A Cage of Ice by Duncan Kyle

Author:Duncan Kyle [Kyle, Duncan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Thrillers, Espionage
ISBN: 9781906288716
Google: JKIZuQAACAAJ
Amazon: B007NPT3OY
Publisher: Ostara Publishing
Published: 2012-03-15T04:00:00+00:00

Chance nodded. I knew what he was thinking because we were all thinking it : the only way in was that door at the head of the steel staircase. So far we had been lucky: we'd got this far undetected, undamaged except for the loss of Chance's Ski-doo. But now—

now, any sound on that stair would be heard inside. The door might be locked; might lead anywhere. And if anybody had heard us on the stair,

we might go through that door to face men armed and ready and in a position of great advantage. Preparations and equipment had now brought us as far as they could. From this moment we were five men on our own.

We moved stealthily round the corner of the building, our feet making almost no sound in the hard snow, and looked at the ladder : sixteen rungs of steel without risers, all coated with ice and treacherous as hell. There was a tubular metal handrail on the side of the staircase away from the building At the top was a narrow square platform on which three men might possibly stand, but not if the door, as it probably did, opened outwards. Chance inched forward, pistol at the ready in his left hand, and put his right on the handrail, then put his weight carefully on the first step and moved up. Ericson followed. The rest of us covered them with our carbines, praying we would not have to use them. Slowly, carefully, Chance climbed the ice-covered staircase to the platform, and began to examine the door. In a moment or two the cautious Ericson had joined him and we watched them both take off their outer gloves and begin to feel the woodwork. Then Ericson bent for a moment and I saw a movement of his shoulders inside his parka that could only be a shrug. They exchanged a few whispered words, and Ericson began a slow careful descent of the staircase. At the bottom he waved us towards him.

'There is no handle on the outside,' he said, 'and the door opens so that only one man can stand on the platform as it swings. Here is what we do. You, Yamamoto, climb the stairs, cross the platform and climb the rail. You flatten yourself against the wall on the far side. Colonel Chance will be on the stairs, also flattened against the wall, and you— he pointed to Grey Smoke—'behind him on the stairs.'

'Me?' I whispered.

'Behind Grey Smoke.' Well, I wasn't there for my abilities in a roughhouse; I didn't mind. Ericson went on : 'I stand on the platform and bang on the door, then turn away so that when they open it, they see only my hood. But I have my carbine in my hands so that when I turn . . .' he left the sentence unfinished.

We were all in position quickly, anxious for any kind of movement in the crippling cold. We stood there, barely breathing, as Yamamoto threw a

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