As Illya Kuryakin slid down the steep hillside in a desperate attempt to lose the THRUSH agents who had spotted his spying device a few moments ago, he saw at the bottom of the hill a smooth and inviting open green space. Scrambling with heels and elbows as he slid, he steered for it, his whole body braced for the impact of stopping.
Suddenly, as he shot out over the fast ridge and into the air, he seemed to notice something ominously suspicious about that smooth greenness. He twisted in mid-air and spread-eagled himself—and fell with a great slap into slimy green ooze! It was a bog—quicksand!
And above him, as the ooze crept up to his mouth, he faintly heard a voice say, “No need to worry further about him—no one has ever come back alive from there!”
THE MAD SCIENTIST AFFAIR
CONTENTS
Prologue
ONE
“Are You Deliberately Trying to Give Me the Cold Shivers?”
TWO
“The Spirits of Me Ancestors Are Watching Ye.”
THREE
“Lovely Night for a Drive, Isn’t It?”
FOUR
“I’m Afraid the Birds Have Flown.”
FIVE
“Talk About Burning Your Boats After You!”
Prologue
JULY WAS DYING in a blaze of sub-tropical swelter, and New York was one vast oven as the two men marched side by side along to Del Floria’s tailor shop. They were looking forward to air-conditioned comfort for a brief while, at least, inside.
An uninformed onlooker would have seen only a row of aged and unremarkable brownstones, with one fairly new three-storied whitestone at the south end of the row to lend a little tone, but these two men knew that the exterior belied the facts. They knew, for instance, just how exclusive was the key-club restaurant, The Masked Club, which took up the first and second floors of the whitestone. They knew that the innocent and rather ordinary offices on the third floor, an organization calling itself U.N.C.L.E., was a pale shadow of the reality. Under that facade of crumbling stone, decrepit shops, a struggling garage and a clutter of lower-income residents, there was one large and complex modern building, the headquarters of the real U.N.C.L.E.
There, in a maze of steel-walled corridors and ultramodern suites, an extremely efficient squad of brisk and alert young people of all nations and persuasions made it their unrelenting business to be curious about and deal with anything at all that offered a threat to international law and order. They had on call every resource of modern technology, plus the drive that comes from hard training and utter dedication.
The two men now passing through the secret entrance in the tailor shop knew as much about it as anyone and more than most. One was Napoleon Solo, Chief Enforcement Agent for U.N.C.L.E., and the other was that imperturbable and coldly efficient technologist and gatherer of unusual and useful information, Illya Nickovetch Kuryakin.
ONE
“Are You Deliberately Trying to Give Me the Cold Shivers?”
ALEXANDER WAVERLY was in a rare mood as he clutched an unlit pipe and eyed the two agents who had come in response to his summons. The Chief of Section One of U.N.C.L.E. usually looked like an untidy, rather severe professor about to pronounce caustic judgment on some miserable student, but at this moment he twinkled. Solo frowned and felt uneasy in consequence.
“It’s our business to know what’s going on,” Waverly began. “We must begin with the facts, no matter how fantastic they may seem. Don’t be too quick to judge, therefore, as I introduce you to an eccentric genius, one Michael O’Rourke, who lives in a castle in Ireland and calls himself ‘King’ Mike. This face.” He swiveled his chair to stare at the screen on the wall as a picture glowed there. The man in the picture was old, with a halo of white hair and a bristling white beard that came to a caprine point, but he had been caught in a sardonic smile, showing a lively eye.
A female voice recited the dossier over a loudspeaker concealed somewhere in the room:
“Dr. Michael O’Rourke, biochemist, bachelor, age 58. Traveled extensively and adventurously in youth, often on the wrong side of the law. Is now head of chemical research for O’Brien’s Beautiful Beers, Inc., at their highly modern brewery near Conway, County Clare, Eire. As well as its commercial functions, the laboratory conducts pure research into vitamins, proteins and molecular chemistry, under Dr. O’Rourke’s direction.”
The goat-bearded grin faded and was replaced by a picturesque view, in bright sunshine over green moor, of a castle.
“Cooraclare Castle,” the impersonal voice went on, “is small, typical of the region, but of dubious authenticity. Dr. O’Rourke acquired it four years ago, has modernized its interior, and lives there with a small staff and his two nieces, the daughters of his two brothers, now deceased. The nieces assist their uncle in the laboratory. The castle is three miles from the brewery, four miles from Conway. Dr. O’Rourke is known locally as ‘King’ Mike.”
Solo grinned. “I never yet knew an Irishman who didn’t claim to be a descendant of one of the kings of ould Ireland. This one seems to believe it.”
“It’s a real castle, at any rate,” Kuryakin murmured. “The architecture looks genuine. Apart from being a mad scientist, why are we interested in him, sir?”
Waverly stroked his cheek with the stem of his cold pipe. He was very seldom seen to light up, and he didn’t now. “O’Rourke is, as you say, a mad—or eccentric—scientist. It is not a crime. Nor is it reprehensible to seek to improve the quality of beer. Quite the reverse. I like a glass of O’Brien’s myself, on occasion. It’s very good. But wait.”
The castle picture gave way to another portrait, this time of a pudgy-faced timid-looking man with wispy dark hair and eyes peering trustfully through heavy pebble lenses. The unseen female voice declared this was:
“Dr. Vittorio Trilli, Genovese biochemist, brilliant but unorthodox. Was in trouble with authorities over illegal experimentation when he was killed in a mysterious laboratory explosion in Milan, four years ago. Is known to us to be a high-ranking Thrush field-agent, and alive.” Solo nodded grimly. That was a very familiar pattern. The voice went on, “Our man in Limerick reports Trilli is in the neighborhood and very interested in O’Rourke. Trilli is accompanied by two lesser Thrush agents—muscle-men.”
Waverly swung his chair around to face Solo and Illya again. “And there you are,” he said, nursing his pipe and watching his two top agents curiously, trying to guess how their thoughts would run.
“That will be Thrush-Italian,” Solo mused, “and if you’d ever tasted the Italian version of bottled beer you wouldn’t be surprised about their trying to learn some Irish know-how. Perhaps they want O’Rourke to build a brewery in Rome for them?”
Kuryakin, characteristically, wasted no time on wit, but went for the key points: “Thrush believes he’s on to something useful. Trilli’s there to find out what, and grab it.”
Waverly nodded. “I would agree. For once, we can let Thrush do the hard work for us. If O’Rourke has developed something, Trilli will validate it for us. He will then try to grab it. That’s where we will step in. Until then, however, I think someone should keep a very sharp eye on Trilli.”
“Ireland!” Solo sighed softly. “County Clare at this time of year should be very pleasant.” He thought of the blistering heat outside and smiled. Very pleasant indeed. But Waverly looked to Kuryakin.
“You”—he pointed his pipe-stem—“will leave immediately. Fly to Shannon, which is right on the spot where it is all happening. Use your own judgment as to cover. Remember, your job is to let Trilli start something, then see that you finish it. Understood?”
Waverly swung on him, again aiming his pipe. “I have something else for you, closer to home. The other end of the thread, perhaps.” He swiveled to the screen again, which now showed a glowing picture of two very lovely faces side by side. The one on the left was Latin-dark and vivid, her heart-shaped face smoldering and exotic—the absolute converse of the girl on the right, who was roses-and-cream fair, with a shy smile, cornflower-blue eyes and masses of heavy golden-blonde hair. Solo stared and promptly forgot all about Irish scenery.
The impassive voice on the loudspeaker told him, “Bridget and Sarah O’Rourke,” and as the picture gave way to another, the shy-smiling blonde girl alone, it went on: “Sarah O’Rourke, single, age twenty-five, at present in New York, attending a convention of chemists and biochemists, to deliver a paper on ‘Some Aspects of Molecular Structure as Evidenced in New Synthetic Yeasts’ later this afternoon.”
Waverly spun his chair again. “That paper may or may not tell us something. Undoubtedly the girl herself can. You, Mr. Solo, will see that she does. You will make her acquaintance, gain her confidence, and get her to talk. You should be able to manage that, I imagine?”
Solo dragged his appreciative gaze away from the shy smile and looked down to see his chief’s quizzical stare.
He smoothed his face hastily. “I think I can manage, sir. I gather there’s a cover already prepared for me?”
“You’ll collect your official invitation and papers on the way out. A room is booked for you. That will be all for now, gentlemen.”
The two turned and marched away. Solo grinned and murmured, “Better watch yourself with Bridget, Illya. She bears all the earmarks of a real ‘femme fatale.’ Not your kind at all.”
“Considering what you know about biochemistry,” Kuryakin retorted with a smile, “I’m sorry I can’t stay to hear you trying to charm Miss Sarah. It ought to be interesting.”
Solo was looking forward to Miss Sarah O’Rourke, but not to biochemistry. Exhaustively thorough training within the U.N.C.L.E. organization had made him able to take care of himself in virtually any situation, but his store of technical information was necessarily superficial, enough to get by but not enough to fool a professional specialist. He hoped, wryly, that she wouldn’t prove to be a fanatic on her own subject. With a face like that? he thought, smiling.
The elevator let him out into a buzz of talk and the to-and-fro of many people, all with lapel-pins giving their names. His own was in place. He drifted, surveying the chattering groups without seeming to do so, making his way to where an easel stood supporting a blackboard decorated with notices. He found the schedule for the day, ran his eye down the listed entries, and there it was. And he stared in sudden suspicion, because someone had run a heavy blue line through Miss S. O’Rourke’s name and time, and alongside had scribbled “CANCELLED.”
Stepping back, Solo swept the room with a sharp eye, spotted one man who sported a blue tag against the standard white ones, and approached him, assuming him to be a person of some authority.
“Dr. Mercer? Can you by any chance tell me why Miss O’Rourke’s talk—?”
“Ah, tragic. Yes, indeed. Not five minutes ago. Lost her voice all at once. Most peculiar. Psychosomatic, probably. Stage-fright, you know?”
“I see,” Solo murmured, keeping an unchanged expression despite the sudden blaze of suspicion in his mind. From the corner of his eye he caught sight of an all-too-familiar face, swung hastily so that his back was to it, and smiled at Mercer. “It’s a bit of a blow. I was particularly interested in—”
“Ah, in that case!” Dr. Mercer seemingly didn’t like to let anyone complete a sentence. “This way, this way.” He led off smartly toward the side of the room, Solo following and frowning, keeping an eye out for any more of Thrush’s minions. He saw one more, and suspicion became certainty. Sarah had been clobbered in some way, to stop her delivering her paper. He moved warily on Mercer’s heels. They reached a long low table strewn with paper. Mercer cast his eye along the piles and reached for one. “Here you are, Dr.—er—Solo? This is a mimeoed copy of Miss O’Rourke’s paper. Your field, I gather?”
“Eh?” Solo took the sheets, snatched at his confused wits and managed to nod and smile. “Shall we just say I’m interested? This was quick work. I mean, you said it was only five minutes ago that Miss O’Rourke lost her voice, didn’t you?”
“These were run off this morning.” Mercer lost a little of his ready geniality. “It’s the usual thing, you know, where there are details and diagrams.”
“Of course. Forgive me. You wouldn’t happen to know where I might—?”
“The last I saw”—Mercer leaned forward with a confiding wink—“she was on her way to the bar. Drown her sorrows. Shame. A very pretty girl, too.”
Solo got directions to the bar from him and managed to detach himself and head for it. His thoughts were confused. The presence of Thrush agents and Sarah O’Rourke’s sudden speechlessness added up to dirty play somewhere. But if copies of the paper were being freely distributed—?
The bar was in a long, low-ceilinged and dimly lit room, not too crowded. She sat at a table in the far corner, all alone. As he neared her he saw that the picture had understated her beauty, if anything, and contrary to Mercer’s suspicions she didn’t look at all affected by her drink, merely miserable, not drowning her sorrows but just dwelling on them.
“Mind if I join you?” he asked, gazing down at the delightful picture she made. Her figure was good enough to match her face, but as she looked up at him the effect was marred just a little by the storm in her eyes. “Yes, I do mind!” she retorted, in a croaking whisper.
“I don’t want to talk about anything, least of all that!” And she glared at the stapled sheets in his hand.
He put on his best smile, ignored her wrath, and sat. “There are several lines I could try at this point,” he murmured. “I could make a remark about having a woman at a disadvantage—speechless, you know? Or I could whip up a passionate interest in this stuff.” He frowned at the paper, then tore it neatly across. “I could say, with absolute honesty, that you’re the prettiest girl I’ve laid eyes on in a very long while and that I’m just trying to figure out some way of getting to know you. Or”—and he shrugged—“I could tell you the plain cold truth. You’re a scientist. Which would you rather have?”
Curiosity battled against irritation and won. “What do you mean, the cold plain truth?” She massaged her throat. “About what?”
“About why you should so suddenly and conveniently lose your voice just before you were going to deliver a paper on an obscure topic. No, let me talk a bit. Your paper deals with some discovery made by Dr. Michael O’Rourke, and somebody didn’t want you to give it, so they slipped you something to paralyze your vocal chords. The question is—why?”
To his surprise she suddenly turned on a glorious smile, enough to make him tingle all over. “You’re having me on,” she whispered. “I was carefully warned that you Americans are the crafty ones, with every trick in the book up your sleeves, but I never expected anything so wild as that!”
“You don’t believe me?”
“I do!” she protested. “I remember now—he was a long skinny Chinaman with a cigarette-holder and gilded fingernails. Very sinister!” And she used her glorious smile again to elevate his blood pressure. “Thank you, Dr. Solo. You’ve managed to take my mind off my disappointment, and I’m very grateful to you for that, anyway.”
“All right,” he said, deciding to follow up his advantage swiftly, “let me do one more little thing for you. I know quite a bit about the kind of drug one uses for this kind of thing.” That much was true enough. “It will be purely temporary in its effect. I can show you how to hasten your recovery from it.”
“You can? And how would that be?”
“Just sit still one moment; I’ll be right back.” He rose and went to the bar, to
return promptly carrying a half-bottle of Smirnoff. Her blue eyes traveled from the vodka to his face and registered distaste.
“Ah, now you’ve spoiled it. Trying to get me drunk—that’s the oldest dodge in the world!”
“Not so fast!” he cautioned. “You aren’t going to drink this. Now, do we go to my room, or yours?” He put on his most frank smile, and saw her bewilderment. She reacted just as he had hoped, and rose to her feet.
“You’re a trier, I’ll say that for it. And I’ll feel a lot safer in my own room.” He bowed gravely and she took his arm like a princess. More than one pair of envious male eyes followed them as they left the bar. There was mild apprehension in her expression as she led him to her room and waited for him to close the door.
“And now what?” she demanded, in that husky scrape that was becoming very attractive to his ears.
“Bathroom,” he said, leading the way, “and a large glass.” He poured, saving just a couple of fingers in the bottle, then handed her the glass with the command, “Gargle! Be sure you spit it out, now, or my reputation will be mud!”
“Your reputation! I should be ashamed of myself for not thinking of it sooner. I ought to know about alcohol, seeing that I work with the stuff.”
“Good! All right, I’ll leave you alone now. I’d rather not stand by and watch good liquor going to waste, even if it is in a good cause. The thing about vodka is that it won’t make you smell like a distillery afterwards.”
She held the glass and looked at him with a lovely frown. “I think I owe you some kind of apology, don’t I?”
“Forget it. I’m always being misunderstood. What I would like from you, though, is a chance to look at your original paper.”
She noticed the stress on “original,” and frowned again. “I don’t see why. There’s hundreds of copies downstairs. Still, help yourself. It’s in my briefcase, in there on the dresser.”
Man From U.N.C.L.E. 05 - The Mad Scientist Affair Page 1
