‘But my hand,’ he protested. ‘I don’t think I can.’
‘You’l do it. I don’t care how much it hurts – but you’l do it. And
never for one moment wil you exceed thirty miles an hour. You won’t
even think of putting the car into a ditch or crashing it in any other
way. And the reason you won’t think of such things is because of this.’
I touched his neck with the cold metal of the pistol.
‘This wil be behind you al the way. Just/imagine that you’re a
prisoner and I’m one of Stalin’s boys back in the bad old days. The
approved method of execution was an unexpected bullet in the back of the
head, wasn’t it? But if you do anything naughty this is one bullet you
can expect for sure. Now, take off, and do it careful y ? my trigger ‘
finger is al ergic to sudden jerks.’
I didn’t have to tel him where to drive. He drove along the Tjarnargata
with the duck-strewn waters of the Tjornin lake on our left, past the
University of Iceland, and so into Miklabraut and out of town. He drove
in silence and once on the open road he obeyed orders and never let the
speed drift above thirty miles an hour. I think this was less out of
sheer obedience and more because changing gears hurt his hand.
After a while he said, ‘What do you think you’re going to gain by this,
Stewart?’
I didn’t answer him: I was busy turning out the contents of his wal et.
There wasn’t anything in it of interest – no plans for the latest guided
missile or laser death ray that a master spy and double agent might have
been expected to carry. I transferred the thick sheaf of currency and
the credit cards to my own wal et; I could use the money – I was out of
pocket on this operation – and should he escape he would find the
shortage of funds a serious disability.
He tried again. ‘Kennikin won’t believe anything you say, you know. He
won’t be bluffed.’
‘He’d better be,’ I said. ‘For your sake. But there’l be no bluff.’
‘Your work wil be cut out convincing Kennikin of that,’ said Slade.
‘You’d better not push that one too hard,’ I said coldly. ‘I might
convince him by taking him your right hand ? the one with the ring on
the middle finger.’
That shut him up for a while and he concentrated on his driving. The
Chevrolet bounced and rolled on its soft springing as the wheels went
over the corrugated dips and rises of the road. We would have got a
smoother ride had we travel ed faster but, as it was, we climbed up and
down every minuscule hil and val ey. I dared not order him to speed up,
much as I wanted to get to Elin; 30 mph gave me the leeway both to shoot
Slade and get out safely should he deliberately run the car off the road.
Presently I said, ‘I notice you’ve given up your protestations of
innocence.’
‘You wouldn’t believe me no matter what I told you – so why should I try?’
He had a point there. ‘I’d just like to clear up a few things, though.
How did you know I was going to meet Jack Case at Geysir?’
‘When you make a cal on open radio to London you can expect people to
listen,’ he said.
‘You listened and you told Kennikin.’
He half-turned his head. ‘How do you know it wasn’t Kennikin who listened?’
‘Keep your eyes on the road,’ I said sharply.
‘All right, Stewart,’ he said. ‘There’s no point in fencing. I admit it
al . You’ve been right al along the line. Not that it wil do you much
good; you’l never get out of Iceland.’ He coughed. ‘What gave me away?’
? ‘Calvados,’ I said.
‘Calvados!’ he repeated. He was at a loss. ‘What the hel is that
supposed to mean?’
‘You knew that Kennikin drinks Calvados. No one else did, except me.’
‘I see! That’s why you asked Taggart about Kennikin’s drinking habits. I
was wondering about that.’ His shoulders seemed to sag and he said
musingly, ‘It’s the little things. You cover every possibility; you
train for years, and get yourself a new identity – a new personality –
and you think you’re safe.’ He shook his head slowly. ‘And then it’s a
little thing like a bottle of Calvados that you saw a man drink years
before. But surely that wasn’t enough?’
‘It started me thinking. There was something else, of course. Lindholm –
who was conveniently in the right place at the right time – but that
could have been coincidence. I didn’t get around to suspecting you until
you sent in Philips at Asbyrgi – that was a bad mistake. You ought to
-have sent Kennikin.’
‘He wasn’t immediately available.’ Slade clicked his tongue. ‘I ought to
have gone in myself.’
I laughed gently. ‘Then you’d be where Philips is now. Count your
blessings, Slade.’ I looked ahead through the windscreen and then leaned
forward to check the position of his hands and feet to make sure he
wasn’t conning me -lulling me with conversation. ‘I suppose there was a
man cal ed Slade once.’
‘A boy,’ said Slade. ‘We found him in Finland during the war. He was
fifteen then. His parents were British and had been kil ed in a bombing
raid by our Stormoviks. We took him into our care, and later there was a
substitution – me.’
‘Something like Gordon Lonsdale,’ I said. ‘I’m surprised you survived
inspection in the turmoil after the Lonsdale case.’
‘So am I,’ he said bleakly.
‘What happened to young Slade?’
‘Siberia perhaps. But I don’t think so.’
I didn’t think so either. Young Master Slade would have been
interrogated to a fare-thee-wel and then dispatched to some anonymous
hole in the ground.
I said, ‘What’s your name – the real Russian one, I mean?’
He laughed. ‘You know, I’ve quite forgotten. I’ve been Slade for the
better part of my life, for so long that my early life in Russia seems
like something I once dreamed.’
‘Come off it! No one forgets his name.’
‘I think of myself as Slade,’ he said. ‘I think we’l stick to it.’
I watched his hand hovering over the button of the glove compartment.
‘You’d better stick to driving,’ I said drily. ‘There’s only one thing
you’l find in the glove compartment and that’s a quick, sweet death.’
Without hurrying too much he withdrew his hand and put it back where it
belonged – on the wheel. I could see that his first fright was over and
he was regaining confidence. More than ever I would have to watch him.
An hour after leaving Reykjavik we arrived at the turn-off to Lake
Thingval avatn and Kennikin’s house. Watching Slade, I saw that he was
about to ignore it, so I said, ‘No funny business – you know the way.’
He hastily applied the brakes and swung off to the right and we bumped
over a road that was even worse. As near as I could remember from the
night drive I had taken with Kennikin along this same road the house was
about five miles from the turn-off. I leaned forward and kept one eye on
the odometer, one eye on the countryside to see if I could recognize
anything, and the other on Slade. Having three eyes would be useful to a
man in my position, but I had to make do with two.
I spotted the house in the distance or, at least, what I thought was the
house, although I could not be entirely sure since I had previously only
seen it in darkness. I laid the gun against Slade’s neck. ‘You drive
past it,’ I said. ‘You don’t speed up and you don’t slow down ? you just
keep the same pace until I tel you to stop.’
As we went past the drive that led to the house I glanced sideways at
it. It was about four hundred yards off the road and I was certain this
was the place. I was absolutely sure when I spotted the lava flow ahead
and to the left where I had encountered Jack Case. I tapped Slade’s
shoulder. ‘In a little while you’l see a level place to the left where
they’ve been scooping out lava for roadmaking. Pull in there.’
I kicked the side of the door and swore loudly as though I had hurt
myself. All I wanted to do was to make noise enough to cover the sound
of my taking the clip out of the pistol and working the slide to eject
the round in the breech. That would leave me unarmed and it wouldn’t do
for Slade to know it. I was going to him him very hard with the butt of