U.N.C.L.E. Beirut Medical was well-lit, sparkling clean, and really, set as it was near the edge of the city, with a view of the mountains out the east-facing window, it was as picturesque as you could hope for a hospital to be. Except for one thing: the men upon men upon men who staffed the place. Oh, Napoleon had heard of the male nurse. Unlike the yeti, Bigfoot and Loch Ness, he had known this bogeyman existed, but he'd always believed it was the kind of thing that happened to other people.

One of these horrors opened the door of Napoleon's private room and peered in. "Good morning, Mr. Solo," said--Hani, according to the nametag he wore on the opposite breast from his U.N.C.L.E. badge. "How are you feeling?"

Horror was a bit strong, Napoleon thought grudgingly. He was quite good-looking, if you liked that sort of thing. He was probably assailed by female admirers as soon as he set foot outside this monastery. The creep.

"As well as can be expected," Napoleon answered.

Hani set a tray on the night stand beside Napoleon's bed. "I brought you some ice cream with your dinner," he said. "It may go down easier than the rest."

"Oh, thank you."

"Is there anything else I can do for you?"

As a matter of fact... "Hani," Napoleon said, "You don't happen to have a sister, do you?"

"I do," said Hani, looking pleasantly surprised. "She lives in America."

"Oh." Napoleon deflated.

"Why do you ask? Do you know her?"

"No, no," said Napoleon. "Just, uh, missing my sister, was all."

"Ahh." Hani nodded. "Does she also work for U.N.C.L.E.?"

"No. She's away, uh, studying. In France. The Sorbonne, you know."

Hani sighed. "You never are quite ready for them to grow up, are you?"

"Uh, no. Seems like only yesterday she was still in pigtails. Ah, thank you for the ice cream."

The nurse withdrew and Napoleon sat brooding for a minute before attempting a brood over the ice cream. It wasn't bad enough Napoleon was stuck here in Purgatory's all-male dorm while Illya vacationed in southern France, spying on beautiful women--he had to have Paul Westcott with him.

Napoleon had read his file after the decoy affair. To all appearances, it was a spotless record with signs of future promise, but Napoleon had disliked him from the moment they laid eyes on each other. It wasn't just the undercover role--Westcott had taken too much pleasure in its playing. No; he was a rat pretending to be an U.N.C.L.E. agent pretending to be a rat. What bothered Napoleon more was that Illya hadn't seen it then, and didn't seem to, now, when it was so obvious. Why couldn't it have been Kittridge? Illya didn't like him much, but at least he wore all his obnoxiousness on the outside. Or Slate--he was a bit useless, but completely innocuous.

Napoleon's dish clattered to the tray when his communicator went off. He pulled it from the breast pocket of his hospital pajamas. "Solo here."

"Napoleon--"

"Illya! How goes the good fight this fine summer evening?"

"I told Westcott THRUSH never goes on vacation," Illya said in an undertone. "They don't, do they?"

"I think they favor the working holiday," said Napoleon. "Do a spot of kidnapping, take in a little sun and seaside air, knock off a world leader in between times."

"Good."

"Look at you--" There was the distinctive click of Illya's communicator snapping shut, then dead air. "--being a responsible senior agent," Napoleon finished, glaring at his communicator.

"Oh, dear," said Hani, when he returned to collect the tray. "Did it not agree with you, after all?"

Napoleon glanced at the ice cream dish he appeared to be trying to strangle. He set it down and rearranged his expression into something more amiable. "No," he said. "Something else is giving me indigestion."

Napoleon's imagination ran away from him when he was bored. That didn't happen often, since he usually had something going, or at least something to plan for, but he hadn't been prepared for an extended stay in bed when he came to Beirut. Hani brought him a paperback mystery, but it failed to hold his attention--that was occupied by thoughts of the affair in France, particularly with Illya's description of Amandine, and with the almighty idiot who was there to appreciate her instead of Napoleon.

He attempted to convince his doctor that he was ready for release, but his argument was hindered by the fact that every time he tried to put a foot out of bed, he came dangerously close to passing out. Somehow, Dr. Sharif wasn't going for it.

About the only breaks in the monotony of his bedridden existence were his little chats with Hani. Napoleon resented the fact that he wasn't his sister, but he did--unasked--bring a photograph of her.

She was beautiful. Napoleon resisted the urge to ask to keep the picture. If you had to have a sister... well, that was precisely the type you didn't want, probably. Hani must stay up nights, worrying.

"It keeps me up at night, worrying," Hani sighed.

Napoleon nodded sympathetically. "I can see why."

"Ah." Hani smiled. "You can tell?"

"Who couldn't, who had eyes to see?"

"I guess you can't hide one enforcement agent from another."

"Eh?" said Napoleon.

"I was very proud of her when she became CEA in New Orleans, but an older brother must worry, mustn't he?"

"Oh, absolutely," Napoleon said. He took another long look at the photograph. Wow. It had clearly been too long since he visited New Orleans HQ.

"As you do," said Hani.

"As I what, now?"

"Worry about your sister," said Hani. "I see it in your face each time I visit. You have the look of a troubled older brother."

Oh, Napoleon thought. Right. The sister at the Sorbonne. He smiled wryly. "The problem is a man," he said, "who's sniffing around where he shouldn't be."

Hani opened his eyes wide in the universal expression for 'got you.' "That is not a problem I often have, thankfully," said Hani. "If a man does too much sniffing, Shafa begins breaking arms."

"Does that happen a lot?"

"Often enough that my parents took out special insurance."

Napoleon whistled. Duly noted, for the next time I do visit New Orleans. "Well, I must admit, I--mogen... is of the same persuasion." Even if Westcott turned out to be a THRUSHie--which Napoleon doubted--Illya would make short work of him. That wasn't the problem. Napoleon didn't like that Illya couldn't see what he did in the man--it felt like Westcott was standing behind Illya making faces at Napoleon--but that, too, he could cope with. It was more that Napoleon couldn't quite guess what he was after. What was his angle, buttering Illya up? He was their junior agent, but he was hardly low-ranking in the New York office. He had a bright future on his own, it wasn't as if he needed a recommendation, and Illya couldn't promote him, himself.

"And yet," said Hani, "you worry."

"Yes," Napoleon said slowly. "I just don't know what exactly he wants."

Hani raised his eyebrows, then averted his eyes.

Napoleon blinked. "No."

Hani shrugged and heaved a heartfelt sigh. "Mr. Solo, you know, as do I, that man is a simple creature, with but a few basic desires."

"Yes, but..." But I'm not talking about a sister; it's my partner I'm worried about. My male partner. Napoleon pursed his lips. It couldn't be that Westcott actually... That is, he'd done his utmost to whisk Fran Parsons away from Napoleon--unsuccessfully. And Napoleon had seen him around headquarters, putting the moves on more than one of the girls Napoleon had his eye on. His eyebrow twitched. It couldn't be. "No," he said again. "He'd--that is--she'd break both his arms."

"Moonlight becomes you, indeed!" Napoleon growled down a closed line. His jaw was still clenched when Hani came in with his breakfast.

"My god, Mr. Solo, are you all right?"

"Top of the world." Surrounded by men while a skunk in a suit spouts movie lines at my partner with a straight face and somehow gets away without a broken wrist for his troubles. "They're going to Morocco."

"Your sister?" asked Hani. "And, er..."

"That man."

Hani sucked air through his teeth.

"What?" asked Napoleon.

"Morocco," said Hani, shaking his head. "There are two problems with Morocco. First, the country is so beautiful and its atmosphere so inviting that visitors tend to go for a month and stay for a lifetime. Second... well, the only man more irresistible to women than a Moroccan is a Lebanese." Hani looked back at him. "He's not Moroccan, is he, this... admirer?"

"No," said Napoleon. He looked sidelong at Hani. He wasn't sure whether to be insulted or impressed. "American."

"That's something, at least. Ah--" Hani cleared his throat and had the grace to look sheepish. "Men of Italian descent are a close third, Mr. Solo."

If I were on my feet, we'd soon see who was number three, Napoleon thought, but he only smiled and nodded graciously.

"Perhaps," said Hani slowly, "you should contact the Moroccan U.N.C.L.E.?"

"Uh... no," said Napoleon. He didn't know anyone in the Rabat HQ or Tangiers branch office very well, and he'd need a very good reason to call in official help on an affair in which he wasn't involved. "I'm not sure my personal concerns import on world peace."

"But if your sister is in danger..."

My sister will break my spine in three places if he ever finds out I had this conversation, Napoleon thought with a grimace. "I don't know if we could call it danger, just yet..."

Hani frowned. "It is still the organization for Law and Enforcement. I don't think they would begrudge you a favor to keep your family safe."

"Well..." Napoleon massaged his forehead. It had to be the boredom aided by lingering fever. He was imagining... he didn't quite want to put into words what he was imagining. It was crazy. Westcott might just be... friendly. Perhaps he'd turned over a new leaf--one that wasn't a snake in the grass. Maybe he'd meant the comment as a joke. Maybe it was just an honest observation. Illya was pretty fetching in moonlight--Napoleon had had ample opportunity to come to the same conclusion. But what business did Westcott have saying so? Napoleon found himself scowling again. "Let's keep that as Plan B," he said.

"So, how's Casablanca?" Napoleon asked.

"Still not in the desert," said Illya.

"Been to Rick's, yet?"

"There is no Rick's Café, Napoleon."

"Sure there is--you just have to find out where everybody goes."

"Everyone goes to the souk. I have yet to run into Mr. Bogart or Ms. Bergman haggling over imitation Gucci handbags."

"Ah, Ingrid," Napoleon sighed. "And what of Ms. Pascal?"

"She is being well taken care of by the active agents," Illya said.

"Oh? How well?"

"Not that well, just yet," said Illya. "It would be suspicious if he had another chance meeting with her, here, this soon. For now, we continue surveillance at a remove, and listen to the bug."

"Saying anything interesting?"

Illya harrumphed. "Not unless it's in code. And--" he said, when Napoleon began to answer, "--I've already tried to identify patterns, twice. No luck so far."

"Want to run some of it by me?"

"No."

Napoleon sighed.

"You're meant to be resting," Illya said.

"Illya, you've never met a man so rested. I've been flat on my back for almost two weeks."

"Well, keep up the hard work."

"Did I interrupt something, when I called?"

"I was trying to sleep, but don't let that trouble you. I have two hours before I need to trade places with Westcott."

"And where is Agent Lurch?"

"Shadowing Ms. Pascal on a rendez-vous with Moulay Karim."

Napoleon raised his eyebrows. "A nobleman. She doesn't do too badly for herself."

"No, indeed," Illya grumbled. "And now--"

"You really should keep your eye on him."

Illya stifled a yawn. "Who, the Moulay?"

"Not the Moulay; Number 22."

"Oh, never fear."

"Good," said Napoleon. "Wait--what does that mean?"

Illya gave an exasperated huff. "It doesn't mean anything. What is your fixation with this man?"

"I don't have a fixation, I have a legitimate concern. There's something about him that's not on the level, and--"

"Napoleon, at this point, I would welcome the news that he was a double agent for THRUSH if it would give me something concrete to do. However, he has been a model junior agent. He follows orders, he shows initiative where necessary--"

"What kind of initiative?"

"I am not about to give you a mission report at three in the morning. Suffice it to say, he has been useful. More than anything, he was assigned to Morocco for a year after Survival School, so he knows the streets and restaurants exceedingly well. I have no complaints."

"A wolf in St. Bernard's clothing."

Illya did a worse job stifling this yawn. "Does it bother you so much that he's larger than you?"

Napoleon frowned at his communicator. "It bothers me that he's a louse."

"Well, consider him watched," Illya mumbled. "Unlike some, I have not been in bed for the past twelve days." Click.

Napoleon flipped the microphone and stowed the pen. He looked down at himself, mired in sheets. "He's not that much larger," he muttered.

"Napoleon... Maybe she is just on holiday."

"Things not going so well, are they?" Napoleon asked.

"You can stop smiling," Illya grumbled.

"I would never," Napoleon said, wrestling his grin down to size. "But what makes you say that?"

"She hasn't put a foot out of place since we arrived," Illya said. "She sunbathes, she dines at elegant restaurants, she hobnobs with high society and trysts with the nobility, but I have neither seen nor heard the least hint of an arms deal, an assassination plot, or so much as a bit of petty thuggery. Oh, and she goes shopping almost daily in the medina, where I have a devil of a time following, because every time I go, I am mobbed by women who try to touch my hair."

"Perhaps they think moonlight becomes you, too," Napoleon muttered.

"What was that?"

Napoleon cleared his throat. "Static. International relay. Do you think she's making a contact there? The old city is full of little offshoots and byways, unregistered vendors of this and that, and, as you said, the souk is crowded as anything. She could be slipping messages to someone when she runs her little errands, or receiving them from any number of people."

"Could be," Illya huffed. "It's impossible to tell. In that crowd, we can't get close enough to see, and the bug's worse than useless--too much noise. The rest of the time, she says nothing any other socialite would not. If it weren't for the bodyguards, I'd doubt she even was THRUSH."

Napoleon snorted. "There's no chance you have the wrong woman, is there?"

"None. This is the Amandine Pascal from the file. But whether she has any connection to Operation Hypnos, or whether that operation even truly exists..."

"Why wouldn't it exist?"

"Because that's all we have of it--the name! Supposedly, Pascal is one of the principals, but there's nothing to suggest Hypnos is anything more than a THRUSH initiative to provide its operatives with paid R and R."

"We've already seen what their retirement package looks like," said Napoleon. "That's a perk I'd refuse." There was a clatter and a muffled curse from Illya's end. "What are you doing?"

"Cleaning my pistol."

"Have you been using it that much?"

"Not once since the affair began."

"As an agent dedicated to the promotion of world peace, you're not supposed to sound so put out by that."

Illya said something Napoleon was content not to translate. Napoleon tried not to smile, picturing the disgruntled expression on his partner's face as he swabbed gun components as though they'd finished the last of the vodka.

"Napoleon," Illya said after a pause.

"Hm?"

"You are all right, aren't you?"

"Yes, yes, not so much as a peep from Aunt Gretchen."

"No, I mean, shouldn't you be out of hospital, by now?"

"Oh, you know doctors," said Napoleon. "Or, more accurately, you know U.N.C.L.E. insurance concerns. They said if you hadn't dragged me in just when you did, I'd be a goner. So, you know how it goes. They probably won't declare me fit for duty for another year." He expected a laugh, or at least a sarcastic comment about that, but he got neither--only another, longer pause.

"I have to relieve Westcott," Illya said. "Good night, Napoleon."

Napoleon twitched, expecting the line to go dead before he could reply, but it didn't. It took him a moment before he realized it wasn't going to. Napoleon's brow pursed. "Good night, Illya," he said.

The next couple times Napoleon called, Illya's mood was similarly dour. Once, he sounded more cheerful at the prospect of Amandine meeting with the Minister of the Interior, but all he would say afterwards was, "Where does she find the energy?"

Napoleon's existence as a eunuch continued. No, even the eunuchs had it better; at least they could see women. All Napoleon could see out his window was those smugly picturesque blue mountains. He squinted at them in hopes his vision would develop beyond 20/20. Somewhere in those mountains were villages, and in those villages were women. Women who, he hoped, embraced the same form-fitting, elegant fashion sensibility as their counterparts in the city. All he got for his efforts, however, was a headache.

He was massaging his temples on the evening of his seventeenth day of incarceration when his friend the male nurse came by with dinner. Napoleon had graduated to solid food by this point, though his appetite wasn't terribly robust, and he could now get all the way to the facilities without the assistance of another person or a wheelchair. He considered that a significant improvement, but Dr. Sharif did not, and though Napoleon's fever was utterly manageable, the good doctor was not impressed that it lingered at all.

"You know, Hani," said Napoleon, as he toyed with the cucumber and yogurt salad on his tray, "you've been awfully decent to me while I've been here, and I've come to think of you rather as a friend."

"How kind, Mr. Solo. I, too, have enjoyed our conversations."

Napoleon smiled, if a trifle impatiently. "Well, so, I hope you won't take offense when I ask this, but... I've noticed a shortage... a complete absence, in fact, of any female personnel at Beirut Medical. Is there... some, uh... cultural reason for that?"

"Oh," said Hani, "no. All the female medical staff are away at a conference in Alexandria."

"Aha!" said Napoleon. "So he was wrong."

"Mr. Solo?"

Napoleon smirked. "My... uh, sister was of the opinion that I was being quarantined from female company." Hani's gaze slid to one side. "What?" Napoleon asked. Hani cleared his throat. "What?"

"Er... The fact is..."

Napoleon leaned forward.

"The trip was planned and put through very quickly, when the head of Medical heard you were coming."

"What! What does he have against me?"

Hani shrugged. "I don't know. I had never seen Dr. Najjar curl his lip that way until he mentioned your name."

Najjar? Napoleon looked at the ceiling. Najjar... Najjar... Oh. U.N.C.L.E. New York Medical, ten years ago. There had been the matter of the girl. And the other girl. And... the third. Oh.

"But," Napoleon said, "he can't have known I'd get sick while I was here."

"He said he was determined you should not molest any of his staff. He tried to include the female staff of Headquarters in the conference, but Section 1 decided it was only useful for a few of them."

Napoleon huffed and slumped back against his pillows. The wily fox. He probably would have evacuated the female population of the city, if he could have. He looked up at Hani. "I'm really not that bad," he said.

"I did get the impression he was exaggerating," said Hani.

Somewhat, anyhow, Napoleon thought. He poked some over-boiled vegetables around his plate.

In his defense, he hadn't known Najjar was sweet on Sarah Fisher, too.

"They were actually due back several days ago," said Hani, "but Dr. Najjar kept finding reasons to prolong the excursion. I overheard Dr. Sharif talking with him on the phone, earlier. They'll be back tomorrow. Section 1 insisted."

Napoleon whistled. It would brighten up the place, at any rate. And maybe Najjar would discharge him, just to get him away from his staff. Napoleon could live with that. "He won't poison me, or anything, will he?"

"Mr. Solo!"

"I'm joking," said Napoleon. I hope, anyway. "I should be out of here pretty soon, though, right? So I shouldn't have to trespass on his good nature too long."

Hani made a face and sighed. "May I?" he said, reaching a hand out towards Napoleon's forehead. Napoleon nodded and Hani pressed his wrist against it. He frowned for a moment, then shook his head. "I am no doctor, but even I would not discharge you. You must be very careful of incurring further complications. If you had come in earlier, it would have been simpler, but..."

"I couldn't," said Napoleon, "I was tied up at the time."

Hani lifted an eyebrow.

"No, I mean literally. And anyway, I thought it was only a stomach ache."

"A stomach ache!" Hani laughed incredulously. "You are quite a man, Mr. Solo."

Napoleon grinned. "That's what they tell me." He popped a carrot in his mouth.

Hani glanced at his watch. "I must leave you. Try to eat as much as you can." He departed on his rounds, and Napoleon made his best effort with the mushy food. He really wished he were eating Lebanese. It was funny how when you simplified cuisine to its base elements to make it easy to digest, it essentially became English.

Eventually, he put the tray aside and settled down among his pillows with that mystery novel. He considered contacting Illya to tell him he was about to get the harem he was due, after all--omitting the part where it was his fault the harem had departed in the first place--but decided against it. When they'd spoken earlier, Illya had said he planned to do some closer surveillance, so best not to break radio silence unless necessary. The book still wasn't much good, but Napoleon was only halfway down the page he'd opened to when he fell asleep.

He opened his eyes from a dream of shiny silks and being fanned with palm fronds to darkness, and took a moment to identify the sound of his communicator, muffled in his pajamas. He blinked several times to adjust to the pale light coming in his window as he pulled the thing out and silenced it. "H'llo?" he said, voice scratchy.

"Napoleon!" Illya's excited voice hissed.

Napoleon looked hard at his three communicators in the moonlight until they resolved into one. "Uh," he said.

"You can go back to sleep in a moment," said Illya. "Where's the Bar Marrakech--do you know it?"

Napoleon closed his eyes and ran a hand over his forehead. "Bar Marrakech... Yeah, it's... Where are you now?"

"Rue d'Anfa."

"Right."

Napoleon called up a mental image of the city, from the rich, flowering Anfa district crowning the hill, down to the coast, and back southeast, through the glitzy commercial district, into the medina, out into the poorer residential streets and the brief industrial area before city ceded to country. "Go down the hill," he said, "until you hit the corniche, and turn south. Follow that road until you see a five-story red stone hotel, and turn onto the street that runs past its front entrance. Keep going till it gets commercial and you see a billboard for hair care--"

"Hair care?" Illya repeated.

"The company may have changed, but the ad won't have. There's a woman brushing back long, straight hair."

"All right," said Illya. Napoleon wasn't sure how he could hear his partner's eyebrow rising, but he could.

"Duck under the billboard--there's a forked alley. Take the right fork, go about, say, thirty yards, look for the sandstone building on your right with the cast-iron railing on the side staircase. Take those stairs, cross the balcony, and go down. The bar's in the basement."

"You're a wonder, Napoleon."

"Thank you." Napoleon was muzzily pleased.

"You can get lost going straight across an empty field--"

"That was forest. Forest is different."

"--but you're more accurate than military intelligence maps when it comes to navigating almost any city in the world. Particularly if it comes to finding bars, hotels, or casinos."

"I'm a city boy," Napoleon sniffed. "I can't help it if my refined personality gives me an affinity for civilization. You were raised by wolves, so I can confidently leave all running around through forest and glen to you."

Illya snorted. "Raised by wolves, was I?"

"I'm willing to go as high as bears. Which would you prefer?"

"I'll take the wolves," said Illya, "and leave civilization to you."

"If you are a wolf, your choice of bar tonight couldn't be better. It's a horrible dive--doesn't sound like your girl's speed at all."

"Well," said Illya, a smile in his voice, "she's changing speeds tonight, and to meet with Enrique de la Fuerta."

"Oh-ho," said Napoleon, to whom the name meant nothing.

"You don't know who he is, do you?"

"Of course I do," Napoleon lied. "Very encouraging."

"Yes, it is," said Illya gleefully. "At last."

He disappeared and Napoleon pawed at his communicator until he'd disabled it, fell back into his pillows and felt very guilty about waking Illya up the other night. He tried to run Spain's usual suspects through his mind, but the name de la Fuerta just didn't say anything to him. There was no subtle way he could find out from here, either. Well, whoever he was, he had a bored Illya coming after him, and might god have mercy on his soul.

The next day brought the return of the Alexandria expedition. By mid-morning, the medical wing was awash with clever-looking women in lab coats with glasses and sharp hairdos, and bright, solicitous girls in those crisp white uniforms for which Napoleon owed some designer, somewhere, several rounds of drinks. There were soprano and alto voices to be heard in the hallways and the trace of floral perfumes in the air. Three female nurses together brought him his lunch, and stayed to talk, clearly fascinated by the man from whom their glorious leader had gone to such lengths to keep them. Five more found excuses to drop by over the next hour, straightening a curtain here and a fixture there. It was bliss. Poor old Najjar. He didn't stop in.

Napoleon waited until it was well after noon before opening a direct channel to tell Illya the good news, and that he might just stay and convalesce another month or so. It took longer than usual to pick up, and when it did, the "Yes?" definitely wasn't in Illya's voice.

"Who--?" Napoleon began. "Westcott!"

"Oh, hello, Solo," drawled Section 2, Number 8. "Did you need something?"

"Not from you," said Napoleon. "What are you doing with Illya's communicator?"

"It was going off in his clothes and getting a bit annoying."

Napoleon was silent for a moment. He knew he would regret his next utterance, but-- "His clothes?" he repeated.

"He's not wearing them," said Westcott.

Napoleon's eyebrows climbed a fraction of an inch. "Put him on," he said.

"No can do, Solo. Mr. Kuryakin's... indisposed at the moment."

Napoleon's eyebrows crept a little higher. A muscle at the corner of his left eye twitched. "Put him on, Westcott," he said evenly.

"Mm, sorry," said Westcott, "but I couldn't bring myself to disturb him, after how late I kept him up last night. I didn't mean to, but he's been so frustrated over the lack of developments on the affair, lately, I just had to do something to help him loosen up. Didn't realize just how far he'd loosen, though. I've never met anyone so flexible--I mean, I know contortionists whose legs don't go that far over their heads. And--"

Napoleon snapped his communicator shut.

"Mr. Solo," said Hani, "what are you doing in the linen closet?"

Napoleon pulled his purloined lab coat over his appropriated scrubs. "Escaping," he said.

"You can't," said Hani.

"I can and I will." Napoleon picked up his suitcase and ignored the twinge it gave him. "Stand aside."

Hani put his arms out and grasped the door frame. "I cannot allow you to leave in your condition, Mr. Solo. Please, be reasonable."

Napoleon sized up the nurse. He was a little shorter than Napoleon, but broad-shouldered and looked like he moved a fair amount of heavy objects in the course of his duties. All members of U.N.C.L.E. got some self-defense training, and members of Medical got more than, say, Translation. Still, under normal circumstances, he wouldn't have posed a threat. Now, he probably did. "Hani, do nurses take the Hippocratic Oath?"

"No."

"Hm. Hani, I like you. I don't want to hurt you--"

"Mr. Solo, it is you who will be hurt, and not by me. Give me that--" He grabbed at the suitcase and grunted at the weight of it. "Drop it!" he cried, so sharply that Napoleon startled and complied. Hani took a deep breath, looking at him with wide-eyed alarm. "You cannot lift that--you will rupture yourself."

"Fine. I don't need it." Napoleon strode forward. Hani caught his shoulders, but when Napoleon kept pushing, Hani winced and walked backwards with him.

"Mr. Solo," be begged, please. You might die."

"Not before I get to Morocco," Napoleon growled. "Not without my hands around Paul Westcott's neck."

Hani dropped his hands. "Your sister?" he asked. "What happened?"

"I called," Napoleon said, "and he answered." Hani's eyes widened. "He said... he said..."

"Stop." Hani closed his eyes and shook his head. "You must go. I will help you." He stooped and lifted Napoleon's suitcase, then strode off down the corridor. Rather more unsteadily, Napoleon followed.

Hani led him through a series of back corridors, and had him stand aside as he cleared the laundry room of witnesses. Napoleon changed quickly back into his suit and replaced his shoulder holster where it should be. He smiled grimly at Hani. "That's all I needed. I feel a hundred percent better."

Hani clapped his shoulders and looked into his eyes. "Do you need my help? I will come with you."

Napoleon paused. "You really are a good guy, Hani. No, I'll handle this. Thanks for everything. It's Napoleon, next time, all right? We'll get a drink."

"Be careful, Mr.--Napoleon. Godspeed."

A few hours later, Napoleon was on MEA Flight 65 to Casablanca.

Act III: The U.N.C.L.E. Protocol Handbook

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