[The Girl From UNCLE 01] - The Birds of a Feather Affair - Avallone Michael. Страница 14

What was the delay?

Sighing grumpily, he reached into his inner pocket for the cigarettes they had allowed him to keep, after properly fluorescing the contents of the pack, and each cylinder of tobacco, under their special infrared light devices. It was when he reached for one of the butts that he first noticed the white business card inserted between the cellophane and the package proper.

Amazed, Zorki held the card up. The light of the cubicle was dim. When he saw the small, hand-stenciled words printed there, he could barely restrain a bleat of joy. It said:

BIRDS OF A FEATHER FLOCK TOGETHER

EGRET

Zorki, aware that his movements in the square cubicle might be under a closed Television circuit supervision, stifled a yawn and extracted a cigarette. He was proud of the fact that his hand did not shake with the excitement he felt.

THRUSH was here! In the very heart of U.N.C.L.E. Headquarters. Somehow they would liberate him. Free him to go on with his great plan to institute the program that would assuredly guarantee the domination of the civilized world.

Da, THRUSH would fly over the world. As befitted the eagle of the skies.

If he had had any doubts about the organization's belief in himself and his plan, they were totally dispelled by the greatest consideration of all. It was a tremendous honor, all in all.

Dr. Egret was tending to his escape herself.

The legendary, terrifying, extraordinary woman who was all that THRUSH itself stood for.

Clean Slate

Mark Slate was very unhappy. It didn't show on his angular, handsome face. The Briton was one of those men who have the ability, usually something they have worked hard for years to attain, of keeping a poker-faced countenance. This control of his intelligent features, and the wry amusement usually found in his eyes, was something that not even his closest associates at U.N.C.L.E. had ever been able to fathom. Including his fellow agent and dearest chum, April Dancer.

To Mr. Riddle, and Arnolda Van Atta, Slate's face was inscrutable. He might have been a Chinaman for all they could tell about him. The true Englishman has an almost Oriental indifference in his nature, thanks to centuries of wars won on the playing fields of Eton. Slate had gone to Cambridge, of course; he could be roasted alive before he would say as much as, "Ow, that hurts."

The ride in the panel truck had ended.

Slate had come to, following a blow on his skull in the darkened corridor, to find himself in another complex situation. Someone had had the decency to outfit him in a pair of blue jeans and a Basque shirt of sorts. But the Christian impulses had ended right there.

He lay face down on a hard wood table, his arms spread-eagled and strapped with leather thongs to the front two legs. Similarly, his ankles were ringed and shackled to the other legs. He was puzzled by the crudity of his position until he saw the niceties of his predicament. He had to restrain a hopeless grin. THRUSH had its methods: this surely was one of the very thorniest.

By craning his face upwards, he could see directly in front of him. The sight was not heartwarming. The wall before him held a large, square recess which in turn displayed a .30 caliber Browning machine gun mounted on its tripod. The air-cooled kind of gun which American GI's used in the field. A gleaming ammunition belt fed directly into its breech from a wooden box stamped U.S. ARMY M-1. The nose of the weapon, with its peculiar, perforated barrel, was leveled directly at his face. He was literally staring into the mouth of the Browning. Further examination revealed that a length of black wiring ran from the trigger beneath the stock, ending in an attachment to one of the legs of the table below his outstretched body. A lanyard sort of affair. A tug on the wire and—boom! It did not take an Einstein to calculate the device; were he even to jar the table a fraction of an inch in the hope of freeing himself, the .30 caliber would open up.

A noisy demise and a messy one. Slate chose not to think about it.

He was too busy trying to determine the amount of time since he had last seen April Dancer.

He heard them come into his room not long after he had awakened. His keen ears picked up the sound of a woman's heels and the heavier tread of three men. They seemed to fan out around the table, surrounding him on all sides. Yet, he was certain they remained out of the line of fire of the Browning.

Lying like that, with his back exposed to them, a helpless target for knives, ice picks or worse, did not constitute the most charming moment of his life.

"Hail, hail, the gang's all here," he muttered, without emphasis.

"You're all of you fools!" the woman's voice said suddenly. He remembered the sound of her and the ruse she had used on him that morning to get into his flat. He despised himself for the simple way in which she had taken him. It was a lesson he would never forget. "The stakes are life and death and yet you and your lady partner waste everyone's time with glib remarks and pointless jokes."

"What else would you suggest, Miss Van Atta?" Slate asked. "A tea dance?"

The woman's laugh was short and brittle.

"We need you alive for the trade, for Zorki, Mr. Slate. That alone has kept you in one piece. Other arrangements are being tried, should we fail. But that is of no consequence to you, just yet. Consider please your present physical condition. I'm sure you have correctly deduced what will happen if you move the table so much as an inch. So—it is now almost six o'clock in the evening. Uncle has until midnight to come to terms. Do you want to stay the way you are for six more hours? I think not. Consider my alternatives."

"What might those be?"

"You could give us many valuable details about your Headquarters operation. Disposition of personnel, door signals, the locations of alarm systems. Waverly's private entrance to the building. That is something we have never been able to learn. You tell us some of those things and perhaps we can make you more comfortable for the rest of your stay with us."

"Do go on."

"A soft bed, some good food, your favorite liquors and tobacco. We will even throw in female companionship, if you feel the need."

Mark Slate laughed a scornful laugh.

"What is so amusing?" Arnolda Van Atta snapped. One of the men in the room made a growling noise in his throat. "Stay where you are, Fried Rice. Let him answer me."

"My answer is no, Miss Van Atta. No, categorically, personally and with exclamation points."

A man's voice, on Slate's left, spoke up. He recognized the flat, bland tones of the man who had addressed him and April from nowhere visible in the prison room. Mr. Riddle.

"It's useless, Arnolda. He fancies that his friend, Miss Dancer, will come running to his rescue. Let's leave well enough alone. Leave Fried Rice and Pig Alley to deal with him. We'll wait for Waverly's answer."

The woman chuckled a low, deadly chuckle.

"You're right, Riddle. He's a damn hero. But let's make him feel good about things. Fried Rice—do you have the transistor?"

"Yes," came a singsong voice. "You wish to turn it on?"

"I do. Get a six o'clock news broadcast. There ought to be something interesting to report, don't you think?"

Slate could not see the smiles that spread from face to face. Nor did he see the Frankenstein face of Mr. Riddle. The other two men in the room were the Chinaman and apache who had trapped April Dancer in the hallway of Slate's building. Fried Rice and Pig Alley were their code names.