Carte Blanche - Jeffery Deaver [7]
4
From the ditch, James Bond watched the locomotive and the cars continue their passage, slowing as they dug into the soft earth, peeling up rails and flinging sand, dirt and stones everywhere. Finally he climbed out and assessed the situation. He’d had only minutes to work out how to avert the calamity that would send the deadly substance into the Danube. After braking to a stop, he’d grabbed two of the grenades the Serbians had brought with them, then leapt on to the tracks to plant the devices.
As he had calculated, the locomotive and wagons had stayed upright and hadn’t toppled into the stream. He’d orchestrated his derailment where the ground was still flat, unlike the intended setting of the Irishman’s sabotage. Finally, hissing, groaning and creaking, the train came to a standstill not far from the Irishman and his partner, though Bond could not see them through the dust and smoke.
He spoke into the SRAC radio. ‘This is Leader One. Are you there?’ Silence. ‘Are you there?’ he growled. ‘Respond.’ Bond massaged his shoulder, where a sliver of hot, whistling shrapnel had torn through his jacket and sliced skin.
A crackle. Finally: ‘The train is derailed!’ It was the older Serbian’s voice. ‘Did you see? Where are you?’
‘Listen to me carefully.’
‘What has happened?’
‘Listen! We don’t have much time. I think they’ll try to blow up or shoot the haz-mat containers. It’s their only way to spill the contents. I’m going to fire towards them and drive them back to their car. Wait till the Mercedes is in that muddy area near the restaurant, then shoot out the tyres and keep them inside it.’
‘We should take them now!’
‘No. Don’t do anything until they’re beside the restaurant. They’ll have no defensive position inside the Mercedes. They’ll have to surrender. Do you understand me?’
The SRAC went dead.
Damn. Bond started forward through the dust towards the place where the third rail car, the one containing the hazardous material, waited to be ripped open.
Niall Dunne tried to reconstruct what had happened. He’d known he might have to improvise, but this was one thing he had not considered: a pre-emptive strike by an unknown enemy.
He looked out carefully from his vantage-point, a stand of bushes near where the locomotive sat, smoking, clicking and hissing. The assailant was invisible, hidden by the darkness of night, the dust and fumes. Maybe the man had been crushed to death. Or fled. Dunne lifted the rucksack over his shoulder and made his way round the diesel to the far side, where the derailed wagons would give him cover from the intruder – if he was still alive and present.
In a curious way, Dunne found himself relieved of his nagging anxiety. The death had been averted. He’d been fully prepared for it, had steeled himself – anything for his boss, of course – but the other man’s intervention had settled the matter.
As he approached the diesel he couldn’t help but admire the massive machine. It was an American General Electric Dash 8-40B, old and battered, as you usually saw in the Balkans, but a classic beauty, 4,000 horsepower. He noted the sheets of steel, the wheels, vents, bearings and valves, the springs, hoses and pipes . . . all so beautiful, elegant in simple functionality. Yes, it was such a relief that—
He was startled by a man staggering towards him, begging for help. It was the train driver. Dunne shot him twice in the head.
It was such a relief that he hadn’t been forced to cause the death of this wonderful machine, as he’d been dreading. He ran his hand along the side of the locomotive, as a father would stroke the hair of a sick child whose fever had just broken. The diesel would be back in service in a few months’ time.
Niall Dunne hitched the rucksack higher on his shoulder and slipped between the wagons to get to work.
5
The two shots James Bond had heard had not hit the hazardous-materials car – he was covering that from thirty yards away. He guessed the engine driver and perhaps his mate had been