We won’t start engines until I have your all clear.’ He smiled at Hamid beside him. ‘Don’t waste time.’ He put down the telephone.
‘The hangar’s been put out of bounds, Vorontsyev! Don’t you understand? Your bright idea isn’t going to pan out!’
They were standing beside the car, in the bitter wind.
Occasional flakes of snow plucked against their cold cheeks, but the blizzard had all but quietened. Low cloud still pressed threateningly. The snowploughs were hundreds of yards down the cleared runway. Lubin hovered on the other side of the car like a child ignored while his parents quarrelled. Lock saw Dmitri scuttling towards them with a crab’s wary haste.
‘Let me think, Lock,’ Vorontsyev ground out between clenched teeth. ‘Let me think.’
‘Well, Alexei — I’ Dmitri blurted as he reached them, red-faced.
Vorontsyev turned on him. ‘Shut up, Dmitri,’ he warned. He had erred, he realised. Perhaps fatally. He rubbed his unshaven cheeks with his still-damp glove. Stamped his feet against the cold, as he wandered away from the car.
‘Marfa?’ he whispered into the R/T.
‘Yes? The GRU troops are all outside the hangar, but you won’t be able to get in now.’ He scowled at the information.
‘There’s a fuel truck, and one of those tugs they use to tow aircraft. Oh, and a fire truck.’
‘The pilots?’
‘I can see them in the cockpit — the flight deck,’ she corrected herself.
‘Anything else?’
‘No.’
‘Keep me informed — tell me when Turgenev and his passengers arrive.’
He turned back to look at his three companions, huddled in argument. Lock waving his arms in derisive dismissal. The anger wearied him, and was futile. Like everything else. Turgenev was here, bold as brass in his Mercedes, tsar of all he surveyed, just about to hand his lame nuclear physicists onto the boarding steps, ushering them away to Iran or Pakistan or even Iraq, wherever he had contracted to send them. His plane would probably bring in another consignment of heroin when it returned! And he — he was standing amid a line of snow-laden cars stamping his feet like a discarded mistress!
Marfa’s voice interrupted his flagellatory recriminations.
The Mercedes is here — with a small bus behind it. Is it them?’
‘Yes!’ he exploded. Then: ‘Where exactly are they?’
‘Outside. Waiting. The aircraft’s being towed out of the hangar now. There are men around the fuel truck. The fire-fighters are standing to attention — I’ It was all so damned easy for Turgenev.
He was, truly, truly untouchable. Only hundreds of yards away but immune. ‘The plane’s cleared the hangar — coming to a stop.
The fuel truck’s alongside it now.’ How long did it take to fuel a Learjet? God, there was an aircraft out there with a range of maybe three thousand miles and more, two pilots on board, a gift from the gods —! He ranted inwardly. ‘The fuelling’s started, by the look-of it,’ he heard.
‘Be careful,’ he warned.
‘Turgenev, . it’s himV she whispered. ‘He’s watching the fuelling. There’s a smaller, dark-featured man with him, and some people are getting out of the bus.’
‘How many?’
‘Four, five — six. That’s all… Just a minute, I’ll try to change my position, get a better look.’
He waited in furious but impotent impatience. As if events raged beyond a thick wall or tinted, unbreakable glass. He was divorced from them; they continued without him.
‘That’s better/ She was breathing harshly. ‘I’m near the hangar doors, there’s no one left inside. There’s — I can see six of the GRU from where I am. The others must be out of my line of sight. The six passengers from the bus are going on board …
When are we going to move, Alexei?’ She asked her question in a peremptory, agitated manner. ‘Turgenev — he’s …’ She paused, then: ‘He and the dark-skinned chap are going aboard, too!’
Turgenev could not, simply could not, be taking them to Tehran personally. The other man would be doing that. But he was on board, they were all together, just as he had hoped and planned.
And there were ten armed guards, and fifty more within shouting distance …
Lock was at his side. He twitched with impatience. ‘What’s happening?’ Then he heard:
‘Yes, they’re all on board now ‘
‘What?’ His eyes burned. ‘They’re leaving while we stand around here?’ He drew the Makarov pistol from inside his topcoat and thrust a round into the chamber. ‘You can kiss my ass, Vorontsycv! If you won’t do something, I will!’
‘Are you coming?’ they heard Marfa ask.
‘I am, lady — / am!’ Then he added: ‘Your boss doesn’t have the chutzpah for it, apparently, honey!’ He scowled in contempt.
‘Wait!’ Vorontsyev cried.
‘What for, man? Hell to freeze over?’
‘The aircraft’s engines have been switched on, they’re running them up,’ Marfa reported. ‘The GRU are scattering like mice!’
Then she sensed the situation; or the quarrel between Vorontsyev and Lock impinged at last. ‘What are we going to do, Alexei?’
‘We’re coming!’ he snapped. ‘All of us. Two minutes-!’ He grabbed Lock’s arm. They reached Dmitri and Lubin. ‘The hangar. Come on, let’s get moving!’ He retained his hold on Lock’s sleeve, as if to prevent the man from bolting, or firing the pistol he held in his hand. ‘We must try to stop the plane.’
ŚHow?’
‘The tower?’
Lock shook his head. They hurried across snow that was barely disturbed by footprints, through a scattering of warehouses blazoned with Cyrillic script and English. A tank creaked across their path, a hundred yards away, imperious and oblivious.
‘There’s no way to stop the plane except by ramming it,’ he admitted breathlessly.
They passed the first of the long row of hangars. The clouds seemed a lighter grey, though no less thick. There was little more than the scent of snow in the air.
‘The plane’s beginning to taxi!’ Marfa’s voice was high with excitement, then suddenly filled with disappointment. ‘Alexei, Dmitri — come onV
Lock ducked back at the corner of a hangar, waving the others to a halt. Someone grabbed his arm to prevent themselves overbalancing.
Then he peered round the edge of the building. The soldiers had passed out of sight. The APC stood as if abandoned fifty yards from them. He saw Turgenev’s Mercedes and the empty bus next to it … And the Learjet sliding gracefully as a swan across the perspective between the two hangars.
Where was Turgenev? The plane was beyond reach, but —
‘Where’s Turgenev?’ he snapped into Vorontsyev’s R/T.
‘Still aboard’
‘Oh — Christ!’ he wailed, staring at the lowering sky.
The Learjet began taxiing away from the hangar, slowly increasing its speed. Yellow-painted self-propelled passenger steps followed servantlike in its wake, out towards the taxiway.
The fuel bowser moved off, puffing grey fumes. The APC, the bus, the Mercedes … The driver was standing beside it, smoking -
scattered pieces. He couldn’t make the jigsaw come together.
Mercedes, relaxed driver, plane, Turgenev, plane, Mercedes, driver still smoking, in no hurry to leave, waiting, waiting for ‘The car! His car — for God’s sake, we can use his car! Look, it’s waiting to pick him up. He’s not going anywhere! He’s getting out before it takes off, has to be—!’
Then he was running along the side of the hangar, its corrugated wall a hypnotic blur, disorientating him. The driver had his back to him, he heard the sound of laughter, presumably from a soldier he could not see. He heard his breathing, his heart thudded in his chest and the blood pounded in his ears. He had no idea whether or not they were behind him. He could see the aircraft, dazzling against the grey sky like a great dove, its flank emblazoned with the logo of— GraingerTurgenev. His throat was dry, he could not swallow, could hardly breathe. It was as if it was put there to mock him. GraingerTurgenev.