The Salzburg Connection Read Free

model chosen for easy handling but with sufficient compressed air for fully thirty minutes at the depths he would have to work in, was pulled gently from the rucksack. He had decided on this small size of scuba tank (“kid stuff” his instructor in Zürich last summer had called it) because it was considerably lighter to carry and less bulky inside the rucksack. He didn’t need the regular scuba: he wasn’t a sportsman going into deep waters; he was sticking on that ledge, twelve feet below. And he had better, he told himself grimly.
    He unpacked a weighted belt which would let him drop down from the surface. Dark blue sneakers, something to give his feet a grip on the ledge and yet not cause added difficulties when the time came to rise to the surface. Mitts of foam-neoprene, tight but easily pulled on if he first wet his hands. A knife, one blade serrated. A strong wire cutter. (Both of these would be strapped to his leg.) A thirty-foot stretch of quarter-inch nylon cord, braided to prevent fouling, and a clamp to fasten one end of the cord that he would coil around the tree nearest the water, a second clamp, with quick release, to fasten the other end around his waist. A piece of rubber tyre to protect the tree’s bark from any friction. An underwater light. A waterproof watch with illuminated numerals. A slab ofchocolate and a flask of brandy to be left beside his camera and tripod, all covered by his clothes which he was now stripping off. He secured the neat pile with a heavy stone. Methodically, he began donning his gear.
    He was ready. He pulled sharply on the rope coiled on its cushion of rubber around the base of the tree, testing the clamp. It would hold. The other end of the rope was already firmly around his waist, the remaining loops neatly gathered in the crook of his left arm. He glanced at his watch strapped over the mitt on his right hand, making sure that nothing interfered with the wrist seal of his suit. He checked the light hooked securely to his belt, adjusted the mask which would let him see sideways as well as above and below, and started regular breathing. Then, gripping the rope in his left hand, with a twist around the wrist for extra security, playing it slowly out, keeping it taut with his right hand, he took a step backwards into the lake. Its bank went straight down. As the water reached his shoulders, he remembered to check his descent and raise his right arm above his head so that his left hand could open the wrist seal briefly and let the air in his suit be pushed out. Then he gripped the rope with both hands again, removing the strain from his left wrist, and sank slowly down into a black-green world.
    It was worse than he had imagined. Cold shock, as his face went under, and blind slow motion; a feeling of being trapped in darkness. With an effort, he forced down the split-second panic that attacked him, and kept his breathing regular. His feet touched something solid under slimy mud. He could stand on it, he could turn slowly, carefully. His right hand could free its rigid grip on the rope for a moment and fumble for the flashlight at his belt. He switched on its powerful beam. By stooping, andthat was the way he would have to move, he could direct the light in front of his feet. Yes, he had found the ledge.
    It was about two feet wide at this point. How long? The beam showed a short stretch of ten feet, no more, before the ledge vanished. Nothing on that section. He turned slowly, remembering not to dislodge any silt by a quick or careless movement—muddied waters could take hours to settle again, and his job would be made impossible even before it had properly begun—and looked along the other stretch of ledge. It was just about the same length; the trees above him had marked almost the middle of this outcrop of rock. And near its end he saw a heavy mass, blacker than the waters around it.
    It’s too big, he thought at first; I’ll never raise that weight by myself. And then, as