The impudent intruders left Pvera in a beat-up Citroen that Bjornstrom had somehow acquired and raced across the bridge at the head of the fjord to take the highway leading to Akureyri.
Two miles farther on, Bjornstrom swung right onto a dirt road that looped up toward the Russian concession.
While the mine workings and the wall barring the entrance were still hidden on the far side of a swell in the landscape, he turned off the road and steered between scattered boulders across a depression that ended in a steepsided valley slanting down to the water.
Once out of sight of the road, he cut the engine and coasted. The noisy clatter of the air-cooled twin-cylinder engine died away, and they bumped across a slope of coarse moorland grass to halt in the shelter of a granite outcrop.
Below them the valley plunged toward a cascade that foamed into a creek leading off the fjord. And there, shielded by a wilderness of tumbled rocks, their Hypalon raft was concealed.
They clambered down and retrieved their wet suits from beneath the seats of the raft.
The one thing in their favor, the only factor that gave them a chance to make the caves unseen, was the fact that the concession was on the western side of the fjord.
Because of this, a combination of low afternoon sun and high cliffs threw a shadow across the water.
"Even so," Bolan said, "we shall have to make the whole distance underwater, with snorkels for both of us all the way."
"The bottom of the fjord is black basalt and marine vegetation grows below the cliffs," Bjornstrom pointed out. "There's no pale seabed sand for us to show up against. You don't think?"
"No way," Bolan insisted. "It's okay for minisubs they will be at some depth; no danger of them leaving a telltale wash. But even if we are invisible below, the moment we broke surface to gulp in a breath of air we'd risk making enough of a commotion to draw the attention of the goons on that spur. Or one of the guards above. They might take it for a fish after a fly the first time, but not the next. Anyway, they'd probably loose off a burst just in case."
"Whatever you say," Bjornstrom agreed.
He sloshed water around inside the eyepiece of his mask, pulled it down over his face and took the hard rubber breathing bit between his teeth.
Followed by the Executioner, he submerged and swam slowly out of the creek into the fjord.
Even with the snorkels they had to take it slowly. In the circumstances it was difficult to remain underwater for much more than a minute. And each time the head of a breathing tube with its caged ball valve periscoped above the surface there was a chance it might leave enough wake to alert a watcher.
Fortunately the tide was now rising.
The inward flow of seawater meeting the current of the Jokulsa a Fjollum created ripples on the shadowed side of the fjord and a constant, shifting glimmer of sunlight beyond.
Each of them was hampered in his movements, Bolan with the waterproof Heckler and Koch G-11 strapped across his chest, the Icelander by the neoprene sack protecting his Ingram and two handguns. In addition, each stroke had to be made cautiously, the breath drawn evenly and slowly when the U-shaped tube broke surface and the ball float dropped to let in air.
It was almost two o'clock before they arrived at the mouth of the smallest cave.
They surfaced still in the shelter of the low rock arch and trod water, staring into the lit interior of the small cavern.
The rowboat had been pulled out of the water and up to the top of the slipway. The only other difference from their previous visit was that now the entry to the generator cave and each of the passageways branching off the quay framed a guard with a Skorpion machine pistol.
Over the hum of turbines the two men could hear the familiar sounds of drills, compressors and concrete mixers. Work was evidently continuing on the rock faces around and behind the caisson.
From time to time an overseer shouted an order, but the noise was mainly mechanical. The guards did not patrol. They remained motionless at their posts.
Clinging to the rough walls just outside the pool of light, the roof of the arch low above their heads with the rising tide, the two freedom fighters waited for the whistle to blow. Would the KGB hardmen barring their way go to the shelter with the others?
No whistle.
Thirty-five minutes passed.
Bolan and his companion were numbed with cold, their circulation sluggish through lack of activity. Finally the Executioner touched Bjornstrom on the arm and jerked his head toward the entrance.
They submerged again, swam out below the cliff and dived in once more via the center arch, surfacing where the channel curved just before it joined the main cavern.
The scene was familiar workers swarming over the scaffolding above the construction site, overseers stalking this way and that, electric cables and compressor tubes snaking over the quays beneath the blazing arcs.
Six guards stood on the gallery.
Three men were posted on the far side, staring down into the water. One was in front of the control room, another by the stack of drums and the last outside the hut from which the blasting was controlled. The air was heavy with the stink of fuel oil spilled from drums punctured during the morning shoot-out.
And still no whistle blew.
Bolan floated to the far side of the tunnel, from where he could steal an upward glance at the hut.
Behind the steel shutters the brightly lit shack was empty.
He had been right no blasting this afternoon.
He flicked a glance at his watch. The luminous digits told him that it was a quarter to three.
Fifteen minutes before Erika came to, helpless in the hands of KGB torturers.
Bolan had no illusions about what would happen to her if he didn't get there first.
"Attention! Attention!" The amplified voice rasped around the caverns from the PA speakers in Russian. "Operation Crystal. Overseers and work force are to return to surface immediately for briefing on simulated mining activity in upper gallery. Brosolov, Rott, Shepelev, Brodsky, Korsun and Radin are to remain below on constant patrol. The remainder of the guards to the pithead."
"Wising them up on the routine to be followed when the prof and his college kids arrive," Bolan whispered. "This is our only chance."
With no more than six guards, and those continually on the move, he was confident that he could blast his way through to the shaft. Yeah, Brosolov, Rott and their fellow thugs were going to be real sorry they didn't make the surface with the others.
"We'll wait to see how they deploy," he murmured to Bjornstrom. "And take three each once they separate."
"We have very little time left." Bjornstrom's face was creased with anxiety. "Erika..."
"I know. But a slug doesn't waste time making it from muzzle to target," the warrior reassured him grimly.
The sounds of work ceased.
Compressors fell silent. When the workers and overseers had trooped away to the elevator, the guards left behind started to patrol. Two pairs of boots clattered down the iron stairway. One man remained up on the far side of the gallery. Bolan reckoned that the others must still be around the smaller basin in the other cave.
Beckoning Bjornstrom to follow, the Executioner swam quickly through into the dock. Pulling himself up onto the quayside, he shook drops of water from the streamlined casing of the G-11 and sprinted for the lock gates at the inner end of the basin. The Icelander sidled through the arch separating the two chambers.