"Solo here."
"There are a number of top priority calls on Channel D and several more on other lines. Would you like to handle them now?"
And then the delayed messages began to come through. Flin Flon. Clipperton Island. Tierra Caliente. Cleveland. Denver—well, that had come out all right. Anchorage meant six months of careful preparation blown and a good agent in the hospital. Hong Kong was still holding, and the attack had finally fallen off again, but he didn't learn that for a while.
He stood there in the hotel room, words falling about him telling of disasters of every description. At last he turned without a word, got back into his limousine and rode back to U.N.C.L.E. Headquarters in silence. For part of the long crosstown journey he wondered about suicide, but ruled it out. Now that he knew the news had preceded him, he wondered seriously about resigning his command. Carlo had run things across the Atlantic before for short periods, and Waverly would be back in two weeks.
He looked up from the desk as the door sighed open and Miss Williamson came in at her usual graceful pace. She set a stack of folders and a spool of film on his desk, straightened and looked him in the eye.
"You really blew it this time, didn't you?" she said matter-of-factly.
He looked up at her for several seconds. "Yes," he said at last. "I guess I did."
Section IV "The Pride Of Utopia."
Chapter 13
"You Knew The Job Was Dangerous When You Took It."
SILVERTHORNE had a regular luncheon date with his opponent in the war game, and Dodgson seemed to find their meetings stimulating. So much so that Silverthorne was confident he would be on the dining terrace at the usual time, vacating his office shortly past noon. Silverthorne had also made it an irregular practice to arrive late, as he would this time, though normally he was precisely punctual.
When Dodgson left his office at 12:06, Silverthorne was just around the corner of the hall, watching. The brisk, sturdy figure walked out the open door into the bright spring sunshine and vanished up the graveled walk, and moments later the thin dark watcher drifted out of the shadows and moved quietly to the just-locked door. With the tip of a short ribbon of spring steel he attacked the bolt, shielding his work with his body so any passerby would have seen only a man fumbling with his key.
In seconds the action yielded to his touch and the door eased open. He looked around the small, spartan room. Where would it be? The desk? His glance settled and he moved to follow it. Top drawer? Second? Third? They opened and closed before his search, but revealed only a few small personal items. If Dodgson was to have any hope of gaining a winning advantage before the game's end, he must have made some notes. The action of the game was too complex for even a mind like this man's to carry around in ready memory.
Standing up, he sent his searching gaze swiftly around the room. There—on a shelf lying in plain sight though half-hidden behind the door, the faded brown dust jacket. The book of mystery fiction with the hollow center. He had only moments—Dodgson might wonder if he was more than a few minutes late. There were no other obvious or reasonable hiding places in the room.
Quickly he stepped across the office and picked it up, flipping open the cover. The hollow was empty. He shook it, turned the volume over and checked the spine. The broken back of the old book gaped open and empty. Then if the plan was not here—could it be that he really didn't have one after all and would go into battle this afternoon essentially unprepared? The mere fact of the book's presence in the office confirmed his suspicion that it related to Dodgson's war effort as a secret safe. Could he have carried the plans on his person? He wouldn't have brought the book if he hadn't needed its services—or expected to need them. It would not be impossible for him to play the action by ear, since they had both opted to supervise the approaching battle personally rather than let the computer adjust the forces within the limits of their basic orders and without imagination, but did he really expect to be able to juggle and coordinate the fantastically complex scheme of play improvisatorially?
Then he knew what to do. Dodgson had studied his style of play, his habitual placement of forces; it was time to switch. Use direct confrontation, perhaps feint at his supply lines first—After all, Silverthorne thought, I am already in a winning position and fighting an essentially defensive campaign…
Plans were forming in his mind as he let himself out of the office, restored the latch to its proper condition and hurried off to keep his luncheon date with his friend and enemy.
Well, they'd vacated their quarters, but nobody minded because they had three days off. Three days—in that time they could have a dozen chances to kill Waverly. And he didn't even know where they were. Illya brooded in the corner of the kitchen, his uniform and mood a patch of black among the gleaming utensils. He was off duty in another ten minutes, but until then he had to stand ready to hop into the electric cart and wheel off to deliver a meal or a few bottles. He had played many roles without complaint during his years with U.N.C.L.E. and before, but few were as difficult to maintain as six weeks of subservience.
The hands of his watch crawled around, snipping the last minutes off the hour, one by one, until at last he looked up to see Andreas, his replacement, coming on duty. They exchanged the usual pleasantries until Illya yawned politely and Andreas bid him a good evening.
There was only one way to draw them out—he'd have to offer himself as a target. His conservative soul shrank from the idea, but it was the only one practicable at the moment, and the need was pressing. All he could do was attract their attention, and then stand ready to move very fast.
He'd go to their room as if to examine his mysteriously silenced bug. If they were looking for their secret friend, they'd find him. He decided to eat lightly and do a few warm-up exercises before he went in. He debated carrying a pistol, a knife or a weighted stick, and finally compromised on all three. Bound by the order not to let anybody get killed if he could help it, his U.N.C.L.E. Special carried only the knockout darts. Illya wished heartily for a sturdier arm like the Webley-Vickers 50/80 machine pistol, but the word for this mission was still Don't Make Waves. He took the note addressed to Curley out of his drawer and propped it up on the desk just before he turned out the light and left.
A popular film was being shown in the employee auditorium this evening, and the halls were nearly deserted. The elevator door slid open on level four and Illya stepped out, glancing in either direction. If anyone was watching, he was well hidden. If there was only one, Illya hoped it was the Turk; the little Japanese was more than he felt up to, even at his best. Their door was just around the corner; a concealed guard wouldn't bother him until he was obviously working on the door of the suite.
He glanced perfunctorily up and down the corridor again before he quite stopped at the door; he knew if they were watching he would see nothing. His muscles tensed as he stopped and fumbled at the keyhole, and he willed them to relax. But the skin of his back itched with expectation as he completed the action and turned the knob, the stick ready in his left hand.