"I told you they were after me; you didn't believe me when I told you so!" Hartmann sounded exasperated, visibly on edge, without any of the aristocratic aloofness he usually displayed.
Eventually rescued and brought back home in the Jeep of a local U.N.C.L.E. correspondent, they were now all reunited in the spacious sojourn of the Morrisons, amid the scattered remains of the party. The children's previous frolics had made the place a joyful mess, which wasn't joyful any more. Several calls to and from the U.N.C.L.E. HQ, separated by long minutes of waiting, had clarified some important points:
First, the kidnapping attempt directed at Miguel was quite real; it had been witnessed by passers-by, whose intervention had allowed the boy to escape. Mr Waverly had some idea of the perpetrators' identity. Two Brazilian businessmen of German origin, with big investments in the drug industry, had attended the medical symposium organized by U.N.C.L.E. about the epidemics and had left the place before the end, just after the third speech of the Uruguayan scientist. Further investigations had revealed they were among the former associates of Hartmann. It also appeared they had taken the same train he was in and had followed him all the way in a rented car down to the accident's location.
"I knew that!" Hartmann exclaimed triumphantly, "I was certain they wouldn't take my refusal quietly."
"Which refusal?" Solo asked abruptly.
"Well, I opposed their plan to develop a mortal virus, ethnically targeted at the 'Indios del la Silva'."
The Morrisons, who until then had kept silent in stunned astonishment as Hartmann spoke, burst in horrified exclamations.
"Admirable indeed! How noble from you! So true to your well-known humanism!" It was futile but Napoleon couldn't help the mockery.
"Your petty sarcasm doesn't touch me," the other replied with gravity, "I am a physician, a doctor of medicine; I never killed anybody."
"No, you only kidnapped children after their parents had been murdered."
"I very probably saved their lives," Hartmann retorted, before stopping abruptly. He frowned deeply, realizing too late he had just admitted what he had always denied.
"Napoleon!" Florence scolded, "You are wasting precious time while Paul is in danger." She laid a protective arm around her son's shoulders. He stared at her, looking nonplussed. The recent events seemed to have awakened long asleep, unsuspected maternal feelings in her. Napoleon considered this touching scene with a slightly impatient irony. He noticed that Carolyn was looking away to hide her unbelieving little smile. That reaction from so young a child saddened him briefly. He was striving hard not to think of Paul, and no more of Illya. Emotions of that kind were not in order at the moment.
"There's been no time lost," he corrected coldly, "the whole region was sealed off by Federal and U.N.C.L.E. forces soon after my first call. If standard emergency procedures have been observed, then they're encircled now."
"Unless they have a helicopter," suggested Flo somberly.
"Come on, Flo, they couldn't guess they'd need it; according to the last information received from Waverly, they left the conference unexpectedly. They seem to have simply followed Hartmann; didn't know where it would lead them." At least, this is what I prefer you to think, my dear. "However," he added with an unmitigated satisfaction: "The copters are on our side, and now, with the improved weather conditions, they will be able to fly over the whole zone."
"What do we do now?" Miguel asked anxiously.
"You? Nothing. What would you do?" asked Solo.
"I want to go with you."
"No way, you stay here with the other kids."
"I'm not a kid!" Miguel was indignant, "I can help, and I want to help."
"This is not a job for amateurs," replied Solo, more harshly than he meant to. Inaction had been gnawing at him since his last mission's dubious issue and he was yearning to do something, anything effective, to feel in control again.
He did not have long to wait. A few minutes later the familiar beep-beep rang, and he heard Waverly's voice. "Mister Solo? Be ready to take the lead of the team I've sent to you. I've dispatched two helicopters. The abductors' vehicle has been located on the road to Cape May. One helicopter will pick you up within minutes, with three agents aboard, while the other one maintains watch over the vehicle. Be ready to take the lead of the team I've sent to you."
"And what about Illya and the boy? Were they seen?" He hadn't dared to say 'My son', though of course Waverly had been informed about the boy's identity.
"I haven't been given any news of their whereabouts. You'll get an update from Mr Hernandez, who is in permanent contact with the second team." The transmission was cut off.
Then, Florence took over: "I'm going with you! I'm responsible for Paul before his grandparents."
Napoleon lost his patience. "That's enough, you two! I'm not taking either of you and that's final."
A call from the helicopter spared him more argument. The choice of the landing place was no problem: the flat ground closest to the Morrison's house was the wide lawn behind the rose garden. The snow coverage wasn't thick enough to hinder the maneuver; they just had to avoid the small pond, partly frozen already.
Only minutes later, the helicopter, marked with the familiar U.N.C.L.E. logo, had landed, and three heavily armed men got out. They moved quickly towards Solo, looking vaguely surprised by the unusual welcome wagon, children and dog ahead.
Instantly Napoleon felt on safe ground again. April and Mark were currently on another assignment but the three agents chosen by Waverly were among the best of the teams under his command: Juan Salvador Hernandez, a brisk and stocky Porto-Rican, Dan "Stalker" Longhorn, an ex-miner from Montana, and Tony Ponto-Bruscelli, a pure Brooklyn product.
Hernandez didn't waste time. His report, concise: the abductors' vehicle, a van with two men in the cabin, had been spotted on a desert road by the other team[, not long after the alert had been given, but they'd lost sight of it in the sudden snow squalls that had followed the brief lull. The storm was threatening to endanger the observers' aircraft and they had been forced to land on a distant field, much too remote to allow an immediate intervention. "When we last saw them, they were headed toward the coast," he concluded.
"Quite logical", Hartmann interfered with his usual impudence," there is no other practicable way out; in the hinterland, the roads are deserted because of the weather and so, easier to control. Only the sea is open to them now. But if the port authorities have been alerted in time, the arrivals and departures are under watch. Hopefully," he added, sarcastically."
"The berthed ships and the docks must be inspected," Solo added, not bothering to note the other's intervention "and we have to consider the area is filled with warehouses and hangars of all kinds, a lot of them unguarded at night, easy to break into. They must be searched. What about the legalities?"
"Done!" Hernandez answered proudly. "I asked Waverly about that as soon as I was informed of the direction taken by our target. Everything is in the U.N.C.L.E lawyers' hands now."
"Good." Solo was thinking aloud. "I take that for a first move we can discard the private houses, though a lot of them are unoccupied this time of year; these men aren't fools: they know the area is going to be searched and they would be trapped like rats in there. I'd bet for a boat in the far end of the harbor, or maybe some shed in the vicinity, where they could wait for a boat, in case they have an accomplice on site."
"What?" Flo wondered. "You just said their action was improvised."
"It was in no way improvised," Hartmann cut in for the second time, "They jumped to the occasion at the conference, but they intended to take hold of me for a long time, a very long time indeed. And I think I know why they now want to catch Miguel too. We'll see soon if I'm right."
"But they had no time to organize anything since they didn't know your destination, that's what I meant," Flo explained with some annoyance, "It seems they followed you by train. How could they have communicated with an accomplice?"
"They could have left a third man in town and kept in contact with him through a radio transmitter." Hartmann was nothing if not obstinate.
Although he found the man's peremptory tone perfectly loathsome, Solo couldn't deny the logic of his reasoning. That was the only possible explanation for the latest events. Men such as Hartmann's former associates weren't amateurs; they wouldn't have rushed into a hurried, doomed-to-fail operation blindly. However, he abstained from uttering his thought aloud. The man was already only too self-confident, no need to comfort him further in his sense of superiority.
"Now is not the time to elaborate hypotheses. I want a last check with the second team and we'll be on our way. Taking off in five minutes."
"I'll go with you," said Hartmann."
"Certainly not," Solo replied.
The other man sneered. "I am afraid you cannot do without me. I am the only one who can talk to them. They want me; me and Miguel; we're the only reason they bothered to take hostages. You won't have to track them for too long: they'll reach out for a contact themselves." He had recovered all of his arrogance. "You're blinded by your worry about your partner's and the boy's fate but they don't care; their prisoners are simply a means to an end: a swap, that is. If they had succeeded in snatching us on the road, the little "Indio" and me, they would be far away at this moment. But they have a deal to set; that's why we have a good chance of taking hold of them eventually." His voice sounded triumphant. "But to achieve that, I repeat, you need me."
Napoleon bit his lip. For a short while, too focused on the threats to his son's life, not to mention Illya's, he had lost sight of the situation as a whole. He flinched inwardly. Self-doubt wasn't a familiar state of mind to him. But since his fateful failure in Uruguay, his ever-friendly luck seemed to have deserted him. He still hadn't recovered fully from the sense of guilt and helplessness he had felt back then. He had to overcome this weakness and soon: Paul's and Illya's life were at stake, not to mention thousands, if not millions of other lives.
"Alright, you can come with us."
"Me too," Florence insisted with a persistence that neared provocation.
"No," Solo repeated firmly, and he turned his back on her. Leaving her to the care of the Morrisons, he strode away towards his team.
Miguel watched the engine taking off with melancholy, wishing he could be aboard, and not only to assuage his old kink for helicopters. Suddenly he felt very lonely. However, it didn't take him long to realize the flaming red-haired woman had a certain facility in Spanish while the Morrisons, as ethnologists and linguists, specialists in the native cultures of South America, were perfectly fluent in this language. His hosts, still in shock from the recent events, needed to understand what was happening to them; so that the rest of the night, after the children had been, with utmost difficulties, put to bed, was spent by the adults exchanging information and feverish speculations about the possible outcomes of this affair.
Meanwhile, now flying aboard the U.N.C.L.E. helicopter, in close connection with the watch team, Solo was trying to work out a strategy. The sky was clearing again and the second team had spotted the abductors' van, dumped in a ditch, not far from the place where they had last lost sight of it in the storm. The tracks of another vehicle were visible nearby. They had led the observers to the neighborhood of the nearest harbor, as Solo had rightly guessed. So, there really had been a third man, at the minimum, and it was confirmed the enemy had means to communicate.
Tony took off his headphones. There were speakers in the cockpit but the surrounding noise didn't allow them to hear the faint and broken transmission. "It was Nelson; he says most of the harbor's warehouses and sheds have been searched already, with the help of the district police; with no result so far."
"Eh, well done, the local cops!", Stalker exclaimed, "no time wasted with them. They've risen in my esteem."
"They'll carry on searching for a while," Tony went on, "to be sure nothing has been overlooked, but Nelson thinks the remaining buildings have no value as a place of refuge: they're isolated, as far from the harbor as from the railway station."
"Yes," Solo agreed, "these men are purposeful businessmen. They must have secured a proper exit for themselves."
"Anyway," commented Hernandez, "they must be aware that no shed or warehouse, even vacant, can be safely used as a shelter, or just for a short time while waiting for a convenient means of transportation; not a 'copter since they're in town now: they're on a boat or on the point of getting aboard."
"Exactly my point," Hartmann interfered again, still uninvited but unfazed, "in my opinion, they're now on some fishing boat en route for Brazil or any other South-American destination, probably already outside US territorial waters."
Solo ignored the interruption. "Nelson must have been in touch with the port authorities. What has he heard from them?"
"He said nothing about it," Tony answered, "but we've to wait a bit, I'm afraid; They have been officially requested assistance only half an hour ago."
Solo frowned. "Why weren't both requests made at the same time?"
"I didn't think of it when I called Waverly the first time. And that's a move I have no power to make on my own." Hernandez spoke warily.
"Don't feel too bad about it, I'd have myself assumed Mr Waverly would have taken care of it," Solo said with an uncharacteristic lapse of loyalty, "It was pretty obvious since the beginning they would be heading towards the sea."
"As I told you," snapped Hartmann.
"Wasn't so obvious at the time." Hernandez looked more and more embarrassed in spite of Solo's appeasements. "Some shelter in town seemed more likely to me. Anyway, I called the Port services as soon as the direction taken by the van had been confirmed by Nelson and they weren't on alert yet."
"You just said they are now." But since when?
"Yes, after my call they asked the Governor's office for instructions, they contacted U.N.C.L.E and the necessary measures were arranged between them; at least that was what I was told by Waverly's secretary when I called the second time, just before we landed."
That didn't bode well. Solo stifled a groan, fighting a sudden hunch of impending disaster.
Hernandez sounded apologetic. "Can't say if they were effective immediately; you know: blocking a few roads and searching some buildings is one thing; shutting down a sea-port is quite another one. Such a decision has to be taken at State level and involves several administrative parties."
"Waverly has clout enough to make it happen." Regarding that Napoleon was genuinely confident. "The delay since your first call is, what? One, two hours? That's not much if they have to prepare for a long journey. We may still catch our birds in the nest." Solo spoke with more hope than he felt. And Hartmann, again, expressed his own hidden fears:
"Not a chance; everything has been prepared in advance, for days, not hours, probably as soon as the conference had been advertised, except of course I was the only designated target then and they couldn't guess we were going to make things so much easier for them by taking precisely the direction of their safe place."
The coincidence was a little too much for Hernandez. "Why Cape May?"
"Well, one of the biggest consortium associates, whom I happened to meet years ago for business, a New-Yorker, used to sail in the region."
"You couldn't tell us that earlier?" Solo and Hernandez said in unison.
"I just recalled the fact a few minutes ago," Hartmann retorted, "and you kept on trying to silence me, remember?" He sneered. "You won't catch them; they'll set the time and place for a meeting."
That was beginning to look only too likely. In spite of all his reservations, Napoleon was obliged to admit the damned German was probably right, again.
The helicopter landed in the far outskirts of the town, on a broad expanse of golf lawns, without much difficulty. A sufficient marking with beacons had been set by the locals. Solo was hailed by the team's leader. Gideon Clark, a tall black man born thirty years ago in a small town in Alabama, had a peculiarly dreadful handshake. Waverly had recruited this former civil rights militant, just out of jail after a brightly organized riot had reduced the town-hall building to ashes and rubbles. Since then, he had found in U.N.C.L.E. Section Two a more constructive way of assuaging his sense of justice. He was assisted by his current partner, Konrad Heyder, an Austrian, and the British pilot, Miranda Driscoll, both loaned by their European authorities to the North American U.N.C.L.E Headquarters.
As usual, Nelson attacked before being called out: "What's going on with the authorities? What's Waverly doing? The harbor's exits have just been closed minutes ago. Several boats have slipped through earlier tonight without being controlled. They must be far away in the open sea now!"
"You see? They've fled; I knew they would," triumphed Hartmann."Anyway, it doesn't matter, they'll get in touch; they want me and Miguel. There's no way they're going to vanish into the blue with their hostages, without attempting a swap."
Solo got a grip on himself. "I hope you're right," and, addressing Nelson, "Is it certain any exit other than the sea is out of the question?"
"Absolutely. I've been kept informed of every move by the local police and our men out in the field: every spot that could be used as a shelter has been thoroughly searched; no trace of intrusion, nothing. Our birds have flown."
Which was confirmed not long afterwards by a call from Waverly. U.N.C.L.E. had been contacted by the abductors, through the medical conference's telephone number (the only one they knew). The call, too short to be precisely located, originated from some place in town or in the countryside nearby, most likely made by the third man, who himself was communicating with his accomplices at sea through a radio transmitter. And yes, they wanted a swap: theU.N.C.L.E. agent and the boy in exchange for Hartmann and the young Indian, as the old man had repeatedly declared.
Saying that Waverly was not pleased was the epitome of understatements. U.N.C.L.E. 's authority and technical competence had been compromised, first by a security leak in the conference's organization, then by the endangering of a U.N.O diplomat; the whole mess being directly related to his most senior agent's private life. The old gentleman's conclusion was brief but scathing: "You and Kuryakin are supposed to be my best team; I wonder how things would have turned out if you weren't."
Solo wisely avoided mentioning the delay in the request for the harbor to be shut down. He had no doubt that Waverly was aware of it and that such a mistake, whether from him or from the U.N.C.L.E.'s lawyers, was probably the main cause of his wrath.
"You'll be called soon by those men; I had to authorize their access to a reserved radio channel, the last one available to your communicator."
Strangely, it sounded like the ultimate humiliation.