"And the powder? The powder that induced the hallucinations?" Illya said.

"We do have it all. We will analyze it, of course, but then it will be destroyed," Waverly said.

Suddenly, Solo jumped up. The chief agent looked all around the room. He seemed to be looking for someone.

"Maxine!" Solo said. "We forgot Maxine!"

Alexander Waverly studied his pipe. "No, we picked her up where you had left her."

"I'll bet she was annoyed," Solo grinned. "We have her?"

Waverly coughed. "Ah, no, I'm afraid she's slipped us again. A very resourceful woman. It seems she had a hidden hypodermic and knocked out our guards. She escaped, and with some of the hallucination powder. She—"

Illya sat up. "Thrush has a sample of that powder?"

A smile spilt Waverly's impassive face. "Yes and no. The Trent woman did escape with a sample. But, fortunately, I had taken the precaution of removing the real powder. I hope Thrush will not be too disappointed with their sample of the simple smoke powder Morlock liked to use, poor man."

Solo and Illya grinned at each other. Solo, his boyish face smiling, wondered just what Thrush would say after their experts ran exhaustive tests on what would turn out to be simple smoke powder.

Solo decided that Maxine would have a few bad moments. But Maxine Trent had a charmed life. Solo knew that he would see her again.

Illya Kuryakin was busy studying the records of the late, and very unlamented Morlock The Great.

The grotesque magician himself was a charred corpse in a tiny coffin on its way to the London morgue.

THE END

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posted 2.14.2010, transcribed by Iris