The Rainbow Affair - McDaniel David - Страница 30

"I leave you here for your nap. The last of the bourbon was laced with another of Thrush's chemical wonders - it will put you comfortably to sleep in the next minute or two, and you will wake up refreshed in two hours, with time for a quick breakfast. Good night. I'd like to get to my quarters before it takes effect." And he closed the door.

Napoleon looked at Illya and said, "I hope he makes it."

"He will. He held off drinking his until a minute or two after we'd finished ours. I remember thinking at the time..." His voice faded away, but Napoleon didn't notice. He wouldn't notice anything for two hours.

Shortly after four Napoleon stood in the gasoline-and-salt smelling area of the concealed clock. A large piece of camouflaged steel protected the anchorage, where several oddly assorted craft bobbed gently on the swells rolling in under the sea door, which was raised slightly to admit the breeze. He and Illya still held a last cup of steaming tea, and were bundled in most of their seafaring gear from the trip over. At their feet an impossibly tiny blue-gray inflated rubber liferaft rose and fell. Attached somehow behind it was a motor.

"Practically invisible to radar," Johnnie was saying, "and quite invisible to an air-borne eye from any altitude over three hundred feet when the matching canopy is drawn over the passenger area."

"Rather a distinctive color," said Solo. "I'd hate to try it in the Fijis on a clear day."

"Of course they are customized for the area in which they expect to see service. Another of Thrush's little gifts." He looked proudly around the cavern. "This," he said, "I have done without help. My ideas, my plans, my money and organization. Thrush has never given me anything really valuable," he continued, turning back to them. "Nothing but simple gadgets - like bright beads to a savage." His face clouded over, and he clasped his hands behind his back. "You should never have wasted your time and talents on me, but instead concentrate on this mob of foreigners who are trying to take over the world. This is what you're supposed to be doing, isn't it? It should certainly take precedence over chasing down a simple, honest, hard-working train robber." The clouds cracked, and he smiled at his own final line. Then he shook hands with each of them. "Mr. Solo - Mr. Kuryakin. It has been a true pleasure meeting both of you, even under such trying circumstances. I hope we may work together sometime, against our mutual enemy."

The two U.N.C.L.E. agents shot a glance at each other, and read agreement. Napoleon cleared his throat. "Ah, it's not impossible," he said slowly. "It might even be profitable."

"Quite. We must keep in touch."

"Quite," echoed Illya.

A turtle-necked dock worker hurried up to Rainbow. "Ten after, chief. Radio room says there's a call for you from somebody about an account coming due."

"Thanks, Bill," said Rainbow, and turned to Illya and Napoleon. "Time for you to leave. I'll have the lights dimmed and the door lifted for you. The tradespeople can wait until I've seen you off."

Quickly and cautiously they climbed over into the swaying little boat and started the engine. Rainbow said, "Compass?" and Illya held it up. "Remember the camouflage shroud," added their host, "and bon voyage."

He lifted an arm, and the lamps all over the cavern dimmed until the thin space of sky seemed light. Then the space widened as the door rose slowly, and Illya fed fuel to the engine. The outboard muttered behind them, and they hurried forward. The waves caught them just before they passed the wall of the cavern. The swell was low enough not to interfere with their propeller's functioning, but they rose and fell a considerable amount as the tide swept past them, running into the mouth of the cavern. Napoleon looked down at the compass as the disguised door eased closed behind them and then looked up at the sky.

A few bright stars came through the thinning mists, and Solo said, "Well! I was turned around. Apparently this passage is on the side away from the mainland."

"Did you expect it would be oriented for the view?" asked Illya.

Napoleon didn't answer. In the gray light of pre-dawn he was occupied working them around the coastline of the island and into the open sea where the tide would carry them to land.

Shortly he took a compass bearing and a sighting, and shook his head. "We'll have to crab," he said. "Other wise we'll end up right about the foot of those steps they were going to take me down."

Realization came to both of them simultaneously. "So there was evidence pointing directly to Donzerly after all!" They congratulated each other on the belated ratiocination, and resolved to spring it on Escott at the earliest opportunity.

They looked back at the rocky spur of Donzerly almost two miles away as the light in the sky behind them grew. The dark lighthouse was still a shadow against the horizon, and the air was very still.

Illya heard it first, a low distant whistle that swiftly developed bass overtones and swelled into an approaching roar. They looked into the east, as the mists thinned and vanished about them, and saw a tiny dot low in the sky. Napoleon looked at Illya without a trace of e pression. "What time is it?" he asked, although he wore a watch on his wrist.

Illya also had a watch, but he didn't look at it. His gaze was fixed on the small jet that bore towards them. "I would hazard a guess," he said slowly, "that it is very near to four-thirty."

Neither of them said any more, being occupied for the next fifteen seconds with breaking out and rigging the camouflaging tent which covered the entire liferaft.

Illya made a peephole and looked up as the plane passed high overhead. "It's a Mystere. Probably a ranging run, or a threat of one. It's about 8000 feet."

"It's past," said Napoleon as the sound went over them. "Open the curtain. I want to..."

The curtains had already parted in Illya's grasp. Both of them had an unobstructed view as the twin-jet light bomber passed over Donzerly, and neither missed a detail an instant later when the entire rock was lost for an instant in a green flash. In the shocked fractions of a second that followed, stunned eyes registered photographically the smoke and blast that accompanied the flash. The lighthouse leaped skyward like a missile, but crumbled with terrifying slowness in midair as it rose. The rock itself seemed to disintegrate, and great pieces blew into the sea.

"Ulsenite," breathed Illya. "So Thrush got that after all!

"Get down and hang on!" snapped Napoleon. "That shock wave is going to hit us in -" The shock wave hit them before he finished, but it caught both of them prone with fists around anchored lanyards. Their ears were buffeted only a moment before the sea rose up under them and hurled them skyward like an express elevator, then fell from under them like an amusement park ride. The secondary and tertiary shocks followed, and the outboard engine screamed as the propeller clawed at the air a moment. They rode the waves for several seconds before daring to let go and look up.

The island was shattered. Ten or twenty feet of it stood up from the water like a broken tooth in an old skull. Through binoculars, Napoleon could barely make out any remains of the inhabited areas. Smoke rose slowly from the wreckage, and the sea lapped once again over the splintered rocks of Donzerly. Of the light, there was no sign.

From somewhere a seabird appeared, and circled the stump of rock, then dived at a stunned fish. In minutes thousands of seabirds clustered around the corpse of the island, like white vultures tearing at it. And their sound came across the slow-swelled sea, screeching and cawing over the choice morsels, fluttering, lit with the golden light of the newly-risen sun.