I put up the col apsible top of the Land-Rover and set water to boil,
and Elin sat on a bunk and tried to take off her sweater. She couldn’t
do it because she couldn’t raise her right arm. I helped her take it off
but, gentle though I was, she gasped in pain. Reasonably enough, she
wasn’t wearing a brassiere under the sweater because the shoulder strap
would have cut right into the wound.
I took off the pad and looked at her shoulder. The wound was angry and
inflamed but there was no sign of any pus which would indicate
infection. I said, ‘I told you that you’d begin to feel it. A graze like
this can hurt like the devil, so don’t be too stiff-upper-lipped about
it – I know how it feels.’
She crossed her arms across her breasts. ‘Has it ever happened to you?’
‘I was grazed across the ribs once,’ I said, as I poured warm water into
a cup.
‘So that’s how you got that scar.’
‘Yours is worse because it’s across the trapezius muscle and you keep
pulling it. You real y should have your arm in a sling – I’l see what I
can find.’ I washed the wound and put on a new medicated dressing from
the first-aid box, then helped her put on the sweater. ‘Where’s your
scarf -the new woollen one?’
She pointed. ‘In that drawer.’
‘Then that’s your sling.’ I took out the scarf and fitted it to her arm
so as to immobilize the shoulder as much as possible. ‘Now, you just sit
there and watch me cook supper.’
I thought this was an appropriate time to open the goody box – the smal
col ection of luxuries we kept for special occasions. We both needed
cheering up and there’s nothing like a first-class meal under the belt
to lift the spirits. I don’t know if Mr Fortnum and Mr Mason are aware
of the joy they bring to sojourners in far-flung lands, but after the
oyster soup, the whole roast quails and the pears pickled in cognac I
felt almost impel ed to write them a letter of appreciation.
The colour came back into Elin’s cheeks as she ate. I insisted that she
didn’t use her right hand and she didn’t have to – the dark, tender
flesh fel away from the quail at the touch of a fork and she managed
al right. I made coffee and we accompanied it with brandy which I
carried for medicinal purposes.
As she sipped her coffee she sighed. ‘Just like old times, Alan.’
‘Yes,’ I said lazily. I was feeling much better myself. ‘But you’d
better sleep. We make an early start tomorrow.’ I calculated it would be
light enough to move at three a.m. when the rivers would also be at
their lowest. I leaned over and took the binoculars.
‘Where are you going?’ she asked.
‘Just to have a look around. You go to bed.’
Her eyes flickered sleepily. ‘I /am/ tired,’ she admitted.
That wasn’t surprising. We’d been on the run for a long time, and
bouncing about in the /Obyggdir/ wasn’t helping -we’d managed to fall
into every damned pothole on the track. I said, ‘Get your head down – I
won’t be long.’
I hung the lanyard of the binoculars around my neck, opened the back
door and dropped to the ground. I was about to walk away when I turned
back on impulse, reached into the cab and picked up the carbine. I don’t
think Elin saw me do that.
First I inspected the river we had to cross. It was flowing wel but
exposed wet stones showed that the level was already dropping. By dawn
the crossing would be easy, and we should be able to get across al the
other rivers that lay between us and Sprengisandur before the increased
flow made it impossible.
I slung the carbine over my shoulder and walked back along the track
towards the river we had crossed which lay a little over a mile away. I
approached cautiously but everything was peaceful. The river flowed and
chuckled and there was nothing in sight to cause alarm. I checked the
distant view with the binoculars, then sat down with my back against a
mossy boulder, lit a cigarette and started to think.
I was worried about Elin’s shoulder; not that there was anything
particularly alarming about its condition, but a doctor would do a
better job than I could, and this bouncing about the wilderness wasn’t
helping. It might be difficult explaining to a doctor how Elin had come
by an unmistakable gunshot wound, but accidents do happen and I thought
I could get away with it by talking fast.
I stayed there for a couple of hours, smoking and thinking and looking
at the river, and at the end of that time I had come up with nothing new
despite my brain beating. The added factor of the American helicopter
was a piece of the jigsaw that wouldn’t fit anywhere. I looked at my
watch and found it was after nine o’clock, so I buried al the cigarette
stubs, picked up the carbine and prepared to go back.
As I stood up I saw something that made me tense – a plume of dust in
the far distance across the river. I laid down the carbine and lifted
the glasses and saw the little dot of a vehicle at the head of that
feather of dust like a high-flying jet at the head of a contrail. I
looked around -there was no cover near the river but about two hundred
yards back a spasm of long gone energy had heaved up the lava into a
ridge which I could hide behind. I ran for it.
The vehicle proved to be a Wil ys jeep ? as good for this country in its
way as my Land-Rover. It slowed as it came to the river, nosed forward
and came to a stop at the water’s edge. The night was quiet and I heard
the click of the door handle as a man got out and walked forward to look
at the ‘water. He turned and said something to the driver and, although
I could not hear the words, I knew he was speaking neither Icelandic nor
English.
He spoke Russian.
The driver got out, looked at the water and shook his head. Presently
there were four of them standing there, and they seemed to be having an
argument. Another jeep came up behind and more men got out to study the
problem until there were eight in al – two jeeps ful . One of them, the
one who made the decisive gestures and who seemed to be the boss, I
thought I recognized.
I lifted the glasses and his face sprang into ful view in the dimming
light. Elin had been wrong; crossing the river had /not/ been an
unjustifiable risk, and the justification lay in the face I now saw. The
scar was stil there, running from the end of the right eyebrow to the
corner of the mouth, and the eyes were stil grey and hard as stones.
The only change in him was that his close-cropped hair was no longer
black but a grizzled grey and his face was puffier with incipient
wattles forming on his neck.
Kennikin and I were both four years older but I think I may have worn
better than he had.
I put my hand out to the carbine and then paused. The light was bad and
getting worse, the gun was strange and it hadn’t the barrel to reach out
and knock a man down at a distance. I estimated the range at a shade
under three hundred yards and I knew that if I hit anyone at that range
and in that light it would be by chance and not by intention.
If I had my own gun I could have dropped Kennikin as easily as dropping
a deer. I have put a soft-nosed bullet into a deer and it has run for
half a mile before dropping dead, and that with an exit wound big enough
to put your fist in. A man can’t do that – his nervous system is too
delicate and can’t stand the shock.
But I hadn’t my own rifle, and there was no percentage in opening fire
at random. That would only tel Kennikin I was close, and it might be
better if he didn’t know. So I let my fingers relax from the carbine and
concentrated on watching what was going to happen next.
The arguing had stopped with Kennikin’s arrival, and I knew why, having
worked with him. He had no time for futile blathering; he would accept
your facts – and God help you if they were wrong – and then he would
make the decisions. He was busily engaged in making one now.
I smiled as I saw someone point out the tracks of the Land-Rover