Алистер Маклин - Air Force One is Down

‘He’s done it, the bastard,’ Bert choked, and started for the tunnel leading to the bridge.

McCafferty grabbed his arm and pulled him back, explaining that the ringer was unlikely to launch a shooting massacre when all he had to do was explode the bomb.

The two agents used rock-cover to get them to the tunnel, and it was sheer bad luck that Dunkels turned to look behind him just at the instant when a shaft of light glinted on the stock of McCafferty’s gun …

Sabrina looked long and hard at the bomb. The detonator was wedged firmly into a crevice in the rock, and the wires, sunk into the viscous mass of pink plastique , might be delicately poised to resist dismantling. She dared not risk setting the explosives off accidentally, so she tried to saw through the trailing yellow cable against a sharp edge of rock. Her head was bent to the task when Jagger’s gun tickled the soft hairs behind her left ear and his voice said ‘Drop the wire.’

She froze, and the cable slipped out of her hand. The ringer plucked the machine-pistol from her belt and motioned her inside.

Then Jagger himself froze as another fusillade of bullets crashed into the wall at his side. He spun round to see Siegfried Dunkels stagger out of the tunnel on to the bridge, clutching his torn stomach. Slowly, almost balletically, Dunkels folded and draped across the suspension-cable. He tried to right himself, but his head fell forward as he died, and his body toppled into the chasm.

McCafferty hurdled the corpse of the guard, brought down in the same burst as that which killed Dunkels, and at last came face to face with his other half – himself! – across twenty feet of rickety bridge.

Mac raised his machine-pistol and caught his trigger-finger just in time when he saw, in the dim lighting of the second cave, that the ringer was using Sabrina Carver as a shield.

‘Back, McCafferty,’ Jagger shouted, ‘or she gets it. You too, Cooligan.’

Mac waved Bert away and retreated himself, still keeping the ringer in his line of vision. Somehow, Jagger knew that the odds were stacked against him, and played his last lunatic card. Fear of the Russians, of Karilian, of what they could do to him if he failed to carry out their orders, governed his life to the last. He groped in his pocket and brought out the detonator.

‘Three minutes,’ he breathed, and pressed the time switch. ‘Three minutes and you’re all dead.’

He shoved Sabrina ahead of him to re-cross the bridge, and saw McCafferty and Cooligan withdraw further into the tunnel. When she and Jagger reached the other side, Sabrina rounded on Cody savagely and yelled, ‘You can’t , you mustn’t , kill those people. They’ve done nothing to harm you. What kind of animal are you, Mister No-Name?’

The ringer exploded and lashed at her face. She took the blow on the chin and crumpled to the ground, striking her head on a rock.

‘The name is Cody Jagger – do you hear ?’ he screamed at her senseless body. ‘Do you hear, McCafferty? I’m Cody Jagger, and I’m going to kill you and everyone else here!’

Mac’s answer was a burst of pistol fire which sent Jagger reeling back unhurt into the darkness of the bridge. He snarled an obscenity when he saw that the detonator had fallen from his hand and was lying a yard from Sabrina’s head. The timer showed two minutes before the bomb would explode.

Jagger began to crawl towards the detonator, but McCafferty had him in clear view now.

‘You’re covered, Jagger,’ he shouted, ‘drop the gun.’

Cody rose and loosed off another salvo until the firing-mechanism jangled on the empty chamber.

The detonator’s timing device clicked round to one minute.

Jagger threw the useless gun away and jerked out the machine-pistol he had taken from Sabrina. He never got to press the trigger: McCafferty shot him twice through the hand, and the gun clattered on to the bridge.

Mac advanced, and his eyes flickered to the ticking remote-control box, then back to Jagger’s face … his own face, warped with hatred, licking the blood from his hand.

‘You son of a bitch, McCafferty, I should have killed you back in Bahrain, but the Russians wanted you alive.’

‘The Russians?’ Mac cried. ‘You work for–’

Sabrina chose that second to moan and stir, and McCafferty’s eyes left Jagger’s long enough to search for her face. Cody heaved himself at the American and kicked out at his groin.

The electronic timer showed thirty-two, thirty-one, thirty seconds.

Mac took the kick on his thigh and rocked back as Jagger caught the gun in his wounded hand and crashed the other into Mac’s face. But Jagger couldn’t retain his hold on the pistol. Blood was pumping from his hand, and his fingers fell away. He tried to defend himself one-handed. Then McCafferty got a lock on him and splintered his cheek-bone with the butt of the gun.

Cody’s head came up, his lips slid away from his teeth, and his eyes glazed over. Mac used the gun butt on him again, and Jagger keeled over against the rail. It broke under his weight, and his dying shriek lasted until his body hit the pointed rocks of the river-bed.

Sabrina screamed when Mac turned to her. Her mind strove to cope with the man standing before her. Who was he? Who had won the fight? She clasped her hands to her pounding head, then reached for the machine-pistol, and McCafferty cried, ‘It’s me, you silly bitch.’

She let the gun go, and in the hiatus that followed they heard the remorseless ticking of the timer. They both dived for it, and she was nearer.

When she switched off the detonator, and disconnected the battery wires, the clock face showed two seconds to blast-off.

‘You’re not quite the last man in the world I expected to see, Philpott,’ Smith remarked urbanely, ‘but I honestly didn’t imagine you’d suddenly drop in out of the blue in that vulgar manner.’

Smith removed his boot from Philpott’s hand, and kicked the gun into the sea.

‘Get up,’ he commanded.

Philpott tried, but fell back grimacing with pain.

‘I think I’ve hurt my foot,’ he apologised.

‘Serves you right,’ said Smith. ‘You must have had a pretty rough journey, too. I suppose you rode on top of the bus.’

‘Something like that,’ Philpott admitted.

Smith’s eyes gleamed and he smiled broadly.

‘Then you’re alone. How convenient – for me. If you can make yourself comfortable on the sand, I would advise you to do so. You will not have long to wait, and I can promise you that what you see will be of consuming interest to you.’

Philpott moaned and lay back, clasping his hands behind his head.

‘What were you doing,’ he asked, ‘when I inflicted myself upon you so rudely?’

Smith put a finger to his lips.

‘Patience,’ he said, ‘and all will be revealed.’ He took from his anorak pocket a small flat metal box.

Philpott recoiled in horror.

‘Don’t, Smith,’ he pleaded, ‘for God’s sake don’t do it. Those people are innocent. You’ll get your ransom. They don’t deserve to die.’

Smith smiled and juggled dexterously with the little box.

‘As I thought,’ he mused, ‘you know far more than is good for you. But on this occasion, Philpott, you’re wrong. This box–’ pointing to the one in his hand ‘–is not the detonator for the explosives at the cave.’

He pulled another, seemingly identical, box from the same pocket.

‘ This one is.’

Philpott regarded him in amazement.

‘Two detonators for the same job? Or rather – three?’

‘Three?’ Smith repeated. ‘What are you talking about?’

It was Philpott’s turn to smirk.