“I can. Now, we have two systems in this business. We have the subscription account—which is fine for clients like that military attaché, who constantly wants snippets of information. But it’ll hardly interest you…Then we have the flat fee.”

“Which is?”

“For every isolated piece of important information, irrespective of how simple or complicated, one thousand dollars. It may seem a lot—but, as you see, I have overheads.”

Solo took a wallet from his breast pocket and counted out ten hundred dollar bills. He laid them on the table.

“…Plus twenty-five percent service charge,” Tufik continued suavely. “One of the reasons I get such good protection is that the boys there are on a percentage. That’s why Gaston spurned your little bribe.”

Solo opened the wallet again and took out two more hundreds and five tens, placing them on top of the bills already on the table.

“…And one percent state tax.”

“You’re not serious!”

“Certainly I am. There’s different kinds of protection, boy.”

Solo shook his head in disbelief and pulled two crumpled five dollar bills from his pocket.

“Right.” Habib Tufik’s voice was suddenly brisk. “I can answer your questions, as it happens, without any research. The consignment—let’s just say it’s highly radioactive—did leave today, at dawn. It’s in a lead canister that’s much heavier than it looks.”

“Good. And the contact?”

“You’ll be traveling by air? Fine. Now, the day after tomorrow, take the Corniche and you’ll find Stanley Bay—it’s the usual sort of bathing beach with a sea-front and a parapet and I don’t know what-all. At the far end, on the landward side of the road, there’s a tatty little restaurant called La Terraza. It stands all by itself; you couldn’t miss it. Order a Turkish coffee and an Izarra and wait there. You’ll be joined by a little man called Mahmoud, who works in the Weights and Measures office. I think he’ll be able to help you.”

“What time the day after tomorrow? I can’t drink Izarra all day!”

“Well now, the harbor at Alexandria’s a very interesting place, they do say. If you was to take a walk down there in the morning, say at about eleven-thirty, I shouldn’t be surprised if someone managed to get a message to you about that.”

Solo rose to his feet. “Thank you very much,” he said.

“A pleasure, sir. There’s a thing you might be able to tell me, now, before you, go. Talking to your friend who met with such a sad end, I found he referred several times to an organization which calls itself Thrush. Now, I never heard tell of that. Do you know what it is?”

“You won’t have heard of it because it never appears in newspapers or on agency tapes,” Solo said with a wintry smile. “But it’s a tremendously powerful organization just the same.”

“You don’t say! And just what exactly is it?”

“It’s…How on earth would you define Thrush, Illya?”

“It is a supra-nation,” Kuryakin said. “A syndicate of scientists, industrialists, mathematicians, political theorists and would-be dictators, all of them brilliant brains with respectable cover occupations—but all of them dedicated to what those who moralize would call evil.”

“And where are they based?”

“Everywhere.” Illya got up and crossed the room to a large globe standing on a side table. He spun the sphere and jabbed a finger towards the revolving surface. “Anywhere I care to stop that globe, my finger will be pointing at a territory containing a Thrush satrap.”

“In the name of God, what’s that?”

“An undercover cell—it may be a manufacturing complex, a university, a chain of stores, anything. It’ll carry out the purpose for which it was ostensibly set up. But underneath, it will have a secret life of its own: to further the aims of Thrush.”

“And what would they be, for God’s sake?”

“Quite simply, to dominate the Earth They work for no one; they have no allies—only enemies. So far as Thrush is concerned, either you’re one of them or you’re to be ruled or destroyed. Which is not to say they won’t help the East against the West, or vice versa, if it serves their purpose.”

“They have an enormous treasury,” Solo put in, “financed by a vast series of enterprises, legal and criminal. And they can command the latest in weapons and communications—whole armies if need be, if the Council considered they could be useful.”

“The Council?”

“The ruling body—the super-brains at the top.”

“And could you be telling me, now, the names of one or two members of this Council—a couple of them normally based in this part of the world, for instance?”

“Certainly. The information will cost you one thousand dollars. There is no service charge.”

Habib Tufik grinned suddenly. “Good night, gentlemen,” he said. “It’s been a pleasure seeing you. A real pleasure.”

He sat for some minutes after they had gone, staring pensively at the papers scattered on his table. At last he reached slowly for the telephone. “Hallo?” he said. “Get me the Commissariat of Police, will you?”

Chapter 4

Contact with the Enemy

THE FIRST ATTACK CAME—rather as Solo had anticipated—almost as soon as they left Habib Tufik’s premises. Broken-nose and his cronies were conspicuous by their absence as Solo and Illya threaded their way out through the din in the coffee shop, and as they pushed open the wrought iron gate leading to the court, Solo said quietly, “Keep your eyes open—I have a hunch.”

“The half-caste we heard on the speaker?”

Solo nodded. “I just have a feeling.”

“Surely you don’t think Thrush is on to us already, Napoleon?”

“I don’t know. Could be. Or it could be just that the fellow doesn’t like our type and really thinks we are police spies. Or again he might think we have money. You’re always in danger of getting rolled at night in this part of the town…”

“If it was Thrush, would you suspect our fat friend.”

“Of giving us away? No, I don’t think so. I don’t think his ignorance of Thrush was faked—and, anyway, I imagine he plays a fair game by his own standards. He’d be out of business otherwise.”

“‘Faithful to thee, Cynara, in my fashion,’” Illya quoted softly.

“You and your night-school…” Solo began chidingly—then suddenly, without an instant’s warning, the fight began.

They had anticipated an ambush somewhere in the dark, cobbled alley leading downhill to the place where they had left the taxi. But when the attack came, it was from above. Half a dozen men leaped down upon them from a balcony above the archway connecting the alley and the court, and in a moment all was confusion.

Solo was sent sprawling to the wet cobbles by a violent blow in the back. He rolled with the fall, drawing his knees up to protect his stomach, so that the follow-up man jumping for his belly tripped and fell heavily beside him. The agent chopped him viciously, flat-handed, to the throat and twisted eel-like to his feet as two more men rushed him with upraised arms.

Kuryakin was on the far side of the alley. His assailant had misjudged his leap and the Russian had been sent spinning across the narrow thoroughfare to slam against the wall, where he was now desperately trying to fend off a trio of attackers bent on clawing him down. Solo dragged his gun—the semi-automatic Special which fired bullets either singly or in bursts—from its shoulder holster. But before he could thumb off the safety catch, a paralyzing blow on the right arm dropped it from his nerveless fingers. More blows were raining on his head and shoulders, and he saw from the corner of his eye the lamplight gleaming on the length of lead pipe which had crippled his arm. He drove his left elbow into a solar plexus, brought his knee up to parry a kick for his groin, and chopped down again on the man who had fallen—who was now groping for Solo’s gun where it lay on the cobbles. The man grunted and collapsed on his face as Solo kicked the weapon, spinning, into the middle of the alley. With a heave of his shoulders, the agent broke momentarily free and piled a left with all his weight behind it to the jaw of the man with the lead pipe. The attacker dropped like a stone, his club clattering to the ground.