Running Blind. Desmond Bagley
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sat by the window. The short northern night was almost over but it was still dark enough to see the sudden glow from the alley across the street as the watching man drew on a cigarette.
He worried me because I was no longer certain Elin was safe.
III
We were both up early, Elin because she wanted to make a quick start for Akureyri, and I because I wanted to get at the Land-Rover before Elin did. I had some things to stow in the Land-Rover that I didn’t want Elin to know about; Lindholm’s gun, for instance. I taped it securely to one of the main chassis girders and well out of sight. His cosh I put in my pocket. It had occurred to me that if things did not go well I might be in need of weaponry in Akureyri.
I didn’t have to go out of the front door to get at the Land-Rover because the garage was at the back, and so the watcher in the alley got no sight of me. But I saw him because the next thing I did was to take a pair of field glasses one flight up to a landing where there was a window overlooking the street.
He was a tall, lean man with a neat moustache and he looked cold. If he had been there all night without a break he would be not only frozen to the marrow but starving. I made sure I would know him again if I saw him and lowered the glasses just as someone came downstairs from an upstairs flat. It was a middle-aged grey-haired woman who looked at me and then at the glasses and gave a meaningful sniff.
I grinned. It was the first time I had been suspected of voyeurism.
I enjoyed breakfast all the more because of my hungry friend across the street. ‘You’re looking more cheerful,’ said Elin.
‘It’s your cooking,’ I said.
She looked at the herring, the cheese, the bread and the eggs. ‘What cooking? Anyone can boil an egg.’
‘Not like you,’ I assured her.
But I was more cheerful. The dark thoughts of the night had gone and in spite of all the unanswered questions the death of Lindholm no longer oppressed me. He had tried to kill me and failed, and had suffered the penalty for failure. The fact that I had killed him didn’t weigh too heavily upon my conscience. My only lingering worry was for Elin.
I said, ‘There’s a flight for Akureyri from Reykjavik City Airport at eleven.’
‘You’ll have lunch there,’ said Elin. ‘Spare a thought for me bouncing about down in Kaldidalur.’ She swallowed hot coffee hastily. ‘I’d like to leave as soon as possible.’
I waved at the laden table. ‘I’ll clean up here.’
She got ready to leave, then picked up the binoculars. ‘I thought these were in the Land-Rover.’
‘I was just checking them,’ I said. ‘They seemed a bit out of focus last time I used them. They’re all right, though.’
‘Then I’ll take them,’ she said.
I went with her down to the garage and kissed her goodbye. She looked at me closely, and said, ‘Everything is all right, isn’t it, Alan?’
‘Of course; why do you ask?’
‘I don’t really know. I’m just being feminine, I suppose. See you in Akureyri.’
I waved her off and watched as she drove away. Nobody seemed to bother; no heads popped around corners and no one followed in hot pursuit. I went back into the flat and checked on the watcher in the alley. He wasn’t to be seen, so I made a mad dash for the upstairs landing from where I could get a better view and I breathed easier when I saw him leaning against the wall, beating his hands against his arms.
It would seem that he was not aware that Elin had left or, if he was, he didn’t care. It lifted a considerable load off my mind.
I washed the breakfast crockery and then went to my room where I took a camera bag and emptied it of its contents. Then I took the hessian-covered steel box and found that it fitted neatly into the leather bag. From now on it was not going to leave my person until I handed it over in Akureyri.
At ten o’clock I rang for a taxi and left for the airport, a move which resulted in some action. I looked back along the street and saw a car draw up near the alley into which my watcher jumped. The car followed the taxi all the way to the airport, keeping a discreet distance.
On arrival I went to the reservation counter. ‘I have a reservation on the flight to Akureyri. My name is Stewart.’
The receptionist checked a list. ‘Oh, yes; Mr Stewart.’ She looked at the clock. ‘But you’re early.’
‘I’ll have a coffee,’ I said. ‘It passes the time.’
She gave me the ticket and I paid for it, then she said, ‘Your luggage is weighed over there.’
I touched the camera case. ‘This is all I have. I travel light.’
She laughed. ‘So I see, Mr Stewart. And may I compliment you on how you speak our language.’
‘Thank you.’ I turned and saw a recognized face lurking close by – my watcher was still watching. I ignored him and headed for the coffee-counter where I bought a newspaper and settled down to wait.
My man had a hurried conversation at the reservation counter, bought a ticket, and then came my way and both of us ignored each other completely. He ordered a late breakfast and ate ravenously, his eyes flicking in my direction infrequently. Presently I had a stroke of luck; the announcement loudspeaker cleared its throat and said in Icelandic, ‘Mr Buchner is wanted on the telephone.’ When it repeated this in fluent German my man looked up, got to his feet, and went to answer the call.
At least I could now put a name to him, and whether the name was accurate or not was really immaterial.
He could see me from the telephone-box and spoke facing outwards as though he expected me to make a break for it. I disappointed him by languidly ordering another coffee and becoming immersed in a newspaper account of how many salmon Bing Crosby had caught on his latest visit to Iceland.
In airport waiting lounges time seems to stretch interminably and it was a couple of eons before the flight to Akureyri was announced. Herr Buchner was close behind me in the queue and in the stroll across the apron towards the aircraft, and he chose a seat on the aisle just behind me.
We took off and flew across Iceland, over the cold glaciers of Langjökull and Hofsjökull, and soon enough we were circling over Eyjafjördur preparatory to landing at Akureyri, a city of fully ten thousand souls, the metropolis of Northern Iceland. The aircraft lurched to a halt and I undid my seat-belt, hearing the answering click as Buchner, behind me, did the same.
The attack, when it came, was made with smoothness and efficiency. I left the airport building and was walking towards the taxi rank when suddenly they were all about me – four of them. One stood in front of me and grabbed my right hand, pumping it up and down while babbling in a loud voice about how good it was to see me again and the enormous pleasure it would give him to show me the marvels of Akureyri.
The man on my left crowded hard and pinned my left arm. He put his mouth close to my ear, and said in Swedish, ‘Don’t make trouble, Herr Stewartsen; or you will be dead.’ I could believe him because the man behind me had a gun in my back.
I heard a snip and turned my head just as the man on my right cut through the shoulder-strap of the camera case with a small pair of shears. I felt the strap snake loose and then he was gone and the camera case with him, while the man behind me took his place with one arm thrown carelessly over my shoulder and the other digging the gun into my ribs.
I could see Buchner standing by a taxi about ten yards away. He looked at me with a blank face and then turned and bent to get into the car. It drove away and I saw the white smudge of his face as he looked through the back window.
They kept up the act for two minutes more to give the man with the camera