The brilliant light seemed to sear into him. Number 8 twisted in the chair and tried to turn away from it, but the bonds at his wrists prevented the effort.

He struggled to think. To remember. He'd awakened this morning (had it been this morning?) in this insane, phantasmic place; this Village. And only yesterday, he hadn't been "Number 8" at all, but Paul Spandler, a man guilty of nothing any more dire than resigning his job.

Now he was no longer a name, but a number.

Number 8.

From the nimbus of the blinding light, a voice demanded, "Answer the question, Number 8. The question!"

Paul shook his head to clear it, but found the action only made his throbbing headache worse. They had given him something. Some drug. He remembered now. It had been in the tea. In that remarkably mundane teapot on the stove in his bizarre little Village cottage.

All of this was a drug-induced nightmare. It had to be.

"Answer the question, Number 8."

Paul tried again to twist away. "No, " he said thickly. "I don't..."

''We want to know why you resigned."

"It was in my report."

"We want the real reason."

"I don't even know who you people are. And anyway, it's none of your concern."

"But it is." The all-obliterating light was suddenly extinguished, and Paul found himself staring instead at a wall-sized screen. Its colored image of moving globules dissolved into the live picture of a man strapped to another chair, very like his own. The man wore a black suit with white piping, and Paul had seen him before.

"This is Number 6," the voice said. Paul still couldn't see the speaker. "I believe you've met him before."

"And I believe you're mistaken."

"Hardly. You worked with him 6 months ago in Yugoslavia. The month after that you shared yet another assignment in North Africa. Cairo, as I recall."

"Really?"

"He resigned, too. You're going to tell me why."

Paul chuckled, feeling a little like he'd just downed one too many cocktails. "Sorry old man, but I haven't the foggiest idea--"

"You will. Because you see, you're going to become reacquainted with our most uncooperative Number 6. Take him into your confidence. Talk over old times. And find out for us why he resigned. Then you will answer the same question about yourself."

"I have no intention of telling you anything."

"You will, Number 8. You will..."

* * *

Number 6 casually perused the shelves of the Village General Store. The odd selection of items, he'd found, was standard here. Striped umbrellas, Chinese tea pots, gaudy hats and ponchos. English biscuits, German cuckoo clocks.

"Mornin' Number 6." The balding man behind the counter greeted him with a clipped Irish accent. "What can we get for you today?"

6 regarded him the way an underfed cat might look at a mouse hole. "Barring a plane flight to London," he said acidly, " 'we' can get a packet of razor blades."

The little man seemed to shrink from his sarcasm. "Certainly," he said, and pulled a packet from the wall behind him. "Anything else for you today?"

"Should there be?"

Myopic eyes blinked at him in confusion. "Sir?"

"Never mind. You'll put this on my tab?"

"Of course, sir."

"Be seeing you."

6 slipped the tiny parcel into a pocket and walked back out the shop door, jangling the overhead bell in his wake. He'd strolled only a short way up the cobbled path when he heard the music. Not the scratchy, recorded strains of the PA system, or the off-key banging of the Village band; this was a single instrument, playing a lonely solo somewhere out near the sea wall. A clarinet, 6 decided as he followed the plaintive sound. He rounded a corner, coming in view of the rock wall and the vast sweep of coastline beyond, and stopped when he saw the figure seated on the wall. Even from this distance, he knew the face. Paul Spandler, the agent he had worked with in both Egypt and Yugoslavia.

The music died away at his approach, and when the younger man's eyes met his, he saw recognition there as well.

"Lovely day for a solo," 6 said conversationally. "Have you played long?"

Paul smiled picking up 6's cue. For the purposes of here and now, they were strangers; simply Numbers 6 and 8 who had chanced to meet on this day in the Village.

"Found it in my new lodgings when I woke up this morning," he replied, stroking the instrument. "It's not as nice as the one I had at home, but then... They do think of everything, don't they?"

"Only when everything happens to suit their purpose."

''As a matter of fact, they gave me two," Paul told him. "Must have thought I needed twice the security. Touch of home, and all that. Do you play?"

A smile tugged at one corner of 6's mouth. "I'm afraid not. But I'm amenable to lessons. It might relieve the boredom now and then."

A familiar, high-pitched whistle had intersected his speech, and he looked out at the glistening water for the source -- an enormous, undulating white ovoid that bobbed up and down out there in the waves. Its whistle grew to a roar as it rolled from the water and onto the sand, gliding ominously toward them.

Paul's eyes had grown wide at the sight of the thing. "What the devil is that?"

"Rover," 6 said flatly. "Don't make any sudden moves. Just stay where you are."

The thing drifted closer, its rippling surface seeming to scrutinize them despite its lack of eyes. Paul fought back the urge to recoil and run. "What is it doing?"

"Watching us. The eyes and ears of our keepers, is Rover. And he knows how to bite. I shouldn't annoy him too much if I were you."

From the walkway behind them, a new voice said, "Sage advice, Number 6."

Both of them turned to see a portly man with a cane, cape and bowler hat. He wore the number 2 emblazoned on his silk-ribboned lapel button. Paul had never seen him before, yet he seemed to know the voice. That very odd dream he'd had last night, with all the bright lights, and the questions...

Rover made an incongruous sighing sound, quivered and then shrank away from 2's approach to return to his sea bed.

"Accommodating fellow," 2 said jovially, watching the ovoid disappear into the water. "Can't imagine where we'd be without him."

Without missing a beat, 6 said, "Considerably less populous, I should think."

2 chuckled at the barb. "Touche," he said. "But we do have other resources, Number 6. Many others."

"So I've been told."

2's smile broadened like a politician's on election day. "I do hope you'll enjoy your stay with us, gentlemen. Actually, I came to welcome Number 8 here to our fair shores, and to say that if I can be of any service--"

"That isn't my name," Paul interrupted him. "And the day I ask for any help from you--"

6 placed a cautionary hand on his shoulder, and Paul fell silent. "Thank you," 6 said, artificially cordial. "We'll certainly keep your generous offer in mind."

"I'm sure you will." 2 saluted them with his cane. "Good day, gentlemen."

6 returned the salute as the portly man turned and strolled away. Before he could say anything more, Paul was on his feet and heading up the path in the opposite direction, clarinet gripped like a club in his hand.

"Something bothering you?" 6 asked, falling promptly into step beside him.

"Yes. You're awfully chummy with our head keeper," Paul grumbled. "A little too much, maybe."

"Ah. Requisite distrust. Shall I say the suspicion is reciprocated, or isn't that the next line in the cloak and dagger script?"

"I don't have any more reason to trust you than them," Paul complained, still walking. "Nor I you."

"Maybe. But I don't kiss up to them the way you do."

"You have to learn to play the game."

"I don't want to learn any games."

"If you want to survive here, you will."

Still fuming, Paul snatched a fresh copy of the Tally Ho from its brightly-striped news stand and shook it under the other man's nose. "Is this part of the game? This brainless Village drivel, and all the overdressed, prating puppets who march around this square three times a day?"

Unflappable, 6 said simply, "They serve their purposes."

"Well not for me." Paul crushed the Tally Ho into a ball and stalked angrily away, tossing the wadded paper at a startled Villager on the way by.

* * *

Number 6, comfortably ensconced in his Village flat for the evening, had just poured a cup of steaming tea from the teapot on his kitchen bar when he heard the hum of his front door coming open. He looked up to see Paul -- Number 8 -- standing at the entrance with a clarinet in either hand.

"I believe I was a trifle rude this afternoon. So I came with a peace offering." He proffered one of the clarinets. "Free lesson. May I?"

6 made a welcoming gesture, ushering him inside and to the neighboring stool at the breakfast bar. "Care for some tea?"

Paul frowned. "No thanks. Tea and I haven't got along too well of late. You know last night I had the oddest dream. Reminded me a lot of that beastly Reinicke affair two years ago in Berlin."

6's expression did not change, but both of them knew the code phrase and what it implied. The knowledge of surveillance, and the preparation for a coded communication to follow.

"You have to be rather careful of dreams around here," 6 said, sipping tea. "They have an unpleasant tendency to bite." He accepted the extra clarinet from Paul, adding pointedly, "That affair in Berlin was a bit of a risk, you know." That had been a veiled warning that Number 2 might well successfully decode any messages, but Paul's subtle smile denied the possibility.

"You hold it this way," he instructed, positioning the instrument in 6's hands. "Put your fingers here... and here. Good. Now we'll try just four notes to start." But instead of playing, he said, "I never did understand why Reinicke went for that frog woman. Can't for the world imagine what he saw in her."

"A good pair of legs, no doubt." 6 plunged eagerly into the game.

"Legs? Hmph. I've seen better looking legs on a piano."

"Yes, but she did have a certain charm." 6 gestured at his own face. "The way her lovely blue eyes sparkled when they crossed."

Not far away, in a circular room beneath a high green dome, Number 2 observed their conversation on the wall-sized screen. Beside him, a short bald man with spectacles squinted at the monitored image and consulted his clipboard. "Has to be some sort of code," he muttered. 2 shot him a withering look. "Of course it's a code, you imbecile. Why are you just standing there? Feed it into the computer, and be quick about it!"

The bald man nodded and obediently hurried away.

"Not that I minded her cod and strawberry souffle," Paul was saying with a perfectly straight face. "But those mustard greens with honey sauce. Yeuch."

"Decidedly unsavory," 6 agreed. "Is this the correct hand position?"

"Like this." Paul demonstrated. "Well, then. Four notes." He raised the instrument to his lips, and four clear tones emanated from it in a row. 6 took mental note of each of them. G, Bb, D and E. G minor 6th chord... Last year, when they had used the musical code in Cairo, that particular chord indicated that instructions had been received.

While he pondered what it might mean in their present context, 6 made a deliberately clumsy effort to imitate the sounds. "Not terribly clear on this end, I'm afraid."

"Don't worry, Number 6. It will be. Try this." Three more notes. C, Eb, Gb. C diminished. That meant 'follow my lead.'

This became more interesting by the moment. The 'instructions,' 6 decided, had no doubt

come from Number 2, and had been given during last night's mysterious 'dream' to Paul. 6 knew the pattern. He'd had a similar 'dream' last night himself.

"Yes, the cod really are quite poor in Berlin at that time of year," he said casually, copying the new notes with a bit more expertise this time. "But then, if Reinicke's left foot hadn't fallen off that way, perhaps he'd have enjoyed the event more thoroughly."

In the round control room beneath the green dome, Number 2 unconciously chewed on a knuckle, intent on the two men on his screen. Behind him, the Village computers clicked and chittered, frantically spewing out data tapes.

"Well?" he demanded when the bald man had returned with several yards of tape sprouting from his clipboard.

"The computer doesn't recognize this code."

"Then run it through again!" 2 snapped at him. "It's a decoding computer, isn't it? So let it decode!"

While their improvised discussion had continued apace, Paul's musical messages had laid down a plan that Number 6 found very much to his liking. He'd interrupted the clarinet lesson long enough to bring his prized bottle of claret out of hiding, and that had been followed shortly by two bottles of home-distilled spirits, gleaned from a private still that was well-concealed in a birch copse near the north shore. Within an hour, their music lesson seemingly forgotten, the two prisoners had lapsed into an altogether different sort of conversation.

"I never did find out what heppened to Marion," Paul said in a thickly slurred voice. "But I told 'em after that what they could do with my bloody job and their organization along with it. I just couldn't take it anymore."

"Mm," 6 said, savoring a taste of the home-brewed corn liquor. "I know exactly how you feel, old boy. Had a similar spat with them myself."

"Did you?"

"Nasty business all around. Had to do with that Tulare affair. The one Hendrix died in."

"Call the head office!" Number 2 sent a control room minion scurrying to the bank of multi-colored telephones. "Tell them we finally got what they wanted. Tell them 6 is talking."

The man with the glasses looked dubious. "It can't be that easy," he said.

"Nonsense. Number 8 was conditioned to gain 6's confidence, and 6 was programmed to respond. It was indeed 'that easy.' I knew permitting 6 to keep that still would prove useful one day."

"But sir--"

"Sh!" 2 motioned him to silence. "Listen!"

"Was Hendrix the reason you resigned?" 8 was asking over the rim of his shot glass.

6 pretended to ponder that while 'refilling' his own glass from an opaque bottle that, unbeknownst to the cameras, never got any emptier. "Nicest little chap you'd ever want to meet, Hendrix," he said disconsolately. Then, with a grim sadness he added, "I had to bury him in a cow pasture, did you know that? Never thought I'd get over that one."

"Check the file!" 2 barked at the control room lackeys. "Find out who this Hendrix person was, and hurry!" He plucked a red phone from the hands of a waiting minion and held it to his ear. "Yes sir," he said stiffly. "That's right sir. We're checking on it now. Thank you sir."

"Now about that frog woman business," Paul gestured with his clarinet and pretended to address a companion nearly two meters to the right of where 6 actually sat. "It wasn't the souffle that caused all of the problems at all, old man." He leaned forward conspiratorially. "It was the toilet paper. Definitely the pink and purple toilet paper."

"A distinct possibility, that," 6 slurred all the words together. "But the Lithuanian Mambo dancers were an intriguing diversion, don't you agree?"

''Oh, absolutely."

"The computer still doesn't recognize this code," the bald man said to Number 2. "If you'll forgive the suggestion, sir.. .perhaps it isn't one."

2 considered that. "A diversion? Yes... Yes, perhaps. That would be just like our Number 6, wouldn't it? Still and all... they were communicating something. I'm sure of it. And I intend to know what." He shouted impatiently toward the computer banks. "Where is that report?"

"Coming in now, sir," one of the operators said. 2 was promptly handed the computer's readout, and all but the bald man retreated at once to the relative safety of the consoles while their superior perused the results. His face fell after he'd skimmed the first few paragraphs. He glared at the two drunken figures on the viewscreen, then went back to reading again. In a moment, he dropped the report to the desktop and moved dejectedly to the black modular chair that formed the center of the control room dais. The bald man followed at a safe distance.

"Hendrix?" he queried softly.

"Lived and died over 25 years ago." 2's voice was that of a tired and broken old man. "I don't wonder Number 6 was heartbroken."

"A childhood friend?"

Venom laced the reply. "Hendrix... was a Pekingese."

On the desk nearby, the red phone began to squeal for attention.

* * *

None too steady on his feet, 6 was showing his drinking companion to the door. "Oh here," he said. "You've forgotten your extra one..."

"The clarinet? You hold onto it," Paul said generously. "Keep you in practice."

"You're too kind." The door buzzed open and they both stepped out to meet the sound of Rover's piercing whistle. "Ah, Rover," 6 said cheerily. "Lovely day for a stroll, what?"

The huge sphere hovered on the path just beyond them, rippling with an unmistakable air of annoyance. On an impulse, Paul put his clarinet to his lips, chose the highest register the instrument could play, and blasted out a squealing, earsplitting note. The spheroid howled, and fled up the path, in obvious pain.

Paul turned back to see 6, all semblance of their feigned drunkeness gone, smiling sardonically. "A splendid game," he said. "Be seeing you."

Paul saluted him with the clarinet. "Be seeing you."

Still smiling, 6 turned to re-enter his flat as 8 disappeared up the Village path. The door hummed shut after him.
 

The End