[Magazine 1967-­10] - The Mind-­Sweeper Affair - Davis Robert Hart (читать лучшие читаемые книги .TXT) 📗

"Represent?" Illya Kuryakin said. The small Russian moved his arms and legs to be sure that he was all right and not held by some device such as THRUSH'S special chair.

"Of course," Rand said. "And never mind telling me, that is a childish tactic on my part. You are Mr. Illya Kuryakin and Mr. Napoleon Solo of an organization called, I believe, U.N.C.L.E. And you are interested in my little brain child here, eh?"

They looked toward where Rand pointed. The macabre machine stood there in the shadows of the vast room. A row of tables and desks stood in front of it. Which was why the two agents had not noticed it at once. Rand watched their faces.

"I see you are interested," the slender man said.

"We're interested," Solo said. "Are you interested in destroying the machine?"

"Destroy?" Rand cried. "My brain child? Really, Mr. Solo, that is a poor joke. You have seen it work, you said? Surely you would not want to destroy such a marvel of the electronic art? Do you have any idea what it can really do, gentlemen?"

The eyes of the grey-haired man seemed to blaze for a moment at the thought of the marvels of his machine. "Beautiful! Sheer magic to think about. Imagine, gentlemen, to read the mind at any time in any place. Ah, who would dare destroy such a wonder?!"

"If it can do what you say," Illya said quietly.

Rand bridled. "If? You say if? Mr. Solo has seen what the Mind-Sweeper can do! That's what we call it, by the way. A rather clever name, I think. Our little mental vacuum cleaner, you might say. The Mind-Sweeper! It will revolutionize the world! Do you hear? And it is mine!"

"I took you for more of a businessman," Solo said.

Rand cocked an e "You did, eh? Very shrewd. Yes, I am a businessman. But I am also an electronics expert. I quite admit that the Sweeper is not precisely my development, but it is my creation. And you wonder if it can do what I say it can do?"

Rand looked at Napoleon Solo. "Mr. Solo has seen. You know that Forsyte came to the health club, and you know that he left his secrets there. A man above reproach. A man no pressure could have forced to reveal a word of what he knew—stripped of all his secrets within minutes!"

The grey-haired electronics man smiled at them. "I think you know much more, also. You know of my tests with the machine in London and in Ottawa. Successful tests. Naturally, we have moved the machine, to be certain we would not be caught while we were perfecting it. But you know of its successes in London, Ottawa, and now New York. We have now finished testing, and will soon market our little Sweeper, eh?"

Illya blinked. "You plan to sell the machine?"

"Why not? As you have said, I am a businessman. Think of the potential! Not a single nation could afford to be without a Mind-Sweeper. Not only does it sweep the secrets from the brain of any one, but it does so without them knowing it at all. Provided it is properly operated. Imagine—it takes the most secret data, and the subject never knows the machine has been working on his brain."

"Not always," Solo said.

"What?"

Solo grinned. "You used it on a man this morning, and he knew it."

Rand waved an angry hand. "A mistake. The idiots I left with to work it on the outer-space defense data made a small error. The man could have known no more than that he was a trifle dizzier than normal."

"It was enough," Illya said. "It will probably finish you."

Rand laughed. "I doubt it, Mr. Kuryakin. It is, however, one of the reasons we decided to end our tests and move now. No, I doubt if we will be found now."

"If it can make one mistake, it can make more," Solo said.

There was a silence in the vast room. Illya and Solo looked at Rand, but they were also studying the warehouse for possible escape. In addition to the armed men around them, there seemed to be another group in a far distant corner. Doors opened off the warehouse at the loading end, and other doors were in the inner wall that joined the production building. All the doors were closed and locked as far as they could see

Rand had stopped smiling. "No, there will be no more mistakes. You see, gentlemen, this is our prototype model. It is the only machine at the moment. I admit that it is not a simple machine; it took years to build and perfect. It has flaws. But the man who really invented the machine, our Dr. Heimat, is even now about to complete his work on the production models. I assure you, gentlemen, that the production models will have no flaws, and will be much simpler to produce. I may not be the research genius Dr. Heimat is, but I am a production genius. That, after all, is the true genius of America, isn't it?"

Rand smiled and touched the grotesque machine lovingly. "Production, and perfecting what is only a raw idea," he said as if to himself. "That is the true American genius. Soon my Mind-Sweeper will be produced in mass production. Now it can absorb only what a man has held in his mind for a week, but soon it will absorb a month, six months, a year, and finally all that a man has learned since his birth! The power! The power!"

Rand's voice rose and echoed through the vast warehouse. All the men in the room looked toward Rand. His booming, half-insane voice carried like a wave through the room and reverberated back from all the walls. In the silence that followed no one moved. At last Rand blinked, sighed.

"So, I get carried away. It is the beauty of the universe, gentlemen, a perfect piece of electronic machinery. But let us talk more, eh? You asked if I am going to sell the Mind-Sweeper. That will depend on the offer, the problems, and the price. At the moment I'm also considering a lease-deal, you know. Lease it to all the countries, but keep the primary secrets to ourselves—with a proper destruct in case anyone attempted to take it apart. Not that anyone could— Heimat's basic secret is a theory no one else knows, not even me."

Rand smiled at them. "Of course, I'm also considering the idea of going into the spy business ourselves. In the long run that might be the best. What do you gentlemen think?"

They said nothing.

Rand continued to smile. "Perhaps you would care to make an offer on behalf of U.N.C.L.E. A large enough offer might induce me to sell it, and Dr. Heimat, to you. After all, I am a business man, and a businessman is in business to sell."

Rand watched them both like a small, bright-eyed bird. They still said nothing. They were both thinking of how they could stop this man, who was obviously partly insane. Rand touched his machine again. Only then did they notice that the machine was operating! Rand read a piece of printed tape from the computer section of the weird instrument.

"No, gentleman, I am not insane, not even partly," Rand said, and looked straight at them. "You see? The machine does work. I have just read your thoughts. Now will you make an offer? And make it good. I already have one very good offer, don't I, Mr. Danton?"

With these last words, Rand raised his voice.

Across the room, in the middle of the other group of armed men, Emil Danton stood up and stared straight at Illya and Solo.

FIVE

RAND LAUGHED aloud. "Mr. Danton came before you, my young friends, and on a similar errand. I'm afraid he was no smarter than you two. You see, it was simple to know what you had on your minds—my little Mind-Sweeper has a coaxial link to the lobby. You were all under mind reading the instant you entered! Another example of what my beauty can do. Once I knew what you had in mind, it was child's play to capture you."