The Final Affair - McDaniel David. Страница 40

“Waverly, eh? Does he say when or how?”

“No, but apparently it was same time ago. He says both he And Mr. Solo have been incapacitated or he would have written sooner, but he doesn’t go into details.”

Baldwin sighed. -Old Waverly. He was a year younger than 1. you know.

A fine man; I wish I could have known him better. Interesting coincidence, don’t you think; all this incapacitation in the fighting arm of U.N.C.l.E. -but it gives me the odd feeling we may not expect to hear from Central at all for quite some time, my dear. Remarkable… One can’t help but wonder how it was accomplished.”

“And this one is addressed to both of us. The postMark is the same but the handwriting is different.”

Baldwin slit the envelope and drew out an inner. unsealed envelope. This yielded an engraved card which he regarded seriously for several seconds before passing to his wife.

“Mr. Solo is getting married! How nice,” said Irene. “I wonder who Joan Galton is.”

-Her second married name,n said Baldwin in an odd voice. -was Perry.

Widow of a Thrush Tech. with us almost twenty years. Did you know she was involved with Mr. Solo before he started with U.N.C.L.E.? I’d wondered about that. Her profile had recommended she be kept away from him.“Somehow they seem to have gotten back together despite everything,”

Irene observed. “Wait! Joan Perry —wasn’t she —”

“She was working in our BioPs.vch section when last seen. She took a weekend’s leave early in August, just before things started to go wrong, and never came back. And I had written her off.” He chuckled. -How that I think of it, she checked out the same night Stevens was .killed —and she was the last one to talk to him. I remember noticin~ that when her AWOl case came Up.M

He chuckled again. .1 do believe Mr. Solo has put one over on us.” he said.

tapping bony fingers on his kne-e.

“Now, Ward, you weren’t going to do something to spoil things for them.

It’s too late to help Thrush, and ven~eance is a sour dish for an old mouth.“Vengeance?” said Bal dwin. .“tt)nsense. -Waverly played the game fairly and won —I’m glad to have escaped the sinking of the Hierarchy with no more damage than a slight tightening of the belt. After all, I still have you -and Robin. and my work.“And two thousand dollars a month in industrial royalties..

“I’ll miss the computer —most of my working data is still on microfilm in the files, but it was convenient to have it available throu”h the terminal.

Perhaps we could subscribe to a service lo~lly. Varan Haruchi picked up most of the old hardware. He might be persuaded to trade service for service… I IIUSt contact Saul Panzer in New York, and have him find out how Mr. Solo and Mr. KuryaKin are. Perhaps some appropriate observance…

-Napoleon shifted uncomfortably in his antique formal attire. and shook his head at Illya. They sat in an ivied niche at the foot of I wide lawn and I sunlit cro~ around white-draped tables. -IITKJst say I never expected my best man to show up in full dress unifonn as an Admiral in the —”

.Vice-Adrni ral. Napoleon. Remember. I was originally detached from Russian Naval Intelligence, and my cOOJnission is still with them. Besides,” he smiled.

“I thought it lend a touch of color to your drab ceremony in pink and qrey with a little bit of yellow. Now, you should see a villaqe weddinq in the Ukraine, with bonfires and dancin~ and hundreds of ~uests.” , “I’d like to.” said Napoleon. “Maybe some time you can show me one.”

He paused. “There was something else, wasn1t there.”

“Yes… Ilve been called hane, along with my promotion. Would you believe I’m the second youngest Vice-Admiral in the Russian Navy?”

Napoleon nodded. “You look very dashing with the sling. How’s the shoulder holding?”

“The pins are nearly solid, I’m told. Should be just as good as new in another month or two. I’ll be in some instructional position when I go back —I’ll send you my address.”

“You?” said Napoleon. “At a blackboard?”

Illya sighed. “Probably not for long. I expect to spend the next six months polishing my Manchurian dialect and studying sane new techniques. I’ll probably be in China next summer. My Moscow address will stay valid. but there may be delays in forwarding.”

Joan. in a small cloud of pink, came across the qrass towaTds them from the reception. llNapoleon,” she was saying, “I’m so glad your partner could be here.”

“Does PObm seem to accept your amnesia story? We’ve .clot the best medical evidence lOOney can buy.”

“I donJt really think so, but she’s too nice to say anythinq. She’s just glad you’re settling down.”

“Behind a desk,” said Napoleon.

“But the big desk,” said Illya. “you’ll never qet fat in that chair.”

Napoleon nodded. “I rel11ember’the last time I held it. Without Thrush working on me it should be a relative picnic. Did you see the file on that, by the way? I was code-named <i>‘Waterloo.’</i>”

“Mr. Simpson has been runninQ barefoot throul’lh the toP secret research reports and filinl1 a sunJnary everv day on the most interestina ones.” Joan said. “You can look at them all when YOu 110 back to ‘r.ork —not before. I talked it over with Miss Cramer. Local offices are doinq fine at sweepina UP

and YOu won’t really be needed for another roo nth or so. Mr. Allison has come back to siQn a few thinas. After all, you’re still officiallv on medical leave.

and I expect it’ll take YOu at least until Christmas to recover full.y.”

“Did he ever find anythinq on the Flin Flon rIkJnster?”

“The what? Oh, yes. in fact he mentioned ,you’d be interested in that.

Very disappointina. It was somethinQ that didn’t work out —thev scraDDed it a little later.”

Illya stood. “you’d better be qettinf1 back to the reception. Nanoleon.

I have a plane to catch. But first. there’s one more weddinQ nresent for you.

It came to my apartment last week, and I’ve had the boys in the lab checking it over ever since. It’s absolutely nothinq more than it appears. Ward and Irene Baldwin sent it.”

It was a staghorn and ebony stick. with a one-inch silver band iust below the handle. On the front was enqraved a tiny U.N.C.L.E. globe; on the back the leqend, <i>“W.B. to N.S. 1970.”</i>

Napoleon levered himself to his feet, braced with an aluminum crutch, and took the cane in his hand. “It feels comfortable.” he said.

“One more thinq I think you should know. now that it’s allover. Remember “little Brother’?”

“I’ll never forget him.”

“Did you know that of those last two wires, one would have detonated the device?”

“I guessed, when you told me not to touch the other one. Whichever one wasn’t cut would set it off.”

“Not exactly. I had the mechanism worked out, you see, but I still hadn’t fiqured out the color-coding of the wires. It didn’t make sense. If I’d had a piece of paper, or if I’d been able to think more clearly, ,1 aight have. But I didn’t have the least idea at that point which of those wires would set it off.”

“You didn’t…” said Joan.

“Then it <i>did</i> matter,” said Napoleon. “You said cut either one.”

“No,” said Illya. “I said, ‘Cut one of them.’ That was all. I’ve worked with you for seven highly variable years, all toqether, and one thing I knew was that you are lucky. I don’t understand it, and I knew it didn’t work if you worried about it. But if I had chosen one of the wires and told you to cut it, my odds of success would be fifty percent, because I believe in the laws of probability. If you chose the one to cut, without bein9 overwhelmingly aware that you would never know if you made the wrong choice, I guessed you had about a two-thirds chance of choosing correctly under the circumstances.

I must say I’m glad you did.”

Napoleon sat down again. A taxi honked at the foot of the lawn and Illya looked around. “That’s for me,” he said. “Sometime again, Napoleon.” And he was gone at a trot, his left arm encumbered, officer’s cap gripped in his right hand, blond hair catching the breeze.