She looked white and scared in the backer glow from the headlights. A moment later, those headlights died; Shaw took up the Kalashnikova, and grabbed a torch from the glove compartment. He made certain Virginia had Andreyev’s heavy revolver and then they climbed out, going in nearly up to their thighs. They started wading, struggling against the flow. Shaw, holding the Kalashnikova clear of the water, beamed his torch ahead, slicing through the pitch blackness of the tunnel. A little later, the beam picked up the outline of a sealed door set tightly in the wall.
Virginia grabbed his arm. “There it is!”
“And about time too.” Shaw felt the water creeping up, deepening still — almost to his hips now. The rate of increase was faster than he liked. By the time they were abreast of the door, it was all they could do to stay on their feet, bent against the rush of water whose speed and pressure were nearly sweeping them down to be washed willy-nilly out into the valley, tossed like those small dead animals. Reaching the door, they hooked their fingers over a big projecting steel bracket set in the wall of the spillway, and they hung there for a while, getting their breath back and resting weary leg-muscles.
Virginia gasped, “There’s something we didn’t think about, I guess. It’ll be locked for sure!”
“No, it won’t. They wouldn’t lock these doors, they’re here for emergency use. A man could easily be caught down here when the overspill valves operate. I believe there’s not even any means of locking them, just so mistakes can’t happen. It just shuts automatically after fifteen seconds if anyone forgets to operate the closing mechanism after entering in a panic.” He took a deep breath. “All set for going in, Virginia?”
She nodded.
“Right, I’ll open up. Take the gun for me.”
Shaw passed her the Kalashnikova and, holding fast to the steel bracket with one hand, he turned the handle, first to the right, then to the left. Nothing happened… he felt a moment of real fear. Maybe he’d got his details mixed. Then suddenly there was a click and a moment later the door swung inward, silently, powerfully. Water washed in, swilling to the foot of a steep flight of bare concrete steps… and that was when Shaw caught sight of the Red Army uniform just inside the door — and saw the snout of the Simonov semi-automatic sticking out through the widening gap. As yet, the soldier holding the Simonov was evidently uncertain as to who Shaw might be — and Shaw didn’t give him a chance to make up his mind. Quick as lightning he had grabbed the carbine’s muzzle and was heaving with all his strength. The startled trooper, caught by surprise, lurched over the step and as he did so Shaw’s fist took him smack in the guts. Doubling up, he fell headlong into the rushing water, still grasping the weapon which Shaw had let go of as he hit the man.
Shaw snapped, “Quick, now — before the door closes!”
As Virginia started to pull herself in, however, the closing mechanism began to operate. Shaw cursed. As they waited there was a stutter of automatic fire and bullets smacked into the spillway walls between himself and the girl. Shaw grabbed the Kalashnikova, gave Virginia a push which sent her staggering, dodged aside himself, and then, as a second burst came close to his head, fired back, a sustained and spreading burst which colandered the Russian soldier. The man threw up his arms and clasped at his throat, from which blood was gushing, and then collapsed finally into the torrent of water.
Shaw took a deep breath and grabbed hold of Virginia, who was doing her best to fight her way back against the stream towards the door. Together they went back to that door, and once again Shaw turned the handle. “Get in,” he ordered. “Fast as you can! We’ve got to get cracking before that guard’s missed.”
As the girl pulled herself in through the door, Shaw followed close behind. Seconds later the door swung to as silently as it had opened; there was another click and once again the jointures were sealed. There was no trickle of water whatsoever; even the water-sounds were utterly blocked out. The silence was complete, deadening in that electrically-lit, bare, and sterile concrete space. Shaw’s voice dropped instinctively to a whisper. He said, “I’ll lead the way, and try to find the control-room. There’s no knowing where Treece’ll have hidden himself, or whether the place has in fact been taken over by his lot, but I’d feel a shade safer in the control-room whatever the set-up! Leave the work-out to me. Quiet as you can, and have that revolver ready.”
She nodded. Shaw, the Kalashnikova cradled in his arms, led the way, wading through the wash of water that had swilled in, and then climbing the steps. At the top a narrow concrete passage led into the distance, lit at intervals by electric bulbs in the ceiling, which was also of concrete. They went along fast, under alternate bright light and deep shadow, not knowing yet what they might come across, nor where to look; their footsteps echoed, seeming to bang along the concrete like an army on the march. Shaw was certain they must be heard.
At the end of the passage, they found a lift-shaft, the wire surround reaching upward into the high distance, the well empty. There was a telephone on a wall-bracket alongside.
Shaw looked up the shaft.
The distance was really immense; he fancied, however, that he could make out the bottom of the lift itself. He murmured, “I wonder if it’s…” He hesitated, his body tensing. He could see now that there was a descending patch of light flickering on the shaft far above — the lift was in fact coming down. He grabbed Virginia and they ran back along the passage, deep into shadow between two sets of lights. “Back against the wall,” he hissed when they were far enough. “Flat as you can. It’s the best chance. They’ve got to come along this way, and that’s when we jump ’em, if we’re not spotted first.”
Only seconds later, the lift came in sight and stopped; the doors went back and two men came out. They seemed, somewhat oddly, to be technicians and not soldiers, but each carried a revolver. Very slowly, shoulder to shoulder, they came along the passage towards Shaw and the girl, who were flattened against the wall and scarcely daring to breathe now. That slow advance seemed to indicate intent — maybe there was some kind of alarm system, a light or a buzzer perhaps, which told the control-room personnel when the spillway doors were operated, but there had been nothing on the plans to indicate this. Possibly that Red Army man had been overdue on some report or other. The men were no more than a dozen yards away when Shaw knew he and the girl had been seen. As the Russians’ fingers tightened on the triggers of the revolvers, Shaw dropped to the concrete and fired, the quick-action Kalashnikova crashing out to shatter that tense silence… lead ricocheted off the walls, off the floor, off the lift-shaft, the racket sounding like thunder in that close space. The two technicians fell, one of them writhing and screaming, thrashing about on the concrete for several seconds before his movements dwindled to a spasmodic twitching, and then he lay still.
The sub-machine gun warm in his hands, Shaw got to his feet. Gunsmoke wreathed around his head. The sudden contrast of silence seemed quite uncanny.
Thirty
Treece had reached the vicinity of the dam some while earlier and had taken, not Shaw’s route towards the spillway outflow, but the extension of the track that had led him towards the dam’s main entrance. And thanks to the short cut he had, as planned, got there ahead of Kosyenko and the main party. One mile short of the entrance he had slowed up, driving ahead in bottom gear until he had seen what he had expected to see: three darker shadows silhouetted against the general gloom — men whom he had been able to contact initially through the network of agents and counter-agents known to him by virtue of his job, men who had had their detailed orders through from Kyakhta the day before.