Nick Carter - Double Identity

Or maybe he would kill his double with the stiletto, Hugo. He shook the needle-sharp little weapon from the chamois sheath on his right forearm down into his hand. The hilt was smooth and as cold as death. As N3 hefted the deadly little weapon in his palm his mind grasped at a curious irony— Chinese Intelligence was most thorough— suppose they had outfitted his double with the same weapons he himself carried. Nick’s grin was sour. It would make for a most interesting showdown— Luger against Luger, stiletto against stiletto!

But there was one weapon the impostor would not have — Nick unbuttoned the quilted trousers and fumbled for Pierre, the little gas bomb which he carried in a metal case between his legs like a third testicle. Pierre was as deadly as a viper — and much faster. One inhalation of the gas and you knew instant death! Nick doubted that the Chinese had tumbled to Pierre — and even if they knew about the bomb they wouldn’t be able to reproduce it The gas was a well-guarded secret of the AXE labs.

Nick replaced the little gas bomb carefully and adjusted his pants. Pierre might just give him the edge over his opponent.

By now the whisky had worn off and he was beginning to feel very ill again. He yearned for more alcohol but did not reach for the bottle. He wanted to be as bright as possible when he met this Dyla Lotti on the morrow— a hangover would never do.

N3 lay for a time, suffering and listening to Hafed snore. He left the tent to relieve himself and was nearly knocked down by the force of the wind. The narrow gorge where they had camped was a blinding whorl of snow. The ponies, their shaggy hides white, stood patiently with their rumps into the wind. Two snow-covered mounds marked the tents where the Sherpas slept. N3 lingered for a moment behind the stalactites of the frozen waterfall, staring into the snow-dervish haunted gloom. It was easy to imagine things out there. Chinese soldiers creeping up. His double, as anxious to kill as he was himself. The women from the lamasery, perhaps, raiding the camp and carrying away the screaming men — a ludicrous reversal of the Sabine bit.

Nick forced himself to laugh at the pictures blurring through his aching head. He was sick, that was all. Nevertheless he found that he had to fight and to hang on to reality. Things were fuzzy and limpid and unreal — like one of Dali’s canvas fantasies.

It was only the altitude, he told himself. He was sick, after all. Yet he felt the cold clamp of an alien hand reaching for him out of the darkness of this place, so near the top of the world, where She Devils lived and magic was commonplace.

Nick shook himself and went back to the tent. Nerves. Better watch it or he would be seeing the yeti next — the Abominable Snowman! Sherpa mothers used the image of the yeti to frighten their children into being good. Nick grinned to himself as he re-entered the tent. It would be fun, at that, to catch a yeti and send it to Hawk. Maybe he could train it to become an AXE agent!

Hafed was still snoring gently. Nick envied the guide his slumber. The night ahead would be long and cold.

Suddenly the words of his old guru, Rammurta, who had taught yoga at the AXE Special School, came back to him.

“The mind can conquer the body always,” old Rammurta had taught, “if only it knows the technique.”

As N3 began his breathing exercises he thought how strange it was that yoga had not occurred to him before. It had stood him in good stead so many times. And here he was, not many miles from the birthplace of yoga, India, and only belatedly did he come to it. The altitude sickness again, he thought. There was no ignoring the brutal fact— he was not his usual self. And that could be extremely dangerous — for him. He had to snap out of it.

N3 squatted on his sleeping bag and assumed Sidd-hasana, the perfect pose. He sat staring straight ahead, his eyes open but growing gradually opaque as his senses turned inward. He no longer felt the cold. His breathing slackened and flattened out to a mere whisper. His chest barely stirred. Slowly, imperceptibly, he slipped into the state of pratyahara. It was a complete withdrawal of consciousness. Nick Carter sat like an image, an idol. He might have been one of the bronze effigies which decorate every Tibetan temple.

The guide Hafed snored on, blissfully unaware of what he would have regarded as an avatar crouched beside him. The guide did not awaken, nor did Nick Carter stir, when the Sherpas awoke early and stealthily departed down the gorge. They were going back to their homes and away from the Lamasery of the She Devils, the spirits of their good wives still safe and dominant in the leather dablams. Going softly, the tinkle of pony bells muffled by the wind, the Sherpas faded away into the blowing snow. They took only what was theirs. Hafed had paid them in advance.

The chamber, even though the massive, nail-studded door was barred on the outside, could hardly be called a cell. It was much too comfortable, of white-washed brick, high and spacious and hung with priceless rugs. There were also rugs on the hard-packed, earthen floor. Nick, who was no rug merchant, recognized one of them as a Samarkand worth at least a thousand.

His bed was on the floor, consisting of half a dozen thin mats piled atop each other. The sheets were of purple silk and the coverlet of rich brocade. A large brazier in the center of the room sent out waves of charcoal heat. Beyond the brazier, set against the far wall, brooded an enormous brass statue of a monkey. The beast was sitting on its haunches, the hand-like forepaws raised as in supplication to strange gods. It was an enormous idol, reaching nearly to the ceiling, and Nick had taken an immediate dislike to it. The eyes, for one thing. They were hollow and once or twice, in the weak yellow light of the butter lamps, he had seen a glitter of white in the empty brass eyes.

So he was being spied on occasionally. So what? It wasn’t the first time. Nick arranged the wooden block pillow beneath his head — it was covered with felt and rather comfortable — and wished the High Priestess, Dyla Lotti, would get on with things. He really had no time for the usual Tibetan amenities — yet he recognized that they must be observed. Protocol must be observed, especially in this place of women. N3 grinned in resignation and lit a cigarette from the one pack he had been permitted to keep.

He blew smoke at the brass monkey and thought back over the events of the day. It had been a long and hectic one…

He had emerged from the yoga trance to find Hafed there with the inevitable cup of tea. Nick was feeling slightly better, stronger, and after a breakfast of tea and biscuit and pressed beef they packed the two remaining ponies and plunged eastward into the pass. The blizzard was in full fury by now.

There was no time for talk and no need for it. Hated did not have to explain — either they made the Lamasery of the She Devils before their strength gave out or they died in the rugged confines of the pass. N3, head lowered into the icy wind, was content to slog along behind Kaswa. The pony knew what it was about, and stuck close to Hafed and the other pony. The trail narrowed steadily until, at one point, it was a bare twelve inches wide with an overhanging cliff to Nick’s right and a mile fall-away to his left. The one factor that saved them, that made the trail passable, was the savage scouring of the wind that kept it free of snow. The going was unmitigated hell. Nick clung to Kaswa’s shaggy tail and hoped for the best — one slip and the mission was all over.

By mid-afternoon they were past the worst of it. About four, as early darkness was clamping down, Hafed stopped and pointed up through the swirling snow. “There, sar! The lamasery. You see all the lights — they are expecting us.”