The Man From Uncle 02 - The Doomsday Affair - Whittington Harry - Страница 16

"Who is 'they'? The Chinese-American that originally approached you and Ursula?"

"Yes. Him. The rest of them. But him mostly. He'll find me if he wants to."

"Could you make it easy for him?"

"What?" She shook her head, her eyes dilating.

"I want you to let him find you. We need you to bring him out—so we can trap him."

She shook her head. She stared at him. Her face was milk white, and her eyes empty Her lips moved, but she did not speak. He leaped up, going around the table because she fainted suddenly, her face striking hard, straight down.

IV

Illya awoke and found himself lying curled upon a red and brown Mexican rug.

He shivered, opening his eyes. Remembering the injection given him by Sam Su Yan, he was astonished to find his mind was clear.

"Ah. He wakes up. Our guinea pig." He heard Sam's voice somewhere above him.

He turned his head, but the light pained his eyes, and suddenly his whole body twitched as he had seen spas-tics quiver.

He tried to speak, but the words were garbled, meaningless, and his tongue felt thick in his mouth.

He heard Sam's amused chuckle, mixed with something new—a woman's contemptuous laughter. He tried to turn again, but every time he tried to move at all, his body reacted in violent and disjointed spasms.

He stared up at Sam standing like a bony vulture above him.

"Yes." Sam was pleased. "We are getting about the same reactions from our human guinea pig that we elicited from our other animals in the lab. Your mind is quite clear, is it?" His smile was sour. "No sense your trying to say yes or no; it won't come out that way. The only sounds you can make are those mindless grunts of the idiot, the spastic, the victim of stroke or brain damage. Try to get up. Come on. Get up on your feet!"

Illya turned his body, aware of the tremors that went through him. When he ordered his arms to support him, his legs bent or straightened, or simply trembled while his arms flew in wild, useless motions.

Sam and the woman laughed again. She moved closer now, in lime green shift, high heels, her hair a golden red. Illya saw her as the kind of new discovery he wouldn't want to introduce to the boys.

Sam Su Yan noticed Illya's rapt staring at the woman. He laughed. "I'm afraid women will be of little use to you in your condition, my friend—unless you enjoy tormenting your mind by seeing what you cannot touch. This is Miss Violet Wild, Kuryakin. I'm sorry I cannot remain here any longer to enjoy the side-effects of my revenge upon you. More urgent matters demand my immediate attention. I'm sure you'll forgive me. Miss Wild will see you safely put away."

Illya struggled frantically on the floor, managing to get to his knees before he was attacked by a sudden fit of violent trembling and sprawled out face down upon the carpeting. He lay still there watching Su Yan and Violet Wild leave the room.

He stayed face down, panting against the carpeting, his body dissociated from the messages of his mind. It was as if the drug had scrambled his nerve centers. Every order from his mind only seemed to confuse and aggravate his nerves and muscular controls.

Lying there he felt the pressure of his shoulder holster, of his gun. They were so sure of themselves they had not even bothered to disarm him.

Painfully, and after many false starts, and falls and wild muscular spasms in his legs and arms, Illya fell over on his back.

Exhausted, he lay for a moment before he attempted any other moves. Then, his forehead sweat-beaded, he ordered his right arm to reach for the gun in his holster.

His left arm trembled and waved in a wild arc. But when it fell, it landed on the holster, although there seemed little sense of feeling in his fingers.

He could see his hand lying on the holster.

He bit his lip, sweated, afraid that his arm might suddenly fly away from the holster in another spasm. Closing his eyes tightly, he ordered his right hand to close on the holster, to cling tightly. His left hand closed on the holster, but his arm quivered all the way to his shoulder.

Afraid even to compliment himself upon this small success, Illya forced his hand to inch upward toward the gun butt.

His shirt was sweat-damp, his eyes burning with perspiration by the time he forced his quivering, fatigue-aching hand to close on the gun butt.

He said the words over and over in his mind. Draw. Draw the gun. Draw.

Suddenly his left arm moved, yanking the gun from its holster. Then it swung in wide arcs, gyrating, shaking, no matter how his mind screamed at it to lie still. The fingers loosed and he watched the gun sail halfway across the room and go sliding under the bed.

He sagged back on the carpeting, too tired to care. His left arm continued to tremble.

He managed to turn his head and saw that his luggage had been brought into this room and stood with two green lightweight lady's weekenders.

He remembered Su Yan's words: "Miss Wild will see you safely put away."

He breathed heavily, going over in his mind the implications of this mild statement. His mind remained clear, but he made the noises of a cretin idiot and his movements were those of one who suffered from epi-lepsy, or a crippling stroke, or brain damage at birth. He could not even control any of his movements.

Miss Wild will see you safely put away.

Put away where?

He managed to search the room by flailing about, lifting his head only to have it fall back hard upon the floor. He was alone. They were certain he wasn't going anywhere.

He managed to hurl his right arm upward and allow it to fall across his shirt pocket and the ball-point pen clipped upon it.

Minutes later he had it closed in his fist and his shaking thumb had pressed down, releasing its point.

Holding the pen as if his life depended upon it, he rolled across the room to the small desk. Quivering, his body jerking in strange and uncoordinated spasms, he pulled himself up to his knees. He reached out and pulled the small stack of hotel stationary toward him.

The papers fluttered out around him and he sprawled out, holding the pen in his fist.

He closed his eyes as tightly as he could after setting his shaking fist at the top left hand corner of the sheet of white paper. He gripped the pen with all his strength even though this caused the rest of his body to react in paroxysms.

He took his time. He knew he could not hope to do more than to print his given name and the word help. Even this pushed out of the balcony would be enough to alert the other U.N.C.L.E. agents in the immediate vicinity.

He exhaled at last, dropping his head upon his arm.

He cried out his success in wild laughter, recoiling from the unnatural sounds pouring across his mouth. He didn't care, it was laughter. It was triumph. It was mind over convulsive muscle.

He lifted his head, staring at the short distance to the double doors standing open to the balcony. He had only to grip the paper, roll over there and let the wind catch it. Miss Wild will see you safely put away.

Maybe she would, Sam.

He finally was able to force his fist to open and let the pen drop to the floor. Then he turned his attention to closing either of his hands on the paper on which he had written, Illya. Help.

He stared at the paper upon which he had written so agonizingly.

The sound that burst from his mouth was a sob of agony, and it sounded like one. He cried out violently, helplessly. The words his mind had struggled so long with were not words at all. There was nothing on the paper except the meaningless scribbling of a three-year-old child.