Eye of the Needle - Ken Follett [138]
Faber said, “Yes, I can hear you, professor. Seen any good cathedrals lately?”
“What?…is that—”
“Yes.” Faber smiled. “How do you do.” Then the smile abruptly left his face, as if playtime was over, and he manipulated the frequency dial of the radio.
Lucy turned and left the room. It was over. She walked listlessly down the stairs and into the kitchen. There was nothing for her to do but wait for him to kill her. She could not run away—she did not have the energy, and he obviously knew it.
She looked out of the window. The storm had ended. The howling gale had dropped to a stiff breeze, there was no rain, and the eastern sky was bright with the promise of sunshine. The sea—
She frowned, and looked again.
Yes, my God, it was a submarine.
Destroy the radio, the man had said.
Last night Henry had cursed in a foreign language…“I did it for my country,” he had said.
And, in his delirium, something about waiting at Calais for a phantom army….
Destroy the radio.
Why would a man take a can of photographic negatives on a fishing trip?
She had known all along he was not insane.
The submarine was a German U-boat, Henry was some kind of German agent…spy?…this very moment he must be trying to contact that U-boat by radio…
Destroy the radio.
She had no right to give up, she couldn’t now that she understood. She knew what she had to do. She would have liked to put Jo somewhere else, where he could not see it—that bothered her more than the pain she knew she would feel—but there was no time for that. Henry would surely find his frequency at any second and then it might be too late—
She had to destroy the radio, but the radio was upstairs with Henry, and he had both the guns and he would kill her.
She knew only one way to do it.
She placed one of Tom’s kitchen chairs in the center of the room, stood on it, reached up and unscrewed the light bulb.
She got down off the chair, went to the door and threw the switch.
“Are you changing the bulb?” Jo asked.
Lucy climbed on the chair, hesitated for a moment, then thrust three fingers into the live socket.
There was a bang, an instant of agony, and then unconsciousness.
FABER HEARD the bang. He had found the right frequency on the transmitter, had thrown the switch to “Transmit” and had picked up the microphone. He was about to speak when the noise came. Immediately afterward the lights on the dials of the wireless set went out.
His face suffused with anger. She had short-circuited the electricity supply to the whole house. He had not credited her with that much ingenuity.
He should have killed her before. What was wrong with him? He had never hesitated, not ever, until he met this woman.
He picked up one of the guns and went downstairs.
The child was crying. Lucy lay in the kitchen doorway, out cold. Faber took in the empty light socket with the chair beneath it. He frowned in amazement.
She had done it with her hand.
Faber said: “Jesus Christ Almighty.”
Lucy’s eyes opened.
She hurt all over.
Henry was standing over her with the gun in his hands. He was saying, “Why did you use your hand? Why not a screwdriver?”
“I didn’t know you could do it with a screwdriver.”
He shook his head. “You are truly an astonishing woman,” he said as he lifted the gun, aimed it at her, and lowered it again. “Damn you.”
His gaze went to the window, and he started.
“You saw it,” he said.
She nodded.
He stood tense for a moment, then went to the door. Finding it nailed shut, he smashed the window with the butt of his gun and climbed out.
Lucy got to her feet. Jo threw his arms around her legs. She did not feel strong enough to pick him up. She staggered to the window and looked out.
He was running toward the cliff. The U-boat was still there, perhaps half a mile offshore. He reached the cliff edge and crawled over. He was going to try to swim to the submarine.
She had to stop him.
Dear God, no more…
She climbed through the window, blotting out the cries of her son, and ran after him.
When she reached the cliff edge she lay down and