[Magazine 1966-­09] - The Brainwash Affair - Davis Robert Hart - Страница 16

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She was like a robot.

He lifted her from the chair, hand clasping her wrist.

"You're hurting me, sir," she said in that smiling, empty voice.

He saw there was no sense trying to reason with her. She had no memory of him, none of having been prisoner in the dungeon.

He simply smiled back at her, marched her across the inner office to the door marked M. Caillou, Private.

He did not knock. The false Caillou swung around as Solo closed the door behind him and Yvonne.

Caillou leaped toward the phone. But Solo said, "Don't do it, fellow." He showed him the U.N.C.L.E. .38 Special.

Caillou winced, straightened. "What do you want?"

"We'll start with the easy questions," Solo said. "Who are you?"

"Why, he's Monsieur Lester Caillou," Yvonne said, as if a tape had been activated inside her by the question.

He sighed, seeing that Yvonne had been programmed by Dr. Maunchaun to recognize this man as the real Caillou under every condition. He ignored her.

He tilted the gun. "I'm waiting, fellow. I tell you this. If I kill you now, Maunchaun's little plan will fall apart. I can end it at any moment, simply by removing you. You better think about that. No matter what they promised you, you won't collect it with bullets in you."

The false Caillou sank into a chair behind his desk. "My name is Jacques DuMont. I am nobody. I was a race-track gambler from Marseilles. I was forced into this. It is not from choice I do it. You will gain nothing by killing me."

"Unfortunately, you're wrong. Still, I hope I don't have to."

DuMont shivered. His face revealed his sickness. "What do you want of me?"

"Quite a bit, I'm afraid. We'll begin by having you call for your car. You are to tell your chauffeur to meet you at the building entrance. But if you say one word more than this, it will be your last."

He held the gun near DuMont's face while the impostor made the call to the building garage. He re placed the phone, his hand shaking.

"Let's go."

DuMont got his hat.

Solo said, "I warn you. I have filed the firing mechanism of my gun so that even anything that disturbs me will cause it to fire. Even if I am killed, you also are dead. You'd better concentrate on keeping me alive."

They went through the outer offices. DuMont spoke to no one, looked neither left nor right. Yvonne accompanied them.

They entered one of the elevators, descended to the street. At the door, Solo checked, seeing the Rolls Royce in the loading area. He also saw the men lounging along the building, aware that they were THRUSH gunmen.

"You will cross the walk, get in the car," Solo told DuMont and Yvonne. "Walk naturally. Remember that my gun is fixed on you. You lose, no matter what happens."

DuMont nodded. The chauffeur got out of the car, came around and opened its rear door as Yvonne and the false banker crossed the walk under the canopy.

Solo waited until the chauffeur closed the door and started around the car again. He stepped out of the door, angled across the walk. He moved along the car behind the chauffeur, timing it so that his gun touched his back as he opened the door.

"Get in and drive as I tell you," Solo ordered. He got into the rear of the car. The driver moved the car out into the traffic. He spoke into the communicator.

"Where do you wish to go?"

Solo spoke grimly. "The Chateau Caillou, driver."

DuMont and the chauffeur stared at him as if he were crazy. Solo shrugged. Perhaps they were right.

PART FOUR:

INCIDENT OF THE EIFFEL TOWER

A MILE FROM the Caillou chateau, Napoleon Solo ordered the driver to turn the car off the highway. They pulled into a copse of trees in the hammock below the huge old estate.

Solo secured the driver with ropes, and left him gagged on the rear floor of the Rolls. Walking behind Yvonne and Jacques, he entered the grounds through a wooden door in the stone wall.

They came up behind the servants' quarters, moved past the garage. At the wall of the house, Solo found the lever which opened a sliding door.

They stepped into the stairway, leading down.

They reached the foot of the steps in the basement foyer before the alarms wailed through the ancient castle.

Maunchaun's voice crackled on the inter-com. When Albert and the guards ran out on the level above them, Solo did not even move his gun from Jacques' spine. Maunchaun ordered: "Shoot him. I do not care why he came back here. I shall no longer tolerate his meddling!"

Solo said nothing, but Jacques DuMont screamed in the terror that had been building inside him on the long ride out from the city. "Wait!"

Guns were already raised, sighted on Solo. Yvonne continued to stand near them, robot-like, unmoved by anything that happened around her.

"Wait!" DuMont yelled again. "A hair-trigger. Even if he is shot, I shall be killed. Wait!"

The men with the guns hesitated.

Solo spoke in a conversational tone. "I hope you heard that, Dr. Maunchaun."

There was a pause. The intercom crackled vibrantly.

At last Maunchaun spoke. "If you kill DuMont, I shall be forced to use the real Caillou. It will not be as easy, but it will still succeed."

"You know better, Maunchaun," Solo said. "It's all over. You know that. It has been, since I got out of here this morning. United Network Command has a full report. They are waiting at a medical center now to receive Lester Caillou—the real Caillou."

"And you expect to walk in here and simply walk out with him unharmed?"

"I haven't given you any terms," Solo said. "I came back for Illya Kuryakin and Lester Caillou. When you bring them here, I will tell you what your chances are to get out of this alive."

Maunchaun laughed. After a moment a guard brought Lester down the steps. At the sight of the real Caillou, Yvonne whimpered gently, looking from him to DuMont––puzzled, the terrors starting in her again.

From the dungeon, a guard led Illya.

Solo winced, seeing his partner. Illya's face was battered and bruised from the beatings inflicted upon him since dawn. He dragged his feet when he walked. His wrists were linked in handcuffs chained to a band about his waist.

Maunchaun laughed again. "You do not look very large, or very awesome on my television screen, Mr. Solo."

Solo continued staring at Illya's swollen face. He did not answer. Involuntarily he jabbed the mouth of his gun into DuMont's spine. The impostor screamed.

"Do you think I am going to let you live, Solo?" Maunchaun's Voice persisted. "You, or Caillou—any of you? If as you suggest you have destroyed my plan to use the World Bank as an instrument of world panic, what have I to gain by permitting you to live to testify against me?"

"You've one gamble, Doctor," Solo said. "You know how long Lester Caillou will live on this drug you've been feeding him."

"Indeed I do."

"I'm willing to gamble with you," Solo said. "I'll exchange DuMont for the real Lester. Caillou, if you let us out of here."

"Why should I?"

"There is a chance Caillou won't live to get to the medical center. There is a chance he won't recover sufficiently to testify against you. That's your only chance."

"And all I have to do is to allow you four people safe conduct from this house?"

"I've bad news for you, Doctor. If we are not out of here in—" Solo checked his watch, "—in thirty more minutes, operatives from United Network Command and the French police will move in here. We're giving you thirty minutes, because if this matter can be settled without further notoriety further panic can be avoided. I thought you'd be interested in thirty minutes. A man like you should be able to do many things in thirty minutes."

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