Jeffrey Lord Blade 30 Dimension Of Horror

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receiver and said, "Hello."
This morning his headache made him stubborn.
J had promised him this little vacation. And Zoe was waiting.
Richard sat and counted fifteen rings, then, when the phone had at last fallen
silent, he collected his dishes without haste, washed them, and left the
apartment.
The MG, not always reliable, performed beautifully on the drive to Dorset, and
Richard was in an excellent humor as he roared down the winding country lane
to his cottage. The headache had vanished, as such headaches often did when he
took them out for a run in the cool morning air.
Zoe heard him coming and met him at the gate.
She wore a kind of white sailor suit that clung delightfully to her small
pointed breasts, and her long dark hair blew in the wind off the sea.
"There was a phone call for you, darling," she said.
With a sinking feeling, Richard asked, "Who was it from?"
"From your boss at the Bureau of Economic Planning."
The Bureau of Economic Planning was a Special Services front, part of Blade's
cover story.
"Was it J?" he demanded.
"That's right. He wants you to call him back. Said it was important."
"Damn and blast!"
After he had parked the car beside the house he came stamping in, muttering to
himself. Zoe stood near the phone and watched him.
"Do you love me, Dick?" she asked blandly.
He looked at her with surprise. "Of course I do."
"Then don't phone."
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There was a hardness in her voice he had never suspected until now. What was
she up to? There was no clue in those wide-set dark eyes that now regarded him
so calmly, so firmly.
"Don't phone?" he said. "Why not?"
"I know what the Bureau of Economic Planning is. I've looked into it. Father
has friends, I have friends, and all our friends have friends. They tell me
you have an office there, in Whitehall, and a pretty little thing as a
secretary, and you spend about an hour a week there, signing papers that mean
nothing. What's your real job, darling?"
Blade closed his eyes. Wait until J heard about this! The plumbing was
leaking. It had, of course, been a hasty setup. "I can't tell you," he said
softly.
"You're some sort of secret agent, aren't. you?"
"I can't tell you. I can't tell you anything at all."
"Not even yes or no?"
"Nothing."
"I can't live like that, Richard." He was no longer Dick, but Richard. In a
moment, if he didn't play his cards right, he would become Mr. Blade.
"Listen, Zoe. Let me make the call. Then we can talk."
She shook her head. "You asked me to marry you. I can give you my answer now.
I will marry you, but on one condition."
He knew what the condition was, but he asked anyway, "What's that?"
"You must quit your job."
He collapsed into the overstuffed couch, thinking faster than he had ever
thought before, even in the field. He'd been with Special Services a long
time. He could leave now with no dishonor.
There were other, younger men who wanted his job, and he was slowing down. He
knew he was slowing down. Someday he would be slower than someone in the MVD .
. . . Zoe a widow?
Perhaps with children? It was not a pretty thought. And it must have been a
thought that had crossed her mind more than once.
Finally he said quietly, "Agreed."
She was surprised. "No argument? You agree just like that?"
"Just like that. Now can I make the call?"
"All right." She kissed him lightly on the forehead.
The switchboard at Copra House put him through to J immediately. He leaned
back in the sofa while Zoe ran her fingers through his hair.
J was saying, "A little something has arisen. Nothing to do with your line of
work, really, but they seem to want you. I don't have much of the picture
myself, except that it's terribly top secret and urgent. I understand it won't
take long-say a few hours at the most. If you'll drop by the
House, Richard, I'll tell you more about it. Which, as I say, isn't a great
deal. I can expect you?"
There was a long pause, then Richard said, "No, I think not." It was the
hardest thing he'd ever had to say.
"What's that? Are you all right?"
"Yes, quite all right, and I hope to stay that way. I want to . . . leave the
Service."
There was another long silence, then J said stiffly, "May I ask why?"
"I'm getting married and ... "
"I see, I see. Family responsibilities and all that. The Cornwall woman? Yes,
of course. She comes of excellent family." He laughed raggedly. "I've been
looking into her background, in a manner of speaking. You understand what I
mean." Blade understood well enough. J had been running a security check on
her, keeping it to himself. "You're quite sure about this-?" said J.
"Quite sure." Blade's arm encircled Zoe's waist.
"I'll have your things sent to your flat," said J.
"I can come down to Copra House and pick them up"
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"No, no, there's no need for that." The old man's voice was shaking. "I'd
rather you didn't come around. We're awfully busy here, you know. I wouldn't
be able to see you."
Blade was astonished. "Not even to say goodbye?"
J's voice rose with a flare of anger. "Don't be a sentimental fool, Richard.
Damnit! You made your choice, now live with it."
Before Blade could reply, he found himself listening to a dead phone. He hung
up slowly, pensively.
Zoe leaned over to whisper in his ear, "You are a brave man, Richard Blade."
He looked up at her over his shoulder. "Then why do I feel like such a
coward?"
"It will pass," she murmured. "We have another choice facing us, and I hope
you will be as quick in making this decision as you were in making the other."
"What decision?"
She nibbled at his ear. "Which shall we have first, the marriage or the
honeymoon?"
"The honeymoon." He reached up and pulled her down to him, but even as he
kissed her his mind was racing.
I shall need a job. Put what can I do? What am I good for? Perhaps, with a bit
of night school, I
could qualify for C.P.A.
Zoe's face filled his eyes, but it was oddly blurred. He could see through
her, as if she were transparent. Behind her appeared a puzzling scene.
There was a nurse lying on a white floor in a strange dim light in front of a
kind of altar. She did not seem to be breathing. He looked closer.
My God, it's Zoe!
The dead woman snapped into sharp focus. Blade whirled toward the circular
entrance to the
Chamber of the Innermost Self and shouted, "Is that your final offer, Ngaa? Is
that it? You'll let me live out the rest of my life in a dream of what might
have been if I'd never entered Dimension
X?"
"You'll be happy, at peace, no longer lonely," pleaded the Ngaa. "Please . .
."
With a howl of berserk rage, Blade hurled himself through the door in a shower
of bone fragments.
The Chamber of the Innermost Self, illuminated by a pulsating dim blue light [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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