They passed the building on the dock that held one of the Norwegian groups. Ryng once again waved to the guard in a friendly manner. He guided the jeep through the one main street, then turned off toward the old fishing pier outside of town.
The smooth gravel surface ended abruptly. Without warning, they were moving much too fast down a dirt path just wide enough for two wheels. The jeep bounced over a rock into the air, plunging down hard on the other side. Wally screamed with an unearthly wail, doubling over in agony, his body awash with the pain that had eluded him until then.
“Keep going,” he moaned between his teeth, his head turned to Ryng. “Get this son of a bitch to that pier, to the morphine!” he shouted in the next breath, his features contorted through waves of pain. The comfortable refuge of shock had left him. Then the spasms of agony brought a merciful loss of consciousness. Denny reached over the seat and held his shoulders until they pulled up beside the fishing shack.
They laid Wally gently on the floor of the shack. Blood pulsed heavily across his stomach, steadily pumping life out of his body. Denny, the team medic, administered the morphine first, then listened to the heart, checked the blood pressure, and finally cleaned the wound enough to determine the damage.
“Forget it, Bernie. Gut shot, not a chance.”
“Will he come around again?”
“He might. He’s lost so much blood already, I wonder if he’s got enough strength left to open his eyes.” He felt the pulse. “Hardly enough left to take a breath, Bernie.”
“Can you do anything for him?”
“Yeah. Another few hundred cc’s and Wally Land will disappear without a thought in the world.”
Ryng’s knuckles whitened perceptibly. “We’re down to minutes ourselves.” There were only so many people on the whole damned island, and the Russians would know there were no Norwegians that could mount an operation like the one that had just taken place. They had just minutes to escape. Ryng nodded, his eyes avoiding Denny’s. Wally Land’s face was tranquil when they left him in the shack. They crawled down under the old pier, making their way between broken-down pilings and remnants of fishing gear to the rubber boat. Their only purpose now was to escape — to survive. They kept two automatic rifles, their pistols, and a few fragmentation grenades. Everything else — food, medicine, electronic gear — was dumped. Ryng kept his radio.
They pushed off from the pier simultaneous with a succession of explosions from the direction of the airport. They could see tall, greasy tongues of flame erupting into the sky — burning aviation fuel. So much for the bombers. If Harry Winters was successful with that freighter…
The electric motor purred inaudibly. Christ, Ryng thought impatiently, I couldn’t care less about how quiet the engine is. All that matters now is speed. I’d take it big and noisy and fast, anything to get us the hell out of here. Silently and with agonizing slowness, the little motor pushed them across the harbor toward the opposite shore. They would follow the coastline as far as they could. If they were followed, then they’d just have to move ashore and somehow get back to civilization overland.
The day was clear and crisp, barely a cloud in sight. It was a perfect arctic autumn day. After months of perpetual daylight, the harbor would soon begin its annual season of darkness. How lovely it would have been to have conducted this operation under that kind of cover, Ryng thought. But then it would have been forty below zero, the arctic winds would have frozen Denny’s fingers as he tried to set his bombs, and the harbor would have been frozen solid.
The familiar noise of a helicopter in the distance snapped Ryng out of his momentary reverie. Perhaps if they had been on land, they could have hidden, but there was no way they could escape the helo that was moving slowly in their direction. The rhythmic thrum of the engine swept across the water, the bass-drum boom magnifying as it rebounded between the peaks on either side of the harbor.
The helo swept back and forth in a zigzag pattern, unsure of what it was looking for, what it might find. In the small boat, the two men placed their rifles on automatic, laying their extra magazines within easy reach. The AK-74 was terrific for what they had done earlier, but it was next to useless against a helicopter — even with incredible luck.
Quite unexpectedly, a deep rumbling from the direction of the harbor mouth caught their attention for an instant. It started like distant thunder, a low growling on the horizon. Lasting no more than two seconds, the rumble became a thunderclap echoing up the harbor, oscillating between the peaks on either side. Beyond the harbor, rising in oily black clouds that rolled over and through one another, came the proof to Ryng that Harry Winters had completed his part of the bargain. There was no doubt in Ryng’s mind that Harry had pulled it off.
“Harry…” Denny offered tentatively.
“Yeah,” Ryng responded. “He’s never missed yet.” A low whistle escaped from his pursed lips.
“I hope he made it—” he began, but Ryng cut him off, gesturing toward the helo.
Ryng headed for the shore on an angle. A wide, glacial river poured into the harbor ahead of them. There would be no way they could cross that if they went ashore on this side of it. He had to get to the other side, and he needed time and something other than the quiet little electric motor that pushed them sluggishly along. It didn’t seem so slow when we came in here, Ryng reminded himself, but no one was after us then. He looked over his shoulder as the helo closed in. It had spotted them.
They both recognized the telltale increase in pitch and knew without looking that they’d been seen. The helo banked as it changed course in their direction, lowering altitude to inspect what had been sighted.
The first pass was free. As the craft hovered just ahead of them, they fired together. It seemed a foolish venture, handheld guns pumping small antipersonnel bullets into a huge metal machine. Three clips each were expended senselessly while the helo backed off to a safe distance.
Ryng swung the boat toward shore. They’d be easy targets on shore — but they were sitting ducks in the boat.
Raucous noise shattered the peaceful arctic calm. Either man could have described the developing scene if he had been blind. Once again the increase of engine revolutions, the thwack of the rotors. The helo was making another pass at them. They waited with loaded clips, bobbing along like toy ducks at a shooting range.
Even before the helo came within range of their rifles, the chatter of machine gun fire added a new dimension to the sounds of the harbor. Foamy trails, punctuated by tiny fountains of water, heralded the path of the bullets, racing first one way and then another. But Ryng realized they had one advantage. The machine guns were attached to a vehicle hanging in the air, swinging as if on a thread, making it more difficult to aim. The trails continued to sweep aimlessly across the water, leaving a white froth behind them.
Ryng whipped the little boat about frantically with one arm — anything to provide a harder target — while he fired wildly with the other. In the hail of bullets, Denny was transformed into a madman, emptying clip after clip when the helo came anywhere within range. As he expended the last shot in a clip, he would yank it out, inserting one clenched between his teeth, mechanically jamming another in his mouth even as he began squeezing the trigger.