And two men with broken, lumpy faces came through a door somewhere in the rear of the restaurant, closer to her than Malone. Petkoff suddenly swam into sight; he was standing very still and looking entirely baffled.
Malone pushed through a pair of dancers, ignored their glares and the man's hissed insult, which he didn't understand anyhow, and found his view suddenly blocked by a large expanse of dark grey.
It was somebody's chest, in a uniform. Malone shifted his gaze half an inch and saw a row of gold buttons. He looked upward.
There, towering above him, was a face. It stared down, looking heavy and cruel and stupid. Malone, his legs still carrying him forward, bounced off the chest and staggered back a step or two. He heard a hissed curse behind him, and realized without thinking about it that he had managed to collide with the same pair of dancers again. He didn't look around to see them. Instead, he looked ahead, at the giant who blocked his path.
The man was about six feet six inches tall, a great Mongol who weighed about a sixth of a ton. But he didn't look fat; he looked strong instead, and enormously massive. Malone sidestepped, and the Mongol moved slightly to block him. To one side, Malone saw Her Majesty scurrying by. The Mongol was apparently more interested in Malone than in trying to stop sweet little old ladies. Malone saw Her Majesty heading for the bar, and forgot about her for the second.
The Mongol shifted again to block Malone's forward progress.
"What seems to be such great hurry, Tovarishch?” he said in a voice that sounded like an earthquake warning. “Have you no culture? Why you run across floor in such impolite manner?"
The man might have been blocking his way because of Lou, or might simply want to teach an uncultured Amerikanski a lesson. Malone couldn't tell which, and it didn't seem to matter. He whirled and reached for a glass of vodka standing momentarily unattended on a nearby table.
He tossed the vodka at the giant's eyes, and scooted around the mountain of flesh before it erupted with a volcanic succession of Russian curses that shook the room with their volume and sincerity.
But Lou and Her Majesty were nowhere in sight. Major Petkoff was staring, and Malone followed his line of sight.
A door in the rear of the restaurant was just closing. Behind it Malone saw Her Majesty and Lou, disappearing from sight.
Malone knocked over a waiter and headed for Petkoff. “What's going on here?” he bellowed over the crash of dishes and the rising wave of Russian profanity.
Petkoff shrugged magnificently. “I have no ideas, colleague,” he said. “I have no ideas."
"But she—"
"Miss Garbitsch was taken suddenly ill,” Petkoff said.
"Damn sudden,” Malone growled.
"Her friend, Miss Thompson, has taken her to the ladies’ room,” Petkoff said. He gestured, narrowly missing a broken, lumpy face Malone had seen before.
"You are under arrest,” the face said. Its partner peered over Petkoff's shoulder.
"I?” Petkoff said.
"Not you,” the face said. “Him.” He started for Malone and Petkoff threw out both arms.
"Hold!” he said. “My orders are to see that this man is not molested."
The guests had suddenly and silently melted away. Malone backed off a step, looking for something to stage a fight with.
"On the other hand, Comrade,” one of the lumpy-faced men said, “we have orders also."
"My orders—” Petkoff began.
"Your orders do not exist,” the other lumpy man said. “We are to arrest this man. Our orders say so."
"You are fools,” Petkoff said. He spread his arms wider, blocking both of them. Malone edged back against the bar, feeling behind him for a bottle or maybe a bungstarter. Instead, his hand touched a sleeve.
A voice behind him bellowed: “Cease!"
The two lumpy-faced men goggled. Petkoff did not move.
Malone turned, and saw a tall, thin civilian with dark glasses. “Cease,” the civilian repeated. “It is the girl we are to arrest! The girl!"
"This is not a girl,” one of the lumpy men said. “Sir. We are to arrest this man. Our orders say distinctly—"
"Never mind your orders!” Petkoff said. “Go and reduce your orders to shreds and stuff them up your nostrils and die of suffocation! My orders say—"
"The girl!” the civilian said. “Where is the girl?"
Malone darted forward. Petkoff caught him neatly with one arm as he went by. “Until we decide what to do,” the MVD man said, “you stay here.” Malone bucked against him, but could get nowhere. “Meanwhile,” Petkoff said, “I am for letting you go."
"I appreciate it,” Malone said through his teeth. “How about proving it?"
"If you let him go,” a lumpy man said, “you will answer to our group head."
Petkoff tightened his hold protectively. Meanwhile, the civilian was climbing up into a stratospheric rage.
"You are dolts, imbeciles, worms without brains and walking bellies filled with carrion!” he said magnificently. “I have orders which I am sworn to carry out!"
"You are not alone,” Petkoff said.
Malone took another try at a getaway, and failed.
"We take precedence,” a lumpy man said. “We can talk later. Arrest comes first."
"But who?” the civilian snapped. “I insist—"
"There shall be no arrest!” Petkoff screamed. “No one is to be arrested at all!"
"I swear by the bones of Stalin that my orders state—” the tall man began.
"The bones of Stalin are with us!” a lumpy man said. “Go and die in a kennel filled with fleas and old newspaper! Go and freeze to the likeness of an obscene statue of a bourgeois deity! Go and hang by the ears from a monument four thousand feet high in the center of the great desert!"
Inspired, the other lumpy man screamed “Charge!” and came for Petkoff and the civilian. Petkoff whirled, letting go of Malone in order to beat back this wave of maddened attackers, and Malone took the advantage. He ducked free under Petkoff's left arm and started around the gesticulating, screaming, fighting group for the door at the back of the restaurant. He took exactly four steps.
Then he stopped. The Mongol, his eyes red with a combination of vodka and bull-roaring rage, was charging toward him, his hands outflung and his fingers grasping at the air. “Warmonger!” he was shouting. “Capitalist slave-owner! Leprous and ancient cannibal without culture! You have begun a war you can not finish!"
"Ha!” Malone said, feeling inadequate to the occasion. As the Mongol charged, he felt a wave of intense pragmatism come over him. He reached back toward the bar, grabbed a bottle of vodka and tossed several glassfuls into the giant's face. The Mongol, deluged and screaming, clawed wildly at his eyes and spun round several times, cursing Malone and all his kin for the next twenty-seven generations, and grabbing thin air in his attempt to reach the Amerikanski.
All of the customers appeared to have discovered urgent engagements elsewhere. There was little for the Mongol to collide with except empty tables and chairs. But he did manage to swipe one of the lumpy-faced men on the side of the head with one flail of his arms. The lumpy-faced man said “Yoop!” and went staggering away into Petkoff, who spun him around and threw him away in the general direction of the bandstand. The diversion provided Malone with just enough time to start moving again.
Four uniformed men were making their way toward the ladies’ room from the opposite side of the restaurant. They were carrying a stretcher, which seemed pitifully inadequate for the carnage Malone had just left.
He blocked their path. “Where are you going?” he said.
"You are American?” one of them said. “I speak English good, no?"
Behind him, Malone heard a yowl and a crunch, as of a body striking wood. It sounded as if somebody had fetched up against the bar. “You speak English fine,” he said, feeling wildly out of place. “Have you been taking lessons?"
"Me?” the man said. “It is no time for talk. We got to get l
ady for hospital."
"Lady?” Malone said. “For hospital?"
"Miss Garbitsch her name is,” the stretcher-man said, trying to get past Malone. The FBI agent shifted slightly, blocking the path. “We wait outside one revolution—"
"One what?"
"When hands revolve once,” the man said. “One hour. Now we get call so we take her to hospital."
It sounded suspicious to Malone. He heard more yells behind him, and they sounded a little closer. The sound of running men came to his ears. “Well,” he said happily, “goodbye all."
The stretcher-bearer said, “Vot?” Malone shoved him backward into the approaching mob, grabbed the stretcher away from the other three men, who were acting a little dazed, and swung it in a wide arc. He caught an MVD man in the stomach, and the man doubled up with a weird whistling groan, turned slightly in agony, and hit another MVD man with his bowed head. The second man fell; Malone heard more crashes and screaming, but he didn't find out any details. Instead, he threw the stretcher at the milling mob and turned, already in motion, racing for the ladies’ room.
He had no notion of what he was going to do when he got there, or what he was going to find. Her Majesty and Lou were in there, all right, but how were they going to get out without being arrested, clubbed, disemboweled or taken to a Russian hospital for God alone knew what novel purposes?
His mind was still a little foggy from the vast amounts of vodka he had poured down, and he wasn't in the least sure that teleportation would even work. He tried to figure out whether Her Majesty had already carried Lou off that way-but he doubted it. Lou was quite a burden for the old woman. And besides, he wasn't at all sure whether it was possible to teleport a human being. A lump of inanimate matter is one thing; an intelligent woman with a mind of her own is definitely something else.
It seemed to take forever for him to reach the door, and he was panting heavily when he reached for it. Suddenly, another hand shot in front of his, turning the doorknob. Malone looked up.
It was impossible to figure out where she had come from, or what she thought she was doing, but a bulging, slightly intoxicated Russian matron with bluish hair piled high on her head, a rusty orange dress and altogether too many jewels scattered here and there about her ample person, stood regarding him with a mixture of scorn, surprise and shock.
Malone crowded her aside without a thought and jerked the door open. Behind her he could see the melee still continuing, though it looked by now as if the Russians weren't very sure who they were supposed to be fighting. The Mongol's great head rose for a second above the storm, shouting something unintelligible, and dropped again into the crowd.
Malone focused on the matron, who was standing with her mouth open staring at him.
"Madam,” he said with stern dignity, “wait your turn!"
He ducked inside and slammed the door behind him. There was a small knob to bolt the door with, and he used it. But it wasn't going to hold long, he knew. If the mob outside ever got straightened out, the door would go down like a piece of cardboard, bolt or no bolt. Undoubtedly the gigantic Mongol could do the job with one hand tied behind his back.
Malone turned around and put his own back to the door. Women were looking up and making up their minds whether or not to scream. Time stood absolutely still, and nobody seemed to be moving-not even the two directly before him: a frightened-looking little old lady, who was trying to hold up a semiconscious redhead.
And, somewhere behind him, he knew, was a howling mob of thoroughly maddened Russians.
CHAPTER 8
The door rattled against Malone's back as a hand twisted the knob and shook it. He braced himself for the next assault, and it came: the shudder of a heavy body slamming up against it. Miraculously, the door held, at least for the moment. But the roars outside were growing louder and louder as the second team came up.
Where was the Mongol? he wondered. But there was no time for idle contemplation. The scene inside the room demanded his immediate attention.
He was in the anteroom, a gilded and decorated parlor filled with overstuffed chairs and couches. There was a door at the far side of the room, and a woman suddenly came out of it holding a pocketbook in one hand and a large powder-puff in the other. She saw Malone and reacted instantly.
Her scream seemed to be a signal. The two other women sitting on couches screamed, too, and jumped up with their hands to their faces. Malone shouted something unintelligible but very loud at them and brandished a fist menacingly. They shrieked again and ran for the interior room.
Malone heard the roaring outside, and pressed his back tighter against the door. Then, suddenly, he broke away from it and ran over to Her Majesty and Lou. He looked down. Lou was apparently completely unconscious by this time, and there was a peaceful look on her face. The Queen looked down at her, then up at Malone.
"I'm sorry, Sir Kenneth,” she said, “but we really haven't time for romantic thoughts just now."
Malone passed a hand over his brow. “We haven't got time for anything,” he said. “You can see what's going on outside."
"My goodness,” Her Majesty said. “Oh, yes. My goodness, yes."
"Okay,” Malone said. “We've got to teleport out, if we can-and if we can take Lou with us."
"I don't know, Sir Kenneth,” the Queen said.
"We've got to try,” Malone said grimly, looking down. There was a crash as something hit the door. It shuddered, creaked, and held. Malone took a breath. Lou was too beautiful to leave behind, no matter what.
"I'll mesh my mind with yours,” Her Majesty said, “so we'll be synchronized."
"Right,” Malone said. “The plane. Let's go."
There was another crash, but he hardly heard it. He closed his eyes and tried to visualize the interior of the plane that was waiting for them at the airfield. He wasn't sure he could do it; the vodka might have clouded his mental processes just enough to make teleporting impossible. He concentrated. The crash came again, and a shout. He almost had it ... he almost had it...
The last sound he heard was the splintering of the door, and a great shout that was cut off in the middle.
Malone opened his eyes.
"We made it,” he said softly. “And I wonder what the MVD is going to think."
Her Majesty took a deep breath. “My goodness,” she said. “That was exciting, wasn't it?"
"Not half as exciting as it's going to be if we don't hurry now,” Malone said. “If you know what I mean."
"I do,” Her Majesty said.
"That's good,” Malone said at random. “I don't.” He helped the Queen ease the unconscious body of Luba Garbitsch into one of the padded seats, and Malone pushed a switch. The seat gave a tiny squeak of protest, and then folded back into a flat bedlike arrangement. Lou was arranged on this comfortable surface, and Malone took a deep breath. “Take care of her for a minute, Your Majesty,” he said.
"Of course,” the Queen said.
Malone nodded. “I'm going to see who's up front,” he said. He walked through the corridors of the plane and rapped authoritatively on the door of the pilot's cabin. A second passed, and he raised his hand to knock again.
It never reached the door, which opened very suddenly. Malone found himself facing a small black hole.
It was the muzzle and the bore of the barrel of an M-2 .45 revolver, and it was pointing somewhere in the space between Malone's eyes. Behind the gun was a hard-eyed air force colonel with a grim expression.
"You know,” Malone said pleasantly, “they're good guns, but they really can't compare to the .44 Magnum."
The pilot blinked, and his gun wavered just a little. “What?” he said.
"Well,” Malone said, “if you'd only join the FBI, like me, you'd have a .44 Magnum, and you could compare the guns."
The pilot blinked again. “You're—"
"Malone,” Malone said. “Kenneth J. Malone, FBI. My friends call me Snookums, but don't try it. Why not let's put the gun away and be friend
s?"
"Oh,” the colonel said weakly. “Mr.-sure. I'm sorry, Mr. Malone. Didn't recognize you for a second there."
"Perfectly all right,” Malone said. The gun was still pointing at him, and in spite of the fact that he felt pleasantly like Philip Marlowe, or maybe the Saint, he was beginning to get a little nervous. “The gun,” he said.
The colonel stared at it for a second, then reholstered it in a hurry. “I am sorry,” he said. “But we've been worried about Russians coming aboard. I've got my copilot and navigator outside, guarding the plane, and they were supposed to let me know if anybody came in. When they didn't let me know, and you knocked, I assumed you were Russians. But, of course, you—"
Conversation came to a sudden dead stop.
"About these Russians—” Malone said desperately. But the pilot's eyes got a little glazed. He wasn't listening.
"Now, wait a minute,” he said. “Why didn't they notify me?"
"Maybe they didn't see me,” Malone said. “I mean us."
"But—"
"I'm not very noticeable,” Malone said hopefully, trying to look small and undistinguished. “They could just have ... not noticed me. Okay?” He gave the pilot his most friendly smile.
"They'd have noticed you,” the pilot said. “If they're still out there. If nothing's happened to them.” He leaned forward. “Did you see them, Malone?"
Malone shrugged. “How would I know?” he said.
"How would you—” The pilot seemed at a loss for words. Malone waited patiently, trying to look as if everything were completely and perfectly normal. “Mr. Malone,” the pilot said at last, “how did you get aboard this aircraft?"
He didn't wait for an answer, and Malone was grateful for that. Instead, he stepped over to a viewport and looked out. On the field, two air force officers were making lonely rounds about the plane. Fifty yards farther away, a squad of Russian guards also patrolled the brightly-lit area. There was nothing else in sight.
"There isn't any way you could have done it,” the pilot said without turning.
"That's the FBI for you,” Malone said. “We've got our little trade secrets, you know.” Somehow, the pilot's back looked unconvinced. “Disguise,” Malone added. “We're masters of disguise."
The Queen's Own FBI Trilogy: Brain Twister; The Impossibles; Supermind Page 42
