[Magazine 1966-­12] - The Goliath Affair - Jakes John - Страница 20

"Oh," said Vanessa, "so you know me too?"

"One doesn't have to see a skunk to recognize it. The smell is—"

Vanessa smacked Illya with an oversized fist, nearly upsetting his guards as well. Instantly she struggled to compose herself. She took a deep breath, said:

"We can all benefit from a little relaxation. This has been a most taxing day." Blithe again, she snapped her fingers. Soldiers hustled to seize Solo.

"You can at least do us the courtesy of telling us what the pit is," he said.

"Oh, just a place that the baron who once lived here used for rebellious subjects."

"What kind of place?" Illya inquired.

Vanessa's white teeth sparkled as she smiled. "A lovely place with an observation window we've built in. A place where my associates and I can relax and have a highball and watch the two of you put on an amusing show while you die. Bring them along, both of them. And quickly!"

TWO

The pit, as Napoleon Solo and Illya sound found out to their dismay, had absolutely sheer sides. It was a perfect cylinder, illuminated by a single light high up in the solid stone ceiling.

That ceiling was at least twenty feet above the tightly-packed dirt floor on which they found themselves unceremoniously dumped by their THRUSH captors. Immediately the steel portal through which they had been pushed clanged shut. They heard the pong of electric bolts ramming home. Opposite they saw a similar steel port, also closed. It was barely three feet tall, and twice as wide as a regular door.

While Solo speculated upon what noxious poison fumes would probably come curling in upon them, Illya walked round and round the base of the cylinder. The pit was constructed entirely of ancient and faintly damp blocks of stone.

"Very exciting so far," Solo said.

"Don't make jokes, please."

"What else can I do? Yell for a Boy Scout to lend assistance?"

"It's a thought." Dourly Illya contemplated their surroundings. "If it hadn't been for Dr. Bauer catching you the way he did, we might have made it."

"Well, we didn't make it. So now we have to figure a way out of here."

A somber silence fell. The two U.N.C.L.E. agents had worked together long enough to know that false high spirits weren't going to help now.

Solo paced. So did Illya. Behind the smaller steel door they heard a peculiar snuffling or coughing.

Abruptly, amplified tinnily through a speaker, they heard Vanessa Robin say:

"Please don't stop the brittle conversation, gentlemen. We were enjoying it no end."

Illya and Solo snapped around, craned upward. An entire section of the stone block wall had slid aside to reveal a thick safety-glass window about six feet wide. The curved window was recessed into the wall of the pit about three feet above their heads.

Beyond the window, Vanessa Robin and Felix Klaanger lifted their right hands in a mock toast. Each held a dark brown highball. Lesser THRUSH lights crowded up behind them to watch the spectacle. The U.N.C.L.E. agents stood their ground and glared.

"Well," came Vanessa's voice again, "I suppose we might as well start the show if you've both run out of epigrams." She reached out to touch a control hidden by the window's edge.

The short steel panel behind them shot aside. They saw a dark stone tunnel from which issued that unusual coughing, plus a decidedly gamy animal smell.

"I must tell you," Vanessa said, "that we keep the poor creature on a starvation diet for occasions such as this. It will be interesting to see which one of you he selects for his first course—"

Crouching against the curved wall opposite the tunnel mouth, Napoleon Solo saw a pair of shining eyes regarding him with what appeared to be hunger. "Good Lord," he breathed as the thing's claws ticked on the stone and it lumbered forward into the pit—an immense, barrel-shaped, club-headed Bavarian brown bear with a wet black snout and dripping white fangs.

Illya Kuryakin looked at the monster and flattened his back against the wall.

"Try not to attract his attention," he whispered.

Both agents remained motionless. The bear lumbered one step forward, then another. It wagged its immense head from side to side, its large, brown, dumb eyes fixed on a point just between the two agents. It became obvious that the bear had located its prey.

The long, lolling red tongue shot out. The bear licked its chops. With a deep growl it started forward again.

When it had reached the midway point in the dirt floor, it paused. Then, ponderously, it swung its head to the right until its snout was pointing directly at Solo.

"If it lunges at me," Solo whispered, "you go out through the tunnel."

"Impossible," Vanessa's voice blared over the speaker. "There are thick bars, and a guard, at the other end."

Solo swallowed hard. The bear advanced again, baring its fangs. Illya was leaning down slowly, very slowly. Very carefully he dug the fingers of his right hand into the dirt.

Solo started to circle to the left around the wall, also slowly. The bear changed course, its huge foot pads making marks in the dirt. Abruptly, with a slavering roar, it lunged forward.

Napoleon Solo dodged wildly to the left. Not fast enough! The furry monster crashed against him, flattening him in the dirt.

Horrible weight crushed down on top of him as he tried to roll out from under. The bear snarled and bit at his head. Solo wrenched his head savagely to one side to avoid the bite.

The bear growled ferociously. Drool dripped off its tongue on to Solo's forehead. The bear dipped its head again to bite, and just at that second Illya darted in and flung a handful of stinging dirt into the creature's eyes.

Startled, the bear automatically chomped its jaws shut. Solo dragged his left arm out of the path of those murderous teeth and ripped himself to the right, out from under. The bear snapped blindly at him, tearing his shirt and leaving painful teeth marks that oozed blood on his left forearm. From the loudspeaker came a mocking patter of applause.

The bear gathered itself on all fours, shook its immense shoulders as Solo carefully backed away from it. There was, unfortunately, no place to run. Next time, Solo knew, he might not be so lucky.

With another mighty growl the bear leaped. Napoleon Solo dodged to one side. His left foot skidded in the dirt. He went down to one knee. The bear charged straight at his head, slavering jaws opening wide and wet and red.

Chommmp! The jaws shut, snatching something out of mid-air, a scarlet something which, incredibly, had sailed out of the mouth of the tunnel.

Now the bear tore at this, worrying it back and forth. Another, similar item sailed into the pit. Then two more.

Solo watched the bear go wild and attempt to ingest all four huge, succulent raw slabs of meat into its maw at once. There was a hiss from the tunnel.

Overhead, Vanessa Robin and Klaanger and the others shouted and cursed. Content with a less-than-human meal, bruin was sitting on his haunches, masticating bone, gristle and meat with loud crunching sounds. And on hands and knees inside the tunnel, her cheeks and knuckles smeared with meat juice, was the person who had called to them and tossed the meat in to save them.

"I stabbed the guard and—unlocked the bars," Helene Bauer panted. "I didn't know whether I could get here in time with the meat. I stole it from the kitchens. Hurry, the bear is nearly finished—" And she backed hastily down the tunnel.

Illya's face lit with hope. "Don't stand on ceremony, for heaven's sake!" He dove into the tunnel on all fours.