Precipice

'Eve here. What about Igor?'

'It will be coming with me.'

'Just checking.'

Well, that's a bonus point, she decided. Not having to look after a damned dog. She sat thinking again. Philip Cardon, whom she'd spent quite a lot of time with, never entered her mind. So Brazil is coming back to Zurich -that means Bob Newman won't be far behind him.

Philip was driving through the mist in Sion with Paula by his side. He carried a canvas bag with the shoulder strap attached. Paula was navigating, the map on her knees, giving him instructions when to turn.

'Why didn't you go and see Anton Marchat after you arrived?' she queried. 'Archie said he was very important and you have the address.'

'Deliberately gave it a miss. We'll go and try to find him later today – after dark. There are too many motorcyclists floating… floating…'

'The people of Geneva call them Leather Bombers.' she interjected.

'All right. Too many Leather Bombers on the road. After dark we'll have a better chance of eluding them. We have to protect Marchat as far as we can.'

They left Sion behind, began the tortuous ascent to the Kellerhorn. Suddenly they emerged from the mist, leaving it below them as a white layer with the castle-like building perched on the mist like a strange ship on a sea. Then they really began to climb, the road hardly wide enough for two vehicles to pass safely.

The wheels of their vehicle gripped the ice patches on the road firmly, to Philip's unspoken relief. On his side a sheer abyss dropped into the distant valley. On Paula's side the mountain wall sheered up vertically. She was so close to it she felt hemmed in, but reminded herself it was better than looking down the abyss with no barrier to keep them on this fiendish road.

An added hazard was the way the road kept turning round sheer bends. Philip was constantly expecting to meet something descending the road but so far it had been clear. The gradient was also much steeper. He concentrated all his mind on driving.

Paula, no longer needing to navigate, looked across him and down into the valley far away. The sun had come out, the mist had dissolved, tiny Sion looked like a street map. They were very high up now and still Philip was having to turn the wheel as he negotiated yet another hairpin bend. He was also watching the road surface as the sun had appeared. Snow was melting, exposing the ice below it had masked. He came to a large alcove in the rock wall, turned into it.

'Thank heavens,' Paula said. 'Time for a rest. Why don't I take over the wheel?'

'Not yet. I've got into the swing of it. Let's get out. I feel like one of my rare cigarettes.'

'You can give me one.' she said as they got out of the four-wheel-drive, stretched their legs.

'You don't smoke.'

'Just occasionally. I used to smoke at boarding school just to keep up with the other girls.' She took the cigarette he offered, bent down so he could light it, took a careful puff, spread out her arms. 'What a spectacular view…'' She stopped. 'Where are you off to?'

'Just exploring.' he called over his shoulder.

'You've left the engine running.'

'You want a breakdown up here?'

Philip had walked to the back of the large alcove where there was a narrow gash in the rock. Beyond he found a narrow valley snaking down the mountain. The waterfall inside it was frozen solid, the ice gleaming in the sun. At frequent intervals rocks protruded above the ice, the snow on them melting. He pointed upwards.

'There's the summit of the Kellerhorn. And there's the so-called weather station.'

Paula stared in fascination up the ravine. A cluster of one-storey buildings of white concrete huddled together not so far above them. A forest of aerials sat on the flat rooftop of one building, surrounding what looked like a slim conning tower in their midst.

Philip had hauled out a pair of high-powered binoculars given to him by Marler, was studying the buildings, when he suddenly stiffened. He pressed the binoculars closer to his eyes.

'See that conning tower effort?' he said. 'It's elevating and a thick rod of some kind has slid out above it. The rod is flexible, is moving round, pointing at various angles.'

'I see it. What can it be?'

'The rod has become vertical again,' Philip reported. 'Now it's disappearing back down inside the conning tower. If that's a weather station my aunt is a bloater.'

'Didn't know you had a bloater for an aunt,' Paula commented to break the tension.

Philip put the binoculars back in his pocket. He gazed up the ravine.

'You know something. With the right footwear you could climb that ravine and get close to the buildings unseen.'

'I think a guard up there has spotted us.'

'I didn't see anything. Probably your imagination.'

But he slipped back quickly inside the alcove, following Paula. She went back to their transport, climbed into the passenger seat. She said as soon as Philip was behind the wheel: 'I still think a guard saw us.'

'Imagin…..'

'If you say imagination I'll clonk you one.'

'Not while I'm driving, you won't.' He grinned. 'We're going higher up. Reach into my pocket on your side – you'll find a camera, a small job. When we get a closer look at that place take pictures. That camera is fast. Take one picture, press the button on top – to take your pic. The mechanism then automatically moves the film along so you can take another in the next second. Use up the whole film.'

'I'll do my best.'

It seemed to Paula that Philip was driving faster. Not dangerously so, but he was now fired up having seen their objective. He swung round blind corners, causing Paula to hold on to the hand-grip. They climbed and climbed and climbed. No sign of an emotional crisis in Philip now, she was thinking. Tweed did know what he was doing.

She was beginning to wonder when they were going to get to the top when Philip turned round another overhanging outcrop, slowed, drove on to a small plateau, stopped under the cover of a ridge like a tank, hull down. The weather station was less than a quarter of a mile away.

She had the viewfinder of the camera to her eye, was taking shot after shot. Philip had taken out the binoculars again, focused them above the buildings, lifting the glasses slowly until they reached the enormous summit.

'You can see why, as I told you, it's called the Kellerhorn,' Paula said, still taking shots.

'I most certainly can.'

The summit was shaped like a gigantic boar's head. It looked incredibly sinister, coated with a slime of melting ice and snow. What interested Philip was the slanting slope running steeply down from the summit towards the weather station. Enormous boulders and a shale of smaller rocks thrust their shark-like snouts above the snow. The slope looked extremely unstable. He could see the ravine they had observed from the rock alcove lower down continuing up the slope.

'Look at those weird old houses inside the perimeter.' Paula commented. 'They look like some old village.'

Philip focused on the houses. Built of wood long ago, they had all their shutters closed. There were signs of the shingle roofs having been renewed. Most odd, he mused.

'That wire fence round the whole caboodle must be twelve feet high,' he said, examining it through his glasses. 'And it has an alarm wire running along the top with sensors at intervals. You'd think they were guarding Fort Knox.'

I've run out of film.' Paula informed him. 'Let's hope we haven't run out of time.'

'Not a guard in sight.' he told her.

'That's what worries me.'

They began their descent. The sun had gone in, masked by an army of dark clouds drifting in rapidly from the west. Paula had unzipped her shoulder bag. They were approaching the large rock alcove where they had stopped on the way up.