Authors: Dennis Wheatley
Taking it from him, the Police Chief gave it a quick look, but put it down with a shake of his square, bristly head. ‘Gentlemen,’ he said, ‘no visitor to Switzerland ever sees more than a hundredth part of the country. The great central massif of the Alps covers an enormous area. From Mount Pilatus to the Matterhorn is seventy-five miles, and from Mont Blanc to St. Moritz one hundred and fifty. Between those four points lie hundreds of peaks, innumerable ridges and perhaps a thousand valleys. How could we possibly expect anyone to pinpoint the spot from which this sketch is said to be made? You might as well draw one fir tree and ask us to identify it in a ten-acre fir forest.’
Barney, as the junior member of the party, had so far bottled himself up, but now he burst out. ‘No one expects you to, and maybe there’s no one here in Berne that could either. But there must be locals who could. I suggest you have that sky-line stencilled immediately and a copy despatched by special messenger to every village police station in the mountain area.’
‘Good for you, young man!’ boomed Richter. ‘He’s hit it, Chief. Don’t lose a moment. Have every machine you’ve got put into operation. We’ll need hundreds of copies. Then, if you’ve not men enough of your own, call out Army despatch riders to deliver them.’
‘That’s it,’ C.B. came to his feet. ‘We have got to find
this place; and quickly. It may be your private belief that we have been made fools of, but there is no getting away from it that an H-bomb war-head has been flown out of England. We believe it to be here in Switzerland, and that it may at any time be used to start a world war. You cannot possibly afford to take a chance on our being wrong.’
Suddenly Tauber’s manner changed. The terrible possibilities of the situation seemed at last to have penetrated his thick skull. As he reached for one of the telephones on his desk, he said, ‘You are right. It was this talk of a Satanist with occult powers that made me sceptical. But we must spare no effort which might prevent the appalling catastrophe you fear.’ Next moment he was giving gruff instructions about mustering despatch riders, and summoning numerous members of his staff.
When he hung up, Verney said, ‘It will take several hours to circulate these things, so we had better get some sleep. But I would like to spend the night as near to the possible scene of action as I can. Where would be the most central place for a move either way into the mountains.’
‘Interlaken,’ Fratelli replied before the Police Chief had a chance to speak. ‘It is only about fifteen kilometres from the Jungfrau, and that mountain forms the centre of the main Alpine chain. We will go to the Victoria – Jungfrau. Permit, please.’ He picked up one of Tauber’s telephones, put a call through to the hotel and a few minutes later reported, ‘The manager apologises that all his best rooms are full, but I have told him that we require only rooms in which to sleep.’
Knowing that such solid types as Tauber were often the most thorough when they got down to a job, and satisfied that he now really meant business, C.B. asked that any news should at once be relayed to him at the Victoria-Jungfrau, then he and his party went down with Fratelli to the Commandante’s car.
From Berne they took the road south through a shallow valley for eighteen miles to Thun at the head of Lake Thuner, then for another eighteen miles followed the south
shore of the lake as it curved gradually eastward. There was no moon and the stars gave only sufficient light for them to get, first, an impression of country similar to that through which earlier they had passed that evening and, later, stretches of dark water glimpsed between black patches formed by clumps of trees. In the villages few lights were now showing and when they reached the palatial Victoria-Jungfrau it was well after midnight.
In the hotel, blissfully unaware that this might be their last night on earth, many of the younger guests had been dancing. The band had not long stopped playing and there were still quite a number of groups in the lounge, chatting and laughing over last drinks before going up to bed. Few of them even glanced at the little cluster of new arrivals as an under-manager led them through to the restaurant and had a corner of it re-lit for them to make good their missed dinner by a late supper.
Over it, while scarcely noticing what they ate, they speculated in low voices on how long it would take Lothar to adapt the bomb war-head for use on his rocket. All of them hoped fervently that it would take several days, but to have assembled a rocket up in a mountain cave showed that Lothar had either become, or had working for him, a highly skilled engineer; and as by morning it would be fortyeight hours since he had arrived in Switzerland with it, they had to face the fact that he might already have completed the work.
With the exception of Fratelli, all of them were dog-tired and it seemed to Barney that he had only just put out his bedside light when C.B., clad in pants and an overcoat, was shaking him awake.
‘Up you get, young feller,’ he said. ‘Your idea of stencilling Otto’s sky-line sketch and circulating it has worked. The local Police Chief has just had word and brought it himself. Several bright boys in the upper Rhone valley are prepared to swear that the central peak in the sketch is the south-west aspect of the Finsteraarhorn.’
As Barney tumbled out of bed, C.B. went on. ‘A sergeant
at a village called Lax has actually identified the cable railway. Apparently it was a private venture financed in the ‘thirties by a crazy Dutchman. He believed that there were valuable mineral deposits in the upper part of the mountains and had the railway constructed up to the cave, with the idea that it would be a good base from which to conduct his operations. There are rare minerals that can be worked up there but the payload was not sufficient to meet the cost of the labour; so the company went bust. The railway has been derelict until a few months ago. Then some solicitors in Zurich, acting for an Hungarian, acquired it for a song. The story was that he intended to build a small chalet restaurant up on the ledge as an attraction for tourists; but the locals say that he is throwing away his money, because it is so far from any of the main tourist resorts.’
The management had supplied Verney’s party with toothbrushes and toilet things from the hotel barber’s shop, but no time could be spared for shaving. After a quick wash the five men scrambled into their clothes and assembled down in the front hall. It was a little after six, so the staff were already busy cleaning the public rooms, and the Interlaken Chief of Police, a tall, wiry, brown-faced man of forty, whose name was Jodelweiss, had ordered coffee and
brödchen
for them. Quickly they gulped down the steaming brew and, still gnawing at the crisp fresh rolls stuffed with smoked ham, they followed him outside.
Two cars with police chauffeurs were already waiting there, and there were four more on the road outside filled with police. As they followed Jodelweiss out to the leading cars he was speaking over his shoulder.
‘Unfortunately, gentlemen, this place is in a valley on the far side of the great barrier. We shall cross it by the Grimsel Pass – I hope. Normally the pass is not open for another three weeks but this year spring has come unusually early so I think we shall get through. The only alternatives are a long detour to the north, by way of the Susten and Oberalp passes, which are just as likely still to be blocked, or to the
south right round by way of Saanen, Aigle, Martigny-Ville, Sion and Brig, but that would mean a run of two hundred and fifty kilometres. If we can cross the Grimsel it is only a third of that distance and we should be there in about three hours; so I feel it is well worth the attempt.’
Since time was so important the others agreed with him and quickly settled themselves in the two cars. As they pulled the rugs over their knees, the klaxons shattered the morning silence and the cavalcade roared away past the still closed jewellers, patisseries, creamery, lace and woodworkers’ shops which later in the day would attract many of the temporary inhabitants of this little town that enjoyed such a picturesque setting.
For the first fifteen miles the road followed the north shore of Interlaken’s other great lake, the Brienzer See; and now in the early morning light they could appreciate the loveliness of the pale spring green of the beech trees seen against a background of dark pines across a sheet of placid water, beyond which lay range after range of snow-capped mountains.
At the lake’s end another seven miles through meadows again dotted with plum, pear and apricot trees in bloom brought them to Meiringen. Beyond the town the road rose sharply, running parallel to the valley of the Aar, through dark gorges, occasional breaks in which offered wonderful vistas of forest and mountain. Ahead on their right reared up, to disappear in clouds, the vast bulk of the Wetterhorn, and to their left those of the Sustenhorn and Dammastock.
Between Guttannen and Hendegg the narrow curving way increased in steepness. The vegetation became arctic in character, on the roadside were high banks of snow and the branches of the trees bent under the weight of it. Still higher up the road became a twisting culvert cut through great cliffs of light-coloured polished granite, and a fresh fall of snow that had not yet been cleared by the snow ploughs brought the car’s speed down to near foot pace. But to their relief they got through and gained the top of the pass. From it a marvellous vista spread before them –
the sparkling blue lakes of Grimsel and Raterichboden, retained by their huge dams and the miles-wide glacier from which the Rhone rises; then, far below, the green meadows of the valley that the river watered and, away in the distance to their right, the mighty cloud-enshrouded peak of the Finsteraarhorn.
For a few miles the road corkscrewed downwards until they reached the valley with its narrow rushing river and the road and railway that ran beside it. On the valley road were halted a long line of military vehicles – jeeps, light tanks and a small type of snow cat.
As Inspector Jodelweiss’s car approached, a short, wiry, leather-faced officer waved it to a halt. When it drew up beside him he said, ‘I am Brigadier Stulich, commanding the garrison at Andermatt. I received a signal that an emergency has arisen in which troops may be needed, and orders that a mixed force should rendezvous with you here. I decided to bring them myself. Inform me, please, of the situation and your requirements.’
Jodelweiss introduced the Brigadier to Verney, who was seated behind him, and Verney said, ‘Please order your men to follow our cars, Sir, then get in with us. I will explain as we go. Every minute we can save is of importance.’
The Brigadier gave the order to an officer who was standing just behind him, then squeezed into the back of the car with Verney and Fratelli. As they drove on, the former, now refraining from any mention of Satanism, gave the soldier particulars of the threatened danger which, when he learned of it, made even this tough-looking character draw in a sharp breath.
The going was much easier now as the valley road was almost straight, and for fifteen miles they ran down a succession of gentle slopes, passing again through neat villages and between meadows where cattle grazed placidly among golden seas of dandelions. When they entered Lax it was a quarter past eight; so in spite of the long climb and their slow going through the pass they had done the fifty mile journey in just under two hours.
In Lax, outside the village police station, the Sergeant who had reported the cable-railway built by the Dutch mineral prospector in the ‘thirties was waiting for them. He was an elderly man with a grey walrus moustache, but bright-eyed and alert. Jodelweiss, the Brigadier, Verney, Fratelli, Barney, Richter and Otto all scrambled out of the two leading cars and crowded round him.
Although still ignorant of the reason for the enquiry circulated the previous night from police headquarters at Berne, he had not let the grass grow under his feet, but at dawn had set off on a reconnaisance. At a hamlet up in the valley where the cable railway was situated, but about five kilometres below it, he had learned that work had been proceeding on the railway for some weeks. During the winter the villagers seldom went so far up the valley, but a number of them had seen aircraft fly in and had assumed that these were bringing the materials with which it was rumoured a buffet to attract tourists was to be built at the top of the railway. The Sergeant had pressed on and found the hangar, but it was securely locked and he had not been able to find out if there was a plane housed in it.
Bumping and skidding on his motor cycle he had, soon after seven o’clock, reached the engine-house. Inside it five Chinese, had been squatting on the floor of a common living and bunk room eating breakfast. But none of them could answer his questions and it seemed that they could speak only their own language. By signs he had then indicated that he wanted to be taken up to the cave, but they had shaken their heads and begun to show hostility; so he had had no option but to return to Lax.
Immediately the group about him had heard his story Jodelweiss gave him a place in the leading car. The others re-distributed themselves, then the cavalcade set off again, now heading almost due north along a rough road that led up into the mountains, and on which, the Sergeant said, about twelve kilometres distant lay the cable railway.
As the cars wound in and out among the foothills of the
chain C.B. wondered anxiously if the old policeman had not done more harm than good by his reconnaisance.
Up till an hour ago, unless Lothar had been keeping an occult watch on Otto, he could not have been aware that they had traced him to Switzerland; but if the Chinese labourers had reported the Sergeant’s visit that might have aroused Lothar’s suspicions. With luck he would assume that only chance or a routine round had brought a local policeman to the engine-house, but his psychic perceptions being so acute it was possible that he would deduce a warning from it. If so, he was now overlooking their approach and, awful thought, if he had his rocket ready, that might precipitate his launching of it.
When they reached the hamlet Jodelweiss spoke into the car radio. He ordered one of the police cars behind them to stop, and its crew to search the hamlet in case any of the men from the engine-house or cave should have come down there since the Sergeant’s visit, and be temporarily hiding in one of the barns. A few kilometres further on, as they came opposite the aircraft hangar, he detached another squad for a similar purpose.