Rage - Smith Wilbur (читать книги онлайн без сокращений .TXT) 📗
'Let me have the tools,' Moses ordered. They were in one of the packets that Moses had carried up from the car, and she handed them to him.
'Don't make any noise,' she pleaded.
The chest was large enough to conceal him completely. She went to the door and listened for a moment. Tricia's typewriter was tapping away reassuringly. Then she went back to the chest and peered into it.
Moses was on his knees working on the floor of the chest with a screwdriver. The screws were authentically antique, taken from another old piece of furniture so that they were not obvious recent additions, and the floor panels of the chest were likewise aged oak and only close examination by an expert would have revealed that they were not original. Once the screws were loose, Moses lifted out the panels to reveal the compartment beneath. This was tightly packed with cotton waste and gently Moses worked it loose, and as he removed the top layer placed it in the package that had contained the tools.
Tara watched with awful fascination as the contents of the first secret compartment came into view. They were small rectangular blocks of some dark amorphous material, like sticky toffee or carpenter's putty, each covered with a translucent greaseproof wrapper and with a label marked in Russian Cyrillic script.
There were ten blocks in the top layer, but Tara knew that there must be two layers below that. Thirty blocks in all, each block weighed two pounds, which made a total of sixty pounds of plastic explosive. It looked mundane and harmless as some kitchen commodity, but Moses had warned her of its lethal power.
'A two-pound brick will destroy the span of a steel bridge, ten pounds would knock down the average house, sixty pounds --' he shrugged. 'It's enough to do the job ten times over." Once he had removed the packing and reassured himself of the contents, Moses replaced the panel and screwed it closed. Then he opened the centre panel of the floor. Again it was packed with cotton waste. As he removed it, he explained in a whisper, 'There are four different types of detonators to cover all possible needs. These,' he gingerly lifted a small flat tin the size of a cigarette pack out of its nest of cotton packing, 'these are electrical detonators that can be wired up to a series of batteries or to the mains. These,' he returned the tin to its slot and lifted the loose cotton to reveal a second larger tin, 'these are radio receiver detonators and are set off by a VHF transmission from this miniature transmitter." It looked to Tara like one of the modern portable radios. Moses lifted it out of its nest. 'It needs only six torch batteries to activate it. Now these are simple acid time-fused detonators, primitive, and the time delay isn't very accurate, but this here is a trembler detonator. Once it is primed, the slightest movement or vibration will set it off. Only an expert will be able to defuse the charge once it is in place." Until this moment she had considered only the abstract dialectic of what they were doing, but now she was faced with the actuality.
Here before her was the very stuff of violent death and'destruction, the innocent appearance no less menacing than the coils of a sleeping mamba, and she found herself wavering.
'Moses,' she whispered. 'Nobody will be hurt. No human life, you said that - didn't you?" 'We have discussed that already." His expression was cold and scornful, and she felt ashamed. 'Forgive me, please." Moses ignored her and unscrewed the third and last panel. This compartment contained an automatic pistol and four clips of ammunition. It took up little space and the rest of the compartment was packed with cotton waste which Moses removed.
'Give me the other packet,' he ordered, and when she passed it to him, he began to pack the contents into the empty recess. Firstly there was a compact tool kit which contained a keyhole saw and hand drill, drill bits and augers, a box of hearing-aid batteries for the detonator and torch batteries for the transmitter, a Penlite torch, a five-hundred-foot roll of thin electrical wire, diamond glass-cutters, putty, staples and tiny one-ounce tins of touch-up paint. Lastly there was a pack of hard rations, dried biscuit and cans of meat and vegetables.
'I wish you had let me give you something more appetizing." 'It will be only two days,' Moses said, and she was reminded ho little store he set by creature comforts.
Moses replaced the panel, but he did not tighten the retainin screws fully, so that they could be loosened by hand.
'All right, pass the books to me now." He repacked the ches replacing the bundles in the same order as he had found them, s that to a casual glance it would not be apparent that the contents c the chest had been disturbed. Carefully Moses closed the chest an replaced the bronze statue on the lid. Then he stood in front of th desk and surveyed the room carefully. 'I will need a place to hide." 'The drapes,' Tara suggested, and he nodded.
'Not very original, but effective." The curtains were embroidere brocade, cut full, and they reached to the floor.
'A key to that door - I'll need one." He indicated the hidden doo: in the panelling.
'I will try --' Tara began and then broke off as there was a knoc on the interleading door. For a moment he thought she might panic and he squeezed her arm to calm her.
'Who is it?" Tara called in a level voice.
'It's me, Mrs Courtney,' Tricia called respectfully. 'It's one o'clock and I'm going to take my lunch." 'Go ahead, Tricia. I'll be a little longer, but I'll lock up when I leave." They heard the outer door close, and then Moses released her arm. 'Go out and search her desk. See if she has a key to the back door." Tara was back within minutes with a small bunch of keys. She tried them in the lock and the third one turned the door in the panelling.
'The serial number is on it." She scribbled a note of the number on Shasa's noteblock and ripped off the top sheet. Tll return the keys to Tricia's desk." When she came back, Moses was buttoning his uniform jacket, but she locked the door behind her.
'What I need now is a plan of the building. There must be one in the public works department, and you must get me a copy. Tell Tricia to do it." 'How?" she asked. 'What excuse can I give?" 'Tell her that you want to change the lighting in here,' he gestured at the chandelier in the roof. 'Tell her you must have an electrical plan of this section, showing the circuits and wall-fittings." 'Yes, I can do that,' she agreed.
'Good. We are finished here for the time being. We can go now." 'There is no hurry, Moses. Tricia will not be back for another hour." He looked down at her, and for a moment she thought she saw a flash of contempt, even disgust, in those dark brooding eyes, but she would not let herself believe that, and she pressed herself to him, hiding her face against his chest. Within seconds she felt the swelling and hardening of his loins through the cloth that separated their lower bodies, and her doubts were dispelled. She was certain that in his own strange African way he loved her still and she reached down to open his clothing and bring him out.
He was so thick that she could barely encompass him within the circle of her thumb and forefinger, and he was hot and hard as a shaft of black ironstone that had lain in the full glare of the sun at midday.
Tara sank down onto the thick silken rug, drawing him down on top of her.
Every day now increased the danger of discovery and both of them were aware of it.
'Will Shasa recognize you?" Tara asked Moses more than once. 'It is becoming more and more difficult to keep you from meeting him face to face. He asked about my new chauffeur a few days ago." Isabella had apparently drawn Shasa's attention to the new employee for her own selfish reasons, and Tara could cheerfully have thrashed her for it. But there had been the danger of establishing the importance of her new driver even more clearly in the child's devious mind, so she had let it pass without comment.
