He moved on slowly.
He was inside the lights now and coming up to the rear of the coach. When he had reached it, he stood up cautiously, moving his body slowly, eyes and ears alert. He felt for the lock of the trunk and found the doors were badly buckled; it might be possible to prise them apart without having to put a bullet in the lock — and every slug saved now might be precious.
So far, so good.
He felt around the panels and it was while he was doing this that he heard the small, nearly inaudible sound from his left and to the rear. He kept perfectly still, scarcely breathing now, tensing his muscles; and then, in the split-second that followed, he threw himself to one side and at the same instant gave his body a sharp twist. His immediate reaction saved his life. He saw the red glow striking off a gun in a man’s hand, saw the gun leveled at his guts, saw it move a fraction as the hand began to squeeze. He had no intention of complicating matters by using Fawcett’s gun on a Russian policeman, but only a moment of time before the roar and the flash, he took further avoiding action. Dropping the Webley, he went forward in a low, flying tackle. A bullet ripped into the back of the coach as he wrapped his arms tightly around the man’s legs. He had plenty of momentum and the Russian went down with a crash, falling heavily across Shaw’s back. Shaw swung an arm backward and upward and got a grip on the man’s clothing, and then, using all his reserves of strength, he twisted until he had his attacker underneath him. The man managed to get a knee drawn back, and jabbed it hard into Shaw’s guts, trying to lever him away; but by this time Shaw had got his hands round the thick, flabby neck. The Russian was in poor condition by the feel of it; he puffed like a steam-engine until the tightening fingers closed his windpipe. Shaw squeezed hard and went on squeezing. Breath bubbled in the throat, the legs kicked out savagely and the heavy body hurled itself sideways, dragging Shaw with it, as if trying to buck him off. Shaw didn’t relax his grip for a moment and, when he had managed to re-straddle the man and keep him flat, he jerked the head up and smashed it hard down on the ground… once, twice, three times.
The man groaned.
Shaw let go of the throat, reached out for the Webley, lying near the coach, reversed it, and brought it down hard on the temple. The body went limp and Shaw got to his feet, breathing hard. The Russian policeman would be out for quite a while… long enough for Shaw to do all he wanted. He was feeling pretty groggy now and his head ached abominably, but he couldn’t let up yet and the Lord alone could tell when he would be able to… he turned away, pressing his hands to his head, lights flashing in his eyes from sheer weariness. His brain was buzzing, but when his vision cleared he saw for the first time something that was going to come in extremely handy: the MVD man’s motor-cycle, parked on the far side of the coach.
That gave him all kinds of ideas… but meanwhile there was plenty to be done. He made for the road. Calling across to Virginia, he was relieved when she stood up and and he saw her coming quickly towards him. She said, “Well, I obeyed orders — right? Don’t you ever leave me behind again, though,” she added accusingly. “I was having kittens after I heard that shot.”
He smiled down at her wearily. “Well, you can relax! It went into the coach, not into me. I’ll tell you something though — you could’ve joined in that fight, couldn’t you? Given me a crack on the head, or used the Webley after I dropped it. And you didn’t.”
She was smiling too. “Trust me now?”
He said, “Yes. From now on we’re in this together. And I’m sorry to say the first thing I’m going to do is leave you behind again, while I go back and look for Pope’s briefcase. It’s a pretty long shot, of course, but I could really do with our passports!” He handed her the Russian’s revolver and nodded towards the body spreadeagled on the ground. “Just keep an eye on that,” he said. “Give him another crack on the head if you have to. I shan’t be long. Keep out of sight from the road, just in case of headlights. All right, Virginia?”
“If you say so.”
“I do.”
He gave her a reassuring squeeze and went for the road, running back towards the site of the checkpoint, veering off into the scrub whenever he saw lights along the road. When he had reached the place, he spent almost half an hour of valuable time searching for the briefcase but he had no luck. There was nothing there but a badly bent police car, hauled up on the roadside. If there had been any bodies they had been removed along with the briefcase.
Back at the coach, he said, “It’s no good, Virginia. We’ll just have to carry on as best we can without papers—”
“If you get caught inside Russia without papers,” she broke in, “it’s the end of the line — or so I’ve always heard!”
“You heard dead right,” he said. “But it’s not quite as bad as all that in our case. I’m not saying it isn’t a hell of a chance to take, but we’ve got quite a straightforward story to tell all the same. If we do get picked up we’ll have to talk our way out, that’s all.”
“And we say?” Her tone was sardonic, accusing.
“We say this: We’re just ordinary tourists on the Moscow trip — we’re clear up to that point anyway, and our story’ll check in all details that far. Now — after the crash, we naturally got out of the coach as fast as we could, just in case she went up in flames. She’s petrol, not diesel or derv, so she could quite easily have burnt right out. No one in his senses would have stayed put, that’s obvious. Once we’d got clear into the scrub, and staggered around a bit in a dazed sort of way, the next thing we knew was the shooting — that was when they were blazing off at what I think must have been Wicks and Fawcett. That panicked us, and we shot off and lay low till the excitement had died down. Needless to say, we soon realized what bloody fools we’d been, et cetera, et cetera… and we’re terribly sorry for all the trouble caused.”
“Think that’ll work, do you?” she asked doubtfully.
“It’d better.” He was moving across to the rear of the coach.
“After we’re found out to have been back here and bent the guard in half?”
He shrugged. “It’s a chance we have to take. It sounds perfectly logical — after all, we’d naturally try to get at our possessions, and we’d also take steps to avoid being shot by the sentry, wouldn’t we?” He grinned. “Talking of possessions, this is where we shift into clean clothes.” He pulled at the buckled doors of the trunk. They moved just a little when he put on the pressure. He murmured, “Leverage should go the trick. Here, let me have that Russian gun.”
Virginia handed it over; it had a longish barrel, and this Shaw inserted into the gap between the double doors. Pushing hard, he forced them apart till there was a crack and one of them flew back on its hinges, several of the suitcases falling out into the mud, just missing Shaw.
“Fine!” he said. “Quick change in the coach, and then we’ll be on our way. Got a raincoat in your grip?” he added.
“It was on the parcel rack inside!”
“So was mine, We’ll need them. But first the mud. I’ll sort out our cases in a moment.”
He looked around. The rain itself would help, indeed had helped already, and there were pools of rainwater collected in the dents made in the bodywork of the coach by the impact. “We strip, Virginia and have a good wash.”
“Here?”
“Round the other side, away from the road — both of us. I’m not risking headlights. Not even the threat of the MVD is going to keep an all night transport driver in his seat if he sees you in his headlights, my girl!”