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'Ah, I see. Perhaps you would prefer something like this?'

She started to play 'Night and Day'. Finebaum moved round the piano to look down at the keys. 'Hey - that's great. That's really something. I mean, where did you ever learn to play like that?'

'Oh, one gets around, Mr Finebaum. Isn't that the phrase?'

'I guess so.'

A roar of engines shattered the morning stillness.

'Oh, my God,' she whispered and stopped playing.

As Finebaum ran to the window there was a sudden booming explosion and the rattle of machine-gun fire.

Gaillard, high in the woods now, on the upper slopes of the mountain, heard the echoes of that first outbreak of firing and paused to listen. His lungs were aching as he struggled for breath, leaning heavily on his sticks, and his legs were trembling slightly.

He was too old, of course. Too many years under his belt, and the truth was he simply wasn't fit enough. When it came right down to it, the only thing he really had going for him was technique and the skill born of his natural genius and years of experience.

The Finns, on the other hand, were young men, battle-hardened to endure anything and at the peak of their physical fitness. He really didn't stand a chance - had not done from the beginning.

He langlaufed across the small plateau that tilted gently upwards and paused on the ridge. On the other side the snow slope was almost vertical, dropping into grey mist, no means of knowing what was down there at all.

He turned and saw the first of the Finns appear from the trees on the other side of the plateau no more than thirty yards away. Gestrin was number three and the big Finn waved his hand to bring the patrol to a halt.

He pushed up his goggles. 'All right, Doctor. You've put up a wonderful show and we admire you for it, but enough of this foolishness. Now we go home.'

There were two more violent explosions somewhere in the mist below. The rattle of small-arms fire persisting. Gaillard thought of his friends; of Claudine Chevalier and of Claire de Beauville and what had happened to her.

He was filled with a fierce, sudden anger and shouted down at the Finns, 'All right, you bastards! Let's see what you're made of.'

He went straight over the edge of that near-vertical drop, crouching, skis nailed together, and plunged into the mist. The Finns, as they reached the edge, followed, one after the other, without hesitation.

Canning, Birr and Hesser were in the tunnel, Howard on the wall, when the engine's roar first shattered the morning calm. A few moments later, the half-tracks emerged into view and took up position. The Finns spilled out and started to deploy. Hoffer and the men under his personal command took up position to the left.

Howard trained his glasses on them, trying to make out what they were doing. In the moment of realization there came a tongue of orange flame; a second later, a violent explosion as the first Panzerfaust projectile struck the wall beside the drawbridge.

Everyone crouched. 'What in the hell was that?' Birr demanded.

'Panzerfaust,' Hesser replied. 'It's an antitank weapon rather like your bazooka.'

'So I see,' Canning said grimly, ducking as another violent explosion rocked the drawbridge - a direct hit this time.

'Obviously it's the chains they're after,' Birr said. 'I wonder how long it will take?'

Heavy machine-gun fire raked the top of the wall, bullets ricocheting into space. 'Give them everything we've got,' Canning cried. 'Really pour it on.'

Schneider opened up with the MG34 and the rest of the Germans backed him with their Mauser rifles, sniping from the embrasures in the wall. The Finns took refuge behind the half-tracks, one of which moved position slightly to cover the Panzerfaust group.

The fourth projectile, fired by Hoffer personally, scored a direct hit on the drawbridge just below the chain-mounting on the left-hand side. The woodwork disintegrated, the chain coupling tore free, the drawbridge sagged.

'Strike