Get Smart 5 - Missed It By That Much! Read Online Free Page B

chop, dropping him to the sidewalk.
    “Max! Why did you do that!” 99 squealed, peering down at the prostrate little man.
    “99, for heaven’s sake, didn’t you recognize that? That was the old match trick. If I’d delayed for just a second, reaching for a match, he’d have fired at us with that poison gas gun.”
    99 looked around. “What poison gas gun, Max?”
    “The cigar. You don’t really think that’s a cigar, do you?” He bent down and picked up the cigar from where it had fallen on the sidewalk. “You see, if you unroll these tobacco leaves, inside you find . . . uh . . . more tobacco leaves. Well, it could have been a poison gas gun, 99. It never pays to take chances.”
    The little man began to stir.
    “I think we better get inside,” Max said, urging 99 on. “You can’t depend on these little short guys having a sense of humor.”
    Inside, the Chop House was dimly-lighted, foul-smelling and smoke-filled. There were tables and booths, most of them occupied by fiendish-looking men and wicked-looking women. Satanic-looking waiters were snaking in and out among the tables, delivering orders. Just inside the doorway was a sign saying: No Children Allowed After 6 P.M.
    “A wise policy,” Max said. “At least, they’re keeping the welfare of the community in mind.”
    “What now, Max?” 99 whispered.
    “Play it cool,” Max replied. “Act as if we belong here.”
    “Right.”
    With Max leading the way, they entered and sat down at a table. A waiter appeared.
    “Yeah, what’ll it be?” the waiter growled.
    “Our usual,” Max replied.
    “Yeah? I don’t remember seeing you in here before. What’s your usual?”
    “Two peanut butter burgers,” Max replied.
    “And I’ll have the same,” 99 said.
    The waiter stared at Max. “Now I know I ain’t never seen you before,” he said. “I ain’t never even heard of nobody that ate a thing like a peanut butter burger. Where you from, Mac? The Moon? Anyway, we don’t serve no food. Unless you want to put our free lunch in the category of food. Which hardly nobody but a tourist with a cast-iron stomach does. All what we serve is drinks. You want a drink?”
    “If we’ll have to settle for that, yes,” Max replied. “Two milks.”
    “Milks!”
    “On the rocks,” Max added.
    The waiter shrugged and departed.
    “That was close, Max,” 99 whispered. “I think he was getting suspicious—until you told him to put ice cubes in the milks.”
    “Ice cubes? Is that what ‘on the rocks’ means, 99?”
    “Yes, Max.”
    “Live and learn.” He squinted his eyes, peering into the cigar and cigarette smoke, looking about the room. “I don’t see any tall, white-haired, distinguished-looking master illusionists,” he said. “We must have given that KAOS agent the slip.”
    “I hope so,” 99 said. “A person who could make us see what didn’t exist—the way he made us see that diner—would be hard to handle.”
    “You’re right. But I think—”
    Max looked up. A small, olive-skinned man, dressed in a flowing white Arab burnoose, was standing at the table, grinning down at them.
    “Permit me,” the little man said. “I am Hassan Pfeiffer, at your service.”
    Max shook his head. “Whatever you’re selling, we don’t want any,” he said.
    “Perhaps if I joined you at your table we could discuss the matter,” Hassan Pfeiffer said, still grinning. “My goods are in great demand. I have jewels, stolen from King Solomon’s mines. I have fresh eggs, stolen directly from under the chickens, still warm. I have teflon-coated fry pans, stolen from Macy’s Department Store, Pahzayk branch. I have—”
    “No, nothing, thanks,” Max broke in.
    “I have the jewel stolen from the eye of the idol.”
    “No, really— Uh, what idol?”
    “What difference does it make? An eye from an idol is an eye from an idol. They’re all alike. Oh, maybe one glitters a little more than another, but, at base, they’re all the same, just a hunk