Molotov smiled sagely. “He is lying. Again an American trait.”
“Umm-mm, they must be terrible,” said the green man. “I’m so glad my ship got lost in space. It gave me an opportunity to land here and right a wrong. Well, I suppose I can get started—”
“Of course,” said Stalin, still rubbing his hands together.
Skinner’s head whirled. Such a completely naive creature! Naive, yes—but ten thousand generations of science stood behind him and his ignorance of Earth played right into Soviet hands. A happy accident for the Commies, bent on world domination, but doom for the free peoples of the planet.
THE GREEN man danced around for a time, flexing tiny muscles. “Whole banks of dials and levers to work,” he mumbled, half to himself. “I do wish I had a little more time.”
“Please! “ Molotov pleaded. “The! decadent capitalists of the West, may decide to unleash their atomic bombs at any moment.”
“Is that so? Even with their Mr. American spy here—that is his name, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” agreed Molotov. “Even with him here. They’d sacrifice anything to conquer our free land.”
“Very well,” the creature nodded doubtfully. But he still jumped up and down, flexing diminutive muscles.
It was then that Skinner acted. He had no plan—nothing. But another moment or two might be too late, for once the green man closed the bubble over his shining dome…
All eyes on the platform watched the creature from space, and Skinner got to Boris Rashevsky first. Poor Rashevsky, the American thought, astounded at his own objectivity in what must surely be the moment of death. Poor Rashevsky! Probably he’d cut quite a swaggering figure. But Skinner had cut him down to size once, and now as the Colonel gaped at the green creature. Skinner could do it again.
He stepped quickly toward the M.V.D. Colonel, reached out, plucked the long black pistol from its holster. Rashevsky almost fell on his back in surprise, but some of the soldiers down below had seen the action, and they cocked their’ own rifles.
“Don’t shoot! “ Molotov wailed into the microphone. “You’re liable to hit the Premier!”
The rifles lowered. A roaring, surging sea of sound swept up from Red Square, as more people saw an American loose among their rulers, a gun in his hand.
Slowly, Rashevsky’s face turned purple. “You will give me that gun, Mironov.” He spit the words out, one slow syllable at a time: “I don’t care if I die, not now. You have shamed me, and anyway, they would kill…” Slowly, one small motion at a time, he advanced on Skinner.
From the corner of his eye, the American saw Laurenti Beria creeping up behind him. This would never do. In another moment it would be an abortive one-man war, and he’d lie dead atop Lenin’s tomb. He could get Rashevsky, but could he swing around in time, to ward off Beria?
Abruptly, he ducked in under Rashevsky’s flailing arms as the man reached him, caught the Russian’s midsection with his shoulder, and, still holding the gun, swung him up into the air. Bellowing, Rashevsky clawed at his face. From, somewhere off in the crowd a rifle barked once, and the Field Marshall, standing near Molotov, pitched forward on his face.
Skinner spun around rapidly, half a dozen times and then again. Centrifugal force flung Rashevsky’s limbs out straight, held him helplessly atop Skinner’s shoulder. He bellowed and roared, but the noise of the crowd made it sound more like, a whimper.
THEN SKINNER dropped quickly to one knee, hurling the man at Beria.
The M.V.D. Commissar ducked, fell forward, and Rashevsky hurtled over his head, tumbling off the flat top of the spaceship and rolling over to the edge of the platform which supported it. He tried to stand up, lost his balance, swung his arms wildly to regain it.
He didn’t make it. Still bellowing,
he tumbled off the platform, striking the ground thirty feet below. From the way he sprawled, with his head hanging limply off to one side, it looked like his neck was broken. But Skinner couldn’t be sure because the crowd swarmed all over him. Perhaps, out of fear more than anything else, the Russian people had bowed under the yoke of their Communist despots, but their hatred for the Secret Police was intense. Like carion they covered Rashevsky…
Skinner turned to Beria. “Stay just where you are, on hands and knees. Don’t try to get up, or I’ll kill you.” He pointed the pistol at Beria’s face.
“This is ridiculous,” Molotov stammered. “You can’t get away with anything. You’re only delaying the end, and—”
The green creature smiled. “It certainly was an interesting demonstration. Is there anything I can do to help?”
“Yes! “ Vishinsky hissed. “Get inside your ship and start your machinery.”
“Better not,” said Skinner.
“Umm-mm. I’m much lighter, than that giant you just threw off the ship. I’ll wager you could throw me a long distance. No, I’d better not. But on the other hand, my bones are not fragile. They don’t break readily. Still, a big brute like you interests me—”
“Hop inside,” Skinner said. “And don’t lock that bubble. I’m coming in after you.”
“Don’t tell me what to do! You know, now that I think of it, that’s what these men were trying to do, and it can get pretty annoying.”
Skinner waved the gun. “If, you want to be temperamental and dead, it’s all right with me. I could smash this whole crazy ship up, and then where would, your Russian friends be?”
“Kill him!” Stalin pleaded, “Someone kill him! Commissar Beria, you’ll wind up in your own Quarters C unless you kill him!”
Beria looked at Skinner, remained on hands and knees.
“You know,” said the green man, “I could like you, Mr. American Spy. That is, if you didn’t come from an evil place. But I could like you because when you try to order me around at least you’re blunt about it. Not my friends, here, though. Oh, no! They’re sly and tricky and they say things which mean other things and—”
“I will be damned!” Skinner roared. “Maybe you can be un-indoctrinated yet. Now, get the hell inside that bubble.”
Tittering, the creature scampered to the edge of the open bubble, dropping through it within the ship.
Skinner whirled and almost dropped his gun. Tuman Tumanov was mounting the stairs behind the platform, his gaunt head peering over the edge. “Hello, everybody,” he said. “It wasn’t hard to get up here, not with air that confusion down below. Need any help, Tovaritch Skinner?”
Laughing, Skinner shook his head. “I don’t think so. But you sure do get around, Tuman. And Sonya, too. My gosh—here comes Sonya!”
Tumanov muttered something, turned for a moment to help the girl onto the platform. Then he strode eagerly toward Stalin, his Premier. “I just thought you’d like to know that I hate your guts, ‘Uncle Joe’. I never had a chance to say this before, but I do. Before the Revolution, things weren’t exactly perfect, but at least I could ride my horse all over the Crimea and come charging all the way down to Yalta if I wanted. Now, I can’t even own a horse, thanks to you and the New Order—”
“…you see,” Sonya was telling Skinner, “Tuman was busy, drinking his tea, and Commissar Beria must have slipped his bonds. First thing I knew, he hit me. When I’ got up and called Tuman, the Commissar was gone. When…”
Skinner was hardly listening. Everything had’ turned in their favor so suddenly. Everything…
“YOU WILL put down your weapon, Mr. American Spy. Or else I will kill you.”
Whirling, Skinner faced the bubble. Perched jauntily on its edge, the little green creature held a thin metal tube in his hand; “It fires an atomic projectile the size of your thumb-nail, Mr. American Spy. Don’t make me use it.”