Colin Forbes - The Janus Man

He ran back to the cab, thanking God he'd left the engine running. Gerda followed, sagging into the passenger seat as Newman released the brake. Again he rammed his foot down. The vehicle leapt forward, felt like a plane lifting off, crashing up and down over solid sleepers. Gerda, her facial muscles taut, stared ahead through the windscreen. She left him for a moment, returned holding the Uzi.

`There are eight of them, you said,' he warned. 'They'll be armed. Our only hope is to hide…'

`If we get there in time,' she reminded him, staring again fixedly through the windscreen.

And if the damned camper will go under that bridge, Newman thought. And if the bridge is wide enough to conceal us so neither end of this bloody great thing doesn't stick out in full view.

The camper jounced, wobbled, rocked as Newman kept his foot down hard on the accelerator. The arched bridge seemed an incredibly long way off. It crawled towards them. Beyond the bridge the sky was black as battalions of storm clouds massed. The heat inside the cab was appalling. They were partitioned off from the main part of the camper by a flimsy door, presumably to give privacy when people slept while the camper was driven through the night.

Newman's hands were sticky on the wheel. The left front tyre hit an obstacle. The wheel slipped out of his grip. He fought to control it as the camper swerved towards the embankment. Just in time he swung it back on course. He wiped each hand separately on his trousers as Gerda glanced at him.

`One of those bloody rocks. Must have rolled down on to the track. I could do without a repeat performance.'

`You'll make it…'

`We have to.'

His eyes were glued to the stone balustrade at the top of the bridge, the point where some policeman in one of those two cars would glance over the parapet and see the camper. Unless they could get under that bridge first. He was gambling with dice he couldn't see. The cars had been moving fast.

He risked a shade more speed. The moment he'd applied the extra pressure the wheels met more solid sleepers. His backside was lifted clear off the seat. Gerda's shoulder bumped against his. She apologized, still staring forward. Would they never reach the goddamn thing?

A grey veil of rain was slanting down beyond the bridge. Thunderheads were building up. Maybe that was why it was so boiling hot inside the cab. They were close enough now for Newman to see the parapet was no higher than an average man's thighs. In the old days – when the trains still ran – schoolboys must have leant their elbows on that parapet, watching a train pass beneath them. No sign of the two cars crossing. Yet. They had to arrive at any second. There'd be no escape from the gulch. The Vopos would hold the high ground.

He rammed his foot down further. One final spurt. They couldn't lose now Yes they could. The arch looked too low to permit passage for the camper. It was going to be a matter of inches. Maybe he'd take the roof off. Through his open window he thought he could hear sirens. On a lonely country road? Yes, because it would wind. Sirens wailing to warn any traffic concealed round a bend. Definitely sirens.

`Push the door open!' he told Gerda.

She reached behind her, pushed the door back, held it open. `Hold tight, Falken! Emergency stop!'

He jammed on the brakes, nearly catapulted himself through the windscreen. They were under the bridge. Suddenly it was dark. Out of the blazing sunlight. He pushed Gerda's shoulder.

`Jump out! Check the front. Make sure it's under the arch. I'll check the back…'

As she slipped out he was running back the full length of the camper. Falken had both arms stretched out, holding on to the end of the couch, to the back. His expression was wary as Newman rushed past him. He turned the handle of the rear door, leapt down on to the step, on to the track, looking up.

The rear end of the camper was at least three feet inside the overhang of the crumbling stone arch. He ran to one side and between the camper and the curved wall. Gerda ran from the other direction towards him. God, it was sticking out at the front. She was panting as she reached him.

`It's well inside at the front. How's the back?'

`Well inside. Listen…'

The sirens had stopped. They could hear the cars coming, slowing down. To take the hump-backed bridge slowly? Newman looked up at the vaulted arch. The cars reached the bridge, stopped. Engines switched off. They had parked above them.

`A Chaika, you said. Under the highway complex? Yes,' Wolf agreed, speaking on the phone, 'tell your men to wait, watch for their return. They should keep well out of sight.'

He put down the receiver, stood up and walked to the wall map, talking to Lysenko as he inserted a fresh pin, locating the road complex.

`I understand from Balkan in London that Tweed often adopts the same method – uses a wall map, marks incidents with pins. In some ways he and I are alike. Strange…'

`And do you mind telling me what has happened?' Lysenko enquired.

`Remember my man, Hecht, stopped three people in a car on a country road here? A Chaika. A patrol has just found a Chaika empty underneath the road complex here. They are still heading for Leipzig – observe the route the pins follow.'

`Search the surrounding countryside?' Lysenko suggested..

`No, that might frighten them off. The key was left in the ignition. I think they will be coming back – if it is the same trio.'

`Oh, I understand now.' Lysenko smirked. 'Two men and also an attractive girl, Hecht told you. I know that area – there are rye fields everywhere. We can imagine what they are doing, can't we?' He smiled lecherously. 'One girl with two men – she must be lively.'

Wolf did not smile. An austere man, he did not appreciate the dirty mind Lysenko was displaying, revelling in his vision of what was taking place. And so odd, he thought as he returned to his desk. The Russian had a brilliant mind for espionage. Yet where sex was concerned he was a common lecher.

`I am putting more men on the streets of Leipzig,' he decided. 'Everyone possible will have their identities thoroughly checked. If there is something wrong with those three suspects they will walk into a trap.'

`What are you basing your suspicions on?'

`The continued disappearance of Schneider of the Border Police. The fact that his farm truck was discovered in that hollow by the highway. I think he has been killed. And now I must check on the imminent movement of those armaments from Skoda in Czechoslovakia bound for Rostock and shipment to Cuba.'

Newman pressed himself against the stone wall of the bridge. Behind him Gerda did the same thing, holding the Uzi. Down in the quiet of the gulch they could hear voices above them. Some of the Vopos had left their vehicles to stretch their legs.

`Good place for a pee,' a voice suggested. 'I'll clamber down under the bridge in case someone comes along…'

`Think I'll join you.' A second voice.

Newman glanced at Gerda, then froze. He could hear scrambling feet on the rocky, weed-strewn slope by the side of the bridge. A small rock came loose, rolled down and settled in the middle of the track. More loose stones followed it. He heard a curse.

`Let's relieve ourselves here, Gunter. You'll break your bloody leg. There are some big rocks under this mess.'

There was the faint sound of water gushing against the wall of the bridge. Silence for a few seconds. Followed by the receding scramble of feet carefully picking their way back up the bank. Newman glanced at Gerda, who shook her head with relief.

Now there were voices talking above them, the two men leaning on the parapet as far as he could tell. They went on for several minutes before the lighted cigarette stub dropped just beyond the archway. It landed amid a clump of tinder-dry grass. There had been no rain for weeks from the and state of the parched gulch. The clump began to smoulder, ignited.