"Mr. Solo and Miss Griffin," McNulty said. "I think this more than makes up for my unimaginative method of capturing you and Mr. Kuryakin the other day. And to think my parents always told me that my ability as a mimic had no practical value!"
* * *
Sometime later, McNulty finished fastening the handcuffs to the frame of the bunk and stepped back to admire his handiwork. From the lower bunk, Illya watched interestedly. "I hope you don't mind taking the upper bunk," he remarked, "but after all, I was here first." McNulty chuckled appreciatively and left. Sanders spat a stream of tobacco juice on the deck and followed.
Illya raised up as much as his handcuffs would allow and asked, "Did Kerry get away?"
"No, she's in another room. Also, they found the real Rudolph and brought him on board. What are they up to, anyway?"
"I don't know, but they're planning a long trip. They're taking sonar equipment from the submarine and installing it in the dirigible." Napoleon looked surprised, and Illya explained. "It won't work very well in the air; response will be very slow, and the range will be limited. I wouldn't have thought it could be adapted at all, but they seem quite confident about it. Of course, they won't be moving very fast, and there really isn't very much up here that they can run into, as long as they stay out of mountains. They can shut off the invisibility occasionally, in order to see where they are, since they can't navigate by sonar."
"But where are they going?"
"I wish I know. McNulty was crowing about pulling off the coup of the century, and Hunter was making snide comments; I gathered that dropping the sandbag on Lavell was due to one of McNulty's errors, and Hunter isn't about to let him forget it. They were using the sandbags as dummy bombs, but I gather that with no bombsight and with McNulty tripping over things, the practice bomb run was a complete fiasco, so McNulty came up with this other idea. But they didn't say what it was or where they were going."
"Is Forbes around? McNulty seems to be bossing the show."
"They said Forbes had gone on ahead, wherever that is. Apparently he trusts McNulty to move the dirigible."
Napoleon signed and lay back on his bunk. "You don't happen to have a file or a tiny hacksaw in your shoe, do you?"
"I don't even have a shoe." Illya wiggled his toes in proof. "McNulty may drop an occasional sandbag, but he is extremely efficient when it comes to searching people."
"Yes, I found that out, Too. I suppose our best bet is to catch up on our rest. We'll want to be at our best when we reach our destination."
* * *
They reached their destination after dark on the fourth day of travel. The dirigible, with invisibility field off and engines silent, drifted slowly downward into a clearing on a tropical plateau near a range of mountains. In the light from a few electric bulbs and dozens of torches scattered around the clearing. Napoleon and Illya could see one large building and several smaller structures. Men on the ground grabbed for lines dangling from the dirigible's descent, but their tugging was enough to maneuver the aerial giant so that it settled with its nose and control gondola near the large building and its length stretched along an open area which appeared to have been recently hacked out of the tropical forest.
"San Sebastian!" Napoleon exclaimed, recognizing the large building below them as the fortress-like three-story structure which was Thrush headquarters in that country. The smaller buildings had been used as barracks for the Thrush mercenaries fighting in the Army of Liberation of Ferdinand Pessina.
There was a light tremor as the bumping bag under the control gondola came to rest on the roof of one of the barracks. The soldiers scurried about with the lines, looking for convenient hitching posts. With no mooring mast available, the ropes were fastened to whatever buildings and trees they would reach. Seconds later, the door to Napoleon's and Illya's room opened and McNulty, Hunter, and a crew member entered. At a gesture from McNulty, the crewman stepped forward and released them from their bunks, while Hunter stood watchfully, gun in hand. Using one of the pairs of handcuffs, he fastened Napoleons right wrist to Illya's left.
"I suppose you've recognized our destination," McNulty said. "I understand you two were here once before and escaped. You may find it harder to do, this time."
Napoleon shrugged. "We do our best."
"I don't think your best will be good enough. Now that I'm here with the dirigible, San Sebastian will belong to Thrush in a matter of hours, with a minimum of blood, sweat and tears—I don't mind the blood but I object to work through that ridiculous idealist, Pessina."
"McNulty, you talk too much," said Hunter.
"That's all right." McNulty smiled at the two U.N.C.L.E. agents. "You wouldn't repeat anything I've said, would you? Now then, you should know the way to the cells in the headquarters building; they'll constitute your home away from home until Forbes gets a chance to question you. Walk slowly and try not to think too much about escape. I hate to see people disappeared."
Chapter 12
"I Never Sabotaged a Dirigible Before"
Napoleon and Illya sat gloomily in their cell. They had occupied the same cell less than two weeks before, but then they had been equipped with a coil of thin, tough wire with which to saw through the bars, shirt buttons which were in reality tiny gas grenades, and other well-tested U.N.C.L.E. equipment. Now they had nothing but their hands and wits.
"I wonder what the San Sebastian contingent has been up to since we left." Napoleon asked.
"Dirigible watching, I hope," Illya replied.
"I'm amazed Thrush didn't move their headquarters after we escaped. It seems careless of them to remain after their security had been breached. For that matter, I'm surprised that El Presidente hasn't flattened the place; he does have an air force."
"Of dubious loyalty," Illya pointed out. "Quite possibly, however, El Presidente doesn't know about this place. Mr. Waverly wasn't at all happy about supporting El Presidente; perhaps he still hopes to get Pessina out from under Thrush domination. In which case..."
"Spare me the speculation on Mr. Waverly's methods of intrigue," Napoleon broke in. "I'm content to realize that he usually knows what he's doing, even though I seldom do."
"In any case," Illya continued, "remember that Latin America has been having a population explosion second to none. Really good bases in isolated areas are getting hard to find; except in the Amazon Basin, isolated areas are hard to find. Quite possibly they haven't moved because they don't have any place to move to, and they feel capable of protecting this place. They certainly know that they have far more men in San Sebastian than we do, and I doubt if they worry much about El Presidente getting this far from Cerro Bueno."