“I would have thought he’d been flattened,” Ian said over boiled eggs and grilled bacon. He never ate anything fried. “But he managed to tunnel his way out like a mole. I’m annoyed with myself, if you want the truth. I should have checked.”
“Do you think he’ll come back?” I asked. The thought made me a little nervous.
Ian shook his head. “I doubt it. He knows I recognized him, and he’s probably out of Colorado by now. Maybe he’s even left the States. He won’t want to hang around.”
“How long do you think you’ll be?”
“A few hours. Don’t let this spoil the vacation, Alex. Just put it out of your mind. You can ski with Sahara today. From the way you two are getting along, I’d say she’ll be glad to have you on your own.”
I didn’t know what he meant by that, but I didn’t argue. In fact, when I knocked on her door an hour later, Sahara wasn’t there. It was opened by her father, Cameron Sands.
“I’m sorry, Alex,” he said. “You’re just too late. She left a few minutes ago; she’s got a lesson this morning. But she’ll probably call in later—I can ask her to meet you.”
“Thanks,” I said. “I’ll be up at Bear Creek.”
He nodded and closed the door, and as he did so, I looked over his shoulder and saw that he wasn’t alone. The two young men were with him, one sitting on the sofa, the other standing by the window. The Secret Service men. I could see his desk too. The laptop that I’d noticed before was there, surrounded by a pile of papers. Cameron Sands was meant to be on vacation, but from the look of it, the work never stopped. I wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d taken the computer skiing with him.
I went downstairs to the locker room and a few minutes later was clumping out to the ski lift with my skis over my shoulder and my poles dragging behind me. I didn’t much like the idea of skiing on my own and wondered if Sahara would even be able to find me . . . if she came looking. There were a lot of people around, and the thing about skiers is that they all look more or less the same. On the other hand, I was wearing a bright green jacket—a North Face Free Thinker. She’d already joked about the color and I was sure she’d recognize it a mile away.
But as it turned out, I saw her before she saw me. The nearest lift to the hotel was a gondola, taking twenty people at a time to an area called Black Ridge, about a half mile higher up. Sahara was right at the front of the line, standing between two men, and I could see at once that something was wrong. She wasn’t smiling. There was something like panic in her eyes. I examined the two men. I had never seen them before, but whoever they were, they certainly weren’t ski instructors. They were standing very close to her, sandwiching her between them like they didn’t want to let her slip away. One of them was round-faced, fat, and white. The other looked Korean. They were both big men—even with the ski suits, I got a sense of overworked muscle. Sahara was scared, I saw that too. And a moment later I saw why.
A third man had gone ahead of them and was waiting inside the gondola. I only glimpsed his face behind the glass, but I recognized it instantly. It was da Silva. His hood was up and he was wearing sunglasses, but his pale skin and bad teeth were unmistakable. He was waiting while the other men joined him with the girl.
I started toward them, but I was already too late. Sahara was inside the gondola. The doors slid shut and the whole thing jerked forward, rising up over the snow. I think Sahara caught sight of me just as she was swept away. Her eyes widened and she jerked her head in the direction of the hotel. The message was obvious. Get help!
I didn’t need telling twice. Sahara was being kidnapped in broad daylight. It was almost unbelievable, but there could be no doubt about it.
I turned around and began to run.
I was running to get help.
If this had happened six months later, if I’d been older and more experienced, I might have tried to do something myself. After all, the three men didn’t know I was there. They weren’t expecting trouble. I might have been able to follow them, taking the next gondola and somehow tracking them down. It might even have been possible to stop the gondola, leaving them dangling in midair. But this was before I’d been recruited by MI6 and given training with the SAS. I was thirteen years old and on my own in an American ski resort. I wasn’t even certain about what I’d just seen. Was Sahara really being kidnapped? And if so, why? According to what my uncle had told me, the man called da Silva was involved in some sort of bank fraud. What possible interest could he have in her?
But then I remembered. Cameron Sands was her father. He worked for the government and traveled with his own entourage of Secret Service men. This wasn’t about Sahara. It was about him—and he was the one I had to find.
I stabbed my skis and poles into a mound of snow and ran back into the hotel as fast as I could—not easy in ski boots. Fortunately, it was only a short distance away. You were meant to take your boots off in the locker room downstairs, but I just clomped right in, through the reception area, into the lift, and up to the second floor. I went to my own room first. It occurred to me that my uncle might not have left yet for the police station, and if he was there, he would know what to do.
I was out of luck. The room was empty. I turned around and was about to go next door, where Sahara and her father were staying, when I heard someone talking. I recognized the voice. It was Cameron Sands, outside on the terrace. Our window was open and I went over and looked out. Cameron was standing there, framed against the mountains, on his cell phone. He had his back to me, but I could tell at once that something was wrong. He was completely still and his whole body was rigid, as if he’d been electrocuted. I heard him speak.
“Where is she? What have you done with her?”
Da Silva. It had to be him. He’d taken the girl and now he was talking to the dad, making his demands. What did he want? Money? Somehow, I didn’t think so. The Granary was comfortable, but it wasn’t the most expensive hotel in the resort by a long way, and if you were into the money-with-menaces business, there were plenty of billionaires to choose from: movie stars, Russian oligarchs, and so on.
Being careful not to make any sound, I leaned forward so that I could hear more.
“All right.” Sands spoke slowly and his voice was ice cold. I could see his breath frosting in the air. “I’ll bring it and I’ll come alone. But I’m warning you—”
That was as far as he got. Whoever he was talking to cut him off. He lowered the phone, staring at it as if it were somehow responsible.
As far as I was concerned, that should have been it. Cameron Sands had two Secret Service men somewhere in the hotel, and this was none of my business. But I couldn’t just leave it there. I liked Sahara, and in a funny way I felt as if this was all my fault. It struck me now that I could have done something more when I saw her being loaded into the gondola. At the very least I could have shouted and raised the alarm. I told myself that I wasn’t going to get involved, that I was being stupid. But I still couldn’t stop myself. When Cameron Sands came out of his room five minutes later, I was waiting around the corner, watching him go.
I followed him downstairs. He had changed into his ski suit with his goggles around his neck and—here was the weird thing—he was carrying the laptop I had seen on the desk. It was sticking out of a black nylon bag. As he went downstairs, he pushed it inside and fastened the zip. There was no sign of the Secret Service men—but I’d heard what he said on the phone: he wasn’t going to involve them. Wherever he was heading, he was going there alone.
I waited outside the boot room, then followed him across the front of the hotel to the gondola, picking up my skis and poles on the way. He had his skis too. The nylon bag with the laptop was hanging across his chest, slightly hidden under one arm. There weren’t many people at the gondola now. Afternoon ski school had begun and the various classes were already practicing their snow plows on the lower slopes. I watched Sahara’s da
d hold his lift pass out to be scanned, waited a few moments, and then did the same. By now I’d pulled up my hood and drawn my goggles down over my face. We got into the same gondola and stood only a few inches apart. Even if he looked in my direction, I knew he wouldn’t recognize me, but of course he wasn’t taking any notice of the people around him. He looked sick with worry. His eyes were fixed on the mountain peaks high above.
Five minutes later we got out at Black Ridge, a sort of wide shelf in the mountains, with another three lifts climbing in different directions. He put on his skis and I did the same. I knew that Cameron Sands was a strong skier, but I reckoned I could keep up with him no matter where he went.
I didn’t need to worry. He only skied as far as the nearest lift—a double chair—and took it up to Gun Hill. There was just one more lift that went up from here. It led to an area called the Needle. It was as high as you could get, so high that even on a bright day like today, the clouds still rubbed against the surface of the snow. Once again I went with him, just a few chairs behind.
Da Silva was waiting for him at the Needle.
I saw Cameron get off his chair and look around him. By the time I arrived, a few seconds later, he had already moved away. I slid over to one side, keeping close to the cabin where the lift attendant sat all day, watching people get on and off. From here I saw Cameron Sands ski down about thirty yards to a flat area with a sign marked by two black diamonds. I knew exactly where we were. This was Breakneck Pass, the run that Sahara had mentioned only the day before. The name tells you everything you need to know. From this point, it was the only way down, a vicious, incredibly steep run of ice and moguls that started with a stomach-churning, zigzagging chute, continued along the edge of a precipice, and then plunged into a wood, with no obvious way between the trees. Not many people took it on and I’d had no hesitation in saying no when Sahara suggested it. My uncle said you’d need nerves of steel to take on Breakneck. Or a death wish.
And there they all were, waiting with da Silva: the fat man and the Korean man I had seen at the gondola, with Sahara trapped between them. She was still scared. Nobody could see me. I was thirty yards higher up, and the clouds and snow flurries chasing along the mountain ridge formed a screen between me and them. I wiped the ice off my goggles and watched as the scene played out. Cameron Sands said something. Sahara started forward, but the two men held her back. Now it was da Silva’s turn. He was smiling. I saw him point at the nylon bag with the laptop. Sands hesitated, but not for very long. He lifted it off his shoulder and held it in front of him as if weighing it, then handed it over. Da Silva nodded to his companions. They let Sahara go and she slithered—I wouldn’t even call it skiing—across to her dad. He put an arm around her. The business was finished.
Except that it wasn’t. I hadn’t decided what I was going to do—until I did it. Suddenly I found myself racing down the slope, my legs bent and my shoulders low, my poles tucked under my arms, picking up as much speed as I could. Nobody was looking my way. They had no idea I was there until it was too late. The next moment I was right in the middle of them, moving so fast that I must have been no more than a blur. Da Silva was still holding the laptop. I snatched it out of his hand and kept going, over the lip and down the first stretch of Breakneck Pass.
The next few seconds were a nightmare as I found myself falling off the edge of the mountain, poling like crazy to avoid the first moguls and at the same time managing to get the strap over my head so that the computer was out of my way, dangling behind my back. I nearly fell three or four times. If I’d had even half a second to think what I was doing, I’d probably have lost control and broken both my legs. But instinct took over. I was twenty yards down the chute and heading for the next segment before da Silva even knew what had happened.
He didn’t hang around. I heard a shout and somehow I knew, without looking back, that the three men were after me. Well, that was sort of what I’d expected. Da Silva wanted the computer. Sands had given it to him. So he and his daughter weren’t needed anymore. I was the target now. All I had to do was get down to the bottom, which couldn’t be more than a couple of thousand yards from here. It was just a pity there was no one else around. If I could get back into a crowd, I’d be safe.
I heard a crack. A bullet slammed into the snow inches from my left ski. Who had fired? The answer was obvious, but even so, I found it hard to believe. Was it really possible to ski in these conditions and bring out guns at the same time? The snow was horrible, wind-packed and hard as metal. My skis were grinding as they carried me over the surface. I was grateful that my uncle had insisted on choosing my equipment for me; I was using Nordica twin tips, wide under the foot and seriously stiff. It had taken me a while to get used to them, but the whole point was that they were built for speed. Right now they seemed to be flying, and as I carved and pivoted around the moguls, I almost wanted to laugh. I didn’t think anyone in the world would be able to catch up with me.
I was wrong. Either da Silva and his men had spent a long time training for this or they’d been experts to begin with. I came to a gully and risked a glance back. There were less than thirty yards between us and they were gaining fast. Worse still, they didn’t even seem to be exerting themselves. They had that slow, fluid quality you may have seen at the Winter Olympics, when the best skiers in the world take to the slopes, and yet the distance between us was closing all the time. Suddenly I knew that there was nothing to laugh about. I cursed myself for getting involved in the first place. Why had I done it? This had nothing to do with me.
I made it to the woodland and heaved a sigh of relief, my breath frosting in front of my goggles. At least the trunks and branches would make it harder for anyone to take another shot at me. I was lucky I’d done plenty of tree skiing with Ian. I knew that I had to keep the speed up—otherwise I’d lose control. Go too fast, though, and I’d risk impaling myself on a branch. The secret is balance. Or luck. Or something.
I didn’t really know where I was going. Everything was just streaks of green and brown and white. I was getting tired. Branches were slashing at my face. My legs were already aching with all the twists and turns. And the laptop was half strangling me, threatening to pull me over backward. One of my skis almost snagged on a root. I shifted my body weight and cried out as my left shoulder slammed into a trunk—it felt like I’d broken a bone. I almost lost control there and then. One of the men shouted something. I couldn’t see any of them, but it sounded as if they were right behind me, inches away. That gave me new strength. I shot forward onto a miniature ramp, and before I knew it I’d left the ground, propelled up into the air through a tangle of branches that scratched my face and tore at my goggles.
I was in the clear. The wood disappeared behind me and I fell into a wide, empty area. But I knew before I landed that I’d lost my balance and that this was going to end badly. Sure enough, my legs were pulled in different directions, my skis slipped away, and there was a sickening crash as I found myself diving headlong into the snow. My entire body shuddered. I couldn’t see. I was sliding helplessly in a blinding white explosion. My skis released themselves and were torn off my feet. I was aware that the surface underneath me had changed. It was smoother and more slippery. I was moving faster. I stretched out a hand and tried to stop myself, but there was no purchase at all. Where was I? At last I slowed down and stopped.
I was breathless and confused. I was sure I must have broken several of my bones. The laptop was around my throat and it almost felt as if the ground was cracking up where I lay. No, it really was cracking up! As I struggled to my feet, I realized what had happened. I had gone spectacularly off-piste. There was a lake on the west side of the mountain—they called it Coldwater Creek. I had landed right next to it and managed to slide in. I was on the surface of the ice. And if that wasn’t bad enough, the ice was breaking under my weight.
Da Silva and the two men had stopped on the edge of the lake. All three
were facing me. The Korean man and the fat man both had guns. My goggles had come off in the fall and da Silva recognized me.
“You!” He spat out the single word. He didn’t sound friendly.
There were about ten yards between us. Nobody moved.
“Give me the laptop,” he demanded.
I said nothing. If I gave him the laptop, he would kill me. That much I knew.
“Give me it or I will take it,” he continued.
There was the sound of something cracking. A black line appeared, snaking its way toward my foot. I steadied myself, trying not to breathe. Water, as cold as death, welled up around me. I wondered how much longer the ice would hold. If it broke, I would disappear forever. There was no use swimming for safety. Five minutes in this freezing water and I would die.
“Why don’t you come and get it,” I said.
Da Silva nodded. The Korean man stepped forward. He was meant to come and get me, and I could see he wasn’t too happy about the idea. He might have been chosen because he was the lightest of the three, but he was an adult, twice as big as me, and he wasn’t light enough. On the third step, the ice broke. One minute he was there, the next he was gone, his arms floundering and his face filling with panic as he tried to grip the sides of the hole. His breath came out as great mushrooms of white steam. He tried to scream but no sound came out. His lungs must have already frozen.
He had taken a gun with him. They only had one other. Da Silva snatched it from the fat man—he had already decided he was going to risk his weight on the ice—and pointed it at me.
“Give me the laptop,” he said. “Or I will shoot you where you stand.”
Alex Rider--Secret Weapon Page 17
