The Blue Ice (24 page)

‘Back to Bergen?' I asked.

‘No. It went up the fjord towards Flamm.'

‘Flamm?' The name meant something to me. I dived into the chartroom and looked at the map. Jill and Curtis crowded round me. Flamm was at the head of Aurlandsfjord. And from Flamn there was a mountain railway which had joined the main Bergen–Oslo line at Myrdal. From Myrdal he was within an hour's run of Finse. I swung round. ‘Can you two ski?'

‘Yes,' said Jill.

‘A bit,' Curtis replied.

‘Right. As soon as I've got my things together, Dick will run you up to Flamm. You may catch up with Dahler there. If so, don't let him see you. If he's gone, take the next train to Myrdal and from there catch the Oslo train to Finse. If my guess is right, you'll pick up Dahler's train there – or if not Dahler's, Jorgensen's. Wait at Finse for them. Understand?'

Curtis nodded. But I saw an obstinate look come into Jill's face. ‘Where are you going?'

‘Sunde and I are going up into the mountains.'

‘I'm coming with you,' she said.

‘No.' She began to argue, but I stopped her. ‘You'll only slow us up. We've got to move fast. We've got to catch Lovaas up before he gets to Farnell. Oh, for God's sake!' I cried as she started to argue again. ‘Do as I say. Follow Dahler. I know what Lovaas is up to. But I don't understand Dahler's game. For all I know he may be the more dangerous of the two.' I went down to my cabin then, calling for Dick. ‘Dick,' I said. ‘You'll stay with the boat. Run Jill and Curtis up to Flamm and then return here. Lie off in the fjord and keep watches. Wilson and Carter will remain with you. Don't move from here for any message whatever.'

I reached down into the bottom drawer of a locker and brought out the two service revolvers. I saw his eyebrows lift. ‘Okay,' he said. ‘You'll find me lying off wherever the water's shallow enough to take my hook. If you want to come aboard at night flick me G-E-O-R-G-E on a torch.'

‘Right,' I said. I opened my wallet. ‘Here's fifty thousand kroner. Give Curtis twenty and Jill ten. Keep the rest yourself. If you want Ulvik, his number is Bergen 155 102.'

I was running through drawers, taking out things I needed – socks, sweaters, gloves, oilskins. ‘Get me some cigarettes, matches, chocolate and a half bottle of whisky,' I told Dick. ‘And a couple of candles. They're in the galley. There's a small torch there, too.'

In five minutes I was ready with everything jumbled into an old kitbag. I dumped it over the side on to the quay. ‘Let go for'ard,' Dick ordered. Wilson ran to the warps. Jill came towards me. ‘Good luck!' she said. Her grey eyes were clouded as though with pain. ‘Please God you reach him in time,' she whispered. Then suddenly she leaned forward and kissed me on the mouth. ‘Thank you,' she said softly and turned quickly away.

‘Let go aft,' Dick called to Wilson. The engine came to life with a roar. I turned to Curtis. ‘I'm relying on you to catch up with Dahler,' I said. ‘Don't follow him if he goes to Bergen. Go on to Finse. I want you there, between us and Jorgensen.'

‘Okay,' he said.

‘I'll get in touch with you at the hotel at Finse just as soon as I can.'

He nodded and I jumped down on to the quay as the ship went slowly astern. In the thin drizzle I stood and watched
Diviner
swing gracefully on the flat surface of the water. The propellers frothed at her stern and she glided away up the fjord, her slender spars devoid of sail, but her brasswork gleaming proudly even in that dull light. I watched her until she was no more than a ghostly shape in the thickening curtain of mist.

An open tourer swung into the quay, hooting furiously. Sunde jumped out from the seat beside the driver as the
drosje
came to a standstill. The back was littered with rucksacks and skis. ‘You jump in the back,' he said, grabbing the kitbag. ‘You can get yer rucksack packed then.' He opened the door and threw the kitbag on top of the rucksacks. I climbed in and the car started off before he was back in his seat. ‘We can go as far as Vassbygden by car,' he said, as we tore up into the square and turned left along the bank of the river.

That was one of the wildest drives I have ever had. The driver was one of Sunde's resistance friends and evidently he knew something of the urgency of the matter, for he drove as though the devil was behind us. The road was little more than a stone track. We bumped and swayed up the valley. The mountains ahead were a grey-white world of snow half obscured by mist. On either side they closed in on us till we were winding along under beetling cliffs that looked as though they would rain boulders down on us at any minute, so cracked was the rock by the ice of countless winters.

Sunde turned in his seat as I was struggling to pack my rucksack and still prevent myself from being jolted out of the car. ‘Lovaas is exactly an hour ahead of us,' he said. ‘Harald here' – he nodded towards the driver – ‘had only just returned from driving him up to Vassbygden when I sent for him.'

An hour! If we went really fast we could still catch up with him. I thought of Lovaas's big girth. Then I remembered how quick he had been on his feet. An hour was quite a lot to make up. But we had one advantage. We knew he was ahead of us. He did not know that we were behind him. ‘Who was with him?' I asked.

‘His mate and another man,' was the reply.

The cliffs above us flattened back to pine-clad slopes. A long sheet of water filled the valley. ‘Vassbygdi,' Sunde shouted. Houses huddled at the farther end, their reflections clearcut in the soft green water.

We skirted the lake and went on for another mile up the valley to the village of Vassbygden. There the
drosje
stopped. It was the end of the road. We piled out and got our rucksacks on to bur shoulders. They were incredibly heavy. Apart from clothing, we carried food – cheese and chocolate mainly. The skis were tied across the top. Harald and the
drosje
disappeared down the track and we turned our faces to the mountains. The air was cold and damp. The rucksack dragged at my unaccustomed shoulders. My borrowed ski boots were too big. I cursed Farnell and began to sweat.

For all that he was a skinny little man about half my size, it was Sunde who set the pace. And when I asked him whether he thought to catch Lovaas up that afternoon, he said. ‘We gotter get to Osterbo
turisthytte
by nightfall. That is unless yer want ter sleep in one of the old disused saeters.'

‘There's a moon,' I panted in reply. ‘We'll push on by moonlight.'

‘Per'aps,' he said. ‘But wait and see 'ow yer feelin' by then. Osterbo's quite a way – over two Norwegian miles; an' there's seven English miles to each Norwegian.'

We climbed in silence after that. We were moving up into the mist, climbing along the side of a valley. Below us the river thundered by narrow gorges down to Vassbygdi. Every now and then the track flattened out and the river rose to meet us. We trudged through a narrow gorge where the water ran deep and swift. Damp-blackened rock rose sheer on either side, its summit lost in a cloud so that it seemed as though it might go up and up into infinity. Ahead of us was the thunder of water. It grew louder and louder until the white froth of a fall emerged like a broad grey ribbon out of the mist. Speech was impossible as we climbed beside the live, swirling water. The river was full of the early melting of the snows and the water curved over the rock ledges in thick green waves. The whole rock-walled valley seemed to shake to the weight of the water thrusting down it to the fjord.

At the top of the fall the rock fell back a little and slopes of lush spring grass ran up to black buttresses that had no summit. Lone rocks as big as houses lay scattered up this valley. In the shelter of an up-ended slab stood the broken remains of a wooden hut. ‘Almen Saeter,' Sunde shouted in my ear. ‘It's over two hundred years old, this saeter. A long time ago an old fellow used ter live 'ere winter and summer. An 'e killed every soul wot come along this valley. Proper myffylogical, 'e was.'

The hut was old and broken. Its walls were made of great beams axe-cut to dove-tail into each other, the ends protruding at the corners like a pile of sticks. The roof was turf on a layer of birch bark. The huge, upended slab of rock protected the building from rock falling from the cliff buttresses high above us. I paused to get my breath and ease the suffocating beating of my heart. ‘Come on nah, Mr Gansert,' Sunde called. ‘You ain't started yet.' He turned and continued up the defile. His small body seemed dominated by the heavy pack. He was like a snail with his house on his back. And he didn't seem to hurry any more than a snail. Yet there was a rhythm about the steady movement of his legs. Unhurriedly, steadily he covered the ground. His bare legs above the white ankle socks were hard with muscle at each forward thrust. Those muscles were the legacy of a youth spent in the mountains on foot and on ski.

I started after him again, trying not to hurry, trying to catch the swing of his easy movement. But my legs ached and my heart pounded. The sweat was pouring down my face, oozing from every pore, soaking my clothes. I thought of Farnell out ahead, not knowing that he was being followed, and I pressed on. I had to reach him before Lovaas. I had that to drive me. If I was out of condition for this sort of thing then my willpower would have to see me through.

The valley widened and split in two. We took the left fork, crossed a flimsy wooden bridge and worked our way over the shoulder of a hill to the other fork of the valley. Here we saw our first snow – a long, white streak lying in a gully across the river. This and the fact that we were in one of the brief descents raised my spirits. I increased my pace and caught up with Sunde. I pointed to the snow. ‘We'll be on ski soon,' I panted. I was thinking of the relief to my aching limbs of gliding across snow.

He looked at me. His face was fresh and barely sweating. ‘The less ski work we 'ave ter do the better. Nah, just you try and go steady. Keep the same pace all the time. 'Um a toon – Tipperary or somefink. Get a swing into it. We're going too slow.'

‘You mean Lovaas will be going faster than this?' I asked.

He nodded. ‘Orl roight,' he said. ‘Oi know it ain't your fault. We're used ter this sort o' walkin'. You ain't. Just shut yer ma'f, get yer 'ead da'n and keep goin'. An' remember, Oi'm settin' the pace. Nah yer loosened up a bit, we'll get goin'.'

He went on then. I watched his feet. They began to twinkle, moving with supple, effortless ease – a long, lithe movement, the stride never varying in length or pace whether going up or down. For a while we were close to the river, the spray of several small falls whipping across our faces. I kept pace with him here, imitating the supple movement of his limbs regardless of the ache of my knees. Then we began to climb, a steady, relentless climb. Try as I might, he began to draw ahead. I put my head forward and my hands on my thrusting knee-caps. I must get to Farnell in time. I gritted my teeth and thought of Farnell. I must reach him in time. I began to hum a tune, hissing it through my teeth with each gasp of breath. It fitted the beat of my feet. And the beat of my feet fitted the words – I must reach Farnell in time.
I must reach Farnell in time.
My feet were hot and tired through to the very bone. My legs ached – ached so that my boots were a leaden weight. My body poured out sweat, blinding my eyes, suffocating my lungs. And over all, the heavy rucksack dragged at my shoulders, cutting into the light flesh over the collar bone, tearing at my neck muscles. Determinedly, doggedly, I clung to the beat of those words –
I must reach Farnell in time.
But gradually my mind became too numb and too dazed even to breathe through my teeth the beat of my feet. Soon the words were wiped away. My mind was blank. I forgot Farnell. I forgot everything. My world became bound by a stony path winding up, ever up and the little figure of Sunde with the enormous rucksack bobbing ahead.

We were swinging away from the river now, climbing that side of the valley. At the top the mist was thicker. There were little patches of snow. There was little sign of a path. We were in a wild place, a jungle of huge, lichen-covered stones topped with snow. Every now and then we came upon a large red T painted on the rock – the tourist association, blazing the trail. Then suddenly among some desolate, gnarled-rooted trees – BJORNSTIGEN in large black letters on a flat slab with an arrow pointing to the left. Sunde was waiting for me here. ‘The Bear's Ladder,' he said. ‘It's a short-cut. If Lovaas takes that easier route we may catch up wiv 'im. It's a bit of a climb this.'

My heart sank. I had no illusions about what Sunde meant when he talked of ‘a bit of a climb'. He started off to the left up an easy slope. ‘We'll pause for a bite at the top,' he said over his shoulder by way of encouragement.

‘Why the Bear's Ladder?' I asked. I was following so close my face was almost touching the battered canvas of his rucksack.

‘An ol' bear used the route, I expect that's why.'

‘Were there bears up in these mountains?'

‘'Course there were. Me fa'ver used ter 'unt them. There's still a few fa'nd. But they don't 'unt them nah.'

We fell silent as the slope became steeper. Soon we were struggling up under a sheer, buttressed wall of rock. The blood pounded in my ears. The sweat trickled down the small of my back. Mist and sweat gathered in beads on my eyebrows. We went through a drift of snow. The marks of nailed boots showed deep in the drift. Sunde pointed to them. ‘All goin' up. None comin' da'n. We may meet Peer yet.'

‘Has Lovaas been this way?' I panted.

‘Can't tell,' he answered.

The world was very still in the mist. The river was no more than distant a rumble of water. A small grey bird chattered on a rock, dipping his body as he talked. Another drift and then the loose rock covered by snow rising right up into the mist. Beyond the mist, there was probably mile on ghastly mile of piled-up, snow-capped peaks. But I could see nothing through the sweat but that treacherous, snow covered trail winding up under the blank wall of the mountains we were climbing. Sliding and cursing, gripping with my hands as well as my feet, thrown off balance by the weight of my pack, sweating and panting, I worked my way up. I thought of the old bear whose ladder this was. He'd had four legs and had not been encumbered by pack and skis. There were patches bare of snow and there Sunde's feet dislodged rocks that rolled down against my legs. I, in turn, dislodged others that clattered below us, some losing themselves in the snow in sudden silence, others rattling down till the sound of them was lost in the distance.