Free Agent Counter-Agent by Nick Carter Page B

today, when you will have your final session. You may return to your room."
    They took me back to the white room with the cot, and I lay down heavily. It seemed as if several agonizing, sleepless days had passed since I'd gotten up that morning. I fell asleep for a while. But this time there was no nightmare. Instead, I had a very detailed dream of Tanya. She was nude and in my arms. The warm softness of her body was engulfing me, consuming me with desire. Every sense was aroused — I heard her lovely voice and smelled the intoxicating scent of her perfume. And throughout the dream, in the heat of her passion, she kept saying to me, "I am sorry, Nick. I am sorry, Nick."
    I couldn't figure out why she was using that foreign name, but I didn't bother to correct her. I didn't care what she called me. Nothing really mattered but the hot, demanding flesh writhing beneath me.
    I sat up suddenly. I thought about Tanya and her use of the foreign name.
Nick.
What did it mean? I'd dreamed about a Luger, then Kalinin had shoved one into my fist. I wondered, as I lay there waiting for them to take me to the final session, whether there wasn't more to these past couple of days than I knew, more than these people were telling me. But they had to be legitimate. They knew all about me, all about my philosophies and my work with the movement. We were all working for the same cause, and I had to trust them.
    When they came for me, they told me it was early evening and I would be released within a few hours, after a good meal. They took me to the orientation room but didn't strap me into the big chair. Instead, they asked me to sit in an ordinary chair beside Salgado. After a short time he left and Tanya and Kalinin came in with a third man, a Russian named Oleg Dimitrov.
    "Señor Dimitrov works closely with the leader of the movement," Kalinin explained to me.
    I looked from the men to Tanya. She was carrying a sheaf of papers under her arm. She smiled uncertainly at me.
    "Shall we get started?" she asked impersonally.
    "All right," I said. "Let's get started."
    They pulled up three chairs and sat down facing me, the men on either side of Tanya. She put the papers on her lap. Dimitrov was staring hard at me, as if trying to assess my innermost thoughts and feelings.
    "We are going to ask you to submit to therapy once more," Tanya said. "Then you will be ready."
    Kalinin was preparing the syringe. He leaned forward from his chair and gave me the injection. "You will receive only a small amount of the sedative this time," he said, "because we will be releasing you immediately after this session is over." The liquid entered my vein, and he withdrew the needle and pressed a bail of cotton to the tiny wound.
    "Now," Tanya said, in her smooth, quiet voice, "you are feeling very relaxed and tranquil." Her voice droned on, caressing my brain, and soon I was in its power. I was completely submissive.
    "This time I am going to ask you to open your eyes, but you must not come out of the deep trance. On the count of five you will open your eyes but remain in the hypnotic state."
    She counted slowly. When she reached
five,
my eyes came open. I looked from one face to the other. I was perfectly aware of everything around me, but I was still in a state of supreme euphoria. I was completely relaxed, and I knew I was in the complete power of that voice.
    "You have been chosen to carry out the most important mission yet attempted by the revolution," Tanya said gravely. "Day after tomorrow, the Caracas Conference will take place. There will be a morning and an afternoon session. The President of Venezuela, the Vice-President of the United States, and various other dignitaries will be present. The conference will take place at the Palacio de Miraflores.
    "You will go to the afternoon session just before the conference is to reconvene. You will be given a water carafe to take into the room. When the conference resumes, a device hidden in the carafe will kill