Текст книги "[Magazine 1967-­11] - The Volacano Box Affair"

Автор книги: Robert Hart Davis

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"What was the message in that cable?"

"The message was 'All Well.'"

"Yes." Having found his tamping tool, Waverly's fingers were tapping his papers to find the outline of his matchbox. "Yes, I see. But all is not well, Reid. I want you personally to investigate Rollins' property and the drilling tower he is erecting. You are to look for a box of the kind I've described to you on his property, the dimensions and exact description of which will be telexed to you as soon as our conversation is concluded. You're to contact me the moment you find such a device or find out where it is being stored."

"Then it's not oil they're after?" said Reid.

"No, Reid. The exact nature of the device will be telexed to you. For now, let's just say that its presence is a grave threat to world security."

"Yes, sir. I'll get on this right away."

They signed off, and the second Reid's voice was cleared from his communicator Waverly was alerting the division heads of a dozen different agency sub-sections, barking instructions at them like a drill sergeant. Every local U.N.C.L.E. operative in the United States was to be contacted right away with the instructions to follow up on any THRUSH agent or criminal element involved in the erection of oil drilling equipment.

A description of the volcano box was to be sent to them, and they were to search for it and report upon detecting it. Similar instructions were issued throughout U.N.C.L.E.'s international network, for it was obvious that THRUSH'S objective was not necessarily America. The agent in Singapore was ordered to check into the individual or individuals using the cable ad dress SINGOIL.

Finally, Waverly decided to get in touch with Napoleon to report on these developments and find out just what his other chief agent had ascertained.

Waverly knew himself to be an impatient man, but with this much at stake, the errors that might arise out of impatience were far less serious than those that might derive from sloth.

FOUR

NAPOLEON SOLO had flown by conventional means to Hong Kong and thence to Singapore. In Singapore he conferred with Joe Kingsley, U.N.C.L.E.'s temporary director; then transportation was arranged to Borua.

Since that island, and all of the islands in its federation, were hostile to peaceful interests, Napoleon would have to be smuggled in.

After resting for six hours, he made his way to a small airport outside the city, where an American jet fighter carried him to a carrier in the Banda Sea. From there he was put on a launch which conveyed him to the waters off Borua. He was greeted by a longboat and rowed to a beach on the south side of the island at a speed he wouldn't have thought possible.

The night was overcast and his arrival on this deserted spot was uneventful. A guide led him to an outpost on the side of a hillock, and as the curtain was drawn aside to admit him into the camouflaged hut, he was given a warm, comradely welcome by his fellow agent, April Dancer. The beautiful young girl wore a khaki shirt and Bermuda-length fatigue shorts and dirty sneakers, but nothing could alter the fact that U.N.C.L.E.'s contact in the Boruvian federation was as lovely as a calendar pinup. Her large, expressive eyes shimmered in the flicker of gas lamps. They appraised Napoleon with a mixture of trust and affection.

"Mr. Solo, I presume."

"April, I'm glad to work with you." He quickly described his trip, then said, "Do you have some liquid refreshment for a weary traveler? I've changed modes of transportation so often today I feel like a pinball."

"I have some warm gin and tonic," April said. And she added "but perhaps a Coke would suit you better." This told Napoleon Solo they were free to speak.

He accepted the Coke and, after excusing the guide, they sat down to talk. As background to their conversation, a short-wave apparatus hummed on a table behind April, and all around the hut there were hoots and cackles of tropical birds.

"Nice place you have here," he said smiling.

"The maid hasn't dusted this week, so you'll have to forgive the untidiness, the snakes and the scorpions."

Napoleon shifted in his seat. "I've briefed myself to a great extent on the situation here, but I'd still like you to go over it again with me. I assume that Mr. Waverly has informed you of the urgency of our situation."

"Oh yes." Her voice was throaty and mellow, and Napoleon knew how effective April was in applying her abundant female attributes on an antagonist to make him speak freely. On the other hand, as a trained agent she was perfectly adept in the arts of self-defense, and what her muscles could not effect, her pocket arsenal could.

"Tell me all you've learned, and I'll decide what's useful and what's not."

"Fine," April said. "Well, about five years ago a native named Emilio Sarabando caught the nationalistic fever and formed a federation of the islands in this area, called the Boruvian Federation after this its principal island. The Federation doesn't seem very important when you look at it casually, but actually it has strategic importance for two reasons: it's a source of certain rare-earth minerals, and it commands certain trade routes in the Indo-Chinese territory. Submarines or missiles based hereabouts could disrupt shipping in this neighborhood quite severely.

"Anyway," April Dancer continued, tugging on a Coke herself, "about a year ago Sarabando grew discontent with his political status and began making noises like a dictator. Our top brass decided that Sarabando, who is not the tyrant type, though he is a strong politician, was stepping out of character. We smelled control over him by another power. It didn't take me long to trace the strings to THRUSH. Sarabando is their puppet and has been for a year."

Napoleon Solo absorbed this information and sat thoughtfully for a moment. Then he asked, "What happened with Tapwana?"

"Tapwana is the outermost island in the crescent. It's a key one because it controls the channel between the Federation and the Luciparas. Some people think the inhabitants of Tapwana are not of the same racial stock as those of the rest of the Boruvian group, but in any event they have resisted incorporation into the group from the beginning, and when THRUSH began putting pressure on them to come in, they rebelled quite belligerently.

"So, about a week before the horrible volcano eruption, Sarabando warned the governor of Tapwana that grave consequences would ensue if the island didn't fall in line with the political structure of the Federation. The governor in effect spit in Sarabando's eye, and you know what happened then. Come."

April Dancer rose and took Napoleon by the hand. She led him out of the hut and up a rough path towards the top of the hill. When they reached the summit they plopped down on an outcropping of rock, and gazed west in the direction of Tapwana. For several minutes, in the blackness of the night and the roiling of black clouds overhead, Napoleon could distinguish nothing on the horizon where her finger pointed.

But after a while he realized that one spot seemed to glow, and as his eyes adjusted he could make out an eerie reddish-orange flickering. She pressed a pair of binoculars into his hands, and through them he could see a horrible yet fascinatingly beautiful turmoil of red molten metal churning far out to sea. His ears became aware of a rumbling, which he realized was not thunder but the sound of the earth throwing up its vitals in long, rhythmically timed spasms.

Focusing more precisely, he could make out the outline of a small cone out of which the lava spewed. With the passage of time that cone would grow to mountainous proportions, continuing to emit the seething magma until the formation of a crust, and cooling rains, capped it and made it dormant.

But that could take years, decades, even eons, and meanwhile life on that island, and on those islands nearby that directly received the pumice and cinders and soot ejaculated from Tapwana, could not exist.

"They say that the stuff that comes out of volcanoes makes great soil after a few million years," he said humorlessly. "Meanwhile, though, humanity has to have some place to rest its feet without getting them burned off. I don't think I like the idea of volcanic eruptions on the main streets of my favorite cities." He put the binoculars to his eyes once again, gazed at Tapwana in awe, then gave them back to April.

They looked out to sea, watching the ebb and flow of the reddish light on the horizon, and letting the cool night breeze play on their cheeks.

"It's like taking your favorite gal to a drive-in movie," Napoleon murmured.

April leaned against his shoulder. "It's good to have you here, Napoleon. How's Illya?"

Solo brought Dancer up to date on his friend's coordinating mission. A gust of wind bent the trees inland and Napoleon put a protective arm around her shoulder. "It's getting a little too chilly," he said.

"Yes, let's go back to the hut."

Hand in hand they descended to the shack. "I don't suppose you were aware," April said as they sat down over a crude table, "that as you came down that hill you were never more than two feet away from the muzzle of a gun or the blade of machete."

"I imagined you'd have guards posted. Silent devils, aren't they?"

"Yes, but the enemy can be just as silent. I worry for you, so please let's transact our business quickly and get you out of here."

"That's fine with me. I want you to tell me what events led up to the volcano in the last days of Tapwana. I learned from your report that Edward Dacian was here."

"Yes, but our U.N.C,L.E. agent, Philip Bouvier, working here, wasn't sure, although he had of course been shown a photograph of Dr. Dacian while in training in Singapore. Philip Bouvier is half French and half native. Maybe you remember his assignment in the Tahitian Affair? Yes, he's terribly clever. Philip communicated with Harry Gray and informed him that a fleet of helicopters had landed on the far side of the island, and Sarabando had gone out there to meet with the men who got off. The descriptions given left much to be desired, but two seemed rather distinctive. One was of a white man with close-cropped red hair, who certainly was Dacian, as reports from headquarters later verified.

"The other was a barrel-chested oriental who seemed quite tall for one of his race, and we can safely guess that it's Kae Soong. Soong is chief THRUSH operative in this area, and it's well known that he's directly responsible for the control exerted over the dictator."

"Yes, go on."

"Philip managed to get in closer, due to the unfortunate guard whose throat managed to get in the vicinity of his dagger. He trained binoculars on the party and got a glimpse of the red-haired Dacian, but Soong was inside in conference with Sarabando and things got too warm to hang around. Anyway, the next thing Philip knew was that they were taking off in the direction of Tapwana. He couldn't be sure that was their destination, but the events of the last few months pointed to it."

"Did we have anyone on Tapwana?"

"None of our regulars, no. We had a man there on the payroll, but we didn't know if he could be trusted, especially on something that, from what we could gather, was shaping up to be pretty big. So that night Philip set out by launch for Tapwana, which is about four hours away.

"He stashed the launch in a cove and made his way towards the city. He guessed that if the helicopter party was anywhere at all it would be at Sarabando's villa-type office.

"He was right. The lights burned brightly at two in the morning, and the place was swarming with armed guards and spectators. Obviously a pretty serious pow-wow was in progress.

"Philip then made his way to the back of the building and saw, in the broad courtyard and field behind the villa, five helicopters. But he knew that six had taken off for the island. So one of them had broken away from the others.

"He had no idea who or what it contained, or where it had gone. But around three, when the conference broke up, the five copters took off again in the direction of Borua. Not long afterwards, however, Philip Bouvier saw that six returned!"

"Strange. Or at least it must have seemed strange then. But you of course know now what happened."

"Certainly. While Kae Soong and his boys were trying to bring the Tapwanans peacefully to their knees, Dacian was elsewhere on the island, planting his little volcano box. Obviously negotiations failed, and Kae Soong signaled Dacian to throw the switch."

"What did Philip Bouvier do when the helicopters left?"

"He visited the governor, who knows about U.N.C.L.E. The governor had defied the group of 'thugs,' as he called them."

"Did he say Kae Soong was their leader?"

"Soong never presented himself by name; merely as The Gentleman from Singapore. They're very formal around here. But the governor was sure it was Soong. At any rate, the governor felt that the thugs wouldn't trouble him again, now that they had seen how determined his people were to retain their independence from the Boruvian Federation. Philip wasn't so sure about that. He headed back to Borua, and was told by his man there that after a few hours, the helicopters had taken off in a northerly direction."

"Towards where, do you guess?"

"Eventually to Singapore."

"What happened then?"

"Nothing eventful, but on the third morning following their visit to Tapwana the island was boiled off the face of the earth."

As if to emphasize the horror of such a scene, a deep rumble sounded far off in the west.

"I flew over it," April said, and suddenly her lip trembled and her eyes filled with tears. "Nothing. Not a tree, not a dwelling, not a hint of life, not a soul. Oh Napoleon, we've got to stop them—we've got to!"

April Dancer had taken his wrist in her hand and her nails almost cut through his flesh. All at once a low beeping sound emitted from the short wave set.

"That will be headquarters," Napoleon said. "And Philip Bouvier—where is he now, April?"

"Returning here he was shot at and wounded. I was able to get most of this first-hand information from him in the hospital in Singapore."

ACT V

THE MAN FROM SINGAPORE

EVERYTHING pointed to Singapore.

Paul Rollins, who had purchased the oil wells in Oklahoma had cabled to Singapore when the deal was made.

Kae Soong had called himself The Man from Singapore.

His helicopter squadron appeared to be based in Singapore.

It was clear that the THRUSH operation was being controlled from Singapore. But what had begun to grow clear only in the last week was that Singapore might be the next victim of volcanic aggression. It was this that Waverly told Napoleon Solo.

Napoleon sucked his breath in sharply when his chief suggested the possibility, and gazed blankly at the short wave radio as if it might be the old warhorse himself, his unlit pipe drooping out of the corner of his bloodhoundlike face, eyes sad with a kind of perpetual contemplation of calamity. Behind Napoleon, April burst out with, "But there are millions of people in Singapore—"

"Is that April?" Waverly asked in response to the girl's high voice.

"Yes, sir," Napoleon said.

"You may tell her that we're aware of Singapore's population. But just as important, we're aware of THRUSH'S total indifference to the lives of millions if the stakes are big enough. In this case the stakes are the souls of billions—that is to say, control of all the world's governments. At this moment, so far as we've been able to conclude, THRUSH is establishing volcanic centers in key locations around the globe.

"We've little idea about their whereabouts specifically, because we've no instruments for detecting the Dacian device. But our Singapore headquarters has been tracking down the sources of cables and other communications to THRUSH and the conspiracy appears to be global.

"I have Illya working on a system to detect and destroy volcano boxes, but I can't count on its being perfected in time, even if it's developed at all. There are too may unknowns, so we have to aim at the source and try to stop the head man from giving the signal to detonate the volcanoes. And of course, we have to find Dacian."

"To your knowledge, sir, are the volcano boxes fully operational?"

"I suspect they are not. But I believe intense pressure, if not torture, is being applied to Dacian to disclose his formula for a key element in the boxes. In anticipation of his yielding, the boxes, minus the key element, are being installed. The moment he relents the element will be mass produced and set into the boxes. That is why it is imperative to find Dacian. I am almost certain he is in Singapore."

"But what makes you think Singapore is next on THRUSH'S agenda?"

"Well, it happens that Sarabando, that nice little tyrant who wiped out Tapwana, has suggested to the government of Singapore that its presence in the Federation would be most welcome. More significant, Sarabando has hinted that Singapore's refusal to come into the Federation would be regarded as an unfriendly if not hostile act.

"I will not go into the political implications now, though I'm sure you can figure most of them out for yourself. It only needs be said that those implications are worldwide. If Singapore is destroyed, no other government will resist a THRUSH demand for surrender. The volcanic weapon will simply be too potent for any sensible government to resist."

"Just one question. Why destroy Singapore if that's where THRUSH is basing its operations?"

"Singapore," Waverly explained, "is a highly strategic location. It's a valuable port and its position, in relation to the Boruvian Federation, gives THRUSH an unbroken chain of control in that part of the Pacific Ocean. So they will, if necessary, destroy it and move their headquarters elsewhere.

"You have to understand, Napoleon, that Dacian is being forced to make one of his secret elements at a time, but THRUSH is going to try to blackmail the world by claiming it has the formula and can make as many of them as it wants. And remember, if Dacian talks, THRUSH will be able to make as many operational volcano boxes as it wants. So you must proceed to Singapore at once, locate Kae Soong and Dacian, and capture or kill."

"Any hint of their specific location?"

"SINGOIL, Napoleon. That is their cable address, but we've been unable to ascertain how they pick up their messages. If you can do that, it will lead you to Kae Soong."

They signed off and Napoleon turned to April. The muscles of her jaw were rigid with tension, and her brow deeply furrowed as if she were in pain. Napoleon, thinking it was only the news from U.N.C.L.E. headquarters that was disturbing her, was about to speak when April Dancer silenced him.

He held his breath and the muscles of his legs tightened in expectation of fast movement. She was straining her ears, and her eyes darted to the left as she heard a bird screeching.

Napoleon Solo tiptoed over to her.

"What is it?" he whispered.

"My guards haven't signaled as they're supposed to, every half hour. Instead I've been hearing—it could be a macaw, but... Come this way."

She moved towards a bamboo panel in the side of the hut, which she gingerly removed. She fell to her hands and knees and crept out after looking both ways. Napoleon followed, and after exiting paused beside her. April reached under a pile of leaves and drew out a pair of machetes.

They crept along the side of the hut and peered cautiously around the corner. It was pitch black, but a dim glow from the doorway of the hut highlighted a few objects directly in front of it.

One of these was a skinny oriental with machete raised. The machete was bloody. He stood poised before the doorway, as if to strike down anyone who emerged from it. Then Napoleon caught the glint of something metallic a few feet away from the intruder, and his eyes at last made out the shape of a second one bearing what might be a grenade.

After a moment the grenade-bearer crept up to the doorway of the hut, and behind him appeared yet another oriental, a loincloth his only piece of clothing. He came to a stealthy halt.

The obvious plan was for the second to toss his bomb, and for the others to position themselves in such a way that any survivors would be slain as they emerged. Napoleon nudged April and nodded with his chin in the direction of the grenade-bearer. She was to take care of him, and he would tackle the other two.

The second intruder released the silvery object, and as he did April and Napoleon rushed them. A pop and hissing noise told them it hadn't been a grenade but a teargas canister, and as they covered the ten yards between themselves and their antagonists their nostrils caught the pungent odor of the gas seeping out of the hut.

They took the intruders completely by surprise. The bomb-thrower reached for a gun, but April's machete lashed across his shoulder. He cried out hideously as blood gouted out of the wound. The nearest oriental with the machete whirled around but had scarcely brought his blade back when Napoleon's caught him fiercely on the neck. The other man was ready for Napoleon and lashed quickly at his exposed left side, but the agent twisted out of the way and warded off a backhand swipe of the blade as the attacker tried to get him coming back.

For an instant they squared off, and it looked as if it would be an even duel. But April had now freed herself and was making ready to join the fray. In matters of world defense, two-to-one odds were not unfair. But as the oriental glanced at April, Napoleon lunged, catching him off his guard, and slashed at his mid-section.

He dropped his machete to defend the blow, and the ring of crossed blades raised a violent chatter of jungle birds. Napoleon brought his foot up and caught the swordsman in the kidney. He yelped in pain, but it was the last noise he was to make, for with immense speed Napoleon brought the razor tip of his weapon up into the man's throat, and he dropped, dying, at Solo's feet.

"We can't stay here any longer," April panted. "I must go back into the hut to destroy the radio and some documents."

"You'll come with me to Singapore," Napoleon said. "Now hurry. I don't know how many more of these guys there are, and how much time it will take for them to get here."

Out of a compartment in her belt she removed a piece of cloth as fine as silk and placed it over her nose and mouth. It was a filter which folded into a package as big as a sugar cube.

Protected against the gas, she went into the hut and came out a few minutes later with the radio and some papers. They ventured into the jungle for twenty or thirty yards, then destroyed the radio by pulling out its vitals and twisting the dials so that even if the radio were found no one would know what wavelength it was on. They buried it and burned the documents beside it. Then they care fully covered everything with dirt and leaves and headed towards the beach.

When they got there, April's guide lay slumped over a gunwale, his head almost separated from his body by a vicious machete blow, and the bottom of the boat had been stove in with heavy stones.

April Dancer ran down the beach to a point where the island cut sharply inland. As they rounded a point they stopped abruptly and spied a sailboat guarded by another oriental.

"I knew this is where it would be," she whispered, drawing out a gun and slipping a silencer over the muzzle. She aimed it at the man guarding the boat, and as the gun hissed he dropped.

"I knew they'd place their boat here to sneak up on yours," she explained once they'd shoved off and were making for open sea, "and the footsteps in the sand showed that I was right."

Napoleon took out his communicator and signaled the ship off shore to send a launch to pick them up. The cool leeward breeze carried them quickly to their destination.

TWO

THE GOVERNMENT of Singapore had read Sarabando's letter with barely stifled amusement. The dictator of the almost invisible little federation of islands to the south was extending to one of the primary centers of trade in the Asian complex an "invitation" to join, in exchange for certain privileges and prerogatives.

With elaborate oriental politeness the government had declined the invitation, explaining that its commitments to other interests made it more feasible to keep its hands untied.

Under any other circumstances such a rejection would have satisfied an insolent petty tyrant like Sarabando. But a week later he issued another invitation to Singapore. This time, cheerfully and patiently, he explained that the honorable governors of the city must have misunderstood his first note. That initial invitation was not so much a cordial expression of good will as it was a subtle suggestion of the unpleasant consequences that might follow if Singapore held out.

So, in case Singapore did not clearly get the implied message, Sarabando spelled it out a little more explicitly.

This note too provoked mirth in the cabinet of this queen of Southeast Asia, except for the response of one minister, who was convinced that Sarabando had a weapon of grave potential, and believed that the dreadful spectacle of Tapwana's volcanic destruction had been no accident.

But his pleas were rejected by his colleagues, and though Sarabando's final message—an undisguisedly severe warning—caused some serious discussion in the higher echelons of the government, no serious measures were considered to defend against, let alone look into, Sarabando's "ravings."

A few days after the diplomatic positions jelled Kae Soong made his appearance in the secret Singapore laboratory of Edward Dacian. Dacian, who had never carried much meat on his bones, had become gaunt and stringy. His hands shook and his muscles twitched, and he had begun to blink frequently.

"I understand you are in the final stage of preparing the liquid reflectors," the chunky, tall THRUSH agent said to him.

"Y—yes, if my hands will stop trembling long enough."

"Why are you so nervous?"

"Hungry, tired."

"You're being mistreated?"

The scientists nodded jerkily.

"You know why, don't you?"

Again Dacian nodded.

"Would it not be easier, then, simply to let us have the formula for the reflectors? Then we would require no further work from you, and we would send you some place pleasant where you would dine well and sleep and never trouble with formulas."

"Heaven," Dacian said.

"You must realize that we are on the verge of deducing your formula anyway. We know what materials you have been using, we even know their measurements and combinations, and it is only a matter of time before we put together our own."

It was sheer bluff, for in spite of all attempts to assess the work Dr. Dacian was doing, his captors hadn't the slightest idea where to begin. Once they had entered the laboratory after Dacian left it for the night, and taken samples of the material he had created, by the next morning Dacian told them that by so tampering with it they had altered its nature, and he would have to start all over. Whether it was true or not, Dacian knew how to play the game of bluff as well as they.

"Why are you letting them kill you by inches?" Kae Soong asked as if "they" were on one side and Soong was on Dacian's. "If you would only be reasonable they would release you from this torture and roil."

"I'm down, not out," said Dacian in one of those American phrases which made little sense to the Oriental mind.

"You mean you will not alter your course?"

"I agreed—one device at a time," Dacian droned, his eyes shutting involuntarily, then snapping open.

"I don't know if they will tolerate such tardy progress any longer. There is too much at stake."

"Learn my formula, then kill me. But you won't learn any more from me."

Trembling almost as if palsied, the scientist returned to his worktable where, crouching over his formulas to prevent televised eavesdropping, he continued his painstaking development of the key device for the next volcano box.

The location for the next eruption had been tentatively settled on the week before. The island of Singapore is for the most part a low and of twenty or thirty feet above sea level, but the central portion is a granite formation dominated by a mountain called Bukit Timah.

It is not high as mountains go, and is really more of a hill than anything else, being less than 600 feet high. Nevertheless its position is enough to radiate destruction in all directions, and a volcanic eruption there would have at least disruptive, and probably critical, effects on rail, shipping and air traffic. And if the eruption were of greater intensity than calculations predicted, the effects would carry into the city itself, with its magnificent skyline and superb harbor facilities.

Bukit Timah, then, was the location of THRUSH'S next display and possibly its last. It was beginning to look dubious that Dacian would ever reveal his formula, and even less likely that he would survive to make the reflectors for even one more box. The threat of suicide became a consideration now. Though Dacian was a coward, his suffering could reach the point where he would be performing a kindness to himself to take his life.

And to his physical suffering must be added the mental torture of realizing that his device was responsible for countless lives lost and an unimaginable number of lives threatened.

But THRUSH was not as disturbed over the prospect of losing or killing Dacian as it could have been. It was planning to use the destruction of Singapore as the key chess piece in its game of world domination. Kae Soong and his colleagues had hoped that the destruction of Tapwana would be a broad enough hint to the nations of the planet that failure to heed a THRUSH warning would result in a spasm of volcanic fury.

But obviously the hint hadn't been broad enough. Some people were convinced that Tapwana's destruction, after rebelling against the Boruvian Federation, was strictly a coincidence. A similar event on Singapore, however, would leave no doubt in anyone's mind. Nor would anyone wonder how far THRUSH would go in its bid for conquest.