Eyes distended, Solo remained an instant too long staring across the open space toward that glass-walled lab.
A sudden hissing alerted him. The sound ripped through the incessant buzzing which had almost become a part of the charged atmosphere.
Solo fell back behind the rock. A sharp beam of light whipped across the mouth of the open space.
Shocked, Napoleon Solo saw the buffalo grass burned gray where the beam touched it.
He stayed there for some moments, while his heart slowed to a regular beating again. Three more times the light beam reached for him, and barely missed.
He inched his way back to Bikini. She stared up at him questioningly.
Solo gazed down at Bikini for a moment, almost regretfully. She whispered. "What's the matter?"
He didn't answer. He reached out his left hand, tilting her chin slightly. Then he struck her sharply with his right, on the side of her jaw.
She slumped forward and he caught her gently.
Carrying her in his arms, he found a small break in the wall. He laid her down in the darkness, whispering, "You'll be safe here, Beautiful. Safer anyhow. Sweet dreams."
He ran back to the mouth of the canyon sump. The light beam still hissed, tilted now, no longer touching the grass as it swung out, reaching for him.
From his pack be took the small canister and sprayed it from his legs upward, covering his body with a fine mist. As he worked, the haze hardened into a flexible plastic.
After a few moments the plastic was like suiting which encased his entire body.
He waited a few seconds longer, watching that beam whip across the open. When the light passed, he stepped boldly out and ran across the opening toward the lab. The plastic was unwieldy but was flexible enough to permit movement.
Solo was within fifty feet of the lab doors when the beam raked across him.
The plastic melted and ran like teardrops. But he was only barely aware of it.
Solo staggered.
His mind fogged over. The green lights dimmed, seeming to recede into a darker canyon.
He felt as if an invisible fist struck him in the chest, barring his way, but not really hurting because it was as though he were numb.
He tried to stride forward, but his legs no longer obeyed commands from his mind.
He slumped to the ground, hearing the buzzing and the hissing louder than ever.
Gradually the green lights brightened and Napoleon Solo opened his eyes.
He was slumped upon his knees, half supported by two men, neither of whom even looked at him.
Things took shape before him. He saw that he was in a brilliantly illumined office-lab. Rows of equipment led away toward the greenhouses, where the lush tropical plants appeared to be growing visibly, as they might when seen in time-lapse photography.
Solo shook his head, trying to clear it.
"Ah, our guest is waking up."
Solo tilted his head, gazing at the man who had spoken.
He was a tall man with a wide frame upon which the flesh hung loosely. He was turned away from Solo at first and Solo was struck by the resemblance between this man and the statues of Julius Caesar— the strong chin, the fine Roman nose, the intelligent forehead, the balding head.
Then the man in the white smock turned full face and Solo caught his breath, wincing. The scientist's face was badly disfigured, the left eye sitting in the corner of its misshapen socket, the skin mottled, rutted.
"Dr. Nesbitt," he whispered. Nesbitt fixed his glowering gaze upon Solo so intently that the young agent turned away, and then caught his breath, shocked a second time.
A few feet from him Illya Kuryakin was slumped in a chair, battered, scarcely more than half alive.
Illya gave him a faint salute. Solo whispered it. "How did you get here?"
"It was a lot easier than I thought."
"What happened to you?"
Illya shrugged. Blood showed at the corner of his mouth. "You don't tell me your woes, I won't tell you mine."
Dr. Nesbitt came around the cluttered desk where he had been working. Turning his scarred face at an angle away from Napoleon Solo, he smiled.
"So now you and your friend have found me, Mr. Solo. Are you pleased?"
Solo spoke ruefully. "This isn't exactly the way we planned it."
"I suppose not. Still, you must have known, you and your interfering spy organization—"
"We were only trying to help, sir—"
"Help? Did it occur to any of you that I might not want help? You must have learned from what happened to your agents in Central America when they came prying that we could have easily have killed you and Mr. Kuryakin."
"We couldn't let that stop us, Doctor. We still believed you might want to communicate through us with your friends in the outside world."
Nesbitt's voice slashed at him. "I have no friends in the outside world. I have only my work."
"But that's it, sir. That's what puzzled us. You turned your back on a most rewarding and selfless career—disappeared. The world was puzzled. We couldn't turn our backs on you."
"I assure you there is no puzzlement. I'm here doing what I want to do. I have my experiments. I am successful beyond my most fantastic expectations."
"Jungle plants growing in Montana," Illya said.
Nesbitt heeled around, the scarred half of his face livid. "That is only the smallest part of it. Mr. Kuryakin. Plants that are like living things, plants growing to huge trees overnight. Incredible, wonderful plants."
Solo kept his voice low. "Your friends are deeply concerned, Doctor."
"I said it once, Solo. I have no friends. None. Except here. My plants. My living, breathing plants."
Solo continued trying to appeal to Nesbitt's reason. "You do have friends. Evidently more than you know, or care to admit. You have one friend who may have given his life searching for you."
Nesbitt straightened slightly. "Oh?"
"Sam Connors," Solo persisted. "Does the name mean anything to you?"
Nesbitt hesitated the space of a breath. He shrugged. "Connors? Once an under-professor of mine."
"At Northwestern. He thought he was a close friend."
"Well, he was wrong."
"He's disappeared. He may be dead. He was looking for you, deeply worried."
Nesbitt shrugged again. "Sorry to hear that."
"But you're not really concerned about his fate?"
Nesbitt straightened his wide, thin shoulders. "No. Not particularly. I am in no wise responsible for a misguided man like Professor Connors—"
"But he was looking for you!"
"I am very busy here. The people who are financing my experiments expect quick results. Nothing else concerns me."
"Not even the life or death of Sam Connors?"
"Nothing! I have no knowledge of Sam's death. I have no wish to kill—not even two meddlers like you—but I wish to be let alone. And I will be let alone—at whatever cost!"
Solo brought the "summons to death" which had been delivered to Sam Connors, from his pocket. The two guards were alert.
Solo handed the paper to the doctor. Nesbitt took it, scanned it calmly.
"Does it mean anything to you?" Solo persisted.
"Nothing. It looks like some one's tasteless idea of a joke."
"Whoever sent it had a deadly sense of humor."