The pilot looked at him as if he had just arrived from Mars. The chopper, nose down, whirled southeast with the line of the A1088 to starboard so that Preston could see the line of marchers.
“The RAF Honington demo,” the pilot said. “It’s been in all the papers and on TV.”
Preston, of course, had seen the news coverage of the projected demonstration against the base. He had spent two weeks watching television in Chesterfield. He had just not realized that the base lay down the A1088 between Thetford and Ixworth. In thirty seconds he could see the real thing.
Away to his right the morning sun glinted on the runways of the airbase. A giant American Galaxy transport was taxiing round the perimeter after landing. Outside the base’s several gates were the black unes of Suffolk policemen, hundreds of them, backs to the wire, facing the demonstrators.
From the swelling crowd in front of the police cordon, a dark line of marchers, banners flapping and waving above their heads, ran back down the access lane to the A1088, debouched onto that road, and ran southeast toward Ixworth junction.
Straight below him he could look down at Little Fakenham village, with Honington village swimming into view. He could make out the barns of Honington Hall and the red brick of Malting Row across the road. Here the marchers were at their thickest as they swirled around the entrance to the narrow lane leading to the base. His heart gave a thump.
Up the road from the center of Honington village there was a line of cars backed up for half a mile—all drivers who had not realized that the road would be blocked for part of the early morning, or who had hoped to get through in time. There were more than a hundred vehicles.
Farther down, right in the heart of the marching column, he could see the glint of two or three car roofs; evidently they belonged to drivers who had been allowed through just before the road was closed but who had not made Ixworth junction in time to avoid being trapped. There were some in Ixworth Thorpe village and two parked near a small church farther on.
“I wonder,” he whispered.
Valeri Petrofsky saw the policeman who had originally stopped him strolling in his direction. The marching column had thinned a bit; it was the tail end that was passing now.
“Sorry it’s taken so long, sir. Seems there were more of them than foreseen.”
Petrofsky shrugged amiably. “Can’t be helped, Officer. I was a fool to try it. Thought I’d get through in time.”
“Ah, there’s quite a few motorists been caught by it all. Won’t be long now. About ten minutes for the marchers, then there’s a few big broadcast vans bringing up the tail. Soon as they’re past, we’ll open the road again.”
Across the fields in front of them a police helicopter went past in a wide circle. In its open doorway Petrofsky could see the traffic controller talking into his handset.
“Harry, can you hear me? Come in, Harry, it’s John.” Preston was sitting in the doorway of the chopper over Ixworth Thorpe, trying to raise Burkinshaw.
The watcher’s voice came back, scratchy and tinny, from Thetford. “Harry here. Read you, John.”
“Harry, there’s an anti-Cruise demonstration going on down here. There’s a chance, just a chance, that Chummy got caught up in it. Hold on.” He turned to the pilot. “How long’s that been going on?”
“ ’Bout an hour.”
“When did they close the road at Ixworth down there?”
From the rear, the traffic officer leaned forward. “Five-twenty,” he said.
Preston glanced at his watch. Six-twenty-five. “Harry, get the hell down the A134 to Bury St. Edmunds, pick up the A45, and meet me at the junction of the 1088 and the 45 at Elmswell. Use the cop up at the garages as an outrider. And Harry, tell Joe to drive like never in his life.” He tapped the pilot on the shoulder. “Take me to Elmswell and set me down in a field near the road junction.”
By air it took only five minutes. As they passed over Ixworth jun
ction, across the A143 Preston could see the long, snaking column of buses parked on the verge, the ones that had brought the bulk of the marchers to this picturesque and sylvan part of the countryside. Two minutes later he could make out the broad A45 running from Bury St. Edmunds to Ipswich.
The pilot banked into a turn, looking for a landing spot. There were meadows near the point where the narrow, lanelike A1088 debouched into the sweep of the A45.
“They could be water meadows,” shouted the pilot. “I’ll hover. You can jump from a couple of feet.”
Preston nodded. He turned to the traffic controller, who was in uniform. “Grab your cap. You’re coming with me.”
“That’s not my job,” protested the sergeant, “I’m traffic control.”
“That’s what I want you for. Come on, let’s go.”
He jumped the two feet from the step of the Bell into thick, tall grass. The police sergeant, holding his flat cap against the draft of the rotors, followed him. The pilot lifted away and turned toward Ipswich and his base.
With Preston in the lead, the pair plodded across the meadow, climbed the fence, and dropped onto the A1088. A hundred yards away it joined the A45. Across the junction they could see the unending stream of traffic heading toward Ipswich.