As they ran down the winding path towards the entrance, Payne spun and unleashed a quick burst of automatic fire, hoping to slow down the goons a little while longer. Blessed with speed and strength, Payne was a rarity among men, an athlete who ran with grace and agility in spite of his size. In a downhill sprint, he knew the odds were pretty good that no one was going to catch him on rough terrain, especially if they were burdened with equipment.
Unfortunately, the same couldn’t be said about Richter, whose stride was hindered by his lack of coordination. If Payne was a thoroughbred, Richter was a plough horse. He was strong and dependable, yet not blessed with speed. Instead of running, Richter lumbered – his feet hitting the ground like heavy hooves, the sound echoing in the canyon. Payne realized that Richter needed as large a head start as possible, so he stopped on the path and fired a few more shots up the hill to buy him time. Then he turned and ran towards the gorge.
The entrance was marked by a wooden hut that had been there for years. Inside, an elderly man sat on a tiny stool, waiting to charge an admission fee. Hard of hearing and barely able to see, he didn’t notice Richter as he rumbled past and ducked into the first tunnel. Nor did he hear the automatic fire from Payne’s rifle or see him sprinting past a few seconds later. In fact, the first time he snapped out of his daze was when a screaming tourist jumped through the hut’s window and hid behind the counter. More confused than scared, the old man looked down at the woman, who was cowering on the floor, and said, ‘That will be two euros.’
Krueger and his goons ran past next. Although they were a few seconds behind, they were quite familiar with the gorge and knew there was plenty of time to catch up. The stone path curved constantly, weaving in and out of dark tunnels that had been carved into the limestone walls. The Partnach River, which flowed so close to the trail that hikers could touch the rapids, and the sheer height of the cliffs would prevent Kaiser’s men from straying. Like everybody else, they’d be forced to stay on the narrow path, a path that tended to clog up at certain junctures. All Krueger had to do was stay close and wait for his opportunity to strike.
Huber jogged beside the trailer as Jones navigated the ATV through the twists and turns that led to the cableway. Once the path straightened out and started to climb the gentle slope of Mount Eckbauer, Huber jumped on back and positioned himself on one of the crates. From there, he watched the woods behind them with his rifle in his hands.
Built in 1956, the Eckbauerbahn stretched 7,020 feet and handled as many as 300 people per hour in each direction. Travelling along an inch-thick steel cable that was supported by twenty-seven towers, the open-air gondolas offered a great view of the valley without the hike. During the descent, a scenic trip that took approximately fourteen minutes, passengers dropped 1,640 feet from the top of the summit to the station below, zipping along at a speed of 8.3 feet per second.
‘We’re almost there,’ Jones called over his shoulder. ‘I’ll pull in right next to the station. When we stop, I’ll need you to talk to the operator.’
‘Yes, sir,’ Huber replied.
The closer they got, the more people they passed along the way. Most of the hikers stopped and stared at the ATV, trying to figure out if these men were responsible for the gunshots they had heard, and whether or not they were dangerous. But Jones managed to ignore them. Used to far worse scrutiny when he had been deployed overseas – particularly in the turbulent streets of Baghdad – Jones kept driving without so much as a sideways glance. That didn’t mean he didn’t see the hikers, because he saw everything around him. It simply meant he didn’t care. As long as they didn’t pull out a camera and take his picture, they could stare all day.
The Eckbauerbahn station was housed in a white two-storey building that resembled a rural church. Nestled beside several pine trees that towered above it, the simple structure was topped with a steep green roof matching the colour of the surrounding grass. Bisecting the lawn was a curved path that curled towards the left side of the building. Jones followed it and parked the trailer next to a short flight of steps that led into the lobby.
Huber hustled inside and came out four minutes later. When he returned, he wasn’t alone. Following him was a large pack of Austrian bodybuilders, who had just ridden the cableway up from Garmisch-Partenkirchen. Dressed in sleeveless shirts and tight shorts, they had overheard Huber’s description of the medical emergency and had offered to help.
Despite the thousands of Arnold Schwarzenegger jokes that floated through Jones’s mind, he kept his tongue in check and politely accepted their offer. With arms the size of legs, the steroid club of Austria carried Kaiser in first, then came out for the cargo. The brute strength these men possessed was nothing short of amazing. Even the crate filled with gold was handled by a single guy, who tossed it around like he had picked up a lunchbox.
Meanwhile, Huber climbed in the first gondola and started his journey down the mountain. He needed to reach the bottom before anyone else, so he could talk to the operator in the valley. After that, Kaiser was strapped into gondola number two and was accompanied by the doctor. The next four gondolas were filled with cargo, one crate in each, before Jones hopped in lucky number seven and was launched out of the station. Unless something strange happened, he knew they would complete their journey in fourteen minutes, which would give them plenty of time to reach the chopper before Payne exited the gorge.
If he exited the gorge.
41
Payne had been in more firefights than Richter, Krueger and the goons combined, but there were certain things that experience couldn’t overcome, such as the inner workings of the human eye. After spending the past several minutes running and shooting in the bright sun, Payne found himself temporarily blind when he sprinted past the iron gate and into the first tunnel.
Carved into the limestone cliff, the narrow corridor lacked artificial lights of any kind. Other than a few beams of sunlight that leaked through a small gap cut into the rock, the passageway was completely dark. Payne skidded to a halt about ten feet inside, just before he slammed into a young couple who were walking hand-in-hand towards the exit. Unwilling to let go of each other’s grasp, they had to turn their bodies sideways and lean against the handrail that had been installed in the jagged wall; otherwise, Payne wouldn’t have had enough room to pass. The tunnel was that narrow.
Forced to temporarily rely on his other senses, Payne focused on the sounds that echoed in the darkness: the trickling of water; the giggling of children; the patter of footsteps. In a matter of seconds, he knew the tranquillity of the gorge would be replaced by the cacophony of war – the screaming, the crying, the gun fire – and it would be up to him to restore calm. Thankfully, he had the expertise to finish the job quickly.
Just before he reached the gap in the rock, the tunnel turned to the right and stretched for more than a hundred feet through the limestone mountain. Along the way, large arches had been cut into the left-hand wall offering intimate views of the Partnach River as it raged through the gorge. People of all ages crowded against the waist-high steel fence, which prevented them from falling into the water even as it splashed their feet and filled their ears with thunder.