wave. However, I understand those tsunami tend to increase in height as the
water shallows. We shall see.’
There wasn’t, in fact, much to sec. With the wave less than a hundred
metres from land, the commentator estimated its height as just under a
metre, which was pretty much in accordance with the scientists’
predictions. Samuelson gestured for the set to be switched off.
‘A few wet feet, no more,’ he said. ‘And not a life lost. An impressive
performance, wouldn’t you say, Mr Danilov?
‘Most impressive.’ True, probably not a life had been lost. Not that day.
But the years to come might well record a different story: the radio-active
fall-out would have fallen or would be falling over the already
flood-beleaguered Flevolands. But it hardly seemed an appropriate moment to
point this out to Samuelson.
Samuelson said: ‘Romero, radio the message to the Haringvliet dam.
Emphasize the need for absolute radio silence. Where the devil are those
two who went in search of Ylvisaker
3o6
and his friends?’Nobody knew where the devil they were. ‘Five good men lost
to me. Five!’
‘It’s annoying, Mr Samuelson,.’ Vasco said. ‘And worrisome. But it can have
no effect on the outcome. We have seventeen men. With the element of total
surprise in our favour I could guarantee to take the Haringvliet with only
four men.’
Samuflson smiled. ‘That’s a comfort. We leave in twenty minutes.’
They left in twenty minutes. All the soldiers were armed, all carried either
rucksacks or satchels. Neither van Effen nor George were armed, at least not
visibly, but they, too, carried satchels, both crammed with gas grenades. In
addition, van Effen had taken the precaution of taking his Yves SaintLaurent
aerosol,
As they climbed aboard the gunship, van Effen said to Samuelson: ‘Gas, not
guns?’
‘Gas, not guns.’
307
Twelve
The gunship touched down on the Haringvliet darn roadway at 2.38 P.m.
Romero Agnelli, dressed as a major and in nominal command of the party,
was the first down the steps. A fair-haired, youngish man with horn-rims
detached himself from a small group of observers, hurried forward to
greet Agnelli and shook him warmly by the hand.
‘Damned glad to see you, Major, damned glad. Have you seen what those
devils have just done in the Markerwaard?’
‘That we have,’ Agnelli said sombrely. ‘That we have.’
‘How seriously do you t2ke this threat to the Haringvliet?’
‘Well,’ Agnelli said reasonably, ‘there’s no threat now. Quite frankly,
I don’t take it seriously at all, but, as soldiers, ours is not to reason
why. Quite frankly again, the country is in a state of near panic and
ninety-nine per cent of all intelligence reports and agitated phone calls
we receive turn out to be groundless. This, I say, may be the hundredth,
although, as I say, I don’t believe it.’ He took the man’s arm and led
him a few steps from the helicopter as soldiers followed down the steps
and others opened the loading doors. ‘May I have your name, sir?’
‘Borodin. Max Borodin. Manager. What on earth are those things they are
unloading?’
‘Missiles and their launching platforms. W e’ll have one facing the North
Sea, the other the river. Ground-to-ground missiles and ground-to-air
missiles. Heat-seeking. Lethal.’ Agnelli did not add that they could be
swivelled on their platforms to cover both road approaches to the
Haringvliet dam. ‘Totally superfluous precaution. The FFF are a mad lot
but not mad enough to launch a frontal attack on the Haringvliet dam. We
expect a destroyer and patrol boats to be standing by shortly. Again,
quite unnecessary.’
3o8
‘Unnecessary or not, you’ve taken a great load off my mind. Who are those
two rather portly and harmless-looking civilians?’
‘Portly they may be. Harmless they are not. Senior police officers from
Amsterdam. Very much specialists in a very specialist anti-terrorist
squad. They’ll be wanting to look for any weak spots in your defences.
Pure formality but they insist. We shall leave two soldiers by the
missiles to keep watch. Inspector Danilov – that’s the less portly one
– also insists that my men accompany us. He wants, understandably, that
they should familiarize themselves with the general layout of the
interior of the dam.’
Twenty minutes it was and a very surprising twenty minutes it turned out
to be for Mr Borodin, not least when four blue-overalled mechanics
produced Kalashnikov machine guns which had been assembled from their
toolbags. It was a completely painless – phsyically, that is, but not
mentally for many of those concerned – and bloodless operation. Borodin,
his staff and his guards had simply no chance. They all finished up in
one of the many giant cellars in which the darn abounded. Agnelli was
about to turn the key in the lock when van Effen stopped him.
‘No. Rope. Tie them. Come, come, Mr Agnelli, you’re the man who never
overlooks anything.’
‘I’ve overlooked something?’
‘You’ve overlooked the fact that O’Brien may not be the only man in the
world who can pick any lock in the world.’
Agnelli nodded. ‘Of course. Rope.’ Rope was fetched, enough to secure a
hundred men. When Borodin and his men had been bound hand and foot,
Samuelson, looking every inch the successful Roman general back from Gaul
and making his ritual entry of triumph into the city of Rome, led them
all up to the control room. Van Effen and his two friends lingered some
way behind while van Effen opened a small tin and brought out six sodden
balls of cotton-wool. These they stuffed into their nostrils. Vasco
winced.
‘What the hell is this? Sulphuric acid?’
‘You’ll get used to it,’ van Effen said.
309
‘And what was this rigmarole about people being able to pick locks? It’s a
million to one against there being another O’Brien down there.’
‘We’re going to need rope. Lots of it. There’s a couple of hundred yards of
it down there.’
Vasco looked at George. ‘The man thinks of everything.’He shook his head.
‘Agnelli is not the only one who overlooks things.’
They entered the control room. It was wide and very spacious with serried
ranks of control panels lining the right-hand wall and paralleling tables.
O’Brien was in the vicinity of them but not examining them: van Effen knew
he didn’t have to.
‘AhP Samuelson said. ‘The very man, Lieutenant. I want to talk to Wieringa,
the Minister of Defence.’
Vasco showed no surprise, merely thought for a few seconds.
‘The Defence Minister will be out at Volkendam, I imagine. Doesn’t matter
where he is. No problem. Wherever he is, office, car or plane, he’s never
more than an arm’s length from a telephone. IT call the War Office and
they’ll patch him in.’
‘How long will it take?’
‘A minute. Less.’
‘A minute!’
‘In the Netherlands,’ Vasco said with a trace of loftiness, ‘the Army has
over-riding priority.’ In less than the specified time he handed the phone
to Samuelson, who took it, his eyes the eyes of a man whose dreams have
come true. Or a madman whose dreams have come true.
‘Mr Wieringa? This is the leader of the FFF, the Fighters For Freedom. I
trust you appreciated our little demonstration in the Markerwaard this
afternoon. I have some more rather unwelcome news for you. We have taken
over the HaringvIiet dam. I repeat, we are in complete control of the
Haringvljet.’ There ensued quite a lengthy pause, at least on Samuelson’s
part before he continued: ‘I am glad, Mr Wieringa that you appreciate the
significance of this. Any attempt to retake the Haringvliet, by force or by
stealth, will have disastrous effects on Holland. I m;,-ht also add that we
have mined the dykes at Hollandsch Diep and the Volkeral. We have observers
there.
PO
Any attempts to send divers to investigate will compel us to radio-detonate
those mines.
‘At 4 P.m. we will be giving a slight demonstration of what awaits your
country if our demands are not met immediately by opening a few sluice
gates for a few minutes. You might find it instructive to have a helicopter
around to take a. few pictures so that the people of the Neffierlands may
understand what lies in store for them.
‘I do hope you speed up negotiations with the British government.’
‘That was quite a performance, Mr Samuelson,’ van Effen said. ‘You really
do have those two dykes mined?’
Samuelson laughed. ‘Of course not. Why should 1. That pusillanimous lot now
take our every word for gospel.’
Van Effen and his two friends drifted unobtrustively into the space between
the table and wall controls and opened their satchels while Samuelson and
his men talked excitedly and congratulated themselves. In the space of just
over two seconds ten gas grenades, fairly evenly spaced around the room,
exploded. The effects were spectacular. Within a few seconds everyone was
staggering about and most were unconscious before they crumpled to the
floor. Van Effen snatched a key from Agnelli’s pocket and the three men