`They must have gone mad,' Beck said hoarsely.
He reached for the walkie-talkie to contact Lachenal, then dropped the instrument back in his lap. Newman shook his head in agreement. There simply wasn't time to reach Lachenal. Always supposing the officer was tuned in to the agreed waveband.
`No time for Lachenal,' Newman warned.
Know…'
The gun barrel seemed to move in slow motion, remorselessly. Originally it had pointed at the sky. Now it had lost half that elevation. Now it only had a few more degrees to lose before they would be staring straight at that diabolical nozzle.
Nancy glanced at Leupin, a tall, thin-faced man. His face was moist with sweat. He seemed hypnotized by the inevitable descent of the huge tube. Still gazing ahead, he reached out his left hand and grasped her arm, an attempt to bring her a little comfort.
`Hold on tight!' Beck shouted suddenly.
He released the brake and rammed down his foot on the accelerator. The Audi shot forward down the icy road, skidded, recovered its equilibrium under Beck's iron control as they went on speeding towards the tank which was growing enormously in size as it rushed towards them through the windscreen. The gun tip was almost facing them. Newman had a horrible preview of the huge shell hitting. A fraction of a second and the explosion would be ripping through metal, tearing apart flesh, incinerating it in one horrendous inferno under the hammer-blow force of the detonation.
Beck, facial muscles tensed, drove on – passed underneath the gun barrel extending far beyond the tank's chassis. He jammed on the brakes. Although braced, everyone inside the car jerked forward. Beck had stopped within inches of the massive caterpillar tracks. It was no longer possible to fire the cannon. He snatched up the walkie-talkie.
`Lachenal! Are you there? Good. What the fucking hell are you trying to do. There's a bloody great tank which aimed its gun at us. I'm in direct radio communication with Berne. They've heard it all. Get this piece of scrap metal out of my way. Tell it to back off, clear the road… Do you read me…?'
`I've been trying to call you…' The strain in Lachenal's voice came clearly over the walkie-talkie. 'You kept talking. It's all a mistake. Kobler is waiting in a car to speak to you. The tank was to stop you driving past him. He caught me at the main exit from the Clinic.
`Tell Kobler to go jump off a cliff,' Beck rapped back as he reversed the car a few inches, using one hand to drive. 'I'm telling you just once more. Tell that tank commander to back off. There will be an enquiry…'
`I've already given the order,' Lachenal reported when he came back on the walkie-talkie. 'You must understand there are manoeuvres…'
`Dr Bruno Kobler's manoeuvres?'
That silenced Lachenal. They sat without speaking as the Leopard began its reverse movement, its tracks grinding ponderously as the commander backed it and turned it up a fork road just behind him. Beck glanced in the rear view mirror and briefly saluted the driver of the ambulance to show him the crisis was over. As soon as the road was open he shot forward, turning left away from the Leopard and downhill on the road which led to the motorway.
Twenty-Two
`I think, Bob, I should explain Dr Kennedy's presence,' Beck said as he drove along the motorway. 'One of my men – Leupin, in fact, who is sitting behind me – was watching the Bellevue Palace when he saw her leaving. He asked her to wait and called me. It is only two minutes by car from my office – using the siren,' he added with a ghost of a smile.
`I told you on no account to go anywhere, Nancy… Newman began.
`Please!' Beck interjected. 'Let me finish. Her help back there at the gateway was invaluable. She told me she had received an urgent phone call from the Berne Clinic. Her grandfather had taken a turn for the worse. I persuaded her to come back with me to the hotel and I called Dr Kobler. He said they had made no such call, that Jesse Kennedy was fast asleep. We still don't know who tried to lure her out. I was on the way to the Clinic myself and she agreed to come with me in the police car. I thought it best to keep an eye on her…'
`What took you to the Clinic tonight of all nights?' `I have someone inside,' Beck replied cryptically. `Who?'
`You, as a foreign correspondent, are in the habit of revealing your sources?' Beck enquired in a mocking tone. `We drove past the main gateway to that second gate…'
`Which was open,' Newman commented.
`I opened it myself. In the boot is a pair of strong wireclippers I used on the padlock chain. Quite illegal, of course, but we could see that poor woman fleeing for the gate. Afterwards, I locked it again with an identical padlock I had taken the precaution of bringing with me.'
`You seem amazingly well-organized,' Newman remarked.
`I know the file on Hannah Stuart backwards. I told you of a certain witness I can't use. Afterwards, I paid a visit to that gate from the laboratory and noticed the type of padlock used. I was banking on a second opportunity – although I did not foresee the consequences would be so tragic.'
`What are you going to do?'
`First, you must realize everything I have told you has to be in the strictest confidence. I am walking a tight-rope – I explained that to you also. Now, we are proceeding with the ambulance to the morgue. I have already alerted poor Anna Kleist who will lose yet another night's sleep. But I wish her to hear Dr Kennedy's diagnosis. And you should be thanking her for being there – not chastising her!'
`You are grateful for her help?'
`Yes!' Beck settled himself more comfortably behind the wheel. They had passed the turn-off to Belp and would soon be approaching the outskirts of Berne. He glanced in his rear-view mirror before continuing. 'Dr Kennedy completely neutralized any authority Lachenal might have asserted by her diagnosis of asphyxiation and possible cyanosis. That made it potential homicide. That put it in my court. That check-mated Lachenal…'
`There is some borderline between yourself and Military Intelligence, I gather?'
`Yes. Tricky on occasion. Officially we always cooperate. We are both concerned with the security of the state. A very flexible phrase. If Lachenal could have made out a case that it concerned counter-espionage the dead woman would have been his. Once it became homicide, even suspected, I had him.'
`I suppose as regards Nancy I should really thank you… `You really should!'
Newman glanced in his own wing mirror and then turned as though to speak to Nancy. The ambulance had dropped back to give reasonable clearance. Some distance behind it was a red streak, a Porsche. He wondered whether Beck had seen it.
`I hate the stink of these places,' Newman remarked without thinking as they sat round a table drinking coffee. 'And an empty stomach doesn't help…'
`There you go again!' Nancy flared in a sudden rage. `Anything to do with a medical atmosphere and you're off – and maybe that includes doctors, too?' she ended savagely.
`We are all tired,' Beck intervened. He clasped Nancy's hand affectionately. 'And we have all had a series of most unnerving shocks.' He glanced at Newman. 'Maybe the best solution would be not to take him with you when you visit patients,' he suggested humorously.
They were sitting in the ante-room of the morgue and they had been quarantined there for a long time. At least, that was how Newman termed it to himself. There was the usual smell of strong disinfectant. The walls, painted white, were bare. There was the minimum of furniture. The single window was frosted glass so there was nothing to look out at in the street beyond.
`Anna does a thorough job,' Beck remarked to break the new silence which had descended on their conversation. am sure she will be here soon…'
Dr Anna Kleist, the pathologist, had been waiting to examine the body of the unknown woman as soon as they arrived. Beck had made brief introductions between Nancy and Kleist, who had asked no questions before she disappeared. Newman had just stood up to stretch his legs when the door opened and Anna Kleist appeared. She addressed herself to Nancy.