‘Nothing like that,’ van Effen said. ‘Nothing so crude. The explosives are Agnelli’s idea. Apart from being a first-class organizer, Agnelli is a very prudent fellow. I believe that the explosives are for back-up purposes only, just in case something should go wrong. ‘What I do believe is that O’Brien knows as much about the controls of the hydraulic gates as the man who designed them. They just open the sluices.’
‘And if the authorities cut off the power from the mainland, if you can call it that?’ Vasco said. ‘Then, perhaps, the explosives?’ ‘There have to be standby generators, O’Brien will have checked on that. As far as the safety of the country is concerned, the sluice gates of the Haringvliet are the most vital installations in the country. Imagine the sluice gates being open at low tide and a major power failure occurs? They simply cannot afford to rely on a single source of power. ‘For the moment, however, and much more importantly, Samuelson and Agnelli have been kind enough to provide us with a detailed outline of their plans.’
George rubbed his hands. ‘And now we make our own plans.’ ‘Now we make our own plans.’
Some forty minutes after Vasco had gone down to the living room he was joined by Samuelson. Vasco, sitting on the radio chair and idly leafing through a magazine, looked up at his entrance.
‘Any luck, Lieutenant?’
‘None. I’ve called four times-every ten minutes, not twenty, as you asked. Nothing.’
‘Good God, good God!’ Unmindful of his own admonitions, Samuelson went behind the bar and brought back two jonge jenevers. ‘Ylvisaker is wildly overdue. What on earth can have happened to him?’
‘I’ve been thinking, Mr Samuelson. He hasn’t blown himself to pieces or the news would be all over the country by now. Let’s assume he’s had an accident or had a breakdown. Let’s further assume he doesn’t know how to operate the radio. What would you have done, sir?’ ‘Gone to the nearest phone and informed us. It’s difficult to move far in any direction in this country without coming across a house with a phone or a public call box.’
‘Exactly. Does Ylvisaker know the telephone number of this place?’ Samuelson stared at him then said: ‘Ylvisaker has never been here. Wait.’ He hurried from the room and returned within a minute, his face grim. ‘The consensus of opinion is that Ylvisaker does not know this number.’ ‘But you know the precise route he was taking?’
‘Of course. Two men, a fast car. Bound to intercept. Thank you, Lieutenant. I’m glad to see that there are some minds still working around these parts.’
‘Shall I keep on trying, Mr Samuelson?’
‘It’s a faint chance, isn’t it?’
Vasco shrugged. ‘Very faint. But nothing else for me to do.’ ‘Thank you.’ Samuelson brought him another jonge jenever. ‘Another trifle like this is not going to hurt a mind as clear as yours.’ ‘That is kind. I think I’ll have it on the veranda, if I may. It is a bit overheated in here.’
‘Of course, of course.’ Samuelson hurried from the room.
The car was a tan-coloured BMW with Antwerp number plates. Vasco watched the car and its two occupants disappear round a comer, finished his drink in a thoughtful manner, then returned inside. He went to the radio, switched wave-band and wavelength and said softly in Flemish: ‘Record.’ He spoke for no more than twelve seconds, then switched back to the previous wave-band and length. He tried again for Ylvisaker and was answered by the some silence. He refreshed his drink at the bar, resumed his radio chair, glanced through a magazine and again called the missing truck with the same lack of response. He tried twice more in the next twenty minutes with the same lack of response. He was still trying to make contact when Samuelson returned. He looked at Vasco, went behind the bar and returned with two more drinks. ‘Breaking my own rules, I know, but you’ve earned it and I feel the need for it. Nothing?’
‘Dead. I know Mr Danilov makes a point of being incurious about everything but I’m a serving army officer. just how important are those nuclear devices to you?’
‘Almost entirely psychological. If necessary, I would have used them to blow off both the northern and southern approaches to the Haringvliet dam.’ ‘Whatever for? No senior military commander in the Netherlands would dream of attacking the Haringvliet dam. Bombers? Never. Fighter planes? Never. Not only is your gunship more than a match for any fighter, not only do you have ground-to-air missiles, you will have a large number of hostages whose lives they would never imperil. Destroyer? Torpedo boats? Ground to-ground missiles are heat- seeking. They’re lethal.’
‘Not bombers?’
‘What would happen if they breached the Haringvliet darn?’ ‘Of course. Well, no point in trying any longer. Perhaps we should both have a brief rest before lunch.’
Vasco gave van Effen and George a brief resume of what had happened.
Van Effen said: ‘So you’ve convinced Samuelson of his total invulnerability and ensured that we will have two fewer hard men to cope with abroad the dam. Whom did you notify?’
‘Rotterdam police.’
‘I think, George, that we may make a policeman of him yet. Well, another hour or so before lunch.’
‘Snooze for me,’ Vasco said. ‘Four jonge jenevers in succession are too much for my delicate constitution.’
‘What did you say?’
‘Dutch hospitality. You know what it’s like.’
Lunch was more than adequate but less than convivial. Samuelson tried to maintain a cheerful facade but he was deeply worried about the fate of his nuclear devices and his worry was palpable with the result that the last half hour of the meal was consumed in almost total silence.
Over coffee, Samuelson said to van Effen: ‘Do you think it possible that Ylvisaker and his men could have been seized by the authorities, army or police?’ I unlikely. I don’t see how they could have been. Your is total. Even if they had been, the question is, would Ylvisaker his men have talked?’
‘About the Haringvliet dam? No. Until we got here today only Riordan, Agnelli, Daniken and O’Brien were privy to the plans.’ Samuelson smiled faintly. ‘Your famous need-to-know maxim, Mr Danilov.’ ‘One does not want to sound cynical or callous, but what the hell are you worrying about, then?’
‘As you can see,’ the TV announcer said, ‘the weather is as atrocious as ever with correspondingly poor visibility, such as one would expect as dusk approaches. The rain is extremely heavy and the wind, between Force eight and nine, has backed to the north-west. We have four cameras in position — one near Hoorn and one near Volendam, on the west side of the Markerwaard and one on the opposite shore near Helystad. This one, I’m afraid, is virtually useless: in spite of its lens hood the rain is driving straight into the lens. We have a fourth camera in a helicopter and we understand they are having a very rough time indeed. The time is 1.58. Our first shots will be taken from the helicopter.’ A white-capped, storm-tossed sea appeared on the screen. Detail was blurred and shifting, because the helicopter was being, it was clear, severely buffeted about, hence making it impossible to maintain a steady camera direction. Another voice took over from the studio announcer.
‘Helicopter camera here. I can assure you that my friend in the studio was not exaggerating. The conditions are abominable and I have to confess that the only person who is not sick is, most fortunately, the pilot. We are flying at seven hundred metres, give or take fifty metres every time this damn machine is going up or down, which we hope is a safe height if the nuclear explosion and its accompanying water spout should occur, which God forbid, directly beneath us. It is now precisely 2 p.m. and — his voice rose almost by an octave — there goes! There it goes! Me and my big mouth.
It is directly beneath us!
The camera lens had been extended to maximum zoom. The surface of the Markerwaard boiled whitely and erupted a great column of water climbing vertically skywards toward s the helicopter’s camera.
‘Would you look at that?’ the excited voice went on. ‘Would you just look at that?’ It seemed rather a superfluous question, as, unquestionably, almost every eye in the Netherlands was looking at nothing else. ‘And the air is full of spray. Our pilot is moving as quickly as possible to the north-west — we want to get out of this area as quickly as possible. We are making poor time in this north-west gale, but he is clearly hoping that that same gale will blow the spout and spray away from us. So do Van Effen looked at Samuelson. He appeared to have gone into some kind of trance. The only sign of movement came from his hands. His fingers were interlocked but his thumbs were revolving slowly around each other. The studio announcer appeared. ‘I am afraid the helicopter’s lenses are clouded by that spray. We regret that none of the other three cameras are in visual contact. The detonation appears to have occurred almost exactly in the centre of the Markerwaard.’ The helicopter commentator’s voice came again. ‘Sorry about that. What with the spray and rain we are at the moment quite blind. We are still moving
