The Stolen Spaceman Affair Page 5

  "Yes," Waverly said, picking up the unlighted pipe again. "Yes, it would seem so. We are fighting a three-cornered battle, Mr. Slate, Project X men, THRUSH and U.N.C.L.E."

  Waverly looked at his agent from under gray, bushy eyebrows. He rose. "Go back to Hong Kong and await orders," he said. "If you get a lead, notify us and get going! If we get a lead then we will inform you at once. It will be a three-way race between you. So, Mr. Slate, all the advice and encouragement I can give you is to make a fast break from the starting gate, get in front of the pack, and stay there!"

  "Yes, sir!" Mark Slate said positively. "You can put your money on it!"

  "I know I can, Mr. Slate," Alexander Waverly said quietly.

  Then as Mark Slate started to leave, Waverly stopped him. "One moment, Mr. Slate," the U.N.C.L.E. chief said. "There is an emergency message coming in."

  Slate came back, but did not sit down. He stood with his hands pressed against the back of the chair he had been occupying. He watched his chief intently.

  "Yes?" Waverly said, "This is Section 1, Alexander Waverly."

  The message was coming in on a code Slate was not familiar with. He saw Waverly's face grow solemn. Slate's fingers sank into the back of the chair in an unconscious gesture of fear. He was certain the message concerned April Dancer.

  Waverly made no comment until the report ended. Then he said, "Thank you. Keep me informed."

  Waverly looked up to meet Slate's questioning stare. The U.N.C.L.E. chief shook his head slowly. He picked up the unlighted pipe and then put it down again.

  "Yes, it is about April," he said, correctly reading the question in Mark Slate's eyes. "Nothing conclusive. The Hong Kong police report that her room was booby trapped. A policeman was killed when he entered looking for her. They are following a lead that April and another woman---probably the THRUSH girl---were spirited unconscious from the hotel. A laundry truck may have been used. That's the sum total of the investigation at the moment. It is continuing and they promise more concrete information shortly."

  "I'll be on the next plane I can take out," Slate said.

  "Be on it, Mr. Slate!" Waverly said. "Do all you can for Miss Dancer, but don't forget that your first loyalty belongs to the world."

  On the plane to San Francisco Slate received a pen-communicator call from Waverly, reporting that the Hong Kong police reported no luck in tracing April Dancer's abductors.

  He called again to U.N.C.L.E. headquarters when he landed in San Francisco. There was no additional information about April Dancer. However, Napoleon Solo replied from South America. He learned that there was great excitement in Project X cells there.

  "I suspect from that," Waverly told Slate, "that their Khmerranian allies have gotten a fix on our lost astronaut. If so, they will be communicating with their people in Hong Kong to make contact with the Khmerranians. It is imperative, Mr. Slate, that you stop them!"

  The plane was going directly on through to Tokyo and then Hong Kong, but had to refuel for the trans-Pacific hop. The passengers debarked during the servicing. Mark Slate went into the terminal just in time to hear his name paged.

  He walked to the service counter. The girl attendant, so lovely in her airline uniform that Mark Slate unconsciously straightened his tie, brought out a package from under the counter. It was about a foot square.

  "Who left it?" Slate asked suspiciously.

  "A messenger," she said. "Is something wrong?"

  "Might be," Slate said softly. "Would you can the police for me please?"

  The girl's eyes widened, but otherwise she kept her composure. She reached for the telephone on her desk. She quickly dialed and silently passed the phone to him.

  Slate spoke a code that identified him to the police as a man from U.N.C.L.E.

  "I received an unsolicited package," Mark Slate said. "Can you send out a man from the bomb squad to take a look at it before I open the thing?"

  "You'll get help in a couple of minutes," the police sergeant re plied. "Because we often get bomb scares on these planes we keep an expert at the terminal. He has radiological devices to probe any suspicious packages."

  The time estimate was almost perfect. In about two minutes a plain-clothed officer joined Slate. They took the suspect package into a back room. The officer, whose name was Lerner, inspected the wrappings carefully and listened to the contents with a doctor's stethoscope.

  "No ticks," he said, looking up at Slate. "Probably isn't operated by clockwork, but that doesn't mean the contents aren't lethal. Had one last week that triggered by acid eating through a cork."

  Lerner gingerly lifted the square box and placed it in front of an X-ray screen.

  "Stand behind that steel protective plate," he told Slate. "You can never tell about an infernal machine."

  He adjusted his dials from behind a similar screen. There was a slight humming noise, and a shadowgraph of the box's interior showed on the fluorescent screen.

  "It looks like---" the officer said. "Yes! It sure looks like a severed head! A woman's head!"

  "Calling all passengers!" the loud speaker outside broke in. "Flight Number two-oh-one for Tokyo, Hong Kong, and Bangkok is now loading on Ramp---"

  "I've got to run," Mark Slate said hastily. "But it's vitally important to me to know whose head that is. I think I know, but I must be sure."

  "I don't think you had better leave," the officer said. "The Homicide people will want to ask you some questions."

  "This is an emergency," Slate said.

  The officer drew his gun. "I'm sorry," he said quietly. "You will have to remain."

  Outside the loudspeaker droned a warning: "Last call for Flight two oh-one for Tokyo, Hong Kong---"

  Slate groaned. He pulled out his pen-communicator to put through an emergency call to Waverly. But he knew that a request could never get through official channels soon enough to get back to the terminal in time for him to make the plane.

  For one brief frantic moment he debated making a dash for it in spite of the officer's warning. But he realized that even if Lerner didn't shoot him, as would be the officer's right, the demolition expert had only to call the tower to have the plane stopped.

  With the fate of the world's major cities depending on the success of his mission, he knew that the delay could be fatal. He took a deep breath. He realized what he had to do. But he also knew, facing the policeman's gun as he was, that a miscalculation would cause that gun to put a bullet into him.

  "Sorry," the policeman said. "You may really be an U.N.C.L.E. operative for all I know. But I don't know. I'll beg your pardon if I'm wrong. You understand."

  "Yes but I need to be on that Hong Kong plane." Slate took a deep breath and waited for the break he needed so desperately.

  Grimly he thought, "This must be why they sent that grisly thing to me. They wanted me delayed."

  He remembered how Napoleon Solo said things appeared to be coming to a head. That meant every split second now became absolutely precious. He closed his eyes and had a horrible vision of monstrous death rays plunging out of the skies on the earth's major cities. Along with that terrible picture, he had a vision of April Dancer in desperate need of his help herself.

  "I've got to get away!" he told himself. "I've got to---"

  SIX

  VOYAGE TO-DEATH!

  In the hotel room in Kowloon April Dancer had her back to a beautiful view of Hong Kong bay. The view in front of her was just the opposite. It was deadly---the muzzle of a gun held in the hand of a man whose intent was murder!

  "Sit down," her captor said. April Dancer turned slowly as if in a daze. Her eyes lighted on her fallen handbag. She half stooped to pick it up, fighting to make her movement seem casual.

  "Stop!" her captor cried. "Get away from that purse!"

  Reluctantly she dismissed the rash idea. The man was too calm to get rattled easily. April was not averse to taking chances. They were part of her business as an U.N.C.L.E. agent. But she was never foolhardy.

&
nbsp; Her calculations now told her that she didn't have a chance. She stepped reluctantly back to sink in to a chair across from the girl from THRUSH.

  The Project X spy replaced the telephone and circled the room, where he could stand in a line with both girls. He was taking no chances on their attacking him from different directions.

  The THRUSH girl looked across at April. She had regained some of her composure now that the threat of death was postponed temporarily.

  "I suppose if we are going to die together we might as well get acquainted," she said. "I'm Avis Avalee. You didn't tell me your name."

  As a matter of fact, April knew that Avis knew her name. She suspected that this conversation was intended to lull the Project X spy's suspicions. April wasn't sure just what they could do, but she was willing to grasp any straw.

  "I'm April Dancer," she said.

  Then, turning to their captor, she asked, "And who are you?"

  He smiled, "There is an ancient Chinese proverb to the effect that he who holds his tongue will hold his head the longest."

  "Thanks for the advice," April said. "I would like---"

  "The advice is worthless for you," he went on with an evil smile. "Those who employ me wish to interrogate the two of you. Once that is done, you will hold your heads no longer."

  April smiled thinly. "I just won't talk!"

  "Oh, you'll talk," he said in a voice only slightly above a whisper. "You see, Miss Dancer, I am a student of the classical methods of making criminals talk which were employed in the days of the emperors. My ancestors held hereditary positions in the imperial torture chambers. It is a family pride that everyone ever interrogated by a member of my family in his official duty always talked and talked freely. I do not think I will spoil the family record, Miss Dancer! Oh no indeed! You will talk. I promise it!"

  He reached in his pocket and pulled out a tiny bottle. When he uncapped it, a thin green vapor came out. April looked at it anxiously, but their captor was still breathing normally, so she did not suspect its purpose until she started to feel a languor stealing over her.

  She tried to get up, but she couldn't move her limbs. She did not lose consciousness, but the room and the man from Project X shimmered as if she was viewing him through the disturbed waters of a pool.

  She was aware of the two men who came into the room, but she could not make out their faces. Their voices were scarcely distinguishable to the partially paralyzed girl.

  "This is a rare catch, Chu, one of the men said. “We have a supply of truth serum on the junk. I think we will get some valuable information before we take care of them!"

  "I hoped I would be permitted to go along," the Chinese spy said eagerly.

  "You can join us later," the man said. "For the moment there may be an investigation into their disappearance. I want you here to throw the investigators off the track. You have made arrangements for us to get these women out of the hotel without being observed?"

  "Definitely, Senor Pedrito," Chu said quickly. "There is a freight elevator in the rear. I have made financial arrangements with the operator to take you down. The laundry baskets are in the adjoining utility room. The truck is scheduled to arrive in precisely ten minutes. The driver has been paid sufficiently to insure his complete cooperation. "

  "Good," Pedrito said. "You will be taken care of in the proper manner."

  "Oh, thank you, sir!" the Chinese spy said.

  "Yes, like this!" Pedrito said. He pulled a curious-looking gun from his pocket.

  Chu's eyes bulged. "Who---?" he began.

  His words ended in a gurgle as a silent projectile burst from the end of the gun and buried itself in his chest. He collapsed on the floor, spurting blood.

  Pedrito said, "Gather up anything that belongs to the girls. I don't want them connected with this rat's death."

  The other man picked up April's purse. She saw him open it. His image was a vague, fluid outline, but she could see sufficiently to realize he had found the pellet gun built into the clasp. He showed it to Pedrito.

  Pedrito grunted. "U.N.C.L.E. has some tricky kids," he said. "Tear it out. Our laboratory men will want to look at it. And I'll take that automatic in there too."

  "She's got a transistor radio that I want---"

  "Nothing doing!" Pedrito snapped. "Put that stuff back. I want that stuff to go overboard with her. I don't want any evidence on you that the police might find later and connect with her."

  The following events were not clear in April Dancer's mind. She knew that they were being taken from the delivery panel truck and loaded on some kind of a boat. She could hear the wooden hull creak. The lap-lap of water was also plainly audible. She was starting to hear better. This gave her some hope that the paralyzing gas was wearing off. However, she still could not move her limbs.

  As she was carried across the deck, April caught a glimpse of the mast with its lowered sail. She knew then that they were aboard a Chinese fishing junk.

  They were carried into the stern cabin. It was dark inside, almost pitch black when a heavy woven curtain was pulled down over the door to the deck.

  "Do not move!" a harsh voice spoke out of the darkness.

  For a long moment there was no sound. Then a brilliant ray of light shot into their faces. It played across each of their faces and then went out.

  There was another silence, broken only by the lap of water on the junk's teakwood hull and the rasping breath of their captors. The men who brought them were deathly afraid. April, who was beginning to regain more of her senses, could feel the slight tremor in the hands of the man who held her.

  "Report!" The word lashed out of the darkness.

  Pedrito, as fawning before this man as the Chinese spy had been in front of him, stuttered slightly as he told how the two girls were captured. The story was essentially true, except his own role was magnified in importance.

  "I brought them here instead of killing them instantly because I thought we might learn something from them," he concluded.

  "For once you have done well," the deathlike voice said. "I am most curious to know why agents from THRUSH and U.N.C.L.E. were working together. If these two enemies of ours have joined forces, then we must take definite precautions."

  There was another silence in the pitch-black cabin. Then the spectral voice said, "Did you have to use the Green Gas on them?"

  "Yes, lord," Pedrito replied, "They were gassed about an hour ago. It will be at least a half hour before they fully recover."

  "That means it will be that long before we can interrogate them," the deathly voice said. "Place them in the hold. And you---"

  In the background a tiny chime tinkled. April's straining ears caught the sound of rustling silk as the master of the boat moved. She heard the click of a switch. Then a voice, tinny from a poorly tuned speaker, said: "There is a message, master! Code AAA!"

  "Give it to me!" the death voice said hollowly.

  "Number XIII reports from Site G in Khmerrania that Khmerranian searchers have located the astronaut's space capsule!"

  "The man! The man in the capsule, you fool! What about him! Everything depends upon the astronaut himself! Did they find him? Is he still alive?"

  There was deep anxiety in the spy master's voice.

  "No, master," the radioed voice replied. "He came down alive. That much we know. He left the capsule. He is somewhere in the jungle. The Khmerranians are searching for him.”

  "Tell Site G to send out a searching party himself," the Project X area chief ordered. "Leave nothing to chance. Both U.N.C.L.E. and THRUSH are after this man also. We must find him first. Project X--- depends upon our getting this man first!"

  "I will relay the message, master."

  "And we will join the search as well. There is no more point in staying here. The British harbor police intercept any boats that sail in the night. We will leave at dawn and will land at Point Four. Notify Post G that we will join them in the search."

  After he ended the conversation
the spy master said to Pedrito, "Get these girls below. It is essential that I know how much THRUSH and U.N.C.L.E. have found out. As soon as you have found out all you can from them, I want both women disposed of as soon as we are outside the bay."

  "It shall be done, master," Pedrito said.

  Ordering the men who accompanied him to bring April and Avis, Pedrito led them down a ladderway into the junk's hold. One of the men lighted a candle which was not permitted in the cabin. Pedrito opened another hatch in the floor. They went down another ladderway into the lower hold.

  April realized then that this was not one of the low fishing junks, but a cargo ship, probably made to carry rice between Thailand and Hong Kong. There were a few bales of rice still in the hold. Several empty fiber rice sacks were thrown in one corner. Both girls were dumped unceremoniously on the teak deck. The candle was stuck on a beam where Pedrito could watch them. The two coolies who carried them down squatted on their heels to the side and watched Pedrito with an unblinking stare.

  April watched them through barely slitted eyelids. Already she was beginning to feel some life returning to her paralyzed limbs. She did not dare move to test how much strength had come back, but an electric-like tingle in her arms and legs told her that the nerve gas was wearing off.

  She anxiously measured the distance between herself and Pedrito.

  "I could get him, I think," she told herself silently.

  An expert judo and karate practitioner, she felt that with surprise on her side she could overpower the big Spaniard. However, there still were two coolies with the ugly knives in their belts.

  She wished desperately that she could find her purse. It was stuffed with the assorted protective devices all U.N.C.L.E. agents carry. As it was, she still had a finger ring with a hidden needle to inject either truth serum or knockout drops, and a wrist watch that concealed an ultra-miniature tape recorder. Neither seemed of much value to her then.

  What April wished desperately to get were the smoke bombs made in the form of a package of mints or the explosives disguised as chewing gum.

  Both, however, were in the handbag. She had not seen it since the man with Pedrito had picked it up in the hotel room.