Authors: Dennis Wheatley
C.B. leaned against the edge of his desk, his long legs stretched out before him, and asked Richter, ‘What had your people to say, Colonel?’
The tubby American made a grimace. ‘At first they thought I was round the bend, but they couldn’t laugh off Washington’s having flown out with the war-head. The Ambassador got on the Transatlantic blower. He couldn’t raise the President. He’s on a golfing holiday; but he spoke with the State Department and the Pentagon. I don’t have to describe the resulting flap. Everything has been alerted and some fool has now only to drop a pin for the whole lot to go off. But what was the alternative? At least we’ll lose not a second in shooting back, if it does happen.’
‘Our Service Chiefs are doing the same,’ Verney announced. ‘Did your man suggest at any stage that we ought to warn the Russians?’
‘Sure; but the Pentagon shot that down. They take the view that Moscow would never credit us with being on the level. They’d believe that this was some sort of a trick. Just one of those things, if you’ll pardon me, Colonel, that a whole lot of other nationalities think the British are so good at – putting up a rabbit that will later enable them to say that it was no fault of theirs that the party ever started.’
Verney smiled, pleased that at such a time of crisis his opposite number should have kept his sense of humour sufficiently to deliver that sly crack. He asked:
‘How about shooting first? At the Cabinet meeting I’ve just come from one Minister was very bellicose. He insisted that if we waited for Russia’s reactions to Lothar’s rocket
we’d be blown off the map before we had a chance, and that our only hope of survival was to pull the trigger right away. But, thank God, the others wouldn’t hear of it.’
‘Same with our folk. First reactions of some of the Pentagon boys was to go to town right away; but the State Department overruled them.’
‘Then in the main our Governments are thinking alike.’
‘Yes; praise be. When I left, my Ambassador was on his way down to see your Prime Minister. Meantime, he’s given me carte blanche on behalf of the United States Government to take any steps I can that might stop it.’
Verney nodded. ‘It’s the same in my case. I’ve already been through to the head of Interpol, and our Foreign Secretary is sending an “Immediate” secret cipher signal to our Ambassador in Berne. Naturally the Swiss will give us every possible help, and in the hope that they may be able to locate Lothar’s cave I propose to fly out to Switzerland at once.’
‘You’ve taken the words out of my mouth, Colonel. I’ve already used my Ambassador’s name with Pan American at London Airport – quicker than our motoring down to the nearest U.S. air base. They’ve pushed some passengers off a plane and are holding it in readiness.’
‘It’s a pleasure to work with you,’ C.B. smiled. Then he turned to Barney and Otto. ‘I’d like you with me, Sullivan, and you had better come too, Mr. Khune. The nearer you are to your brother the better chance you’ll have, I take it, of locating him.’
In such circumstances there could be no question of their delaying to pack bags. As C.B. passed through the outer office he told his P.A. that any communication to him should be made through Interpol H.Q. at Geneva, then the four men hurried down to the waiting cars.
The whole morning had gone in conferences, so it was now well past lunch time and they did not arrive at London Airport until a quarter to three. There they were escorted straight through to the airliner and, shortly after it had taken off, they sat down to a meal. Verney then sent a
radiogram to Interpol asking that a senior official should meet them with a car at the Geneva airport.
It was six o’clock when they got in. A thin, dark, brisk-mannered Italian Commandante, named Fratelli, met them and whisked them into the city, then along the lakeside to the fine park in which the International Conference buildings stand. Half an hour after landing they were closeted with Monsieur Martell, the grey-haired Chef de Surêté, to whom C.B. had spoken on the telephone while still at 10, Downing Street.
For security reasons Martell had been asked only to use all his resources to trace Lothar Khune, Colonel Washington and Mary Morden, with such information as might enable him to do so. Now C.B. put him fully in the picture and, as they were old friends, although Martell showed amazement and consternation, he did not question the statement that the wanted men possessed occult powers.
Having heard Verney out, he said, ‘Within minutes of your speaking to me I had these people’s descriptions circulated and a big reward offered for information concerning them. But, as you know, we are an international organisation, so our main strength lies in the airports and frontier posts. The interior is a matter for the Swiss police. Naturally, I passed the word to my Swiss colleague at once, and for some hours they have been making enquiries. I will get through and see if he has any news.’
For a few minutes he talked on one of his telephones, then he hung up and shook his head. ‘As yet, my friend, nothing. Now that May has come the cable railways are being opened up again, but many remain closed all through the winter and are not yet once more in commission. The probability is that it is one such in a sparsely populated area that this man Lothar Khune has made use of while it was deserted, and without the knowledge of the authorities.’
‘A check-up must be made on every one of them with a minimum of delay,’ said Verney quickly.
‘Agreed,’ Monsieur Martell promptly conceded. ‘But remember that so far the Swiss know only that we are seeking
three people urgently. They are not yet aware that their lives, and those of millions of others, depend on the success of their efforts; so…’
Richter raised a hand. ‘Sure, but you will appreciate the necessity for keeping the awful truth from all but the people at the top. If it got out there would be nation-wide panics, thousands of suicides and a leak to the Russians which would probably lead to their opening the ball right away.’
‘That’s so,’ Verney agreed. ‘But our Foreign Secretary was going to send a code message to our Ambassador in Berne and instruct him to inform the Swiss Government.’
‘Ah!’ exclaimed Martell. ‘That is better, much better. Realising the full danger the Government will exert itself to the maximum. By now, perhaps troops may even have been called out to assist the police in their searching and questioning. But all reports will go to Berne. I shall receive them here only later. Therefore, if I may advise, you should proceed at once to the capital. I must remain here to redouble the activities of my own people: but Commandante Fratelli is at your disposal and will open all doors for you on your arrival.’
His advice was sound so they accepted it at once, and a few minutes later he was seeing them off in the car on their way north-eastward. For the first thirty-eight miles their route lay along the north shore of Lac Léman and even their anxieties could not altogether prevent their taking in the beauties of the scene. To one side lay the five to ten mile wide sheet of now placid water, with occasional tree-surrounded chateaux and chalets standing in gardens that ran down to its shore. On the other, the ground rose gently at first, then more steeply, towards the Jura range, the whole being either meadows, in which herds of a curiously mushroom-coloured breed of cows grazed, or orchards. The latter – mainly plums, pears and apricots – were a mass of blossom as, also, in brighter hues, were the chalet gardens of their owners.
Every few miles they passed through a village or small
town, each neat, clean and orderly, with gay massed flowers in the beds of its central square. The sight of such peace and unforced prosperity made them more than ever conscious of the incredible evil that Lothar planned to bring upon the world, by turning all this into shambles so that even the few survivors would be forced to live like pariah dogs in the ruins of what had once been their pleasant homes.
On entering Lausanne they mounted steeply through the streets of the city to come out on much higher ground, from which they caught some panoramic views of the lovely lake before leaving it behind. The road now lay through flattish country, fringed on both sides with orchards and meadows, many of which were a sea of golden dandelions. There were, too, more beautifully kept villages, huge barns with chalet roofs, and often villas in the gardens of which fine magnolia trees were in full blossom; but the light was failing now, taking the colour out of the flowers, and by the time they reached the picturesque old city of Fribourg it was nearly dark. The last twenty miles were soon eaten up and at just on ten o’clock Fratelli brought the car to a halt in front of the Police Headquarters in Berne.
Martell had telephoned so they were shown straight up to the office of the Chief-of-Police. Actually, as Fratelli told them afterwards, the elderly square-faced stolid-looking man who received them was not the Chief-of-Police, but his Deputy by seniority, as the Chief had been involved in a car smash a few days earlier and was in hospital.
The acting Chief stood up, Bowed sharply from the waist, and introduced himself as ‘Tauber’. He had no news to give them, but said that he had that afternoon been told by the Minister of the Interior of the menace to world peace, and was doing everything possible to trace the people concerned. He added that he had not been informed upon what evidence it was believed that a madman with an H-bomb had brought it into Switzerland and proposed to launch it from a mountain cave, and that he was anxious to have particulars.
Verney at once complied, giving him an abbreviated version of the whole story. When Herr Tauber had heard it he raised his grey eyebrows until they almost met the bristling grey hair that grew like a brush above his low forehead; then he said angrily,
‘But, Colonel, this is not evidence. It is not even hearsay. There can be no more to it than the predictions of a gipsy woman who has gazed into a crystal.’
‘It’s no prediction that Colonel Henrik G. Washington stole and flew off with a nuclear war-head,’ Richter rapped out. ‘That’s a fact.’
The Police Chief grunted. ‘I do not question that. But why should he bring it to Switzerland? That he should take it to Russia would make sense or, if he could not fly so far, to Czechoslovakia or East Germany, perhaps, but…’
It was evident that the bulky, heavy-jowled man had not yet grasped the significance of what he had been told of the intentions with which his visitors credited Lothar; so C.B. interrupted him to cross the t’s and dot the i’s of the matter.
Tauber shrugged. ‘In crooks I believe; in madmen I believe; but not in fairies or magicians. Even to suggest that such people exist, in this age of science, is an absurdity. I have no wish to be rude to this Mr. Khune whom you have brought with you, but in my opinion he is the victim of delusions.’
‘We, on the contrary,’ Verney declared coldly, ‘are satisfied that he is perfectly sane, and may yet be able to locate this mountain cave in which his brother has set up a rocket.’
‘Then he will be cleverer than myself and my police. After our Minister had sent for me this afternoon, we studied the maps of the country and listed all its cable railways. On account of Switzerland’s unrivalled position as a tourist centre, in the past eighty years or so a considerable number of these railways have been constructed by our excellent engineers. Some are open, others are still shut because the snow at their upper terminals has not yet melted sufficiently for them to be workable. All those either in use
or that might have been put into temporary use without the knowledge of the authorities have been inspected within the past few hours. None of them is being put to the use you suggest. The cave you speak of is a myth; a figment of the imagination.’
Otto gave him an angry look. ‘I’ve climbed quite a lot in Switzerland. I’ve several times seen old ski-lifts and cable hoists that for one reason or another have been abandoned. Have all of those also been checked up as still inoperative?’
‘Not the ones in the more remote valleys,’ Tauber admitted grudgingly. ‘Besides, most of those were constructed by private enterprise so there would be no record of them here in Berne; only at the administrative centres of the cantons in which they are situated.’
Verney sat forward quickly. ‘But that is just the sort of railway that Lothar Khune would have made use of. Even if you have to call out every policeman in the country, not one of them must be left unvisited. Just think what it may mean if we fail to lay this man by the heels before he can let off his rocket.’
The Police Chief nodded ponderously. ‘Providing you cut out all this talk of Satanism being at the bottom of it I’d be inclined to agree with you. I’m willing, though, to concede that we are up against a madman and, although you’ve given me no proof of it, accept the possibility that he is in this country. That being so, I’ll send out an emergency call for an exhaustive search in all mountain areas. But there is little point in starting it before dawn; because the patrols would not be able to see more than twenty yards, even with powerful torches.’
For a moment everyone remained silent, then Verney said, ‘A few hours may make the difference between life and death for more men, women and children than the mind is capable of grasping. Is there no way in which we could identify the probable site of this railway and cave; so that we could raid it first thing in the morning?’
Otto looked across at him. ‘In my spirit I’ve been to the entrance of the cave several times now, and on most the
weather has been clear; so I have a good mental picture of the view from it. Do you think that if I drew the sky-line from memory someone might be able roughly to identify the place from which it was viewed?’
‘That’s a great idea,’ Richter enthused. ‘Go to it, Mr. Khune, and give us that picture.’
Tauber shrugged, but pushed a sheet of paper and a pencil towards Otto, then lit a cigar and offered the box, and a box of cigarettes, round to the others. They declined the cigars but accepted cigarettes and for some minutes sat smoking in silence while Otto made two false starts then drew a very good picture of a mountain range with a high peak near its centre.