The one thought that finally lulled him into a fitful sleep was the memory of the 21,000 Swiss francs he had spent yesterday in Geneva, after his pleasant little detour to Talloires. For if events worked out as he now anticipated, Mademoiselle Sarah Laval-Smith was probably the best investment he owned.
When the telephone by the bed woke him at exactly 6.30, his malaise had returned; the sheets were rumpled, and his whole body ached as though it had been expertly beaten all over.
CHAPTER 16
Ryderbeit was already in the hut when Packer arrived. He sat sprawled back against the wall, one hand holding a tumbler of mahogany liquid, the other, one of his eight-inch coronas.
Packer had already discovered, during the run that morning, that although the Rhodesian had only one eye and had spent most of his life in the tropics, he was a recklessly adroit skier; while Packer was tired and out of practice. This second run of the day, down one of the fastest pistes on the Gotschnagrat, had left him bruised and bad tempered, as he unclipped his skis and clumped into the hut, which smelled of sauerkraut and wet wool. The only other customers were a group of noisy Germans ranged along a table, drinking glühwein.
Ryderbeit had a pile of Polaroid exposures spread out like playing cards, next to a large cloth-backed military map. As Packer stood in front of him, shaking the snow off his clothes like a dog after a swim, he noticed several rings in red felt-tip down the spine of brown-shaded mountain. From the last of these a straight line — in the same red — stretched diagonally across the map and ended in a spray of arrows, each touching a black line broken with little strokes, like a centipede.
‘Okay, soldier?’
Packer nodded, pulled off his mittens, unhoisted his rucksack, and took out a similar map; sat down and drew another stack of photographs from his anorak pocket.
A large girl appeared in front of them. Ryderbeit eyed her with disapproval. ‘What are you having, soldier? Mine’s a teeny triple Scotch.’
‘Apfelsaft, bitte,’ Packer told the girl, and Ryderbeit cackled.
‘Still being a good boy, eh?’
Packer ignored him. He looked again at Ryderbeit’s map, then unfolded his own, on which he had made similar markings, but in green. He compared the two, nodded, and ran his finger down the red rings on Ryderbeit’s. ‘These are all possibles?’ he asked.
Ryderbeit said, ‘Uh-huh,’ and drew on his cigar. Packer tapped the black centipede on his own map.
‘This is the T-bar up to the Mähder run, okay? According to this, it covers almost exactly 600 metres. Taking into account the undulations, we’ll call it 700 yards. When I went on it this morning it took twelve minutes and nineteen seconds. That puts its speed at between four and five mph — a brisk walking pace.’
Ryderbeit took a deep drink and said, ‘Fine. But it gets worse.’
‘Yes, it’s a rear sighting. But it’s also at a thirty-two-degree angle, remember, so the target will seem slower.’
Ryderbeit shook his head. ‘Not through a telescopic lens, it won’t. You’re getting forgetful, Packer Boy. At 860-odd metres, his speed’s going to look twice as fast!’ He ran his finger along the red line he had drawn across the two white grooves of valley; then tapped the brown-shaded ridges between them. ‘But this is what’s going to give us the real shit. Even as late as four o’clock there’s still going to be a lot of shimmer, like panes of distorting glass.’
‘Which point have you chosen?’
Ryderbeit tapped the red ring from which he had drawn the line across the centre of the T-bar. ‘Barring accidents, it should take me ten minutes to get down to Wolfgang.’
‘And how long have you got up there?’
‘Seven seconds.’
‘And you’ll have him in your sights all the time?’
‘No.’ Ryderbeit shuffled through the pile of photographs and selected three, which he arranged in order. The first showed a small blurred figure in a half-sitting position, against a white background. In the second shot the figure’s head was disappearing over a ridge of snow; then reappearing in the third. ‘I got three to four seconds from when he first shows, and less than three when he’s over the hump,’ he added. ‘But for a hundred thou’ I can’t really complain.’
Packer smiled. ‘If you’re as good as you say you are, Sammy, he’ll be a sitting duck.’
‘Yeah. Trouble is, so will I.’ Ryderbeit swallowed the rest of his whisky and waved his tumbler at the girl behind the bar; then again tapped the red ring on his map. ‘This gives me the best sighting, but it’s also a fucking horrible place to stop. I got to do a bloody smart turn, on forty-five degrees of ice, or I go smack over the edge, thirty feet down on to bare rocks. Then there’s always the danger of some bastard running into the back of me. This afternoon I was lucky — got three clear minutes to make the sightings and take a few snaps before anyone came past. That run gets pretty busy this time of day. So if I’m going to keep this thing nice and quiet — just between me and the Ruler — I’m going to have to be bloody quick and bloody lucky.’
‘It should be a lot clearer when he comes up,’ said Packer. ‘They empty the cable car for him, remember?’ He paused. ‘What about cover?’
‘Sod all. The back of the bend is a wall of soft snow
