The subs were holding off, not coming in for the kill. But then, they wanted 'Leopard', not blood. And they were jamming every radio frequency they could.
Two minutes ten. Hayter was back at his orisons in front of the exposed innards of 'Leopard', kneeling in what might have been a prayer of desperation. If he could get it functioning again, if it would only switch itself back on, then he would risk the ship by moving her, limping off into another dark corner. At least he'd try to play hide- and-seek with them as long as he could, if only 'Leopard' would work.
Hayter looked at him again, shaking his head. Two minutes twenty-four. It wasn't going to work.
Carr, the navigator, appeared at the door of the cabin. 'Sir, sonar's picked up a very small vessel moving away from the rescue ship.' As if there had been a public admission of failure, Carr spoke in his normal tone, normal volume. 'Ship's launch, we think.'
'What does the First-Lieutenant think?'
'Divers, sir. Some attempt to inspect our damage.'
'Very well.' Two minutes fifty. It wasn't going to come on, now. Now it was too late. The rescue ship was less than half-a-mile away. They'd fixed her position by now. Lloyd looked with helpless vehemence at the exposed, purposeless interior of the 'Leopard' cabinets. 'Tell the First-Lieutenant I'm on my way.' Carr disappeared. There was no attempt to modify the noise of his footsteps now. It was an admission of defeat, a surrender. 'Keep me informed, Don— for Christ's sake keep on trying!'
As he headed for the control room, the image of the opened useless cabinets remained with him, like a sudden, shocking glimpse of a body undergoing surgery. Hideously expensive, sophisticated almost beyond comprehension, impossible to repair. So much junk—
A team of divers. A threat that somehow diminished even as it presented itself. Perhaps a dozen men, outside the twin hulls of the
The control room reasserted Lloyd's sense of authority, supplying also a fugitive sense of security. They were almost fifty fathoms down. He must consider moving
'Sorry, skipper — nothing. Just the howl of the jamming.'
'Make a guess— did
'Doubtful. Almost impossible.'
'So Lloyd doesn't know he must destroy the equipment?'
'Don't you think he's done so, skipper? She's been on sonar for over four minutes now.'
'That could be the malfunction. Can we contact MoD?'
'No.'
'Okay everybody. I'm taking her down again, for a look-see. It's almost dark down there. Keep your eyes wide open. Cameras ready. We might as well get any gen we can.'
Hyde looked at his watch. A minute before eight. He got out of the unmarked police car parked in Watson Street, then looked back in at the Special Branch inspector before closing the door.
'Half an hour. Just keep clear of the place for half an hour, okay?'
'You're taking an unnecessary risk, Mr Hyde,' the policeman offered without inflection. 'Yours is a face they know. They'll pick you up on your way in, and bingo — '
'Maybe. And if your lot go in, the girl will panic and either run off or refuse to talk when we' ve got her. Sorry, sport, we have to take the risk.' He looked at his watch again. 'Thirty minutes from now, you can come running blowing whistles, anything you like. But not till I' ve talked to the girl.'
'Have it your own way.“
'I will. Look —' Hyde felt a sudden need for reassurance, a desire to ameliorate the police resentment of him. 'The girl's almost paranoid about us.
'Okay. You' ve got thirty minutes.'
Hyde shut the car door softly. It was almost dark, and the shadows were black pools between the street lamps. Shop windows lighted, and a few pedestrians scuttling ahead of the wind. According to reports, there was one man at the back of the Free Trade Hall — but only one. Hyde thrust his hands into his pockets, and began slouching up the narrow street leading to the rear of the concert hall.
The cars were parked and empty, the street lamps betrayed no pedestrians or loiterers. The weak strains of a country-and-western song came from a slightly open upstairs window of a flat above a shop. The pervasive odour of fish and chips fluttered on the wind, then was gone. It made Hyde feel hungry. He felt small, and alone.
Dim, unlit shop windows. Dust in his eyes. Bookshop, sex shop, barber's. Then Hyde saw him, on the other side of the street, no more than a shadow that moved, perhaps a bored man shifting his weight on tired, aching feet. Hyde stopped, staring into the unlit window of a tiny record shop. Garish LP covers, posters, price cuts daubed in white. The language English but the place no longer Manchester. Some foreign place where he was outnumbered, known, sought. He shivered. If he passed the man, presumably his presence would be noted and reported. They would conclude it was him, even if he hadn't been recognized. On the other hand, if he removed the man from the board, his failure to contact Petrunin — still reported to be sitting in his car in the square — might similarly prove Hyde's presence in the area.
The man had emerged from the doorway of a baker's shop, and was standing on the pavement. As Hyde turned slowly to face him, it was evident that the man was staring directly at him, aware of who he was. Hyde, hands still in his pockets of his corduroy trousers, shoulders hunched, feet apart, was helpless. A Volvo was awkwardly parked, pulled right up bumper-to-bumper against the rear of a Ford Escort directly in front of him. Between him and the man across the street.
One hand of the bulky figure in a raincoat and a hat was moving towards his face, as if to feed himself the tiny R/T set. They hadn't picked up any transmissions all afternoon, Hyde thought, and had discounted R/T. In a moment, two or three paces of time, Petrunin would know that Hyde was about to enter the Free Trade Hall. The hand was moving, Hyde's foot was on the Volvo's bumper, his left foot on the bonnet of the car, the man's hand stopped moving — Hyde could not see the finger press the transceiver button — one step on the bonnet, then down half-way across the street. The man was surprised, the hand moved away from his face, his other hand fumbled in his raincoat, two strides, one more, collision —
The man staggered back into the darkened doorway of the shop. Old mosaiced threshold, the man's mouth opening in a groan as the ornate, polished brass doorknocker thrust into his back. Hyde, one hand scrabbling at his side, reached for the transceiver in the Russian's hand, and punched at the face that had opened in pain. The Russian's head ducked to one side as if he had avoided the blow, but the knees were going, and the body sagged. Hyde felt the hand surrender the transceiver, and hit the Russian again, behind the ear. Then he lowered him in his arms on to the mosaic of the threshold. The Russian was breathing as if asleep, on the verge of snoring.
Hyde dropped the transceiver, and was about to grind it beneath his shoe. Then he picked it up and put it into the pocket of his windcheater. If Petrunin tried to contact the man in the doorway, then at least he would know; know, too, that he would have only minutes after that.
He hurried now, shaking from the brief violence, the surge of adrenalin.
There were double gates at the rear of the hall. A uniformed constable opened a small judas-door to him, and closed it behind him. Hyde debated for a moment whether to tell the young policeman of the Russian in the doorway, or the others that might come looking for him, then decided against so doing.
The Edwin Shirley trucks were drawn up in convoy, as if the Free Trade Hall were some cargo terminal. Hyde skirted them, searching in the almost complete darkness for the rear entrance that the Special Branch inspector had pointed out on a plan of the building. He climbed three steps, his hand resting for a moment on a cold metal railing, then tried the door. It had been left unlocked by one of the plainclothes detectives who had been inside the building all day. Hyde went in and closed the door behind him. A lighted passage in need of a fresh coat of cream paint. Dark brown doors. Cramped, uncomfortable, draughty, strip-lighting the only modernism. There was no one in the corridor.
