They jogged through the tunnel. Nora first, then him and Manga, with Jeff bringing up the rear. HP couldnt help looking back over his shoulder.
He tried to say something to Manga, ask more questions, but their speed and the uphill slope were keeping his exhausted lungs fully occupied.
The huts disappeared beyond the curve of the tunnel and after a few more metres Nora slowed down.
I cant make sense of it, HP panted to Manga. The Game owns PayTag. Black works for the Game Master …
He was gasping for air.
No, no, absolutely not, Manga replied. PayTag is owned by a secretive foundation. We have our theories about whos behind it, but thats a different story. To start with PayTag was just one of many companies that employed the Game. But for the past year or so theyve been pretty much the Games only client …
Nora stopped short and the others were forced to do the same.
She held one hand up. For a few moments the distant noise of the air vents and HPs laboured breathing were the only sounds.
Then there was a faint, rhythmic scraping sound somewhere ahead of them.
It was easy to recognize. Footsteps, probably from more than one person.
A shrill, three-note signal echoed off the rough walls and made them all jump.
A radio, must be Underground staff! Jeff growled.
Back, Nora said quickly, and started to jog back the way they had come.
But then well run straight into the arms of whoever … Jeff protested.
Quiet! she snapped. Just keep up …
They set off at a run.
So you and your friends are planning a rebellion. A little Palace coup … HP hissed.
Something like that, Manga replied. The Game could still be used in a good way. But we have to cut ties with PayTag and get rid of the current Game Master.
Old Sammer?
Manga flinched and almost stopped.
Youve met him?
Last winter, out in the pet cemetery beyond the Kaknäs Tower … Becca thinks hes one of Dads old colleagues. Is he?
Here! Nora suddenly stopped and pointed at the tunnel wall. There was rusty metal hatch hidden between two thick pipes.
Jeff pushed in front of them. From a small holster on his belt he pulled out a multipurpose tool. A few moments later he had the hatch open, revealing a dark hole.
They were hit by a warm gust of fetid underground air.
Nora didnt hesitate, just snaked past the pipes and through the opening.
Go with her, Manga said, pointing at the hole. Nora will look after you. Jeff and I will stay behind to close the hatch after you. Theres another way out through the station at Slussen, with a bit of luck well make it in time …
B-but … er, hold on, HP protested.
Get moving, Jeff snarled. Theyll be here any minute.
HP gave Manga an angry look.
You and I have more talking to do …
Absolutely, I promise, HP. Well sort everything out, but until then you have to trust me. Now go, for fucks sake!
HP hesitated a couple more seconds. The noises from further up the tunnel were clearer now. Heavy steps, probably boots. Voices drifting through the darkness, followed by the unmistakable crackle of a radio. HP took a deep breath, then dived into the darkness.
19
Being Earnest
She should really be asleep.
It was middle of the night, her day had been eventful, to put it mildly, and it was more than an hour since she had taken her sleeping pills.
But in spite of that, she was wide awake.
Her laptop was sitting on the little kitchen table beside a plate holding the remains of the microwaved Gorby pie she had forced herself to have as an evening meal. Thoughts were flying around inside her head.
She no longer knew what to believe.
Uncle Tages story was pretty astonishing, but at the same time far from impossible. When you looked at all the evidence and threw in a number of other events and indications, it actually held up.
Claim number one: Dad and André Pellas / Tage Sammer served together in Cyprus.
The photograph from the safe deposit box and the other one she had found in the book both seemed to support that theory.
Claim number two: Dad and some colleagues tried to smuggle arms in an attempt to stop the losing side from being massacred.
The event itself certainly happened, and if you accepted the fact that Dad served in Cyprus, then the claim could very well be accurate.
Then what?
Dad was supposed to have carried on working for the military in some capacity … as a courier who needed fake passports because of the sensitive nature of his work?
That wasnt actually quite as unlikely as she had initially thought. Until very recently, the Cold War had felt very distant to her, the sort of thing you only saw in films and television documentaries.
But back then, in the sixties and seventies, it had been very real indeed.
The post-war period had started to fascinate her more than she liked to admit. A few hours on Wikipedia was all it had taken to get a better idea of what things had been like. Sweden had had one of the largest air forces in the world, with vast underground hangars, like the one out in Tullinge.
There werent many people, now or then, who doubted the fact that the enemy was off to the east, and Swedens friends to the west. Sweden had feigned neutrality, but at the same time the National Defence Radio Institute was monitoring the Soviet union and, in all likelihood, passing the information to NATO. None of this was exactly news, but it wasnt the sort of thing you normally chatted about over coffee, except perhaps the other year when divers found the wreckage of one of the surveillance planes shot down by the Russians over the Baltic Sea.
But the part that fascinated her most was something else entirely, something shed had no idea about until just a few weeks ago. If it hadnt been for the newspaper cuttings on Henkes bedroom wall she would probably never have made the connection.
Sweden had recently handed over three kilos of plutonium to the USA. According to the official statement, the plutonium had been used in research projects during the sixties and seventies, and since then had been lying hidden in an underground military base, probably somewhere much like the Fortress.
A Swedish project conducting research into nuclear weapons, and then sitting on several kilos of potentially lethal plutonium for something like forty years, sounded utterly incredible. The whole thing must have been top secret!
Apart from recent newspaper articles about the handover, to her surprise she found that Wikipedia had a great deal to say on the matter:
There had been two different threads to the research.
The S-programme was supposed to develop ways of counteracting a nuclear attack. Which seemed entirely logical, given the spirit of the times. She had seen black and white public information films on the Discovery Channel dating from the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis, American schoolchildren diving under their desks.
Duck and cover!
As if that would help …
But the considerably more confidential L-programme was a different matter entirely: research into the development of Swedish nuclear weapons. If there hadnt been so much documentary evidence she would have dismissed the whole idea as fantasy. Like that television mockumentary claiming that the 1958 World Cup didnt actually take place in Sweden, or the theory that Neil Armstrong was really bouncing around in a sandpit in a Hollywood studio rather than on the surface of the moon.
But the remains of the first test reactor were preserved in the rock beneath the Royal Institute of Technology, pretty much slap bang in the middle of the city. That much was confirmed by the Institutes own website.
A second reactor out at Älta, just outside the city, was intended to develop high-grade plutonium. Just like the Iranians were attempting to do, fifty years on.
But it had turned out to be more difficult than anticipated. So the military had begun to procure plutonium from other sources. And this was where Wikipedia started to get really interesting.
On 6 April 1960 the US National Security Council decided that American policy would not support Swedish nuclear armament, nor any Swedish programme to develop nuclear weapons, because it was thought more beneficial to the defence of the West against the Soviet union if Sweden were to devote its limited resources to conventional weapons rather than a very costly nuclear weapons programme.
In other words, the Americans had formally rejected the L-programme. So, no help from them with nuclear weapons. But the following paragraphs made the hair on her arms stand up.
In spite of the policies outlined in 1960, Swedish representatives in contact with the US military were granted access to confidential information during the 1960s, partly regarding nuclear weapon tactics and the demands these made on surveillance resources and rapid decision-taking, and partly other data about nuclear physics.
Among other things, Swedish representatives were able to inspect the MGR-1 Honest John missile system, which could be armed with the W7 and W31 nuclear warheads. The USA had also developed the W48 shell to be fired from 155 mm howitzers, with an explosive effect of 0.072 kilotons. No plans for such small-scale Swedish nuclear weapons have ever been found, however.
Honest John.
Earnest John.
John Earnest …
John Earnest from Bloemfontein, South Africa, with loads of entry stamps from the US in his passport. And whose photograph was a picture of her dad …
That could hardly be a coincidence.
They must have been crawling through the pitch blackness for at least three quarters of an hour.