The Utopia Affair - McDaniel David - Страница 9

The screen of the satellite computer flashed blue, then faded to a black surface on which appeared glowing letters in perfect block printing:

3010671846 Z DE: UCR TO: WATERLOO RE-

SCHEDULING PLAN ACCEPTED AND ACTED

UPON... CALCULATIONS COMPLETED... RE-

SULTS TRANSFERRED...

SCHEDULE CHANGE ORDERS TRANSMITTED

TO ALL AFFECTED OPERATIONS. FIRST OVERT

ACTION 1800 HOURS LOCAL TUESDAY 31 OCTO-

BER. SCHEDULE FOLLOWS ON PRINTER READ OUT.

By the time the last phrase appeared, the first lines had faded. The printer began to chatter, and an eight-inch-wide strip of paper started unreeling from some where within it. Roger caught it as it came out, read some of it, and whistled softly. "We really will be keeping him busy. Memphis, Detroit, Cape Kennedy, Denver, Seattle... Here we go! San Salvador, Anchorage, Las Vegas, Teguei—Tegucigaipa? Martinique..."

"And it starts tomorrow," said Helena with a feline smile. "Happy Halloween, Napoleon. May it last until Christmas."

Napoleon Solo answered Channel D about 6:28. An emergency report had just been processed in the Denver office concerning an explosion at a top secret missile base, and positive evidence of sabotage. Two high-rank officers were deeply involved, and the entire affair was very touchy and terribly important. They needed at least two men immediately.

Miss Williamson had clipped a memo to it, stating that Section Two Number Five, Jock Tuber, was available for assignment. Noting this, he thought of Miss Ewert, of Communications, as a second agent for the job, and sent the call signal.

It was dark outside his windows when he had collected the necessary data, received files, passed them on to his two agents and offered a few basic suggestions. Their tickets to Denver were for ten o'clock the next morning.

Four routine notes had piled up during his conference; he looked them over and filed them, with part of his mind still wondering about the exact nature of the explosion until the priority call chimed again and he reached for the slim silver mike to answer.

The two agents monitoring a tense post-revolutionary situation in Tierra Caliente were suddenly in the midst of a new outburst of fighting in the least defended part of the city. They needed help, and the Managua office was out of contact.

Quickly punching a code number on his control panel, Solo watched the main screen as a status map of the Central America Subcommand flashed into view. San Salvador was tied up at the moment, San Jose was still inoperational... He made a cross-connection to Mexico City.

"Can you spare about ten men for penetration in Tierra Caliente? There's some kind of agitation going on and we want to put a stop to it."

He left the Field Agent talking to Mexico City to work out details, and cleared the channel. He signaled Miss Williamson on the intercom and said, "Could you see about having a tray sent up from the commissary? Something simple but nourishing centered around a large rare steak and followed with something to maintain the blood sugar level, and several cups of hot coffee timed to arrive about every fifteen minutes for the next couple of hours?"

"Certainly, sir. And by the way, I would like to bring in my opposite number to introduce you."

"Opposite number?"

"She works the night shift in my place."

"Don't bring her in until I've eaten or I'll be rude."

"All right. Dinner will be—"

Channel D flickered and chimed, and Napoleon switched his attention to the call. The third one in as many hours; he hoped this wasn't an average.

This one was from the agent on bodyguard duty to the Akhoond of Swat. It was seven in the morning there, and the Akhoond's prize greyhound had been found with its throat cut at the foot of the Imperial bed. The inhabitant of the bed was in a roaring royal rage, and the servants were absolutely in the clear.

Napoleon was half-tempted to say, "Don't touch a thing—I'll be on the next jet." But he bit his tongue and asked, "Any indication of a struggle?"

"None, but there wasn't much blood either. I think the dog was killed somewhere else. Which is funny, because he usually sleeps right there where he was found."

"How sure is the Akhoond that this is his greyhound? Could someone have kidnapped the prize pooch and left a ringer?"

"It's a possibility. There'll be a Royal tattoo inside the ear if it's the real one, and His Imperial Hotstuff wouldn't have bothered checking for it. If it's there I'll call you hack."

"If it's there, Mr. Harbeson, you can take action on your own. You're a field agent and a good one, but you'll never catch anyone if you stop to call me first. If we can't take the initiative, we've got to keep our reactions as fast as possible; I can have a three-man team in to back you up in two and a half hours if you need them." He didn't think that was quite what Waverly would have said, but it'd have to do.

The distant bodyguard verbally clicked his heels, saluted and rang off. Solo reached for the intercom, licking his dry lips.

"About my dinner..."

"It's on its way up now, sir."

"Good. By the way, it isn't eleven o'clock already, is it?"

"I'm afraid it is, sir."

"No wonder I'm hungry."

Channel D remained mercifully silent during dinner, though one or two calls came through on lower priority lines; neither demanded immediate action, but both added to his burden of worries. There were now definite signs of concealed manipulation of the Paris Bourse; U.N.C.L.E. Headquarters in Geneva was quite capable of handling the situation, but it was a factor that might affect his operations and he had to know about it.

Channel D signaled just as his dinner was cleared and he began to stuff a pipe with Waverly's private mixture. He answered the call between puffs. The voice was strange to him, and he tapped the code for a lighted map display of the sender's location. He found the light as the caller finished his identification. "Buck DeWeese, Flin Flon, Manitoba."

Napoleon sought through his mind for data on the Flin Flon office and found nothing. He decided to play it straight for the moment, coming to this decision as he said, "Yes?"

"I think we have something here worth a look at, sir. It started a few weeks ago with a couple old trappers who came in from the woods claiming they'd seen the Williwaw. That's the local imaginary monster. Since then I've heard stories from some of the lonelier farms, and seen one very blurred photograph. Tonight the entire population of Cranberry Portage saw the thing, just about four hours ago."

"What does it look like, and what does it do?"

"Well, it hasn't done anything yet except move around a little. I haven't seen it myself, but the photograph tallies closely with the descriptions I've heard. It doesn't have any particular shape, but it's pretty big. The picture was taken just about dusk—the earliest the thing's been seen. It's shaped like a fat fir tree, almost conical, but rounded. It doesn't have any particular color either, I'm told; the black-and-white snapshot here shows it as medium dark, indeterminate texture. I can see trees silhouetted against its base, though, and knowing the heights of those trees it has to be about a thousand or fifteen hundred feet tall."

"Fifteen hundred feet?"

"Uh-huh."

Napoleon considered that for a few seconds, and asked, "Any features visible at all? Anything that remains constant?"

"The man from Cranberry Portage who drove up here to tell me about it says all they could see was something big beginning to block out the stars in one whole part of the sky. It kind of reared up over them, he said, and the only thing they could see were two dim red stars up about where its eyes might have been. They have no idea how far away the thing was. It stood over the town for about ten minutes, then gradually went away, back the way it had come, and was gone entirely in about two minutes. And one other thing before you ask. The wind has been from the Northeast at a steady twelve knots since shortly before sunset. A nice stiff breeze."