The Collected Short Stories of Louis L'Amour, Volume Four (65 page)

T
HROUGH IT ALL
, Arseniev had said nothing. And Arseniev was supposed to be his friend! The thought was still puzzling him when he became conscious of the drumming of a motor. Looking to the runway, not sixty feet away, he saw a small pursuit ship. The motor was running, it had been running several minutes, and no one was anywhere near.

He glanced around quickly. There was no one in sight. His captors were at least a dozen feet away and appeared to be paying no attention. Their guns were buttoned under their tunics. It was the chance of a lifetime. He took another quick glance around, set himself for a dash to the plane. Then his muscles relaxed under a hammering suspicion.

It was too easy. The scene was too perfect. There wasn’t a flaw in this picture anywhere. Deliberately, he stopped, waiting for his guards to catch up. As he half turned, waiting, he saw a rifle muzzle projecting just beyond the corner of a building. Even as he looked, it was withdrawn.

He broke into a cold sweat. He would have been dead before he’d covered a dozen feet! Someone was out to get him. But who? And why?

The attitude of his captors changed suddenly, they dropped their careless manner, and came up alongside.

“Quick!” Olentiev snapped. “You loafer. You murderer. We’ll show you. A firing squad you’ll get for what you did to Lutvin!”

Turk Madden said nothing. He was taken to the prison and shoved into a cell. The room was of stone, damp and chilly. There was straw on the floor, and a dirty blanket. Above him, on the ground level, was a small, barred window.

He looked around bitterly.

“Looks like you’re behind the eight ball, pal!” he told himself. “Framed for a murder, and before they get through, you’ll be stuck.”

He walked swiftly across the cell, leaped, and seized the bars. They were strong, thicker than they looked. A glance at the way they were set into the concrete told him there was no chance there. He lay down on the straw and tried to think. Closing his eyes, he let his mind wander back over the pictures. Something. There had been something there. If he only knew!

But although the pictures were clear in his mind, he could remember nothing. Thinking of that lonely stretch of coast brought another picture to his mind. Before his trip to pick up Arseniev from the coast of Japan he had consulted charts of both coasts carefully. There was something wrong in his mind. Something about his memory of the chart of the coast and the picture of the coast near the Nahtohu River didn’t click.

T
HE DAY PASSED SLOWLY
. The prison sat near the edge of a wash or gully on the outskirts of town. The bank behind the prison, he had noticed, was crumbling. If he could loosen one of the floor-stones—it was only a chance, but that was all he asked.

Shadows lengthened in the cell, then it was dark, although the light through the window was still gray. Pulling back the straw, he found the outline of a stone block.

The prison was an old building, put together many years ago, still with a look of seasoned strength. Yet time and the elements had taken their toll. Water had run in through the ground-level window, and it had drained out through a hole on the low side. But in running off, it had found the line of least resistance along the crack in the floor. Using the broken spoon with which he was to eat, he began to work at the cement. It crumbled easily, but the stone of the floor was thick.

Four hours passed before he gave up. He had cut down over three inches all around, but still the block was firm, and the handle of his spoon would no longer reach far enough. For a long time he lay still, resting and thinking. Outside all was still, yet he felt restless. Someone about the airport wanted him dead. Someone here was communicating with the man who wore the
unty,
who had fired at him with the old Berdianka in the mountains. Whoever that person was would not rest until, he, Turk Madden, was killed.

That person would have access to this prison, and if he were killed, in the confusion of war, not too much attention would be paid. Arseniev had been his only real friend here, and Arseniev had sat quietly and said nothing. Chevski was efficiency personified. He was interested only in the successful functioning of the port.

But it was more than his own life that mattered. Here, at this key port, close to the line that carried supplies from Vladivostok to the western front, an enemy agent could do untold damage. Lutvin had discovered something, had become suspicious. Flying to the coast, he had photographed something the agent did not want known. Well, what?

At least, if he could not escape, he could think. What would there be on the coast that a man could photograph? A ship could be moved, so it must be some permanent construction. An airport? Turk sat up restlessly. Thinking was all right, but action was his line. He sat back against the wall and stared at the block of stone. The crack was wide. Suddenly, he forced both heels into the crack, and, bracing himself against the wall, pushed.

The veins swelled in his forehead, his palms pressed hard against the floor, but he shoved, and shoved hard. Something gave, but it was not the block against which he pushed. It was the wall behind him. He struggled to his feet, and turned. It was much too dark to see, but he could feel.

His fingers found the cracks in the stones, and his heart gave a great leap. The old wall was falling apart, the cheap cement crumbling. What looked so strong was obviously weak. The prison had been thrown together by convict labor eighty years before, or so he had been told. He seized his spoon and went to work.

I
N A MOMENT
, he had loosened a block. He lifted it out and placed it on the floor beside him. What lay beyond? Another cell? He shrugged. At least he was busy. He took down another block, another, and then a fourth. He crawled through the hole, then carefully, shielding it with his hands, struck a match.

His heart sank. He was in a cell, no different from his own. He rose to his feet and tiptoed across to the door. He took the iron ring in his hand and turned. It moved easily, and the door swung open!

A faint movement in the shadowy hall outside stopped him. Carefully, he moved himself into the doorway, and glanced along the wall.

He caught his breath. A dark figure crouched before his own door and, slowly, carefully, opened it!

Like a shadow, the man straightened, and his hand slipped into his shirt front, coming out with a long knife. Turk’s eyes narrowed. In two quick steps he was behind the man. There must have been a sound, for the man turned, catlike. Turk Madden’s fist exploded on the corner of the man’s jaw like a six-inch shell, and the fellow crumpled. Madden stepped in, hooking viciously to the short ribs. He wet his lips. “That’ll hold you, pal,” he muttered.

Stooping, he retrieved the knife. Then he frisked the man carefully, grinned when he found a Tokarev automatic and several clips of cartridges. He pocketed them, then turned the man over. He was a stranger. Carefully, noticing signs of returning consciousness, he bound and gagged the man, then closed the cell door on him, and locked it. Returning to the cell from which he had escaped, he put the stones back into place, then put the key out of sight on a stone ledge above the door.

Turning, he walked down the hall. The back door was not locked, and he went out into the night. For an instant, he stood still. He was wondering about his own ship. He knew what there was to do. He had to fly to the coast and see for himself. He thought he knew what was wrong, but on the other hand—

Also, there was the business of Lutvin’s killer. He had flown a plane. He might still be there, and if he saw the Grumman—

Turk Madden smiled grimly. He crossed the open spaces toward the hangars, walking swiftly. Subterfuge wouldn’t help. If he tried slipping around he would surely be seen. The direct approach was best. A sleepy sentry stared at him, but said nothing. Turk opened the small door and walked in.

Instantly, he faded back into the shadows inside the door. Not ten feet away Commissar Chevski was staring at Shan Bao. The Manchu faced him, standing stiffly.

“This ship’s motors are warm!” Chevski said sharply.

“Yes, comrade,” Shan Bao said politely. “The Colonel Granatman said to keep it warm, he might wish to use it for a flight.”

“A flight?” Chevski said. He looked puzzled. From the shadows, Turk could hear his heart pounding as he sensed what was coming. “What flight?”

“Along the coast,” the Manchu said simply. “He said he might want to fly along the coast.”

Chevski leaned forward tensely.

“The
coast
? Granatman said that?” He stared at Shan Bao. “If you’re lying…” He wheeled and strode from the hangar. As he stepped past Turk, his breath was coming hard, and his eyes were dilated.

T
HE INSTANT
the door closed, Shan Bao’s eyes turned to Turk.

“We must work fast, comrade. It was a lie.”

Madden stepped out.

“A shrewd lie. He knows something, that one.” Turk hesitated, then he looked at the Manchu. “You don’t miss much. Have you seen a man with a Berdianka? You know, one of those old model rifles. You know, with a
soshki
? One of those wooden props to hold up the barrel?”

“I know,” Shan Bao nodded. “There was one. A man named Batoul, a half-breed, has one. He meets frequently with Comrade Chevski in the woods. He threw it away this day. Now he has a new rifle.”

“So,” Turk smiled. “The ship is warmed up?”

Shan Bao nodded.

“I have started it every hour since you were taken and have run the motor for fifteen minutes. I thought you might need it. Did you have to kill many men getting away?”

“Not one.” Turk smiled. “I’m getting in. When I give the word, start the motor that opens the doors. I’ll be going out.”

Shan Bao nodded. “You did not kill even one? Leave the door open in the cabin. I shall go with you. I was more fortunate—I killed one.”

Turk sprang into the Grumman. The motors roared into life. Killed one? Who? He waved his hand, and the doors started to move, then the Manchu dashed over. He crawled into the plane as it started to move. From outside there was a startled shout, then the plane was running down the icy runway. A shot, but the Grumman was beginning to lift. Another shot. Yells, they were in the air.

He banked the amphibian in a tight circle and headed for the mountains. They’d get him, but first he’d lead them to the coast, he’d let them see for themselves that something was wrong.

In the east, the skies grew gray with dawn. The short night was passing. Below him the first ridges of the mountains slid past, dark furrows in a field of snow.

Shan Bao was at his shoulder. Two planes showed against the sky where he pointed. Turk nodded. Two—one was bad enough when it was a fast pursuit job. One was far ahead of the other.

Madden’s eyes picked out the gray of the sea, then he turned the plane north along the coast to the mouth of the Nahtohu. That was the place—and that long reeflike curving finger. That was it.

Ahead of him a dark plane shot up from the forest and climbed in tight spirals, reaching for altitude. Turk’s jaws set. That was the plane that got Lutvin. He fired a trial burst from his guns and pulled back on the stick. The two planes rose together. Then the pursuit ship shot at him, guns blazing.

Turk’s face was calm, but hard. He banked steeply, swinging the ship around the oncoming plane, opening fire with all his guns.

S
UDDENLY THE GRAY LIGHT
of dawn was aflame with blasting guns as the two ships spun and spiraled in desperate combat. Teeth clenched, Turk spun the amphibian through a haze of maneuvers, side-slipping, diving, and squirming from position to position, his guns ripping the night apart with streaks of blasting fire. Tracers streamed by his nose, then ugly holes sprang into a wing, then he was out of range, and the streaking black ship was coming around at him again.

In desperation, Turk saw he had no chance. No man in an amphibian had a chance against a pursuit plane unless the breaks were with him. Like an avenging fury, the black ship darted in and around him. Only Turk’s great flying skill, his uncanny judgment of distance, and his knowledge of his ship enabled him to stay in the fight.

Suddenly, he saw the other two planes closing in. It was now or never. He spun the ship over in a half-roll, then shoved the stick all the way forward and went screaming for earth with the black ship hot on his tail. Fiery streams of tracer shot by him. His plane shot down faster and faster.

The black, ugly ridges of the mountains swept up at him. Off to one side he saw the black shoulder of a peak he remembered, saw the heavy circle of cloud around it and knew this was his chance. He pulled the Grumman out of the power-dive so quickly he expected her wings to tear loose, but she came out of it and lifted to an even keel.

Then, straight into that curtain of cloud around the mountain he went streaking, the black pursuit ship hot on his tail. He felt the ship wobble, saw his compass splash into splinters of glass as a bullet struck, then the white mist of the cloud was around him, and he pulled back on the stick. The Grumman shot up, and even as it zoomed, Turk saw the black, glistening shoulder of icy black mountain sweep below him. He had missed it by a fraction of an inch.

Below him as he glanced down he saw the streaking pursuit ship break through the cloud, saw the pilot grab frantically at his stick. Then the ship crashed full tilt into the mountain at three hundred miles an hour, blossomed into flame and fell, tangled, burning wreckage into the canyon below.

The Grumman lifted toward the sky, and Turk Madden’s eyes swept the horizon. Off to the south, not a half mile away, the two Russian ships were tangled in a desperate dogfight.

O
PENING THE
G
RUMMAN UP
, he roared down on them at full tilt. Shan Bao crouched in his seat, the straps tight about his body, his face stiff and cold. In his hands he clutched a Thompson machine gun. The nearer ship he recognized instantly. It was the specially built Havoc flown by Arseniev. The other—