Then the crackling of a loudspeaker from the MiL above him:
'Major Gant — please put down your weapons. Major Gant — put down your weapons.'
The dogs seemed more alert now. The men had hesitated. He held up the rifle slowly, then threw it aside. He drew the Makarov with his left hand, butt first, and dropped it. The white-clad troops hurried towards him. Beyond them, the second and third MiL-4s slid over the trees and out onto the lake. He hunched his shoulders, thrusting his hands into the pockets of the check jacket. He might have been waiting for a bus. One of the two approaching MiLs settled onto the ice and its rotors slowed.
Ten yards. Seven…
The dogs were quiet, tongues lolling, suspicious and forgiving.
Fourth MiL, rotors hammering, its fuselage slim and knifelike as it banked savagely. The searchlight blinked off him, loping away across the ice as the helicopter above moved as if startled. Gant looked up. Nose-on, closing and dropping swiftly. The Russian troops looked up, halted, uncertain. The dogs growled.
MiL-4…
Sharp-nosed, not round-nosed as it whipped into full silhouette. Concealed markings, not unmarked like the others. Sharp-nosed, and a white-clad form at the open cabin door, gesturing. The MiL that had hung above him sidled towards the newcomer, much as a dog might have investigated a bitch. The newcomer rose rapidly, hopping over the MiL and closing on his still figure on the ice. The form waved. The helicopter danced closer, then away, enticing him.
The second and third MiLs wound up their rotors, both having landed. The airborne MiL-4 swung nose-on, closing. The form bellowed something. He did not know in what language, but it did not seem to be Russian.
Sharp-nosed…
Lynx -
The language was English. He moved his feet, lifted his reluctant legs and began to run. The dogs were up, shaking themselves, moving more quickly than himself. The Lynx helicopter danced slowly away, tempting him to reach it, hovering only feet above the ice. The winch had been swung out of the main cabin and its rescue wire trailed like a black snake across the ice.
He slipped, righted himself, plunged on, arms flailing. One of the dogs snapped at him, leaping at his side. He flung his arm at it, fist clenched. The dog rolled and skidded away. Twenty yards, fifteen -
He kicked out at the second dog — the first was recovering, moving again — missed, kicked again, almost losing his balance. The dog watched for its opportunity. Ten yards. Only ten -
Eight, seven, five… the wire was almost underfoot, the Lynx rising a little so that he could grasp it without bending, be heaved upwards immediately…
The noise of the dogs. Something ripped at his calf, making him stagger. A yard, no more, the face of someone yelling and cursing, firing over his head. The dogs yelping, whining suddenly…
He touched the wire -
Then the helicopter was flung away from him. The ice came up, he was winded, the searchlight came back, something pressed down on him, almost smothering him. He smelt onions, felt hot breathing on his cold face. His head cracked against the ice. He groaned. More dogs, renewed barking, as if they expressed his howl of despair.
He watched the Lynx lift away, the cabin door slam shut, the helicopter hop over the nearer of the two MiLs, skitter like a flung stone towards the trees…
The Russian soldier who had knocked him over in a flying tackle got slowly, heavily to his feet. Despite his efforts, he seemed satisfied. Other faces crowded around him, dipped into the glare of the searchlight. The light began to hurt, dazzling him as if it were being filtered through a diamond. He closed his eyes and lay back. His calf hurt where the dog had torn at it.
He heard the distant noise of the fleeing Lynx and the rotors of a pursuing MiL. Then nothing except the rotors above him, the shudder of the downdraught, the cloud of snow around him, and the sense that he was dreaming…
Dreaming of the Lynx, dreaming that he was being lifted, carried… dreaming…
Waterford slammed the main cabin door of the Lynx with a curse, heaving at it to expel his rage. He locked it furiously, as if breaking into the environment outside rather than making something secure. Then he staggered as the pilot flung the Lynx into a violent alteration of course. He grabbed a handhold and looked out of the cabin window. The lake streamed beneath them. Craning, he could catch the lights of one of the MiLs, a sullen wash upon the ice. Then they were over the trees, and Waterford clambered back into the cockpit, regained his seat and his headset, and strapped himself in. In the co-pilot's mirror, Waterford could see two of the MiLs dropping slowly behind them. The third would be loading Gant aboard and scrambling for home. The Lynx was approaching its top ground-level speed, perhaps forty miles an hour faster than the Russian helicopters.
'We're in Norway,' Gunnar announced casually and without any slowing of the Lynx. 'They will not follow, I think.'
They flashed over car headlights, glaring as they twisted along a north-south road, then the scattered, muffled lights of a small village.
'More important things to do,' Waterford muttered, his hands clenched on his thighs as if gripping something tightly. He could hear himself grinding his teeth. To have missed him by a yard — a yard 'Oh, fuck it!' he raged.
'They've dropped back — shaking sticks at us, I expect, now that we have been seen off the property.' Gunnar chuckled. 'Are you all right, Major!'
'No.'
'You don't like losing?'
'I hate losing.'
'We were too lucky ever to find them — it could not hold.' Gunnar altered course. Two white dots registered on the radar. 'Ah. They are heading east, very quickly now. Soon we will lose track of them, they are very low.' The dots already appeared to lose sharpness, becoming pale smears. There were other smudges on the screen from the general ground-clutter. The MiLs and the Lynx were all too low for effective radar tracking; which had exaggerated their luck in stumbling onto the Russians.
Only to lose him, Waterford thought. 'How long?' he asked.
'A matter of minutes.' Cloud was building above the canopy of the cockpit, the sliver of moon threatened. To the east, it might already be snowing on the Russian border. 'In a few minutes, we can return to the lake.'
'We're all fucked if that plane's in one piece!' Waterford growled.
///
'Well done, Colonel — well done!'
It was difficult not to smile at Andropov's enthusiasm — smile with it, Vladimirov corrected himself. Smile in concert. The War Command Centre was like the scene of a promotion or medal-presentation party, though the guests were not yet drunk. But they had done it — !
'My congratulations, too, Colonel,' Vladimirov added into the microphone. He and Andropov watched one another until they heard the Border Guard commander's reply.
'Thank you, Comrade General — thank you.'
'What of the other helicopter?' Andropov asked Vladimirov. 'It was Norwegian, I presume?'
'The Nimrod knew we were looking. It, too, was looking. We found him. Soon, he will tell us what happened to the MiG-31. What he has done with it.'
Andropov leaned towards the transmitter once more. The operator seemed to flinch slightly from the proximity of the Chairman of the KGB. 'Transfer him to Murmansk with all possible speed, Colonel — then he'll be flown to Moscow He turned away from the transmitter, and added to Vladimirov: 'Midday tomorrow, at the latest. He'll be here by midday.' Andropov removed his spectacles and wiped them. His narrow features sagged. 'It has been a very long day,' he said nonchalantly, 'and now I feel tired.' He suppressed a yawn.