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“Come,” Gaby says imperiously, dropping Illya’s overcoat on his desk atop a stack of blueprints. “If we don’t get moving now, we won’t have time for you to stop by Wardrobe to change.”
Illya rescues the loose components of his latest bug from a stray sleeve and looks up at Gaby. She’s dressed remarkably well, in a pristine white overcoat with white gloves. A long saffron skirt is peeking out from beneath the hem; Illya recognizes it as the Pateau from the disguises closet.
“Oh?” he says, raising an eyebrow.
“Oh,” Gaby confirms. “Lock up your desk, we won’t be back tonight.”
“What is the mission? Illya asked, sweeping bug and blueprints alike into a desk drawer and turning the key in the lock. Given the skills of most of UNCLE employees, a locked drawer was more of a “KEEP OUT” sign than an actual impediment to drawer-rifling, but it was good to make them practice every now and then.
“You’ll find out when we get there.”
*
“Our mission is… ballet?” Illya asks dubiously, adjusting his gloves on the steps of the New York State Theater.
“Yes,” Gaby says, delicately side-stepping a puddle of winter slush. “I have not been since the Deutsches Fernsehballett made their debut. I should have liked to have seen their Don Quixote, but alas, we had that business in Johannesburg in May.”
“So our mission is not so much a mission as…”
“A date, yes.”
“To see ballet.”
“Yes.”
“I do not care for large crowds of wealthy people pretending to appreciate art. Ask Napolean. Good afternoon,” Illya says. He doffs his hat, then turns to head back to the subway platform.
Gaby runs after him and grabs his arm. “I can’t ask Napolean, you know that. The man has no quality of stillness. He’d steal the jewels from everyone in our session just to keep from dying of boredom, then get caught trying to put half of them back.” This, Illya reflects, is true, but not sufficient justification for surprise ballet. “And the composer and the choreographer are both Russian –Balachine doing Tchaikovsky!”
“Defector and deviant,” Illya says curtly.
“You’re one to talk,” Gaby retorts, reaching up to flick his collarbone, where an impeccably starched white shirt hides a large bruise that Napolean had started and Gaby improved upon last night. Illya inclines his head, acknowledging the literal and metaphorical hit.
“And – I suppose I thought you might like it,” Gaby says, trailing off a bit at the end and biting her lip.
It is very unfair when she bites her lip.
*
“That was wonderful!” Illya exclaims as they emerge several hours later. “The skill, the athleticism, the artistry!”
“Yes,” Gaby says, more reservedly. “The prima had wonderful expression, but I felt like the chorus struggled a bit to fill the space. I would have liked to have seen it before it was reworked.”
Struck by Gaby’s tone, Illya looks down at his companion. She is smiling, but her eyes are a bit sad. Illya offers his arm for her to take, thinking quickly, then says, “I seem to recall your file mentioning you had a professional’s eye for this.”
“Never a professional’s eye,” Gaby says. “Only a talented amateur’s.”
“Oh, talented!” Illya elbows her. “Why, then, is the artistic world deprived of Gabriella Teller, prima ballerina extraordinaire?”
“I tore my hip,” Gaby says. There is nothing self-pitying in her tone, just a fact, but the statement hides a longer story. “I tore my hip, and my father – my foster father, you know, not Udo – my father fell ill, and perhaps my career might have survived one such injury, but not both. By the time my father was well again, my hip had healed so poorly that my teachers let me know that there would be no career for me if I returned. So, I made my choice to come home and learn my father’s trade. Six months later, Waverley approached me.”
They walk in silence for a time, under the streetlamps wrapped in gay green garlands.
“Well,” Illya says at last, “The loss of the artistic world is the gain of the espionage world. Come. Let us go home, and let Napolean know that he missed out on a chance to steal a top-quality diamond choker from a woman much too young for such jewels.”
“He’ll be furious,” Gaby says, smiling, and leans her head on his shoulder as they turn for home.
***
For someone who has built his career on lies, Napolean is remarkably ill at ease with perpetuating them to children. He has never been fond even of the small, necessary lies – “You won’t grow if you don’t eat your vegetables” or “This won’t hurt a bit” – and he has never yet managed to spit out one of the big ones – “I’ll just be a moment” and “Everything will be all right.”
Most of the time, this isn’t an issue, as their day-to-day life puts them into contact with relatively few children, but the UNCLE office Christmas party has a few of them running around the pub chosen for the event, mainly belonging to the support staff whose families really do believe that Mama works in a tailor’s shop. Waverley is doing his bit as a rather unconvincing Father Christmas, but one of the sprogs manages to catch Napolean brooding in an armchair by the fire, on the wrong side of the eggnog and ask him what he’s asked of Father Christmas this year.
Normally Napolean would just brush the question off with “New oxfords and a good bottle of gin,” but just as the moppet asks, he catches sight of Gaby, laughing as she hauls Illya out into the middle of the room, standing on tip-toe to put her arms around his neck, swaying to “White Christmas,” and he’s struck by the knowledge that a week ago Illya calmly told a THRUSH henchman “Kill the American, he doesn’t matter” as Gaby worked to untie his wrists, and three weeks ago they both were drugged and dangling over a shark pit because he couldn’t resist lifting the duchess’s watch, and that partners in their field almost never last more than five years together, and they’re closing in on four, and really, nothing - nothing gold can stay, so why even try? - and so he replies, “There is no Father Christmas; your mother stole your list and bought you what you asked for,” and the tyke bursts into tears and stands there awkwardly, refusing Solo’s offer of a handkerchief until its mother comes to collect it with a dirty look at him.
Napolean is still staring after the child, now being comforted and dandled on one hip by Gladys from the typing pool, when Gaby steps up behind him and rests her chin on his shoulder, wrapping her arms around him. “What have you done now, you Grinch?” she asks, amused and warmed by several glasses of eggnog herself.
Gaby has a very pointy chin. Napolean resists the urge to shrug. “I believe I’ve just ruined Christmas, Max old thing.” He goes for nonchalant, but some sincerity must creep into his voice with the eggnog, because Gaby leaves off boring a hole into his collarbone and slides around to sit next to him on the arm of the chair. Illya comes up and sits on the footstool. His knees stick up comically. Napolean suspects they have planned this.
“Nonsense,” Gaby says. “The Christmases of children are remarkably resilient things.”
“Come,” Illya says, producing a bottle of vodka and waving it enticingly. “We have made obligatory appearance. Let us celebrate more privately, no?”
Napolean is not fond of Christmas, but he is fond of seizing the moment. He’s been seizing moments for four years now, and it’s worked well; he sees no reason to stop now. “Indeed,” he says. “Let’s be off,” and stands, offering his arm to Gaby as Ilya falls in just behind his shoulder. The three walk off, into the brisk night of Christmas Eve.