The Dark Side of the Island - Jack Higgins [31]
As he reached the foot of the stairs, Boyd came round the corner. There was blood on his face where a piece of stone had sliced his cheek.
"Turned the corner and met one of them coming down," he said. "Too bloody quick for me. Closed some kind of steel trapdoor where the stairs pass through the first floor."
"They'll have every soldier in town up here before we know it," Lomax said. "And Nikoli isn't supposed to blow the bridge until he hears this lot go. You'll have to lay your charges here."
Boyd didn't argue. He took off his pack and opened it. The plastic explosive he was using was already made up into charges and Lomax helped him to fuse them quickly. Boyd placed them round the walls at spaced intervals. As he started to wire them up, an explosion sounded in the distance.
They looked at each other for a brief moment and then Boyd continued with his task, face calm. Something had obviously made Nikoli Aleko move ahead of time. Probably a vehicle had tried to cross the bridge and he had realised that something must have gone wrong.
"Is there enough?" Lomax demanded.
Boyd shrugged. "Depends how good the foundations are. In this climate, the mortar in these old buildings is usually pretty rotten."
He linked the wires to a small, battery-operated detonating box and nodded. "You get the truck moving. As soon as I hear the engine, I'll set this thing for thirty seconds."
Lomax moved outside quickly. The dead sentry still crouched on the floor of the cab, flies crawling over his face. Lomax dragged him out and clambered behind the wheel. The engine roared into life and as he moved into gear, Boyd ran out of the entrance and swung up beside him.
Lomax turned so tightly that the off-side wheels lifted. As they accelerated across the yard, someone fired a Schmeisser from one of the upper storeys, the bullets kicking fountains of dust into the air ten yards to the left and then they were through the gates.
The explosion, when it came, was tremendous and in the driving mirror Lomax saw a great cloud mushroom above the walls, the tower rising from its centre.
For a few moments it remained straight and true and then it seemed to lurch to one side. It started to fall in slow motion, gathering momentum as it disappeared into the dust and smoke.
Boyd had been leaning out of the window and he turned with a grin and wiped blood from his face with the back of his hand. "I don't mind telling you I was worried there for a moment or two."
"I still am," Lomax told him. "The sooner we're on the other side of the mountain, the better I'll like it."
He took the truck down through the ravine in a cloud of dust and braked sharply as they came out into the open. A German troop-carrier had just rounded the shoulder of the mountain a couple of hundred yards below and was moving towards them.
There were only seconds in which to act and he gave Boyd a shove towards the other door. "Get out of it," he shouted.
Boyd didn't argue. He jumped to the ground and Lomax took the truck forward in a burst of speed. A moment later, he opened the door and jumped.
The Germans seemed unaware of their danger until the last moment and then their driver swung the wheel of the troop carrier so sharply that the vehicle heeled over into the ditch as the empty truck rolled past. Fifty yards further on, it went over the edge of the road and disappeared from view as another troop-carrier came round the shoulder of the mountain.
As Lomax climbed out of the ditch and started across the road, a dozen soldiers ran towards him. He dropped to one knee and loosed off a long burst that sent them diving for cover and then continued across the road and began to scramble up the slope.
Behind him, the grey-clad figures fanned out as he worked his way up diagonally, keeping to the shelter of the boulders. He paused once and a