She shrugged. “Just as you say! Let’s get started.” She looked at him quizzically, a faint smile hovering as she moved round to the side of the coach. “Like to unzip me?”
He said, “Like to? That’s an understatement!” As she stopped, he fumbled with the back of her frock and then she pulled it over her head.
She said, “I’ll have to change the lot. That mud has penetrated… where no mud should ever be I guess.” He saw the gleam of white skin in the glow from the warning lamps as she slipped out of her underclothes. He swilled cold water over her from his cupped hands and helped her wash away the stinking Pripet mud. Then he attended to himself. The falling rain washed them both down and they felt a lot better, much fresher, though desperately cold.
When he had finished, he paddled back to the boot and dragged out all the cases until he had found his own and Virginia’s. These he carried round to where the girl was still standing out in the rain and rubbing down her flanks. He asked, “All ready?”
She nodded.
“Right.” He put the cases down. “I’m going in via the emergency exit. Mind handing the cases up?”
“Course not…” She moved towards them as Shaw pulled himself up the bodywork towards the emergency door. As she heaved the two cases up towards him. he took them and dropped them through into the interior.
“Now you,” he told her gruffly. He reached down and took her outstretched hand. As she found a foothold he heaved. She came up quickly, gracefully, lightly… right into his arms. For a moment, as he regained his balance in the doorway, their two bodies were close and intimate. It was dark but he didn’t need his eyes or the throb of his blood to tell him the girl’s figure was as near perfection as any he was likely to see… a moment later his lips came down, almost savagely on her mouth. Virginia hadn’t given him any actual encouragement but she had yielded to him as though she couldn’t hold herself back. For his part, he was beginning to feel an equally compulsive attraction towards her. He would have to watch that… he pushed her away, roughly now. He said in a tight voice, “Time isn’t on our side, Virginia. One day it will be — if we’re lucky.”
Quickly, he slid away from her, feeling with his bare feet for a hold in the deserted interior of the coach.
Twelve
In the darkness, lightened occasionally by the beaming headlights passing along the road, Shaw and Virginia dressed as quickly as they could. Those occasional beams lit up the windows in the upturned side, the windows that were now the ceiling, and sent moving shadows chasing eerily across the sideways-lying seats.
Virginia changed into a multi-colored shirt and blue jeans, which Shaw considered a practical enough choice, though he was doubtful as to its effect in a Russian town. As he pulled on a clean, dry pair of trousers, he said, “Just try to hide the curves as much as humanly possible, won’t you?”
He heard her quiet laugh. Picking his way with difficulty along the coach a few minutes later, he examined the personal articles that had shot from the parcel racks when the coach had overturned, looking, without much hope, for anything that might give him a line on Wicks or Fawcett. There was nothing. There were only pathetic, innocuous articles such as the women’s handbags, some of them now with their contents upset and spilled wholesale, showering coins and lipsticks and letters over the seats. There was a traveling rug, which had belonged to Miss Absolom, some wrapped purchases made by someone back in Warsaw; there were scattered boxes of chocolates, packets of English cigarettes, and other raincoats beside their own. There was little else, and nothing whatever to point a finger at anyone who might be Ivan O’Shea Conroy; indeed Shaw had been doubtful that there would be. Conroy wouldn’t carry any trademarks.
Shaw made his way back to where the girl was putting the finishing touches to her toilet. He said, “I know you’d like a rest. So would I, but there isn’t time. I’m sorry. Every minute counts now.”
“Sure,” she said crisply. “Don’t worry about me. When the time comes we can rest, I’ll flop right out. Till then, I’ll manage.”
He nodded. “Well — let’s get moving, then.”
They went out once again through the emergency exit, carrying their discarded clothing with them. They were warmer now, and dry in their raincoats. As they hit the ground, Virginia asked, “What now?” She looked surprised when she saw that he’d dropped their two grips through behind her. “What’s this for?”
“Part of what comes next. When that MVD chap recovers he’ll know someone hit him — but he won’t know who. I’m pretty sure I didn’t give him long enough to get an image of me in his mind, and anyway it was dark. So — we confuse the trail, and then there’ll never be any reason why we should admit to coming back. Otherwise the story’s the same.”
“I don’t get it,” she said blankly and with a touch of nervy sharpness. “Just what do we do?”
“Scatter our belongings and force open as many as possible of the other cases from the trunk and scatter their contents as well. Then it’ll appear as though some character decided to carry out a robbery and was interrupted by the gallant security officer. That character,” Shaw added, “could have been anybody who happened to come along this road during the night. There won’t be a damn thing to point a finger at us.”
“Haven’t you,” she asked ominously, “forgotten something?” He saw the gleam of her eyes.
“I don’t think so, but don’t be shy of telling me.”
She said, “Our raincoats. Did we stop to grab them when we panicked out from the wreck — or what?”
He grinned, his face almost devilish in the red glow. “Hardly, I suppose. But they could have been in our pockets — they’re both nylon. I could have been looking after yours for you.”
She nodded. “Can’t fault you.”
“Glad to hear it! We can always ditch them later on if we need to, anyway, and our robber can still take the rap. And as for us looking so nice and dry after dashing off into the rain… well, we won’t stay this way for long in any case.”
Shaw made for the trunk and got to work. In less than half an hour, most of the cases had been forced and their contents scattered around, littering the mud, all the intimate, personal belongings of the tourists laid bare to provide a glimpse into various private lives, their own swamp-fouled clothing being trampled anonymously into the mud with all the rest. Shaw had sorted through the lot with an eye to finding out a little more about the owners. He paid particular attention to the belongings of Wicks and Fawcett but again found nothing of the slightest value. Moving across to the MVD man, he bent and examined him. He was still out, but his breathing was easier now. He’d live.
Shaw wheeled the motorcycle out from behind the coach and on to the highway. He mounted, and Virginia got on the pillion; Shaw kicked the starter twice and the engine roared sweetly into life. A moment later they were away — and going fast. Within fifteen minutes of their reaching the outskirts of Minsk, the motorcycle had been run quietly into the Svisloch’ River and they were walking through the town towards the eastern end and the main road to Moscow. The Russian’s revolver also had gone into the Svisloch’ …Shaw felt very regretful about that, and more so about the motor-cycle. The latter had been a beauty — it was fast and could have got them to Moscow with no time wasted at all.
Minsk was asleep; much had happened in a comparatively short while and the time was still only a little after 1 am. They found no more than the occasional late home-goer — and, as always, patrolling police. Shaw and Virginia made their way along the age-old streets beside the Svisloch’ like lovers, arm-in-arm and very close, for the benefit of those patrols. No one but lovers would be braving the rainy night, though in fact the weather was easier now; but each time they saw a policeman, Shaw had to restrain himself from hustling the girl down a side-alley. Already, as they neared the eastern end of town, he was on the watch for likely transport. He knew it would be useless to attempt to reach the capital by train. At the station papers would be demanded — if they confessed to being British, they would have to show passports; if they kept up the pretence of being Russian citizens, then other documents would have to be produced to authorize their journey, for the citizens of the Soviet Union were not, on the whole, free to come and go precisely as they pleased. In fact, a rigorous control was exercised on movements inside Russia. No man could ever be certain as to when his identity was going to be called into question.