Land of Fire (24 page)

I wedged the knife in deeper and levered hard. There was a snap and the bolt popped out. We held our breath for a few seconds, listening for any sounds of alarm. I had my foot wedged against the door to stop it blowing open in the wind.

"Take your cammies off," I said, struggling out of my whites.

"I'm going to have a leak too."

"Good idea." It might be the last chance we would have for a while. We unzipped and peed into the pile of melting snow by the door. Then I zipped up again, cracked open the door a fraction and peered into the hangar.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

I blinked. I was looking at a scene of incandescent brightness. I had pushed up my night-vision goggles, and after the pitch-blackness of the night outside the glare was dazzling.

The hangar was immense. From outside it had been hard to get a true impression of its real size. We were at the south-east corner and from where we were perched the vast space ran away before our eyes like the Houston Astrodome. The inner walls were painted black or maybe a dark green, I couldn't tell. There must have been at least two hundred great arc lights slung from the gantries running across beneath us. Their blinding glare bounced off the plane and the concrete floor, and the heat thrown back by the reflectors was so immense it was like staring into the sun.

The hangar was huge, but the plane was more awe-inspiring still. I'd seen these big cargo freighters before, even flown on an American Lockheed C-5 Galaxy, but this was the first time I'd seen a plane like this inside a building. The great tail was towards us with its high T-fin practically touching the light arrays. The rear ramp was down and we could glimpse the entrance to a cavernous interior that gaped open like a railroad tunnel. The wings sprouted straight from the plane's back, with the enormous fuselage and the four giant engines slung beneath. The whole effect was of colossal power and strength, and yet with surprising grace in the angle of the swept-back wing and tail surfaces and in the upward-turned wing lets protruding from the wing tips.

"Jesus," I heard Josh whisper behind me, 'a Globemaster."

The name seemed to sum up the massive power and capacity of the beast. This was the next-generation cargo air lifter developed for the US Air Force's Air Mobility Command. Although smaller than the Lockheed C-5, I knew the Globemaster's hold was spacious enough to accommodate the sort of heavy armoured vehicles that even the massive Galaxy would baulk at.

"The R.A.F just leased some of those beauties, "Josh breathed. "Word is they can stick an entire Tornado fighter inside one and fly it 5000 miles at 400 knots, then land on an unimproved airfield less than a thousand metres long."

"The question is," I said, 'how in hell did the Argies get hold of one and what are they going to do with it?"

"With two of them, you mean, "Josh reminded me. "That was its twin brother that went into the hangar next door."

I had pulled the door shut after us. We were crouched on a narrow platform close to the outside wall. Around us were the steel beams and trusses that held up the roof. Below were the lighting arrays and steel joists carrying cranes for lifting heavy equipment. From where we were it was a thirty-metre direct drop to the concrete floor. I held on tight to the platform railing, felt for the UHF handset and pressed the transmit button.

The response was a burst of static in my earpiece.

"Nobby," I said quietly. "Can you hear me? Bleep for yes." More static. I listened for a moment, then shut the set up. It was no use. Maybe some equipment in use down below was interfering with the signal. Or possibly the entire building was hardened against leakage of radio transmissions. Either way we were on our own for the present.

From the platform a spindly ladder led down to a catwalk that looked to run clear across the hangar at main roof level. From that another ladder led down to a similar one serving the lighting gantries at a level three metres above the tops of the main doors. So long as no one climbed up into the roof space, we were completely shielded from view by the glare of the lights.

A heavy electric motor whined into life somewhere down below and a tow cart came into view pulling a two-storey steel gantry. There were other gantries already in position by the tail and next to the wings. A couple of dozen men in white overalls were clambering about the aircraft. Some were servicing the engines while others worked away with long-handled brushes, swabbing down the aluminium skin. Others seemed to be scrubbing away at the camouflage paint job on the hull. They were jabbering away among themselves, clattering equipment and generally creating sufficient noise to cover up any sounds we might have made breaking in. Even if they hadn't been, the drumming of rain on the roof and the booming of the wind gave us all the cover we needed.

"What are they doing?" Josh whispered.

"Drying the aircraft off and repainting it, I think."

"In the middle of the night?"

It seemed strange to me too, but there had to be a reason. I guessed an Argentine air force commander wouldn't worry about turning his men out in the middle of the night to get a plane prepared. I was more concerned over why the Argentines thought they needed a pair of heavy lifters like the one below us.

The mission was starting to make sense. Suppose someone in the MOD or the Foreign Office had got wind of the imminent arrival of the Globemasters? The acquisition of airlift capacity on such a scale might change the balance of power in the South Atlantic. With these planes the Argentines could fly in reinforcements from the mainland in large numbers. A single Globemaster could embark over two hundred fully armed paratroops.

But that didn't make sense. If the Argies needed to ferry troops around they had the use of the state airline's fleet of passenger aircraft take a jumbo jet out of service, pack it full of grunts and fly it down to Rio Grande where the runway was easily long enough. No, there had to be another reason.

An electric polisher started up below. Someone kicked over a tray of tools and the sound echoed off the hangar walls. "I want to get closer," I said, still speaking in a whisper, though at fifty metres' distance with a dozen power tools in operation there was no danger of being overheard. "If we could climb down a level we'd have a less obstructed view."

Josh pointed down the ladder to the catwalk below us and gave me a questioning look. I hesitated. It looked horribly exposed. Then I reflected that was because we were looking down upon it. The catwalk ran above the level of the lighting; from the floor of the hangar it would be invisible. And even if someone did look up and catch the dim shadow of a person moving up there, chances were he would take us for maintenance workers going about their business.

Silently we climbed down the ladder to the next level. No one would pick us out against the dark backdrop of the hangar wall. We reached the catwalk and I put a tentative foot on it. "Fuck!" I said, drawing back.

There was no need to explain. The catwalk was swaying alarmingly. It was suspended on guy wires from the overhead beams and moored at intervals to cross members. The slightest weight set it bouncing and snaking like an Andean rope bridge. Any attempt to cross it would draw the attention of the whole workforce.

"We do this, we'll be spotted before we've gone a dozen steps," Josh said.

We scanned the roof together. "It looks like the team on the starboard side of the aircraft are ahead of the portside lot in whatever it is they're doing," I told Josh. "If we can find a way to crawl around the tail we could get a better look."

"What about the beam above?"

I followed the direction he was looking. The hangar was constructed on a steel skeleton plated over with metal sheeting to form the exterior skin. Massive columns rose from concrete foundations and were joined by horizontal members running the width of the building. One of these ran three metres above where we were crouched, providing anchorage points for the guy wires from which the catwalk was slung. At intervals it was joined by cross beams and trusses supporting the roof peaks, making a complex web of steel designed to resist the incredible winds prevailing in this part of the world.

"If we could crawl out and wedge ourselves in where two of those trusses meet we'd be in clover, "Josh said.

I looked down. It was a hell of a drop. The beam was around ten inches across. If we could sit on that and pull ourselves along we could cross out to the centre of the hangar and look down on to the other side of the plane. It was a long run but no worse than some of the assault courses we'd had to face in our time.

"Come on then, let's get stuck in."

We crossed one at a time to minimise the risk of being spotted. I went first. I settled myself on the beam and locked my legs underneath. It had a convenient lip either side I could grip on to and pull myself along. The outer leg of the first truss was about forty metres along, slanting upwards away from me into one of the roof peaks. I would have to work my way past it somehow. The temptation to look down again was strong but I forced myself to keep my eyes level and concentrate on moving. It felt horribly exposed away from the side of the hangar and I had to keep reminding myself that anyone looking up would see only a glare of lights.

As a kid I'd hated heights, but I've always approached any fear head on, so I took up rock climbing. Eventually I became a mountaineer and even climbed K2 in the Himalayas with Jock, which many in the business rate a harder climb than Everest. I learned to trust my ability to support myself with my own body strength and to break up an ascent into a series of steps.

The truss, when I reached it, was easier to negotiate than I had feared. A crossbeam joined two horizontals at this point and I was able to grip the truss and clamber round to the other side. There was one nerve-jangling point, at which I had to stand on the beam twenty-five metres up and turn myself round in order to face the front again. The smooth surface of the steel made it hard to find a grip, and I was conscious of a hollow sensation in my legs. Relax, I told myself firmly. You know how to do this. I wrapped an arm around the beam, turned around and lowered myself till I was sitting sideways on the beam with an arm still around the upright. Then I swung a leg across and I was settled.

At the fourth truss I waited for Josh to catch up with me. We were now directly over the aircraft, with the huge tail-fin almost beneath us. Josh reached me and heaved himself alongside on the crossbar. Together we spent a long time staring down at the technicians working below.

"What does that new paint job remind you of?" Josh whispered after a while.

"R.A.F European winter overall?"

"That's what it looks like to me too."

The plane had originally been a mix of sandy hues, suggesting an origin from one of the Gulf states, perhaps even Saudi. I watched a man with a long brush smoothing grey paint against a pattern of darker blue. If the plane was to be based down in the South Atlantic it was natural the Argies would want to change. Many nations used similar camo schemes; there was nothing especially sinister about what was happening, except perhaps the haste with which it was being carried out.

"Let's edge out a bit further and see if we can spot the insignia to tell us which unit it belongs to now."

I had to force myself to lead the way this time. The further out we went, the longer the distance to get back. A cold sweat was pouring off my body and my hands were slippery with moisture. I tried not to think about how easy it would be to slip sideways off the beam. I pictured myself hanging on with my fingers, arms at full stretch, and the sickening moments before my hold slipped and I crashed down to the concrete below. Perhaps if I were lucky I would break my fall on one of the lighting arrays.

Josh seemed unaffected. He shuffled along behind me as if he was enjoying it.

We did two more trusses before I called a halt again. It was now possible to see the starboard side of the plane clearly. The Argentines were using big electric fan heaters to dry the fresh paint, and the draughts of warm air and fumes wafted up to where we squatted on the beams. I watched a man on a high gantry stencilling some kind of insignia on to the side of the tail-fin. It was evidently an important job because there was an officer with him, supervising.

The painter put the finishing touches to the task and removed the stencil. He and the officer stepped back a pace to observe his handiwork. I could see their hands gripping the safety rail of the gantry behind them. The job was evidently important because the two men spent a while discussing it, pointing out details to one another. Finally, at the officer's direction, the painter took up his brush again and added more colour to the central section.

The vertical angle of the fin made it hard to distinguish the design. I leaned out to get a better view but the swept-back T-section of the upper tail obscured my vision. "Josh," I said softly the gantry where the men were standing was only some ten metres below us and we could be overheard now. "Josh, see if you can crawl out along that crossbeam and get a squint of that insignia."

"Sure thing." Like an acrobat he swung himself round the base of the truss to drop down on to the beam. Then cautiously he began to crawl outwards in the direction of the door. The plane had been towed in at a slight angle, and by getting further out he should be able to see the device on the tail-fin clearly. As he got into position I saw him peer downward, his brow furrowed as he tried to make out the design.

The painter was still stooped at his work and the officer was consulting a ring binder with photographs of aircraft identification marks, the kind of thing all services keep around for information on their own aircraft and those of other nations. All of us on the mission had studied similar recognition shots of Argy planes before setting out.

The painter finished what he was doing and stepped back again. He was quite young and, unusually for a South American, he was fair-haired. I saw Josh's face clear momentarily as he got an unobstructed view of the fin at last. Then abruptly he stiffened. He stared again, long and hard. I saw his lips move as he memorised the markings. Then very carefully he began to work his way backwards along the crossbeam towards where I was waiting.