Colin Forbes - The Stockholm syndicate

I'll stay." Marker's chubby face was grim and hard as he remembered his superior invading his office back at Politigarden in Copenhagen, recalled how he had been told to drop this case, remembered what the Syndicate had threatened to do to his wife and son. "And I'm armed," he said.

"So are a lot of people round here," Beaurain assured him.

Startled, Marker looked round the whole area. Before wandering round the back of the station to where the wagons were waiting, Kellerman had made a brief hand signal to Henderson. Give me back-up. The Scot had again raised the camera-like walkie-talkie and had given the order.

"Cover Max, surround entire action area immediately."

Fascinated, Marker watched as some of the 'hikers' with packs on their backs drifted back inside the station. He guessed that there would be exits from inside the station into the shunting zone where Foxbel had disappeared. Other 'tourists' closed in round the front of the station between the ferry terminal and the shunting zone. Henderson himself picked up his sports bag and unzipped it. Now he could have his machine-gun in action in seconds. Henderson's main fear was that Syndicate men now concealed might appear in strength at any moment. Everything depended on Kellerman.

The Danish railway man who had guided the engine with his flag was pacing up and down alongside the first wagon when Kellerman appeared. The German realised immediately that the main problem was the engine-driver waiting in his cab to shunt the two wagons aboard the ferry. He was relieved to see two of Henderson's back-up men dressed like hikers appear from the main station beyond the engine. With a swift gesture to them he indicated the engine-driver and continued walking towards the man with the flag, who shouted something in Danish.

"Don't understand the language!" Kellerman called back in English. He was still walking towards him, smiling broadly. It was amazing how a smile threw people off balance, even if only for a few vital seconds. The rail guard spoke again, this time in English.

"You are on private property and must leave at once. Go back! Go back the way you came or I will call the security police!"

"Good idea. You call them. Now! Before these wagons move!"

The back-up team had moved with their accustomed speed. Already one had engaged the engine-driver in conversation while the second man disappeared behind the locomotive, then silently reappeared climbing up into the engine cab behind the driver whose attention was distracted. A hand holding a choloroform-soaked cloth was clasped over the driver's mouth; in less than thirty seconds he was unconscious on the floor of his cab.

"You will get out of this area now!" The thin-faced rail guard slipped his hand inside his jacket and Kellerman leapt forward two paces. His right hand closed over the Dane's wrist, dragging the hand out, a hand which held a pistol. "Danish State Railways issue?" the German enquired. As he spoke he twisted the wrist, broke it and the pistol fell to the ground. The guard's mouth opened to scream and the scream was stifled by Kellerman's other hand. The German was bending the Dane backwards and suddenly he kicked the man's feet from under him. The guard fell backwards and only Kellerman's grip saved him splitting his skull open on the rail. The German lowered him gently until his neck was resting on the rail. He tried to lift his head and something sharp pricked his throat, the tip of Kellerman's knife.

Try shouting and I'll slit your throat," Kellerman hissed.

"The wagon…"

"Will move any moment now," Kellerman assured him. "It will neatly slice off your head like a guillotine. Straight across the neck, leaving your head between the tracks, the rest of your body on this side," he elaborated brutally.

"You wouldn't!"

"I would and will. And if you lift your head to get it off the rail I'll stick you. Comes to the same thing, really, doesn't it? Where's the heroin?"

"What heroin?"

The words were cut off by the prick of Kellerman's knife against his throat. He lay sprawled with the pressure of the iron rail against the back of his neck, and when he looked to the left — the direction from which death would come — he saw the wheel's rim which was now assuming enormous dimensions in his mind.

"The heroin stashed for Sweden," Kellerman said wearily, "I really believe you're stupid enough not to tell me in which case any second now: crunch!"

"They'll kill me if I speak."

The Stockholm Syndicate?"

"For Jesus Christ's sake have mercy!"

"And let all that heroin flood the streets? I'd sooner behead you."

Despite the freezing of his emotions after the murder of his wife, Kellerman was impressed by the man's terror terror of the Stockholm Syndicate even caught in this dreadful position. His gaunt face had almost aged since Kellerman had threatened him; there was the stench of the man's own sweat in the air, the sweat of fear which coursed down his face in rivulets and streamed over his neck, already dirty with rust from the rail. Still he didn't speak and the German was not sure what to do next. A bell began ringing, a steady ding-dong in slow time somewhere in the direction of the ferry terminal.

"The heroin… just above you… inside the second wadge… let me up, the train is moving!"

He jerked his head up violently, staring at the rim of the wheel to his left in gibbering terror. Kellerman withdrew the knife a second before the Dane could impale himself on its point. '… the train is moving!"

Kellerman's reflex action was to grab the man's tie, swing his head to the side away from the wheel and clear of the line. Then, streaming with his own sweat, he realised what had happened.

The steady tolling of the bell continued, warning approaching traffic that a train was on the way. But this train wouldn't be moving because the engine-driver had been knocked out with chloroform, a fact which for a terrible split second Kellerman had forgotten when the bell started its racket. It was no surprise that the Dane had fainted and was lying inert by the track. He heard a rush of feet and hoped they were the feet of friends.

"Did he talk?"

Henderson's voice. Kellerman, his face showing strain, looked up. To his right the two 'hikers' who had dealt with the engine-driver were quietly slipping away to the main station. Gunners disguised as tourists blocked off the approach from the ferry terminal.

"Stop the bell the train isn't going?" he said.

"The heroin?"

Marker's voice. A mixture of eagerness and anxiety. Kellerman used his sleeve to mop the sweat dripping off his forehead. He'd been shaken and he didn't mind admitting it. For a few seconds he'd had a vision of the head rolling free between the rails.

"We've got it," he told them, 'if he told me the truth and I think he did. I would have. In this wagon just above me the second slat back "wadge" I think he called it."

He stood up and stiffened his legs to stop himself swaying. Only Louise saw him surreptitiously wipe the damp palms of his hands on his trousers. He winked at her and she smiled sympathetically. It was at the most unexpected moments that the terrible strain of their work hit them like a sledgehammer, often when they were least prepared for it.

It was being handled with typical Telescope efficiency. Henderson had gone quickly back up the track directing the gunners to form a defensive cordon.

Beaurain had climbed up into the wagon with Marker and called down for the loan of Kellerman's knife which was handed up.

"The guard is in it up to his neck." He paused as the potentially unfortunate phrasing occurred to him, then continued, looking at Louise. "The engine-driver may be in it or he could be completely innocent. At the moment he's…" He made a gesture placing his hand over his mouth indicating he was out of action. Then, in the near distance, growing louder every second they heard the one sound Beaurain did not wish to hear, the sound of a patrol-car's siren screaming.