[Magazine 1966-­06] - The Vanishing Act Affair - Lynds Dennis - Страница 13

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Dabori finished it. "And soon. I know it is soon. They are worried that they will be discovered."

This time the silence was deeper. Maxine Trent seemed lost in her own thoughts. Solo and Illya were seeing the horror of what they had just said. Somehow, Morlock The Great intended to set the powers of the world at war with each other—an atomic war in which the only survivors would be the Cult itself, deep in its shelters. Illya moved.

"You brought weapons for us?" Illya said.

"Of course," Solo said.

Solo hands the extra U.N.C.L.E. Special he had brought to Illya, and handed Dabori the small pistol he carried as a spare. Maxine drew her own pistol from the holster on her leg.

The four crawled back through the opening in the wall into the inner corridor. They followed Dabori as the hunchback led them back along the old stone corridors until they reached a lead door. Dabori opened this door with a key he had stolen, and the four stepped through into the new shelter-headquarters of the Cult.

TWO

AFTER A time, moving down the silent concrete concrete corridors with their faintly whirring air-vents and lead doors, they became aware of a strange silence. Dabori was the first to raise his head. The hunchback was puzzled.

"We should have met guards. There should be noise, some activity," Dabori whispered.

"How many men are down here?" Solo asked, his voice low.

"Normally fifty who are the regulars, and some fifty more who come and go. Morlock did not want too many of us to vanish from the surface at one time. Most of the Cult hold down regular jobs. Only a cadre of elite are permanently down below," Dabori explained.

They continued along the concrete corridors, so silent they could have been buried beneath the Sahara Desert. Illya was worried.

"Do you think Morlock could have started his plan?" the blond Russian said.

"I don't know," Dabori whispered. "He could have. I know it was to be soon."

"You mean you think they have all gone to start whatever their plan is?" Maxine asked.

"It is a possibility," Illya said. "We have no idea what the plan is."

"How can we find out?" Solo spoke quietly to Dabori.

The hunchback shrugged. "The Inner Council. They are the only ones who would know, and they will be very hard to reach, very dangerous."

"Can you get us to them?" Illya said.

"I can take you as far as I know," Dabori said. "That is to a chamber I have seen them enter. The chamber is not where they meet, but it must lead to where they meet. It is always empty after they enter, and there must be some secret exit because they do not come back out for a long time."

"Let's find out," Solo said.

Dabori nodded and, when they reached a cross corridor in the maze of thick concrete tunnels and lead-lined rooms, led them down the corridor to the right. They twisted and turned through the catacomb of concrete. Still they met no one, heard no one. Maxine became nervous.

"It's not right," The Thrush agent said. "It's not natural to meet no guards, hear nothing, Napoleon."

"Until we know better, let's be thankful," Solo remarked.

"Unless we are too late," Illya said grimly.

They moved on through the silent tunnels with Illya's words in their minds. Already hell could be breaking loose above, and they would be trapped down here—safe, but for how long? They would survive the holocaust above, but there was not one of them who thought they would be welcome guests of Morlock the Great.

"There," Dabori said.

They had reached a widening of the corridor, a long, narrow room of benches and tables, obviously a kind of dining hall, to be used during the long, lonely days of waiting for the surface to be safe again. Doors were cut into the concrete walls. It was a small door to their left that Dabori pointed to.

"Stand back," Solo said.

He placed another strip of heat foil on the lock and pulled the metallic cord. The foil burst into white heat. The door melted around the lock. The four hurried through into a small, empty room. Solo indicated the four smooth walls.

"Look for a secret door," Solo said.

The voice that answered was not one of the other three. It was a voice from nowhere.

"Spare yourself, Mr. Solo," the sardonic voice said. "I will show you where the door is."

There was a rumble of concrete and the wall on the left slid, moved and there was a door leading into blackness. The voice was faintly mocking.

"Voila, gentlemen, and lady—the door!"

Illya crouched, let his eyes search the walls around. There was nothing. Solo looked carefully for the source of the voice. Maxine Trent held her pistol and looked form wall to wall. Only Dabori did nothing. The hunchback stood there calmly. Unafraid, but aware that there was nothing to be done.

The voice spoke. "You wish to see me? That could be arranged, but what is the point, gentlemen? We have you now. Look behind you."

They looked.

In the doorway through which they had entered the small room there were a horde of shaggy-haired creatures whose eyes seemed to glow in the dark.

"Take them!" the voice commanded.

Illya and Solo raised their weapons. There was a puff o smoke that instantly filled the room. Then all went black.

* * *

AT FIRST both Solo and Illya seemed to be having the same dream. A dream filled with a face of the Devil himself bathed in a red glow. Their most deadly Thrush enemies crowded behind the face of the Devil and fired at them. The Thrush agents were small, tiny, and the face of the laughing Devil filled their minds.

Then they became aware that they were seated on a damp floor, and the face of the Devil became the satanic face of Morlock The Great.

The magician was not alone. Behind him his deformed, shaggy-haired guards held very efficient-looking machine pistols.

"So, gentlemen, we meet at last. Ah, you have caused me a certain trouble. That little affair in Santa Carla was most inopportune. We had to move our location."

"You should have told us it would be inconvenient," Illya said.

The tiny magician laughed. "Bravado, gentlemen? I expected more from you. Your Mr. Morgan led me to admire U.N.C.L.E. Most resourceful, that one. No one else had ever penetrated out little fortress down here." Morlock looked at Dabori. "Not counting traitors, of course. Ah, Dabori, I was worried about you. Never enough hate for the healthy and handsome. No gall."

"I am not insane," Dabori said softly.

The brilliant eyes of the tiny magician flared as he looked again at the hunchback. Dabori did not flinch. He stared back at his former leader.

"Insane," Dabori said again, softly.

Morlock drew a deep breath, smiled. "It is always the excuse of the weak and faint-hearted. So you have thrown in with the doomed ones, very well. I have no more time to waste with any of you. I don't suppose you will tell me just how much you know, how much your organizations know of my plans."

"We won't," Solo said.

Morlock nodded his grotesquely enlarged head. "I thought not. Well, I leave you now. This prison, you note, is not within my shelter. After it is all over perhaps the death form above will not reach here for some hours, even days. You will have time to think about being almost alone as you die."

Morlock turned to go. Suddenly, Maxine Trent leaped up. None of them had been tied. The beautiful Thrush agent stepped toward Morlock. The shaggy-haired guards rushed forward. Maxine laughed.

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