Shaw was in the second batch to go up.
The lifts rose swiftly, breathtakingly fast — alarmingly so as the walls of the tower flashed by; but even at their high speed it took them nearly five minutes to reach the top of the tower, the air growing cooler all the time so that sweat dried quickly on their bodies. That tunnel must be deep indeed in the western end where Shaw had descended, for the railway along its latter stretch had risen for nearly the whole of its distance and yet they were still so far from the surface.
At the top of the tower, doors slid open and the workers spilled out of the lift-house onto the wide, flat roof — and into the cold bite of the wind.
Shaw looked round swiftly, taking it all in, the layout and the chances. This was where he had to make his getaway — if he could.
The top of the tower was surrounded by a guardrail, and beyond that was the sea thirty feet below, and then, farther out, the circle of small constructions carrying the defensive boom. If he could get into the water without being spotted he would back himself to swim under the boom all right — the cold wouldn’t be too bad this far off winter conditions — and then make his way to the shore beyond the limits of the military area long before anyone found out what had been going on. If he could get into the water…
That looked utterly impossible now and he had to face it.
The whole of the tower was brilliantly lit from the floods on tall standards at intervals along the guardrails, and there were four observation-posts mounted on the perimeter. These posts were each manned by two guards armed with automatic weapons, and their fire would cover the whole area very adequately indeed. It didn’t look as though he had a hope in hell. Perhaps it would be easier to get away from the shore end after all… but no, that wouldn’t do. Once he was forced to enter some mess-hut or other in that military encampment, someone would realize very quickly that there was a stranger around. He could get away with it — had done so — down on the workings, where all the men were mixed up and wouldn’t know all their mates, but that wouldn’t be possible in the camp. Nor, for that matter, would he be able to cross the wire out of the military area. So it had to be done now — and quickly, before the men were hustled into the line of trucks waiting on the pierhead to drive them shorewards.
He looked round again, almost desperately now, pushing his way nearer the tower’s side through the ranks of workers, the ranks which were thickening as more and more came up from below from the other groups of lifts. It seemed that for some reason — security, no doubt — all the men were being kept together in the floods and under the guns and not allowed into the trucks until the whole lot was up from below. Then Shaw caught sight of something on the wall of the nearer lift-house, just above his head now — a big, square metal projection which looked as if it might be a junction-box.
If it was — then it could conceivably control those floods!
But that didn’t help much; the box was well out of reach.
He was wondering how he could reach it when a bell began clanging, like an action-alarm; for one terrible nightmare second Shaw fancied the whole thing was about to go into action right here and now, that he had been too late. Then the bell stopped and he saw that a Red Army captain had lifted a telephone off a hook. The Russian spoke for fifteen seconds, his face hardening in the glare of the floods, and then he slammed the phone back on the hook and swung round. Voices were stilled as he called for silence, raising a hand, and then he shouted: “The relieved shift will remain here for questioning. One of your number has been murdered.”
Seventeen
At once Shaw, taking advantage of the frightened confusion of the workers, pushed his hand down the front of his trousers, grabbed for the already silenced Webley, flattened himself against the wall of the lift-house, raised the gun and at once fired upward.
He hit the junction-box with his first shot, loosened it, and fired twice more in as many seconds. On the third shot the box disintegrated and there was a sheet of blue lightning which fizzed and crackled over the heads of the frightened mob of workers. All the floods went out together, leaving a total and vibrant blackness behind.
That did it.
Instantly there was complete chaos on the roof, with officers shouting, and men yelling and getting in the way of the officers who hit out at them savagely and indiscriminately with fists and boots and gun-butts. Shaw smashed his way through the mob and reached the guardrail. As he climbed over in the darkness and dived in, losing his gun as he did so, there was a rattle of automatic fire, a long burst followed by screams of agony as the Kalashnikovs’ 7.62 mm. cartridges sprayed into the mass of bodies.
Shaw hit the water cleanly, went into the cold sea with hardly a ripple; keeping well under the surface he swam quickly for the perimeter and the boom. Through the water now he could see a searchlight sweeping the area, probing, like a vengeful finger, a directing beam of death trying to seek out anyone who might have gone over under cover of the panic — he was sure he hadn’t been personally spotted and as things had happened he fancied his chances were more than good. Whoever had been fool enough to give the order to fire was going to regret it soon; because of that mad burst of bullets they could never be sure, now, of what had happened while the lights were out. With luck some bodies would have gone over the side and their numbers would be all to hell.
Inside a minute Shaw was moving below the boom; and then he was fighting for his life as his legs and arms entangled in the heavy steel mesh of an anti-submarine net, which closed over head and body grippingly, like some wicked metal octopus.
Every struggle seemed to make matters worse. He felt that he was being dragged down deeper and deeper into the icy water by steel chains round his feet. His lungs were bursting now; curving himself into a tight ball he freed his head and arms and then he reached down towards his feet, managed at last to get one leg free. Time stood still. Above him the searchlight played on the water, sweeping in an arc, then pencilled back to the tower’s roof. Shaw felt as if he was really done for this time… and then all at once the net moved on some underwater current and he was clear again. Blood drummed in his ears as he kicked himself away from the net and forced himself to go deeper yet, down and down until his ear-drums cracked and he felt sick and giddy, down and down towards the foot of the mesh.
The net seemed to reach to the very bottom of the sea. He couldn’t go on like this for much longer. He made one final effort and went deeper… and then his reaching fingers found the heavy weights at the bottom of the mesh. Pulling himself down, he glided beneath the net, kicked clear again, then let himself go upward as slowly and gently as his bursting lungs would allow.
He wondered how he could ever have done it.
He didn’t know how long he had been underwater when at last he surfaced for a few quick gulps of air — but it must have been quite a time. It was no short stretch from the tower to the boom alone, although his dive had carried him well clear of the tower and he was a strong, fast swimmer. And now he was some distance from the boom itself, making seaward for a while and not hurrying, idling along for the time being to get his wind back.