“The first refueling key was the sentence suggesting solitaire in those exact words, which unlocks his basic conditioning. Then the queen of diamonds, in so many ways reminiscent of Raymond’s dearly loved and hated mother, is the second key that will clear his mechanism for any assignment.” As Yen spoke, Raymond had been shuffling the cards and was laying out the seven-card spread that is variously called solitaire, Klondike, or patience.
“He will play the game until the queen of diamonds enters the play, which will be soon because we arranged it that way to save your time. Ah, here it is.” Raymond’s play had turned up the queen. He scooped all the other cards together neatly. He squared them, placed them facedown on the table, and put the queen of diamonds faceup on top of the pack, then sat back to watch the card with offhand interest, his manner entirely normal.
“May I have that bayonet, please?” Yen Lo asked General Berezovo.
“Not with the knife,” Gomel barked. “With the hands.”
“His hands?” Yen responded distastefully.
“Here,” Berezovo said. “Have him use this.” He handed a white silk scarf to an assistant who carried it to Yen Lo. Yen knotted the scarf tightly in three close places, speaking to Raymond as he did so.
“Raymond, whom do you dislike the least in your group who are here today?”
“The least?”
“That’s right.”
“Well—I guess Captain Marco, sir.”
“Notice how he is drawn always to authority?” Yen asked the group. Then he said to Raymond, “That won’t do. We will need the captain to get you your medal. Whom else?” Both Gomel’s and Berezovo’s translators were right at their masters’ ears, keeping up with the conversation in English on the stage.
“Well—” It was a difficult question. Raymond disliked the rest of them in the same detached and distant way. “Well, I guess Ed Mavole, sir.”
“Why?”
“He is a funny fellow, sir. I mean very humorous. And he never seems to complain. Not while I’m around, anyway.”
“Very good, Raymond. Now. Take this scarf and strangle Ed Mavole to death.”
“Yes, sir.”
Raymond got up from the table and took the scarf from Yen. He walked to the end of the line of seated men at stage left, then moved along behind the row to a position directly behind Mavole, fifth man from the end. Mavole was chewing gum rapidly and trying to watch both Yen and Raymond at the same time. Raymond looped the scarf around Mavole’s throat.
“Hey, Sarge. Cut it out. What is this?” Mavole said irritably, only because it was Raymond.
“Quiet, please, Ed,” Yen said with affectionate sternness. “You just sit there quietly and cooperate.”
“Yes, sir,” Mavole said.
Yen nodded to Raymond, who pulled at either end of the white scarf with all of the considerable strength of his long arms and deep torso and strangled Ed Mavole to death among his friends and his enemies in the twenty-first year of his life, producing a terrible sight and terrible sounds. Berezovo dictated steadily to his recording assistant who made notes and watched Mavole at the same time, showing horror only far back behind the expression in her eyes. As she set down the last Berezovo observation she excused herself, turned aside, and vomited. Leaning over almost double, she walked rapidly from the room, pressing a handkerchief to her face and retching.
Gomel watched the strangling with his lips pursed studiously and primly. He belched. “Pardon me,” he said to no one at all.
Raymond let the body drop, then walked along the line of men to the end of the row, rounded it, and returned to his chair. There was a rustle of light applause which Yen Lo ignored, so it stopped almost instantly, as when inadvertent applause breaks out during an orchestral rest in the performance of a symphony.
“Very good, Raymond,” Yen said.
“Yes, sir.”
“Raymond, who is that little fellow sitting next to the captain?”
The sergeant looked to his right. “That’s Bobby Lembeck, sir. Our mascot, I guess you could call him.”
“He doesn’t look old enough to be in your Army.”
“Frankly, sir, he isn’t old enough but there he is.”
Yen opened the only drawer in the table in front of Raymond and took out an automatic pistol. “Shoot Bobby, Raymond,” he ordered. “Through the forehead.” He handed the pistol to Raymond who then walked along the front of the stage to his right.
“Hi, Ben,” he said to the captain.
“Hiya, kid.”
Apologizing for presenting his back to the audience, Raymond then shot Bobby Lembeck through the forehead at point-blank range. He returned to his place at the table, offering the pistol butt to Yen Lo who motioned that it should be put in the drawer. “That was very good, Raymond,” he said warmly and with evident appreciation. “Sit down.” Then Yen turned to face his audience and made a deep, mock-ceremonial bow, smiling with much self-satisfaction.
“Oh, marvelous!” the shorter Chinese, Wen Ch’ang, cried out in elation.
“You are to be congratulated on a most marvelous demonstration, Yen Lo,” said the other Chinese, Pa Cha, loudly and proudly, right on top of his colleague’s exclamation. The Russians broke out into sustained applause and were tasteful enough not to yell “Encore!” or “Bis!” in the bourgeois French manner. The young lieutenant who had been picking his nose shouted “Bravo!” then immediately felt very silly. Gomel, who was applauding as heavily and as rapidly as the others, yelled hoarsely, “Excellent! Really, Yen, really, really, excellent!” Yen Lo put one long forefinger to his lips in an elaborate gesture. The line of soldiers watched the demonstration from the stage with tolerance, even amusement. Yen turned to them. The force of the bullet velocity at such close range had knocked little Bobby Lembeck over backward in his chair. His corpse without a forehead, never having known a fat lady or a tall one, sprawled backward with its feet still hooked into the front legs of the overturned chair, as though it were a saddle which had slipped off a running colt.
Mavole’s body had fallen forward. The color of the face was magenta into purple and the eyes seemed to pop out toward Yen in a diligent effort to pay him the utmost attention.
The other men of the patrol sat relaxed, with the pleasant look of fathers with hang-overs who are enjoying watching a little girls’ skating party in the moist, cool air of an indoor rink on a Saturday morning.
“Captain Marco?” Yen said briskly.
“Yes, sir.”
“To your feet, Captain, please.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Captain, when you return with your patrol to your command headquarters what will be among the first duties you will undertake?”
“I will submit my report on the patrol, sir.”
“What will you report?”
“I will recommend urgently that Sergeant Shaw be posted for the Medal of Honor, sir. He saved our lives and he took out a full company of enemy infantry.”
“A full company!” Gomel said indignantly when this sentence was translated to him. “What the hell is this?”
“We can spare an imaginary company of infantry for this particular plan, Mikhail,” Berezovo said irritably.
“All right! If we are out to humiliate our brave Chinese ally in the newspapers of the world we might as well go ahead and make it a full battalion,” Gomel retorted, watching the Chinese representatives carefully as he spoke.