checked. There was something less, or something more mysteriously, wrong with the complex lump of junk near his head than was the matter with the Nimrod. Sure, Aubrey kept reassuring him, but the communications black-outs and the poor reception and the constant re-requests and repeats of instructions told him everything.
The boots shuffled, then moved, on the hull. They were over his face now, only a couple of feet from stamping on it.
The Nimrod was at the fringes of, and at times beyond, the communications range. Which meant that the aircraft had company, Soviet company. MiGs were shadowing the Nimrod, maybe even playing shepherd games with her —
As he rehearsed the conclusion once more, a chill coldness seized him. They suspected, even knew, about him. The boots on the hull, and the silence which he had noticed from the turbine room beneath him. They were listening, too. Everyone was listening for him, waiting for the mouse behind the wainscot to move again. He held his breath, one part of his mind explaining with a weary patience that he was behaving ridiculously, the remainder of his consciousness believing that the hull above him and beneath his back and head and legs was no more than a sounding-board, a corridor of whispers eager to betray his whereabouts.
The boots moved away, forward along the hull towards the sail. Almost immediately, Lloyd was speaking in a voice muffled by the pocket of his immersion suit, through the tiny R/T Clark had left with him. Relief overcame Clark, and he felt the renewed perspiration cool almost at once on his skin, making his flesh shudder.
He removed the R/T from his pocket and pressed it to his cheek.
'Yes?'
'I' ve seen Hayter and Thurston. They know what to do.'
'Good.'
'Any luck?'
'None.'
'It's six now.'
'I know.'
'Is it still on?'
'Eight o' clock, on the button.'
'I heard my guard and another talking. The man from Novosibirsk has arrived in Murmansk.'
'Damn. Is he on his way?'
'I don't know.'
'Okay — I'll call you.'
Clark replaced the R/T set in his breast pocket, and zipped the pocket closed with a real and savage anger. He rolled on to his stomach, and the turtle without its shell was humped on the edge of the pool of light from the lamp, still baffling him, still apparently undamaged.
'You heard that?' he whispered. There were noises now from the turbine room. He had imagined the silence.
'Yes,' Aubrey replied. His voice was gauzy and faint, a smear of distant sound. Flying on the limit again.
'What trouble are you in?'
'None.'
Tell me.'
'Four MiG-23s. They're keeping us as far away from Soviet airspace as possible —' The voice blacked out, then Clark heard an additional smear of sound some seconds later which he could not decipher. Then two more spits of sound which the cassette recorder slowed down and replayed. He could understand neither of them. The cool part of his brain suggested a storm might be adding to the difficulties, but the remainder of his awareness was raging with the same kind of helpless, impotent fury his body felt. He was shaking as he knelt in front of the 'Leopard' backup system. He was in a mood to break, damage, throw. The rational part of him understood, and mocked at, the emotions he felt and his desire for their expression, and gradually he calmed himself. Then, suddenly, Aubrey was speaking again, clearly.
'Can you hear me now?'
'Yes.'
'Eastoe has dodged them, ducked inside,' Aubrey said. Clark could even pick out the irony of the old man's tone.
'Quin suggests it will take only hours to dismantle “Leopard”, if that is what they intend, and the same amount of time for a full analysis, with the resources they have available. Once they begin the work, they will be searching for the back-up system. You must not be where you are when that happens. “Leopard” must not be intact when this expert steps aboard. Do I make myself clear?'
'Yes.'
'It will take an hour from Murmansk by helicopter.'
'All right, all right. I'm moving on — what next?'
'Very well. You have
Clark looked up and into the gloom beyond the lamplight. 'Yes,' he replied with a sense of defeat. 'Both of them.'
'Keep me informed.'
'Clark?' It was Quin's voice now, not so irritating, not so pessimistic as that of Aubrey. Quin allowed the fiction of success to be entertained. 'You should move on to the spectrum analyser, noise generator and phase reverser unit.'
'Right.'
'You need the special test kit.'
'Sure.' Clark unclipped it from his belt. A dial, various scales, a rotary switch, buttons, a small grille. Quin had to instruct every step of the way: every switch, every light, every reading. 'All right, I'm ready.' He studied the exposed maze of wiring, microprocessors and circuits in front of him. For a moment, his mind was a blank and the system before him was a puzzle to which he had no clue. Then, sighing, he shrugged off his numbing reluctance, and reached out and waited for Quin's instructions.
It was six o-five.
'It's almost six, Admiral — perhaps we can now be leaving for Pechenga. Too much time has already been wasted.'
'Comrade Academician, you say it will take a matter of no more than three or four hours to complete your work on “Leopard”. What is your hurry? You waited at the airport in Novosibirsk for almost three days.' Dolohov was expansive, and mocking. He was almost drunk, Panov decided, and had abandoned most of his dignity. Panov did not like the military, especially the older representatives, the officer caste. As a man who was an honoured member of another elite, one without the stain of imitating those that existed before the Revolution, Panov disliked, even loathed, the upper echelons of the military.
Panov glanced again at his gold Swiss watch. He had purchased it in Paris, while attending a scientific congress, and that had added to its potency as a reminder of his identity. The large-faced clock on the wall behind Dolohov, which Panov would hardly have admitted to his wife's kitchen in Novosibirsk, jerked its hand past another minute. The drunken old fool remained in his chair.
'Admiral — I must insist that we leave for Pechenga at once. My colleagues will be waiting for me. I must study their preliminary findings before I can specify what needs to be done.' Panov stopped at this point, feeling the asperity in his tone raising his voice beyond the point of acceptable masculinity. He despised his own too-high voice. The admiral growled and huffed like a bear.
'I see. You insist?'
Panov cleared his throat. 'I do.'
Dolohov reached across his desk and flicked the switch of his intercom.
'Get my car to the door at once, and warn the tower I shall want an immediate take-off.' He switched off, and stood up, his arms extended in a bear-like embrace. The image made Panov suppress a shudder, and smooth dislike from his bland features. 'Come, Comrade Academician Panov — your carriage awaits.' Then Dolohov laughed. Panov had to endure a large hand slapping him on the shoulder, and the log-like fall of an arm across his neck, as he was ushered to the door. Dolohov's voice was like a caress when he added: 'Don't you think
