‘You don’t call it a disaster being rocked into eternity with lead guitar music?’ asks Porta, with a short laugh, and patting his mpi.
‘Certainly,’ answers the Commissar, ‘but we can’t use that kind of disaster in this instance.’
‘If you want to know what I think, man, then I’m for pissin’ off out of here in one hell of a hurry,’ whines Albert, in a hoarse voice. He pulls his snow-mask further down over his face.
‘What kind of weak sisters are you?’ roars Porta angrily. ‘Here I’m trying to make you rich, so you can wave goodbye to the stinking army for the rest of your lives, and lie on the beach playin’ with the luxury whores. When you’ve started something then you finish it. Panjemajo? The earth’s round, and if you ain’t smart you can risk falling off it. And it ain’t smart to give up now just because a party of Sweatyfoot Indians come slidin’ along on planks. Let’s get on with it. There’s daylight up ahead!’
‘Und wenn die ganze Erde bebt,*
und die Welt sich aus den Angeln hebt,
da kann doch einen Goldsucher nicht erschüttern!
Keine Angst, keine Angst, Rose Mari . . .’
hums Tiny thoughtfully, drumming his fingers on his Kalashnikov.
‘Could we get along that windin’ trail there that goes up alongside the ruins?’ asks Barcelona, pointing.
‘Yes, you could if you were a mountain goat that’d lost its wits,’ answers the Commissar. ‘This time of the winter nobody gets through without going through the gulch, and after that there’s the Paritip†, but we can leave that for now. I can tell you it’s not for people with weak stomachs, and in a high wind even the strongest-nerved get the shits!’
‘Paritip? What the hell’s a Paritip?’ asks Porta.
‘Wait till you see it,’ grins ‘Frostlips’. ‘It might make even you wish you’d stayed home. That is if you ain’t one of these religious types who thinks death’s better’n life!’
Und noch bei Petrus wollen wir*
den Würfelbecher schwingen . . .’
hums Tiny, and kisses a hand-grenade.
‘Shut bloody up, you half-witted idiots,’ rages the Old Man, banging the butt of his machine-pistol into the snow.
‘Won’t even let us sing any bleedin’ more,’ grumbles Tiny.
The Commissar goes down in the snow between the Old Man and ‘Frostlips’ and draws a sketch with the tip of a bayonet.
‘An avalanche,’ cries the Old Man, in surprise, studying the sketch with a sceptical mien. ‘Think it can be done?’
‘Our one chance,’ answers the Commissar. ‘There’s tons of snow up above ready to come down if we just help it a bit.’
‘Shut up, then!’ cries Porta, licking his frost-chapped lips cautiously. ‘The light begins to flicker out there. An avalanche! Fuck me! Those headhunters down there’ll get rolled straight into Paradise. Both St Peter an’ Jesus’ll go arse-over-tip when they arrive up there with all that snow!’
‘How much gel’ we got?’ asks the Old Man, getting to his feet.
‘Three full boxes,’ answers Barcelona. ‘Enough to put the Kremlin up on the moon!’
‘One box o’ ten’s enough,’ says the Old Man.
‘Catch!’ shouts Tiny, throwing a package of explosives into the Old Man’s lap.
‘Are you completely mad?’ shouts the Commissar, in terror, throwing himself down like lightning behind aweathered stone block. ‘In this temperature? Anybody knows it’ll have degenerated by now and can go off at the slightest touch.’
‘Take it easy,’ smiles Porta. ‘We don’t have to abide by the patent laws, so we’ve changed the formula round a bit. What we’ve done’d send the inventors crawling up their own arseholes for fright, but we found out, when we were soddin’ about up there where it’d freeze the balls offa brass reindeer, that a bit of nitroglycerine in the dough and a freshener of nitre made it more stable in cold weather. If we’d used what the eggheads at Bamberg’d told us to we’d have been on the moon by now playin’ hide and seek with the Mars-men!’
Tiny fishes a whole bundle of loose primers carelessly out of his pocket, and hands them to him. Any ammunition expert would have jumped out of his boots at the sight. Primers have to be treated with great care. The least shock can send them off.
‘Shall we blow off all the soap, then?’ asks Tiny, eagerly, beginning to make preparations.
‘Hell no!’ answers the Old Man crossly. ‘Five or six ought to be more than enough!’
‘Mon Dieu! Where are the pincers?’ asks the Legionnaire, excitedly. ‘We must hurry! They are coming towards us quickly!’
‘Pincers?’ asks Tiny. ‘They’ve gone missin’, but who needs ’em? You can bite ’em on to the cable. I’ve done it often. Quicker, too! Don’t ’ave to bite too’ard though, else vour teeth fall out – an’ your old napper goes with ’em, too!’
‘Merde! says the Legionnaire, shaking his head. ‘Only a man who is tired of life bites on those things!’
Unworriedly Tiny pushes the wires into the primers and bites them fast.
‘He’s too stupid to realize the danger,’ grins Porta. ‘Not even the dumbest dog’d even sniff at a primer!’
‘He’s raying mad,’ says ‘Frostlips’. ‘We have to put on rubber shoes when we go into the depots where they keep that shit. That sod eats ’em!’
‘It’s because he’s a Sunday’s child, born on Christmas Eve,’ laughs Porta. ‘Nothing can happen to him!
Tiny is already chewing on the fifth primer. When he has finished he connects the explosive mass in a way that sends shivers down our spines. Then he puts the whole lot down into his deep pocket. The dangerous primers stick up on their wires and bob about like the bells on a jester’s cap.
With Dalin in the lead we make our way towards the mountain-top. When we have got some way up we have to change from skis to snowshoes.
‘You’re goin’ to have to learn to stand on those planks a hell of a lot better,’ Dalin criticizes us, with the irritability of the expert,’ or you’ll never manage this job!’
Up under the small conifer trees, we fumble our way in pitch darkness, and have to use our handlamps in short flashes. There are narrow, deep crevasses everywhere. To go down in one of these is certain death.
The storm howls, in long, miserable moans. Frost explodes in branch and trees with the sharp crack of rifle-shots.
Cursing and fuming we try to protect our faces against the short stiff branches of the trees. They whip across our faces, drawing blood when the skin breaks.
Dalin pushes us along, angrily, jeering at us for our clumsiness.
‘Even an old, worn-out Cossack grandmother could catch up with you,’ he rages, impatiently. ‘Dopes like you lot’ll never win this world war!’
‘Wait’n see, you bowlegged Jewboy,’ screams Tiny, throwing his mpi at Dalin, but not succeeding in hitting him. ‘You don’t know us Germans yet!’
After two hours of inhuman toil we reach the open slope above the tree-line. Tired out we drop down. The wind is not merely icy, it is a roaring hurricane. We can see the peak, like a great, threatening colossus, a little way in front of us.
‘Ssatan,’ Dalin curses. ‘Up on your feet! In half an hour the moon’ll be out, and they’ll be able to see us 100 miles off.’
‘Jesus’n Mary,’ groans Tiny. ‘I can feel them OGPU Kalashnikov explosive berries borin’ their way into my good German guts already!’
Suddenly I stumble, and begin to slide down the slope. I am rolling like a snowball at constantly increasing speed when a large rock gets in my way. For a moment I think I have broken, or sprained, an ankle, but the fear of being left alone soon gets me back on my feet, even though I can feel the pain right up through my back.
‘I can’t go on!’ groans Gregor, dropping like a felled tree to the snow.
‘Up you get!’ snarls Porta, giving him a brutal kick. ‘Think of your share of the gold and you’ll want to go on!’
‘Shit on the gold,??
? pants Gregor, worn out. ‘If it’s all the gold in the world you can keep it! Let me sleep! I want to die! Now!’ He presses his face into the snow, and his whole body shakes with hysterical sobs.
Together we get him back up on his feet, and drag him between us like a sack. He shouts, and calls us every name he can think of. Finally Porta cannot stand it any longer. He gives him such a beating that all his frost-sores break open like ripe boils. It helps for a while.
Ermolov is lying in the shelter of a projecting shelf of rock staring through his night-glasses. Silently he points down the mountain. We can see the OGPU company, like small, moving, black spots below us.
‘We’ve got to get further up,’ says Dalin. ‘But get some speed on now! There’s not much time to lose! But don’t look down,’ he warns us. ‘Look up!’
‘Good Lord deliver us, ‘Porta breaks out, in amazement, when we are all the way up, and see the enormous masses of snow which are resting on only a relatively small rock-shelf.
‘When once that starts to roll,’ says Barcelona, ‘that band of murderers down there’ll do well to move arse in one hell of a hurry!’
‘Four charges ought to be plenty to set that snowball rolling down on their nuts,’ says ‘Frostlips’, scratching his head thoughtfully under his fur cap.
‘Let’s use five. Better safe than sorry!’ suggests Porta, looking up at the huge lip of snow. ‘But now the devil are we goin’ to position the loads without settin’ the avalanche going too soon? If it starts before the neck-shooters have got into the wide bit there, they’ll get back with their balls intact and we’re in the shit up to our necks!’
‘We’ll have to get over on the other side,’ says Barcelona. He leans over the steep cliff-face and draws back, shivering. ‘That’s impossible! Take an eagle to do it!’
‘Leave it to me,’ says Tiny, pushing energetically forward. ‘I ain’t no eagle, but I’m clever’n one. You lot ain’t got no idea of’ow to blow anythin’ up! I’ll show you how to do it!’
‘Don’t do it,’ warns ‘Frostlips’. ‘You’ll break your neck!’
‘Don’t give me that piss!’ sneers Tiny, contemptuously. ‘Take a look at the way a bloke from’Amburg does it! I’ll be up on that mantelshelf and ’ave the fireworks in place quicker’n a bull up a butcher!’
‘He’s right,’ says the Old Man, convinced. ‘The shelfs bound to increase the force of the blow an’ make even more snow come down on ’em. The noise of the charges’ll get damped down by the snow, and the slits down there won’t get frightened and do the devil out of a nice fresh delivery!’
‘Why not?’ asks Porta, shrugging his shoulders, indifferently. ‘Try it! Tiny’s always gettin’ away with things other fellers’d break their necks trying!’
‘D’you think it’s dangerous?’ asks Tiny doubtfully, peering cautiously down into the dizzying abyss.
‘Not a bit of it,’ lies Porta impudently, pointing up to the snow-cap hanging threateningly out over the lip of the shelf. ‘If all that weight ofice an’snow can’t fall, how’llyou be able to? Just be careful not to spit on both hands at the same time!’
‘Let’s do it then,’ says Tiny, decisively, wrapping the rope around him. ‘Gimme that ice-axe. Keep a tight hold on the string now so’s you can pull me up again if I go on me arse!’
Gregor sits down, presses his heels well into the cliff and passes the rope out slowly, as Tiny moves across the icy slope.
‘He’ll never make it,’ whispers Barcelona nervously.
‘More rope,’ shouts Tiny impatiently. ‘I got to go round a corner, for Christ’s sake! It’s black as up Albert’s arse down’ere!’
‘He’ll kill himself,’ says Gregor, darkly, paying out more rope.
Frostlips sits down beside him and helps him hold on to it. It is literally Tiny’s lifeline.
‘Jesus Christ!’ howls Tiny, in a voice which sounds as if it is coming to us through cotton-wool.
‘Anything up?’ asks Porta, looking up, but unable to catch sight of him.
‘Fell on me arse,’ comes faintly from the cliff-face. ‘It’s blowin’ like’ell over’ere. My prick’s turned into a bleedin’ icicle.’
‘This is madness,’ mumbles Barcelona. ‘He’ll never make it!’
‘Wait and see,’ says Porta. ‘I know Tiny. If he gets really angry there’s nothing can stop him!’
We can hear the sound of the ice-axe, which he is using to cut steps in the rock and ice. Gregor and ‘Frostlips’ pay out more and more rope.
‘How the hell’s he doing it?’ asks ‘Frostlips’, shaking his head. ‘He needs all his strength to even hang on to the cliff-wall, and he must already be frozen through and through!’
‘Yes, and don’t forget he’s got his pockets full of explosives,’ says Barcelona. ‘And like the dope he is it’s primed! Don’t need much of a knock for him to blow himself and half the mountain to bits.’
‘Did he ever take an ammunition course anyway?’ asks ‘Frostlips’. ‘Nobody who’s ever had anything to do with explosives treats ’em the way he does!’
‘He was on a course at Bamberg,’ laughs Porta, carelessly. ‘But they threw him off it before he managed to blow the whole place up. He did kill off a few ammo experts though, without getting as much as a scratch himself. Even though he went up there on the Milky Way a time or two, he still came down licking the cream off his chops!’
If we lean out over the edge of the cliff we can just see Tiny’s dark shadow moving slowly upwards, veiled in billowing clouds of snow.
‘He looks like one of those stuntmen climbing up a skyscraper,’ mutters the Commissar nervously.
‘Bit short of windows to nip through, though, if he gets tired,’ says Porta, drily.
‘If he slips now,’ mumbles ‘Frostlips’, ‘he’s got 5,000 feet under him. The rope’d cut him clean in two!’
‘Damn an’ set fire to it,’ curses Tiny from out in the snow. ‘This bleedin’ ledge ain’t no wider than a fly is between the eyes.’
‘Hang on with your toes,’ suggests Porta. ‘Bend ’em like the birds do!’
‘What do you think I am doin’?’ comes Tiny’s voice from out on the mountain-side.
‘Get on with it,’ shouts ‘Frostlips’ nervously. ‘Those headhunters’ll be in the valley in a minute, and at our throats before we know where we are!’
A nasty crash and a rain of powdery snow cuts him short. The rock-shelf has given way. With a howl of terror Tiny goes out into thin air but in some miraculous manner manages to hang on with his ice-axe.
Cursing and swearing he begins to work his way upwards again. We lean out and see him hanging and swaying where the ledge was before.
He hacks viciously at the snow and finally makes a hole large enough for the charges. Spitting with rage he rolls the cables a couple of times more round the explosive and forces stones and pieces of ice into the hole to wedge the charge in place. It wouldn’t be smart if we were to take it with us when we moved the wires.
A strong gust of wind takes off his fur cap and nearly sends him down into the gulf with it. He slides down hazardously, but finds a foothold on the second ledge, which is somewhat broader.
Even though he is bear-like in size, he looks small against the tons of snow which hang, suspended, above his head. He checks the charges once more and gives the primers an extra crimp with his teeth. Balancing on the edge he takes a swig from his water-bottle. Then he starts back across the vertical, wind-blown, rock wall. A huge eagle flaps close by him. Furiously, he throws a punch at it, loses his grip and slides some way down the mountain face.
Gregor, alone on the safety rope, had become unobservant from cold and exhaustion and does not feel Tiny’s tug on the rope. It is hanging so loosely that it has become dangerous. The big man has no more than just rounded the sharp corner when the eagle attacks again. He strikes out at it and loses his footing. His hands claw at the ice, blood spurts from long gashes and nails rip away. His axe curves out over the ed
ge of the cliff, and goes sailing on down in a cloud of snow.
The eagle gives a hoarse, triumphant scream, and dives to the attack again.
Porta lets out a terrified shout, which warns Gregor just in time. He manages to press himself in between two vertical rocks, before he is taken over the edge by the terrific pull on the rope.
‘What the devil are you up to?’ asks the Commissar, wriggling his way over to us. ‘Good Lord Almighty. He must have been killed!’
Far below we can see Tiny swinging back and forth on the rope with the raging eagle flapping around his head.
‘He’s lost his axe!’ says Porta.
The Commissar lowers his own ice-axe down to him, quickly, and he manages to grasp it after several attempts.
Slowly we tighten the rope. If we go too quickly we can risk it snapping.
As we pull him up higher and higher we can hear him cursing and swearing.
‘Got a full head of steam up,’ says Porta. ‘Gregor’d better get going till he’s gone off the boil!’
‘I’m off,’ says Gregor firmly, beginning to buckle on his skis.
None of us has noticed that Tiny is already up over the edge, foaming with rage. The Commissar gives a warning shout as he comes rushing towards us through the snow, looking for the guilty party.
‘You drop Tiny’s bleedin’ rope?’ he roars accusingly, pointing his ice-axe at me.
‘No, no!’ I yell, to avoid certain death. ‘It was Gregor! He dozed off!’
‘Dozed off, did’e?’ roars Tiny. He bulldozes through the snow, towards where Gregor is sitting buckling on his skis.
The Old Man throws an mpi at him. It hits him right in the face, but he carries on, without even a second’s pause.
Gregor just manages to turn around. Tiny grabs him by both skis and swings him round above his head like a hammer-thrower. When he has got speed up he lets go of him. With a crunch his body strikes a rock, his skis splintering. Then Tiny is on him again, hammering at him with his fists. They seem to be rotating as fast as propellers. Gregor knows he is fighting for his life. With the courage of desperation he succeeds in kicking upwards and hitting Tiny on the knee. Now the big man goes really crazy. With a scream he jumps up into the air, turns, and comes down on Gregor with such force that the man’s body is literally pressed down into the frozen snow.