And kist his wounds that were so red.

responsible for the theft of the fuses. And for the smashing of the radio valves. And for the theft of the condensers." "And for the theft of the sugar," Joss put in. "Though heaven only knows why they should want to steal that." "Sugar!" I exclaimed, and then the question died in my throat. I happened to be looking straight at the little Jew, Theodore Mahler, and the nervous start he gave, the quick flicker of his eyes in Joss's direction, was unmistakable. I knew I couldn't have imagined it. But I looked away quickly, before he could see my face. "Our last bag," Joss explained. "Maybe thirty pounds. It's gone. I found what little was left of itjust a handful lying on the floor of the tunnelmixed up with the smashed valves." I shook my head and said nothing. The reason for this last theft I couldn't even begin to imagine. Supper that night was a sketchy affairsoup, coffee and a couple of biscuits each as the only solids. The soup was thin, the biscuits no more than a bite and the coffee, for me at any rate, all but undrinkable without sugar. And the meal was as silent as it was miserable, conversation being limited to what was absolutely necessary. Time and again I would see someone turn to his neighbour and make to say something, then his lips would clamp tightly shut, the expression drain out of his face as he turned away without a word: with almost everyone thinking that his or her neighbour might be a murderer, or, what was almost as bad, that his or her neighbour might be thinking that he was a murderer, the meal was by all odds the most awkward and uncomfortable that I'd ever had. Or, that is, the first part of it was: but by and by I came to the conclusion that I'd a great deal more to worry about than the niceties of social intercourse. After the meal I rose, pulled on parka and gloves, picked up the searchlight; told Jackstraw and Joss to come with me and headed for the trap-door. Zagero's voice stopped me. "Where you goin', Doc?" "That's no concern of yours. Well, Mrs Dansby-Gregg?" "Shouldn't youshouldn't you take the rifle with you?" "Don't worry." I smiled thinly. "With everyone watching everyone else like hawks, that rifle's as safe as houses." "Butbut someone could jump for it," she said nervously. "They could get you when you're coming down the hatch" "Mr Nielsen and I are the last two persons they'd ever shoot. Without us, they couldn't get a mile from here. digital camera buying advice and tips The most likely candidates for the next bullet are some of yourselves. You're absolutely inessential and, as far as the killers are concerned, represent nothing more than a waste of priceless rations." With this comforting thought I left them, each person trying to watch all the others at one and the same time, while doing his level best to give the appearance of watching no one. The wind was so slight now that the anemometer cups had stopped turning. The dying embers of the burnt-out plane were a dull smouldering glow to the north-east. The snow had gone completely and the first faint stars were beginning to show through the thinning cloud above. It was typically Greenland, this swift change in the weather, and so, too, was the temperature inversion that would surely follow in the morning, or before morning. Twelve hours from now it was going to be very cold indeed. With searchlight and torches we examined every inch of the tractor and sledges, above and below, and if there had been a pin there I would have sworn that we couldn't have missed it, far less anything so large as a couple of guns. We found nothing. I straightened, and turned to look at the glow that was lightening the sky to the east, and even as I stood there with Joss and Jackstraw by my side the moon, preternaturally large and rather more than half full, heaved itself above the distant horizon and flooded the ice-cap with its pale and ghostly light, laying down between itself and our feet a bar-straight path of glittering silver grey. We watched in silence for a full minute, then Jackstraw stirred. Even before he spoke, I knew what was in his mind. "Uplavnik," he murmured. "Tomorrow, we set off for Uplav-nik. But first, you said, a good night's sleep." "I know," I said. "A traveller's moon." "A traveller's moon," he echoed. He was right, of course. Travel in the Arctic, in winter, was regulated not by daylight but my moonlight. And tonight we had that moonand we had a clear sky, a dying wind and no snow at all. I turned to Joss. "You'll be all right alone?" "I have no worries," he said soberly. "Look, sir, can't I come too?" "Stay here and stay healthy," I advised. "Thanks, Joss, but you know someone must remain behind. I'll call you up on the usual schedules. You

The wind sall blaw for evermair."

outstretched and saying something I couldn't catch. It was a brave gesture of the little minister's, but a forlorn and hopeless one: I could see Corazzini change his gun to his left hand, strike Mr Smallwood a heavy backhanded blow across the face and the sound of a body falling on the ice above was unmistakable. And then Corazzini was waving the others back at the point of the gun and was advancing towards the wooden battens that straddled the crevasse, and I knew with a dull certainty how he intended to dispose of us. Why waste two bullets when all he had to do was to kick the edges of these battens over the side? Whether these . battens, weighing two hundred pounds between them, struck us or smashed away the last remaining buttress of the snow-bridge was quite immaterial: the point was that I was inescapably attached to them by the nylon rope round my waist, and when they plummeted down I would go with them, tearing away the bridge and carrying Jackstraw with me to our deaths in the unthinkable depths below. Despairingly, I considered the idea of snatching at the rifle still strapped to Jackstraw's back, but dismissed it even with the thought. It would take me seconds to get it off. There was only one thing for it, and it wasn't going to do me any good at all. With a jump I could be half-way up the rope in a second, the increased weight would make the battens difficult to kick over, and while Corazzini was either pushing these or pumping bullets into me as I swarmed up the rope, somebodyZagero, say, could get him from the rear. That way there might, at least, be a faint chance for Jackstraw. I swung my arms behind me, bent my knees then remained frozen in that ridiculous position as a rope came uncoiling down from above and struck me across the shoulder. I glanced up and saw Corazzini smiling down at me. "You two characters fixin' on stayin' down there all day? Come on up." It would be useless to try to describe the maelstrom of thoughts and emotions that whirled through my mind in the ninety seconds that elapsed before Jackstraw and I stood once more in incredulous safety on the trail above. They ranged from hope to bafflement to wild relief to the conviction that Corazzini was playing a cat-and-mouse game with us, and no one thought was in my mind for more than seconds at a time. Even when I was safe, I still didn't know what to think, the overwhelming relief and gladness and reaction blotted out everything. I was trembling violently, and although Corazzini must have noticed it he affected sony digital camera carl zeiss not to. He stepped forward and handed me the Beretta, butt first. "You're a mite careless about where you stow your armoury, Doc. I've known for a long time where you kept this. But I guess it may have been fairly useful these last few minutes." "Butbut why-?" "Because I've got a damned good job and a chair behind a vice-president's desk waiting for me in Glasgow," he snapped. "I'd appreciate the chance to sit in that chair some day." Without another word, he turned away. I knew what he meant, all right. I knew we owed him our lives. Corazzini was as convinced as I that someone had engineered the whole thing. It didn't require any thought at all to guess who that someone was. My first thought was for Jackstraw. Jackstraw with a broken arm was going to make things very difficult for me: it might well make things quite impossible. But when I'd worked his parka off it required only one glance at the unnatural twist of the left arm to see that though Jackstraw had had every excuse for thinking his arm gone, it was, in fact, an elbow dislocation. He made no murmur and his face remained quite expressionless as I manipulated the bone back into the socket, but the wide white grin that cracked his face immediately afterwards was proof enough of his feelings. I walked over to where Helene Fleming sat on the sledge, still shaking from the shock, Mrs Dansby-Gregg and Margaret Ross doing their best to soothe her. The uncharitable thought struck me that it was probably the first time that Mrs Dansby-Gregg had ever tried to soothe anyone, but I was almost ashamed of the thought as soon as it had occurred to me. "That was a close call, young lady," I said to Helene. "But all's well.. . . Any more bones broken, eh?" I tried to speak jocularly, but it didn't sound very convincing. "No, Dr Mason." She gave a long shuddering sigh. "I don't know how to thank you and Mr Nielsen" "Don't try," I advised. "Who pushed you?" "What?" She stared at me. "You heard, Helene. Who did it?" "Yes, I -1 was pushed," she murmured reluctantly. "But it was an accident, I know it was." "Who?" I persisted. "It was me," Solly Levin put in. He was twisting his hands nervously. "Like the lady