The Hollow Crown Affair - McDaniel David (читать книги онлайн без .txt) 📗

Napoleon said chidingly, "Even I know the answer to that one. Do you want to retract your question? He was quick-thawed and cooked by the same burst."

"I wish you hadn't said that," said Illya.

After a pause, Napoleon said slowly, "So do I."

Chapter 3: "Where Would You Go If You Were Homesick For 1890?"

For three weeks following their three-minute war, Napoleon and Illya spent the days sitting around the commissary and various offices, engaged in low priority research or flirting as their tastes differed, and playing endless games of Superghosts or Botticelli. The former had precedence the Tuesday afternoon as they sat in the nearly-deserted lunch area on the second floor.

"K," said Napoleon.

"N, before," said Illya.

"S, after," answered Napoleon. "N, K, S."

Illya considered for a moment and said cagily, "T. After."

Napoleon studied his cup of coffee. "N, K, S, T." He tapped idly on the table with an unoccupied fingertip. "I think you're bluffing. I'll challenge."

"Inkstand," said the Russian. "G."

A concealed speaker mentioned their names softly and invited them to Waverly's office. Napoleon finished his coffee, crumpled the cup and lobbed it into a trash bin as he rose. "N, after. I wonder if the All Points Alert has finally paid off."

"You sound as if you didn't think we could find Baldwin."

"Do I? More like I'd almost rather we couldn't. Even if he is the key to this whole silly business. Until we straighten out his political situation we'll be in trouble." He frowned as they stepped into the elevator. "What are we doing in the middle of their politics, anyway? We're supposed to be their enemy."

"Enemies are usually in the middle of each others' politics," Illya said. "In fact from time to time I get the impression that if we didn't have enemies we wouldn't need politics at all. And by the way, I'm not going to add a U, nor am I going to fall for a polyconsonantal trap. Your language is mostly vowels. Add an I."

"Then I'll put another I on the front," said Napoleon, after a pause. The elevator door slid open.

"Add a T on the end," said Illya. "Do you want to concede now or think about it for a while?"

Napoleon stopped at the entrance to Waverly's office and scowled. "Not a chance. L at the beginning, and I think I've got you," he said, and tripped the door.

Their chief was seated at the master communications consol with a slim silver microphone in his hand, listening to a report from Santiago. He made his recommendations while Solo and Kuryakin took their usual places at the table, then broke the connection and turned his chair to face them.

"Our Department of Useless Information has come up with one of the most tentative leads on record," he said. "If you feel it is worth anything, you may follow it up until something more promising comes in."

"What is it, sir?"

Waverly tossed a neatly printed eight-by-five brochure on the table and turned it towards them. "Cape May, New Jersey, is in the midst of a program that could not exactly be called urban renewal—under the direction of a local home-owner's association they are gradually restoring the town as a Victorian era beach resort. It seemed like the sort of thing that might attract Ward Baldwin, especially as the area is one of the least traveled and least-modernized parts of the Atlantic seaboard."

"We're at the height of the tourist season," said Illya non-committally. "Would Baldwin be likely to go to a resort area?"

"This one he might," said Napoleon. "Have you ever heard of it?"

"Only by geographical reference. It's the south tip of New Jersey."

"Neither have I, which means it is what the travel folders call 'undiscovered'. Baldwin would make it his business to know about it, especially if it's all Victorian."

"But a beach resort? I can't quite see Baldwin sunning himself on the public sands."

"I can," said Napoleon with a glazed look in his eyes. "He wears a blue-and-white striped bathing costume with a shirt..."

* * *

After the poisonous stenches of Newark and Elizabeth thinned to a colorless haze on the horizon and the bulk of the traffic dispersed into the tangled access ramps of Interstate 95, the Garden State Parkway ran wide and level southward. Glimpses of the sea flashed in the mid-morning sun far off to the left, and open farmlands rolled away through untainted air. The road narrowed by stages to two lanes in each direction with seventy and more feet of grass between and occasional neat stands of timber, and in time clumps of lank salt grass stood like clusters of green bayonets here and there along the shoulders.

It was quite definitely past time for lunch when Napoleon came off the end of the Parkway and followed the direction of a sign which said CAPE MAY 2. The low-slung car he drove bumped over the hump of a tiny drawbridge, and his attention was called to the hour by the sign of the Poseidon Grill, standing with an inviting open parking lot off the road to his left. Without hesitation he tapped the signal lever and swung the wheel over. He could face his uncertain search for Ward Baldwin better on a full stomach, and he could consider specific direction of investigations while he ate.

Mixed seafood platters are a considered risk in the best places. Here the entr?e consisted of one shrimp, two scallops, a tuna cake, a plain fishcake and a square of sole, each in a soggy brown wrapper. The roll was tough enough to bounce and the cherry cheesecake was beyond description. Napoleon began to wonder if Ward Baldwin was really likely to be in this improbable corner of the world. He'd give it no more than two days.

He decided to let fortune carry him for a while and look around more or less at random. His first stop was in the heart of the three-block business district to pick up a map of hotels and motels—he'd have to show Baldwin's picture to every room clerk in town, more than likely. And that was too much like work. Illya liked leg-work; a pity he'd decided to stick around the office in case something else came in.

Maybe he could break it up a little. He took the first ten motels and spent three hours covering them, then put the candid portrait back into the glove compartment and returned to the middle of town.

It lacked fifteen minutes of six as he strolled idly into the store-front Town History Museum on Washington Street. The proprietor looked up through rimless glasses and said, "We're closing in quarter-hour."

"Oh, I'm just passing through," said Napoleon. "Like to take a look around." He thought of the photograph back in the car, and decided he could ask the gentleman here about Baldwin tomorrow. He would expect Baldwin to spend some time here, if he had been drawn to the area at all.

He wandered among glass cases for several minutes, lost in the idle contemplation of a more leisurely age, a more elegant age, of which only a few rare relics exist to remind us of all we have lost for all we have gained. Except for Ward Baldwin, who somehow seemed to have brought the best of that vanished world forward with him by sheer force of will.

He glanced up at the hollow tapping of high heels on the old wooden boards of the floor, and saw a girl in a fluffy blue dress outlined against the late afternoon sun entering the museum.

"Closin' five minutes, ma'am," said the proprietor. "'F y' come back tomorrah after ten I c'n give y' tour."

"Oh dear," she said, as Napoleon wandered over towards the desk. "I'm sorry—I thought you were open later." She looked up and fastened her large brown eyes on Napoleon's slightly startled ones.