The Golden Keel / The Vivero Letter. Desmond Bagley

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СКАЧАТЬ to scan the road, hands clutching the grips of the machine-gun mounted in front of him.

      As in a dream he saw Coertze’s hand come into view, apparently in slow motion, and toss a grenade casually into the sidecar. It lodged between the gunner’s back and the coaming of the sidecar and the gunner turned in surprise. With his sudden movement the grenade disappeared into the interior of the sidecar.

      Then it exploded.

      The sidecar disintegrated and the gunner must have had his legs blown off. The cycle wheeled drunkenly across the road and Walker saw Coertze step out of cover, his sub-machine-gun pumping bullets into the driver. Then he had stepped out himself and his own gun was blazing at the staff car.

      He had orientated himself very carefully so that he had a very good idea of where the driver would be placed. When he started firing, he did so without aiming and the windscreen shattered in the driver’s face.

      In the background he was conscious of the tac-a-tac of the machine-guns firing in long bursts at the trucks, but he had no time or desire to cast a glance that way. He was occupied in jumping out of the way of the staff car as it slewed towards him, a dead man’s hand on the wheel.

      The officer in the passenger seat was standing up, his hand clawing at the flap of his pistol holster. Coertze fired a burst at him and he suddenly collapsed and folded grotesquely over the metal rim of the broken windscreen as though he had suddenly turned into a rag doll. The pistol dropped from his hand and clattered on the ground.

      With a rending jar the staff car bumped into a rock on the side of the road and came to a sudden stop, jolting the soldier in the rear who was shooting at Walker. Walker heard the bullets going over his head and pulled the trigger. A dozen bullets hit the German and slammed him back in his seat. Walker said that the range was about nine feet and he swore he heard the bullets hit, sounding like a rod hitting a soft carpet several times.

      Then Coertze was shouting at him, waving him on to the trucks. He ran up the road following Coertze and saw that the first truck was stopped. He fired a burst into the cab just to be on the safe side, then took shelter, leaning against the hot radiator to reload.

      By the time he had reloaded the battle was over. All the vehicles were stopped and Alberto and Donato were escorting a couple of dazed prisoners forward.

      Coertze barked, ‘Parker, go up and see if anyone else is coming,’ then turned to look at the chaos he had planned.

      The two men with the motor-cycle had been killed outright, as had the three in the staff car. Each truck had carried two men in the cab and one in the back. All the men in the cabs had been killed within twenty seconds of the machine-guns opening fire. As Harrison said, ‘At twenty yards we couldn’t miss – we just squirted at the first truck, then hosed down the second. It was like using a howitzer at a coconut-shy – too easy.’

      Of the seventeen men in the German party there were two survivors, one of whom had a flesh wound in his arm.

      Coertze said, ‘Notice anything?’

      Walker shook his head. He was trembling in the aftermath of danger and was in no condition to be observant.

      Coertze went up to one of the prisoners and fingered the emblem on his collar. The man cringed.

      ‘These are S.S. men. All of them.’

      He turned and went back to the staff car. The officer was lying on his back, half in and half out of the front door, his empty eyes looking up at the sky, terrible in death. Coertze looked at him, then leaned over and pulled a leather briefcase from the front seat. It was locked.

      ‘There’s something funny here,’ he said. ‘Why would they come by this road?’

      Harrison said, ‘They might have got through, you know. If we hadn’t been here they would have got through – and we were only here by chance.’

      ‘I know,’ said Coertze. ‘They had a good idea and they nearly got away with it – that’s what I’m worrying about. The Jerries aren’t an imaginative lot, usually; they follow a routine. So why would they do something different? Unless this wasn’t a routine unit.’

      He looked at the trucks. ‘It might be a good idea to see what’s in those trucks.’

      He sent Donato up the road to the north to keep watch and the rest went to investigate the trucks, excepting Alberto who was guarding the prisoners.

      Harrison looked over the tailboard of the first truck. ‘Not much in here,’ he said.

      Walker looked in and saw that the bottom of the truck was filled with boxes – small wooden boxes about eighteen inches long, a foot wide and six inches deep. He said, ‘That’s a hell of a small load.’

      Coertze frowned and said, ‘Boxes like that ring a bell with me, but I just can’t place it. Let’s have one of them out.’

      Walker and Harrison climbed into the truck and moved aside the body of a dead German which was in the way. Harrison grasped the corner of the nearest box and lifted. ‘My God!’ he said. ‘The damn’ thing’s nailed to the floor.’

      Walker helped him and the box shifted. ‘No, it isn’t, but it must be full of lead.’

      Coertze let down the tailboard. ‘I think we’d better have it out and opened,’ he said. His voice was suddenly croaking with excitement.

      Walker and Harrison manhandled a box to the edge and tipped it over. It fell with a loud thump to the dusty road. Coertze said, ‘Give me that bayonet.’

      Walker took the bayonet from the scabbard of the dead German and handed it to Coertze, who began to prise the box open. Nails squealed as the top of the box came up. Coertze ripped it off and said, ‘I thought so.’

      ‘What is it?’ asked Harrison, mopping his brow.

      ‘Gold,’ said Coertze softly.

      Everyone stood still.

      Walker was very drunk when he got to this point of his story. He was unsteady on his feet and caught the edge of the bar counter to support himself as he repeated solemnly, ‘Gold.’

      ‘For the love of Mike, what did you do with it?’ I said. ‘And how much of it was there?’

      Walker hiccoughed gently. ‘What about another drink?’ he said.

      I beckoned to the bar steward, then said, ‘Come on; you can’t leave me in suspense.’

      He looked at me sideways. ‘I really shouldn’t tell,’ he said. ‘But what the hell! There’s no harm in it now. It was like this …’

      They had stood looking at each other for a long moment, then Coertze said, ‘I knew I recognized those boxes. They use boxes like that on the Reef for packing the ingots for shipment.’

      As soon as they had checked that all the boxes in that truck were just as heavy, there was a mad rush to the other trucks. These were disappointing at first – the second truck was full of packing cases containing documents and files.

      Coertze delved into a case, tossing papers out, and said, СКАЧАТЬ