Red Ice

The legionnaire’s second toss caught the ridge crest solidly. He gave it three strong tugs and then kept steady tension on the line. Meanwhile, Gurung clambered from quoin to quoin until he was at a slightly higher level than the upper set of windows. Next, Chamonix angled the line over to the Gurkha. Gurung transferred his weight to the line and let Chamonix jockey the line to the balustrade of the nearest window. A resounding crack from above indicated that one of the ridge tiles had given way and the grappling hook had come loose. Gurung threw out his arms and started to fall.

CHAPTER 15

The Gurkha lunged for the balustrade, his boots clawing for footholds in the air. With one hand he caught a pillar as the grappling hook plunged past him. For a few moments he just oscillated by one hand. Then he mustered the reserve to thrust his free hand to the railing and kip over the balustrade. He was safe.

Immediately, he set to work on the shutters. They were old and poorly maintained. Gradually, he managed to pry enough space between them to pop the hooks with his knife. Using a pry bar, he raised the window and peered in. Then he disappeared through the window.

Seconds later, he was beckoning for the free end of the mountaineering line. Gurung anchored it to the balustrade while Chamonix tied off the other end to a fence post. The sloping line, now taut, could not be seen from the lower window. Dravit was the first to hoist himself up the line, then Puckins, and then myself. Chamonix, in his Russian uniform, posted himself at the base of the building and attempted to look routine and nonchalant.

From the second story, I could just distinguish the rest of the village through the night mist. A gray carpet of chimneyless roofs stretched uniformly in all directions. The pattern was marred by thirty-five years of deterioration, a few Russian-style chimneys, and an occasional concrete shoe box.

We closed the shutters and entered the passageway. The title and responsibilities of each official were etched with bureaucratic orderliness to the left of his office door. The Corrective Labor Colony Section held the third office on the left. Its door was locked.

Dravit tested the transom. It was locked, too. He reached into one of his cargo pockets and unrolled a cloth tool kit on the floor.

“It’s a key-lever tumbler; this may take some time.”

He inserted a Z-shaped tension tool into the keyway and applied pressure. Then, with a curved pick, he began locating the individual tumblers, raising each one to the unlocked position. Sweat beaded on his forehead.

Precious minutes passed.

“Open, yon great muckin’ door of the bloody Bolshies.” He pushed the door open cautiously. “Ah, the old magic’s still there. Remind me to tell you about my night in the strong room at Pusan.”

Dravit went through the desks and cabinets, skimming every document by flashlight. There were reams of documents. If the camps’ prisoners could have eaten the documents they generated, they would have grown fat.

A half hour went by. An hour. An hour and a half. “Got it! Got it! Got it! Just like the bloody Bolshies to wallow in ruddy paper,” Dravit exclaimed under his breath. He drew the Nikonos from his other pocket and clicked away.

We nearly didn’t hear the footsteps moving down the passageway. The guard had walked past the office earlier. This time he hesitated before the relocked door. Dravit and I ducked behind some desks with Gurung. The bolt shifted in the lock. Puckins slipped behind the door just as it opened. The guard swept his light across the room. As he stepped forward to look behind the desks, Puckins dropped him with a sharp tap, using the butt of his shotgun.

The four of us dragged the unconscious guard to the bottom of the stairway, just out of sight of the front doorway. We positioned him as if he had fallen. As we were about to turn away, Gurung pulled a flask from his jacket and sprinkled some fluid over the VOKhk guard.

“Oh, sergeant of the guard being very much pissed if finding guard in such condition,” Gurung signed. “I know surely this guard will not report irregularities of the evening to his sergeant, him now smelling of cheap vodka. I know, having much fear of sergeant of the guard myself for many years.”

He returned down the passageway chuckling elfishly.

“We do have our fun,” Chamonix mumbled dourly on hearing of Gurung’s prank when we rejoined him outside.