THE SYNTHETIC STORM AFFAIR
By Robert Hart Davis (attributed to I.G. Edmonds)
May 1967
Issue 16
Deadly beyond belief was the secret THRUSH had learned—how to goad Nature herself into a frenzy that could ravage
the world as Illya and Solo sought the perverted madman who could summon the
very hurricane of hell to do his bidding.
The
Atoll of a Thousand Deaths, men called it. From it
maddened nature would unleash a storm which would engulf all mankind, unless
Solo and Illya could get there before it was too late—and still stay alive!
ACT I: A STORMY FUTURE
It had been a most trying business, that Stolen Steamer Affair, and Napoleon Solo, felt that he had
earned a good rest. And what better way to spend a vacation in Rio than in the
company of an extremely beautiful woman?
Solo surveyed himself in the full length
mirror in his suite in Rio de Janeiro. Slender, medium height, with dark hair
and a cleft chin, he admitted that he wasn't exactly a Dracula in appearance.
But he also wondered what there was about him that beat the time of two
Hollywood movie stars for the company of luscious Lula LaAmour.
Lula, along with the other Hollywood
types, was in Rio to film an extravaganza called "Rompin' in Rio."
Napoleon had only asked her for a date from force of habit he had when meeting
any lovely unattached young woman.
It surprised him when she accepted
instead of taking up invitations from the handsome actors. Movie stars aren't
easy to date. But although he thought her crazy, he was grateful for her
idiocy. Lula was the new Marilyn Monroe. A latter-day version of Jean Harlow.
The reincarnated spirit of original vampire, Theda Bara.
Napoleon Solo adjusted the carnation in
his evening clothes lapel and thought with genuine pleasure of the envy his
entrance with the film queen would elicit from his colleagues, Illya Kuryakin
and Mark Slate. He even hoped that April Dancer, the Girl from U.N.C.L.E.,
would be a bit jealous.
Solo grinned at his image. "We know
how Don Juan must have felt, eh, old chap?" he said.
He looked at his watch. It was almost
time to pick up Lula. He started for the door and stopped when he remembered
that he had not called Illya Kuryakin, to let the other U.N.C.L.E. agent know
that he would not be available that evening for anything less than a four-alarm
emergency.
But as he walked over to pick up the
telephone, it rang. He picked it up.
"Harmon," he said, using the
name he was registered under.
"Mr. Harmon?" Napoleon
recognized the slightly Spanish accent of the hotel desk clerk. "I have a
message for you from New York. The gentleman who called said it was most
urgent."
The Man from U.N.C.L.E. sighed. He had an
unhappy vision of the technicolored image of Lula LaAmour vanishing as a
curtain marked "business" drew across the screen.
"Yes?" he said wearily,
"What is the message?"
"The caller said to inform you that
the closing market in New York is decidedly unsteady."
"Thank you," Napoleon said with
ill grace.
He dropped the telephone into its cradle
and considered the cryptic message. He understood it. U.N.C.L.E. headquarters
wanted him to call it. Thoughtfully he took a silver fountain pen from his
pocket and twisted the cap. A tiny antenna shot up six inches.
"Central Control." He said into
the ultra-miniature transmitter built into the fake pen.
The electronic wizardry of the tiny
communications set bridged the distance to U.N.C.L.E. headquarters in New York
with face-to-face clarity.
"Mr. Solo?" a slightly English
accented voice said from the set.
"Yes, sir, Mr. Waverly," Solo replied
to his chief's brief question.
"What is her name, Mr. Solo?"
the U.N.C.L.E. chief said.
"Whose name, sir?" Napoleon
answered.
"The lady whose escort for the
evening I am stealing."
"You won't believe me, but is Lula
LaAmour."
"The—er—buxom actress?"
"Buxom only in the right places,
sir."
"Well, her type can always find a
substitute escort, fortunately."
"But my type can't find a substitute
for her type!"
"Fortunately, Mr. Solo,"
Alexander Waverly went on. "I never let my emotions interfere with
business. Do you, Mr. Solo?"
Napoleon Solo sighed.
"No, sir, I do not," Solo said
sadly, "but only because you will not let me."
"An excellent observation, Mr.
Solo," Waverly said. "I need you on a matter of the gravest concern.
I also need Mr. Kuryakin. I suppose he has one of these actresses dated for the
evening?"
"No, sir," Solo said. "He
is having dinner with April Dancer."
"Then I will have three of my
operatives upset for the price of two."
"Yes, sir," Napoleon said.
"I assure you, Mr. Solo, that this
is a matter of the utmost importance or I would not interrupt your well earned
vacation. It is so urgent that every second counts. Every second! The lives of
thousands now and millions later depend upon prompt and decisive action."
"Yes, sir," Solo replied
crisply. "What is the problem?"
"There is registered at the
Quitandinha Hotel a man named Senor Pablo de Santos-Lopez. This man is a world
reknown meteorologist and has been working in South Argentina on a
revolutionary method of breaking up storms. We have a tip that this man's life
is in extreme danger. Protect him at all costs."
"Yes, sir," Solo said. "Is
THRUSH involved?"
"Yes," Waverly replied.
"We are not sure just how, but THRUSH agents are showing an extraordinary
interest in Dr. Santos-Lopez. We believe they intend to kidnap him."
"I see, sir," Solo said.
"If Santos-Lopez can really break up storms, it would be an important war
weapon."
"This man has been very secretive
about his experiments," Waverly said. "But it stands to reason that
if a man can break a storm, he may be in a fair way to discover how to start
one!"
"That would really be
something," Napoleon said. His face grew grave at the implications.
"I believe I've read that typhoons carry the destructive fury of a
thousand atomic bombs."
"That is correct, Mr. Solo,"
Waverly said. "A weapon like that in the hands of THRUSH could be
disastrous. I do not know that there is such a weapon, mind you, but it is a
chance we cannot afford to take. You see now how grave the situation is."
"Yes, sir," Napoleon Solo
replied. "Illya and I will get on it at once. Is there any evidence of a
direct contact between this meteorologist and THRUSH?"
"There was a conference between this
man and a THRUSH agent in Buenos Aires three days ago," Waverly said.
"Apparently it was not a satisfactory one. Santos-Lopez left the city
under an assumed name and came to Rio. He is registered at the hotel as Senor
Diego de Vega. He seems afraid, according to my information."
"We will contact him
immediately," Solo said.
"Good!" Waverly said, "And
Mr. Solo—"
"Yes, sir?"
"I know the producer of Miss Lula
LaAmour's films. I will arrange with him to get you an autographed picture of
the lady. A sort of consolation prize, shall we say!"
Solo broke off the connection ruefully.
Although there was a certain amount of chagrin at losing his date with the
lovely movie star, years of working with the great crime-fighting organization
known as U.N.C.L.E., had made Napoleon something of a philosopher.
TWO
With Waverly the job came first, last and
always. The dedicated man in the driver's seat in New York made that plain to
all of them. They also knew that he demanded the same devotion to duty of
himself that he asked of them.
Solo slipped into his coat and walked
across the hall to Illya Kuryakin's room. He found his partner just putting on
his coat. Illya was a slightly smaller man than Solo and his blond hair
contrasted with Solo's dark head. The blond hair had a perpetual unruliness
about it that somehow matched the look in Illya Kuryakin's eyes. His pale blue
eyes stared out of his Slavic face with a hint of sadness when he caught the
expression on Napoleon Solo's face.
Don't tell me," he said plaintively.
"Mr. Waverly called. Mr. Waverly said in effect that vacations are for
bums. And he said—"
"A man's life is in extreme
danger," Napoleon broke in. Waverly said there wasn't a second to
lose."
"Have you arranged for wheels or is
it within walking distance?" Illya said crisply, his manner changing to
grim efficiency.
"A cab will be in front of the hotel
in three minutes."
"I can make it to the lobby in two
minutes flat," Illya said. "That leaves me one minute to take care of
an essential matter."
He picked up the room phone and dialed
room service.
"I want a hot dog," he said.
"That's right. Put one on a silver platter. Deliver it to room three
hundred four, occupied by a Miss April Dancer. Tell her that the
'dinner'—provided through the courtesy of Mr. Alexander Waverly—is a substitute
for the pheasant under glass with caviar and champagne promised her by one
Illya Kuryakin."
He grinned at Solo as he jammed down the
phone. "Come on, Napoleon," he said. "Adventure calls
again!"
"It's okay for you to take this
lightly," Solo said with a grimace. "A date with a girl married to
her job like April could not possibly be more than just a friendly evening. But
Lula and I might have made some beautiful music together."
"Sure!" Illya retorted.
"She would have sung you right into the movies yourself. You could dodge
ersatz bullets instead of real ones."
"I don't know but what I wouldn't
like that to this," Napoleon said gloomily. "There was a tone in
Waverly's voice that indicated this was going to be one tough case."
"What is it?" Kuryakin asked as
they hurried down the hall to the elevator.
"He hinted that THRUSH was on the
track of a method to control storms. Can you imagine the havoc they could raise
if they could hit us with a hurricane or typhoon at will?"
Illya Kuryakin whistled softly. He face
grew more grave.
"A hurricane can do more damage to a
town than a bombing," he said slowly.
"Mr. Waverly said the average
typhoon packs the explosive force of a thousand atom bombs," Napoleon Solo
said.
"And worse," Illya added,
"the storm travels over a wide track. A directed hurricane could strike
Miami in Florida and devastate the entire Atlantic coast all the way to
Canada!"
"Not only the coast but inland for a
hundred miles," Napoleon said hurriedly. "Imagine not one storm, but
a series hitting the East Coast, the West Coast and the Gulf States
simultaneously! Millions would die. The country would be paralyzed. The effect
would be greater than any possible nuclear bombing by intercontinental
ballistic missiles."
"It this thing is true—and Waverly
should know—then THRUSH has come up with the most devastatingly terrible weapon
the world has ever known."
"It looks like that is what we're
faced with."
"What's our lead, if any?"
Illya asked.
"A world famed meteorologist named
Campos-Lopez seems to be the key to this thing. THRUSH is after him. He is
staying her in Rio incognito. We are going to see him now."
At the meteorologist's hotel, a frigidly
polite desk clerk informed them that the hotel never gave any information about
its guests. Napoleon Solo flashed his U.N.C.L.E. identification card and the
clerk's manner changed abruptly.
"I am sorry, sir," he said.
"The gentleman you inquire about is registered here as Senor Diego de Vega
of Argentina. He left early this morning and has not returned. I have no idea
where he went."
"I see," Solo said. "It is
very important that we contact him as soon as possible. If he—"
"But wait, sir! Yes, it is he! Senor
de Vega is just getting out of the cab outside."
"Yes, I see him." Illya
Kuryakin said. "The gray-haired man paying the cabbie."
"Come on," Napoleon said,
striding rapidly across the lobby.
Illya Kuryakin frowned slightly as if hit
by an uneasy hunch. His hand reached up and touched the small automatic in the
shoulder holster under his coat. He missed the super U.N.C.L.E. gun, but it was
much too large to carry under the coat.
Solo went out the revolving doors just
ahead of his companion.
"Dr. Campos-Lopez?" he said,
extending his hand to the stooped gray-haired man who was just turning away
from the cab driver.
The meteorologist jumped back against the
cab. His hand jerked down to his coat pocket. Napoleon stopped short as he
faced the ugly muzzle of a small gun in the hands of the frightened man.
"Don't come near me!" Dr.
Campos-Lopez cried.
"Doctor! We are your friends,"
Napoleon said soothingly. "We are from U.N.C.L.E."
"I have no friends!" the man
cried in a choked voice. "Keep away from me. Take your hands away from
your pocket! Don't try to pull a gun on me. I'll kill you if you make a false
move!"
"Please, doctor—" Napoleon
began.
"Don't move! I'll shoot!" the
frightened man warned.
The meteorologist had not seen Illya.
Kuryakin moved to the side. He looked around and caught Solo's eye. Napoleon
gave a short negative shake of his head. His orders from Waverly was to protect
Campos-Lopez, but not to force himself upon the scientist.
The frightened man reached back and
pulled open the cab door.
"Take me to the airport!" he
said hurriedly. "I'll not wait for the baggage."
He slammed the door, still holding the
gun on Napoleon Solo. The uneasy cab driver jerked the car, clashing the gears
as he went off.
"Shall I follow him?" Illya
asked.
"Yes!" Napoleon said. "Do
the best you can, but don't force yourself on him. I'll contact the South
American bureau of U.N.C.L.E. and get a Spanish-speaking agent to pick him up
at the airport. He—"
"Napoleon!" Illya's sharp cry
cut in on Solo's words.
The man from U.N.C.L.E. whirled to see a
car dart from a side street just as the fleeing cab turned the first corner
away from the hotel.
There was a sudden blaze of gunfire
straight into the cab. The horrified men saw the cab careen wildly and plunge
into a thick hedge. They started to run toward the wreck. The killers' car spun
around in the road. Its headlights flashed full on the two men from U.N.C.L.E.
They split, each diving for the opposite
side of the road to divide their attackers' aim.
Napoleon hit the ground, snaking his body
around under the doubtful protection of a small evergreen. Across the street
Illya Kuryakin took refuge behind a small rock wall. A spray of sub-machine gun
bullets smashed into the rocks. Illya ducked, sprawling flat to save himself.
THREE
Across the street Napoleon Solo raised up
on his knees and started shooting. He kept his aim low, hitting for the car's
tires. The first bullet caught the left rear wheel.
The car swerved as the tire exploded. It
plunged straight at the low wall hiding Kuryakin. Solo leaped to his feet,
caught in a sudden clutch of fear as the out-of-control vehicle aimed straight
at his companion.
Solo caught just the briefest glimpse of
Kuryakin as Illya threw himself to one side. The car struck the stone wall,
ripping the mortar loose and plunging halfway through before it came to a halt.
"Illya!" Napoleon cried running
across the road. "Are you—"
"Look out, Napoleon!"
Solo could not see the cause of
Kuryakin's frantic cry, but he knew his companion too well to disregard the
warning. He dropped flat, hugging the street curb for what little protection he
could get from it.
A gun cracked from the back of the wreck.
The slug slammed into the concrete, inches from Napoleon's head. It glanced off
at a screaming angle after bringing blood to the man from U.N.C.L.E.'s cheek
with a chip of pavement.
Napoleon shifted slightly in order not to
present the same target twice. The shot came from the back of the wrecked car.
He half raised and fired through the broken rear glass.
A bright red stab of muzzle blast showed
him his mistake. The next shot came from under the wrecked car instead of
inside it as he thought. The shot came so close it scraped cloth from the
shoulder of Napoleon's coat.
He shot back, aiming for the spot where
he saw the muzzle flash. The bullet struck metal and clanged like a bell.
Napoleon, realizing their adversary had pulled back, ducked half doubled up and
make a dash to the right.
The killer's gun barked again, but his
fleeing quarry ducked behind the remnants of the stone wall. Napoleon moved
stealthily forward, his gun ready, seeking a target.
He saw a shadow move on the opposite side
of the wreck. He raised the gun, but before he could pull the trigger he heard
Illya yell again. Once again he couldn't see the new danger, but he flattened
against the wall.
Then he heard the roar of a car's engine
and headlights cut through the darkness, throwing him into a bright glare of
light. He caught just the briefest glimpse of a man's silhouette. He was
leaning out the passenger's side of the car. He was holding a sub-machine gun
in his hand.
ACT II: THE STRANGE STORM
It was impossible to scramble over the
wrecked wall. He would run directly into the other killer's line of fire! In
that moment of desperation Napoleon Solo realized that he had only two
alternatives. He could crouch there and die—or he could attack!
Either one seemed like suicide, but it
was better to go down swinging! He leaped to his feet, bent almost double and
charged straight toward the flaring headlights.
The killer cursed loudly and tried to
lean far enough out the door to bring the gun to bear on the charging man.
But as he leaned out he presented a
target of his own. Solo's gun spat at him, but the jar of running spoiled his
aim.
Behind the other wreck the first killer
got rattled and started to shoot at Napoleon's running back. The bullet passed
over Solo's head with a deadly whine and smashed into the windshield of a car
facing the man from U.N.C.L.E.
The driver screamed a frantic curse and
shouted for the gunman to stop before he killed the wrong targets. He shoved
the car in gear and tried to ram Napoleon. But as the car started Solo leaped
on the hood. He shoved his gun through the shattered windshield. The gunman
frantically tried to swing his gun around.
The driver twisted the steering wheel
frantically. The car swerved, throwing Napoleon on the grass. A burst of fire
ripped from the killer's tommy gun, but it flashed up toward the sky as the man
was thrown back by a straight shot from Illya Kuryakin's gun.
Solo twisted around. As Illya raised up
to fire the shot that saved Solo's life, he made a perfect target for the first
killer still crouched behind the wrecked car.
As Solo twisted he saw the man rise up.
He shot from the ground, without aiming for he realized in that split second of
danger that Illya's life hung by a mere thread.
He missed! He shot too fast, but there
was no alternative.
The bullet struck the edge of the
shattered windshield. The spray of splintered glass showered the crouching
gunman. He jumped and his aim was spoiled. The bullet intended for Kuryakin
smashed into the ground at the U.N.C.L.E. agent's feet.
Solo whirled as the driver of the stalled
car grabbed for the machine gun dropped by his dead companion. As the man
raised up, Solo's bullet caught him between the eyes. Napoleon whirled, but it
was all over. He saw Illya walking rapidly toward the slumped figure of the
other THRUSH agent.
After they made sure neither of the
THRUSH men were playing 'possum but were really dead, Solo said crisply,
"Keep me covered just in case there's another group following them."
Illya nodded silently. He went over and
switched off the car lights so they wouldn't present as good a target if
another attack was made by THRUSH.
While Solo hurried over to the wrecked
taxi to see what had happened to Santos-Lopez, Illya stared at the dead men.
For perhaps the thousandth time in his life he wondered about them and the
strange organization they served.
THRUSH! An organization so strange no one
knew even what its initials stood for. Only one thing was clear about THRUSH.
This was that was composed of a group of men willing and able to use criminal
means to affect a dream of world conquest.
Apparently the organization was based in
and received support from a certain European country, but it had never been
determined that the country's government was behind the organization. Because
it operated world-wide, only a world-wide crime fighting group like U.N.C.L.E.
could effectively block this super-evil group.
Kuryakin took a deep breath as he
considered their narrow escape. Each tangle with THRUSH was more difficult than
the last. He wondered, staring at the dead men, where it all would lead.
The blare of a police siren broke his
thoughts. He went down to the street to identify himself and make a report to
the police. The tough manner of the police changed instantly when Illya flashed
his U.N.C.L.E. identification.
He turned as Napoleon Solo came up. The
man from U.N.C.L.E.'s face was grim. Illya did not have to ask him what
Santos-Lopez's condition was. Solo's face told him.
"Chalk up another for THRUSH,"
Illya said bitterly.
"We did the best we could,"
Solo said slowly. "Unfortunately time was so short we had to approach
Santos-Lopez direct. We should have arranged an interview with him through some
third party he trusted. He would have trusted us then."
"What do we do now?" Illya
asked. "This thing isn't over by any means."
"No, I'm afraid this storm expert's
death only complicates what promises to be a bitter battle. I've got to report
to Waverly that we failed. Why don't you help the police as much as you can?
I'll call New York."
Solo walked over to the broken wall,
where he could not be heard by the others. He pulled out his pen-communicator
and twisted the cap to extend the aerial. His low spoken call letters were
amplified and transmitted instantly to a room high in an office building in New
York.
In this office a leathery faced man of
indeterminate middle age leaned back in a high backed chair and thoughtfully
regarded the steel and glass spire of the United Nations building visible
through his window. He was thoughtfully rubbing the bowl of an unlighted briar
pipe as he looked at the giant building which represented a large share of the
world's hope for tomorrow.
A light flared on a small console
recessed in the large mahogany desk in front of him. He turned so quickly he
dropped the pipe on the thick rug. In his haste he didn't bother to pick it up.
He snapped on a circuit to hear Napoleon Solo's voice identifying himself.
"Mr. Waverly? Come in, please,"
Solo said from South America
TWO
Alexander Waverly, Section I member and
operations chief for U.N.C.L.E., hesitated just a moment to compose himself. He
was a human being with a human's worries and doubts, but he tried never to
present any face but a composed, confident one to his agents. His personal
troubles and uncertainties remained his personal property.
He shared them with no one—not even the
five other men who share with him the terrible responsibility for direction of
the giant United Network Command for Law and Enforcement.
It took him but a second to compose
himself and shove back his anxiety over this latest and most terrible of
THRUSH's threats to the world.
"Yes, Mr. Solo," he said
quietly. "Go ahead, please."
In South America the quiet, decisive
voice had a soothing effect on Napoleon Solo. Regardless how tough a situation
might be, he never failed to feel better about it after hearing Alexander
Waverly's quiet, confident voice.
"I'm afraid we have to report a
failure, sir," he said.
"What happened?" Waverly asked.
Napoleon gave him a brief but accurate
sketch of what they encountered.
"Unfortunate," Waverly said
slowly. "But unavoidable, I can see now. Since I called you I received a
special report on Dr. Santos-Lopez from our Section IV. Just a moment."
Waverly picked up a yellow teletype sheet
marked with the call code of U.N.C.L.E.'s section IV Enforcement and
Communications.
"It says that Dr. Santos-Lopez was
extremely suspicious of anyone," Waverly said. "Under the
circumstances I doubt that we could have made direct contact with him."
"Shall we remain here and see if we
can get his reports on his storm breaking experiments?" Solo asked.
"No," Waverly said. "Our
South American offices will be put on that job. I want you—"
He broke off as a brilliant red light
flashed on his desk console.
"One moment, Mr. Solo. Stand by. I
have an emergency call."
Mr. Waverly punched in a new circuit. A
hidden speaker went into action with: "Section III on report."
"Go ahead, Section III,"
Waverly said. "Switch to Code Line A, since I will retransmit your report
to Mr. Solo on the field band."
"Yes, sir," Section III,
Enforcement and Intelligence replied. "News service reports from South
America are that the laboratory of Dr. Santos-Lopez was destroyed two hours ago
by fire. Another fire of unknown origin broke out in the hotel where he had
been staying. It destroyed his baggage."
"Thank you," Mr. Waverly said,
cutting the connection to Section III. "Did you get that report, Mr.
Solo?"
"Yes, sir. I'd say it is futile to
try and find any reports that Dr. Santos-Lopez might have left about his storm
destroying work."
"It would seem so," the
U.N.C.L.E. chief said slowly. "However, I doubt that he was far enough
advanced to provide us a sure kill for any storm generating system THRUSH is
working on. That threat is our immediate concern. So you and Mr. Kuryakin
report to me here just as quickly as you can get here."
"Yes, sir," Solo said.
"There is a regular airline flight leaving here in-"
He glanced down at his watch. "—In
forty-five minutes. We can make that quicker than we can charter a special
flight."
"I am sure you can," Waverly
said. He picked up another piece of paper from his desk. "But there is
another flight, the Inter-Hemisphere Airlines, leaving in forty minutes. I have
already arranged through Section II for the blocking of two seats on it for you
and Mr. Kuryakin. That cuts five minutes from your departure time. I consider
five seconds wasted a tragedy. Five minutes compounds the tragedy sixty times.
So you will forgive my presumptuousness in arranging a different schedule for
you."
"Yes, sir," Solo said, sighing.
It was impossible to get ahead of Waverly, he thought wryly.
"Excellent," Waverly said.
"We have received new evidence that clearly indicates that my original
presumption was correct. THRUSH is experimenting with the creation of synthetic
storms—and they are succeeding! Therefore you can see why every second—every
second—Mr. Solo—endangers the lives of thousands of people!"
"We'll be on the plane, sir,"
Napoleon said.
"I'll be expecting you,"
Waverly replied crisply as he cut the connection.
A police escort got them to the airport
with only one of Mr. Waverly's precious seconds to spare. There wasn't even
time for them to check out of their hotel. Illya asked the chief of their
police escort to inform April Dancer of their sudden departure and to request
the girl from U.N.C.L.E. to take care of such details for them.
The two U.N.C.L.E. operatives were the
last passengers aboard. Every other seat was taken.
"Sit down here, Illya," Solo
said. "I'll take the next one."
But Kuryakin had seen the girl sitting in
the window seat farther up the aisle.
"No!" he said, to Solo's
surprise. "Age before beauty. You sit here."
He went up the aisle to the other empty
seat. Napoleon saw the girl then and his face twisted, wryly.
Solo slipped into the other empty seat,
opposite a sour-faced old man. Up the aisle he could see Illya talking with the
lovely girl. From what little he could see of her, she seemed to what Alexander
Waverly would describe as buxom in the—er—right places.
He sighed and leaned back in his seat.
Between Illya's aggressiveness and Alexander Waverly's impatience, Solo
wondered how he would ever get any romance in his life!
THREE
About thirty minutes after were airborne,
the stewardess lowered the lights. The old man beside Napoleon Solo started to
snore loudly. Deep breathing showed that others in the plane were also
sleeping. Solo found it impossible to doze off himself. He kept thinking of
THRUSH's new weapon.
He had more than the usual experience
with hurricanes and typhoons. He knew that if THRUSH could harness their
fantastic fury, U.N.C.L.E.'s great enemy now possessed a weapon capable of
doing more damage than any weapon ever conceived.
Napoleon was thinking of the terrible
devastation he'd seen only a few months ago when a typhoon hit southern Japan.
Not a house remained standing in a hundred mile area.
As Napoleon recalled it, more than 2,000
people died and losses ran into the millions.
What frightened him was the thought of
THRUSH-guided typhoons striking the U.S. coast in areas unused to storms of
such frightful nature. Florida was constantly ripped by hurricanes. The people
there knew how to batten down the hatches and ride out the blow. But what would
happen if a typhoon suddenly struck the coast of Southern California, with its
lath and plaster houses? Or Honolulu or Seattle or San Francisco? The
destruction would be frightful.
Suddenly his thoughts were shattered by a
sickening heave of the flying plane. His head flopped forward. But for the seat
belt he would have been thrown across the aisle.
The plane shuddered. It was almost as if
a giant hand had pushed against it and the four-motored jet was struggling to
fly through the obstruction. Solo had the awful feeling that they had stopped
dead in the air.
Then the left wing dipped. He was thrown
heavily against the arm rest. The old man beside him neglected to fasten his
seat belt. He was thrown over on top of Napoleon.
The plane fell a hundred feet and pulled
up with a sickening thud. It rose like an elevator and then dropped again,
snapping the necks of the frightened passengers.
Outside, a wild fury of rain beat on the
windows. A vivid crack of lightning flashed through the sky, throwing a weird
blue light inside the passenger compartment of the beleagured plane. The
stewardess switched on the lights to help calm the passengers.
She came down the aisle, obviously a
frightened young woman but one bravely trying to hide her fear. The bucking of
the plane in the super turbulent air almost threw her off her feet with each
sickening heave. But she braced herself, grasping each seat back as she passed
in an attempt to keep her balance.
"Please tighten your seat
belts!" she cried above the noise of rain, thunder and jets. "Please
be calm! There is no danger. We have just run into some turbulence. It will
pass in a few minutes!"
Solo watched her in admiration, but Illya
Kuryakin did not even glance in her direction. He was too busy with his lovely
companion. She was neither brave nor afraid. That is what surprised him. She
was furious. Her face was flushed. Her eyes flashed as vividly as the lightning
outside.
"Damn them!" she cried, balling
her fists and beating on the back of the seat in front of her as an outlet for
her fury. "What are they trying to do to me! They should have checked to
see which plane I boarded!"
Illya Kuryakin looked at her in
astonishment. It seemed like a very curious time to get mad.
He put his hand over and caught her fist.
"Take it easy," he said.
"Everything is going to be okay. It's just a strong front."
He raised his voice to make himself heard
for the slap of rain on the metal skin of the plane was loud as hail.
But before he finished speaking there was
a sudden lull between rain gusts. His loud claim that it was just a strong
weather front carried halfway down the passenger compartment.
A man in the uniform of an officer in the
U.S. Air Force leaned across the aisle.
"Don't kid yourself, buddy," he
said to Kuryakin. "Before I went on military duty in South America I flew
hurricane patrols out of Florida. This is no front. It is a genuine
hurricane!"
Illya thought so too. His remark was
intended to calm the furious girl beside him. Yet the weather report when they
left Rio was for calm weather all the way. The meteorological reports might
miss a budding storm, but this one was full-blown. Anything so large should
have been discovered by hurricane hunter planes.
It was impossible for so large a storm to
have gone completely undetected.
But was it?
He remembered what Napoleon told him
regarding the call to Mr. Waverly.
Was this a THRUSH-made storm? That would
explain its unusual sudden appearance.
Just then there was another lull in the
driving rain. The former hurricane hunter across the aisle leaned over and said
to Illya: "There is something very strange about this storm. I know
something about hurricanes. This thing is absolutely impossible!"
"How do you—" Illya Kuryakin
began, but the full fury of the storm struck the plane again. It was impossible
to be heard. He gripped the armrests of his seat as the storm-tossed plane
almost went into a loop.
His stomach heaved from the furious up
and down motion. He hoped that he wasn't going to disgrace himself before the
girl by losing his supper.
There was another short lull between
gusts of rain. He heard the officer talking to himself: "It's impossible!
There couldn't be a storm like this!"
ACT III: THE STORM GIRL
The pitching of the plane grew more
violent. The hard driven rain was becoming hail. The alarm of the passengers increased.
Suddenly the girl unbuckled her seat
belt. She stood up, bracing herself by holding to seat in front of her.
"Just a minute!" Illya said to
her. "You can't—"
"Mind your own business!" she
snapped. "I know what I'm doing. That fool of a pilot is going to get us
all killed. I've got to do something to keep alive!"
"All you will do is hinder the
pilot," Illya said. "Everything will be all right. These men are
experienced—"
"Get out of my way!" she said.
She had the look of a person who knew
exactly what she was doing. She stepped over Illya's legs. The plane lurched,
but she kept her feet. She started making her way down the aisle, holding to
the seat backs for support.
At the end of the compartment the
stewardess tried to stop her. The girl brushed on past. The plane almost rolled
over. She caught the knob of the compartment door.
Illya Kuryakin unbuckled his seat belt
and got up. However, the girl braced her herself in time to avoid being thrown
off her feet. When the plane righted itself, she opened the door and stepped
into the pilot's compartment.
Illya hesitated for a second, then went
after her. The wind was becoming gusty. The plane shivered and rolled between
moments of comparative calm.
The stewardess half rose from her seat by
the compartment door.
"Please, sir—" she began.
Illya patted her shoulder and said,
"Don't worry!"
"But you can't bother the pilot at a
time like this. He needs to keep his attention on the plane."
"I'm going to get that girl out of
there," Illya said. "I—"
"You are from U.N.C.L.E.," she
said.
The plane twisted. Every strut and rivet
groaning under the strain. Illya could imagine the pilot's struggle to bring
them back to an even keel.
"How did you know that?" he
asked the girl when he could get his balance again.
"That woman—the one who went in the
pilot's compartment. She asked me about you when you first got on the plane.
She saw you coming up the ramp and she asked me to make sure nobody took the
seat beside her. She wanted one of you to sit there."
"Thanks," Illya said.
"Thanks for telling me."
He went on up front, fighting constantly
to keep his feet. The tossing of the plane was getting worse. It was building
up to the most ferocious storm he ever encountered.
He found the girl standing between the
pilot and co-pilot. Both men's uniforms were stained with sweat.
Their faces were strained and tired from
the constant struggle to keep the plane from tossing over and losing lift.
"You've got to climb!" It was
the girl screaming in the pilot's ear. "These storms only rise about
twenty thousand feet. It you can break out of the worst circle of wind, you can
rise above it!"
"I've tried!" he yelled back.
"I can't gain any altitude. It's taking all our power just to keep out of
the sea!"
"Then turn with the wind!" she cried.
"Let it carry you—"
"Lady, let me fly the plane, will
you? Now get the hell back there in your seat. You're stopping me from-"
"Can't you understand!" she
screamed at him. "I know plenty about these storms. I—"
"If you don't get out of
here—!" he cried.
She grabbed his arm. The plane pitched to
one side. He shoved her and pulled back on the wheel with all his strength in a
desperate attempt to bring the nose up.
Illya Kuryakin caught the girl just in
time to keep her from being thrown against the control panel. When the plane
was half on an even keel again, the angry pilot switched to intercom and called
the stewardess.
"Come up here! Get this crazy woman
out of here before she wrecks us!"
"You stupid fool!" the girl
cried wildly. "You'll kill us all if you don't listen to me!"
Illya braced himself as best he could,
and pulled out his U.N.C.L.E. identification. He flashed it to the startled
pilot.
"Better do what she says," he
shouted. "I've a hunch she knows more about this thing than any of
us!"
"I can't take a chance on
hunches!" the pilot yelled back. "I've got a two million dollar plane
and the lives of ninety people to think about!"
"Do you think we've got a chance to
get out of this alive?" Illya asked. "Be honest. A lot depends on
this."
"No," the pilot replied.
"This is the worst storm I've ever encountered. We're continually losing
altitude. Unless a miracle happens, nothing can keep us from going into the
ocean!"
He wasn't a coward. Illya Kuryakin could
see that. He just spoke the plain truth based on long experience as captain of
an international jet.
"Then try it her way," Illya
said persuasively. "Things can't get any worse."
The pilot hesitated. The reputation of
the men from U.N.C.L.E. was so great that he nodded.
"I guess you're right," he
said. "Things can't get much worse, no matter what we do."
"Thank you!" the girl said
breathlessly to Illya. "You can stop worrying now. We'll come out okay.
There's a rhythm in these things. If we turn on the pulse, we can make it into
the eye.
He was amazed by her confidence. He moved
back to make room for her beside the pilot. As he did, he backed into someone.
He turned his head and saw Napoleon Solo.
"I saw you rush up here," Solo
said. "So I followed. What gives?"
"I don't know!" Illya said into
Solo's ear. "But this girl seems to know more about storms than
anyone."
"Who is she?" Napoleon asked.
There was another flash of that
frightening blue lightning outside. In the brief glare Illya saw the suspicion
on Solo's face as he stared at the girl's back.
"I don't know," Illya said.
"But I would like to."
Solo nodded. Together they watched the
girl. Her swaying body, slenderly outlined against the glow of the cockpit
instrument panel, bent half doubled so she could shout her instructions into
the pilot's ear.
TWO
The wild turbulence increased in fury. It
was beyond anything either of the men from U.N.C.L.E. had ever experienced
before. At one point it appeared that the groaning, straining plane would be
torn apart. But somehow, it struggled through.
Outside another crash of lightning
illuminated the cockpit with a ghostly glare. It shocked Napoleon to see how
helpless the crew was now. But he was even more struck by the calm confidence
of the girl.
As the plane continued to fight the wild
wind and rain, the two men from U.N.C.L.E. began to realize that the girl was
right. There did appear to be a rhythm to the storm's gusts.
Cleverly the girl was anticipating this
stormy rhythm and informing the pilot when to make his banks.
Then suddenly the solid wall of surging
clouds was gone from in front of them. The plane's tail gave one last upward
loop as they left the circling winds. Then they were flying in still air.
The stars were visible above them,
dimming with the approach of dawn. The sea beneath was whipped to an
indescribable fury and a circling wall of clouds hemmed them in.
"We're in the eye now," the
girl said calmly. "In all storms of this kind the winds circle about a
dead section of air known as the eye of the storm. This eye moves along with
the hurricane."
"Thanks," the pilot said,
mopping his dripping face. "You knew what you were doing. I'm sorry I
doubted you, but'
"Forget it," she said crisply.
"My life was at stake here too, you know."
She turned to go back to her seat. As she
passed Napoleon Solo, he stopped her.
"This is quite a remarkable thing
you did," he said, giving her an engaging smile. Illya noted with
amusement that Solo's charm was lost on the young woman.
"How does it happen that you know so
much about storms?" Solo asked.
She gave him a steady stare.
"Are you a policeman?" she
asked, her voice cold and harsh.
"No," he said quickly.
"Then, until you get your badge,
keep your questions to yourself!' she snapped.
"I'm sorry," he said. "I
was just curious."
She brushed past him.
He turned to follow, but she slammed the
compartment door in his face.
Illya chuckled. Napoleon turned to look
at him.
"How many times have I told you to
let me handle the pretty girls we meet up with? Girls require finesse, you
know. You just confine yourself to masterminds and old ladies. Let me handle the young pretty ones!"
Solo gave his partner a sour look.
"Are you a betting man, Mr.
Kuryakin?" he said, an edge in his voice.
"Definitely not, Mr. Solo,"
Illya said formally. "But on occasion I have been known to slap down a
chip or two."
"Okay," Napoleon snapped.
"I'll bet you a drink when we get to New York that you don't have what it
takes to even get her name."
"Mr. Solo, you have yourself a bet!
And no fair putting it on your expense account. This has to come out of your
pocket, as punishment for doubting my romantic abilities!"
Solo smiled. "Trot back and start
your pitch. I've got to call Mr. Waverly. That young lady will bear watching. I
want to arrange for a shadow to pick her up when we land."
"Okay, I—" Illya began, but
broke off suddenly when the pilot's compartment door opened.
THREE
The storm girl—as they came to call
her—stood there looking at them. Her expression was half angry, half malicious.
Obviously she had not gone to her seat, but remained against the other side of
the door listening to them talk.
"And I bet both of you two drinks
that neither of you get anywhere with me!" she snapped.
She slammed the door, leaving the two
young men looking at each other with embarrassment.
"You made a bet," Solo said.
"I'm holding you to it."
"I'll find out who she is,"
Illya retorted. "She has thrown me a challenge."
He went back to his seat. The girl didn't
look at him as he slid into it. She kept staring out the window at the
gradually lightening sky. The pilot was circling inside the eye of the
hurricane, gaining altitude as he sought to fly over the storm.
Illya Kuryakin felt a curious sense of
uneasiness as he stared at her lovely, but determined, profile. He had a
peculiar hunch that this woman meant trouble. He couldn't put his finger on the
source of his uneasiness. He did not believe her part of the THRUSH
organization.
If the storm was an artificial one
created to destroy him and Napoleon Solo, it seemed unlikely that a THRUSH
agent as resourceful as this one would have been expended.
Then he caught himself with a start. He
recalled something that had slipped his mind in the rush of events. This was
the angry exclamation of the girl when the storm first broke so unexpectedly.
He shot her a narrow glance. She still
had her eyes focused on the swirling clouds outlining the eye of the storm. He
recalled her anger.
They should have checked to see which plane I
took!"
Those had been her words; as nearly as he
could recall them. At the time he thought they referred to someone who should
have seen her off. Now, in view of her extraordinary knowledge of the storm, he
wasn't so sure that there wasn't something more sinister behind them.
Still in the pilot's compartment,
Napoleon Solo was in contact with Mr. Waverly in New York. He made a hasty
report of the unusual storm.
"Yes," Waverly said. "I
have just received a report from Weather Central. Everyone is dumfounded by the
sudden appearance of the hurricane."
"Was it really artificial?"
Napoleon asked. "It seemed like the real McCoy to us in it!"
"There is a real curious thing about
this storm, Mr. Solo," Waverly replied. "It is so strange that
Weather Central is flabbergasted. They can't understand it. To me that is proof
positive that the storm was created."
"What is that, sir?" solo
asked.
"The storm is turning in the wrong
direction!"
"What?" Solo asked. "I
don't understand."
"Hurricanes and typhoons are the
same," Waverly said. "They are most monstrous circling storms,
revolving about a calm eye. The difference is that the hurricane is in the
Atlantic and the typhoon is the name given to Pacific Ocean storms. There is
one other difference and that is what concerns us here."
"And that is, sir?"
"The direction of rotation of these
storms are always from right to left on the north side of the equator. On the
south side of the equator they revolve from left to right."
"Ours didn't?"
"It did not. You were south of the
equator when you were struck. Radar planes from the international weather
service have picked up the storm on their scopes. It is circling from right to
left. This is the first known case of this ever happening in the history of the
weather service."
"That seems to indicate that this
might be an artificial storm after all," Solo said.
"Yes," Waverly replied.
"Other storms we caught which we feel may also be THRUSH tests behaved
normally. The only explanation is that this storm was generated to destroy you
and Mr. Kuryakin. I suspect your attempt to contact Dr. Santos-Lopez made
THRUSH suspect you knew something about these experiments."
"Do we have any kind of lead as to
where these things are generated, sir?" Napoleon asked. His brow creased
with worry. If THRUSH had so mastered the elements that it could create a storm
of such cyclonic fury, the evil organization was close to being ready to launch
a stormy attack as a prelude to destroying the world's governments.
"There is only the smallest possible
lead and it may prove false," Waverly said. "A sea-going yacht was
spotted off the fringes of two Pacific typhoons. It may be a coincidence or it
may have something to do with generating these monstrous things. We are
investigating."
"There may be something else,"
Napoleon said. "We got out of this because of a girl—a rather odd young
lady. She showed a surprising knowledge of the storm."
Waverly had his chief enforcement officer
describe the girl minutely.
"Hang on a moment," he said.
"I want to see what the computer has to say about anyone with that
description."
Solo waited impatiently. In U.N.C.L.E.
headquarters the giant computers, storing a fantastic amount of criminal and
scientific data ground out Waverly's request in forty-five seconds.
"The description you gave me could
fit a young woman names Lupe de Rosa," Waverly said. "Does she have a
Spanish look about her?"
"Vaguely," Napoleon said.
"But she does not speak with an accent."
"Miss de Rosa has no accent. She was
born in California. She was a brilliant student, specializing in meteorology. A
paper she wrote brought her to the attention of Dr. Santos-Lopez. She was his
assistant until about eighteen months ago. She quit after a quarrel. The
quarrel seems to have had something to do with her belief that she was
providing all the genius in his experiments while he was taking the
credit."
"That could well be this lady,"
Napoleon said positively.
"If so, please cultivate her,"
Waverly said. "She could be very important to us. She should know all of
Santos-Lopez's secrets. She could be extremely important in helping destroy
THRUSH's storm maker."
"Much as I hate to mention it,"
Napoleon said, "but you may have to call in Mark Slate. This lady is under
the present impression that Illya and I are first class bums."
"Well, whatever you have done to
give her that impression, undo it at once!" Waverly snapped. "I have
a horrible vision of a series of those killer storms striking the United
States. Our situation is desperate!"
ACT IV: VANISHING LADY
The plane kept spiraling up, circling
inside the still eye of the hurricane. It was growing lighter outside by the
minute. Slowly the big jet climbed above the boiling clouds, breaking out into
the clear air above the storm.
Several times Illya Kuryakin tried to
engage the girl in conversation. She ignored him and kept staring out the
window. After about an hour of this, he got up and went back to see Napoleon
Solo. The two men walked up forward, where they could talk without being
overheard. Solo quickly filled him in on Waverly's hunch that the girl was the
dead meteorologist's former assistant.
"That means she is probably in
danger herself," Illya said.
"That is right," Napoleon
replied. "And we must do a better job of taking care of her than we did
her former boss."
"She has the same opinion of us that
he did," Illya said wryly.
"Mr. Waverly will have some people
at the airport to help us keep her under surveillance," Solo said.
"She is our best lead. If THRUSH strikes at her, we must be
prepared."
Illya nodded. But I wish she would say
something to me," he said. "I don't expect a kind word, but she could
at least curse me. Anything is better than that frigid silence."
"Try a new tack," Napoleon
suggested.
"What?"
"How do I know? Am I supposed to do
your romancing for you?"
"Just go back to your seat,"
Illya retorted. "I'll win that drink from you yet!"
When Illya slipped back in the seat
beside the girl, he decided the best thing was a direct, honest approach. The
girl was obviously no idiot. Her record as a meteorologist showed that she had
brains to match her beauty.
"Miss de Rosa," he said. Her
shoulders jerked unconsciously at the mention of her name, but she still did
not look around at him. He knew, though, from her unconscious flinch that the
name struck home.
"Miss de Rosa," he repeated.
"I am sure you heard just before we took off from South America that Dr.
Santos-Lopez was killed."
She did not answer, but she started
breathing harder. The rapid rise and fall of her breast showed clearly that
what he said was having an effect upon her, even though she continued to ignore
him.
"We have reason to believe that you
might be in similar danger," he said. "Dr. Santos-Lopez was killed
because of work you shared with him. We would like to protect you from a
similar fate if we can."
She turned then and looked at him. There
was an odd light in her deep dark eyes. It wasn't exactly anger, but it was
partially that, plus a mixture of exasperation and amusement.
"Mr. Solo—or are you the one they
call Kuryakin?"
"Illya Kuryakin, I—"
"Well, Mr. Kuryakin, I do not care
to be protected by you or Mr. Solo. I am perfectly capable of taking care of
myself! Perfectly capable, thank you!"
She turned to her absorbed study of the
morning sky. He did not get so much as a glance from her the rest of the flight
in to New York.
As they went through customs, Illya
contacted Waverly and received word that two other U.N.C.L.E. agents were at
the airport to help them watch over the lovely meteorologist. This made both he
and Solo feel a little better.
Solo spotted both of them as they came
out of customs. He joined the two men for a quick conference while Illya
followed the girl out to the taxi stand.
Suddenly she turned to face him. He
braced himself for another angry blast, but she fooled him.
"Mr. Solo—or is it Kuryakin?"
"Kuryakin," he explained
patiently for the second time.
"Oh," she said with a smile
that brightened her face and seemed to give her a new and more inviting
personality. "I never could keep names straight! I'm sorry I was so rude
to you on the plane."
Illya tried to play down his startled
pleasure.
"I'm afraid it was I who was
rude," he said. "You had ample reason to be annoyed with me."
"Well I was annoyed. It was the
first time I've ever been the object of a bet between two young men. I didn't
quite know how to take it."
"I must apologize. It was extremely
ill-mannered of us."
"I thought so at the time, but now
that I've had time to think about it, I'm not sure but what I should have been
flattered."
"Anyway, you had your revenge,"
Illya said with a grimace. "You caused me to lose."
"If I recall correctly, in my
annoyance I made a bet with you."
"You did," he said. "You
offered to bet a drink yourself that I wouldn't succeed in learning your name.
But I did, didn't I?"
"Yes, and I suppose I must be a good
sport and buy you one."
"Why not?" he said quickly.
"I suppose you are going down
town," she replied. "Why don't we share a cab? I'm going to
Park-Plaza."
"Right on my way!" Illya lied
quickly. "Let me get my bag and I'll be right with you!"
He walked hurried back inside the
terminal, passing Napoleon Solo who stopped just inside the door to light a
cigarette.
"Watch me and learn how to get along
with the girls!" Illya whispered quickly as he went past.
"Park-Plaza!"
Solo gave no indication that he heard. He
finished lighting the cigarette and went over to a phone booth.
Instead of dialing he removed his
pen-communicator and called U.N.C.L.E. headquarters.
When he got Waverly, he said, "Illya
has made contact with the lady. They are off by taxi to the Park-Plaza to have
a cocktail together."
"Excellent!" Waverly said.
"Tell Watson and Armat to put a stakeout on her room there. Contact the
hotel management and ask their cooperation. We want a twenty-four hour watch on
her. However, keep out of sight. This woman is not a criminal. We are
protecting her, but we must be positive that we do nothing that can cause her
to complain that her right of privacy has been invaded."
"Yes, sir," Solo said and broke
the connection.
He walked back outside just as Illya was
helping Lupe de Rosa into the cab. He couldn't help noticing the very friendly
manner in which she smiled at Kuryakin.
TWO
In the cab Illya Kuryakin found Miss de
Rosa exactly the opposite from the silent sphinx of the plane. She talked quite
animatedly. On the plane she seemed angry at the world in general, but now her
mood had done a one hundred eighty degree turn. He knew that she had made a
phone call after leaving customs and before coming out of the terminal. He
wondered if this accounted for her change of spirits.
But knowing women, he wondered how long
her good humor would last. It took him twenty-two minutes to find out. It was
just exactly that long after they left the airport that she said, her voice
changing from its feminine chatter to a grim coldness:
"Mr. Solo—"
"I'm Kuryakin!" he said
wearily.
"It makes no difference. Do you see
this!"
She lifted the bag in her lap. Illya saw
a tiny automatic with the barrel directed straight at him. Her finger was on
the trigger and she had a business-like expression on her face. It told him she
could and would pull the trigger if she had to.
He eyed the gun and quirked his eyebrows
up in an exasperated quirk.
"I take it we aren't friends any
more," he said.
His voice was light, but his eyes were
wary. This woman had shown during the storm that she had nerves of steel.
"Don't move!" she snapped.
"And don't try to signal to the car following us!"
Illya Kuryakin leaned back, his eyes half
closed, watching the girl.
"Whatever you are up to, I can be
more help to you as a friend than as an enemy," he said quietly.
"I don't think so," she said.
"You strike me as the kind of person who would be burdened with that most
useless of things: a conscience!"
Before Illya could reply to that
surprising observation, the girl leaned forward and spoke hurriedly to the cab
driver.
"How much longer before those fools
are going to stop the car following us?"
"Just after we come out of the
tunnel," the driver said, half turning his head. "Don't worry.
They'll shoot a razor dart into the car's tires. Then we'll get away before
Napoleon Solo can get another cab."
"There were two men with him in the
terminal. I saw him signal to them," she said hurriedly.
"Stop worrying! We know our
business!" he snapped. "We'll throw them off the track and get you
there."
"Mind if I smoke?" Illya said.
"Looking down a gun barrel is sort of hard on the nerves."
"Shut up!" she snapped.
"There's nothing you can say I want to hear!"
Suddenly the driver floorboarded the
cab's accelerator. The car shot forward. Illya glanced in the rear view mirror.
He saw the cab carrying Solo dropping back. Tires screeched as their own cab
took a corner on two wheels.
The driver went up one block and then
took another turn. There was nothing haphazard in his attempts to throw off
Solo's pursuit. He drove exactly like a man who has every turn of the wheel
plotted in advance.
He made two other turns and drove into
the garage back of an industrial building.
"Get out!" Lupe snapped to
Illya.
"You might say please!" he
said, giving her an amused quirk of his lips that definitely did not reflect
his inner feelings.
She gave him an angry glance. His casual
manner was beginning to worry her. She paused and looked at him sharply. Her
indecision was mirrored clearly on her face.
"He's taking this too easy,"
she said to the fake cab driver. "Do you think there's still another car
following us?"
The driver shrugged.
"You can never tell anything for
sure when you're up against these U.N.C.L.E. rats," he said. "They're
tricky, Lupe. Just remember that if you expect to pull this deal off."
She nervously bit her lower lip.
"Don't let him kid you, lady," Illya said, twisting his own lips in a
peculiar grin. "Solo and I are the Laurel and Hardy of U.N.C.L.E. Just a
couple of clowns. You don't have to worry about us."
Lupe's face flared. She was goaded to the
point of explosion by Illya's mockery—which was what he intended. She suddenly
swung her purse at him.
His heart leaped as the purse slammed against
the side of his face. It was just what he was hoping for. The blow gave him an
excuse to stagger back without causing the driver to jump him. He doubled up
and hit the driver's legs.
Lupe cursed, and jerked the gun around to
shoot. Illya swung the startled driver and shoved him into the girl. The two
hit just as she squeezed the trigger. The jar spoiled her aim. The bullet
slammed into the metal cross beams overhead.
Illya caught the driver with a hard knee
to the stomach. The burly man collapsed with a choking sputter.
Kuryakin twisted, trying to grab the girl
before she could get to her feet.
He caught her arm as she swung the gun
toward him. She jerked back, but couldn't tear loose from his desperate grip.
"Now—!" Illya Kuryakin
began—and pitched forward on his face.
A tall man slipped the gun he used to
pistol whip the man from U.N.C.L.E. back in its shoulder holster. He was
breathing hard and all of it was not from running to join the fight. He glared
coldly at Lupe de Rosa.
"My dear," he said, his voice
heavy with menace, "for all your brilliance as a scientist, you are a
complete fool!"
"You can't talk to me that
way!" she flared.
The man's bleak face flushed slightly.
"Can't I?" he said softly. "Your work with these storms is very
important to us, my dear, but in THRUSH nothing is so important as being a
member of the team! There is no place in our organization for individualists.
If we don't work together, U.N.C.L.E. will destroy us. Important as you are,
you are worthless to us if we must treat you as a prima donna."
Lying on his face on the concrete floor,
Illya Kuryakin could hear them talking. The blow, for all its savagery, had but
stunned him momentarily. He half opened his eyes. He could see his assailant's
feet. They were close enough that Illya thought he could upset the man. He
hesitated because he could not yet place the position of the cab driver. It
would be fatal to make a move now."
"And what about your end of the
bargain!" Lupe flared. "You almost killed me with that damned
storm!"
"We had no idea you were on the
plane," he said coldly. "You should have contacted our man in Rio for
instructions instead of jumping off on your own. We could have told you not to
take that plane. We had already learned that Waverly himself arranged for two
passenger seats to be cancelled to make room for Solo and Kuryakin."
"Santos-Lopez tried to treat me like
a slave!" she cried. "I don't intend to exchange one slave master for
another. I don't have to account to you for every minute of my time."
"You saw what happens when you
don't!" he snapped. "You almost got yourself killed. And now you
almost made a mess of things by trying to shoot Kuryakin. Can't you understand?
Murder must be handled with finesse in this town—especially murder of an
U.N.C.L.E. agent."
"He tried to—"
"You were under my surveillance
every second. He did not have a chance in the world of harming you," the
tall man said impatiently. "I am not going to argue. This is your last
chance. Play by THRUSH rules, or you may not play at all!"
"Are you threatening me!"
"Call it what you will!"
"I want to talk to Mr. Leach about
this! We'll see what he has to say."
"Mr. Leach works for me. He does
what I tell him. And you will be expected to do the same!"
Illya Kuryakin couldn't see the girl's
face, but knowing her, he was sure that she was furious. It gave him a thrill
of anticipation. He was sure now that the girl's resentment of THRUSH's
regimentation could be used to his advantage.
He slowly reached his hand around where
he could pull his pen-communicator from his pocket. While the man and Lupe were
arguing he surreptitiously twisted the cap. The antenna shot up six inches. He
pulled the tiny communications set down against his body where it would not be
seen, but where it could pick up and pass to U.N.C.L.E. headquarters the
incriminating conversation between the girl and her THRUSH boss.
But the only thing he was able to
transmit was his own gasp of pain! A heavy boot caught him in the ribs. He
doubled up with a groan. The same foot that kicked him ground a heel down on
the communicator.
"What is it?" the THRUSH man
cried, whirling about.
"He was trying to sneak a fast one,
boss," the cab driver said. "Look here!"
"Did he get anything
transmitted?" the man asked in alarm.
"I don't know. I don't think
so."
"In this business you can't afford
to think!" the man rasped. "We've got to get moving!"
"Get this rat into another cab. Get
a driver who is expendable. Place some article of Lupe's in the seat beside
Kuryakin. Then arrange a wreck. You understand?"
"Yes, sir, Mr. Martin," the
driver said hurriedly.
"Good! Don't leave anything to
chance. Be sure Kuryakin and the driver are dead. Have a prepared witness to
tell the police what happened. Arrange a story that will look as if the girl
was kidnaped and the two men killed by a South American revolutionary group who
want the girl's knowledge of storms to help their revolution. Be sure THRUSH is
not connected in any way."
Illya only dimly heard the man, Martin,
reading his death warrant. He groaned and tried to sit up. Something like
volcanic fire burst in his head as he took another savage kick. This time it
was against his temple.
He pitched forward on his face.
Martin smiled down at his limp body.
"You see," he said. "The
men from U.N.C.L.E. aren't at all the supermen some of our faint-hearted
members seem to think. They are just human. They can be hurt and defeated, just
as any other human can!"
He laughed softly and turned to the girl.
"You see, Lupe," he said,
"you did not make a mistake agreeing to work with THRUSH. Nothing stands
between us and total victory except U.N.C.L.E. and you see how we deal
decisively with that organization!"
ACT V: "SO LONG, LUPE!"
When their cab's left rear tire started
bumping, Napoleon Solo grabbed his pen-communicator.
He quickly transmitted his identification
and added, "Mr. Waverly! Emergency!"
"Go ahead, Mr. Solo."
Alexander Waverly's quiet, confident tone
was a direct contrast to Solo's clipped anxious voice."
"One moment, sir," Napoleon
said. He turned to the two men with him. "Get out quickly! Try to thumb a
ride from anyone who will stop for you. See if you can spot where that cab went
with Illya and the girl!"
Then into the transmitter, he said
hurriedly, "They're getting away from us, sir. The girl suddenly had a
change of character and got chummy with Illya. I think now it was a trick. I
think she's leading him into a trap."
"What can we do here to help you,
Mr. Solo?" Waverly asked.
"I'd like an all-points alarm put
out for this cab. You have the number. I phoned it in from the airport. I
suspect it is not a regular cab driver. Possibly the cab was stolen. Also I'd
like the tri-angular magnetic locators manned. Illya may get a chance to open
his communicator. If so, we can get a fix on their location from it."
"Very good, Mr. Solo," Waverly
said. "Within five minutes every policeman and every cab driver in New
York will be alerted to watch for this car and its passengers."
"Thank you, sir," Napoleon
said. "I'll leave my pen-communicator open so you can contact me instantly
as well as keep abreast of all our developments."
"Excellent, Mr. Solo," the
U.N.C.L.E. chief said. "I do not understand your statement that Miss de
Rosa led Mr. Kuryakin into a trap. Isn't it possible that THRUSH agents trapped
both her and Mr. Kuryakin? After all, she was Santos-Lopez's assistant in his
storm breaking activities."
"Yes, sir," Napoleon replied.
"But it seems to me she had a definite change of character after she made
a phone call on landing. Call it a hunch if you wish, but I don't believe she
is a victim of THRUSH. I believe she is part of THRUSH."
"Mr. Solo, I personally would never
rely on a hunch," Mr. Waverly said severely. "I must have something
concrete and definite upon which to base my actions."
"Yes, sir," Solo replied.
"However, that is my personal
feeling about my actions," Waverly went on. "I am also aware that on
at least three notable occasions your hunches kept us from total defeat. So I
am not going to stop you from following any hunch you may have, Mr. Solo."
"Thank you," Napoleon said.
"I'll keep you informed, sir."
Traffic was partially stalled behind the
stopped cab. Solo looked down the line for a likely car to commandeer. He hit
on a hot rod driven by two teenagers as the most likely to give him
cooperation. Although an international law enforcement group, he had no power
to commandeer a vehicle as the New York City police could do. He could only
request.
However, he found the two boys not only
willing but absolutely eager to help when he flashed his U.N.C.L.E.
identification.
"Gee!" one of the said.
"Wait until I tell my girl I'm a genuine man from U.N.C.L.E.!"
"You won't be a man until you're
twenty-one," his companion said.
"Just help me pull this off and I'll
tell her for you that you're every inch a man and a big one at that!"
Napoleon said.
"Hang on, Unk!" the boy cried.
He must have been all of sixteen. "Awaaaaay we
go!"
He took off with a spin of screeching
rubber that almost threw Napoleon out of the topless car. They took the corner
on two wheels.
"Where to now, Unk?" he yelled
back over his shoulder at Napoleon.
"Take a left," Napoleon said,
after the slightest hesitation.
"That's a dead end. It leads right
down to the river," the other boy said.
"Then make a right," Solo
replied. "Another hunch gone wrong. Just keep cruising up one street and
down another. It's anybody's guess where the cab went. We—"
The open circuit on the pen communicator
in his jacket pocket crackled into life.
"This is Waverly. We have a report.
No cabs cross the bridge. They must be holed up somewhere in your neighborhood.
We have another report that they did not go back toward the airport. I'm
sending seven police cars out to ring in the area. I— Wait!"
Listening tensely to the micro-speaker
hidden in the fake fountain pen, Napoleon motioned for the driver to stop. Both
boys leaned back, fascinated by the tiny communications set.
"Waverly again!" the speaker
crackled into life. "Evidently Mr. Kuryakin managed to get his
pen-communicator into action for the briefest second!"
"Did we get sufficient reception to
do any good?"
"They must have caught him just as
he opened the circuit," Waverly said.
His voice still sounded calm to the
unpracticed ear, but Solo knew his chief so well he could detect the thin note
of anxiety under the outwardly steady voice. In a man with Waverly's self
control this was about the same as sheer panic in another's voice.
It told Napoleon Solo how desperate their
chief thought Illya's situation was.
"All we got was a gasp of pain from
somebody, an angry shout from another, and the briefest snatch of voices in the
background but blurred by the louder noises close to the microphone."
"Can the scrambler—" Napoleon
began.
"We are working on it," Waverly
said crisply. "Also we hope to get a tri-angular fix on the radio
reception. There is a bare chance that the directional beam finder can work on
so small a reception if we set up the microphone and keep repeating the
reception signal. Stay where you are. I'll call you back as the scrambler
starts feeding us data. I should have a preliminary report in three
minutes."
"Yes, sir," Napoleon said
crisply. "We'll stand by."
TWO
A car swung around the corner, its lights
flashing on them. Napoleon Solo whispered an urgent order for the two boys to
duck. He drew his gun from its shoulder holster.
Then he relaxed as he recognized the man
leaning out the back window. It was one of the two U.N.C.L.E. agents who had
joined them at the airport. Napoleon motioned for him to stop.
"Aw gee!" the younger of the
two boys said in a disgusted voice. "No shooting!"
"Relax!" Napoleon said grimly.
"You'll get shot at quicker than you need to be!"
He hurried over to the other car for
quick conference. He sketched briefly for his co-agent what Waverly transmitted
to them.
"That broken cry on the
pen-communicator sounds like Illya got it," the other U.N.C.L.E. man said,
his voice grim.
"Don't bet on it," Napoleon
said, his voice growing harsh to hide his own grave concern. "Illya's
lives can run any cat competition."
"Okay," the other man said.
"I'll pull down to the intersection. That way, if we flush them out, we'll
be set up where one or the other of us can take off instantly without having to
turn around."
Napoleon nodded and went back to the boys
in the hot rod.
"What's this scrambler thing?"
they asked him, referring to the mysterious reference Mr. Waverly made in his
transmission.
"The short reception U.N.C.L.E.
headquarters got from Illya Kuryakin was recorded as all calls to headquarters
are," Napoleon explained hurriedly. "The scrambler is an electronic
means of separating the voices and rerecording each alone."
"Then you can tell what each
said?"
"Yes," the man from U.N.C.L.E.
replied, "but the big question here is how much was received. It might not
be enough to do any good."
"Then—!"
"Wait! I'm getting a call from
headquarters!"
Napoleon Solo pulled out his transmitter.
"Yes, Mr. Waverly?" he said.
"The first scrambler report is
in," Waverly said crisply. "We converted the words unscrambled into
oscillograph impulses and compared them with oscillograph voiceprints we have
on record. The cry of pain came from Mr. Kuryakin. The curse of the man who
evidently struck him is from a known THRUSH agent named Paul Wicker. We are
working on the two voices in the background. That is all right now."
"Gee!" said the younger boy,
his eyes big. "What's a voiceprint?"
"Everybody's voice has certain
tones, just like your fingers have certain print marks," Napoleon
explained. "When samples of voices are changed to lines on an electronic
oscilloscope these tones show up as distinct marks which can be compared with
records. It is as infallible as fingerprints for identification."
Before the boy could reply, Waverly
called again. "The computers were successful in unscrambling the voices in
the background. One of the voices is that of Lupe de Rosa. The other is Maxwell
Martin. This man is a minor Wall Street stock broker, but we have good reason
to suspect that he is an important THRUSH executive in New York."
"Was there enough of their
conversation to give us any clue?" Napoleon asked.
"They were discussing the
elimination of Mr. Kuryakin through a fake accident. That is all we could get.
The directional finders were unable to
get a fix on Kuryakin's transmission."
"What does that mean?" one of
the boys asked Napoleon after the Man from U.N.C.L.E. broke the connection with
Waverly.
"It means these people are planning
to murder their captive. We know they are somewhere in this area, but have no
idea where to start looking. You boys know this neighborhood. Where would you
go if you wanted a quick hideout?"
"There are some warehouses back on
Fourteenth Street near the river," one of the boys said. "The company
that owns them shut down about two weeks ago."
"But they have a watchman
there," his companion objected. "I know. We tried to get in and he
run us off."
"But THRUSH could have bribed the
watchman to provide them a quick place to duck into. Apparently this thing was
well planed in advance," Napoleon said. "Where is this place?"
"Hang on, Unk!" the youthful
driver cried. "Awaaay we go!"
Rubber screeched on the pavement and the
car shot forward. The hot rod careened around the corner on two wheels in a way
that made Napoleon Solo wonder dismally if he wasn't in more danger from the
driver than he was from THRUSH.
The car shot down along a railroad track
and made another short right. The warehouses loomed dead ahead. The driver
braked sharply.
"Do you want to go inside?" he
asked.
The man from U.N.C.L.E. shook his head.
"They would spot the car," he
said. "Park along the fence. Douse your lights when you drive up. I'll
walk in."
"We'll go with you!" the driver
said eagerly.
Napoleon hesitated. He knew it was too
dangerous for the boys to accompany him. Yet he was reluctant to tell them no
after all the help he got from them. He was trying to think of some excuse to
send them somewhere else, somewhere they would not be in danger but would feel
that they were contributing.
Before he could make a decision, he saw a
car move around the corner of the warehouse. It was just after dark, too dark
to be driving without lights, but there wasn't the sign of a glimmer from the
cab. A bigger car came right behind it. It also had its lights completely
switched off.
"Look!" he said hurriedly to
the boys. "I can't wait. Take this!"
He shoved the pen-communicator in their
hands. "Just talk in the mouthpiece here where this tiny hole is. Tell Mr.
Waverly what is going on. Tell him to call all our people and have them
surround this area."
"We want to go with you!" the
boy cried.
"This is more important,"
Napoleon said hurriedly. "There are too many for us to handle with only
one gun between us. Now get me some help quickly—or a man's life may be
lost!"
"Sure thing, Unk!" the boy
cried. "Hey, Uncle. Hey, Uncle!"
This last cry was made into the
pen-communicator. Napoleon winced as he jumped from the car and ran into the
darkness. He could just imagine Alexander Waverly's startled anger at the boy's
irreverant cry. But he had no choice.
He could not permit the boys to rush into
certain death. He knew that they would follow him regardless of any orders
unless he gave them something to do.
THREE
Napoleon bent low and ran along the side
of the fence. The cab was moving slowly in order not to attract attention. Solo
came to the gate. The truck gate was closed, but there was a small personnel
gate open. Just beyond it was a guard shack.
Napoleon moved closer, hugging the fence.
He could see the shadowy figure of the guard standing in front of the shack.
The small personnel gate was ajar, but when Napoleon pushed on it, the un-oiled
hinges squeaked.
The guard whirled. Napoleon saw the
silhouette of the gun in his hand.
"Who's there?" the guard said
in a harsh voice.
"Quick!" Solo cried. It didn't
take much acting ability to put a lot of agitation in his voice. "Where
are they? There isn't a second to lose. Those rats from U.N.C.L.E. are on to
us!"
"What!" the guard cried.
"Mr. Martin told me this was perfectly safe when I agreed to let them use
this place. I don't want to get in any trouble!"
Napoleon Solo hesitated, wondering if he
could trust the man to help him. He decided it was too much of a risk.
"Come here," he said.
When the guard walked closer, Napoleon's
hand flashed up and hit him against the temple with the butt of the gun. Solo
caught the guard as he fell. He pulled the man into the shack. Then he turned
and scooped up the fallen man's gun. He shoved it into his coat pocket.
The two cars were coming closer. The
driver of the cab stuck his head out and snarled, "Hurry up and get that
gate open! We haven't any time to lose!"
"Okay. Keep your shirt on!"
Napoleon replied in a muffled voice. "I'm coming as fast as I can."
He shuffled across the road, imitating
the guard's dragging walk. He pulled open the gate and started to swing it
back. Then before the driver could put the cab in gear, Solo leaped forward. He
swung the gun in a vicious blow.
The driver squalled and tried to duck.
The blow caught him on the side of the head. He slumped over the wheel. Solo
whirled. The big limousine behind stopped with a squeal of brakes. The darkness
was split with the red stab of muzzle blast. A bullet just missed Solo. It
struck the car fender and carreened off with a deadly whine.
Solo dropped flat on the pavement to
present as small a target as possible. He jerked up his own gun, but the
trigger stuck. The blow he struck the driver had broken the trigger spring.
He twisted frantically, rolling back
under the stalled cab. It was a moment of extreme danger. If the driver
recovered and started the car, he would be run over.
He dug in his pocket for the guard's gun.
It was a bigger, heavier .45 caliber. Solo's own gun was a snubnosed .38,
carried because its smaller size would fit more unobstrusively under his coat.
He wished desperately he had the supremely accurate U.N.C.L.E. gun, but its
bulk prevented it being carried on the person.
He pulled himself up against the left
rear wheel. The driver of the limousine and his woman companion did not try to
escape by driving away. That made Solo suspect that Illya was a prisoner in the
cab.
This supposition was borne out when he
heard the man yell at the girl: "Hurry! The shots will bring the police in
a few minutes! Take this package of gas tablets! I'll keep that U.N.C.L.E. rat
pinned down! Throw one of these pellets in the back of the cab. Suffocate our
prisoner. He may have heard too much and can incriminate me. We've got to
remove him."
"Okay!" the girl gasped.
"How do I use them?"
"They're glass. Just throw one
inside. Hurry! We haven't a second to lose!"
The two split, coming on opposite sides
of the car. Napoleon groaned. There was no way he could cover both sides of the
car. He tried to move toward the side the girl was approaching, but a bullet
ripped the air at his ear. He whirled and fired back, but his shot went wild.
He whirled. He saw the girl's ankles. It
was all of her he could see of her from his position under the car. He realized
then that he made a tactical error in climbing under it. He would have been
better off taking his chances in the open. That way he could have maneuvered.
Now he was completely pinned down!
He tried to draw a bead on Lupe's ankles,
hoping he could knock her off her feet before she could hurl the suffocating
gas in on top of Illya Kuryakin.
But she moved too quickly. The right
wheel got between them. He tried to snake his body around for a better shot,
knowing that he was exposing himself to a deadly shot from the gun of Maxwell
Martin. It was a chance he had to take. Otherwise his U.N.C.L.E. partner would
die!
As he turned he saw the girl stagger
back. He couldn't understand what hit her. Maxwell Martin also was so startled
that he whirled to face this new danger without shooting at the exposed
Napoleon Solo.
Solo, suddenly suspecting the truth,
ignored the girl. He whirled and fired at Martin. The THRUSH man staggered,
falling with a wailing cry.
Solo rolled the rest of the way from
under the cab. He saw Lupe stagger to her feet. She was holding a handkerchief
to her nose. A greenish phosphorescent cloud was swirling about her. In her
fall she broke the suffocating gas bulb.
Solo took a deep breath and held it as he
whirled to aid his companion in the back of the cab. The cab door was open.
Kuryakin lay on the floor. It was obvious to Napoleon what had happened.
Although bound, Illya managed to pull
down the door handle to open the door, but keeping it pulled closed. Then, when
the girl approached to drop the gas pellets inside, he kicked the unlatched
door with his bound feet. The unexpected blow knocked her back and down against
the pavement.
The extreme danger was not over. The gas
cloud was a terrible threat to the bound man. Illya sat up. Napoleon gasped out
a quick order for his partner to hold his breath.
He grabbed Kuryakin about the middle,
pulling him from the cab. Then, swinging his co-agent up over his shoulder in a
fireman's carry, Solo staggered back away from the poisonous green cloud.
He dropped Illya beside the guard shack.
Kuryakin was bound hand and foot. He had a gag in his mouth. Solo jerked out
the gag and cut the bonds on Illya's wrist.
"You can get out of the rest,"
he said hurriedly. "I'm going after Lupe. She's getting away!"
"Let her go!" Illya gasped.
"If she's free, there may be a chance we can follow her to the THRUSH cell
operating this storm gimmick."
"You're right," Napoleon said.
"I'll shadow her. Are you in shape to come along?"
"Get moving!" Illya snapped.
"Don't waste time on me. I'll be right behind you!"
But before Solo could leave, one of the
hot rod boys yelled from the gate: "We got her! We got her! Hey, Mr.
Uncle! We got the woman who was running away!"
"Who's that?" Illya asked,
getting to his feet after cutting his leg bonds.
"Two boys helping me," he said
exasperated. "They are too much help!"
"Yell for them to let her go!"
"No," Napoleon replied.
"We'll have to think of some way to let her escape. Otherwise she will
know we released her just to follow her to THRUSH headquarters."
Illya rubbed his wrists. He said wryly,
"You can always get more than enough help when you don't need it any
more!"
"Oh, don't start blaming the boys.
They thought they were being helpful. And they were helpful. It was their idea
that you might be here. Otherwise we might not have found you in time."
"Then I change my mind,"
Kuryakin said with a grin. "There is hope for the younger
generation!"
"And I'd say there is hope for the
older generation to muddle through while we have kids like these to help
us!" Napoleon said with a grin. "I'm going to ask Mr. Waverly to
write them an official U.N.C.L.E. letter of commendation. I'll mean a lot to
them."
"And I want to add my thanks at the
bottom," Illya said. "I was in one tough spot."
ACT VI: WATERLOO?
After thanking the boys for their help,
Napoleon Solo promised them they would be receiving an official letter from Mr.
Waverly. Then he and Illya Kuryakin took Lupe into the dead Maxwell Martin's
car.
Solo made quite a show of holding the gun
on the girl to keep her from escaping. She looked at it and shuddered.
"M-must you point that terrible
thing at me?" she said.
Solo smiled.
"I'm sure you aren't tough enough to
overpower both of us," he said.
He slipped the .38 special into his
pocket. This was his own gun, the one he had fouled when he struck the guard
and the cab driver. The.45 he took from the guard was passed to Illya, who
slipped in the front to drive the car.
"Please!" Lupe said
breathlessly. "Things are not the way they seem. I know it seems to your
Mr. Solo—"
"Kuryakin," Illya said wearily.
"—Mr. Kuryakin that I was aiding Mr.
Martin," she went on. "But it isn't true. You see, I knew what they
did to Dr. Santos-Lopez. I had to play along with them to protect myself. I was
just trying to find out how they are able to generate these terrible storms.
Then I intended to call the police."
"I hope your story checks out, Miss
de Rosa," Napoleon said. "Of course that is outside our
department."
She leaned breathlessly close to him. In
the front seat Illya watched her performance with a cynical eye.
"But you believe me, don't
you?" she whispered.
Her hand touched his arm in a pleading
manner.
Illya Kuryakin watching in the rear view
mirror, smiled cynically as her hand dropped suddenly, grabbing the unworkable
gun from Solo's pocket.
She jumped back against the opposite side
of the car, shakily pointing the gun in a wavering arc that included both
Kuryakin in the front seat and solo across from her.
"Stop the car!" she snapped.
Illya braked to a stop. Watching her
closely, Napoleon wondered if they were doing right in letting her get away.
"Get out of the car!" she
snapped to both men. "Get out or I'll shoot."
Solo hesitated, but Kuryakin said,
"Come on, Napoleon. You've met your Waterloo!"
"What's that? What's that?" the
girl cried in a strangled voice. "How did you know—"
She broke off. "Move faster!"
she said through clinched teeth. "I haven't got time to fool with you
now!"
The two men stepped down to the curb.
They stared after the car as she sped off. Napoleon looked at Illya in
surprise.
"What brought on that last
outburst?" he asked.
"You got me," Kuryakin said.
"Apparently she has a phobia about the word Waterloo. I don't know why she
should be bothered by it. If I recall correctly, that was where another
Napoleon took his worst defeat. The word should bother you, not her."
"Remember this letting her go was
you idea," Solo said. "I'm beginning to wonder if she is safe to let
run around. For my money she is a genuine kook."
"I don't know," Illya said
thoughtfully. "I just hope those two keep her in sight."
"They're good men, both of them.
They caught my signal as she pulled away. They'll do as good a job sticking to
her as we could. Better, perhaps. She knows us and they are strangers to her—I
hope."
"What do we do now?" Illya
asked.
"I'll call Mr. Waverly."
He tuned in the pen-communicator and
reported their actions to the U.N.C.L.E. chief. Waverly gave them instant
approval of their gambit in permitting the Storm Girl to "escape."
"Mr. Kuryakin is right,"
Waverly said. "We have no lead to the THRUSH cell operating this storm
generator. This girl should be able to lead us to them."
"I hope so," Napoleon said.
"But I keep remembering the cool, smart way that girl reacted when it
looked like our plane was going down in that hurricane. She has brains and
courage. We must not underestimate her."
"I agree, Mr. Solo." Alexander
Waverly's calm voice said.
"And, sir—" Illya put in.
"Yes, Mr. Kuryakin?"
"Does the word 'Waterloo,' in
connection with this case, mean anything to you, sir?"
Just the faintest note of surprise broke
the calmness of the U.N.C.L.E. chief's voice. "As a matter of fact, Mr.
Kuryakin, it does!"
"What is it, Mr. Waverly?" Solo
put in. "Illya mentioned the name as a pun on my own name. This girl, Lupe
de Rosa, seemed quite disturbed by it."
"I fancy she might well be,"
Waverly said. "Let the New York unit keep track of Miss de Rosa. You
gentlemen report to me here as U.N.C.L.E. headquarters as rapidly as possible!
Our situation is growing more grave by the second. It is far worse than when I
spoke to you at the airport. We have received additional information that
indicates THRUSH is ready to strike!"
TWO
After they broke their connection with
Waverly, the two men from U.N.C.L.E. walked soberly to the main intersection,
where they stopped at a drugstore to phone for a taxi.
Neither of the spoke much on the drive
over to Manhattan. They were both deep in thought most of the time, trying to
piece together the puzzling series of facts they faced these last twenty-four
hours.
They dismissed the taxi in the lower
fifties and headed in a fast walk back toward the United Nations building
towering darkly against the night sky by the East River.
But instead of continuing on, they made a
sharp turn and walked past a whitestone building in the middle of the long
block.
A tailor shop was still open in the
basement. Solo said to his friend, "We look a sight. We'd better get a
press before we report to the boss."
Illya Kuryakin nodded. The two turned and
went down the short flight of steps. Solo pushed open the door marked "Del Floria—Tailor" and the two
went in. A little man past middle age rubbed his hands on his tailor's apron
and nodded to the two.
The two men walked to the back of the
shop. They entered a small dressing room and let the curtain drop behind them.
They paused for a moment while a cleverly concealed electronic eye scanned
them. Then the back of the dressing room wall swung in. Napoleon and Illya
stepped out of the old world tailor shop into a modern, well appointed
reception office.
A smiling girl at the desk asked them to
place their hands on a frosted glass on her desk. She pressed a button and
their prints were electronically verified from master records in the banks of
computers jammed in the long steel corridors of the ultra-modern offices hidden
behind the prosaic whitestone front.
Only after a verification signal from the
identifications computer buzzed on her desk, did the admissions clerk give each
of the two men a peculiarly shaped triangular badge to pin to their lapel.
Electronic scanners would instantly sound an alarm if anyone not wearing the
U.N.C.L.E. badge tried to enter any of the hundreds of top secret rooms in the
headquarters.
They walked down the gleaming hall to an
elevator. They took it to a top floor, walking across to a door whose oak
appearance was a clever lamination. It was actually solid steel.
Solo pressed a recessed button beside the
door. There was a faint buzz inside, as scanners checked their identity. The
door slid noiselessly into its recess.
Across the room Alexander Waverly sat
behind a desk that was in reality an elaborate communications console. At a
flick of any of the rainbow colored buttons he could put himself in contact
with any of the world-wide network of U.N.C.L.E. operatives.
He was watching a TV screen set in the
desk. He did not look up, but said, "This will interest you. It is the
aftermath of the storm that almost got you!"
Waverly pressed a button. The picture was
transferred from his private screen to a giant one revealed in the opposite end
of the room as the wall rolled back in obedience to his electronic command.
"This is the Bahamas after this
freak storm struck it," Waverly said, motioning toward the screen.
The two men saw what appeared to be view
of an island from a low flying airplane. The island was a wreck. Docks were
smashed. Boats were driven as much as a half mile inland. Palms were stripped
and houses were smashed like kindling wood. As far as the eye could see there
was death and destruction.
"We can expect a similar disaster
along the entire Pacific and Atlantic coasts," Mr. Waverly said. "I
have been discussing the possibilities with meteorologists. They tell me that
if a series of storms as ferocious as this one struck at strategic points about
the world, it would bring the entire earth's governments to a standstill."
"Do we have any indication of
THRUSH's intentions, sir?" Solo asked as the screen went dark. He and
Illya Kuryakin turned to face the grim faced man behind the communications
console desk.
Waverly thoughtfully rubbed the bowl of
an unlighted pipe against the sleeve of his tweed jacket.
"Yes," he said slowly.
"Our sources within THRUSH informs us that the plan is to throw a chain of
these monstrous disturbances at the United States, Europe, and Asia. England,
France, the Netherlands, the Mediterranean countries, India and Japan are
expected to take the worst of the strike. All the storms will hit
simultaneously."
Solo said, his face mirroring the horror
he felt, "We can expect two billion people to
die. That is more than have died in all the wars ever fought since the
beginning of history!"
Waverly got up suddenly and strode to the
large window. He stood for a long moment staring out over the lights of
Manhattan. He whirled to face his two agents.
"Gentlemen, I am not sure you
realize fully what this can mean. You feel that these steel and concrete
monsters our architects have raised can withstand the fury of any storm.
"You are right. They can. But if
twenty storms the strength of this latest one were to strike twenty separate
spots about the globe at the same time, it would lash the seven seas into such
a fury that tidal waves would be monstrous.
"Typhoons and hurricanes are ocean
storms. That many simultaneous cyclones would pile up tidal waves so high water
would pour through these man-made canyons to a height of twenty feet at least!"
"Don't we have any leads?"
Illya asked, the edge in his voice mirroring his growing desperation.
"What do our—sources in THRUSH tell us."
"Only that the cyclonic weapons is
being handled by a special cell. Nobody can tell us where or how it
operates," Waverly said in a resigned voice. "This girl, Lupe de
Rosa, is our only solid lead. And it is possible we may have another very
slender one in—the Waterloo."
"What is the Waterloo?"
Napoleon asked.
"It is a ship—a private sea-going
yacht," the U.N.C.L.E. chief said. "We do not know for sure that it
is connected with these storms, but it was observed on the fringes of two which
sprung up unexpectedly in the Pacific. It is possible that this ship was
directing the storm's movement. We are not sure, however."
"Could we ask the Coast Guard to
stop and inspect it?"
"It is not registered under the flag
of any country with which we have official contact," Waverly said.
"To board this ship without permission of the country involved is piracy
under the laws of the high seas. You will recall that the American War of
Eighteen Hundred and Twelve was fought over the principle of one country
inspecting the ships of another."
"Have we contacted this country for
permission?"
"Yes—and was refused."
"Is this the same country where
THRUSH headquarters is located?"
"Yes!"
"Then that would indicated definite
grounds for your suspicions," Solo said.
"It does. Therefore, Mr. Napoleon
Solo, your next job is to find out what is happening on the Waterloo."
He turned to Illya. "Mr. Kuryakin,
your job is to follow this girl who knows so much about storms. It is my
supposition that she will eventually contact the Waterloo.
At this point you will team with Mr. Solo to fight a new Battle of Waterloo. At
that time we will have at your disposal the entire resources of U.N.C.L.E. This
threat is that important."
"Very well, sir," Solo said,
getting up.
"The Waterloo
last made port in Honolulu," Waverly said. "I suggest your start
there. See if you can pick up any information that might have been
inadvertently dropped by any member of its crew."
"With his luck," Illya said
with a grimace, "he'll run into a grass-skirted hula girl who has all the
information. While I'll be tangling with a girl who goes around hitting me on
the head with a gun—when she isn't trying to shoot me!"
A red light flashed on the emergency
circuit on Alexander Waverly's desk.
"Yes? Waverly here."
The two men saw their chief's face grow
bleak. Waverly hunched forward in his chair. His hands clinched momentarily
into white-knuckled fists before he got command of himself. Then he leaned back
in his chair, once more the human machine who directed the world's greatest
crime fighting organization.
Solo and Kuryakin waited tensely. On
emergency calls the first call came on a secret earphone monitor so that no one
could hear expect the chief himself.
Waverly, after his first review, touched
a switch which opened the circuit to a loud speaker so his two top men could
hear.
"How could something like that
possibly happen?" Waverly said.
"She just outsmarted us, is all I
can say, sir," the unhappy reporting voice said. "We followed her to
Manhattan. She registered at the hotel and then went to a late movie. We
followed her inside. She went to the ladies room on the mezzanine floor and did
not come out."
"So?" Waverly said.
"We got the janitoress to
investigate for us. Apparently Miss de Rosa climbed out the window which the
theater staff uses to change the billing."
"At this time of night there are not
many people on the streets," Waverly said. "A pretty girl like her
would certainly attract attention walking alone. Call in all the assistance you
need. We must find her!"
"Well, she didn't go on the
street," the agent said, his voice sounding even more unhappy. "She
came back into the theater and went into the ladies room on the ground floor.
There we found her dress and the broken tooth of a comb. From this we surmise
that she changed clothes and altered her hairdo. It is quite possible she
walked right past us without any of us being aware of it."
Waverly leaned back and sighed.
"There goes our best lead!" he
said bitterly. "If the Waterloo lead frizzles
out, we really are in a fix!"
ACT VII: GIRL IN THE DARK
For the next five minutes, Alexander
Waverly sat hunched over his control panel, issuing a string of orders that
diverted the world-wide facilities of U.N.C.L.E. to cope with this new
emergency.
Every international airline office was
covered, both in the United States and abroad. A complete physical description
of the girl was transmitted. Each operative had orders to get a voice sample of
any woman who outwardly resembled the fugitive in the slightest manner. This
was to be transmitted immediately to U.N.C.L.E. headquarters, where it would be
transcribed into a voiceprint for comparison with the master prints of Lupe de
Rosa's voice.
In the meantime teams of investigators
tried to track down any person who may have seen a woman leaving the Broadway
theater at about one in the morning.
Dozens of leads turned up and were proven
false. Hundreds of voice prints poured into U.N.C.L.E. headquarters. In no case
did the jagged oscillograph lines match those on file of Lupe de Rosa.
Both Solo and Illya were anxious to join
the search, but Waverly insisted on keeping them with him. Than after an hour
he sent them down to the headquarters dormitory to get some rest. Because of
the excitement and urgency, both had difficulty getting asleep. They had just
managed to drop off when Waverly summoned them again.
They found the U.N.C.L.E. chief standing
at the window looking out over the dawning skyline of the city. He turned when
they entered.
"We have not been successful,"
Waverly said, coming back and seating himself at the console desk. "That
leaves us only one alternative. We must proceed according to the law of
probabilities."
Illya grimaced. To him this reliance on
mechanical computers to analyze a situation and give a probable answer based on
the evidence was little better than a hunch. Although he had seen it work many
times, he was never fully convinced that they would not sooner or later come to
disaster by relying on what he called "the might-to-be."
Waverly caught the twist of the little
man's face.
"Do you have a better suggestion,
Mr. Kuryakin?" he asked.
"No, sir, not at the moment,"
Illya said.
"Then proceeding on the
probabilities is better than not proceeding, isn't it?" Waverly asked.
"Yes, sir," Illya said, but his
voice still held an element of doubt.
"Well, I have had all the known
facts about this synthetic storm affair fed into the computers. This includes
all the data we have on what appears to have been THRUSH's tests, all the
information and rumors we have picked up from our spy sources within THRUSH,
and all known information on Miss de Rosa. We also fed in what little we know
about the Waterloo."
"And the answer, sir?" Napoleon
asked. He had much more faith in the law of probabilities than his friend.
"The computer indicates that there
has been more activity in the Atlantic than in the Pacific. This indicates that
THRUSH has not been as successful in breeding typhoons as they have in
originating hurricanes. They are the same, of course, except one originates in
a different section of the globe. This trouble may arise from some climatic
condition in the Pacific which is giving THRUSH trouble.
"The computer then gives us the
probability that THRUSH will shift its full operations to the Pacific to solve
this problem. It is essential to any storm-weapon plan that THRUSH be able to
strike simultaneously all over the world. The probability also is that Miss de
Rosa will go immediately to join the Waterloo."
"Is there any indication what this
girl's role is exactly?" Solo asked.
"None," Waverly said. "As
Santos-Lopez's assistant, she presumably knows a lot about his work in
destroying storms."
He got up and faced his two top agents.
"Gentlemen, you will leave for Honolulu immediately. I'll expect a report
from you from there at three this afternoon."
"Three!" Illya said.
"That's impossible. The—"
"Mr. Kuryakin!" Waverly said
severely, "Impossible is a perfectly good word for anyone except an
employee of U.N.C.L.E.!"
"Yes, sir!" Illya said.
Waverly extended his hand, first to one
of the men and then to the other.
"Good-by—and good luck!"
In the hall Illya said to Solo,
"You're the brains of this team. How do we get to Honolulu by three? By
taking a helicopter to Kennedy International Airport we can just make
connections on a jet to San Francisco. But what do we do there? I'm familiar
with the schedules on Honolulu flights. We'll have a two hour layover in
Frisco."
"Don't hand me your problems!"
Napoleon retorted. "You are supposed to make the 'difference,' aren't
you?"
"It's your problem as well as
mine!"
"Is it?" Napoleon said with a
smile. "It seems to me that Mr. Waverly told you to report at three. He
said nothing about me."
In San Francisco the two men from
U.N.C.L.E. went directly to the airline ticket counter to check their
reservations for the first flight out to Hawaii.
"I'm sorry," the young lady
behind the counter said, "but your reservations were cancelled from New
York."
"When Waverly pulls a joke to
relieve the tension, he doesn't know when to stop," Illya complained.
"What do we do now?"
"Excercise your ingenuity, as
Waverly would say. Don't worry me with your problems. You have to make the
three o'clock report."
"I don't—"
"Are you Mr. Kuryakin?"
Illya turned. A young man in the uniform
of a technical sergeant in the U.S. Air Force was at his elbow.
"Yes," Illya said brightening.
"And which general are you?"
He smiled. "You're early by a few
years. It takes a while to become a general. We are holding a plane for you. A
Mr. Waverly, who really must be some big shot to arrange this, made a request
through the department of defense for us to wait for you."
Illya Kuryakin looked crossly over at
Napoleon Solo, who grinned back.
"He could have told us and saved me
a lot of worry," he said.
"Just Waverly's idea of a joke. A
tension reliever, you know!"
"Well, I didn't have any tension
until he started that report-by-three stuff. You know Waverly never says
anything even as a joke unless he means it. When he said report by three, he
meant it."
"Let's not keep the sergeant
waiting," Napoleon said.
They followed the airman out to an Air
Force jet bomber. They learned from the pilot that it had been in the States
for installation of weather equipment. It and the crew were being transferred
to Hawaii to fly weather reconnaissance.
"Are you what they call hurricane
hunters?" Illya asked.
"No," the pilot said.
"Hawaii is outside the typhoon belt. Our job will be chart air masses
below Hawaii and off the usual line of air traffic. Airline planes send back
sufficient weather reports along their route, but we'll be covering an area
where there is practically no air traffic."
"Why do that?" Illya asked.
"Several storms apparently popped up
unexpectedly in that area recently," the pilot said. "Nobody knows
why. We are supposed to look into it. Probably some freak atmospheric
condition."
"Probably," Solo said and
looked at his companion.
TWO
On the flight over to Honolulu, both men
spent all their time with the crew's weather observer. By the time the weather
plane's wheels touched down at Honolulu International Airport, they both had a
thorough working knowledge of typhoons and tropical storms.
It was exactly three when they walked
into the terminal at the air base. Illya Kuryakin stepped into a phone booth
for cover and used his communicator to send a report of their arrival to
Waverly in New York.
"Excellent," the U.N.C.L.E.
chief said. "I have additional information for you. We have just received
a fix on the Waterloo. It is just above the equator in
the central Pacific. Apparently it is heading toward either the Ellice Islands
or the Gilberts. However, the Pacific in this area is studded with tiny atolls,
many inhabited by natives and many barren."
"Then the ship could be headed for
some secret THRUSH station on one of these tiny islands," Illya said.
"It is possible. Arrangements have
been made for the U.S. Navy and the U.S. Air Force to step up their weather
flights into this area. Although there are no storms reported in the vicinity
of the Waterloo, we want to keep a close eye on the
ship's activity."
Illya gave Napoleon a terse summary of
Waverly's report. Solo grunted.
"Well, I guess this is where the
trail forks, as they say in those Western movies on the TV late show," he
said. "I've got to hunt for a ship while you get to trail a pretty girl.
It's obvious which of us Waverly is partial to!"
Illya Kuryakin grinned. "He just
recognizes talent when he sees it," he said. "He knows what each of
us does best."
The two men met the next evening to
compare notes. Illya reported a complete blank on the girl. He found evidence
that four separate women who might have been her landed at Honolulu
International Airport. Two checked out to be vacationing school teachers. One
left by another flight to Bali, while the fourth apparently disappeared.
"If it were me, I'd forget the
disappearing dame," Solo said. "I'd check out those two school
teachers. This is October. It's a peculiar time for school teachers to be
vacationing."
"I did," Illya Kuryakin said
ruefully. "One turned out to be a private detective chasing an errant
husband. The other is a disguised woman reporter chasing the same story but for
a different reason."
"Oh!" Solo said.
"See, what did I tell you? Leave the
woman to me."
"Apparently so," Solo said
sadly. He had just smiled at a pretty girl in a trim airline stewardess uniform
and gotten a frosty stare. "Chasin 'shes' with stately lines and sails
doesn't seem to be in my line either. All I can learn is that the Waterloo put in here a month ago for refueling. The crew was
exceptionally close-mouthed. I've been unable to find anyone who has any idea
what the ship is up to."
"Well, tomorrow's another day,"
Illya said. "I'm going to check the steamship lines in the morning. We get
in such a habit of flying we forget there are ships. This stormy kid could have
taken a boat."
"Boy!" Napoleon said with mock
admiration. "Are you smart!"
Suddenly Illya leaned forward. They were
seated on a lanai ringed with flickering luau torches. He shaded his eyes with
his hand to keep the light out of his eyes. Solo turned to see what his
companion was staring at. The lanai with its thatched palm roof fronted on
Waikiki's Kalakaua Avenue. All he could see was the rear view of a shapely
woman going away from them.
"Don't be so obvious in your girl
watching, chum," he said reprovingly.
"There's something decidedly
familiar! I'll be back as soon as I get a closer look at her."
"Maybe," Solo said cynically.
"Pay the check for me, will
you?" Illya flung back over his shoulder.
"So that's it!"
Solo said, smiling, as he leaned across the clipped hibiscus hedge to watch
Kuryakin follow the girl.
His eyes narrowed thoughtfully. For all
his banter, he had more than the average respect for his partner's ability. He
did not himself get as good a look at the girl as Kuryakin had. Like any good
investigator seeking for a missing person, he did not expect to find them
looking just their pictures.
But certain things cannot be disguised.
Hairdos can be altered. The shape of lips changed by curving lipsticks
slightly. Different types of clothing can alter the outward appearances of
personality. However, basic bodily shapes are difficult to alter. The way a
person walks. The tilt of the head. And a hundred more little mannerisms are
more tell-tale than the obvious features.
When Solo leaned out to look down the
street the girl was out of sight. He glimpsed the back of Kuryakin just
vanishing into the darkness. Solo grunted and started to turn back when his
attention was arrested by the shadowy shape of two men who stepped out on the
sidewalk behind Kuryakin.
Napoleon hesitated for a fraction of a
second. The sudden appearance of the two men did not necessarily have a
sinister meaning, but deep inside one of his famous hunches was nudging him
into action.
"When you deal with THRUSH it is
better to be safe that sorry," he muttered.
He motioned to the waitress, who glided
up with a sway of her hips under the grass skirt which was more tourist than
genuine Hawaiian. She smiled brightly.
"I wish I had time to enjoy that
smile," he said with a sad grin. "But I got to run. Is this enough to
cover the bill?"
He handed her a twenty.
"And enough to leave a tip that will
make you more than welcome any time you want to come back!" she said, her
scarlet lips smiling out of her tanned face.
"I hoped I'd be welcome for some
other reason," he said and closed his eye in a sly wink.
Her smile broadened.
"You will be!" she said.
She sighed when he jumped over the
hibiscus hedge to the street and strode rapidly away without a backward look.
Solo followed the two men for a couple of
blocks. They kept their distance behind Kuryakin. Napoleon could not tell for
sure if they were following his partner.
They left the more brightly lighted
section of Waikiki and the girl cut across Kalakaua Avenue at Fort DeRussy, the
Army's Waikiki rest center. Kuryakin, after a pause to make sure she did not
see him, crossed over behind her. The two men continued down on the east side
of the street.
Solo shrugged and turned back, sure now
that they were not following Illya. But in the middle of the block he glanced
back. The two shadowy figure were crossing now. Solo stopped, his heart
starting to beat rapidly. He could not see either Kuryakin or the girl.
Apparently the two shadows waited until
Illya was out of sight before crossing. This marked them as professionals who
knew how to divert attention.
Napoleon reached for the gun in his
shoulder holster. He slipped it in his jacket pocket and kept his hand on the
butt and his finger on the trigger.
He hurried after the shadowy figures. He
caught just a glimpse of them turning up a side street toward the beach. In the
distance he could see a beach hotel.
The two men cut suddenly down a path
running across a small park to the right of the street. It was obvious to
Napoleon Solo that they intended to flank Kuryakin.
He started after them. They were out of
sight behind a thick stand of ornamental bamboo. He advanced cautiously.
There was always the possibility that
they had spotted him following them.
But when he came around the bend he saw
one of the men just disappearing around another turn in the park path. He
started forward in a half run. As he did another figure stepped from behind the
bole of a huge palm. A shaft of bright tropic moon streaming through the
rustling palms overhead clearly outlined the gun in his hand.
Solo jerked his own automatic from his
pocket. But he was too slow. Before he could shoot the shadowy figure pulled
his own trigger.
There was no loud report, only a muffled
snapping whine. The tiny, needlelike projectile the gun fired struck Solo in
the shoulder. He felt a sudden spreading numbness that flashed through his body
with lightning speed.
He tried to shoot, but his arm was
paralyzed. The gun dropped from his nerveless fingers. He tried to shout a
warning to Kuryakin. His tongue froze in his mouth. He tried to run. His knees
collapsed. He fell forward, hitting the grass.
The paralyzing shot apparently only
affected the motor nerves. Solo did not lose consciousness. He heard quick
footsteps of the other man returning.
Then a sneering voice said, "I
thought you said these U.N.C.L.E. rats were tough!"
"Don't underestimate them, Taro.
Watch them every second. They are tricky."
"They won't put anything over
me!" the heavy voice of the man addressed as Taro said.
"I'm giving it to you straight,
Taro," the other THRUSH man said impatiently. "Don't get
over-confident. The only U.N.C.L.E. man you can count on is a dead one!"
"Well, in just a little while that
is how you can describe this punk!"
He laughed—a cold, sneering chuckle.
THREE
"Get in the car!" Taro said.
"When Horton gets the other one, I'll dump 'em both in the Ala Wai
Canal!"
"Be sure you make it look like an
accident," the other THRUSH man said. "Things are too shaky right now
to risk getting the Honolulu police mixed up in this mess. They're not open to
bribery."
"I know my business!" Taro
snapped. "When I do a job it's done right."
"Okay, but work fast. That
paralyzing serum only holds for a short time. It has to be that way so none of
it will show in any autopsies after a victim is found dead."
"Just get me the other punk,"
Taro said. "Then I promise you it will be over in fifteen minutes."
"Horton is a good man. He'll have
the other one here in a minute."
There was no more conversation between
the two. They pulled Napoleon Solo back behind the clump of bamboo. He lay
there trying to figure what had happened. He was sure that he had not been
followed himself. Also he never detected either of the men he was trailing
looking back. Yet he had run directly into a trap. It was hard to explain.
Shortly a car pulled up at the curb
behind them.
"Horton?" Taro asked.
"Get a move on. I got the other
one!" a heavy voice said from the car.
The two men picked up Napoleon and rushed
him into the car. He was propped up in the backseat beside an equally paralyzed
Illya Kuryakin.
"Okay, you two take care of
them," the THRUSH man said, turning the murder over to Horton and Taro.
"I've got to get Lupe and get her on the seaplane out of here. Things
worked out great. I'll file a report to THRUSH headquarters on what a great job
you boys did."
"Thanks, chief!" Horton said.
"I thought for a minute it wasn't going to work. Lupe paraded past that
sidewalk restaurant twice before that jerk from U.N.C.L.E. was bright enough to
spot her."
"Yeah," Taro put in. "And
I thought for a minute the other one wasn't going to have brains enough to
follow him. I though I would have to go in and poison his salad!"
"There's no time for talking. Get
moving," the THRUSH cell chief said. "And don't waste too much time.
That serum wears off fast, but don't worry if they move a little. It will be at
least another fifteen minutes before either can use his limbs enough to pose a
threat."
"Should we tie 'em up?" Taro
asked.
"No, I don't want any rope burns on
their wrists. It must look like an accident with absolutely nothing suspicious
about their being corpses."
"Okay, so long, chief; we'll—"
"Wait!" the cell chief said
hurriedly. "I almost forgot something. Frisk them. These U.N.C.L.E. rats
carry all sorts of cute gadgets like rings with hidden knockout needles, little
balls of tear gas, chewing gum that explodes, mints that turn into fire bombs,
and all sorts of trick devices. Unload their pockets."
"We'll have this thing over before
they come to enough to use anything like that," Horton said confidently.
"I know," his boss replied,
"but THRUSH laboratories are always interested in what new gadgets the
competition has come up with."
They quickly turned out both men's
pockets. The miniature tape recorder shaped like a package of cigarettes, the
pen-communicator, the ring with its hidden needle for dispensing knockout
potions, and the lighter that doubled as a cutting torch, all went into the
THRUSH cell chief's pocket.
"Turn on the dome light," Taro
said. "Maybe he's got something we didn't get."
"Don't!" the cell chief
cautioned. "We can't afford to attract attention. Feel for them."
"Hey! Here's something in Kuryakin's
lapel. It's like a lapel button, but there's a tiny bulb on the back!"
A thin hope Napoleon Solo retained
crumbled when Taro made that discovery. He had hoped they would overlook that
hidden reserve of pressurized tear gas.
He braced himself, desperately trying to
force his paralyzed arms up to crush the bulb before Taro could work it out of
the lapel. Sweat broke out on his face from the violence of his struggle, but
couldn't do more than barely twitch his fingers. He could slightly contract the
muscles of his arms, but lacked the power to raise them.
He was sitting upright next to Kuryakin.
He suspected that his partner was undergoing an equally desperate attempt to
break the paralysis.
Suddenly he switched tactics. He
stiffened every workable muscle in his body. He threw everything into a last
desperate attempt to move. He did not try to lift his hands any longer. He knew
now that this was impossible.
Instead he put every desperate
contraction of his sluggish muscles in an attempt to throw his body off
balance.
It wasn't too difficult. Kuryakin seemed
to realize what he was attempting to do. Illya moved slightly away. With the
two bodies not supporting each other so well, Napoleon was able to fall
forward.
His head hit against the hand of Taro as
the murderous THRUSH agent pulled away the tear gas bulb from Solo's lapel. The
blow pushed Taro's fingers down hard against the U.N.C.L.E. protective device.
The thin container crushed.
Solo closed his eyes tight as the
blinding flood of supercompressed tear gas burst through Taro's fingers. The
three THRUSH men jumped back, but it was too late. They fell, choking and
crying, too blinded to see.
Both Solo and Illya closed their eyes
tightly in preparation for the rush of irritating gases, but even so the highly
penetrable material set their eyes streaming with blinding tears.
Solo hunched over, his chin hanging over
the back of the front seat. Tears streamed down his face. His body racked with
choking coughs.
But despite his painful predicament, his
mind was still working sharply. He tried to raise his arms again. He still
could do no more then barely move them. He tried to speak to Kuryakin, but his
tongue would not move. He shifted his feet and got the slightest movement.
It was true that the effects of the
THRUSH numbing injection was wearing off, but he was certain now it would come
too late. Even though the soft trade winds dispersed the tear gas, the effect
once it entered the eyes would last for about fifteen minutes.
That meant that the THRUSH men would
regain their faculties before he and Illya could hope to beat off the
paralysis.
There was always a hope that someone
would pass, see them and call the police. However, he knew it was a slim one.
This section of the park was carefully chosen by the THRUSH men because it was
deserted at night.
It was only a short distance to Kalakaua,
the Broadway of Waikiki, but for all the good it did them, the street might
have been a mile away.
In the background he could hear the
THRUSH men coughing and retching. He knew that he had to find some way to call
attention to their plight before the nauseating tear gas wore off. The tool for
that lay just two feet from his head, but he couldn't move two inches.
He tensed, waiting for a spasm of
coughing to pass and then threw his full will into a desperate effort to move.
When this supreme trial failed, he
relaxed. His chin fell down over the back curve of the front seat. For a while
he huddled there, coughing, eyes streaming and fighting the struggle of his
stomach to throw up.
At the same time, he tried to estimate
the passing time. It was impossible. Time dragged so slowly for the desperate
man that each ticking second moved like an hour.
He waited until he estimated another five
minutes had passed. He tensed. His body shivered with his intense struggle to
raise his hand. His teeth gritted. Sweat poured from his face. Slowly his hands
moved two inches. His feet shifted slightly.
He relaxed, taking fresh courage from the
movement. The paralysis was wearing off, but so slowly he doubted it would come
fast enough to save them. He strained again, striving with all his strength to
force his body. Already he was coughing less, proving that the tear gas was
wearing off faster than the paralysis serum.
He tried to estimate the passage of time
by the old photographer's system of counting seconds by saying,
"One-thousand-and-one, one-thousand-and-two—"
He waited then for another five minutes
before throwing all his depleted strength into one more final attempt to move.
He knew this was his last chance.
This time he braced his legs, trying to
heave his body up. It moved slightly. He managed to get his dragging arms over
the back of the front seat. He pulled with his arms and pushed hard with his
legs.
But his body shook. It inched up
slightly, but his trembling legs lacked the force to push him up. He hung
there, taking all his strength to maintain his balance. There was none left to
push himself up any higher.
Grimly he hung on to the slight gain he
had made. Even though he knew he had lost, he refused to let himself fall back.
The relentless determination that had carried him through desperate situations
before refused to quit even when he knew it was useless to struggle any longer.
Then he felt a weight against his
shoulder. He realized it was Illya Kuryakin. His partner seemed to realize what
he was doing. He tried to speak to him, but his racking coughs from the special
U.N.C.L.E. gas choked his voice.
But he didn't need to speak. Kuryakin
understood what he was attempting. He needed no instructions.
Weakly pushing himself partly up, Illya
got his shoulder under Solo's armpit. For a breathless moment the two men
remained there, gathering strength for the final push that could mean the
difference between life and death.
For a brief moment they hesitated. Then
Solo's muscles tensed again. Illya felt it and shoved with his feet, putting
all his slowly returning strength into a push to help Napoleon.
Solo's legs shook under the strain of
heaving his body up. For one nearly fatal moment he thought he was going to
fall, but with agonizing slowness he kept moving with Kuryakin's help.
But his rising body reached the
overbalance point and he fell forward over the back of the front seat. His head
hit the steering wheel with a crack that momentarily dazed him.
Then gasping, choking, he forced his head
into a slight shift to the left. It touched the horn button. He pressed his
head down harder.
The blast of the horn cut through the
soft tropic night, loud, insistent, never stopping!
The effort, plus the hard blow he took on
the head when he fell forward in his desperate attempt to hit the horn, was too
much for him. His senses reeled. He lost consciousness, but the weight of his
body kept the horns screeching out its wild appeal for help.
When he regained consciousness he was in
an ambulance. All his frantic appeals that he was not injured, only deathly
tired, had no affect on the attendants. They refused to release him.
At the hospital the doctors were equally
adamant. He had to call New York and get Waverly to call the surgeon of the
U.S. Public Health Service before the stubborn doctor would release his
prerogative of deciding when a patient was well or not.
Even then the doctor, a short little man
with bristly hair and the manner of an indignant bulldog, was furious.
Following their release from the
hospital, Illya and Napoleon held a hasty conference at their Waikiki hotel.
The three THRUSH men were in the Honolulu
jail, but neither would talk. On their own the two men from U.N.C.L.E. might
have injected the prisoners with truth serum, but since they were in the hands
of the civilian police, this was impossible. The U.S. constitutional guarantee
against self-incrimination held true even when the knowledge hidden could mean
the destruction of half a dozen of the world's governments.
Lupe de Rosa had vanished. All attempts
to find her in Honolulu were fruitless. Late on the second day Illya picked up
her trail, but it proved too late. He traced her to Hilo on the "Big
Island" and from there she took a chartered seaplane for Maui, but never
arrived.
Back checking they discovered the
seaplane landed in Honlulu instead. A general alarm was put out for the pilot.
Honolulu and the entire island of Oahu were combed for both him and the girl.
Absolutely no trace of either were found.
Solo checked back on the pilot's record,
utilizing Army service records, FBI facilities and the international records of
Interpol and U.N.C.L.E.
"This man is clean," he said in
a discouraged voice when he and Illya held their next conference. "There
is absolutely no evidence to connect him with THRUSH or any other criminal
organization. He was a good family man, an ardent supporter of the church and
active in civic affairs."
"Then that means he is probably
dead," Illya said. "Lupe or some other THRUSH agent hired the plane.
After it flew her to a secret destination, the pilot returned here and was
silenced."
"But where did she go?"
Napoleon asked irritably. "She didn't leave by plane, by boat or by
outrigger!"
"Maybe she swam!" Illya said.
Napoleon gave him a sour look. "It
may be closer to the truth than you realized."
He turned to the telephone on the table
beside the sitting room couch. He dialed jerkily and sat staring moodily out
across the vista of Waikiki visible through the hotel window.
"Colonel Davis, please," he
said into the phone when his call was completed. "Colonel? Napoleon Solo
here. Did the okay come from Washington to cooperate with Mr. Kuryakin and me?
Good! There is something most important. The Islands defense system has means
of checking on any submarine penetration of this area?"
When Colonel Davis replied in the
affirmative, Napoleon asked, "Would your defense patrols intercept any
such undersea craft?"
"No," the army defense chief
said. "Not unless it penetrated within the three mile territorial limits
of Hawaii. We would mark its position and aerial patrols and antisubmarine
units of the Navy would keep close watch over it just in case it might be a
defense threat."
"Was one reported out around Maui
yesterday?"
"There was," the colonel said.
"I see," Napoleon said.
"Was the sea calm enough that a light seaplane might have landed on the
water and made contact with this submarine?"
"Oh, entirely possible," the
defense chief said. "Our patrols observed no such action, but when they
arrived the submarine was submerged and departing."
"Do you have any indication of the
sub's identity?"
"No," the colonel said.
"These things happen all the time, both here, along the U.S. Pacific Coast
and on the Atlantic. Foreign countries do it to test our defenses. We do the
same thing in Asia and Europe. That is not unusual. However, if someone from
Hawaii joined the sub, then that is not usual. We would be very much interested
in a report of that to our counter-intelligence."
"As soon as I have anything
definite, colonel," Napoleon sad, "I'll certainly make a full report.
Thanks for your help."
He hung up and turned to Illya.
"Well, wise guy, you are right for once. She swam off—in a tin fish!"
"To join the Waterloo,
more than likely," Illya said. "Am I permitted to venture a small
guess?"
"Don't waste time telling me she is
probably going to the Waterloo to help solve the
problem of why storm generation is not as successful in the Pacific as it was
in the Atlantic," Napoleon said. "I'm smart too."
"While you're being so smart,"
Illya said with a sour grin, "go on and tell me how you intend to keep
this Waterloo ship from being the Waterloo of us
both?"
"I intend to depend on your
brilliance," Napoleon said with a grin of his own. "You are the
difference, you know. And that is an order directly from Waverly himself!"
"I wish I could," Illya said.
"Never have I felt so useless on any case. We are getting absolutely
nowhere, Napoleon."
"Don't I know it!" Solo said
with a worried frown creasing his forehead. "I was talking to Waverly just
a half hour ago. He reports there is excitement all through the THRUSH
organization. Harmon reports it from Europe. April Dancer sent a similar report
from South America. Mark Slate had the same story from Southeast Asia. Waverly
believes THRUSH has definite hope that the girl will solve the problem. They
believe it so strongly that they have alerted their cells worldwide to be ready
to step in when these monstrous storms spread their destruction!"
"I don't know what we are doing
wasting more time here," Illya said. "We've got to find a new lead. I
think—"
He broke off when the phone rang.
Napoleon, who was nearest, picked up the instrument. Illya, tensely watching
his partner's face, saw Napoleon start.
"What is it?" Illya asked
eagerly.
"A typhoon has been spotted outside
the usual belt!" Solo said hurriedly. Then into the phone he said,
"How is the storm reacting?"
He listened for a few seconds and said,
"We certainly would! We'll be there as soon as a taxi can get us
there!"
He jammed down the phone. "The storm
acts as though it's crippled!" he said to Illya. "It builds up fury
and then seems to lose its punch and then builds up again. It is sort of
pulsing!"
"This could be it!" Illya said,
his face flushing with excitement. "What are we going to do?"
"We are going to ride one of the
typhoon-tracker planes out and see for ourselves!"
"Typhoon trackers? Those are the
boys who deliberately fly into these cyclones to measure wind velocity and
direction, isn't it?"
"That's right," Napoleon said.
"We're going to go straight into that storm and we're not coming out
without its secrets!"
ACT VIII: INTO THE STORM
An hour later Solo and Kuryakin were in a
weather reconnaissance plane of the U.S. Air Force, heading into the deep
Pacific out of Honolulu.
Another weather reconnaissance plane was
already in the area which was east of Tarawa in the Gilbert Islands. The two
men listened to the reports coming back.
"It is a small storm," the
report said. "It covers about two hundred and fifty miles in radius. We
managed to penetrate into the eye. It covers an area of about fifteen miles.
There is a wall of clouds circling about the eye which holds the worst
turbulence I have ever encountered. I am estimating the wind speed at close to
two hundred knots—and that is some wind. The hail,
rain and lightning is awful. There are times when I didn't think we would make
it. Under no circumstances do I recommend you to try a penetration
yourself."
The pilot called Napoleon Solo on the
intercom.
"We are under your orders," he
said. "We were told to do as you wished. Shall we try to penetrate the
storm or not?"
Napoleon hesitated.
"What do you recommend?" he
asked.
"It is getting close to night,"
he said. "I don't know what we could find out inside the eye that the
other weather plane didn't get."
"Can you get him on the radio?"
Solo asked. "Ask if he saw any indication of a ship in the eye."
"No," the answer came back
across the intervening miles. "The ocean inside the eye is lashed to an
awful fury. A fish would get seasick in that wild water. I don't see how any
ship could keep afloat if trapped in there."
Illya Kuryakin nodded.
"You remember, Napoleon," he
said. "When we were in the eye of that Atlantic hurricane, the trapped sea
water inside the eye was boiling while the air above was perfectly still."
"What about on the fringes outside
the circular area of the storm itself?" Solo asked. "Can you get any
radar return that shows a ship or submarine might be anywhere along the
fringes?"
"No," the reply came back,
"but the only reading we can get is the side we are on. There could be a
ship on the other side, but our radar will not penetrate the entire storm area.
We get a bounce-back off the clouds, you know."
"Okay," Napoleon said, making a
fast decision. "The plane out there now must come back. Its fuel is
getting low. I think we should go on, even though it is getting dark. We won't
try to penetrate the storm itself. But I want to circle as much of the total
storm area as possible. I'm sure the Waterloo is
somewhere in the area."
"And if it isn't?" Illya asked.
"Then this is a real storm and not
one of THRUSH's hellish experiments," Napoleon said grimly. "That
will mean returning to Hawaii and starting all over again."
"There isn't time to start
again," Illya said. "Time is running out on us, Napoleon."
"I know it," Solo said grimly.
"Those world-wide reports of THRUSH activity shows they expect the climax
to come very soon. It makes me shudder, Illya, when I think of the millions of
lives that may be lost."
"It makes me shudder even
more," Illya said soberly, "when I think how little we have to go on
to save those lives."
"All we can do is keep trying—trying
right up to the end."
The plane droned on across the wide
Pacific. The sun dropped lower. Clouds started to thicken on the horizon. The
slanting light of the dropping sun set them ablaze with fiery color.
The turbulence of the air increased as
they started to circle the fringes of the storm.
The plane flew on, its weather radar beam
scanning storm and sea. An hour passed. It was twilight, with only a few
minutes of visibility left. The radar was still seeking some sign of the Waterloo.
It had grown too dark to see anything on
the water by human eyesight. Napoleon and Illya left their scanners' positions
and went forward to watch the radar screen over the operator's shoulder.
They watched the blips come and go on the
greenly glowing screen. Once they thought they saw something, but it proved to
be a whale. Another time the radar scope picked up an object, but they were
never able to identify it.
Then the operator pointed out a new blip
echoing from the water.
"Probably that whale again," he
said.
"He's in for a tough swim if he
doesn't get away from that storm," Illya said, recalling the wild froth
whipped up inside the eye.
"No," the operator said.
"Most of the sea agitation is along the surface. If you drop in a
submarine, say, a hundred or so feet below the water, you would never know
there was a storm overhead."
Napoleon and Solo looked at each other.
"Then that sub which picked up the girl could have gone under the storm to
make the rendezvous with the Waterloo," Illya
said.
"I think this is it," Solo said
grimly.
Napoleon Solo nodded. He called the pilot
on the intercom. "I'd like to go down as low as possible and investigate
this whale."
"It's going to be rougher down
there," the pilot warned. "Hold on tight."
The huge four-motored weather plane
circled, losing altitude. True to the pilot's prediction, it became
increasingly rough as the plane descended.
"What is the 'whale' doing?"
Illya asked. To him the glowing radar screen was a mystery.
"I've lost him," the operator
said. "You see, radar beams reflect off clouds and rain masses. "We
can't see anything behind them."
"I thought the Air Force uses radar
to bomb through clouds," Solo said.
"Yes, but we're weather
observers," the operator replied. "If we used beams that would go
right through clouds like X-ray, it would do us no good. We are trying to find
out about clouds and their shapes."
"I see," Solo said and he
sounded discouraged. "Do you—"
"Wait! I've got something! It just
came out of that rain squall mass here on the top of the scope. It's—yes, it's
a boat of some kind. Just a minute. I can give you its length. It's about
sixty-five feet long and— Hey, maybe that isn't a whale after all. It's making
contact with the boat!"
Solo's heart leaped. "It is the sub
that picked up Rosa," he said to Illya. "This is it, my friend!"
"What are we going to do? I'm for
calling Waverly and getting the U.S. Navy submarines to sink both the Waterloo and the sub."
"And get them in international
difficulties?" Solo asked. "We have no positive proof that the Waterloo is engaged in directing storms. All we have are
suspicions. We could never get any official action on the basis of what we
have."
"Then it is up to us to take
unofficial action," Kuryakin said. "I don't think it would be any
breach of international maritime law to go down for a close look at the ship.
We could claim we thought it might be in danger from the storm."
"That sounds good to me,"
Napoleon said. "Solo to pilot, over! Can we go down for a close look at
those ships?"
"Roger," the pilot said.
"Hold on tight. It is going to be some roller coaster ride."
He put the big plane in a steep bank and
started to descend. As they dropped, the two men from U.N.C.L.E. saw details of
the sea. The waves were piling up. Their whitecaps were snatched away by the
hard wind.
"It must be pretty important for
those two vessels to meet to risk docking with each other in this wind,"
the pilot said.
"I imagine it is," Illya
replied.
Suddenly the wind faltered, came back
with a hard gust and then almost died.
"That has been going on since the
blame thing was sighted," the ship's weather observer said to Solo.
"It is what makes this storm so unusual. It seems to have trouble keeping
going."
"Good!" Napoleon said crisply.
"It will give us a break to get a close look at that rendezvous."
The plane came down only a couple of
hundred feet above the water. Despite the fall of the wind the waves were still
high and angry.
They faced a sudden rain squall. The
plane plunged into it. Rain drummed on the windows. A sudden gust of wind
caused the airplane to lurch. Then the wind died to almost nothing. They came
out of the rain with the mysterious ship dead ahead. There was no sign of the
submarine in the gloom, but the radar scope showed it slightly submerged and
departing.
Napoleon was at the scanner's window,
trying to focus a pair of binoculars he borrowed from the pilot. The plane was
bouncing so badly he could not get a clear enough view in the gloom to pick out
the vessel's name on the bow.
Suddenly the plane gave a savage lurch
that almost tore loose Solo's grip. In spite of himself his shoulder hit the
side of the plane with a hard jolt.
The pilot suddenly applied full power.
The straining plane shuddered as it struggled for altitude. A wing dipped
dangerously. For one startled moment Napoleon Solo thought they were falling
into a side slip. But slowly the pilot brought his craft under control again.
"Hang on!" he called grimly
over the intercom. "They're shooting at us!"
Then as the plane circled, struggling for
altitude, Napoleon saw an explosion just off their right wing. It was a savage
burst of fire and smoke, reminding him of a 75mm shell burst.
The plane shuddered again. Napoleon did
not have to wait for the pilot's report to know they were hit. For a moment
they lost altitude, but then began to climb with agonizing slowness.
Another shell ripped through the
fuselage. It exploded in the radio compartment. Illya and Napoleon rushed
forward. The radio operator was dead. The radio equipment was a shambles. Even
the plane's intercom was out.
Napoleon stepped through into the pilot's
cockpit. He was staggered by what he saw. Another shell had ripped away part of
the windshield. Rain and wind was slashing through the broken hole. The
co-pilot was slumped over his controls, unconscious. Blood was streaming down
the pilot's face.
He turned his agonized eyes on Solo.
"I c-an't keep her up! Help
me!"
With Illya's help, Napoleon pulled the
unconscious co-pilot out of the way and slipped into the seat himself. Acting
on the choked instructions of the man in the other seat, Solo helped him fight
to keep the plane under control.
"Right rudder! R-right rudder!"
the pilot cried.
Solo jammed the right rudder control down
with all his strength. The plane was lurching with the renewed fury of the
wind. The rain was increasing in violence. An occasional ball of hail banged
like a cannon ball on the skin of the plane.
"The typhoon is overtaking us!"
the ship's weather observer, Major Frank Patterson, came forward to tell them.
"T-here's not a chance with the ship
crippled like this!" the injured pilot gasped.
"We can't ditch in the ocean!"
the weather observer said quickly. "Those waves will pile up as much as a
hundred feet high before the storm subsides. No human being could live in such
a sea, no matter what kind of life vest he wore!"
"We'll never keep aloft," the
pilot said, gritting his teeth against the pain from his cut head. "One
engine is out now. Another is running rough. I don't expect it to hold out much
longer. We have no directional aids. I don't know where in hell we are. Without
a radio we haven't any chance of getting back to Hawaii."
"Look," the observer said,
desperation in his voice. "This section of the Pacific is dotted with
atolls. Can't we find one to crash land on?"
"Our navigator is dead," the
pilot said wearily. "I don't know where we are. I don't know where any
islands are."
One of the enlisted scanners stuck his
head in the cockpit.
"Major!" he said, shouting to
making himself heard above the howl of the wind ripping through the broken
section of the windshield. "I checked the radio equipment like you told
me. There isn't a chance of patching it up enough to get any reception."
"What do we do?" the major
said.
"Pray, if you still know how,"
the pilot said.
His head drooped with weariness. Rain
splashing through the cracked plexiglass, ran down his face. The plane
side-slipped dangerously as his feet slipped on the foot controls. He caught
himself in time.
Slowly through the combined supreme
efforts of himself and Napoleon Solo, they got the plane flying half way level
again.
All of them knew the pilot couldn't hold
out much longer. He had already done more than any person should be called upon
to do.
It would only be a matter of a short time
before he would collapse completely.
Illya Kuryakin offered to take his place.
"You can sit between us and tell us
what to do."
The pilot shook his head. "What good
will it do? I think I can hold out longer than the plane will."
"Do you think we could make it to
some atoll island if we could get a fix on our position?" Napoleon asked.
They could converse a little better since Major Patterson rigged up a canvas
barrier that partially cut out the driving rain slamming into the cockpit.
"Maybe," the pilot said.
"That's all I can say—maybe. In this kind of a storm, nothing is certain.
We're being carried farther into it. We don't have sufficient power left in our
crippled engines to fight our way out!"
Napoleon turned and shouted back over his
shoulder to Kuryakin, "Illya! Can you raise New York on the
pen-communicator?"
"I don't even know if the thing
works," Kuryakin said. "I haven't tried it since we got it back from
the police when they searched Taro. But I'll try."
He pulled out the tiny world-wide
communication set. A twist of the cap extended the six inch aerial. He quickly
spoke his identifying call letters and added, "Kuryakin calling Mr.
Waverly. Emergency! Over!"
He repeated the call several times. Then
he paused. Vicious bolts of lightning were ripping through the black boiling
clouds. He waited until the worse of the display was over. Solo looked back at
him anxiously as Illya tried again.
"Kuryakin calling Mr. Waverly! This
is an emergency! Over!"
"—ryakin. This is Wav—"
That is all they got. Illya looked at
Napoleon.
"Repeat!—Keep—repeatin—"
"He means keep repeating your
message over and over," Solo said quickly. "The atmospherics are so
bad it keeps killing part of the reception. But if you keep repeating it,
they'll be able to assemble a complete message from the fragments!"
"Here goes!" Illya said.
"I hope it does some good!"
The tone of his voice implied that he
didn't have much hope.
ACT IX: THE CRASH
Slowly, desperately, Illya Kuryakin kept
repeating a brief message. It took about five minutes before Waverly's broken
transmission indicated that the U.N.C.L.E. chief understood their situation. He
told them to keep transmitting while the great U.N.C.L.E. locator transmitters
located in strategic places around the world tried to zero in on the
pen-communicator transmission and get a fix on their position.
Three minutes later Waverly reported:
"We will have you in forty-five minutes."
"We must land! We must land! We must
land!" Illya kept repeating the message for a full minute. "Give us
the coordinates for the nearest atoll! Give us—"
This interchange went on for what seemed
forever to the anxious men in the plane. Finally there was a slight break in
the rain static. They heard Waverly so clearly he seemed to be in the cockpit
with them.
"The Alofa Atoll, a group off the
beaten track but governed out of the British Gilbert Islands, is about
twenty-five miles from your present location, as nearly as we can determine.
The storm is interferring with our reception on the locator beams as well as on
the radio. If you take a heading of—"
"All our directional equipment is
out, sir," Illya interrupted to say. "We don't even have a working
pocket compass. All we know is that we are circling."
There was a silence on the radio. "I
think we've lost them," Illya said. "And only twenty-five miles away!
It might as well be twenty-five million if we don't know which way to
head!"
Then the pen-communicator speaker boomed
out again. "Waverly here. Can you read me?"
"You are coming in loud and clear,
sir," Illya said.
"I can barely hear you,"
Waverly said. "I will talk fast before my own transmission fails. Our
directional beams can no longer pinpoint you exactly. It is impossible for us
to give you directions."
"Well, that's it!" the pilot
said wearily.
"But there is a bare
possibility," Waverly went on. "We have direct lines open to New York
Weather Central and Weather Central in Hawaii. Weather planes with long range
radar were dispatched over two hours ago. They have the storm in their scopes,
but cannot pick you up. In any event, they know the speed and location of the
storm exactly. It has stopped pulsing and is picking up fury. It is moving
directly toward Alofa Atoll. Are you reading me?"
"Clearly, sir," Illya said
quickly.
"Then here is what the aviation and
weather experts suggest," Waverly said. "They say it is your only
chance."
"We'll take it!" Illya said.
Rain from the cracked window splattered
his face and dripped to the flight deck.
"You must get into the eye of the
storm. In your crippled condition you can't stay aloft in this violence. All
prediction is for it to get worse. Get into the eye. Then, if you can keep
circling for the next forty-five minutes, the typhoon will move directly over
Alofa. After that you can crash land the best you can. Do you read me?"
"Yes, sir," Illya said.
"It's a desperate chance,"
Waverly said. "But it is all you have. Good luck. We'll all be pulling for
you here!"
The next hour was the longest either of
the men from U.N.C.L.E. had ever experienced. The drawn out terror of fighting
the awful battering of the storm was the worst moments of their lives. They
struggled to the point of total exhaustion to keep the plane flying a halfway
level course. Those able to take the controls spelled each other until worked
into exhaustion themselves.
The pitching of the plane was so bad all
except Kuryakin were airsick. The rain and hail slammed the unfortunate plane.
Once a terrific gust of wind seemed to whirl them in a circle. The plane
side-slipped, at one point falling so far the crippled engines almost failed to
bring her back up. Once the nose went down and the tail acted as if it wanted
to take the lead. For a breathless moment the plane was completely out of
control.
Kuryakin and Solo were at the controls.
The injured pilot was thrown from his perch between them, slamming heavily
against the instrument panel.
Both men from U.N.C.L.E. hung on to the
wheel, fighting to bring the plane's nose back up. Two of the crewmen pulled
the pilot up, but a sudden shift of the wind piled them all on top of Solo. He
lost his grip on the wheel. The savage fury of the wind was too much for one
man to hold.
Kuryakin struggled, but the plane's nose
went down again.
The plane picked up speed, plunging down
at a forty-five degree angle.
"Some one help me!" Napoleon
Solo gasped.
One of the crewmen sprang to his aid.
Solo got his hands back on the other wheel. One of the other crewmen gave him a
hand. The other tried to get the pilot back on his feet.
"Quick!" Solo gasped. "Ask
him what we do now! We can't seem to bring it out of the dive!"
"He's out completely!" the
sergeant bent over the pilot cried.
"Then what in Hades do we do?"
Napoleon grated. "Doesn't anybody know how to fly this confounded
thing?"
"Major Patterson! Can you take over
these controls for me?" Illya said hurriedly. "I'll see if I can
raise New York on the communicator again. Maybe Mr. Waverly can get us a pilot
who can give us directions!"
"You had better get him in the next
minute or two," Solo said. "The way we're going down, it won't be
long! I can't see the ground, but it must be down there somewhere. The ocean, I
mean."
Major Patterson slipped into the pilot's
seat as Illya relinquished his grip on the wheel. He started to step back. As
he did the plane gave a mighty lurch. The nose was thrown up until the plane
almost stood on its tail.
Solo and Patterson, who had been pulling
back on the controls with all their strength in an impossible attempt to bring
the nose up, now frantically reversed procedures to try and bring it down
again.
Illya's grip on the back of the pilot's
seat was torn loose. He was thrown back, slamming against the back of the
cockpit compartment with a jarring force that momentarily stunned him. He hit
the flight deck and his instinct for survival caused him to try and fight his
way back on his feet again.
He got to his knees when another
sickening turn of the plane threw him heavily against the back of the
co-pilot's seat. He staggered up, hanging on the back of the seat occupied by
Solo.
He was swaying so badly he did not
immediately realize that the terrible wind had ceased.
He looked around in surprise. The
slashing rain was gone. There were stars visible overhead. He blinked, still
too dazed to comprehend the sudden stillness of the air about them.
Then Solo's voice cut through his hazy
brain: "We're in the eye! Don't tell me we did that!"
"Not us," Patterson said from
the pilot's seat. "It was the plane! It must have been, for I surely
didn't know what I was doing!"
"I guess these planes are like the
cavalry horses. The old soldiers used to tell recruits just to let the horses
alone and they would get them through the drill. Horses had more sense than
soldiers in those days!"
"We're still going down,"
Napoleon said, suddenly sobering after the first burst of jubilation at getting
out of the wild winds of the spinning typhoon.
The plane was losing altitude as its
overtaxed engines started cutting out momentarily, but not as badly as before.
"Can you see the atoll?"
Patterson asked anxiously.
"I can't see a thing," Napoleon
said. "Do you think the eye has already passed the island?"
Below it was dark, but they could easily
make out the frothing sea. It looked white for the trapped waters were churned
into a mad frenzy by the circling wall of terrific winds.
Nobody spoke for a moment. Each knew it
was death for the plane to drop in those anguished waters.
"How is the pilot?" Solo asked.
"Is there any way of bringing him to long enough to give us some
instructions?"
Patterson crouched over the pilot's body
looked up. He shivered.
"No, sir!" he said in a thick
voice. "He's dead!"
"And the flight engineer is dead
too," Solo said in a stricken voice.
Illya pulled himself together and reached
for the pen-communicator. He shakily extended the aerial. All he got was a
thick crackle of static from the boiling ring of clouds circling about the
typhoon eye with speeds above one hundred and seventy-five knots.
Solo glanced back over his shoulder.
"Illya! Can't you raise New York?"
"No," Kuryakin said, shoving
the communicator back in his pocket.
"Well, that's it," Solo said
grimly. "That looks like the atoll ahead. It is just emerging from the
storm into the eye."
"Yes! That's it!" Patterson
cried.
"But how do we land?" Solo
said. "I wouldn't know what to do if there was a ten thousand foot runway.
What can I do on a coral strip covered with coconut palms, and most of them
blown down by the wind?"
They were still circling, trying to stay
within the forty miles radius of the typhoon eye. But at the same time they
were gradually losing altitude.
It was only a matter of minutes before
they had to come down somewhere. Each second, the mad, vicious ocean was
getting closer and closer to the belly of the doomed plane.
"What do we do?" Patterson
said, his voice hoarse.
"Let's try to figure out
something!" Solo replied. "What do you do when you land? You go down,
level off, touch the wheels and roll. Going down is no problem. We're doing
that any way."
"We can't roll," Patterson
said. "So we can't use that to eat up our landing speed."
"How about pulling back on the stick
just before we strike? That should bring the nose up and then the tail can drag
and slow us down before the nose drops?" Illya suggested. "It seems
to me that is the big problem. We have to get our speed down before we take the
big bump."
"We would break the tail off,"
Patterson objected.
"Well, we'll break our own tails off
if we don't!" the fiery little man from U.N.C.L.E. retorted.
Patterson had no answer to that one.
"Let's try it," Solo said, the
deep lines of his face mirrored his bone weariness. The terrific struggle to hang
on to the plane's controls had brought him close to the point of collapse.
"Well, you never know what you can
do until you try it," Patterson said. His weary voice held little
confidence.
TWO
They circled one more time and then
headed directly in toward the storm-battled island. The atoll was a circular
stand of coral built on the rim of an extinct undersea volcano to make a thin
rim of tiny islands circling a small lagoon. The water in the lagoon, partially
protected by the encircling reef, was not lashed to the terrible fury of the
open sea.
They came in less than one hundred
twenty-five feet above the sea. The boiling foam started striking the bottom of
the plane as they descended lower.
They came over the south strip of islands
at fifty feet. It was uninhabited and completely treeless. In the darkness Solo
got just a glimpse of coral sand reflecting the starlight coming down through
the open eye above them.
The larger island was looming up fast
across the lagoon.
"Now!" Solo cried.
Both he and Patterson pulled back on the
wheel, desperately trying to lift the nose of the plane. All the others braced
themselves for the coming crash. Illya threw himself on the flight deck,
pressing his back and the back of his head against the rear of the pilot's
seat. He shoved his legs hard against the fuselage to brace himself.
The tail of the plane struck the lagoon.
The crashing surf splashed higher than the plane. They were blinded by the
foaming water striking the windshield. The tail dragged on the coral, sending a
terrible vibration through the dying airplane. The two men in the pilot and
co-pilot's seat struggled to hold back on the stick, still fighting to keep the
planes' nose up.
It was losing speed fast. One wing tip
struck the huge bole of a coconut tree. They spun around. The other wing dug
into the sand. The plane heaved up as if trying to fly again. It settled and
the broken trunk of a palm, ripped by the typhoon, ripped through the fuselage.
Its splintered end sliced through
Patterson's body. It rammed past Napoleon Solo and smashed into the instrument
panel.
The plane hung there, rocking, each metal
joint creaking in a dying agony.
Outside there was a glaring flash of
light and fire burst through a tearing hold in the wing as one of the wing gas
tanks exploded.
"We've got to get out!" Solo
gasped. "Illya! Are you okay?"
"Yes," Kuryakin said shakily.
"We've got one dead man, but the rest seem to be okay."
"I'm trapped," Solo said.
"This broken palm trunk has me wedged in. Can you—"
Illya grabbed the palm trunk and heaved
as Solo pushed with all his strength. It would not budge. Outside on the wing
the flaming gas fire was eating closer to the cockpit.
Illya straightened up. "We're not
doing any good. Just a minute, I'll get some help. I—"
"Hey!" one of the airmen cried
from the back of the plane. "Somebody's coming! There's people on the
island!"
"I'll get help!" Illya repeated
to Solo. "I'll be right back."
Kuryakin turned and ran to the waist door
of the plane. In the flickering light of the fire he could see several people
running through the downed palms toward the wreck. One of the latter was a
woman.
"Hurry!" Illya shouted to them.
"We've got some men trapped in here!"
The first to clamber into the plane was a
giant Polynesian man wearing only a native lava-lave loin cloth. Illya grabbed
his arm.
"This way!" he gasped.
"There's a man trapped in the cockpit. We must get him out now, before the
flames—"
The big Polynesian grunted. He grabbed
the smaller man about the waist and threw him from the plane. Illya hit the wet
coral sand, sprawling flat and just missing the bole of an uprooted palm.
He jerked himself up. "Hey!" he
shouted. "I—"
"Stop! Stop, Mr. Solo!"
The cold feminine voice caused Illya to
jerk around. He stared open-mouthed into the deadly hole of a .38 automatic
held in the hand of Lupe de Rosa.
"Grab him!" she ordered.
A native in European dress sprang forward
to grab Illya's arms. He tried to struggle, but in his weakened condition they
handled him easily.
"Napoleon! Napoleon!" he
shouted. "We're in the hands of THRUSH! We crashed on a THRUSH controlled
island!"
The European smashed him in the face.
Illya sagged. They let him drop. He fell face down in the sand.
Inside the cockpit, Napoleon heard
Illya's warning cry. He knew it was impossible to extricate himself in time.
The tree trunk was pressed so tightly across his chest that he couldn't even
get to his gun in its shoulder holster.
He reached out and rubbed his hand over
the bloody body of the dead man in the pilot's seat. He streaked the blood
across his own temple and sagged his head against the trunk. He closed his
eyes.
The big Polynesian came into the cockpit.
He looked at the smashed body of the pilot and grunted. He looked at Solo and
reached for Napoleon's wrist. He felt the pulse and grunted again.
He wrapped his huge arms about the
entrapping tree trunk and heaved. The bole shivered and moved just a fraction
of an inch. The giant relaxed, took a deep breath and grasped the tree trunk
again.
Outside the blazing fire was moving
rapidly up the plane's wing. Solo could feel the heat, scorching against his
head.
But as the big Polynesian grasped the log
for a final heave to free Solo, a voice with a Middle-Eastern accent said from
behind them:
"Leave him! It's not worth the
trouble."
"Him still alive!" the
Polynesian said.
"He won't be long!" the
newcomer said and laughed. "Let the fire take care of him."
The Polynesian straightened up. "You
big boss," he said.
"I sure as hell am and don't you
ever forget it. Come on. Let him burn!"
ACT X: THE THRUSH OUTPOST
When Illya Kuryakin regained
consciousness, he found himself strapped in a chair inside a small room jammed
with electronic gear. The first thing he saw when he opened his eyes was the
angry face of Lupe de Rosa. The first thing he heard was her bitter voice:
"Kill him! He has caused me nothing but trouble!"
"That's what I like in my girl
friends," Illya mumbled. "Quiet, shy, lovable—"
She hit him hard across the mouth. A
trickle of blood ran down from a cut where her blow drove his lip against his
teeth.
She whirled on a tall man with a
middle-Eastern accent.
"Where is the other one?" she
snapped.
"Miss de Rosa!" he said in a
harsh voice. "You may be the chief scientist for this project, but I am in
charge of this station! I am responsible to THRUSH headquarters for its
security. Not you. I will stay out of your technical business. You will stay
out of my security affairs!"
"If you had done your work properly
here, it would not have been necessary for me to come!" she snapped.
"These storms lost energy because this station did not operate correctly.
We must have three points of electronic focus to build up these typhoons to the
point where their own energy will carry them forward. Your station here did not
reach full energy capacity!"
"That was not my fault," he
said defensively. "The equipment you sent was defective."
"It was no such thing!" she
snapped. "I personally checked it out before it left South America. The
trouble was in sabotage—here! Now what about your
highly vaunted security!"
The tall field chief grabbed Lupe's
shoulder. "If you try to send out a report like that, I'll—"
Lupe's hand flashed down to her handbag.
She didn't bother to draw the gun cached there. She fired through the leather.
The field chief clutched his stomach. Blood pumped between his agonized
fingers. He pitched forward on his face.
The girl from THURSH whirled to face the
others, drawing the gun from her bag. The group, three European and the big
Polynesian, stared silently at her.
"Get the THRUSH-Pacific on the
coder!" she snapped. "It sends though the water. The storm
atmospherics will not interfere."
One of the Europeans came to remove a
silver key from the body of the dead man. He moved back, keeping a wary eye on
the gun in Lupe's hand.
He inserted the key in an electronic box.
The key completed a complicated circuit inside.
A voice from the box said,
"Four-oh-one. The check shows the mixer-coder in operation. We cannot be
intercepted. You may speak."
This is THRUSH outpost three," Lupe
said, going over to the mike, but keeping her gun on the men. "I had to
liquidate the field chief here. Inform the rest of my status, please."
"The lady known to you as Lupe de
Rosa is a member of the Supreme THRUSH scientific board. Her orders take
precedence over all other THRUSH agents below Division One level. Is this
understood?"
Each of the men, including the
Polynesian, were required to give his identification number into the black box
and their understanding.
"Can you report now?" the voice
asked Lupe.
"You have my report to the time I
contacted the Waterloo. I was unable to go aboard
because of the high seas. However, the data I received from the ship permitted
me to deduce the trouble. It came from a weak signal generated by one of the
focalpoints we use to start the gravitational spin to create the revolving
storm. I came here in the submarine after ordering the guidance crew on the Waterloo to move the storm's eye over the atoll here."
"Excellent!" the THRUSH voice
said. "What did you learn?"
"The trouble is sabotage! Someone in
this group deliberately grounded the central machine. It could not put out full
power. The saboteur is surely still among us!"
"There are electronic interrogation
machines in the submarine," the THRUSH voice said. "Did it
remain?"
"Yes, it is submerged in the lagoon
to keep it from being harmed when the eye passes," Lupe said.
"Call the sub commander and have one
of the machines brought up to the control room," the THRUSH voice said.
"Ferret out the traitor as quickly as possible—and take care of him! I'd
like a report as soon as possible on his identity."
"I will do so," Lupe said
crisply. "I also have either Solo or Kuryakin prisoner here. I never could
get their faces straight in my mind. The other one is dead. He burned up in the
plane crash."
"Wonderful!" the THRUSH voice
said. "Give him a complete interrogation on the machine. File a full
report of all you learn from him. This will give us a full picture of how much
U.N.C.L.E. knows of our present program. This is a wonderful break!"
"Then may I—liquidate—him after the
interrogation?" Lupe asked with a vicious sidelong glance at Illya.
"You may have the pleasure, my
dear!" the voice replied.
What hit Illya Kuryakin hardest was not
the death sentence imposed on him, but Lupe's claim that Napoleon had burned to
death in the plane.
He swallowed a huge lump in his throat
and stared stonily at his captors.
Silently he promised himself that he
would find some way to avenge Napoleon Solo before they destroyed him.
Lupe also turned to face the outpost
crew.
"None of you are to leave this room
until we get the interrogator over here!" she snapped.
She walked around to face Illya. He took
a deep breath. The belts binding him to the chair cut into his arms.
"I'm willing to make a deal,"
he said in a toneless voice.
She smiled cruelly. "I've been with
THRUSH for five years. I was recruited right out of college and sent to work
with that fool Santos-Lopez. So you see I have had plenty of experience with
U.N.C.L.E. and its people. You do not make deals."
"Can I bring up one point to
convince you that I might?" Illya asked quietly, giving her a steady
stare.
She gave him a sharp look back.
"I'll listen to anything." she said.
"It is this," Kuryakin said.
"What makes you think this is the only place where we were able to plant
saboteurs?"
She started. She started breathing hard.
Her face turned white.
Stabbing in the dark, but basing his
supposition on her alarm, he said, "I know that this storm brewer is your
baby. It means everything to you because you developed it from Santos-Lopez's
basic data on storm destruction. You saw a way to twist his principles around.
You sold the idea to THRUSH. You'll go high with them if it works. You many not
need any social security for your old age if it fails—for people who fail
THRUSH don't have old ages. I might keep you from failing!"
"You're trying to trick me!"
she snapped. "I can get everything out of your mind with the interrogation
machine and you know it!"
"Can you?" Illya said and gave
her a malicious grin. "What about this!"
He partially opened his mouth and made a
quick flip of his tongue too fast for her to follow clearly.
"See it?" he said and sneered
at her. "It's a mouth capsule—of poison, Lupe! I'm going to die anyway. I
heard that voice from THRUSH pronounce sentence on me. I'm going to beat you to
the punch! All I have to do is crush down on this thing with my teeth—and
there'll be no mind left for you to probe!"
She sucked in her breath sharply. Her
eyes searched his face, looking for some clue to the truth of his claim.
"I don't believe you!" she
cried hoarsely.
Illya Kuryakin shrugged. "That's a
chance you have to take. Shall I point out the saboteur here—as a mark of my
good faith? Then if I prove right when you put him on the interrogator, maybe
we can make a deal on what other U.N.C.L.E. men are hidden in your
organization, here and in the Atlantic."
"I don't believe you!" she
whispered again.
"Okay!" Illya said.
He looked over the silent, tense group of
men across the room from them. He selected the one he least thought could
possibly be the unknown saboteur.
"That's the one!" he said,
nodding his head toward the man.
The man, small and with a rat-face,
squeaked in alarm. "That's a lie! That's a lie! He's lying like a dog!
Don't believe him. He—"
He lost his sense of judgment in his
alarm. He started toward Lupe, his arms outstretched in fearful supplication.
"Stop!" Lupe snarled, and
before the frightened man could obey she shot him.
The rest stared in silent fascination at
the dead man. Illya's anxious eyes were scanning their faces. He was seeking
some clue to which was the real saboteur.
When he first mentioned that he was going
to reveal the man's name, the noticed the big brutish Polynesian unconsciously
grip his fists. Then when he named the rat-faced man, the fists relaxed.
He thought this very curious. His eyes
went back to the giant. It seemed impossible for this nearly naked native to
know enough about the operations to sabotage it in the first place. And even
more puzzling, what could be his motive?
Obviously the man lived on this island.
He was here when the THRUSH men came. He certainly was not an U.N.C.L.E. agent.
And so far as Illya Kuryakin knew, no other organization was aware of these
stormy operations.
He caught the giant's eye. The big
Polynesian looked back at him dully, the very picture of brutish stupidity.
"It can't be," Illya told
himself.
His eyes sought the faces of the others
as they listened to the cold, murderous voice of Lupe de Rosa warn them that
the same bullet would be waiting for any of them who tried to come toward her
until she determined which was the traitor.
Illya stared at her, then looked back at
the big Polynesian. The giant stared straight ahead, his face still a mask of
stupidity.
"Maybe—" Illya told himself.
"Maybe, but if he did—why?"
TWO
His thoughts were interrupted by a thin
chime from among the masses of electronic equipment. After warning the huddled
group of men not to move, Lupe went over to the machine. Watching her, Illya
could see why she had risen so high in THRUSH circles. She was completely
ruthless in furthering her ambitions.
Lupe de Rosa pressed a circuit switch.
Immediately the voice they had heard before came out of the speaker.
"We have received reports from the Waterloo that the storm has maintained its strength. This
indicates that the Pacific tests are now successful. What is your considered
opinion in launching an immediate attack according to Plan A?"
"I am ready," the girl said
firmly.
"Good!" the voice said.
"We must know if U.N.C.L.E. is sufficiently aware of our activity to throw
any kind of barrier in our way. As soon as the interrogator turns the mind of
this U.N.C.L.E. man inside out, report at once."
"Yes, sir," Lupe said.
"Then if we are safe from
U.N.C.L.E., the attack of storms against the East and West Coasts of the United
States, Hawaii, Japan, India, France, England, the North Countries and the
Mediterranean countries will be launched exactly twelve hours from now. Is
there any technical reason why this should not be done?"
"None!" Lupe said firmly.
"Excellent. If this succeeds, you
will be more than amply rewarded. You have earned our deepest gratitude."
The girl's face flushed with pleasure as
the connection was broken. Kuryakin shivered as he thought of the utter
devastation the chain of hurricanes and storms would bring to the world. He
knew that meteorologists claimed the damage from one typhoon was equal to a
thousand atom bombs. This meant that THRUSH's stormy attack would bring more
destruction to the world than if all the nuclear powers on earth fired all
their stockpiled atomic bombs. The terror, devastation and death would be
beyond belief.
His grim thoughts were broken by a sudden
bellow from the big Polynesian.
"Missy!" he cried, his deep
voice sounded like the bass blast of a conch horn. "The prisoner! He
moved! I think his arms loose!"
"What?" Lupe cried, whirling
about. "Check him!"
"Yes, Missy!" the giant said
and lumbered toward Illya. Kuryakin was sure now that he was the saboteur.
He waited breathlessly to see what trick
the native would pull.
As the big man rounded the bank of
computer cases, he suddenly grabbed one and overturned it. It smashed back into
Lupe. She fell with a strangled cry. Her gun exploded into the bunker ceiling
as she fell.
The giant whirled. His face no longer
looked stupid. He caught the back of Illya's chair. He sent it and its bound
occupant crashing into the men who charged him.
Illya and the chair crashed into the
three men. They all sprawled into a heap. The wooden chair legs collapsed,
leaving Kuryakin's arms still bound to the intact back.
Before any of them could scramble up, the
native hit the light switch. In the wild melee in the dark Illya crawled to one
side and got to his feet. He started to twist and strain in a frantic attempt
to free himself.
Across the computer room the door opened.
He glimpsed the native leaping out into the night. He tried to follow and
crashed into one of the THRUSH men. They both fell. Before Kuryakin could get
up, the lights came on. He saw one of the men aiming a savage blow at his head.
He tried to dodge, but didn't make it.
The blow was not sufficient to knock him
out, but it kicked him off balance. He fell and his head struck the edge of the
upset computer. He sprawled flat. His senses reeled. He fought to hold his
consciousness.
As if from a great distance he heard
Lupe's outraged screams for the men to help her reset the fallen computer.
"The storm is out of control without
it!" she cried.
As if in answer to her cry, the eye began
to move from its stationary position over the atoll. The wild winds whipped
toward the island.
ACT XI: THE PASSING STORM
Napoleon Solo kept his eyes closed as the
THRUSH man ordered the big Polynesian to leave him to burn in the flaming
plane. The native moved the imprisoning log slightly in his first attempt to
free the man from U.N.C.L.E. Solo was afraid to test it with the two still
about.
The sounds from the back showed him that
Kuryakin was captured. He knew that their only chance lay in himself staying
free. He did not feel that he could capture the entire island alone. He hoped
only to stay free long enough for the storm to pass. Then the atmospherics
would clear up sufficiently for the pen-communicator to get a message out to
U.N.C.L.E. headquarters.
After that it didn't matter what happened
to him.
Out on the wing the flaming gasoline was
spreading rapidly toward the cockpit. He knew he had only minutes left. He
raised his head slowly. The pilot's compartment door was open. He could see the
THRUSH men taking their Air Force prisoners out through the waist door.
If they looked around they could see him.
But it was a risk he had to take.
The flames were so close to the cockpit
that the heat was scorching through the metal skin of the plane.
He pushed against the log. He was unable
to bulge it. The terrific heat of the encroaching fire was causing the sweat to
roll down his face. The slight movement made by the Polynesian giant helped
some. He could move slightly, but not enough to squeeze out.
He relaxed, panting from his exertions.
The heat was becoming unbearable. He pressed his body up as tightly as he could
against the imprisoning log. He reached in behind, struggling to loosen the
belt that held the seat padding in place. He grabbed one end and tried to pull
it free.
It came part of the way and stuck. He
took a fresh grip and jerked again. His hand was so sweaty from the increasing
heat that his fingers slipped. He hastily dried them on his trouser leg and
took a fresh grip. He sucked in his stomach and pressed his body up, grating
against the rough trunk of the tree.
He slowly pulled the padding away.
This gave him extra space and he started
working his body free. It came slowly, tearing his clothing and in places
raking the flesh raw.
He finally pulled himself free and fell
back on the flight deck. The metal was unbearably hot. The plexiglass side
windows suddenly shattered under the terrific heat of the burning wing. Flames
licked hungrily into the cockpit. Solo staggered back through the hatch into
the waist of the plane.
He peered cautiously through the broken
door. The THRUSH men had gone with their prisoners.
He hesitated, then jumped down to the
ground. He bent almost double and scurried into the uprooted coconut grove to
keep from presenting a target against the light of the blazing plane.
The typhoon devastation was terrific. The
once densely palmed island had half its trees snapped or uprooted. Looking
about, Napoleon could see the giant wall of the eye moving in. The storm was
but half over. He realized he had only a short time before the island would
again be lashed by the fury of the typhoon. Unless he found some sort of
shelter, there was little chance that he would survive the storm.
He started to circle, seeking tracks in
the wet sand to show him where the THRUSH men took their prisoners. He found
the tracks leading up the beach. He was afraid to walk along the sand for fear
he would be spotted. He took the difficult way, climbing over the broken,
uprooted trees.
As he went he carefully checked his
protective devices. The .38 special was still in his shoulder holster. In his
pockets he carried several of the standard U.N.C.L.E. defensive equipment. The
pen-communicator. A chewing gum that was actually a power explosive. A ring
with a secret needle for dispensing knockout drops. Mints which developed a
blinding smokescreen when dropped in water. A tie pin hiding a bulb of tear
gas.
Each of them at one time or another had
saved his life in a tight spot. Right then he had no idea what he could do or
how he could use them, but he took comfort in their presence.
He continued to follow the trail until it
branched. One line, with the most footprints led back toward the lagoon. The
second, showing only the marks of three people.
Solo hesitated, knowing that he was
throwing away any chance of success if he chose the wrong track. He got down on
his hands and knees. The wet sand held the impression well, but he was unable
to determine if either of the footprints belonged to Kuryakin. However, one
definitely was a woman's print.
He got up, making a decision to follow
it. He continued for several hundred yards and after climbing over a jumbled
mass of uprooted trees, he came to a hill or large mound.
He stopped, suddenly suspicious. Such a
formation was decidedly unusual on a normally flat coral island. Once it
apparently had been covered with brush and vines. The storm had ripped these
away. Under the torn areas he could see the marks of a concrete structure under
the carefully arranged soil. He circled it, seeking some kind of an entrance.
He found it at the north end. Once it had been carefully screened by vines, but
the typhoon had ripped them away.
"They must have taken Illya and the
Air Force prisoners in there," he told himself.
He sat down on an uprooted palm. He was
bone weary. His arms and legs ached from the struggle to keep the plane in the
air. His skin burned.
Solo permitted himself only the briefest
rest. Then he took a deep breath and tried to whip his flagging brain into
action. A dozen wild plans turned over in his mind. He discarded every one as
being impossible and wearily started over again.
He knew he could not expect to force the
opening into the underground shelter. There was an excellent possibility he
could blow an opening in the door with his explosive "chewing gum."
Kneaded and fused with its almost microscopic cap, the U.N.C.L.E. developed
super-explosive no bigger than a wad of gum packed the power of several sticks
of dynamite.
However, he had no way of knowing what
was immediately beyond the door. He would be sacrificing his element of
surprise, his most precious asset, for little advantage.
He decided that his greatest chance of
success lay in drawing the THRUSH men from the shelter where he could ambush as
many as possible.
Once his decision was made, Napoleon Solo
worked rapidly. He carefully prepared two wads of the gum explosive and stuck
them to ends of sticks. These he carefully laid on the sand beside him. Then he
took a third and attached it to a small splinter of wood.
He raised up slowly from his hiding place
behind a tangled pile of storm riven trees. There seemed no guards about the
outside of the THRUSH outpost.
He crept quickly to the side of the mound
covering the structure. He pushed a hole in the wet sand, using a piece of
stick. He adjusted the tiny automatic fuse, no bigger than a BB shot, for a
five-minute time lag and hurried back to his protected spot.
He did not expect the explosion to break
an opening. It wasn't designed for that. He was sure that this place had some
connection with the THRUSH storm generating system. If so, that meant there
would have to be considerable electronic equipment inside. He wanted to create
a shock wave to throw the equipment off register. This, he hoped, would bring
the operators rushing out to find the cause.
When they did, they would be met by a
devastating bomb made by more gum explosive stuck to the wooden stick. He hoped
under the confusion of this blast to get inside. Then if his suspicions were
true about the function of the bunker-type building, the third gum bomb would
effectively destroy the interior.
It seemed an effective plan. The only
thing that worried him was the whereabouts of the prisoners. He was sure that
they were also in the bunker. An explosion to rip up the storm generating
equipment could injure or even kill them. He hoped there was some way to avoid
that, but if not, then he knew Illya Kuryakin would understand.
The lives of millions were more important
than the lives of a few. Every U.N.C.L.E. agent knew this. As military men, the
Air Forces prisoners would understand as well.
Napoleon Solo looked at the luminous dial
of his watch. It had been but a single minute since he placed the charge. This
surprised him. It seemed an age. He shook the watch to make sure it was
running.
Then, as he looked up, he saw something
move in the darkness behind him. He whirled. There was a rustling of the broken
palms for the utter stillness of the typhoon eye was starting to break with
some wind as the wall of clouds moved closer to the atoll with the passing of
the eye. A few drops of rain were starting to fall.
Napoleon looked anxiously at the sky,
hoping the full fury of the returning storm would hold off until he completed
his mission.
If he could destroy the outpost, he would
consider himself paid for. After that, if he came out of it alive, he had
plenty to live for. If not—well, it had been a good life while it lasted. He
couldn't complain.
He turned back to watch for the
explosion, sure that what he had seen was a wind-blown palm. Then out of the
corner of his eye he caught another suspicious movement. This time it was too
definite to be his imagination.
He whirled, jerking his hand toward his
shoulder holster. He was just a fraction of a second late. His assailant swung
at his head with a piece of wooden pole. Solo ducked, but his legs bumped
against the mass of uprooted trees. It threw him off balance and he took the
savage blow on the shoulder. It knocked him to his knees. He glimpsed the flash
of brown skin as his unknown attacker tried to hit again.
This time the tree trunks interferred
with his assailant. Napoleon ducked another blow and managed to get the gun
out. He got his first good look at his attacker. He started with surprise. It
was a girl—a native in a sarong she wore as beautifully as if she came from a
technicolored Hollywood film.
TWO
She hesitated in the face of his gun.
"Don't move!" Solo said.
She stood staring at him. The rising wind
whipped her hair. He couldn't see her face too clearly in the darkness.
Suddenly she leaped back, jumping over two entwined broken trees. She dropped
out of sight.
Napoleon Solo heard her move. She seemed
to be circling, seeking a chance to attack him again. Suddenly he started. He
wondered why his usually sharp mind had not noticed the most peculiar thing
about her before.
This was how quietly she fought him. Had
she been attached to THRUSH she would surely have called for help.
"Where are you?" he called
softly. "Don't be afraid. I am not one of them. I am their enemy who came
by the vakalele."
The rustling noise ceased.
"Don't you understand?" he
said. "If I was one of them, I would have shouted for help. I am their
enemy and your friend."
This argument was telling. She realized
the same as he that a THRUSH agent would have yelled. He would not have fought
in silence as they both did, each afraid of alerting the enemy inside the
bunker.
She stepped back into the small clearing.
Napoleon Solo looked at his watch. There
was still two minutes before the explosion.
"You came in the boat that
flies?" she said, her voice low and as sweet as he always imagined the
brown-skinned beauties of the Far Pacific islands.
"Yes," he said. "What are
these men doing here? How can we help each other?"
"They are evil men!" she said
fiercely. "They came to our island. They threatened us with death. They
forced our people to build and slave for them."
"What are they doing here?"
"I do not know," she said.
"But my—the man I love, he knows. He is the son of the talking chief and
very smart. He went to the native college in Laie and then came back here. He
said they were very evil men and he would find out what they were doing and
when the British commissioner makes his annual inspection, he would tell
him."
"Where is your boy friend now?"
Solo asked. "Perhaps he and I can work together."
"He is in there," she pointed
at the closed door of the bunker. "He is very big and very strong. They
use him for their work slave. He makes them think he is stupid so he can learn
what they are doing."
"I see," Napoleon said,
remembering the big Polynesian who tried to free him in the plane.
"Oh, I am so afraid for him!"
the girl cried. "That is why I came here to watch. I am afraid they will
find him spying and kill him!"
"We'll help him," Napoleon
assured her. "How about your people? How many of them can we trust to help
us?"
"They will do what Kahlihi tells them,"
she said.
"Can you arrange for me to talk to
Kahlihi?"
"He is with the bad men," she
replied. "Even I cannot get to talk to him. That is why I came here in the
storm. I just want to see him."
"Then can I talk to your next
chief?"
"Nobody will talk to you unless
Kahlihi orders," she replied. "They fear all strangers."
"But can't—"
"There is nothing anyone can do.
These bad men have placed a terrible taboo on this end of the island. Any of
our people who come here, except those chosen for slaves, die by the death
lights?"
"What are the death lights?"
"They placed them around this end of
the island. They work night and day and anyone approaching this place dies. The
storm tore them down and so I came, hoping just to see my beloved. Just a
glimpse of him is all I ask. Then I could sneak away. After the storm they will
replace the lights."
There was a resigned defiance on the
girl's face that told him she spoke the truth. Mentally he drew a line through
the idea that he might get native help. Whatever he did he must do alone.
"What about you?" he asked,
"Will you help me?"
"If Kahlihi tell me to," she
replied.
Napoleon Solo sighed, defeated.
"Well, I guess—"
He broke off startled by the sudden
opening of the bunker door. The big Polynesian came bounding through it.
Napoleon saw the shadow of someone running after him. He saw the outline of a
gun raised in the shadow's hand.
The girl screamed. Napoleon tried to grab
her hand, but she broke away, running to help her lover.
Solo jerked his gun out and half raised
up from behind the protecting barrier of trees.
Before he could shoot to protect the
hysterical girl, the charge he set went off. Wet sand and debris shot into the
air. The ground rocked. The shot fired at her went wild. Shooting before the
sound of the explosion died, Napoleon put a shot into the body of the THRUSH
man. Then he jumped the storm piled debris and ran toward the bunker door,
carrying his improvised gum bomb.
A shot whined past his ear. Someone was
shooting at him from inside the door. He threw himself flat, scrambling for
cover. Another bullet smacked into the coconut log.
"Give me some help! I think it's
that other rat from U.N.C.L.E.!" the gunman yelled back inside the bunker.
"He wasn't burned after all!"
"Get on the intercom radio!"
Napoleon recognized Lupe de Rosa's voice. "Call the submarine! Tell them
to send men up here at once!"
THREE
The wind was rising fast. The rain was
getting harder. Napoleon Solo knew the full fury of the typhoon would be upon
him within minutes. His chances of survival here in the open were slim. Even if
he lived, he would come out of it so beaten and exhausted he could not possibly
hope to elude the searchers Lupe was sending to hunt him.
He felt he had only one slim chance—and
he took it. He jumped up, even though it presented a perfect target for the
gunman and hurled the gum bomb at the open doorway.
As he threw, he heard the report of the
THRUSH gun. But the gunman fired too quickly, startled as he was by the
unexpected appearance of Solo. The bullet went wild and Napoleon fell flat,
scrambling for protection behind the fallen trees.
As he fell, the gum bomb went off. It was
a larger charge than the one he set in the ground to pull attention out the
bunker. It ripped the concrete facing around the door, and ripped the heavy
wooden barrier from its hinges.
Smoke, debris and dust from the shattered
concrete choked the opening. Solo, gun clutched in his hand, leaped the fallen
trees and darted toward the opening. The wind was increasing in fury by the
second. Napoleon could only hope that he could get inside before the wind
flushed the dust and smoke away.
He charged into the blinding cloud,
bumped against the shattered door and pressed against the inside wall. He held
his gun ready to shoot at the first sign of a target.
"Put up your hands, Mr. Solo!"
It was Lupe de Rosa's voice, cold and
deadly.
"I have you squarely in the sights
of an infra-red scope!" she went on. "You know I can see you
perfectly in the dark!"
Her voice echoed so that Napoleon could
not place her position. He let the gun and the last remaining gum bomb drop
from his hands to the floor.
"Get a light!" Lupe snapped.
"And shore up that broken door. The storm is moving again. I don't want
the rain ruining our equipment."
Light flooded the room. Napoleon Solo saw
the girl standing across the room with a THRUSH gun aimed at him.
There were two THRUSH men across from
her. Illya Kuryakin lay on the floor by Lupe's feet. His hands were bound to a
chair back. Remnants of the rest of the chair were scattered, showing Illya had
put up some kind of battle. His legs were free. Kuryakin didn't move.
Napoleon flicked a quick glance at the
two THRUSH men. Neither seemed to be armed, but he could not be sure.
"Bind him!" Lupe snapped,
motioning toward Solo. "I want his mind dredged by the interrogation
machine before he's shot. This is a break. The other one may be dead, but we
can still find out what U.N.C.L.E. knows about our work. Where is that machine?
Get on the intercom and call the sub after you tie him up."
The two men came toward Solo, but Lupe
was too smart for him. When he tensed, she warned the men: "Get back, you
fools! Don't come between my gun and that U.N.C.L.E. rat!"
The two men jumped aside, split and
circled around the bank of electronic equipment to come at Napoleon Solo from
different sides.
Solo shot them a quick glance. Neither
appeared to be armed—probably because Lupe did not trust them. He cut his eyes
back for the briefest contact with Kuryakin. Illya gave him a nod.
Suddenly Illya kicked the side of a
computer with his unbound foot. Lupe jumped at the unexpected noise. She jerked
her head around. The two men stopped to look back.
In that brief instant of their
inattention, Napoleon Solo ducked behind a line of computers. He grabbed the
corner of an electronic cabinet and overturned it as the two men leaped for
him.
Lupe gave a strangled cry of rage and
whirled to bring her gun to bear on Solo as he raised up to overturn another
cabinet to slow down the two men pursuing him.
Illya Kuryakin lurched to his feet. His
hands were still bound to the chair back, but he bent low and rammed his head
into the small of the girl's back. She fell and her head smashed against the
side of a computer.
Kuryakin turned and kicked at the gun
that fell from her nerveless fingers.
He sent it skidding down the path between
the banks, directly toward Solo.
Napoleon stooped to grab it, but before
he could straighten up, one of the THRUSH men leaped on his back. They both
fell. Solo twisted to avoid a knee in his stomach.
The second man's foot slammed down on his
wrist as he sought to jerk the gun up. The first man caught Solo with a savage
kick in the ribs. Napoleon managed to catch his foot with his one free hand.
The THRUSH man fell heavily on top of Solo.
Kuryakin came charging toward them. He
was still unable to free his hand, but he caught the second THRUSH man with a
hard drive of his hunched shoulder, knocking the man back against another of
the long line of electronic cabinets.
Freed momentarily of the double menace,
Napoleon Solo caught his opponent with a hard blow to the chin. The man's head
snapped back and his eyes glazed. Napoleon grabbed the THRUSH gun with his left
hand. As he opponent tried to jump him again, Solo pulled the trigger. He
whirled as the second assailant tried to duck around Kuryakin. Solo pulled the
trigger a second time.
Kuryakin stepped back quickly to avoid
the falling body. He grinned at his battered partner.
"I've been glad to see a lot of
things in my life," he said. "But never have I been so glad to see
anyone as I was you!"
Solo tried to grin back, but his mouth
was too battered by a blow he never even knew he took. "And I guess
Waverly was right," he said through his puffy lips. "You are the
difference!"
"What do we do now?" Illya
asked as Napoleon unbound his arms.
"What do you know about this
stuff?" he waved his hands at the electronic gear still operating.
"From what I overheard," Illya
said. "There are three of these outposts. It takes a radiation feed from
all three to keep the storm going. The Waterloo focuses
the transmitted beams and directs the storm. That big black box in the center
is the transmitter."
"Then let's see what happens,"
Solo said. He raised the THRUSH gun and put three quick shots through the
plexiglass window in front. Bulbs shattered and there was a flash of blue light
as the circuit shorted.
For a moment it seemed to have no effect,
the increasing fury of the storm battered at the broken door of the bunker.
"I guess it didn't—" Illya
began.
The rest of his words were lost in a
tremendous explosive sound like the crash of a hundred bombs. The concrete
bunker shook with the violent force of a severe earthquake. The lights went
out. Two great cracks ripped across the concrete ceiling.
Water poured in. The rain suddenly became
a solid mass of water as the clouds dumped their entire contents at once.
"We had better get out of
here!" Illya Kuryakin shouted above the din. "This ceiling looks like
it is going to come all the way down any second!"
"We'll drown outside!" Solo
shouted back.
"Okay! So you get to pick the way
you want to die!"
"Then let's drown! It's better than
being crushed!" Solo said.
They started for the door, but by the
time they arrived, the clouds were gone, wrung dry by that one great deluge.
Water ran a foot deep in the bunker and
across the island. But the sky over head showed stars to all horizons.
"Great!" Illya said. "We
should be able to get a call in to Mr. Waverly. We have definite proof now. He
can get Air Force planes out to sink the Waterloo."
"Then there is the matter of the Air
Force prisoners," Solo said.
"They were taken to the submarine
for safe keeping. It is in the lagoon."
"We'll have to do something about
that," Napoleon said.
"What can we do?" Illya asked.
"We can figure out something, I
guess," Solo said. "Do you mind if I pass that detail to you?"
But as it happened, this was not
necessary. The girl, Aloma, came running to meet them. Breathlessly she told
Solo that her lover, the big Polynesian, had rallied his people after he
escaped from the bunker. Those in the sub had not heard of his deflection and
opening the hatch when he called. He held it open until his war party broke in.
They took the vessel.
Illya Kuryakin looked at the girl with
open admiration.
"Say, Solo," he said, "Ask
her if she's got a sister?"
"Sister?" the girl said,
"Oh, yes, I get!"
"Wait!" Napoleon said. "He
was just joking. He—"
"Speak for yourself!" Illya
retorted.
A few minutes later, after they made sure
that the THRUSH sub crew was completely subdued, Napoleon Solo contacted Mr.
Waverly on the pen-communicator.
He gave a brief report. Waverly promised
to get planes and ships out to locate the Waterloo and
the other two outposts. At the same time, they would send search planes into
the Pacific and Indian oceans to find the storm generating positions there.
"We have Lupe de Rosa under
guard," Napoleon said. "She's still pretty dizzy from a blow on the
head. As soon as she is able we'll interrogate her under the truth serum. I
think then we will have the complete story and locations. That will wind up the
whole affair."
"Excellent, Mr. Solo," Mr.
Waverly said. "And how is Mr. Kuryakin?
"Great!" Napoleon said.
"You know that pretty native girl I told you helped us?"
"You mean that she and
Kuryakin—?"
"No, sir. She has a native boy
friend. Illya asked her if she had a sister. She did."
"Oh, so Mr. Kuryakin and the sister
are looking at the tropic moon?"
"Yes, sir, and is she lovely. The
biggest brown eyes you ever saw. Wavy hair down to her shoulders. A laughing
mouth. And she is wearing a genuine grass skirt."
"Hmmm!" the U.N.C.L.E. chief
said. "Maybe I'd better hurry that plane out for you before Mr. Kuryakin
goes native."
"Oh, I don't know," Solo said.
"You see Aloma either didn't understand what Illya meant when he asked if
she had a sister or she is a great kidder. Just a minute I'll tune you in on
the romance—"
In New York the U.N.C.L.E. chief was
startled to hear his agent's voice say: "No! No. it's 'Pat-a-cake,
pat-a-cake, baker's man—"
Then a tiny voice said,
"Pat-eee—cake, Pat—ee-cake—"
"What?" Waverly said.
"That's right," Solo replied.
"The sister is almost, but not quite three years old!"
Waverly chucked. "Tell Mr. Kuryakin
I said, 'Better luck next time!'"
THE END
No comments:
Post a Comment