hooded lamp as men already beyond the wire fired long bursts at the retreating vehicle. The Mercedes was still moving, turning a sharp corner and accelerating afresh when the patrol left behind the wire and vanished into the night.

Macomber wasted no time on the ladder. Levering himself over the side farthest away from the signal-box, he fell heavily in the snow, cushioning his fall by rolling away from the wagon. The shock of the impact was still with him as he forced himself to his feet, glanced quickly in both directions and scrambled under the tanker between its wheels. He emerged from underneath gripping the Luger, and his gaze was fixed on the point of maximum danger – the signal-box. Gunther had taken up position, was leaning out of the window with his rifle, unaffected by the headlong rush away from the railyard.

There's always one who uses his head, Macomber thought grimly as the German leaned out farther, raised his rifle and took swift aim at the blurred shadow moving away from the last petrol wagon. Macomber jerked the Luger high, hoped the damned barrel wasn't blocked with ice from bis fall, steadied the gun and fired. The sound of his shot was drowned in the rattle of firearms beyond the wire as the German flopped over the window ledge, lost his rifle and hung in mid-air, face downwards. Macomber ran towards the wire, ran awkwardly because his legs were still stiff and unwieldy from the long wait, and as he ran he hoped to God the signalman wasn't the courageous type who raised alarms, but from a brief glance at the window he saw no sign of him – he was crouched on the floor between bis levers.

He slowed down to pass through-the tangle of wire and then began running in earnest, running to the left – away from the signal-box and away from the road where the Mercedes had driven off. Behind him, some distance up the yard, dogs were barking excitedly; the other section of the patrol had gone to the front of the train to start a systematic search. He ran slowly but steadily, his eyes growing accustomed to the unlit darkness as he threaded his way between man-high piles of wooden sleepers, ran with his Luger held well forward so he could aim it quickly in case of emergency, but this fringe area of the railyard was deserted and he reached the parked Volkswagen safely. Now to start his own engine. At the sixth attempt the car fired and he paused only to haul off the German army blanket he had draped over bonnet and radiator, stuffing it on the passenger seat before driving away across the snow. The blanket had frozen into a natural canopy and it retained its strange shape as he left the field and drove onto a road which would take him the long way back into Bucharest. Remembering what he had deposited under the petrol train, he pressed his foot down as soon as he reached the road, building up speed dangerously as the wheels whipped over the ice-coated surface. His watch registered thirty seconds beyond zero.

He swore in German, the language he had accustomed himself to speak always, to think in, even to dream in as part of his German cover. Surely all the bloody time fuses couldn't be defective? Or had he gone through all this for nothing? He shivered uncontrollably as he accelerated to even greater speed, gripping the wheel tightly to overcome the tremor. Reaction? Probably. Beyond his headlight beams the flat countryside was a mystery, a realm of darkness which might have contained anything, but from frequent reconnaissance in daylight hours he knew there were only bleak, endless fields stretching away to the Danube. A paling fence rushed towards him, disappeared as he lost speed and started to take a bend, then the skid began. He reacted instinctively, guiding rather than forcing the steering, following the spin while the headlights swept a crazy arc over the snowbound landscape. When he pulled up, by some miracle still on the road, the Volkswagen had swung through one hundred and eighty degrees, so he faced the way he had come at the moment of detonation.

The first sound was a dull boom, like the firing of a sixteen-inch naval gun, followed by a series of repeating booms which thundered out across the plain. A tremendous flash illuminated the snow with a searing light, then the flash died and was succeeded by an appalling roar, a deafening, blasting sound as the petrol went up, wagon after wagon in such swift succession that the night seemed to break apart, to open up with volcanic force, to burst and boil with fire. During all his sabotage missions Macomber had never seen anything like it – the moonless night was suddenly lit with a vast orange conflagration which showed the huddled rooftops of Bucharest to his left, rooftops white with snow and then palely coloured by the glow of the seething fire enveloping the railyard from end to end. He was turning the car when the smoke came, a billowing cloud of blackness which temporarily smothered the orange glow and rolled towards the city. Reversing cautiously, he edged the rear of the Volkswagen into the paling fence, which cracked like glass in its frozen state, pitching an intact section into the field beyond. He changed gear, turned a cautious semicircle, straightened up, accelerated and headed for Bucharest.

The sabotaging of the petrol train was Macomber's last assignment in the Balkans, since the taking over of Rumania by the Wehrmacht would soon make any further explosive excursions well-nigh impossible, and while he drove into the outer suburbs of Bucharest his attention was concentrated on the hazards which lay ahead – the hazard of escaping from Rumania, of crossing German-occupied Bulgaria and entering neutral Turkey where he could catch a boat for Greece. The Greek mainland – where Allied troops had recently landed to meet the threat of German invasion – meant safety, but reaching the haven was quite a different matter. He could only hope to pass through the intervening control points by preserving his impersonation of a German up to the last moment, but it was the Abwehr he feared most. It was the Abwehr who had sent men into the Balkans to end the wave of sabotage and Macomber knew the Abwehr were closing in on him, might even be within twenty-four hours of discovering his true identity. So it was back to his flat to pick up the already packed bag, then on the road again, south for Bulgaria and Istanbul beyond.

Lord, he was tired! Macomber rubbed the back of bis hand over his eyes as he drove slowly through the deserted streets -driving at speed inside a built-up area might attract attention. The old stone buildings, five storeys tall, were in darkness, except where here and there a high window showed a light -some family woken by the unnerving explosions which had broken over the city – but the lights were going out again as he drove along a devious route which avoided the main highway, feeling the tension rising as he drew closer to the flat. Returning late at night it was always like this – because you never knew who might be waiting for you on the darkened staircase. Reversing the Volkswagen into the garage which had once served as a stable, he parked it facing the double doors, ready for a speedy departure in case of emergency; then, lighting one of the foul-tasting German cigars he had come to like, he began the five minute-walk to the apartment block.

As he walked steadily through the crusted snow he found his thoughts wandering back over the years to when he had walked through other cities without fear. Through New York as a boy when they had lived there with his American mother, and later, as a youth, through the streets of Edinburgh when his been the sapping fatigue, the temptation of a few hours in bed which had made him take this needless risk. The place where you stayed was always the most dangerous – they'd taken Forester in his Budapest flat. I'll damned well hold out a few hours longer, let sleep wait until I'm well clear of the city. He had the torch still in his hand when a hard, pipe-like object was rammed into the small of his back and a voice spoke in German.

'Be very careful, Herr Wolff. This is a gun, so why die so early in life? Put on the landing light, please, but do not turn round."

Macomber's hand, which should have been gripping the Luger, now gripped the torch – another sign of the dreadful weariness which had made him overlook his normal precautions. He raised the hand still holding the torch, wondered briefly whether he could utilize the weapon, whether he could swing round and wield the torch as a club, and dismissed the idea as soon as it entered bis head. The man on the landing knew exactly what he was doing, had the gun muzzle pressed firmly into his back, so firmly he would have plenty of time to squeeze the trigger and blow his victim's spine in half at the first hint of a wrong movement. Macomber fumbled for the switch, pressed it down. Light from the low-powered bulb percolated dismally across the landing.

'We will go inside,' the voice continued, a mature experienced voice. 'Use your key to open the door – and be careful!'

Thirty seconds later the pistol in the German's hand was aimed at a point a fraction above Macomber's stomach as he backed through the doorway into his small bedroom. As requested, he pressed down the switch and only the far bedside light came on. 'What is the matter with the overhead light?' the German demanded.

'It's defective – the same switch operates both lights.'

The German, having flashed his own torch into each room, had chosen this one because it was the smallest. Macomber continued backing inside the room where the space for manoeuvre was precisely nil, which presumably was why the German had preferred it, and the watchful look on his adversary's face produced the same reaction in the Scot as the steadiness of the pistol: this was a man who wouldn't be taken by surprise, who wouldn't make a single mistake, a man who would squeeze the trigger instantly if he considered such drastic action necessary. Thin-faced, a shorter man than Macomber, he was in his early forties and he wore a similar leather coat and a similar soft hat. Behind rimless glasses his eyes were unblinking as he gestured for the Scot to sit at the far side of the bed.

'If we're going to talk in here may I take off my coat,' Macomber began, 'and then you can start telling me what the hell this is all about.'

The thin German nodded and issued no further warning about being careful; he simply held his pistol levelled and watched the slow careful movements of taking off the coat. Macomber had noted the rubber overshoes peeping out of his visitor's own coat pocket, which explained his mode of entry -he must have used a skeleton key to open the street door, must then have taken off his overshoes and stepped over the doorstep without disturbing the snow. A man who thought of everything – or almost everything. The Scot hung his coat on a hook at the end of the huge wardrobe which was the other main item of furniture in the room, taking up so much space with the double bed that he had to squeeze his way round in the morning when dressing. He hung the coat carefully to conceal the instability of the wardrobe, the fact that it wobbled easily on its rotting plinth, and he hung the coat with one pocket outwards, the pocket containing the Luger. When he turned round the German reacted instantly. 'You have a gun inside your jacket – take it out very carefully and drop it on the bed, Herr Wolff.'

Macomber used his fingertips to extract the second Luger by the butt, keeping his index finger well away from the trigger as he eased the weapon out of the shoulder holster and let it fall on the bed. The shock had gone, his brain was working again, and at least this manoeuvre had succeeded – by drawing the German's attention to the second gun he had distracted his attention from the coat. The German used his left hand to pick up the Luger and slip it into his pocket. 'Now sit on your side of the bed, Herr Wolff. Incidentally, your German is quite flawless. I congratulate you. My name is Dietrich. Of the Abwehr, of course.'

'Then why the devil do you want to see me?'

Dietrich said nothing while he closed and locked the bedroom door to guard against the arrival of an associate of Macomber's. The precaution taken, the Abwehr man leaned against the door as he began his interrogation.

'It has been a long time to this moment, Herr Wolff -I will call you that until you decide to tell me your real name.'

'My real name?' Macomber stared at Dietrich as though he must be mad. 'I am Hermann Wolff…'

'It has been a long time since January 1940,' the Abwehr man continued as though he hadn't heard the Scot. 'A long way, too, from Budapest to this apartment. I almost caught up with you once in Gyor, but I made the mistake of letting my assistant come for you. What happened to him? We never saw him again.'

'As a citizen of the Reich…'

'You demand to be taken to police headquarters?' Dietrich was amused and smiled unpleasantly. 'Do you really think you would enjoy that experience – particularly if I take you to Gestapo headquarters instead?'

'I shall complain direct to Berlin – I know people there,* Macomber growled. 'I am a German businessman sent here by my firm in Munich and I have correspondence with me to prove this…'

'I'm sure you have," Dietrich replied sarcastically. 'I'm also sure that it would stand up to superficial examination – until we checked back with your so-called employers. You nearly had me killed tonight, Herr Wolff – and by my own people. I was inside that Mercedes the Wehrmacht opened fire on and I had to drive like a maniac to stay alive, so I decided it might be interesting to come straight here – in case you escaped^ I have been following you for some time but I lost you this evening on your way to the railyard.'

'I still haven't the least idea what the hell you're talking about,' Macomber told him coolly. He re-crossed his legs and put his hands together in his lap where Dietrich could see them, and at the same time he hooked his right foot round the electric cord attached to the table-lamp plug. Dietrich smiled without humour.

'I was at the railyard tonight, Wolff – when the shooting started. Now do you understand?'

'Which railyard? What am I supposed to understand about this rubbish?'

'That there is no way out, that you have come to the end of the line. That railyard was the end of the line for you – literally.'

'I don't understand one damned thing,' Macomber rasped, 'but if you open the drawer in that other bedside table over there you may grasp what a bloody fool you're making of yourself? Then the Scot waited.

It was a chance, no more, and Macomber knew that within a few minutes he would be dead or free. He scratched at his knee as though it tickled and this covered the slight movement of his leg testing the cord. The cable felt to be looped firmly round his ankle, but he could only test it by feel; if he dropped his eyes for even a second Dietrich would guess that something was wrong. Macomber waited, saying not a word while the Abwehr man wondered about the closed drawer. Everything depended on whether Macomber's offhand tone of voice, his arrogant manner, had half-convinced the German there might be something important in the bedside table. The Scot's expression had changed during the past minute, had become a mixture of boredom and contempt, as though the pistol had no existence, as though he thought the Abwehr man an idiot and had proof of the fact – inside the closed drawer.

The bait was tempting. The little table was close enough for Dietrich to lean forward, to reach out with one hand and open it, to see what was there. And he still had Macomber safely on the far side of the bed, his hands pacificially clasped in his lap, unable to come anywhere near the Abwehr man without standing up and running down the narrow space between wardrobe and bed – with Dietrich holding his pistol.

'What is in this drawer?' the Abwehr man asked waspishly.

Macomber said nothing and the battle of nerves continued as the Scot used the only weapon available – silence. The German watched him a few moments longer and then he nodded again, as much as to say very well, we will have a look at this great revelation. He stood up from the door, took a step towards the table, his pistol aimed point-blank at Macomber's chest, but his prisoner was looking at the door with a bored expression. Dietrich used bis left hand to reach down for the handle, the hand closest to Macomber, who had foreseen his dilemma. With his gun in his right hand while the other reached for the drawer it was physically impossible for him to keep the pistol muzzle trained on the Scot. Macomber was sitting with his hands limply at rest when the telephone beyond the locked door began to ring.

'Who will that be at this hour?' Dietrich demanded.

Macomber shrugged his shoulders, made no reply. The Abwehr man was becoming rattled – the Scot's refusal to speak was getting on his nerves and the muffled ringing of the phone irritated him. And he wanted to see what was inside the drawer before he found out who was calling Wolff, so everything became urgent. He grabbed at the handle, jerked open the drawer, saw a leather-bound book which might have been a diary, and while he stared at the book he wasn't watching the Scot. Still sitting on the bed, Macomber gave his right foot a tremendous jerk. The plug came out of the wall socket, the room went dark, the table lamp fell onto the bed. Macomber lay sprawled on the floor, waiting for the first shot. But the German didn't fire, which showed extraordinary self-control and quick thinking – a shot would reveal his position. To avoid his boots making a sound, Macomber swivelled on his knees, felt up to the coat, scooped the. Luger out of the pocket, then pressed his shoulder against the wardrobe and waited for endless seconds. Had he heard the quietest of noises, a swift slither? He was certain the Abwehr man had changed position, that he had moved along the wall and was now standing with his back to the locked door, facing the other end of the unstable wardrobe. Still on his knees, Macomber heaved massively. The wardrobe toppled, left him, over a hundredweight of solid wood moving through an angle of ninety degrees. It struck something brutally and Macomber heard a muffled cry which cut off suddenly as the wardrobe completed its turn and landed on its side. He used his left hand to locate the coat still attached to the hook, fumbled inside the other pocket and pulled out the torch. The beam showed Dietrich lying under the great weight, the upper half of his body turned to one side, crumpled and motionless, although he still wore his glasses. The left side of his head was oddly misshapen where the wardrobe had crushed his skull.

The phone bell had stopped ringing in the outer room but from its limited duration and the lateness of the hour Macomber guessed who had called him. He had difficulty easing open the door past Dietrich's sprawled body and then he went across the living-room and opened the front door. No sound from below. Locking the door, he went back into the bedroom, turned off the light switch, rescued the table lamp, fixed in the plug and then switched on again. The identity cards were inside the dead man's wallet which he levered from his breast pocket. Two of them, and Dietrich was who he claimed to be. One card – the card tucked away inside a secret pocket – identified him as a high-ranking officer of the Abwehr, but it was the other card which interested Macomber. Dr Richard Dietrich, archaeologist. He had heard of this practice – the carrying of a civilian card for use when the Abwehr wished to conceal its true identity. Amid the shambles of the room, with the body lying under the wardrobe he couldn't move without help, Macomber sat on the edge of the bed and lit a cigar while he studied the card for several minutes. Then he went back to the living-room and called a number, puffing at his cigar while he waited for the operator to put him through. Baxter answered sleepily, became alert within a few seconds. 'Hermann here…' Macomber began.

'I tried to call you a few minutes ago.'

'I know. Get over to Marie's – she's had some news from Munich.'

He slammed down the receiver, hoping the line wasn't tapped, but they had spoken in German and 'Marie's' identified no address; only the mention of Munich warned Baxter that a grave emergency had arisen. While he waited, Macomber sat calmly smoking because there was nothing more to do; the fiat held not a single piece of incriminating evidence and the only papers concerned the fictitious Wolff, papers prepared by the ingenious Baxter. Ten minutes after their brief call had ended, the Englishman who was posing as a Spanish mineralogist with Fascist sympathies arrived and he listened without speaking while Macomber explained what had happened, then looked at the two cards the Scot gave him. 'Roy, I want to use that card to take me out of Europe – the civilian version. Can you fix it up for me damned fast – you've still got some of my pictures, haven't you?'

'Should be able to.' Baxter, a wiry, sallow-faced individual in his late thirties stared up from his chair in the living-room, 'You really think you can get away with it – using the card of a man you've just killed? I'd say you were carrying it a bit far this time. The risk is colossal.'

Baxter studied the huge Scot who stood smoking his cigar without replying immediately. An impressive figure, Mac, he was thinking, but the last man he would personally have chosen to lead a sabotage team: he was too prominent, stood out too much in a crowd. It was characteristic of Macomber that he should have turned this seeming disadvantage into a major asset, always taking up an aggressive role when he was in the company of Germans, which in itself made his impersonation so much more convincing in Nazi-occupied Europe. The brutal thrust was absent from his personality now as, for a brief period only, he was able to be himself, to let the natural, dry-humoured smile show at the corners of his mouth. But to impersonate a senior officer of the Abwehr! The idea alone made Baxter want to shudder. Macomber smiled easily as he spoke.

'Look, Roy, as a cover Hermann Wolff is blown sky-high -the presence of Dietrich in there proves that. So I need a fresh identity. Audacity always pays – it's paid me all the way down through the Balkans and it will get me. safely home to Greece,'

'Sometimes, Mac, I think you like the big bluff. You play it that way because it suits your temperament as much as for any other reason…'

'I play it that way because it works. And I need that card fixed during the next few hours, so you're going to have to break all records. As soon as you've gone I'm clearing out of Bucharest and I'd like you to deliver the card to me in Giurgiu. I'll wait at that inn where we once spent a weekend. Can you manage it by noon? Today.'

'I might manage it.' Which was Baxter's way of saying he would be in Giurgiu by noon. 'There's the description to change as well as the photo, but the new quick-drying inks should help. I might even fix up the other one too,' he grinned quickly, 'just in case you want to go the whole hog.' He gestured towards the bedroom. 'Leaving the late Herr Dietrich in there?'

'No, he's got to disappear for several days, but if you'll help me shift that wardrobe I'll cope with the rest. And this, by the way, is your last job. Get that card to me and then make your own way home.' Macomber paused, a gleam of humour in his brown eyes. 'That is, unless you'd sooner come out with me?'

'Thanks, but no thanks. The sort of tricks you go in for would leave me a nervous wreck before we were halfway to the Turkish border.' Baxter grinned wryly. 'If it's all the same to you I'll creep out all by myself.' He looked towards the bedroom again. 'You really think it's wise trying to move him? The city is stiff with German army trucks swarming out to the railyard. Seems someone left a few bombs lying around the place earlier tonight.'

'Then I'll avoid the trucks. But if I'm using Herr Dietrich's card he has to disappear for a while. So long as they don't find him his local people won't know for sure what's happened -don't forget the Abwehr operate on their own a good deal.'

'Better you than me.' Baxter stood up, hoping he wasn't showing too great an eagerness to get away from the flat. 'What do I do with the store of demolition charges? Smash the time fuses and leave them there?'

'Don't bother.' Macomber checked his watch and moved impatiently. 'The Germans have a few more of them, so it's pointless and takes time. Now, I've got to get that body out of here.'

'I'll help you to shift that evidence if you like…'

'Just help me to shift the wardrobe and then push off. I'd sooner deal with this on my own.' A typical reaction, Baxter thought, and he marvelled at the Scot's steady nerves. Forester, Dyce, Lemaitre – all the rest of the sabotage team were dead and Mac was the sole survivor, possibly because of his habit of working alone. And he can have it, he told himself as he followed Macomber inside the bedroom.

Macomber felt a little more relaxed as he drove the Volkswagen through the still-dark streets of Bucharest, a reaction which would have astounded the less phlegmatic Baxter. Down side roads which led to the main highway the Scot had already seen several army trucks trundling through the snow and for a short distance he must travel along that highway himself. The army blanket, thawed out by the heat of the car on his journey from the railyard, was thrown over the back seat, but it still assumed an odd shape – it had proved impossible to disguise completely the hump of Dietrich's body underneath. So relaxation was perhaps not a correct description of the Scot's present frame of mind. Even so he was relieved, relieved to have accomplished the mind-numbing trip he had made down the apartment block's fire-escape with the Abwehr man looped over his shoulder. The iron treads of the fire-escape had been coated with ice, he had heard a window open in the darkness during his grim journey down the staircase, and there had been no cover to hide his progress across the walled yard to the back street where he had parked his Volkswagen. But for Macomber the worst phase of this problem was over – providing he could avoid those army trucks.

He drove very slowly as he approached the exit to the main highway, then pulled up with his engine still ticking ever. He waited half a minute and when nothing passed the exit he drove out and turned left, north towards the railway, the direction which would take him into open country most quickly. He drove steadily at a "medium speed and his headlights showed up sombre buildings, their iron balconies laced with snow; later a desolate square, the trees naked and frosted with a bowed statue in the centre; later still shabby tenements forming a continuous wall of poverty. Lord, he'd be glad to leave this place. He was close to the outskirts when the emergency began. Driving at a sober speed along the empty highway, although the fog of fatigue was settling on his weary mind, he still watched the road keenly as he glanced at his watch. 4.15 AM. A little over two hours ago he had been lying on top of that petrol wagon with the sounds of the dogs in his ears. He turned a bend, saw an army truck emerging from a side street ahead, and then he was driving behind it as the vehicle rattled forward over the uneven road. Headlights glared in his rear mirror, roared up behind him, only slowing when he thought he was going to be run down by the second army truck. He was boxed in by the Wehrmacht.

There was no side turning he could take now except the turning a mile ahead he intended using, so he had to put up with the unwelcome escort as they drove on into the countryside. He glanced back quickly, saw the truck behind within twenty feet of the Volkswagen, and when he looked back again where the road curved he saw a stream of headlights coming up. He had slotted himself inside a whole convoy of German trucks. Clenching the cigar more tightly, he concentrated on holding the same speed as the vehicle ahead, his eyes fixed on the red light, the closed canvas covers, while in his rear mirror the oncoming headlights behind remained a constant glare. Even leaving this damned convoy was going to be tricky. He timed it carefully, drawing nearer to the vehicle in front as the vital side turning approached, and he was on the verge of signalling when he saw the pole barricading the side road, the German military policeman behind it. They had blocked it off to prevent civilian traffic entering this route. He drove past his escape exit without a glance while he searched for a solution, tried to foresee the next move. A mile farther on the road forked; the left fork leading to the railyard, the right one across the plain. But logically they would have blocked this off, too, so he would be forced to continue with the convoy until it reached the railyard he had half-destroyed, an area which must be swarming with troops. Perhaps, after all, Baxter had had a point.

As they drove on through the night the fatigue grew worse, encouraged by the monotonous rumble of the truck engines, increased by the necessity to go on staring at the red light ahead, and when the German vehicle's canvas covers parted briefly his headlights picked up the silhouette of a helmet: the trucks were packed with German troops. Wiping sweat away from his forehead, Macomber began to conduct the only possible manoeuvre which might extricate him from the trap, gradually reducing speed so that the truck in front moved farther away. But there was a limit to the loss of speed the driver behind would tolerate, and Macomber was gambling on the lack of enthusiasm for his job which might be expected in the middle of the night. He drove on until there was a gap of twenty yards between the Volkswagen and the truck ahead and then held it at that distance, expecting at any moment a furious burst of hooting from his rear. He had decided to try and use a very minor road turning off to the right, a road which was a dead end, leading over the fields and across the railway to a large farm, but he wanted to conceal the fact that he had turned off up this dangerous dead end. If the driver behind reported the presence of the lone Volkswagen when he reached the railyard they mustn't know where to look for him. The next bend was the crucial point and it needed split-second timing.

A copse of trees flashed into the lights of the vehicle in front and then vanished as the truck turned the corner. Macomber glanced in the mirror, saw the headlights locked onto him, suddenly speeded up. The car raced forward over the wheel-gutted snow, left well behind the truck in his rear as he accelerated, praying he wouldn't go into another skid. As he reduced speed to go round the curve his lights shone on the trees, then he was momentarily out of sight of the truck behind. The wooden gate was set back from the road and he almost missed it, but he saw it just in time, swung his wheel, crashed through the obstacle, turned behind a stone wall and felt the Volkswagen wobble from side to side as it passed over iron-hard ruts. Leaving the engine running, he switched off the lights and waited.

He was chewing at his cigar-end when a glow of lights appeared beyond the wall, silhouetting the naked tree-trunks like a natural palisade. The truck's engine was losing speed as the driver saw the bend, and too much loss of speed enormously increased the danger of his seeing the smashed gate, the tracks left by the Volkswagen in the snow when it plunged into the field. Macomber sat motionless while the truck lost even more speed and lumbered ponderously round the bend, then it sounded as though it were stopping. He had been spotted – the smashed gate, the tyre tracks had been seen! He grabbed the door handle, ready for a futile flight into the wasteland, knowing that the truck had only to follow him once the headlights picked up the fugitive, doubtful whether his legs had the strength to carry him far, when the engine ticked over more strongly and the truck rumbled past the gateway towards the railyard.

He left the car at once, stumbled his way over the ruts in the darkness, found a buttress which he used to haul himself up to where he could see over the wall and back along the road. Between the pole-shapes of the trees he observed the headlights moving towards him, saw a gap between the fourth and fifth set of lights. There would be orders about maintaining an even distance in convoy but there was always a laggard – if only he would continue to lag behind! Macomber ran back towards the Volkswagen, sprawling headlong in the snow when his foot caught in a rut, clambering swiftly to his feet again and reaching the car as the first set of headlights lit the top of the wall. The second vehicle followed closely, then the third and the fourth. Now! The Volkswagen rocked unsteadily as he drove towards the gateway and when he arrived at the exit the road was clear. Turning out of the field, he pressed his foot down and sped after the retreating rear light of the truck in the distance.

The turning onto the farm track came sooner than he expected and he swung the wheel automatically, glancing back the way he had come. No headlights behind: the fifth truck had not yet arrived at the bend. Within a hundred yards the track dropped into a bowl and his own lights were hidden from the main road. As he drove along the track, his headlight beams showing up clumps of frosted glass on either side, he concentrated on the immediate problem – the disposal of Dietrich. In summer, with the grasses grown tall, he could have dumped him in a dozen places, but with the ground frozen to the consistency of iron, the grasses ankle-high and the fields a white sheet against which the body would show up clearly, any unlucky chance might disclose the evidence in daylight. He would have to do better than that.

Five minutes later he was driving up a slope as he approached the bridge which crossed the railway; even in the daytime it was a lonely spot but at this hour there was an atmosphere of eerie desolation about the place and spiked reeds caught in the headlights reminded him he was driving across marshland. He slowed down to take a dangerous turn beyond the bridge and heard the clanking of goods wagons moving up from the south. On the spur of the moment he pulled up, left the engine running and got out to look over the bridge. A hooded lamp a short distance away shone down on a steam engine which passed under him hauling a train of empty coal trucks bound for the eastern section of the railyard, a section unaffected by the explosions. The trucks were on their way to the coal hopper where they would be filled and sent on their long journey to Germany. Macomber felt a sudden lightening of the dreadful fatigue which was steadily wearing him out, making even thought difficult. There could be a ready-made solution to his problem twenty feet below him.

Long weeks of observation had made the Scot an expert on the workings of that railyard, and he knew the coal would be loaded into the trucks as soon as the train arrived. The first trucks were already passing under him as he gauged their speed and the moment when the centre of a truck was exactly below where he stood. Without further calculation he switched off the car lights, opened the rear door and wrestled out the blanketed bundle. Hoisting the German on his shoulders, a major effort in itself, he staggered to the parapet and waited, gauging the right moment afresh, knowing he couldn't afford to misjudge his timing by so much as a second. He waited until one truck was centred under the bridge and flopped the bundle across the wall; as the rear of the truck rolled out of sight he heaved and held his breath. The body dropped, landed in the centre of the next coal truck, vanished under the bridge. Dr Richard Dietrich, archaeologist, was on his way home to Germany.