The Shot in the Park Affair - Chapter 4 LeetheT

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Napoleon half-watched the show, mindful of the verse on the playbill (though these snowmen were not clowns) and half-scanned the environs – the passersby, the performers going to and fro, the crew setting up. Brown might have had contact with any of these people. His killer could be among them; Napoleon had had only a glimpse and could not be sure he could identify the man.

He'd already talked to a dozen staffers and performers, chosen fairly at random, and was batting zero. No one knew Brown, no one evidenced the slightest sign of being shady. If he were to find anything here, it would be by purest chance.

A sprinkling of snow began to fall as a trio of pretty girls took to the ice in costumes most fetching but entirely inappropriate to the weather. They zipped around the ice for a circle or two, as if warming up, then slid to a stop near where he waited as a team of ice-acrobats took over the ice, taking no notice of them.
He came close enough to hear their disgruntled comments, which petered out as they spotted him.
"Good morning, and may I say your beauty and grace on the ice provide a warmth of delight on this frosty day." He flashed his UNCLE card before any of them got the impression he was a masher. "Do any of you, by chance, know a gentleman by the name of Ronald "Parson" Brown?" It was both a long shot and a risk – any of them, young and innocent as they seemed, might be a THRUSH operative – but it was worth it.

"The sax player?" said a brunette in surprise.

"That's the very fellow," Napoleon responded, his surprise about equal to hers.

"Well, I don't know him ..." she began, blinking snowflakes from her eyelashes.

The others shook their heads in denial, so he took the brunette's elbow and gently steered her away.
"Wait a second," she said. "Let me get my guards and my coat." She skated back to the spot from which the girls had entered and put the guards on the blades of her skates, then gestured for him to follow. She entered a nearby tent and when he got there she was wearing a well-made but worn coat a little too big for her.

"Sorry," she said. "It's too cold unless you're skating, you know."

"Of course." Napoleon quickly took note that the tent was full of gear but empty of other people. "So you said you know Brown?"

Her face changed. "Is he in some kind of trouble?" Implicit in her words was the codicil: am I?
He's past trouble, Napoleon thought, but smiled.

"No, not at all. We simply need to speak with him. So you do know him?"

"In a way. I mean, I've heard him play."

Napoleon, finding his luck hard to believe – even for him – smiled. "Yes, he's good, isn't he? Where did you hear him?"

"In the subway. He's there nearly every day. I got used to seeing him. Only he wasn't there today, it was someone else." She blushed remembering the adorable blond fellow. "But I also saw him last night."

"You did? Where was that?" Napoleon kept all but a hint of his keen interest from his tone.

"In the park."

"Central Park?"

"Yes. We passed each other. It was late. I was in a hurry, you know."
Napoleon nodded. No explanation was needed for why a young woman would hurry through the park late at night.

"We almost crashed into each other. I was startled, but I recognized him from the subway. I've listened to him a lot, given him tips, you know, when I could – that's how I knew his name. It's on the hat he uses for tips. We talked a little. I'm sure he wouldn't – I mean, I would have said for sure he didn't know me, but in the park he said, 'you're the skater.'"

She laughed. "I was surprised. No one remembers me. But he said he saw the show and I was great. I thanked him and he shook my hand. He seemed in a hurry. We said goodbye and went in opposite directions. I was almost out of the park when I heard something that sounded like a car backfiring. Maybe a gunshot. I don't know. But I hightailed it onto the street where there were lights and people, you can bet that."

It took but a moment for Napoleon to guess what had happened – or what might have happened, if Brown had realized he was being followed.

"You were wearing this coat?" he said.

"Do I look like I can afford more than one coat?" she said sarcastically.

He smiled. "A girl as lovely as you should be showered in riches, more's the pity. What is your name, by the way?"

"Toni Angel." She flushed scarlet. "I mean, that's my stage name, for when I make it, you know. My whole name is Antonia De Angelo."

He grinned. "Well, Miss Angel, I don't mean to seem too forward, but it is in the line of duty. May I –""
A blast of noise and shouting hit his ears – both of them flinched. Some commotion had exploded in the square. One hand on his Special, he said sharply, "Stay in here, quiet and out of sight. All right?"

Looking frightened, she nodded, and he moved toward the tent flaps.

Illya came to in either a very unfortunate nightmare or a thoroughly risible THRUSH hideout. To all appearances it was a circus tent – but in a big windowless room rather than under sheets of canvas. Walls painted red and white, wooden bleachers along the size, a trapeze overhead – not very high, as the room was about three storeys tall. He lay in the ring, hands and feet bound with rope, breathing in the smell of sawdust and hay, though he could see or smell no live animals.

"I'm tellin' you I didn't make no mistake."

He lay still, listening to two men behind him talking. Arguing.

"Then why is this man here?"

"I searched Brown in the park. He didn't have nothin' on him."

"I told you the module was small; you might've missed it."

"I didn't miss nothin'!" the other man exploded.

IK tried to work subtly at his bonds. They were bulky, a little sloppy, but at the moment sufficient.

"So you did make a mistake. You did shoot the wrong man."

"No. I went after the guy you sent me after. Sax player, worked in the subway …"

"Which is precisely where you found this sax player?"

"Alls I know is the first guy didn't have it on 'im. So maybe this guy does. And if he does, I'll find it."

"Perhaps." The calmer man raised his voice. "Glad to see you are awake, Mr Kuryakin."

A quick sigh and Illya rolled over to face the speaker. All right, so there were two live animals. Two tigers sat chained and peaceable on either side of a huge, garish circus style throne, upon which sat …
Illya sighed in earnest. Why do I always get the crazy ones?

Clearly the clown he faced recognized the reaction.

"The costume is one of many designed to blend into the local scenery. At a circus—" He raised his hands to the side – "a clown is invisible."

"And you are?" Illya asked, struggling into a seated position in the sawdust. Another man stood near the clown – Brown's killer. This close Illya saw a couple of ugly scars on the man's face.

"I am known as Snowman." He set his gloved palms on his satin-clad knees and leaned forward. "Now. Where is the module?"

Illya blinked innocently. "Module?"

Snowman sighed. "Don't force Mr. Belz here to get personal with you."
The man who'd killed Parson Brown leered at him – Illya noted that he stood a goodly distance from the tigers.

"Mr. Belz would be wasting his energy—" he began.

"Oh, no." Snowman smiled. "He enjoys his work. In fact his nickname is Slay – and I assure you it has nothing to do with dashing through the snow."
Illya took a deep breath. "I'm afraid I still don't know what you're talking about."

"Don't be foolish. We know you are with the UNCLE. You chased Mr. Belz in Central Park."
"And why would I chase Mr. Belz if I already had this whichamacallit?"

Snowman smiled, and Illya thought there was nothing more terrifying than an evil clown.
"Why, to capture a THRUSH operative, of course – the man who killed your courier."

A light flashed on some partially hidden console at the side of the throne, and Belz moved in to lean over it, reading something.

"If he had been our courier he would have had the item," Illya responded, still trying to figure out who did have the module, if Brown didn't and THRUSH didn't and UNCLE certainly didn't. "So if you do not have it, and I do not have it, and we can safely assume poor Mr. Brown does not have it …" He shrugged. "What does this thing do, anyway?"

Again the smile. "As you know very well, in the proper hands, it can destroy civilization as we know it."
Illya was given a moment to absorb that – he knew the module contained computer code for a weather control program, but that was all he knew, and Snowman's words were, all jokes aside, chilling – before Belz leaned in to speak urgently in Snowman's ear. The message visibly startled him.

"Bad news, I hope?" Illya prodded.

Snowman faced him. "Not at all. Your associate Mr. Solo has been spotted at Madison Square Garden questioning the troupe – one young skater in particular. Now why would he be doing that?" Not waiting for an answer, he snapped at Belz.

"Send some men to get Solo and that girl now. The you can try to persuade Mr. Kuryakin here—" Belz and Snowman both smiled those ice cold smiles that meant pain – "to be a little more forthcoming."