The Thrush from Thrush Affair

by jhalpin322@aol. com

  “No!” Hand screamed. “No, the council will not decide that! This is my territory! I have the organization. I give the orders here, do you all understand?”

  “You would oppose us?” Councilman Z said ominously. Hand raged. “If I have to, yes! I will oppose the whole lot of you. I am the chief here, and I will hold you if I have to!”

  Councilman Z turned purple with anger.”You are threatening me! You dare to threaten a council member!”

  “Dare?” Hand screamed. “Yes, I dare! I have power here! These are my people! Maxine, shoot this woman! Shoot her now! Kill her!”

  “Will you kill me?” Councilman Z thundered.

  “If I have to!” Hand screamed. “Maxine! Kill that woman! Shoot! Shoot!”

  Maxine shot. The sound of the shot reverberated through the closed room.

  Walter Hand fell dead instantly, shot through the head by the single bullet.

  Maxine Trent held her pistol. She smiled at Lilli Kessler.

  “It will be good to have a woman chief, Miss Kessler.”

  “Thank you Maxine.” Lilli said.

  The tall council member smile as he looked at the dead body of Walter Hand. In THRUSH only results counted, only winners had an organization. Maxine had joined the winning side, and Walter Hand had gotten the THRUSH reward for failure---he was dead.

  Lilli looked up at the grille. “He has held us up! They will escape.”

  “I think not,” Councilman Z grimly.

  The tall man strode to a communications console. He flipped a switch. “All guards, all security. Two U.N.C.L.E. agents are in the building. Block all exits from below, and block all exits from the warehouse. Hunt them all down at once. Shoot on sight.”

  All though the complex of rooms shields came down and locks double locked automatically. Councilman Z turned back to Lilli and Maxine.

  “They will be stopped, Madam Chief!” Councilman Z said, and he smiled at Lilli Kessler.

  Illya Kuryakin and Solo had dropped into the corridor just before they heard the shot that killed Walter Hand. They ran for the closet and the conduit. The shot rang through the corridors. Two guards appeared in the corridor as if by magic. Napoleon Solo shot both of them down with his silent sleep darts.

  Illya and Solo jumped over them. Two more appeared. The U.N.C.L.E. men shot at the same time. Both men fell under the darts.

  “No time for the crawlway!” Illya cried.

  “The exit!” Solo panted. “It has to be near.”

  “There!” Illya said.

  The exit up to the fifth door was a tiny, narrow elevator. Solo and Illya crowded in and started up. They reached the door just as alarms began to sound all through the complex of rooms. They opened the door and were out in the warehouse. Almost at once a steel panel slammed down behind them, a panel that would have trapped them in the elevator seconds sooner.

  All through the dark warehouse the panels slammed down over the doors. Illya and Solo plunged into the shadows of the piled crates. They heard the voices of the guards all through the warehouse. Booted feet ran up and down the aisles.

  Solo and Illya slunk in among the crates that towered up to the dim ceiling. Kuryakin looked up and pointed. High above there was an overhead crane used for stacking the crates. It ran on a track which led to an opening in the warehouse, very high up on the pier side. Obviously the track ran from the warehouse all the way out along the pier to where the ships could be unloaded.

  THRUSH had neglected to provide an emergency barrier for the high overhead track.

  “If we can get up there we have a chance, Napoleon,” Illya said.

  “It would help if we had wings,” Solo said.

  “Where is your improvisation? We’ll fake it.”

  “Think good thoughts and we can fly.”

  “I prefer to plan good plans,” Illya said drily, “and our witty remarks are costing us time.”

  The THRUSH guards had formed against the walls. Their leader was dividing up the floor space. Soon they would move out from both sides and comb every inch of the floor and the piled crates. Illya motioned to Solo to start climbing.

  They climbed the crates on the shadow side. It was slow work. The THRUSH guards were already in the stacks of crates, probing as they moved slowly ahead. Solo and Illya inched up. At last they reached the top of the pile. Solo reached up as Illya watched the guards below.

  “Too short!” Solo whispered.

  The reach of the handsome chief agent was two feet too short. Illya Kuryakin looked up, and then down at the guards below.

  “We’ll have to move a crate.” Illya whispered.

  “Let’s move it,” Solo said.

  The crates were very heavy. The two agents strained. At last they broke one loose and heaved it up onto the top of the stack. Below, the guards had almost met. When they did, they would look elsewhere, including up.

  Solo and Illya had the crate up on the stack. They climbed onto it. The hook of the crane dangled directly above them. Solo swung up. He reached down and hoisted Illya up into the operator’s cab of the crane. The controls were in the cab. Solo studied them for a moment.

  “There!”

  “Up there!”

  “They’re in the crane!”

  The shouts came from below. The THRUSH guards opened fire. The cab of the crane was steel and the bullets glance off. Illya crouched and returned the fire with his Special set on bullets now. The THRUSH guards scattered for cover. At the other end of the warehouse some guards were already climbing to get on a level with the crane.

  Solo began to operate the controls. The crane moved out toward the high opening in the side of the warehouse. It reached a point where there were no crates below, only open space. The opening was near.

  “They’ll just chase us out!” Solo said. “The crane comes to an end at the end of the pier.”

  “We won’t go that far,” Illya shouted. “We’ll get out and up on the roof of the warehouse.”

  “Good, we---“

  He did not finish. The crane shuddered to a halt a good ten feet from the opening. They were at least twenty feet from the nearest giant stack of crates. Below there was nothing but a two story drop and the THRUSH guards looking up.

  There was a laugh. A woman laughed.

  “We control the crane from down here, Napoleon and my dear Illya,” Lilli Kessler’s voice said over a loudspeaker system. “You might just as well surrender. There is no escape now. Before you die, let me thank you for all your help, lieblings.”

  Illya and Solo said nothing. They crouched in the cab of the crane, out of range of the bullets of the THRUSH guards. But the guards were climbing ladders on both walls now. Soon the THRUSH guns would be above Illya and Solo.

  The cab began to move back toward the crates. Illya and Solo tensed to leap. The crane stopped after a few feet.

  “As you can see, we do control the crane,” the voice of the cadaverous Councilman Z said over the loudspeaker. “You might as well come down, my friends. It is easier to die on the ground.”

  Lilli’s voice chuckled grotesquely over the loudspeaker. “You will have time to reflect on trusting people. We must, of course, ask you many questions.”

  Illya and Solo looked down, and then around. Trapped in the cab of the crane, they watched the THRUSH guards almost in range above them. They raised their Specials.

  The explosion shook the warehouse.

  One of the outer doors blew open in a great cloud of smoke. Another door blew in. A voice boomed out louder than the explosions or the other voices.

  “Put down your weapons! This is Alexander Waverly with the police. All THRUSH men will put down their guns. We have you all surrounded. You cannot escape!”

  In an instant, the warehouse was a scene of wild chaos.

  FIVE

  The THRUSH men formed a line behind the boxes. Firing rose in a loud crescendo as the police broke into the warehouse. They came from all sides. The THRUSH men, caught in a cross fire, blinded by
tear gas bombs, fought desperately, but hopelessly.

  In the cab of the crane, Napoleon Solo pointed down. “They’re covering the getaway of Councilman Z and Lilli Kessler!”

  “Move it!” Kuryakin shouted.

  Solo worked the controls. They were under the control of the cab again. They reached a pile of crates and leaped out. They half slid, half climbed down the great mound of crates to where the fifth door stood closed. Two THRUSH men blocked their way. Solo shot them both.

  In the melee, no more THRUSH men thought of them. The door below was locked, sealed.

  “The crawlway!” Solo shouted.

  They ran to the cover plate, opened it inward and crawled again into the electrical conduit crawlway. They crawled faster this time---the plans for the rocket were still below. They reached the closet and jumped out into the corridor. Two THRUSH men ran past without even noticing them. They turned left and raced to the door of the big conference and control room.

  Two guards were in the room. They fired and missed. Illya did not miss. There was nothing else in the room. The computer was gone. Solo and Illya ran back into the corridor.

  “They would have to escape by water,” Illya said.

  Solo nodded. “That way then, toward the pier!”

  The two agents raced along the corridor. They heard faintly the sound of an engine. They ran faster. Up above, the noise of firing was slackening. Solo and Illya raced on until they rounded a corner in the bright corridor and came into a large underground room. They stopped.

  The sight that greeted their eyes was a scene from some nightmare.

  The room was long and low, little more than an old sewer. Rats ran and water sloshed across the stones. A deep channel ran along the far wall. They realized that they were beneath the pier at the edge of the bay.

  Men struggled with the heavy model of the Ultimate Computer. They sweated, cursing, their clothes torn in the effort of moving the giant machine.

  At the edge of the water, urging them on with frantic commands, was the emaciated giant, Councilman Z. His eyes behind the dark glasses looked up continually toward the door into the bright corridor. Beside him Maxine Trent and Lilli Kessler urged the men on.

  Then they saw Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin.

  Councilman Z fired at them with his pistol. Maxine fired.

  Illya and Solo ducked to the floor.

  The men sweating with the computer dropped it and clawed for their weapons.

  Solo and Illya laid down a withering fire. The THRUSH men went down as if cut by some giant scythe. Illya and Solo jumped up. Maxine turned and leaped into the water. She made a great splash. But she did not sink. She stood on some kind of solid object. The Solo and Illya saw the tiny conning tower---there was a midget submarine in the channel.

  Solo and Illya ran forward.

  The tall, cadaverous council member held up an object.

  “Stop! This is a lethal gas bomb! Do not move another step!”

  Solo and Illya halted. Councilman Z held the small bomb and his eyes flashed behind the dark glasses in the sewer like room. In the same hand he held a small briefcase.

  Maxine stood on the small submarine. Lilli Kessler was at the side of Councilman Z. The petite blonde almost snarled as she looked back at Solo and Illya. The two agents tensed for an attack. Councilman Z watched them. Then Lilli turned, her face twisted in anger. She looked up at the council member.

  “We must leave the computer! I’ll return and take care of them!

  Lilli said.

  Councilman Z studied Lilli Kessler from behind his dark glasses. He smiled a thin smile.

  No. my dear, you will not return. You were smart, yes, but not smart enough. You led Alexander Waverly to us! You are no more use to us now!”

  A pistol appeared in Councilman Z’s free hand.

  The two shots rang out at the same instant.

  His eyes on Lilli for a split second, Councilman Z did not see Illya Kuryakin shoot. Illya’s shot struck his hand and he dropped the gas bomb and the briefcase into the water.

  The shot of Councilman Z hit Lilli.

  Lilli Kessler went down. The council member grabbed for the briefcase and missed. It floated away. Maxine Trent had vanished into the submarine. Solo and Illya fired as Councilman Z leaped for the conning tower. They both hit the giant council member. He staggered, clawed for the conning tower. It was closed!

  Councilman Z beat frantically on the closed conning tower. The sub began to go down. He hammered, screamed. The sub inexorably sank beneath the water. He stopped hammering, turned with the water up to his waist, and his dying eyes stared back at Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin as the midget submarine disappeared beneath the water.

  In THRUSH there was no waiting for anyone.

  When Alexander Waverly appeared in the sewer like room, Councilman Z still floated face down in the water. THRUSH bodies littered the room. Napoleon Solo had retrieved the briefcase and found the decoded plans for the new rocket inside. Illya stood over Lilli Kessler.

  The petite blonde looked up, a smile on her face now. She had been shot through the shoulder and her pain was great. Blood dripped down through her hand that was pressed to the wound. She coughed, and her smoky voice was a faint frightened whisper. She looked at Alexander Waverly through half-closed eyes.

  “How?”

  Waverly was solemn. In all his years he had never been able to watch intense suffering, even the agony of evil. He cleared his throat.

  “A transmitter, Miss Kessler. One of the homing devices I had planted on you was actually a small transmitter. We heard it all. What you told Councilman Z.”

  Lilli Kessler coughed. “A transmitter? Then you---you never believed me?”

  Waverly rubbed his chin. “Let us say I had certain vague suspicions. You were, uh, too convenient. You were too anxious to risk your life by returning to San Francisco. Let us say I had a hunch.”

  Lilli nodded. “Yes, I was---afraid you---might.”

  “It occurred to me that your help to get the microfilm could have been because you wanted it. When you were captured by Hand, it struck me that we helped you to escape Hand as much as you helped Mr. Solo and Mr. Kuryakin.”

  Lilli Kessler looked at Solo and Illya. “They knew?”

  “No,” Waverly said. “All I had was a vague suspicion. I thought it best not to inform them. They had to act as if they believed you if you were to be fooled into leading us here.”

  “You are very---clever,” Lilli said. “I see why you are---Chief---“

  “Let us say I am older, too old to be taken in completely by a charming singer,” Waverly said.

  “Smart,” Lilli said. “Yes, very clever. I was ---not clever---enough.”

  The petite blonde looked at all of them, coughed a racking cough. Her eyes were suddenly wide. “I should have---remained---a singer. I was---good.”

  And Lilli Kessler fainted dead away.

  Two days later the warehouse had been stripped, Walter Hand’s stronghold was destroyed, and Manfred Burton’s house was also stripped bare. The submarine was not found. The records of all the North American affairs of THRUSH were in U.N.C.L.E.’s hands. Waverly sat in his office with a broad smile for once.

  “The plans are recovered. THRUSH will be a long time rebuilding in North America,” Waverly said. “A council member is dead, and a potentially very dangerous THRUSH is gone. All in all a very good piece of work, gentlemen.”

  Illya was not happy. “Lilli---such a mellow voice. I’ve all her records.”

  “Yes, a fine voice, but she had wrong ambitions,” Waverly said. “She was very clever. Interpol never even suspected her, Mr. Kuryakin.”

  “She sang so well,” Illya said. “I wonder if she’ll recover; she was severely wounded. What could’ve caused her to turn bad?”

  “Difficult to say, Mr. Kuryakin! A hard life and working with THRUSH, too. There was a twist in her mind. There are a thousand reasons for evil. But she is still on the hospital’s
critical list. Who knows---we may see her again!”

  Solo sighed. “The submarine got away though.”

  “Really, Mr. Solo, we can’t expect to succeed at everything,” Waverly said.

  “No, I mean that she has done it again,” Solo said.

  “She?”

  “Maxine,” Solo said. “She was on the submarine.”

  Waverly nodded. “I see your point. That woman will be your undoing, Mr. Solo.”

  “We all have to be undone someday,” Napoleon Solo said with a smile.

  Waverly began to look for a match. He raised a bushy eyebrow at Solo. Waverly was not smiling.

  Illya Kuryakin grinned.