[Magazine 1966-­06] - The Vanishing Act Affair - Lynds Dennis. Страница 8

"From what section?"

"Santa Carla, California," Illya said.

"So?" the second man said. Suddenly he thrust out his hand. Illya did not flinch, did not flicker an eyelid beneath his disguise. The man smiled. "Welcome, morlock. We need more word on Santa Carla. Come."

The two men turned without another word and limped through the smoke and noise toward the door. Illya finished his drink casually, and followed. So far it looked like he and been right, "Red at low noon" was indeed a password. At the door the two men motioned him to hurry. He stepped out into the dark night.

The two men walked ahead to the left, past where Solo was under the lamppost. But Solo was not under the lamppost.

Illya raised his ring to his lips. "Sonny, this is Bubba. I have made contact. Sonny? Come in, Sonny. This is Bubba. Come in, Sonny."

There was only silence. The dim circle of light beneath the feeble lamppost was empty. The ring radio was silent. Illya looked up to see where the two men were.

He saw them standing in the road directly ahead of him. They seemed to be waiting for him. They were not alone.

As if from out of the earth itself men came limping into the dim light of the street. Many men, all limping, all shaggy-haired.

Illya looked around quickly.

He fingered the U.N.C.L.E. Special in his shoulder holster.

Then he dropped his hand to his side. They were all around him now. Too many of them.

He bent to his radio ring. "Sonny, this is Bubba. Mayday! Mayday!"

There was no answer, and suddenly, there was a great puff of smoke directly in front of him.

A man appeared standing where the smoke blew away. A tiny man with a sardonic face that was all black eyebrows and sharp nose. A man almost a midget, but with a large head of satanic cast. The man laughed.

"Ah, Mr. Kuryakin, I think. We expected U.N.C.L.E. to send someone," the tiny man said.

Illya knew at once that this was Morlock the Great.

Morlock The Great laughed again. "Our man missed you in New York, but we have you now. Very foolish to use that password Morgan gave you."

"I found you with it," Illya said drily. His voice was cool, calm, but his mind raced. Where was Napoleon?

"True, and that you may well regret," Morlock said. "You will also regret coming alone. Strange. I was sure Mr. Solo would be with you."

Illya watched the tiny man. They did not have Solo? The words sounded true. The Cult did not have Napoleon? Then who did? Morlock The Great gave him no more chance to think.

The tiny magician seemed to wave his hand. A cloud rolled over Illya's mind. He felt himself stiffening, losing consciousness. Where was Napoleon?

THREE

NAPOLEON SOLO had waited under the lamppost, feigning drunkenness, and watched Illya enter The End of the World. Alert, ready to give the warning if anyone suspicious entered. No one did.

Some time passed. The night was cold and wet under the feeble street lamp, and Solo stamped his feet, sang to convince anyone who watched that he was indeed drunk. He received Illya's first message, and become even more alert. Illya had spotted two possible suspects.

Solo was so busy watching the door and the street that he did not see them come from a building behind him until they were on him. The cold muzzle of a pistol was pressed into his back. An only too familiar voice hissed in his ear.

"Really, Napoleon, that beard!"

Maxine Trent!

"And those awful clothes and thick beard," the Thrush agent purred. "What have they done to you? Why, I hardly get a twinge of desire when I see you like this."

"Good evening, Maxine," Solo said. "Should I say it is a pleasant surprise?"

His alert eyes took in the situation at a glance. Maxine stood behind him, but she held no gun. Another Thrush agent held the gun in his back. There were two other Thrush men, armed and watching him closely.

"It's always pleasant, Napoleon. This time especially. I don't have to kill you," Maxine said sweetly.

"I'm relieved," Solo said.

He turned and smiled at the beautiful Thrush agent he knew so well. Her violet eyes were so deceptively alluring. Her long, soft hair was black now—it could be red, or blonde, or any color she chose for any job. Solo ran her through his mind like a card through a computer. Age twenty-five; all the right measurements; runner-up for Miss America one year; daughter of industrialist Clark Trent. One of the best, most skillful of Thrush agents. A tall, lovely, deadly woman.

"To what do I owe my good fortune?" Solo said.

"I need you," Maxine said. "I want to know all you know about Morlock The Great and the Cult."

"So you're working with him?" Napoleon said. "That makes him a little more dangerous."

Maxine smiled. "Why, thank you, Napoleon. I take that as a compliment. Thrush will be pleased. Now, tell me—"

The beautiful Thrush agent stopped. Her violet eyes were looking across the street. Solo whirled. The door of The End of the World had opened. Two shaggy men stepped out.

"Well—" Solo began.

He got no farther. As he turned back to Maxine, the tall woman reached out and touched his neck with her hand. She was smiling. Solo felt the tiny pin prick, and knew no more.

* * *

ILLYA opened his eyes. There was no light. He moved and found that he was lying on a damp stone floor. He flexed his arms and his hands. He was not tied up. He felt his face—his disguise was gone.

He sat up and looked around. His eyes, as they grew accustomed to the dark, saw the confines of his prison. Four stone walls, no windows, perhaps ten square feet of floor space. A table and a chair. Nothing else.

And not a sound. He listened. The stone room was quieter than a tomb. No sound at all.

He looked at his watch. Strangely, they had left him all his clothes, his jewelry and hidden weapons. His U.N.C.L.E. Special, and his knife, were gone. Also his eye patch and false mustache. His watch showed that no more than half an hour had passed since he had left The End of the World. Then he had to be still somewhere in London.

But there was no sound at all. The entire life of the great city gave no hint of existing somewhere beyond the stone walls. He felt no drafts, no current of air. Nothing on the surface could be this silent. He was underground—in a stone room far under the earth.

Somewhere deep under the heart of London the morlocks must have headquarters, their real headquarters. The shaggy, limping creatures lurking in hidden passages under the earth and—. And Illya stopped. If there had been any light his eyes would have brightened.

He had it! Morlocks! The Things To Come Brotherhood! What had Taylor, the CID Inspector, said? They believe they will survive! Of course, H. G. Wells and his Time Machine! They had mixed two of H. G. Wells's stories. The morlocks appeared in The Time Machine. Things To Come was another book. And yet, both books were much the same—they presented what Wells thought the future would be like!

A world destroyed—and the morlocks survived! More than that, the morlocks ruled the future! A mutant race of shaggy-haired, half-crippled men who lived on, and controlled, their more fortunate-looking fellow humans. This Cult had merely taken the deformed and cast-out, the survivors of mental wards, and told them they would, indeed, survive and inherit the earth!

Ridiculous, half-insane; yet what else was any Cult? Cults grew because some people, some groups, had to have a dream to believe, no matter how crazy it was. What better dream than to believe that you will inherit the earth, and are, therefore, really better than all the normal, healthy, handsome people?