Free Get Smart 3 - Get Smart Once Again! by William Johnston Page A

said. “You must be a Control agent.” He indicated the other men. “We were all Control agents once,” he said. “But, luckily, we were captured by Noman.” He smiled, recalling. “Oh, the many times I’ve heard that call to duty—the you-know-what of the entire you-know-what is hanging in the you-know-what. Fortunately, I don’t remember what it means any more.”
    Max crooked a finger at Peaches. “I’d like to speak to you in private, please,” he said.
    “I’m just getting comfortable.”
    “If you don’t mind!”
    Reluctantly, Peaches got up and followed Max to the other side of the room.
    “I think we’re in luck,” Max said. “Right now, these men are under the spell of the TV set. But . . . once a Control agent, always a Control agent. I think I can revive their interest in the fate of the you-know-what. And when I do, they’ll rebel and help us break out of this cell.”
    “They’d be fools to,” Peaches said. “They’ve got it made.”
    “Nevertheless, instinct is stronger than security.”
    “Who told you that?”
    “I just made it up,” Max replied. “And now I’ll prove it.”
    Max stepped to the center of the room. “Gentlemen!” he called. “May I have your attention!”
    The program had paused so that the sponsor could deliver a commercial, so the men turned to Max.
    “Gentlemen, my name is Max Smart. I have been sent here by Control to liberate you from the clutches of that diabolical monster, I. M. Noman.”
    A voice replied. “Yeaaaa! Noman! Booooo! Smart!”
    “I think you will change your minds,” Max went on, “when you learn that I have in my possession a Dooms Day Plan. As long as I keep the Plan, the world, as we know it, is safe. But —if the Plan falls into the hands of Noman, I think we can expect a pretty messy world in the near future. Consequently, I call upon you to—”
    Max had lost his audience. The program was on again, and the men had turned back to it.
    Max sighed. “I guess I’ll have to wait for the station break,” he said.
    But at that moment Noman appeared at the bars of the cell.
    “Smart!” he called. “Hand the Plan through the bars to me!”
    “Not by the hair of my chinny-chin-chin,” Max replied.
    “Smart, the cord to the television set is plugged in outside the cell. Hand me the Plan or I’ll unplug it. And when the set goes dead, these prisoners will go stark raving mad and destroy everything and everyone within reach. It’ll be a cruel way to go, Smart.”
    “The key word is ‘everything,’ Noman. They’ll also destroy the Plan.”
    Noman winced. “You have a point there. They’d be mad as wet hens back at Headquarters.” He sighed. “I’ll just have to come in and get it.”
    “This is our chance,” Max said to Peaches. “When he opens the cell door, we’ll rush him.”
    But Noman first pulled out a pistol, then opened the cell door.
    “Scratch that,” Max said to Peaches. “We’ll have to play it by ear.”
    Just then the program ended, and the between programs commercial came on. Noman took advantage of the situation.
    “Prisoners,” he said. “You have an enemy in your midst.”
    The men turned toward Max and Peaches, showing their teeth.
    “That piece of paper that Smart is holding,” Noman said. “It’s next week’s program schedule. Get it!”
    The men rushed at Max.
    But Max wadded the Plan into a ball and tossed it across the room to Peaches. “Run!”
    Peaches caught the ball—but found herself hemmed in by another group of men. She tossed it to Max.
    Max caught it, and started to throw it back. But just then he was struck on the arm by one of the men.
    “Foul!” Max cried.
    The men stood back, looking sheepish.
    “That’s a free-throw for me,” Max said. “Everybody keep away!”
    The men waited, tense and eager. And Max lobbed the ball to Peaches.
    As she caught it, the men came to life and rushed at her once more.
    Peaches tossed the ball high into the air—toward Max. But,