The Daleth Effect

signaled two of the policemen to examine him and hobbled on, ignoring the huddled shape. A line of guards and police closed in behind him; a patrol boat moved closer to shore, its motor rumbling and its spotlight sweeping the deep shadows of the ways.

“There they are!” someone shouted as the spotlight ceased shifting and came to rest. Skou stopped, and halted the others with a signal.

The riveted plates of the keel were a stage, the curved ribs a proscenium, the scene was lit. The drama was one of life and death. A man in shining black from head to toe half crouched behind Arnie Klein’s slumped form. He supported Arnie with an arm across his chest. His other hand held a gun, the muzzle of which was pressed against Arnie’s head. The sirens died, their work done, the alarm given, and a sudden silence fell. In it the man’s voice was loud and hoarse, his words clear.

“Don’t come here—I kill!”

The words were in English, thickly accented but understandable. There were no movements from the onlookers as he began to drag Arnie’s limp form along the keel toward the water’s edge.

Nils Hansen stepped from the shadows behind him and reached out a great hand that engulfed the other’s, trapping it, pulling the gun into the air and away from Arnie’s head. The man in black shrieked, in pain or surprise, and the pistol fired, the bullet vanishing into the darkness.

With his free hand Nils pulled Arnie from the other’s grasp, and slowly and carefully bent to lay him on the steel plate below. The man he held captive writhed ineffectually against his grip, then began beating at Nils with his fist. Nils ignored him until he straightened up again, seemingly ignorant of the blows striking him. Only then did he reach out and pluck the gun from the other’s grasp and hurl it away. And draw his hand back, to bring it down in a quick, open-palmed slap. The man spun half around, dropped, hanging from Nils’s unrelenting grasp.

“I want to talk to him!” Skou shouted, hurrying up.

Nils now had the man in both hands, shaking him like a great doll, holding him out to Skou. He was dressed in rubberized black, a frogman’s suit, and only his head was uncovered. His skin was sallow, with a thin moustache cheek drawn like a black pencil line on his upper lip. One flared red with the print of a great hand.

For a brief moment the man struggled in Nils’s unbreakable grip, looking at the approaching policemen. Then he stopped, realizing perhaps that there was no escape. There was no more resistance in him. He lifted his hand and chewed his thumbnail, a seemingly infantile gesture.

“Stop him!” Shouting, trying to hurry. Too late.

A look of shock, pain, passed over the man’s face. His eyes widened and his mouth opened in a soundless scream. He writhed in Nils’s hands, his back arching, more and more, impossibly, until he collapsed limply, completely.

“Let him go,” Skou said, peeling open one eyelid. “He’s dead. Poison in the nail.”

“The other one too,” a policeman said. “You shot him in…”

“I know where I shot him.”

Nils bent over Arnie, who was stirring, rolling his head with his eyes closed. There was a red welt behind his ear, already swollen.

“He seems to be all right,” Nils said, looking up. He caught sight of the blood on Skou’s pants leg and shoe, dribbling onto the metal plate. “You’re hurt!”

“The same leg they always shoot me in. My target leg. It doesn’t matter. It is more important to get the Professor to the hospital. What a mess. They’ve found us, someone. It is going to get much worse from now on.”

15

Sitting in the darkness, on his bridge, in his chair, Nils Hansen tried to picture himself operating these controls of the Galatliea. Normally not a very imaginative man, he could, when he had to, visualize how a machine would operate, how it would behave. He had test piloted almost all the new jets purchased by SAS, as well as tested new and experimental planes for the Air Force. Before flying a plane he would study blueprints and construction, sit in a mock-up for simulated flight, talk to the engineers. He would learn all the intricacies of the craft he was to fly, learn everything that he possibly could before that moment when he was committed, he alone, to taking it into the air. He was never bored, never in a hurry. Others grew exasperated at his insistence upon examining every little detail, but he never did. Once airborne he was on his own. The more knowledge he carried aloft with him, the better chance he had of a successful flight—and of returning alive.

Now, his particular powers had been taxed to their limit. This craft was so impossibly big, the principles were so new. Yet he had flown Blaeksprutten, and that experience was the most valuable of all. Remembering the problems, he had worked along with the engineers in laying out the controls and instrumentation. Reaching out he touched the wheel lightly—the same standard wheel, purchased from stock, that was in a Boeing 707 jet. He almost felt right at home. /This was connected through the computer to the Daleth drive and would be used for precision maneuvers such as take-off and landing. Altimeter, air-speed indicator, true-speed readout, power consumption—his eyes moved from one to the other, unerringly, despite the darkness.

There was a large pressure-sealed glass port set into the steel wall before him that now gave a good view of the shipyard and the harbor. Although it was after two in the morning and Helsingor was long asleep, the area on all sides of the shipyard was brightly lit and astir with movement. Police cars cruised slowly along the waterfront and flashed their lights into the narrow side streets. A squad of soldiers moved in, loose formation among the buildings. Extra spotlights were mounted above the normal streetlights so the entire area was bright as day. The motor torpedo boat Hejren was anchored across the near end of the harbor with its gun turrets manned and trained.

There was the hum of motors as the bridge door slid open and the radio operator came in, going to his position. Skou was behind him, hobbling on a single crutch. He stood for a moment next to Nils, eyes moving over his posted defenses outside. With a grunt, possibly of approval, he dropped into the second pilot’s chair.

“They know we’re here,” he said. “But that’s all they are going to know. How is this tub?”

“Checked, double-checked, and a few times after that. I’ve done what I can, and the engineers and inspectors have been over every inch of hull and every piece of equipment. Here are their signed reports.” He held up a thick folder of papers. “Anything new on last week’s visitors?”

“A blank, all along the line. Frogman equipment bought right here, in Copenhagen. No marks, tags, papers. Their guns were German P-thirty-eights, Second World War vintage. Could have come from anyplace. We thought we had a lead on their fingerprints, but it was a mistaken identification. I checked it myself. Nothing. Two invisible men from nowhere.”

“Then you’ll never know what country sent them?”

“I don’t really care. A wink is as good as a nod. Someone has winked us and, after that dust-up, the whole world knows that there is something going on up here. They just don’t know what, and I’ve kept them far enough away so they can’t learn more.” He leaned forward to read the glowing dial of the clock. “Not too much longer to go. Everything set?”

“All stations manned, ready to go when they give the word. Except for Henning Wilhelmsen. He’s lying down or sleeping until I call him. It’s his job tonight.”

“Better do that now.”

Nils took up the phone and dialed Henning’s number; it was answered instantly.

“Commander Wilhelmsen here.”

“Bridge. Will you report now.”

“On the way!”

“There!” Skou said, pointing to the road at the far end of the harbor where a half-dozen soldiers on motorcycles had appeared. “It’s moving like clockwork—and well it better! She has been staying at Fredensborg Castle, twenty minutes away.”