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Jason
King is abducted to Moscow to unravel the mystery of
three men who have been turned into three tidy piles
of ashes. He creates his own Phoenix.
It
is doubtless an honour for Jason King (PETER WYNGARDE)
to be regarded by the Russians as the only man capable
of solving a mystery which is baffling them, but it
is an assignment he might well have refused but for
being abducted and transported to Moscow in a wooden
crate. He is in no position to argue, and less inclined
to do so when the facts are presented to him and he
is also provided with the services of a lovely guide
named Anna (ELIZABETH COUNSELL) and a bewitching
interpreter named Alexi (PAMELA SALEM) as well
as three detectives, Porokov (JEFFREY WICKHAM),
Krosnic (STEFAM GRYFF) and Kivich (TUTTE LEMKOW).
Jason
is greeted by the man responsible for the abduction,
the Chief of Police, Colonel Kolkov (JOHN MALCOLM),
who presents him with the strange facts and shows him
three tidy piles of ashes which represent all that remain
of a delegation of workers visiting Moscow. The three
men had stepped into the elevator, which stopped on
the sixth floor. When the door was opened, only their
ashes were to be found. Kolkov is going to have some
embarrassing questions to answer unless the mystery
is solved.
The
mystery becomes even more intriguing when an intruder
is chased and drops a bag containing frogmen's flippers.
Moscow is a long way from the sea!
Investigating
the elevator provides Jason with a shock. He has reached
the sixth floor when machine gun bullets splatter around
him, but the fact that he is kneeling to study the trapdoor
of the lift saves him. The trapdoor interests him, and
he is told that the elevator shaft goes right down through
the basement level and there is no way out at the bottom.
Jason
has an idea. He asks one of Kolkov's detectives, Porokov,
to find out all he can about the dead men. He also makes
some enquiries about Anna. The answers provide the information
that the three "murdered" men didn't come to Moscow
after all, and that Anna isn't a courier: she is a Police
Department operator.
Jason's
typical, burgeois, capitalistic logic convinces him
that sheer, greedy crookedness is behind the mystery.
Could it be that it would be possible to get into the
Kremlin through the base of the elevator shaft? Would
anyone dare try to rob the Kremlin? The frogmen's flippers
provide a clue. After all, it would be possible for
determined men to tunnel their way to a vault containing
fabulous treasures which once belonged to the
Czar.......
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