Ice Station Zebra (35 page)

      "Well, that's Jolly. Incidentally, you can discount most of the gallant doctor's heroism during the fire--although he was understandably as anxious as any of us that we survive. The first time he went into the engine room it was too damned hot and uncomfortable for his liking, so he just lay down on the floor and let someone carry him for'ard to where the fresh air was. Later--"
      "He had his mask off," Hansen objected.
      "He took it off. _You_ can hold your breath for ten or fifteen seconds--don't you think Jolly can, too? Later on, when he was performing his heroics in the engine room, it was because conditions there were better, conditions outside worse-- and because by -going into the engine room he was entitled to a closed-circuit breathing set. Jolly got more clean air last night than any of us. He doesn't mind if he causes someone to die screaming his head off in agony--but he himself isn't going to suffer the slightest degree of hardship. Not if he can help it. Isn't that so, Jolly?"
      He didn't answer.
      "Where are the films, Jolly?"
      "I don't know what you're talking about," he said in a quiet, toneless voice. "Before God, my hands are clean."
      "How about your fingerprints on that foil with the salt on it?"
      "Any doctor can make a mistake."
      "My God! Mistake! Where are they, Jolly--the films?"
      "For God's sake, leave me alone," he said tiredly.
      "Have it your own way." I looked at Swanson. "Got some nice secure place where you can lock this character up?"
      "I certainly have," Swanson said grimly. "I'll conduct him there in person."
      "No one's conducting anyone anywhere," Kinnaird said. He was looking at me, and I didn't care very much for the way he was looking at me. I didn't care very much either for, what he held in his hand: a very nasty-looking Mauser. It was cradled in his fist as if it had grown there, and it was pointing straight between my eybs.
13
      "Clever clever counter-espionage, Carpenter," Dr. Jolly murmured. "How swiftly the fortunes of war change, old boy. But you shouldn't be surprised really. You haven't found out anything that actually matters, but surely you should have found out enough to realize that you are operating out of your class. Please don't try anything foolish. Kinnaird is one of the finest pistol shots I 'have ever known--and you will observe how strategically he's placed,  so that everyone in the room is covered."
      He delicately patted his still bleeding mouth with a handkerchief, rose, went behind me, and ran his hands quickly down my clothes.
      "My word," he said. "Not even carrying a gun. You really are unprepared, Carpenter. Turn round, will you, so that your back is to Kinnaird's gun?"
      I turned around. He smiled pleasantly, then hit me twice across the face with, all his strength, first with the back of his right hand and then with the back of his left. I staggered but didn't fall down. I could taste the salt of blood.
      "Can't even call it regrettable loss of temper," Jolly said with satisfaction. "Did it deliberately and with malice aforethought. Enjoyed it, too."
      "So Kinnaird was the killer," I said slowly, thickly. "He was the man with the gun?"
      "Wouldn't want to take all the credit, mate," Kinnaird said modestly. "Let's say we sorted them out fifty-fifty."
      "_You_ were the one who went out with the monitor to find the capsule," I nodded. "That's why you got your face as badly frost-bitten."
      "Got lost," Kinnaird admitted. "Thought I'd never find the damned station again."
      "Jolly and Kinnaird," Jeremy said wonderingly. "Jolly and Kinnaird. Your own mates. You two ifithy, murderous--"
      "Be quiet," Jolly ordered. "Kinnaird, don't bother answering questions. Unlike Carpenter here, I take no pleasure in outlining my _modus operandi_ and explaining at length how clever I've been. As you observed, Carpenter, I'm a man of action. Commander Swanson, get on that phone there, call up your control room, order your ship to surface and steam north."
      "You're becoming too ambitious, Jolly," Swanson said calmly. "You can't hijack a submarine."
      "Kinnaird," Jolly said. "Point your gun at Hansen's stomach. When I reach the count of five, pull the trigger. One, two, three--"
      Swanson half raised a hand in acknowledgment of defeat, crossed to the wall phone, gave the necessary orders, hung up and came back to stand beside me. He looked at me without either respect or admiration. I looked around at all the other people in the room. Jolly, Hansen and Rawlings standing, Zabrinski sitting on a chair by himself with the now disregarded copy of the _Dolphin Daze_ on his knees, all the others sitting around the table, Kinnaird well clear of them, the gun very steady in his hands. So very steady. No one seemed to be contemplating any heroics. For the most part, everyone was too shocked, too dazed, to think of anything.
      "Hijacking a nuclear submarine is an intriguing prospect, and no doubt would be a highly profitable one, Commander Swanson," Jolly said. "But I know my limitations, No, old top, we shall simply be leaving you. Not very many miles from here is a naval vessel with a helicopter on its after deck. In a little while, Commander, you will send a wireless message on a certain frequency giving our position: the helicopter will pick us up. And even if your crippled engine would stand the strain, I wouldn't advise you to come chasing after that ship with ideas about torpedoing it or anything of that dramatic sort. Apart from the fact that you wouldn't like to be responsible for triggering off a nuclear war, you couldn't catch it anyway. You won't even be able to see the ship, Commander--and if you did, it wouldn't matter, anyway. It has no nationality markings."
      "Where are the films?" I asked.
      "They're already aboard that naval vessel."
      "They're _what?_" Swanson demanded. "How in hell's name can they be?"
      "Sorry and all that, old boy. I repeat that, unlike Carpenter here, I don't go around shooting off my mouth. A professional, my dear captain, _never_ gives information about his methods."
      "So you get off with it," I said bitterly. My mouth felt thick and swollen.
      "Don't see what's to stop us. Crimes don't always come home to roost, you know."
      "Eight men murdered," I said wonderingly. "Eight men. You can stand there and cheerfully admit that you are responsible for the deaths of eight men."
      "Cheerfully?" he said consideringly. "No, not cheerfully. Fm a professional, and a professional never kills unnecessarily. But this time it was necessary. That's all."
      "That's the second time you've used the word 'professional,'" I said slowly. "I was wrong on one theory. You weren't just suborned after the Zebra team had been picked. You've been at this game a long time--you're. too good not to have been."
      "Fifteen years, old lad," Jolly said calmly. "Kinnaird and I--we were the best team in Britain. Our usefulness in that country,, unfortunately, is over. I should imagine that our-- uh--exceptional talents can be employed elsewhere."
      "You admit to all those murders?" I asked.
      He looked at me in sudden cold speculation. "A damned funny question, Carpenter. Of course. I've told you. Why?"
      "And do you, Kinnaird?"
      He looked at me in bleak suspicion. "Why ask?"
      "You answer my question and I'll answer yours." At the corner of my range of vision I could see Jolly looking at me with narrowed eyes. He was very sensitive to atmosphere, he knew there was something off-key.
      "You know damn well what I did, mate," Kinnaird said coldly.
      "So there we have it. In the presence of no less than twelve witnesses, you both confess to murder. You shouldn't have done that, you know. I'll answer your question, Kinnaird. I wanted to have an oral confession from you because, apart from the sheet of aluminum foil and something I'll mention in a minute, we have no actual proof at all against either of you. But now we have your confessions. Your great talents are not going to be used in any other sphere, I'm afraid. You'll never see that helicopter or that naval vessel. You'll both die jerking on the end of a rope."
      "What rubbish is this?" Jolly asked contemptuously. But there was worry under the contempt. "What last-minute despairing bluff are you trying to pull, Carpenter?"
      I ignored his question. I said: "I've been on to Kinnaird for some sixty hours also, Jolly. But I had to play it this way. Without letting you gain what appeared to be the upper hand you would never have admitted to the crimes. But now you have."
      "Don't fall for it, old lad," Jolly said to Kinnaird. "It's just some desperate bluff. He never had any idea that you were in on this."
      "When I knew you were one of the killers," I said to Jolly, I was almost certain Kinnaird had to be another. You shared the same cabin and unless Kinnaird had been sapped or drugged he had to be in on it. He was neither. He was in on it. That door wasn't jammed when Naseby ran to the radio room to warn you--the two of you were leaning all your weight against it to give the impression that it had been closed for hours and that ice had formed.
      "By the same token, young Grant, the assistant radio operator, was in cahoots with you--or he wasn't. If he wasn't, he would have .to be silenced. He wasn't. So you silenced him. After I'd caught on to the two of you, I had a good look at Grant. I went out and dug him up from where we'd buried him. Rawlings and I. I found a great big bruise at the base of his neck. He surprised you in something, or he woke when you knifed or shot one of Major Halliwell's men, and you laid him out. You didn't bother killing him: you were about to set the hut on fire and incinerate him, so killing would have been pointless. But you didn't reckon on Captain Folsom here going in and bringing him out--alive.
      "That was most damnably awkward for you, wasn't it, Jolly? He was unconscious, but when and if he recovered consciousness, he could blow the whole works on you. But you couldn't get at him to finish him off, could you? The bunkhouse was full of people, most of them suffering so severely that sleep was impossible for them. When we arrived on the scene you got desperate. Grant was showing signs of regaining consciousness. You took a chance, but not all that much of a chance. Remember how surprised I was to find that you had used up all my morphine? Well, I _was_ surprised then. But not now. I know now where it went. You gave him an injection of morphine--and you made damn sure the hypodermic held a lethal dose. Am I correct?"
      "You're cleverer than I thought you were," he said calmly. "Maybe I have misjudged you a little. But it still makes no difference, old boy."
      "I wonder. If I'd known about Kinnaird so long, why do you think I allowed a situation to develop where you could apparently turn the tables?"
      "'Apparently' is not the word you want. And the answer to your question is easy. You didn't know Kinnaird _had_ a gun."
      "No?" I looked at Kinnaird. "Are you sure that thing works?"
      "Don't come that old stuff with me, mate," Kinnaird said in contempt.
      "I just wondered," I said mildly. "I thought perhaps the petrol in the tractor's tank might have removed all the lubricating oil."
      Jolly came close to me, his face tight and cold. "You _knew_ about this? What goes on, Carpenter?"
      "It was actually Commander Swanson here who found the gun in the tank," I said. "You had to leave it there because you knew you'd all be getting a good clean-up and medical examination when we got you on board, and it would have been bound to be discovered. But a murderer--a professional, Jolly--will never part with his gun unless he is compelled to. I knew if you got the slightest chance you would go back for it. So I put it back in the tank."
      "The hell you did!" Swanson was as nearly angry as I'd ever seen him. "Forgot to tell me, didn't you7'
      "I must have. That was after I'd cottoned on to you, Jolly. I wasn't _absolutely_ sure you had a partner, but I knew if you had, it must be Kinnaird. So I put the gun back there in the middle of the night and I made good and certain that you, Jolly, didn't get the chance to go anywhere near the tractor shed at any time. But the gun vanished that following morning when everyone was out sampling the fresh air. So then I knew you had an accomplice. But the real reason for planting that gun, of course, is that without it you'd never have talked. But now you have talked and it's all finished. Put up that gun, Kinnaird."
      "I'm afraid your bluff's run out, mate." The gun was pointing directly at my face.
      "Your last chance, Kinnaird. Please pay attention to what I am saying. Put up that gun or you will be requiring the services of a doctor within twenty seconds."
      He said something, short and unprintable. I said, "It's on your own head. Rawlings, you know what to do."
      Every head turned toward Rawlings, who was standing leaning negligently against a bulkhead, his hands crossed lightly in front of him. Kinnaird looked too, the Mauser following the direction of his eyes. A gun barked, the sharp, flat crack of a Mannlicher-Schoenauer. Kinnaird screamed and his gun spun from his smashed hand. Zabrinski, holding my automatic in one hand and his copy of the _Dolphin Daze_--now with a neat charred hole through the middle--in the other, regarded his handiwork admiringly, then turned to me. "Was that how you wanted it done, Doc?"
      "That was exactly how I wanted it done, Zabrinski. Thank you very much. A first-class job."
      "A first-class job," Rawlings sniffed. He retrieved the fallen Mauser and pointed it in Jolly's general direction. "At four feet, even Zabrinski couldn't miss." He dug into a pocket, pulled out a roll of bandage, and tossed it to Jolly. "We kinda thought we might be having to use this, so we came prepared. Dr. Carpenter said your pal here would be requiring the services of a doctor. He is. You're a doctor. Get busy."
      "Do it yourself," Jolly snarled. No "old boy," no "old top." The bonhomie was gone, and gone forever.
      Rawlings looked at Swanson and said woodenly, "Permission to hit Dr. Jolly over the head with this little old gun, sir?"
      "Permission granted," Swanson said grimly. But no further persuasion was necessary. Jolly cursed and started ripping the cover off the bandage.
      For almost a minute there was silence in the room while we watched Jolly carry out a rough, ready and far from gentle repair job on Kinnaird's hand. Then Swanson said slowly: "I still don't understand how the hell Jolly got rid of the film."