[The Girl From UNCLE 01] - The Global Globules Affair - Latter Simon - Страница 26

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April nodded pensively. "And dat is down dere?" She pointed.

He chuckled. "Dat is. Tell you something else—dere is someone over dar." He pointed to further around the hills. "I seen him bobbing behind a rock."

"A peeping Tom?"

Mark looked at her, one eyebrow flicked up. "You're kidding, of course?"

She looked away. "Well, I mean—we're not what people might think, and—"

He grabbed her, held her tight. "Darling—you're really human! Let's give Tom an eyeful he won't forget."

She stared at him calmly, her face close to his. She kissed him gently, then said softly:

"Let go of me, you over-sexed rat, or I'll clobber you!"

"At last!" he cried. "At last, the real woman emerges from her glossy career cage!" He too kissed her gently. "You're a sweet bitch. Keep looking over my shoulder."

She lay still. "Yes—yes, I saw a movement. Ah! He's gone now—scuttled up and over the brow of the hill."

Mark looked back and released her. "Now who? Not one of our friends, surely? And it's a powerful long hike from the valley to where he was, so we'd have seen him." Mark pulled out the range glass and twisted the bevel for focus. "He's gone right enough. It's a great big lonely world out there." He switched to the sprawled cluster of buildings below them. "No activity. Strange, y'know. Not seen a soul outside ever since we got here. There's movement inside—can just see shadows through the screens over those picture windows. What is it—off-season for nut hatches?"

She held out her hand for the glass, then laughed. "They must have heard you!"

"I can see them—not to identify though. They look like women."

"They're not," said April firmly. "They're dressed like women, but they're husky men." She lowered the glass, then looked at Mark. "Could be they have spotted us and are putting on a show?"

"Not a chance. We were here before dawn. We've built a natural stone rampart, plus the cover that scrub further down must give us against anyone looking up here." He tapped his chest. "Plus these desert-camouflage track suits which blend perfectly against the background. Why, I couldn't even spot you when I reccied along the ridge." He paused before adding: "But chummy-boy over there might have set them off."

"Set them off on what?"

Mark pointed downwards. "If that nut hatch was genuine, there would be people resting on the patios, others taking the air, some using the pool—there's an awning over it to protect invalids from the sun. And where are the staff? It's a lovely place down there. Lush and beautifully laid out. Wouldn't there be even one single person with business or pleasure outside the building? There are stables beyond the pool and a carport full of cars and pick-up trucks. Yet no one to tend the horses? No car needing checking? No, me old darling—something set 'em moving, and I think it was young chummy on the hill yonder. He was wearing dark clothes."

"Young?"

"The way he scarpered over the Beecham—yes."

"Speak English, you limey half-wit!"

"Scarpered, darling—ran. Beecham—as in Beecham Pill hill. They call it rhyming slang. Very useful."

"Not now. The only useful thing I need is a way in to that lush oasis without setting off their goddamn button."

Mark leaned back, relaxed.

"With you little eye, can you spy a gee-gee?"

"A number of them in stables—the top halves of the doors are open."

"I have a way with gee-gees. I think I smell good—a sort of inner cleanliness."

"Skip the commercial."

"Devices are for alarm—yes?"

She shrugged. "I've known some killers—booby traps."

"But not down there."

"Oh no? Flower beds, lawns, curving paths—we won't know how to avoid them. That dirt road from the highway must be all of eight miles, but I'd say there'd be alarms every mile."

"But not killers."

"If it was me, I'd wire the patio too," she said thoughtfully. "That would leave the path around the perimeter fence, past the corrals and the carports and on to the stables. Now where would I booby that? I'd let us get in—some way in—then I'd rig them across that open area. Hmm—can't see what's at back of the main building. Doesn't really matter. Our shortest line for entry is at the side." She moved her head and the range glass back and forth. "Yep—through or over the fence, along the outer path, past the stables, cut across at the edge of the pool. Three leaps and we're under a window."

"They won't be killers," said Mark.

"Will you quit saying that? It's a chance we have to take."

"I love horses. I wouldn't hurt a horse. And it can run a sight faster than I can."

She lowered the glass, leaning on one elbow.

"You British! Crazy animal lovers. Feed a dog and starve a child."

"Nasty, nasty."

"Yes, it was. Sorry. But you make me so mad. You think we can use the horses?"

"Me—not we. I will give my well-known impersonation of the galloping major while you trip the light fantastic around t'other way."

"But if the approaches are booby-trapped, as we're sure they must be, you'll set them off. It's the very thing we want to avoid."

"Horses, ducky—horses will set 'em off. So if you set any off, they'll think it's another horse. By the time they find out, you'll be through the alarm system."

"You'll draw them to you."

"I shall be expecting them. They won't be expecting me."

"How do you get around to the stables?"

"Goat's milk—very nourishing," said Mark. "Make yogurt from it. Marvellous stuff. Makes you live to a hundred and ten. And goats live on old chop sticks and bubble gum."

"What are you burbling about?"

"Behind the stables, in the shade of them now, no doubt; but last time I spied, I saw a li'l white goatee beard. Where there's goats there are no booby traps, so I hike me around yonder, do a spot of belly crawl down that side and, at a synchronized time—bingo!" He rested his head in the crook of his arm and tilted his hat over his face. "Call me at eighteen hundred hours, mother dear, for I long to be Queen of the May."

"Queen is right," April snarled. "What am I supposed to do?"

"Stop yapping," said Mark. "Do your knitting—or something."

He snored into a quivering silence.

CHAPTER ELEVEN: THEY'RE ALL YOURS!

A SHREDDED canopy of silver and black lay over the valley and hills of Little Basin. The moon rode the hills, rimming them with light.

Earlier, in the sunset's flare, the message "Let's go" had flashed into the sky. They waited until a smoky-purple haze rippled beneath the early stars, then became two swift, soft- moving figures. Their track suits had been reversed—the underside being black with a pattern of zigzag purple stripes, giving an illusory effect of a moving shadow. Whereas all black is a stark outline in all but the deepest of shadows where the eyes cannot see, this coloring had an affinity with both full and half shadow. The pouch belts and shoulder attachments fitted natural body contours and did not rattle, reflect or protrude.

Mark swung wide around the fencing to come in at the far side, leaving April to enter at a point immediately opposite the swimming pool providing shortest access to the patio. Watches were synchronized for the time when each would don U.N.C.L.E. gas masks and make the first move according to the carefully assessed plan.

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