Free Operation Pax by Michael Innes

snatches of what they said.
    ‘Surely he can’t get far?’
    ‘Probably not. But the devil of it is, he got hold of some keys. So if by any chance he reached the ring fence before the current went on–’
    ‘The current! You don’t mean to say they’ve turned on that? They told me that was only for the greatest crisis of all.’
    ‘Get in and don’t waste time.’ The floor beneath Routh lurched suddenly and there was the sound of a door closing. More faintly, the same voice continued. ‘It is the greatest crisis of all – only not just as we’ve expected it. This fellow is the crack agent of something pretty big. And there’s the point. He mustn’t be killed. He may have hidden this thing already. Or he may simply have thrown it away. That’s why we must have him back alive. Ready?’
    ‘Ready.’
    ‘Go out fairly rapidly and then come more slowly in again.’
    Exultant and trembling, Routh hardly dared to breathe. There could be no doubt about the incredible truth. He was going to be driven straight out of this abominable place – yard, gardens, sinister ring-fence, park, boundary wall and all – he was going to be driven straight out of it in search of himself! The fools – the bloody fools! He lay absolutely rigid. Close to his fingers, he knew, was the heavy wrench or spanner that he would eventually raise to bring crashing down on his unconscious chauffeur’s skull. And then, having pitched him into a ditch, he would drive the car himself hell for leather to London. Oh triumphant and all-powerful Routh!
    The car was moving. It appeared to be coasting out of the garage. Lying on this hard floor, Routh thought, made the suspension feel funny. He had to brace his body more firmly still so as not to give himself away. But what did it matter if he was in for an uncomfortable ten minutes? Only provided –
    The engine burst into life. For a full minute it appeared to race unbearably. Routh waited for the gears to engage, the clutch to be let in, the first swift acceleration that might send him lurching or rolling dangerously backwards. But nothing happened. The sense of something quite unapprehended in his situation possessed him. The whole movement was queer. And under his nose –
    He stared again, and there was no doubt of it. Part of the flooring on which he lay was for some reason of a transparent substance – glass or perspex. He could see the road beneath him, studded with cats’ eyes. Only the road was green – was as green as the rubber in that endless corridor… His eyes adjusted their focus and he saw what was really there. The two sides of the road were two broad green paddocks. The cats’ eyes were the tops of white fencing posts dividing them. Routh, in fact, was suspended in air.

 
     
3
     
    The discovery was a terrific shock. Nausea gripped him and for a horrible moment he thought that he must vomit. The line of posts slipped sideways across his field of vision. He stared below him in fascination. The earth had swung round like a compass card and was now almost motionless. His tired mind, making a conscious effort of analysis, grasped the implication that he himself must be motionless too. In fact the craft in which he had hidden himself was a helicopter.
    For a moment Routh closed his eyes. He was awed at the extent of his enemies’ resources. But he himself had held out against them now – as it seemed – for hours. And he still had his astounding chance of triumph. He had nothing to do but rise from his lurking place, hit his unsuspecting pilot hard on the head, take charge of the machine –
    But at this his nerve failed him. The thought of hanging high in air alone, with a set of unfamiliar and inexplicable controls between himself and disaster – this was something he found he couldn’t take. In any case he had better wait. The fellow had been told to ‘go out fairly rapidly’. That meant, presumably, outside the boundaries of the estate below him. He must bide his time