Midnight Never Comes - Jack Higgins [27]
He was back within a couple of minutes. 'Nothing doing, I'm afraid. All the cupboards are locked and the calor gas cylinders are empty, so we couldn't cook anything even if we wanted to.'
'Never mind, the chocolate is fine.' Already half was gone and she held the bar out, a guilty look on her face. 'Have some.'
'That's all right,' he said. 'I had a whole bar to myself back there on the mountain. I'll make do with a cigarette.'
'I must say you seem extraordinarily self-sufficient,' she said. 'What do you do for a living?'
'I'm Lecturer in French Literature at the University of Essex--or at least I will be when the new term starts in October. Something of a return to the fold really.'
'Why do you say that?'
'Oh, I was a university lecturer way back when I first started out, but it all seemed too restricting, so I joined the overseas Civil Service.'
'What went wrong?'
'Nothing really, except that the Empire diminished year by year and they kept moving me on. Kenya, Cyprus, Northern Rhodesia. The future seemed uncertain to say the least, so I decided to get out while the going was good.'
'Back to a calmer more ordered world.'
'Something like that. After all, one doesn't need a great deal. You learn that as you get older. Take this lodge for example. A man could live here quite comfortably.'
'But not alone, surely?'
'All right then, we'll admit Eve into his paradise.'
'But what would they live on in these barren hills?'
'There's fish in the stream, deer in the forest.' He laughed. 'Aren't you familiar with that old Italian proverb? One may live well on bread and kisses?'
'Or chocolate?' she said solemnly, holding up what was left of the bar and they both laughed.
He opened the door and looked out. It was a night to thank God for, the whole earth fresh after the heat of the day and when a bank of cloud rolled away from the moon the loch and the mountains beyond were bathed in a hard white light. The sky was incredibly beautiful with stars strung away to the horizon where the mountains lifted to meet them.
He had not heard her move and yet she spoke at his shoulder. 'We could be the only two people left on earth.'
He turned, aware of her warmth, her closeness, of the eyes shining through the half-darkness and shook his head gently.
'Not for long, Asta Svensson. Not for long. Listen.'
She moved out of the porch and stood there looking down the glen to where the sounds echoed faintly between the hills. 'What is it?'
'A motor vehicle of some description--perhaps two. They'll be here soon.'
She turned and when she moved back inside, her face was quite calm. 'Then let us be ready for them.'
She limped to the fireplace and settled herself into the chair and Chavasse stayed in the porch. A cloud covered the face of the moon for perhaps a full minute and as it moved on, moonlight flooding the glen again, two Land Rovers turned off the track and braked to a halt.
The man who slid from behind the wheel of the first one holding a shotgun was of medium height, thick-set and muscular, his mouth cruel in a pale face. Chavasse recognised him at once from his briefing file. Jack Murdoch, Donner's factor. Fergus Munro came round from the other side of the cab to join him.
Donner was at the wheel of the second vehicle and a woman sat beside him, her face in darkness, a scarf around her head. Probably Ruth Murray, Donner's secretary, Chavasse decided and then Donner got out of the Land Rover and moved to join the others, an enormously powerful looking figure in a sheepskin coat.
Murdoch said something, there was the click of the hammers going back on the shotgun and Donner whistled softly. There was a sudden scramble inside his Land Rover and a black shadow materialised from the darkness to stand beside him in the moonlight.
Chavasse's mouth went dry and fear moved inside him for