Well, they'd know soon enough.
"You know," Mark Slate said suddenly, his wry voice alive with his own devilish sense of humor. "There's a jolly good movie playing Radio City. It's about spies and foreign intrigue and all. Stars Sophia Loren. Imagine that Italian pizza playing a spy. Quite ridiculous on the face of it. But what say we drop everything and go see it?"
"Sure," April said, "and why don't I run for Congress or grow wings and fly over London and drop leaflets inviting everybody to the wedding of George Hamilton and Luci Baines Johnson, or is it Lynda Bird he's marrying?"
"Lynda Bird," said Mark Slate and lapsed into silence again.
The round, magnificent table-desk in Mr. Waverly office was one of those ornate yet supremely technological masterpieces that defies description. The table revolved at a finger's touch and whoever was sitting at a place there could command the use of a telephone, radio set, transmitter or a host of filing treats that made an agent's work much easier.
Mark Slate, in jocular moods, would spin the table like a roulette wheel and call out numbers. But only when he and April were awaiting Mr. Waverly's presence.
On this particular occasion, the head of U.N.C.L.E. was waiting for them when they entered the office. After brief greetings, Mr. Waverly asked them for detailed reports of the day's activities.
Slate began the narration, leaving off where April had entered the picture. From that point on, she added all that she knew and had accomplished. She spoke lightly in an even, melodious voice, whose tonal quality Mr. Waverly had always found soothing. And rather astounding too. When one looked at Miss Dancer, for all her vital good looks and obvious intelligence, one hardly expected a combination of Mata Hari and a female Tarzan. Mr. Waverly had always thoroughly approved of April Dancer. She was a credit to her U.N.C.L.E. Academy training. A living refutation of the claim that women could not be made to serve in the capacity of Enforcement agents.
"Good work. Miss Dancer," he murmured, when she had concluded. "You too, Mr. Slate. Glad to have you both back in one piece, as it were." He steepled his fingers, regarding them in his headmaster way. "This certainly has the thoroughness of a Thrush project. I'd rather hoped that I was in error about our Mr. Zorki."
April moved around in her chair. The bruised leg and shoulder were still bothering her, having stiffened somewhat. But her mind was on something else.
"How do you mean, Mr. Waverly?"
"You recall Zorki's miraculous escape from death the day he was exposed to the radium bullets? And his subsequent boast about a drug that guaranteed life everlasting?"
"But that's—fiddlesticks," April blurted. "He's an egomaniac. A fluke saved him. Possibly the machine wasn't working at full power. As for his boast, well, he only thinks he's the greatest living scientist in the world, doesn't he?"
Mark Slate prodded his weary eyes with his hands. "I go along with April on that, sir. It's all beer and skittles."
"Is it?" Waverly smiled fondly at them both. "I wish I could say that I shared your certainty. I'm afraid I cannot. What explanation is there then for the efforts of Thrush to regain his services? For abducting you, Mr. Slate? And you, Miss Dancer? Look how extensive their plain out-and-out efforts were. The business with this blue truck of theirs. The circus aspects of the thing. Your captors. This mysterious Mr. Riddle and the Van Atta woman. No, I am quite convinced in my mind. Which is why I chose to fly to the capitol and discuss the matter with some VIP's. We shall have to treat Mr. Zorki as if he indeed is the discoverer of the most shocking panacea of them all. There is no other alternative."
April shrugged. "We have the man. Isn't that enough?"
"It is, certainly. But I'm sure we haven't seen the last of Thrush in the matter. They are still in the wings, ready to come on. I'm sure of it."
"He could be brainwashed," April suggested.
"Perhaps. But not just yet. I have planned a diversion. You see, Dr. Egret is in this somewhere. The communique I received re your capture, Mr. Slate, was signed with that name."
"Egret?" April murmured the name; she and Slate exchanged impressed glances.
"Yes, Egret. The diabolical, the unknown. The woman of a thousand faces and disguises." Mr. Waverly unsteepled his fingers and leaned forward across the polished table. "What of this Van Atta woman, Miss Dancer?"
"She checks out, sir. All the way down the line. Born in New York, raised here. Career woman from the word go. No romantic affiliations. She does work at the UN as a translator. Her sole means of support, barring any funds she receives from Thrush. No, she's not Egret. She couldn't be. Just a gorgeous magpie who flew with the bright, new movement. An intellectual radical. And a bit of a case for the analysts. Ask Slate."
Slate nodded. "They must have contacted her for this assignment. She was figurative head of this League of Nations gang. The man called Mr. Riddle seemed to be the top man but I'd stake my last penny that our redhead was the one calling the plays."
"Neither of you saw this person at any time?"
"Just a voice to me," April recalled. "A flat emotionless voice. Like someone reading a grocery list. Really a hard voice to pin down to a definite category."
Mark Slate coughed. "I saw half of him when they crowded around that serving board they had me laid out on. The voice sounded muffled then, half-clear, as though the man was wearing a mask of sorts."
"Man," Mr. Waverly repeated. "Then you would both rule out the possibility that it could be a woman disguising her natural speaking voice?"
"I wouldn't commit myself," April answered, trying to hear once again that flat voice coming into their cell room. "If it was a woman talking like a man, then Dr. Egret must be a marvelous mimic."
"She is, Miss Dancer. She once posed as an eighty-year-old Nobel prizewinner and fooled the police of three countries for five months. Mr. Slate?"
Mark shook his head. It was impossible to say for sure.
Waverly pursed his lips.
"Let's recap, shall we? Might clear the air a bit. Alek Yakov Zorki comes here to do a bit of damage, indulging in his old fondness for bombings. We apprehend him. Thrush knows almost immediately that we have. A troubling thought about our Headquarters Security system, incidentally. Now, Thrush captures Mr. Slate through the ingenuity of this Van Atta woman. She is equipped with an entourage of international help—the Chinese, the Frenchman and the poor Hindu you mentioned, Miss Dancer. His corpse, as well as the truckdriver's is probably in the rubble back there at that burned-out factory in the Bronx. We'll know better in the morning. The note from Egret suggests a swap of agents at midnight in Grand Central Station, or at the very least a continuance of negotiations. We have put a stop to that by having you both back safe and sound. The next move is Egret's. Will she or won't she get in touch with me? All fairly simple now, save for two odd factors." The head of U.N.C.L.E. fixed his stern but parental gaze on April and Mark Slate. "Who and what is Mr. Riddle and where did he get off to? And that dear little girl you found in the lockers—Joanna Paula Jones?—odd name that—where does she fit into the picture? We are contacting Naval Intelligence now to see if such a person was assigned to this matter. When I was in Washington, the Navy Chief did mention some interest in Zorki. But we shall have to wait. As I see it, that about represents all we have so far. Have I left anything out?"
"Yes," April interjected. "You mentioned some diversion you had planned in regard to Zorki—"